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The Dutch government may ban ASML from servicing high-end wafer fab tools in China, but the outgoing ASML CEO says this will not be a major problem for earnings. View the full article

NAND-based storage devices are a fiercely contested sector, one in which Samsung has held the lead since 2002, but its rivals are gaining ground. The South Korean electronics giant has announced plans to commence mass production of its newest 290-layer ninth-generation vertical (V9) NAND chips, aimed at AI and cloud devices as well as large-scale enterprise servers. These utilize Samsung’s double-stack technology, rather than the triple stack method typically used. Other firms are closing in, however. SK Hynix, the world's second-largest memory chipmaker and Samsung’s archrival, intends to launch its 321-layer NAND tech early next year, while Chinese flash memory specialist Yangtze Memory Technologies says it plans to introduce 300-layer chips later this year. A game of chicken With the battle heating up, Samsung is already looking beyond the impending V9 launch, with industry insiders indicating that a staggering 430-layer tenth-generation (V10) NAND chip is expected to be unveiled next year. Unlike the V9, this will use Samsung’s triple-stack technology. The aggressive push for NAND supremacy comes as demand for high-performance and large-capacity storage devices grows in the AI era. High-density NAND chips answer that demand while also enhancing capabilities for 5G smartphones. The Korea Economic Daily says the major chipmakers are now “engaged in a game of chicken in a race to develop advanced chip stacking technology to cut costs and improve performance.” It points out that Samsung has previously announced plans to develop over 1,000-layer NAND chips by 2030. More from TechRadar Pro Scientists inch closer to holy grail of memory breakthroughSamsung to showcase record-smashing 280-layer QLC NAND flash memory chipHere’s the chip that could make 100TB SSDs mainstream in 2024 View the full article

TSMC preps 8x reticle size or larger interposers for gargantuan AI and HPC SiPs. View the full article

Apple chipmaker TSMC has announced plans to produce highly advanced 1.6nm chips that could be destined for future generations of Apple silicon. TSMC yesterday unveiled a series of technologies, including the "A16" process, which is a 1.6nm node. The new technology significantly enhances chip logic density and performance, promising substantial improvements for high-performance computing (HPC) products and data centers. Historically, Apple is among the first companies to adopt new, state-of-the-art chip fabrication technologies. For example, it was the first company to utilize TSMC's 3nm node with the A17 Pro chip in the iPhone 15 Pro and ‌iPhone 15 Pro‌ Max, and Apple is likely to follow suit with the chipmaker's upcoming nodes. Apple's most advanced chip designs have historically appeared in the iPhone before making their way to the iPad and Mac lineups, and ultimately trickling down to the Apple Watch and Apple TV. The A16 technology, which TSMC plans to begin producing in 2026, incorporates innovative nanosheet transistors along with a novel backside power rail solution. This development is expected to provide an 8-10% increase in speed and a 15-20% reduction in power consumption at the same speeds compared to TSMC's N2P process, alongside up to a 1.10x chip density improvement. TSMC also announced the rollout of its System-on-Wafer (SoW) technology, which integrates multiple dies on a single wafer to boost computing power while occupying less space—a development that could be transformative for Apple's data center operations. TSMC's first SoW offering, which is already in production, is based on Integrated Fan-Out (InFO) technology. A more advanced chip-on-wafer version leveraging CoWoS technology is slated for readiness in 2027. TSMC is also making progress toward manufacturing 2nm and 1.4nm chips that are likely destined for future generations of Apple silicon. Its 2nm "N2" node is scheduled for trial production in the second half of 2024 and mass production in late 2025, to be followed by an enhanced "N2P" process in late 2026. Trial production of the 2nm node will begin in the second half of 2024, with small-scale production ramping up in the second quarter of 2025. In 2027, facilities in Taiwan will start to shift toward production of "A14" 1.4nm chips. Apple's upcoming A18 chips for the iPhone 16 lineup are expected to be based on N3E, while the "A19" for the 2025 ‌iPhone‌ models is expected to be Apple's first 2nm chip. The subsequent year, Apple will likely move to an enhanced version of this 2nm node, followed by the newly announced 1.6nm process. Each successive TSMC node surpasses its predecessor in terms of transistor density, performance, and efficiency. Late last year, it emerged that TSMC had already demonstrated prototype 2nm chips to Apple ahead of their expected introduction in 2025.Tags: TSMC, Apple Silicon This article, "Apple Partner TSMC Unveils Advanced 1.6nm Process for 2026 Chips" first appeared on MacRumors.com Discuss this article in our forums View the full article

At Google, we build sustainable, secure, and scalable hardware and software to enable services that support billions of users. We have embraced open innovation as a core tenet to deliver these experiences. Our society’s AI-driven future includes many types of system-on-chips (SoCs) acting in concert with each other — from CPUs to GPUs to TPUs to NICs to SSDs and more. To deliver secure solutions at scale, there must be trust and transparency for the firmware that runs on all of these chips. Welcoming Caliptra 1.0 Google partnered with AMD, Microsoft, and NVIDIA to develop Caliptra, a standard at the Open Compute Project (OCP) to raise the bar on security for chips. Caliptra is a hardware root-of-trust (RoT) that provides verifiable cryptographic assurances to help ensure that only recognized and trusted firmware is allowed to run production workloads. Caliptra’s initial focus is on hardware implementations used in confidential computing, and, over time, will extend to all chips. To address the increasingly sophisticated nature of cyberattacks, the team went beyond a written specification to deliver an open-source implementation at the CHIPS Alliance. The result is a silicon-level intellectual property (IP) block for integration into future chips, including CPUs, GPUs, and SSDs. The Caliptra source code also covers the block’s ROM and firmware. We are pleased to announce that the Caliptra specification and open-source hardware and software implementation is complete, reaching the revision 1.0 milestone. The Caliptra community continues to grow and now includes 9elements, AMI, Antmicro, ASPEED, Axiado, Lubis EDA, ScaleFlux, Marvell and Nuvoton, who together have significant domain expertise across SoC design automation, firmware, and verification. The Caliptra IP block is currently being integrated by companies across the ecosystem into chips that will start to appear in the market in 2026. In less than two years, we have gone from project inception to a complete specification and open-source implementation of the hardware and software. The team is already working on the next iteration with Caliptra 2.0, which will tackle quantum cryptography to comply with NIST’s recommendations for module-lattice-based digital signatures and stateful hash-based signature schemes. Download the Caliptra 1.0 specification and access the open source repositories at caliptra.io. OCP S.A.F.E. Google, Microsoft, and OCP are also engaged in a complementary effort to raise the bar on security assessments: OCP Security Appraisal Framework for Enablement (OCP S.A.F.E.). This program provides security conformance assurance to consumers of devices such as SSDs. The program has certified a list of approved OCP Security Review Providers (SRPs) who conduct security conformance reviews to ensure the provenance, code quality, and software supply chain for firmware releases and patches for devices, while protecting the intellectual property of the device vendors. You can learn more about OCP’s S.A.F.E. program here. What’s to come Already, Caliptra has emerged as a high-quality specification and implementation that addresses security of a complex problem. And we’re following up on it with a new initiative called OCP Layered Open-source Cryptographic Key-management (OCP L.O.C.K.) Established by Google, Microsoft, Samsung, Solidigm and KIOXIA, OCP L.O.C.K. defines and implements a standard for NVM Express (NVMe) key management block to protect customer data even if a physical drive is stolen from a data center. It’s energizing to unite with industry leaders to deliver technology that will make society’s infrastructure more trustworthy and secure, using open source as a mechanism to help the hardware, firmware, and software achieve the standard’s objectives in a transparent and auditable manner. You can learn more about Caliptra, OCP S.A.F.E., and OCP L.O.C.K. at the OCP Regional Summit this week in Lisbon, Portugal. We are looking forward to discussing these technologies and inventing the future together. View the full article

Astera Labs, a relatively unknown semiconductor company with a $10 billion market value, recently showed off its new Aries 6 PCIe retimer board, which it is now sampling to leading AI and cloud infrastructure providers. Due to the high-speed data transfer within the PCIe interface, the signals can suffer from degradation, especially over longer distances or due to interference. A PCIe retimer helps maintain the data signal integrity over the PCIe interface by cleaning, reshaping, and retransmitting the data signals. The Aries 6 retimers, the first in Astera Labs' PCIe 6.x portfolio, offer robust, low power, and efficient PCIe 6.x and CXL 3.x connectivity, squarely aimed at catering to the networking requirements of next-generation GPUs, accelerators, CPUs, and CXL memory controllers. 3x the reach Based on Intel's Retimer Supplemental Specification, the new Aries 6 retimers build upon the company’s widely deployed PCIe 5.0 retimer portfolio and reportedly extend reach distance by three times the standard rate. Casey Morrison, Chief Product Officer, Astera Labs, said, “PCIe 6.x technology’s superior bandwidth is required to handle data-intensive workloads and to maximize utilization of AI accelerators, but the faster speeds introduce new signal integrity issues in hyperscale platforms. Aries Smart DSP Retimers have set the gold standard for addressing critical PCIe/CXL connectivity challenges with a solid track record of robust performance and seamless interoperability. We’re proud that our third generation of Aries Retimers with support for PCIe 6.x, PCIe 5.x, and CXL 3.x have now been sampled to leading AI and cloud platform providers.” ServeTheHome took a first look at Astera Labs’s new portfolio at Nvidia GTC 2024 (see the photograph above) and observed that the “Aries 6 was linked at PCIe Gen6 x16 speeds at 10-11W of power consumption. That is a big deal since it is lower than Broadcom is claiming with its new retimers.“ Many major AI firms are excited about the imminent arrival of Astera Labs’ new generation Aries Smart DSP Retimers. Raghu Nambiar, Corporate Vice President, Data Center Ecosystems and Solutions, AMD, said, “Our close collaboration with Astera Labs on PCIe technologies ensures our customers’ platforms continue to meet the higher bandwidth connectivity requirements of next-generation AI and HPC workloads,” while Brian Kelleher, Senior Vice President of GPU Engineering, Nvidia, added, “Astera Labs’ new Aries Smart DSP Retimers with support for PCIe 6.2 will help enable higher bandwidth to optimize utilization of our next-generation computing platforms.” More from TechRadar Pro Startup aims to boost LLM performance using standard memoryAI startup making GPU training obsolete with extraordinary piece of techAI chip built using ancient Samsung tech as fast as Nvidia A100 GPU View the full article

With certain notebooks ready to be showcased by respective OEMs, Qualcomm has another announcement in the pipeline for April 24. View the full article

On this week's episode of The MacRumors Show, we discuss the latest AI consumer technology and Apple's rumored plans to bring major AI-focused hardware enhancements to the Mac later this year. Subscribe to The MacRumors Show YouTube channel for more videos We talk through the response to Humane's AI Pin and its widely acknowledged deficiencies, such as its limited utility, subpar camera performance, and steep price point. We also take a look at the Rabbit R1, another AI device that prompts us to question the necessity of such hardware when similar functionalities could potentially be achieved with existing smartphones. Apple is rumored to introduce M4-series custom silicon chips starting this year, featuring more powerful Neural Engines with more cores to support AI processes. These chips are likely based on the advancements coming to the iPhone 16 lineup's A18 chip, hinting that iPhone-exclusive AI features could later come to the Mac. We also touch on the progress of AI tools in video editing software, including recent announcements from Adobe Premiere and DaVinci Resolve which have introduced new AI-driven editing features like generative fill and object removal. Such features could see enhanced performance on next-generation Macs with AI-focused chips. The MacRumors Show is now on its own YouTube channel, so make sure you're subscribed to keep up with new episodes and clips going forward: Subscribe to The MacRumors Show YouTube channel! You can also listen to ‌The MacRumors Show‌ on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or your preferred podcasts app. You can also copy our RSS feed directly into your podcast player. If you haven't already listened to the previous episode of The MacRumors Show, catch up for our chat with Matthew Cassinelli, one of the minds behind Workflow, discuss Apple Shortcuts and potential improvements and AI features coming to the app in iOS 18. Subscribe to ‌The MacRumors Show‌ for new episodes every week, where we discuss some of the topical news breaking here on MacRumors, often joined by interesting guests such as Brian Tong, Quinn Nelson, Kevin Nether, Jared Nelson, Eli Hodapp, Luke Miani, Mike Bell, Sara Dietschy, iJustine, Jon Rettinger, Andru Edwards, Arnold Kim, Ben Sullins, Marcus Kane, Christopher Lawley, Frank McShan, David Lewis, Tyler Stalman, Jon Prosser, Sam Kohl, John Gruber, Federico Viticci, Thomas Frank, Jonathan Morrison, Ross Young, Ian Zelbo, and Rene Ritchie. ‌The MacRumors Show‌ is on X @MacRumorsShow, so be sure to give us a follow to keep up with the podcast. You can also head over to The MacRumors Show forum thread to engage with us directly. Remember to rate and review the podcast, and let us know what subjects and guests you would like to see in the future. Tag: The MacRumors Show This article, "The MacRumors Show: AI Macs With M4 Chips" first appeared on MacRumors.com Discuss this article in our forums View the full article

We put Intel's Core i5-14400 through a battery of gaming and productivity benchmarks to see how it fares against competing AMD Ryzen processors. View the full article

UIUC researchers gave GPT-4 the CVE advisories of critical cybersecurity vulnerabilities. The model successfully knew how to exploit 87% of them. View the full article

Nvidia has launched two new entry-level GPUs featuring its last-generation Ampere architecture. The A1000 looks like a professional variant of the RTX 3050 8GB, but the A400 is much less powerful. View the full article

Huaxia Chip was a rising star among China’s original computer processor intellectual property (IP) designers. However, despite the voracious appetite for all-things IT, the company is now bankrupt and will be liquidated. View the full article

Sanctions drive prices of chips for Russia considerably, but they cannot stop the flow of Western technologies into the aggressive nation. View the full article

The next generation of Apple Silicon is already nearing production, according to Bloomberg. Apple M4 chips are designed to revamp the Mac computer line by delivering a new AI focus. View the full article

Apple will begin updating its Mac lineup with M4 chips in late 2024, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. The M4 chip will be focused on improving performance for artificial intelligence capabilities. Last year, Apple introduced the M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max chips all at once in October, so it's possible we could see the M4 lineup come during the same time frame. Gurman says that the entire Mac lineup is slated to get the M4 across late 2024 and early 2025. The iMac, low-end 14-inch MacBook Pro, high-end 14-inch MacBook Pro, 16-inch MacBook Pro, and Mac mini machines will be updated with M4 chips first, followed by the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Air models in spring 2025, the Mac Studio in mid-2025, and the Mac Pro later in 2025. Apple is said to be nearing production of the M4 processor, and it is expected to come in at least three main varieties. Chips are codenamed Donan for the low-end, Brava for the mid-tier, and Hidra for the top-end. The Donan chip will be used in the entry-level MacBook Pro, the ‌MacBook Air‌ machines, and the low-end ‌Mac mini‌, and the Brava chips will be used in the higher-end MacBook Pro and the higher-end ‌Mac mini‌. The Hidra chip is designed for the ‌Mac Pro‌, which suggests it is an "Ultra" or "Extreme" tier chip. As for the ‌Mac Studio‌, Apple is testing versions with an unreleased M3-era chip and a variation of the M4 Brava processor that would presumably be higher tier than the M4 Pro and M4 Max "Brava" chips. M4 versions of the Mac desktops could support as much as 512GB Unified Memory, which would be a marked jump over the current 192GB limit. The M4 chips will be built on the same 3-nanometer process as the M3 chips, but Apple supplier TSMC will likely use an improved version of the 3nm process for boosts in performance and power efficiency. Apple also plans to add a much improved Neural Engine that has an increased number of cores for AI tasks.Related Roundups: iMac, Mac Studio, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro 14 & 16" , Mac mini, Mac ProTags: Bloomberg, Mark GurmanBuyer's Guide: iMac (Buy Now), Mac Studio (Caution), 15" MacBook Air (Buy Now), 14" & 16" MacBook Pro (Neutral), 13" MacBook Air (Buy Now), Mac Mini (Neutral), Mac Pro (Neutral)Related Forums: iMac, Mac Studio, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, Mac mini, Mac Pro This article, "Macs to Get AI-Focused M4 Chips Starting in Late 2024" first appeared on MacRumors.com Discuss this article in our forums View the full article

RISC-V hardware manufacutrer SiFive has debuted a new RISC-V development board aimed at large-scale deployment. The new board surprisingly comes with a Chinese RISC-V CPU even though SiFive is a partner with Intel. View the full article

Apple chipmaker TSMC is making progress toward manufacturing 2nm and 1.4nm chips that are likely destined for future generations of Apple silicon, DigiTimes reports. The manufacturing time frames for mass production of 2nm and 1.4nm chips have now apparently been determined: Trial production of the 2nm node will begin at in the second half of 2024, with small-scale production ramping up in the second quarter of 2025. Notably, TSMC's new plant in Arizona will also join 2nm production efforts. In 2027, facilities in Taiwan will start to shift toward production of 1.4nm chips. TSMC's first 1.4nm node is officially called "A14" and will follow its "N2" 2nm chips. N2 is scheduled for mass production in late 2025, to be followed by an enhanced "N2P" node in late 2026. Historically, Apple is among the first companies to adopt new, state-of-the-art chip fabrication technologies. For example, it was the first company to utilize TSMC's 3nm node with the A17 Pro chip in the iPhone 15 Pro and ‌iPhone 15 Pro‌ Max, and Apple is likely to follow suit with the chipmaker's upcoming nodes. Apple's most advanced chip designs have historically appeared in the iPhone before making their way to the iPad and Mac lineups. With all of the latest information, here's how the ‌iPhone‌'s chip technology is expected to look going forward: ‌iPhone‌ XR and XS (2018): A12 Bionic (7nm, N7) ‌iPhone‌ 11 lineup (2019): A13 Bionic (7nm, N7P) ‌iPhone‌ 12 lineup (2020): A14 Bionic (5nm, N5) iPhone 13 Pro (2021): A15 Bionic (5nm, N5P) iPhone 14 Pro (2022): A16 Bionic (4nm, N4P) ‌iPhone 15 Pro‌ (2023): A17 Pro (‌3nm‌, N3B) iPhone 16 Pro (2024): "A18" (‌3nm‌, N3E) "‌iPhone‌ 17 Pro" (2025): "A19" (2nm, N2) "‌iPhone‌ 18 Pro" (2026): "A20" (2nm, N2P) "‌iPhone‌ 19 Pro" (2027): "A21" (1.4nm, A14) The M1 series of Apple silicon chips is based on the A14 Bionic and uses TSMC's N5 node, while the M2 and M3 series use N5P and N3B, respectively. The Apple Watch's S4 and S5 chips use N7, the S6, S7, and S8 chips use N7P, and the latest S9 chip uses N4P. Each successive TSMC node surpasses its predecessor in terms of transistor density, performance, and efficiency. Late last year, it emerged that TSMC had already demonstrated prototype 2nm chips to Apple ahead of their expected introduction in 2025.Tags: TSMC, DigiTimes, Apple Silicon This article, "TSMC's Next-Generation Chip Technology for Apple Silicon on Schedule" first appeared on MacRumors.com Discuss this article in our forums View the full article

Samsung seems to be getting a sizable subsidy in exchange for its increased investment in US chipmaking. View the full article

Although tech giants like Samsung and TSMC currently dominate the silicon landscape, Elon Musk has hinted that Tesla could potentially make its own chips in the future - and while the idea remains a tentative one, it's certainly not beyond the realms of possibility. Tesla spends a fortune on silicon. Its Dojo ExaPod supercomputer boasts a staggering 1.1 exaflops of computing power dedicated to training machine learning models for Tesla's self-driving technology. Musk said in February 2024 that the company will spend "over a billion dollars" on Nvidia and AMD hardware this year just to stay competitive in the AI space. Making its own AI chips would be impossible for Tesla, but it could potentially produce chips for its cars. Currently, Tesla relies on Samsung for the main chips used in its Autopilot feature. Building a chip factory to create processors specifically for that task would be a significant undertaking. Significant, but not impossible. "Tesla could do it..." A recent X exchange between Musk and legendary game developer John Carmack has sparked speculation. Carmack mused about the feasibility of a large tech company creating its own bespoke chips rather than competing with established general-purpose companies. Musk's response? "Tesla could do it, but I sure hope we don’t have to." With growing concerns over the reliance on Korean, Taiwanese and Chinese chipmakers, the possibility of bringing some silicon development in-house is no doubt tempting for Tesla, but the practicalities of such an undertaking mean that without a compelling reason to do so, the company will wisely stick with the status quo for now. As PC Gamer reports, “Nobody in their right mind would want to spend billions of dollars on something that has the distinct potential of not working right for years, when you can just contract a highly experienced and cost-effective business to do it for you.” Tesla could do it, but I sure hope we don’t have toMarch 24, 2024 See more More from TechRadar Pro An unpatchable AMD chip flaw is jailbreaking Tesla carsNvidia is powering a mega Tesla supercomputer powered by 10,000 H100 GPUsAdopting generative AI to drive softwarization of automobiles View the full article

Intel's top-tier Core i9-14900KF processor is on offer at Newegg for an all-time low price. View the full article

The U.S. Commerce Department halts CHIPS funding for R&D facilities. View the full article

TSMC is set to expand its plans in Arizona and invest $65 billion in the manufacturing site. View the full article

The United States Commerce Department today announced a significant financial commitment to Apple chip supplier TSMC to make more chips in the U.S. (via Bloomberg). The White House shared a statement explaining that the U.S. Commerce Department will allocate a $6.6 billion subsidy to TSMC for the advancement of semiconductor production in Phoenix, Arizona. TSMC will also receive $5 billion in loans and be eligible to claim an investment tax credit of up to 25% of capital expenditures. The move is part of a larger initiative under the CHIPS and Science Act, which aims to rejuvenate the United States' semiconductor manufacturing capabilities. TSMC has already committed to an escalated investment of $25 billion, elevating its total investment to $65 billion. This is the largest foreign direct investment in a completely new project in U.S. history. The chipmaker also announced plans to construct a third fabrication plant in Arizona by 2030. The first TSMC plant in Arizona will start producing 4nm chips next year. The second plant, which was originally designed to make 3nm chips, will also make 2nm ones by 2028. The third plant will produce 2nm chips with capacity to make even more advanced semiconductors in the future. Apple's most advanced chips are currently made in Taiwan using TSMC's ‌3nm‌ process, so the ability to make these chips and even more powerful ones in the future in the United States could represent a significant future shift in the company's supply chain.Tag: TSMC This article, "Apple Chipmaker TSMC to Receive $6.6 Billion Grant to Step Up Production in the U.S." first appeared on MacRumors.com Discuss this article in our forums View the full article

With Apple WWDC 2024 on the way in a couple of months, a lot of expectation is building that Apple will announce its last SoC for this generation, the Apple M3 Ultra, a powerhouse chip that will run high-end Mac Studio and Mac Pro workstations. Apple surprised everyone at the end of October 2023 with its Scary Fast event, where we got not just the expected Apple M3 chip, but also the Apple M3 Pro and Apple M3 Max. These chips were socketed in the new iMac 24-inch (M3), MacBook Pro 14-inch and MacBook Pro 16-inch models, as well as the new MacBook Air 13-inch and MacBook Air 15-inch. The last Mac products expected to launch before the whole Mac lineup gets refreshed for Apple M4 is the Mac Studio and Mac Pro, both of which are still using the Apple M2 Max and Apple M2 Ultra chips. With the strong industry and developer focus at WWDC, it would make a lot of sense for these two products to get a spec refresh with a new Apple M3 Ultra, and it's something that we're eagerly anticipating, even though Apple has been rather quiet on this front, per usual. So what do we know about this upcoming SoC? Let's dig in and find out. Apple M3 Ultra: Cut to the chase What is it? Apple's next workstation-class SoCHow much does it cost? It won't sell on its own, but a Mac Studio with M3 Ultra will likely cost about $4,000/£4,000/AU$6,000 to start, with higher level configurations costing much more.When can I get it? There is no official release date, but if Apple announces at WWDC, you will likely be able to pre-order the Mac Studio with M3 Ultra starting on June 7, 2024, with delivery later that month. Apple M3 Ultra: Latest news The M3 Ultra could debut this year – but is Apple leaving the Mac Pro out in the cold?Apple M3 Ultra CPU might blow away M3 Max – but we won’t find out for a long time yetApple’s M3 Ultra chips promise a huge performance jump - if rumors are true Apple M3 Ultra: Possible Release date There is no official release date for the Apple M3 Ultra, but it is likely to be announced as early as June 7, 2024, at WWDC 2024. If so, we can expect preorders for Mac Studio and Mac Pro units with M3 Ultra to start that day, with delivery starting a few weeks after that. Apple M3 Ultra: Specs & Performance While we don't have anything official from Apple about the Apple M3 Ultra, we do know that the Ultra series SoCs are traditionally two Max chips stitched together with high-speed interconnects, so we can speculate about the M3 Ultra based on what we know about the Apple M3 Max. In terms of performance, we absolutely expect that this will be one of the most powerful workstation chips on the market, but with the Apple ecosystem, its not apples-to-apples comparing the chip to, say, the AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 7995WX. The software ecosystems for different workstation chips can be very different, and there may be Apple-specific or Windows/Linux-specific apps that you run, so your options for switching between the two chips will be much more limited than choosing between an Intel Xeon and AMD Threadripper. That said, we can get a sense of the performance jump for the M3 Ultra over the M1 Ultra, since the M1 Ultra effectively doubled the performance of the M1 Max. And since the M3 Max is nearly twice as powerful as the M1 Max (Apple claims up to 80% faster), we can expect the M3 Ultra to mirror that performance jump. Apple M3 Ultra: What to expect You can definitely expect a lot of performance from this chip, no question, but it won't be cheap. You also might question whether you'll truly need this level of performance. Maybe if you're a Mac Pro buyer with an industry of money supporting the purchase, but this won't be for prosumers, who might be more inclined to check out a Mac Studio. In that case, an M2 Ultra Mac Studio might be the better option, since it is still going to be a very powerful workstation and will almost certainly come down in cost. That still remains to be seen, of course, and we'll have to wait for an official announcement from Apple before we know more. Stay tuned! View the full article

Samsung to add another fab module, an advanced packaging facility, and an R&D center to its Taylor, Texas, campus. View the full article