The tinybox pro is now up for preorder on the tinygrad website, offering two more GPUs, an extra AMD Genoa EPYC processor, and three times the system RAM as the original $15,000 TinyBox AI accelerator.
Although its $40k asking price is more than double that of the tinybox red, the pro version could hit 1.36 PetaFLOPS of FP16 computing with its eight RTX 4090s and 192GB of GPU RAM. While the tinybox pro is closer to the price of a single Nvidia H100 GPU, it’s still a more affordable alternative considering you’re getting a complete system versus just one graphics card.
tinybox prooooooooooooooooooo (preorder today) pic.twitter.com/tGBznXdrHyNovember 13, 2024
The company shared an image of the tinybox pro on X on November 13, saying it’s available for preorder today. The pro model seems only available in a rack-mounted case, with its specifications saying that it’s compatible with Supermicro rails. The spec table also doesn’t say how much noise its fans generate, only saying that it’s ‘Loud,’ which shows that it prioritizes performance over the aural comfort of its users.
Launching tinybox’s pro model is a good sign for the company, as it will likely see pent-up demand for lighter, more affordable AI accelerator alternatives to Nvidia and AMD. This is a major change as, just earlier this year, the tinybox project was put on hold due to issues with AMD’s drivers. It was eventually able to work with the company to fix the problems. However, the tinybox specifications still say that the driver quality for its tinybox red AI accelerator, which uses six 7900XTX GPUs, is ‘Mediocre.’
It is likely the primary reason tinygrad released the tinybox green, which uses six RTX 4090s. We’ve also heard it will release a tinybox blue model with Intel Arc GPUs, but it’s still in the prototype stage in August.
If you’re in the market for a powerful yet affordable AI accelerator, you can preorder the tinybox pro today. tinygrad asks for a 5% deposit ($2,000) to reserve your slot, and the order page says it will start shipping in December 2024.
