Gemini 3.1 Pro vs GLM 5.1

Cursor's Composer is built on Kimi K2.5, which is Moonshot's Chinese model. Shopify switched to Alibaba's Qwen and saved $5 million a year. Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky has said publicly: "We rely a lot on Qwen. It's very good, fast, and cheap." Cognition's SWE-1.6 model is likely post-trained on Zhipu's GLM. And last week Zhipu dropped GLM-5.1, an open source model that benchmarks close to Claude Opus on coding tasks.

Meanwhile the tech press is full of stories about OpenAI vs. Anthropic vs. Google. The narrative is still that American closed-lab models are the ones actually deployed in production. But what's running inside some of Silicon Valley's biggest products right now? Chinese open source.

These companies aren't making ideological choices. They're using Kimi and Qwen because they're fast, cheap, and accurate enough for their specific tasks. That's actually the most interesting part - it's a story about how well-optimized open source competes with frontier labs on real-world economics, not benchmarks. And it's happening faster than most people expected.

There's also a dimension that nobody wants to say out loud: users booking Airbnb trips are getting results from a model built in Shanghai. People using Cursor are getting code completions from a Chinese company's research. Most of them have no idea, and Airbnb didn't exactly put it in the changelog.

The question I'm genuinely uncertain about: does the model's origin actually matter once it's running in your infrastructure, if the data pipeline is controlled by the American company? Or does there remain some structural difference - in training data provenance, in post-training alignment choices, in the incentives of the organization that built it - that carries forward even when the weights are open source?

Build is done. 16 DGX Sparks on the fabric, all hitting line rate.

Setup was time consuming but honestly smoother than I expected. Each Spark runs Nvidia’s flavor of Ubuntu out of the box with mostly everything pre installed and ready to go. For setup I had to rack them, power on, create the same user/pass across all nodes, wait about 20 minutes per node for updates, then configure passwordless SSH, jumbo frames, IPs, etc. which I scripted to save time.

Each Spark connects to the FS N8510 switch with a single QSFP56 cable. The DGX Spark bonds its two NIC interfaces into each port, so you get dual rail over one cable. I'm seeing 100 to 111 Gbps per rail, which aggregates to the advertised 200 Gbps.

**Why this over H100s or a GB300?**

Unified memory. The whole point is maximizing unified memory capacity within the Nvidia ecosystem. With 8 nodes I was serving GLM-5.1-NVFP4 (434GB) at TP=8. Now going to test with DeepSeek and Kimi

The longer term plan is a prefill/decode split. The Spark cluster handles prefill (massive parallel throughput), and once the M5 Ultra Mac Studios drop I'll add 2 to 4 into the rack for decode.

—

Full rack, top to bottom:

\- 1U Brush Panel

\- OPNSense Firewall

\- Mikrotik 10Gb switch (internet uplink)

\- Mikrotik 100Gb switch (HPC to NAS)

\- 1U Brush Panel

\- QNAP 374TB all U.2 NAS

\- Management Server

\- Dual 4090 Workstation

\- Backup Dual 4090 Workstation (identical specs)

\- FS 200Gbps QSFP56 Fabric Switch (Spark cluster)

\- 1U Brush Panel

\- 8x DGX Spark Shelf One

\- 8x DGX Spark Shelf Two

\- 2U Spacer Panel

\- SuperMicro 4x H100 NVL Station

\- GH200

It is crazy that Qwen3.6 27B now matches Sonnet 4.6 on AA's Agentic Index, overtaking Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview, GPT 5.2 and 5.3 as well as MiniMax 2.7. It made gains across all three indices but the way the Coding Index works, I don't think the gains are as apparent as they should be. The Coding Index only uses Terminal Bench Hard and SciCode which are both strange choices. Cleary the training on the 3.6 models out now has focused on agentic use for OpenClaw/Hermes but it's interesting how close to frontier models such a small model can get. Qwen3.6 122B might be epic. . .

**Deepseek V4** will probably release this week. Since I've already posted quite a lot about it here and I'm very hyped about V4, **I've summarized all the leaks. Everything is just leaked, unconfirmed**! Of course, everything could be different. If you have any new information or updates, please post them here! If you have different views or a different opinion, write them down too.

# DeepSeek V4 - Release

The release was originally expected for mid-February, alongside Gemini 3.1 Pro. However, DeepSeek has been delayed – this is not unusual and has happened multiple times before. The new release strongly points to **March 3rd** (Lantern Festival / 元宵节), but it could also be later in the week. The Financial Times reported on February 28th that V4 is coming "next week," timed to coincide with China's "Two Sessions" (两会) starting March 4th. DeepSeek's release pattern shows that new models often drop on **Tuesdays**. A short technical report is expected to be published simultaneously, with a full engineering report following about a month later.

# DeepSeek Delay History

DeepSeek delays regularly. Here's the pattern:

|Model|Originally Expected|Actual Release|Delay|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|DeepSeek-R1|Lite Preview Nov 2024, Full Version Dec 2024|January 20, 2025|\~4-8 weeks|
|DeepSeek-R2|May 2025 (according to reports)|Never released – replaced by R1-0528 update|Cancelled|
|DeepSeek-V3.1|Early Summer 2025 (expected)|August 21, 2025|Several months|
|DeepSeek-V3.2|Fall 2025 (expected)|December 1, 2025 (V3.2-Exp: Sep 29)|Weeks|
|DeepSeek-V4|\~February 17, 2026|\~March 3, 2026?|\~2 weeks|

# Architecture & Specifications – What Can We Expect?

**All unconfirmed! Much of this has been leaked but could turn out differently!**

# V4 Flagship – Main Model

|Specification|DeepSeek V3/V3.2|DeepSeek V4 (Leaks)|
|:-|:-|:-|
|Total Parameters|671B–685B MoE|\~1 Trillion (1T) MoE|
|Active Parameters/Token|\~37B|\~32B (fewer despite a larger model!)|
|Context Window|128K (since Feb '26: 1M)|1 Million Tokens (native)|
|Architecture|MoE + MLA|MoE + MLA + Engram Memory + mHC + DSA Lightning|
|Multimodal|No (text only)|Yes – Text, Image, Video, Audio (native)|
|Expert Routing|Top-2/Top-4 from 256 experts|16 experts active per token (from hundreds)|
|Hardware Optimization|Nvidia H800/H20 (CUDA)|Huawei Ascend + Cambricon (Nvidia secondary!)|
|Training|14.8T Tokens, H800 GPUs|Trained on Nvidia, inference optimized for Huawei|
|License|\-|\-|
|Input Modalities|Text|Text, Image, Video, Audio|
|Output Modalities|Text|Text (Image/Video generation unclear)|
|Estimated Input Price|$0.28/M Tokens|\~$0.14/M Tokens|
|Estimated Output Price|$0.42/M Tokens|\~$0.28/M Tokens|

# New Architecture Features (all backed by papers)

* **Engram Conditional Memory** (Paper: arXiv:2601.07372, Jan 13, 2026): O(1) hash lookup for static knowledge directly in DRAM. Saves GPU computation. 75% dynamic reasoning / 25% static lookups. Needle-in-a-Haystack: 97% vs. 84.2% with standard architectures
* **Manifold-Constrained Hyper-Connections (mHC)**: Solves training stability at 1T+ parameters. Separate paper published in January 2026
* **DSA Lightning Indexer**: Builds on V3.2-Exp's DeepSeek Sparse Attention. Fast preprocessing for 1M-token contexts, \~50% less compute

# DeepSeek V4 Lite (Codename: "sealion-lite")

A lighter variant has leaked alongside the flagship. At least one inference provider is testing the model under strict NDA.

|Specification|V4 Lite (Leak)|
|:-|:-|
|Parameters|\~200 Billion|
|Context Window|1M Tokens (native)|
|Multimodal|Yes (native)|
|Engram Memory|No (according to 36kr, not integrated)|
|vs. V3.2|"Significantly better" than current Web/App|
|Non-Thinking vs. V3.2 Thinking|Non-Thinking mode surpasses V3.2 Thinking mode|
|Status|NDA testing at inference providers|

# SVG Code Leak Examples

* **Xbox Controller**: 54 lines of SVG – highly detailed and efficient
* **Pelican on a Bicycle**: 42 lines of SVG – multi-element scene

According to internal evaluations: V4 Lite outperforms DeepSeek V3.2, Claude Opus 4.6 AND Gemini 3.1 in code optimization and visual accuracy.

# Leaked Benchmarks (NOT verified!)

**⚠️ IMPORTANT: All benchmark numbers come from internal leaks. The "83.7% SWE-bench" graphic circulating on X has been confirmed as FAKE (denied by the Epoch AI/FrontierMath team). The numbers below are the more conservative, more frequently cited leaks.**

|Benchmark|V4 (Leak)|V3.2|V3.2-Exp|Claude Opus 4.6|GPT-5.3 Codex|Qwen 3.5|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|HumanEval (Code Gen)|\~90%|–|–|\~88%|**\~93%**|–|
|SWE-bench Verified|**>80%**|\~73.1%|67.8%|80.8%|80.0%|76.4%|
|Needle-in-a-Haystack|97% (Engram)|–|–|–|–|–|
|MMLU-Pro|TBD|85.0|–|85.8|–|–|
|GPQA Diamond|TBD|82.4|–|91.3|–|–|
|AIME 2025|TBD|93.1|–|87.2|–|–|
|Codeforces Rating|TBD|2386|–|2100|–|–|
|BrowseComp|TBD|51.4-67.6|40.1|84.0|–|–|

# Huawei & Hardware – The Geopolitical Dimension

* **Reuters (Feb 25)**: DeepSeek deliberately denied Nvidia and AMD access to the V4 model
* **Huawei Ascend + Cambricon** have early access for inference optimization
* Training was done on Nvidia hardware (H800), but **inference** is optimized for Chinese chips
* For the open-source community on Nvidia GPUs: performance could be **suboptimal** at launch
* This is an unprecedented hardware bet for a frontier model

# Price Comparison (estimated)

|Model|Input/1M Tokens|Output/1M Tokens|
|:-|:-|:-|
|DeepSeek V4 (estimated)|**\~$0.14**|**\~$0.28**|
|DeepSeek V3.2|$0.28|$0.42|
|Kimi K2.5|$0.60|$3.00|
|Gemini 3.1 Pro|$2.00|$12.00|
|Claude Opus 4.6|$5.00|$25.00|

If correct: V4 would be **36x cheaper** than Claude Opus 4.6 on input and **89x cheaper** on output.

# Open Questions

* Does V4 actually generate images/videos or just understand them?
* Will Nvidia GPU users get an optimized version?
* When will the open-source weights be released?

**Sources**: Financial Times, Reuters, CNBC, awesomeagents.ai, nxcode.io, FlashMLA GitHub, r/LocalLLaMA, Geeky Gadgets, 36kr

**Edit 03.03.2026**

The chance that the model will be released this week is relatively high, but not today. It is assumed that Deepseek will be released between March 3 and 5 if it is not published within the next 5 hours today. It will come in the next few days, as it then deviates from the release pattern (in terms of time).

**Edit 03.03.2026 Part 2**

The situation is becoming increasingly heated and tense, with an extremely large number of leaks and sources currently emerging. Collecting them all and verifying their credibility would take a very long time. However, a release is expected this week, with Wednesday or Thursday being the most likely dates.

**Edit 03.03.2026 Part 3 – Evening Update**

March 3rd (Lantern Festival) has passed without a release. However, in Beijing it is currently the early morning of March 4th, meaning the Chinese workday hasn't even started yet. A release on March 4th is still very much possible, especially since China's "Two Sessions" (两会) begin today.

What happened today:

1. **V4 Lite is being silently updated in production.** AIBase reported today that DeepSeek quietly pushed a new V4 Lite version tagged "0302". Community testers report a massive quality jump in logic, code generation, and aesthetics – now reportedly on par with Claude Sonnet 4.6. This strongly suggests DeepSeek is actively fine-tuning V4 models right before the official launch. (Source: AIBase)
2. **36kr published a new article** titled "The Entire Village Anticipates DeepSeek to Join for Dinner" – confirming the entire Chinese tech industry is waiting for V4. (Source: 36kr)

**Edit 04.03.2026 – Why not today, why Thursday is THE day**

March 4 passed without a release – and that makes strategic sense.

**Why not today:**

* CPPCC opening day = all Chinese media focused on politics, V4 would've been buried
* Shanghai Composite dropped 0.98% to 4,082 (4-week low) – bad sentiment to release into
* Beijing evening release window (8-10 PM BJT) has passed

**Why Thursday March 5 is the perfect storm:**

* **NPC opens tomorrow morning** – Premier Li Qiang delivers Government Work Report with AI & tech as centerpiece of the new Five-Year Plan. Morning: politics declares AI a national priority → Evening: DeepSeek delivers the proof
* **BYD "disruptive technology" event same day** – DiPilot 5.0, Blade 2.0, DM 6.0 reveal. Global headline: "China showcases two AI breakthroughs in one day"
* **Market timing** – Shanghai closes 3 PM BJT, evening release gives markets overnight to digest, Friday opens with V4 hype
* **Developer weekend** – Thursday drop = Fri + Sat + Sun to test & benchmark

**Expected release window:**

|Release|Beijing Time|UTC|
|:-|:-|:-|
|R1 (Jan 2025)|\~10-11 PM|\~2-3 PM|
|V3.2 (Nov 2025)|\~12 AM|\~4 PM|
|**V4 (expected)**|**8-11 PM**|**12-3 PM**|

**If Thursday doesn't happen?**

* Friday = bad release day (weekend kills momentum, DeepSeek has never released on a Friday)
* Next window: Monday/Tuesday March 9-10
* But: silent V4 Lite "0302" production update + 36kr's "The Entire Village Anticipates DeepSeek" article suggest we're in final hours, not days

**Edit 05.03.2026**

It has to happen today. Deepseek Web was down for 40 minutes, but it hasn't been down for the last 30 days, and it was the same before the big launch of V3 and R1. In addition, today is the BYD event Deepseek Partner. It will happen in the next few hours, and if not, then Deepseek has missed the best window of opportunity they could ever have had.

**Edit 05.03.2026 Part 2**

**The model will not be released this week or probably next week. Although DeepSee v4 has been ready for a long time and there were really only a few minor issues left, the model would have been released last week or this week. Is there a major delay due to the government, because at the last minute they said that deepseek is not allowed to release the model as long as it does not run on Chinese hardware, but the model was trained on Nvidia, so such a restructuring naturally takes time, because the new technology in V4 was completely for Nvidia and not for Huawei, and I think we still know what happened with R2...**

**Edit 07.03.2026**

When will Deepseek be released? After all the leaks, news, and crisis status, Deepseek V4 will and must come and cannot end like R2. The Chinese government has gone too far with its AI and told the US that it no longer needs it, whereupon Trump, in order not to appear weak, wants to impose a ban that will allow him to control all chip trade (meaning no more chips to China).

However, BYD and China have praised Deepseek too much in recent days. If V4 ended up like R2 and didn't come out at all, China would look extremely foolish, which the government would never allow.

That's why I suspect that Deepseek will receive help from the Chinese government (in recent years, Deepseek's CEO has been in frequent talks with the government and has received support from it) and will no longer adhere to any release pattern, as Deepseek has already missed three good release windows. My guess is that they will release it when it is least expected, which could be this weekend. (V3.2 was released on Sunday) In order to weaken and expose Nvidia and the entire US market with new AI technology.

Deepseek waiting until Claude or other providers are ready is incorrect and highly unlikely. Deepseek has problems and needs to fix them before release. V4 is already 90% complete (Lite has been corrected several times and is said to be just as intelligent as Sonnet 4.6). We also know that Deepseek's CEO is a perfectionist and would never release a half-finished product or leave it unfinished, as was the case with the GLM-5 release

**🚨 UPDATE 11.03.2026 – 22:00 CET – V4 WEIGHTS SPOTTED**

Major development: Chinese quantization expert u/bdsqlsz (青龍聖者) on X was spotted uploading **DeepSeek-V4-INT8** model shards to HuggingFace with the caption "it is coming." The upload shows multiple `model-0...` shards, a `.gitattributes`, and a [`README.md`](http://README.md) — indicating a full model repo creation.

**Why this is significant:**

* u/bdsqlsz is a verified, well-known quantization specialist — not a random account
* INT8 quantization requires access to the **full original weights** first
* Historically, community quants appear **within hours** of official weight releases (V3: same day, R1: same day, V3.2: within 24h)
* This means the official FP8/BF16 weights either already exist on HuggingFace (possibly private/unlisted) or u/bdsqlsz has NDA access

**Full leaked specs now confirmed:**

* \~1 Trillion parameters (MoE), \~32B active per token
* 1M native context window
* Multimodal: text + vision + audio
* Huawei Ascend 910C optimized
* MIT License

**Previous delays explained:** Huawei Ascend inference optimization (only 80% Nvidia efficiency), Blackwell chip fingerprint removal, and CEO Liang Wenfeng's perfectionism. The 40-min web outage on March 5 was likely a deployment test.

**My prediction: Official release within 24-72 hours.** The weights exist. The upload is happening. Keep your monitors running.

⚠️ UPDATE 11.03 – Unverified leak: u/bdsqlsz posted V4-INT8 weight uploads on X. r/LocalLLaMA is split – top comment (193 upvotes) questions authenticity. The file structure looks technically correct and INT8 aligns with Huawei optimization rumors, but previous V4 benchmark leaks in February were confirmed fake. Treat with caution until official deepseek-ai repo appears on HuggingFace."

Will update when it drops. 🚀