Discussion Apple Silicon SoC thread

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Eug

Lifer
Mar 11, 2000
23,807
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M1
5 nm
Unified memory architecture - LP-DDR4
16 billion transistors

8-core CPU

4 high-performance cores
192 KB instruction cache
128 KB data cache
Shared 12 MB L2 cache

4 high-efficiency cores
128 KB instruction cache
64 KB data cache
Shared 4 MB L2 cache
(Apple claims the 4 high-effiency cores alone perform like a dual-core Intel MacBook Air)

8-core iGPU (but there is a 7-core variant, likely with one inactive core)
128 execution units
Up to 24576 concurrent threads
2.6 Teraflops
82 Gigatexels/s
41 gigapixels/s

16-core neural engine
Secure Enclave
USB 4

Products:
$999 ($899 edu) 13" MacBook Air (fanless) - 18 hour video playback battery life
$699 Mac mini (with fan)
$1299 ($1199 edu) 13" MacBook Pro (with fan) - 20 hour video playback battery life

Memory options 8 GB and 16 GB. No 32 GB option (unless you go Intel).

It should be noted that the M1 chip in these three Macs is the same (aside from GPU core number). Basically, Apple is taking the same approach which these chips as they do the iPhones and iPads. Just one SKU (excluding the X variants), which is the same across all iDevices (aside from maybe slight clock speed differences occasionally).

EDIT:

Screen-Shot-2021-10-18-at-1.20.47-PM.jpg

M1 Pro 8-core CPU (6+2), 14-core GPU
M1 Pro 10-core CPU (8+2), 14-core GPU
M1 Pro 10-core CPU (8+2), 16-core GPU
M1 Max 10-core CPU (8+2), 24-core GPU
M1 Max 10-core CPU (8+2), 32-core GPU

M1 Pro and M1 Max discussion here:


M1 Ultra discussion here:


M2 discussion here:


Second Generation 5 nm
Unified memory architecture - LPDDR5, up to 24 GB and 100 GB/s
20 billion transistors

8-core CPU

4 high-performance cores
192 KB instruction cache
128 KB data cache
Shared 16 MB L2 cache

4 high-efficiency cores
128 KB instruction cache
64 KB data cache
Shared 4 MB L2 cache

10-core iGPU (but there is an 8-core variant)
3.6 Teraflops

16-core neural engine
Secure Enclave
USB 4

Hardware acceleration for 8K h.264, h.264, ProRes

M3 Family discussion here:


M4 Family discussion here:

 
Last edited:

Eug

Lifer
Mar 11, 2000
23,807
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I for one think this is going to be a watershed moment and will surely be one of the biggest highlights for Tim Cook's reign, no matter what comes. This will formally erase that blurry line between phones and computers.

As for the performance, using just SPEC and GB5 it would be easy to get excited. This will be a stellar laptop and entry level desktop Mac for most users. Undoubtedly, it'll handle word processing, light to medium spreadsheet work, presentations, browsing, and so on with ease.

The big question will be whether this thing can scale up, and what the power/speed ramp looks like on a real chip. Do we compare this 4 big/4 little chip to a 4/8 Renoir/ICL/TGL chip or to an 8/16 chip? What did Apple use in their comparison? And in what applications? Lots of questions. Hopefully we get some good benchmarks next week.
A lot of the traditional benchmarking methods may actually fall down here. For example, in many optimized multi-media applications, A12X iPad Pros from 2018 actually do much better than current Intel MacBook Pros.

The problem with the iPad Pros though is they do not (yet) have the depth of software support so a lot of the big legacy apps are missing. However, for the mid-tier mainstream power users, the Apple designed SoCs shine, if the software can leverage it.

What will be interesting for example is the comparison of Final Cut on Apple's chips vs Intel. There will be no truly native Adobe Premiere on Apple's chips any time soon, but Apple said they have now built Final Cut to be native on M1, etc.
 

Gideon

Golden Member
Nov 27, 2007
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(b) The 13" MBP is the low-end model. Which part of "low end is low end" did you not understand. Only idiots (of which, OMG, there are so many. Reading Twitter right now makes you weep for humanity) assume that these specs are the end point for the MBP range as a whole.

If these specs don't meet your needs, then wait. The claim is not "no-one needs more than 16GB", it is "plenty of people will find these machines meet their needs". If you're not one, you're not one.

I did get it's the low-end model and I agree it works for a large majority of the current buyer base, I was just saying that my actual requirements are not some desperate attempt to "just complain about something" (I still wish they made macbook models geared towards developers).

(c) I am not "agressively-defensive about [my] favorite company"; I am happy to (and frequently do) criticize Apple. I am aggressively against stupidity and dishonesty.
Yeah ok, I can relate. Ignorance and stupidity are awfully widespread in the tech-enthusiast crowd. People buy a product, immediately become emotionally attached to it and suddenly just like everything praising the company and dislike anything even slightly pointing towards negative (no matter te fact).

And sorry for the unneeded agressiveness. It probably stemmed from the fact that I've not stumbled upon any of your criticism, yet every post I have cmoe accross has been highly supportive of pretty much every aspect of how apple operates (with the exception of perhaps yearly cadence being set to stone) and all of their prodcut decisions under active debate (not saying it's a valid impression by any means, it's just the one that stuck).
 
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name99

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Sep 11, 2010
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I did get it's the low-end model and I agree it works for a large majority of the current buyer base, I was just saying that my actual requirements are not some desperate attempt to "just complain about something" (I still wish they made macbook models geared towards developers).


Yeah ok, I can relate. Ignorance and stupidity are awfully widespread in the tech-enthusiast crowd. People buy a product, immediately become emotionally attached to it and suddenly just like everything praising the company and dislike anything even slightly pointing towards negative (no matter te fact).

And sorry for the unneeded agressiveness. It probably stemmed from the fact that I've not stumbled upon any of your criticism, yet every post I have cmoe accross has been highly supportive of pretty much every aspect of how apple operates (with the exception of perhaps yearly cadence being set to stone) and all of their prodcut decisions under active debate (not saying it's a valid impression by any means, it's just the one that stuck).

Got to respect you for that reply!
I get irritated (by many things!) but especially by people who can't tell the difference between "product designed for the bulk of humanity" and "what I want designed for me, personally, in a perfect world". Hell, I usually don't get what I want -- but I understand the wya the world works in this regard.

As for Apple criticism, mainly what's discussed in this forum is the SoCs, and with those there's little to criticize! You can wish that they had sometimes made different choices, but their choices are justified.

Where I am a lot less happy is
- general software quality. Far too many bugs, far too many obviously dumb/short-sighted design decisions.
- far too limited (ie unambitious) thinking around HomeKit and Apple TV, both of which are being run by pathetically timid management.
- they still haven't internalized that what they are selling is the Apple Compute Ecosystem, not individual products, so, while there is adequate (far better than any other company) linkage between devices, it's not nearly good enough. I should be able to set preferences for my entire compute ecosystem in one place, update software in one place, view state in one place. Think of how large clusters (things like Beowulf, let alone a data warehouse) are managed; I should have that sort of total view and total control of my personal Apple ecosystem, not fifteen devices that all have to be manually curated, updated, migrated.
 

Doug S

Platinum Member
Feb 8, 2020
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Serious question

A) could we do M1s in chiplets of 2 and 4?
B) or would it make more sense to make a larger chip as a separate die?
C) or is Apple just going to wait 6 months or a year and do the successor of the firestorm (big) and icestorm (little) before doing 8 or more big cores?

A, B, or C? I have had time to see if it is technically impossible / not feasible to see if the M1 could be done as chiplets today with the info Apple dropped.


A couple years ago when we were speculating about Apple going ARM on the Mac over on RWT I postulated they would use an A14X for the low end Macs that could also operate as a chiplet, and go two chiplet on the higher end MBP models and iMac, four chiplet on the iMac Pro / low end Mac Pro and eight chiplet on a top end 32 core Mac Pro. I think I even suggested the first three models would be the Air, Mini and low end MBP, but I'd have to see if I can find that thread before I could be sure (too bad the search function on that site is so crappy)

So sure, I could believe this (and claim to be prescient if it comes to pass) but the Twitter rumors about Apple doing an "8+4" design, if true, mean there's a bigger chip out there beyond the A14X/M1. So if they go the chiplet route they'd use that 8+4 design as the base unit not the M1.

I wouldn't be shocked if some of the first A15 based wafers TSMC fabs for Apple are 8+4 chips. The volume they need for those are tiny compared to iPhone volumes, so they could get the higher end MBP and the iMac out the door in time for back to school. It would also give them plenty of lead time for testing chiplet based designs (though I think the iMac Pro and Mac Pro will be A16 based, these A15 based "chiplets" would just be for internal testing to work out some of the issues in a more complex design than Apple has previously attempted)
 

Doug S

Platinum Member
Feb 8, 2020
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Too low based on what?
Plenty of macbooks are sold to people (like half my family) who only use them for email, browsing, and various forms of chat.
Remember macOS uses RAM compression (which has had many years to be perfected) and will have even faster swapping than the current machines.

Honestly, this carping about RAM feels like people desperate to find SOMETHING to complain about. It does not match the reality of most user experience.


I don't think there's anything wrong with 8GB as the entry level, it is 16GB being the high end that's the problem. Now maybe this is just a product segmentation thing, and when the A15 based Air, Mini and 13" MBP come out next July or so the current models will sell for $100 off as "last year's model" similar to what they do with the iPhone - and then only offering lower end memory configs will make sense.
 

Eug

Lifer
Mar 11, 2000
23,807
1,385
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Confirmed. M1 Macs do NOT support existing eGPUS.


I don't think there's anything wrong with 8GB as the entry level, it is 16GB being the high end that's the problem. Now maybe this is just a product segmentation thing, and when the A15 based Air, Mini and 13" MBP come out next July or so the current models will sell for $100 off as "last year's model" similar to what they do with the iPhone - and then only offering lower end memory configs will make sense.
I mentioned this before, but it appears that these new Macs replace older Intel models that were also limited to 16 GB. The Intel models that support 32 GB are higher end models, and they are still being sold on the Apple website, because they haven’t been replaced yet.

The 32 GB replacements will likely come in the form of new machines with a different chip next year, along with a new form factor and mini-LED.

In a way, these new M1 machines are effectively almost mass market dev kits.
 

HurleyBird

Platinum Member
Apr 22, 2003
2,759
1,455
136
I think Apple marketing screwed this one up if M1 is as fast as most of us think it is. The performance claims look like the typical BS and by now a lot of people know the pattern and have it set to ignore. To the extent M1 is impressive, they should have actually shown it to be so.
 

ultimatebob

Lifer
Jul 1, 2001
25,134
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I don't think there's anything wrong with 8GB as the entry level, it is 16GB being the high end that's the problem. Now maybe this is just a product segmentation thing, and when the A15 based Air, Mini and 13" MBP come out next July or so the current models will sell for $100 off as "last year's model" similar to what they do with the iPhone - and then only offering lower end memory configs will make sense.

Honestly, that seems like a typical Apple marketing strategy. They always launch their first generation product with an obvious design limitation, and then "fix" it in the second generation to get people to upgrade faster.

Take the first gen iPhone for example. It only had 2G Edge networking when most high-end phones were already coming with 3G. The following year, when they (finally) released a 3G phone, everyone felt compelled to upgrade. The first gen iPad was also slow as molasses, so when the "much faster" iPad 2 came out a year later, a lot of those early adopters upgraded.

I think that the lesson is obvious... avoid the first generation of any new Apple product or total redesign of an existing product.
 

Eug

Lifer
Mar 11, 2000
23,807
1,385
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Honestly, that seems like a typical Apple marketing strategy. They always launch their first generation product with an obvious design limitation, and then "fix" it in the second generation to get people to upgrade faster.

Take the first gen iPhone for example. It only had 2G Edge networking when most high-end phones were already coming with 3G. The following year, when they (finally) released a 3G phone, everyone felt compelled to upgrade. The first gen iPad was also slow as molasses, so when the "much faster" iPad 2 came out a year later, a lot of those early adopters upgraded.

I think that the lesson is obvious... avoid the first generation of any new Apple product or total redesign of an existing product.
In general I agree with you, and as mentioned above, I think of the M1 Macs as being almost a set of mainstream mass market dev kits that you can buy and keep. However, it should be noted that the 3G chipsets at the time of the original iPhone were quite power hungry. The lower power model 3G chipset is what Apple put in the iPhone 3G.

BTW, our carriers in Canada didn't even bother to carry the original iPhone. They only started with the 3G. Part of the reason was because Apple did its negotiations first with the American carriers, but I suspect that many carriers around the world were less interested in a 2G handset anyway. Of course, that didn't stop my buddies driving down to Buffalo to pick up US models that they subsequently jailbroke and ran in Canada.

I agree about the iPad though. I absolute refused to buy the original iPad, mainly because it only had 256 MB RAM. I waited for the iPad 2 with twice the RAM. Same with the original iPad Air. I refused to buy that one, and waited for the iPad Air 2 with twice the RAM. We are still using the iPad Air 2 now 6 years later. The kids are using it, with no need to upgrade for the next couple of years.
 

name99

Senior member
Sep 11, 2010
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I think Apple marketing screwed this one up if M1 is as fast as most of us think it is. The performance claims look like the typical BS and by now a lot of people know the pattern and have it set to ignore. To the extent M1 is impressive, they should have actually shown it to be so.
Really? And what would you have them do differently?

Because you can go read the comments on Andrei's article and see the insanity in full force. The people who do not want to believe this will not believe it; and more benchmarks won't convince them.

I fully expect the same is just as true of you. You will read Andrei's arrticle and come up with a dozen dumb reasons why his numbers are "dishonest" -- the compiler lost many of the Intel votes, the test harness is biased to report that Apple is ahead, equipment from big energy is deliberately manipulating how much power is reported used by each device.
The full range of lunacy from last week is being redeployed as we speak.
 
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Eug

Lifer
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OK, I went through all the marketing blurbs and matched the claims with the machines compared:

Up to 3.9X faster video processing
Up to 3.5X faster CPU performance

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction MacBook Air systems with Apple M1 chip and 8-core GPU, as well as production 1.2GHz quad-core Intel Core i7-based MacBook Air systems, all configured with 16GB RAM and 2TB SSD. Tested with prerelease Final Cut Pro 10.5 using a 55-second clip with 4K Apple ProRes RAW media, at 4096x2160 resolution and 59.94 frames per second, transcoded to Apple ProRes 422. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Air.

Up to 7.1X faster image processing
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Prerelease Adobe Lightroom 4.1 tested using a 28MB image. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Our high‑performance core is the world’s fastest CPU core when it comes to low‑power silicon.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM measuring peak single-thread performance of workloads taken from select industry-standard benchmarks, commercial applications, and open source applications. Comparison made against the highest-performing CPUs for notebooks commercially available at the time of testing. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

Up to 2X faster CPU performance
Matches peak PC performance using 25% of the power

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM. Multithreaded performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Comparison made against latest‑generation high‑performance notebooks commercially available at the time of testing. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

3X CPU performance per watt
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM, as well as previous‑generation Mac notebooks. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

From teraflops to texture bandwidth to fill rate to power efficiency, this GPU is in a class of its own — and brings the world’s fastest integrated graphics in a personal computer.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM using select industry-standard benchmarks. Comparison made against the highest-performing integrated GPUs for notebooks and desktops commercially available at the time of testing. Integrated GPU is defined as a GPU located on a monolithic silicon die along with a CPU and memory controller, behind a unified memory subsystem. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

Up to 2X faster GPU performance
Matches peak PC performance using 33% of the power

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Comparison made against latest‑generation high‑performance notebooks commercially available at the time of testing. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

Up to 15X faster machine learning performance
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Prerelease Pixelmator Pro 2.0 Lynx tested using a 216KB image. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Up to 17 hrs of wireless web browsing
Up to 20 hrs of movie playback

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip, 8GB of RAM, and 512GB SSD. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. The Apple TV app movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See apple.com/batteries for more information.

Up to 15 hrs of wireless web browsing
Up to 18 hrs of movie playback

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction MacBook Air systems with Apple M1 chip and 8-core GPU, configured with 8GB of RAM and 512GB SSD. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. The Apple TV app movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See apple.com/batteries for more information.

Run up to 3x more instrument and effect plug‑ins with Logic Pro.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Tested with prerelease Logic Pro 10.6.0 with project consisting of multiple tracks, each with an Amp Designer plug-in instance applied. Individual tracks were added during playback until CPU became overloaded. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Fly through tasks with Final Cut Pro, like rendering a complex timeline up to 6x faster.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems with Intel Iris UHD Graphics 630, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Tested with prerelease Final Cut Pro 10.5 using a complex 2-minute project with a variety of media up to 4K resolution. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.
 

HurleyBird

Platinum Member
Apr 22, 2003
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I fully expect the same is just as true of you. You will read Andrei's arrticle and come up with a dozen dumb reasons why his numbers are "dishonest" -- the compiler lost many of the Intel votes, the test harness is biased to report that Apple is ahead, equipment from big energy is deliberately manipulating how much power is reported used by each device.
The full range of lunacy from last week is being redeployed as we speak.

I think you misunderstand me. I think that M1 is likely very strong. It might not beat Renoir at everything MT or Tiger Lake at everything ST, but as an entire package my intuition says that this should be the best laptop chip out there by a good margin. Cezanne might upset that a bit, but will be disadvantaged by 7nm vs 5nm.

I'm not saying that Apple resorted to marketing BS because their product is weak. I'm saying I think the product is strong, but present the product in a way that reeks of snake oil makes it look weaker than it likely is since many people are primed to automatically discount this kind of marketing.
 

name99

Senior member
Sep 11, 2010
496
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Baldur's Gate is native. Though probably not fully optimized given the limited time available.
Some details here, along with a number of scenes.
As a non-gamer I have no idea what to look for.


One thing that is clear in this talk is that Apple are positioning the M1 as an iGPU. ie the point is not "we are better than some 350W monster" it is "we are an iGPU that can do stuff that prevously demanded a dGPU".
I noticed the same thing when I had a chance to watch the Apple event directly (not a liveblog), Apple specifically said "M1 has been optimized for our most popular, low-power systems", along with a bunch of other such reminders that this is just step one, that this is us not even trying for maximum performance, only for low power and cost...
 

ultimatebob

Lifer
Jul 1, 2001
25,134
2,446
126
OK, I went through all the marketing blurbs and matched the claims with the machines compared:

Up to 3.9X faster video processing
Up to 3.5X faster CPU performance

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction MacBook Air systems with Apple M1 chip and 8-core GPU, as well as production 1.2GHz quad-core Intel Core i7-based MacBook Air systems, all configured with 16GB RAM and 2TB SSD. Tested with prerelease Final Cut Pro 10.5 using a 55-second clip with 4K Apple ProRes RAW media, at 4096x2160 resolution and 59.94 frames per second, transcoded to Apple ProRes 422. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Air.

Up to 7.1X faster image processing
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Prerelease Adobe Lightroom 4.1 tested using a 28MB image. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Our high‑performance core is the world’s fastest CPU core when it comes to low‑power silicon.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM measuring peak single-thread performance of workloads taken from select industry-standard benchmarks, commercial applications, and open source applications. Comparison made against the highest-performing CPUs for notebooks commercially available at the time of testing. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

Up to 2X faster CPU performance
Matches peak PC performance using 25% of the power

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM. Multithreaded performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Comparison made against latest‑generation high‑performance notebooks commercially available at the time of testing. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

3X CPU performance per watt
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM, as well as previous‑generation Mac notebooks. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

From teraflops to texture bandwidth to fill rate to power efficiency, this GPU is in a class of its own — and brings the world’s fastest integrated graphics in a personal computer.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM using select industry-standard benchmarks. Comparison made against the highest-performing integrated GPUs for notebooks and desktops commercially available at the time of testing. Integrated GPU is defined as a GPU located on a monolithic silicon die along with a CPU and memory controller, behind a unified memory subsystem. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

Up to 2X faster GPU performance
Matches peak PC performance using 33% of the power

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Comparison made against latest‑generation high‑performance notebooks commercially available at the time of testing. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

Up to 15X faster machine learning performance
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Prerelease Pixelmator Pro 2.0 Lynx tested using a 216KB image. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Up to 17 hrs of wireless web browsing
Up to 20 hrs of movie playback

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction 13‑inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1 chip, 8GB of RAM, and 512GB SSD. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. The Apple TV app movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See apple.com/batteries for more information.

Up to 15 hrs of wireless web browsing
Up to 18 hrs of movie playback

Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction MacBook Air systems with Apple M1 chip and 8-core GPU, configured with 8GB of RAM and 512GB SSD. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. The Apple TV app movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 8 clicks from bottom. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See apple.com/batteries for more information.

Run up to 3x more instrument and effect plug‑ins with Logic Pro.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Tested with prerelease Logic Pro 10.6.0 with project consisting of multiple tracks, each with an Amp Designer plug-in instance applied. Individual tracks were added during playback until CPU became overloaded. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Fly through tasks with Final Cut Pro, like rendering a complex timeline up to 6x faster.
Testing conducted by Apple in October 2020 using preproduction Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip, and production 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems with Intel Iris UHD Graphics 630, all configured with 16GB of RAM and 2TB SSD. Tested with prerelease Final Cut Pro 10.5 using a complex 2-minute project with a variety of media up to 4K resolution. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of Mac mini.

Yup, Apple is back to its old benchmarking tricks that it used from the Power PC era. You'll get "3x" better performance using special plugins and benchmarks that are optimized for the new processor, but you'll probably see little of that performance boost in your usual day-to-day usage. If anything, I'll bet that gaming performance is going to suffer compared to similarly priced laptops that have a dedicated GPU and graphics memory.

I'll be curious to read the Ars Technica review of these products once they come out, because they'll look past the hype and run real benchmarks for products that most Apple users actually use on a daily basis.
 
Last edited:

name99

Senior member
Sep 11, 2010
496
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I think you misunderstand me. I think that M1 is likely very strong. It might not beat Renoir at everything MT or Tiger Lake at everything ST, but as an entire package my intuition says that this should be the best laptop chip out there by a good margin. Cezanne might upset that a bit, but will be disadvantaged by 7nm vs 5nm.

I'm not saying that Apple resorted to marketing BS because their product is weak. I'm saying I think the product is strong, but present the product in a way that reeks of snake oil makes it look weaker than it likely is since many people are primed to automatically discount this kind of marketing.

You are welcome to your opinions about how something should be marketed. But I suspect the trillion dollar company know rather more about this than you do.
Apple are not targeting this event at you, stop pretending they are. If you want tech details, go read articles like Anandtech.

At the end of the day, this is whining for the sake of whining. The info you want is available, you're just demanding that Apple prioritize your interests over their market.

This is a constant theme in my irritation today -- this entitled view that an event that will be watched by, I don't know, half a billion people?, should be structured to appeal to the particular interests of a few hundred thousand or less.
I ALSO want super detailed info. The difference is I neither believe Apple OWES ME that info, nor do I believe that I represent some sort of majority of buyers who make their decisions based on whether the ROB is 560 vs 640 entries in size.
 
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name99

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Yup, Apple is back to its old benchmarking tricks that it used from the Power PC era. You'll get "3x" better performance using special plugins and benchmarks that are optimized for the new processor, but you'll probably see little of that performance boost in your usual day-to-day usage. If anything, I'll bet that gaming performance is going to suffer compared to similarly priced laptops that have a dedicated GPU and graphics memory.

Probably so. Given that they explicitly say the comparison market is laptops with an iGPU, I don't think this is knockout blow you seem to imagine it to be...
You seem to be upset that someone's selling you a bicycle that they claim is very fast, whereas you can buy a motorbike and go even faster!

When Apple sells what they claim to be a dedicated, best of breed, gaming machine, perhaps THEN is the time to start making comparisons against other gaming machines?
 

HurleyBird

Platinum Member
Apr 22, 2003
2,759
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You are welcome to your opinions about how something should be marketed. But I suspect the trillion dollar company know rather more about this than you do.

Argument from authority. And no, just being big and successful doesn't make one right. There are people on this forum who, if you had plucked them up and put them in the role of Intel CEO six years ago, would likely have done a much better job.

I ALSO want super detailed info. The difference is I neither believe Apple OWES ME that info, nor do I believe that I represent some sort of majority of buyers who make their decisions based on whether the ROB is 560 vs 640 entries in size.

Strawman. I'm saying that I think the average consumer will respond better to, say if you're 20% faster, actually showing that (eg. as AMD does at their events), rather than presenting incredibly generic graphs that are obvious approximations, combined with stratospheric claims that are obviously extremely cherry picked if not outright rigged. Consumers don't need to be technically savvy. Everyone has experienced snake oil, and the way Apple is marketing M1 just reeks of it. The inference is instinctual.
 
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ultimatebob

Lifer
Jul 1, 2001
25,134
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Probably so. Given that they explicitly say the comparison market is laptops with an iGPU, I don't think this is knockout blow you seem to imagine it to be...
You seem to be upset that someone's selling you a bicycle that they claim is very fast, whereas you can buy a motorbike and go even faster!

When Apple sells what they claim to be a dedicated, best of breed, gaming machine, perhaps THEN is the time to start making comparisons against other gaming machines?

On the flip side, do you see a lot of professional video editors editing their 4K films on low end 13" MacBook Pro with Final Cut Pro? Of course not, the 13" screen and 16 GB memory cap would have been total dealbreakers for them. They'll take their footage home and edit it on a Mac Pro with a 4K display and over 4 times that much memory.

If you're going to show me Macbook benchmarks, show me benchmarks for Safari or iPhoto. You know, products I would actually use on a laptop like that.
 
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Eug

Lifer
Mar 11, 2000
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Yup, Apple is back to its old benchmarking tricks that it used from the Power PC era. You'll get "3x" better performance using special plugins and benchmarks that are optimized for the new processor, but you'll probably see little of that performance boost in your usual day-to-day usage. If anything, I'll bet that gaming performance is going to suffer compared to similarly priced laptops that have a dedicated GPU and graphics memory.
Actually, I find the Logic Pro and Final Cut tests interesting, the latter particularly. Why? Cuz if it bears out with end-user testing, it will mirror the results people have had comparing video editing on the iPad Pro vs. the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro.

For a lot of stuff, the iPad Pro does extremely well, probably because Apple purposely designed the SoC to handle this sort of stuff.


iPad-Pro-editing-performance-1.jpg

iPad-Pro-editing-performance-2.jpg

The main problem in the past is stuff like Final Cut didn't exist on Arm. Now it does, just not on the iPad Pro, but on Macs instead.


On the flip side, do you see a lot of professional video editors editing their 4K films on 13" MacBook Pro with Final Cut Pro? Of course not, the 13" screen and 16 GB memory cap would have been total dealbreakers for them. They'll take their footage home and edit it on a Mac Pro with a 4K display and over 4 times that much memory.
You mistake Final Cut users as necessarily "pro". There are a TON of Final Cut users who don't work on Hollywood blockbusters. I would guess Final Cut users on 13" MacBook Pros outnumber Final Cut users on Mac Pros by a ratio of 50:1.

BTW, a friend of mine who is a design lead who has worked on stuff for major international banks and huge multinational companies does all his design work on a 2014 iMac. Even though he is actual a real "pro", he won't be buying a Mac Pro or even an iMac Pro either.
 
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name99

Senior member
Sep 11, 2010
496
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On the flip side, do you see a lot of professional video editors editing their 4K films on low end 13" MacBook Pro with Final Cut Pro? Of course not, the 13" screen and 16 GB memory cap would have been total dealbreakers for them. They'll take their footage home and edit it on a Mac Pro with a 4K display and over 4 times that much memory.

If you're going to show me Macbook benchmarks, show me benchmarks for Safari or iPhoto. You know, products I would actually use on a laptop like that.

"Professional video editors", no.
TikTok editors, yes. And they are the target market...

They said Safari is "1.9x more responsive". But I expect now you're pissed off because you don't know what that means exactly...

How about

"
Browsing with Safari — which is already the world’s fastest browser — is now up to 1.5x speedier at running JavaScript and nearly 2x more responsive.6
"

“World’s fastest browser”: Testing conducted by Apple in August and October 2020 using JetStream 2, MotionMark 1.1, and Speedometer 2.0 performance benchmarks on browsers that completed the test. Tested with prerelease Safari 14 and latest stable versions of Chrome, Firefox, and (Windows) Microsoft Edge at the time of testing, on Intel Core i5-based 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with prerelease macOS Big Sur and Windows 10 Home running in Boot Camp; 12.9-inch iPad Pro (4th generation) units with prerelease iPadOS 14 and Intel Core i7-based Microsoft Surface Pro 7 systems with Windows 10 Pro; and iPhone 11 Pro Max with prerelease iOS 14 and Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra with Android 10. Devices tested with a WPA2 Wi-Fi network connection. Performance will vary based on usage, system configuration, network connection, and other factors. “Up to 1.5x speedier at running JavaScript and nearly 2x more responsive”: Testing conducted by Apple in September and October 2020 using JetStream 2 and Speedometer 2.0 performance benchmarks. Tested on preproduction MacBook Air and Mac mini systems with Apple M1 chip and 8-core GPU, as well as production 1.2GHz quad-core Intel Core i7-based 13-inch MacBook Air systems and 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3-based Mac mini systems, all configured with 16GB RAM, 2TB SSD, and prerelease macOS Big Sur. Tested with prerelease Safari 14.0.1 and WPA2 Wi-Fi network connection. Performance will vary based on system configuration, network configuration, network connection, and other factors.
 

ultimatebob

Lifer
Jul 1, 2001
25,134
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Probably so. Given that they explicitly say the comparison market is laptops with an iGPU, I don't think this is knockout blow you seem to imagine it to be...
You seem to be upset that someone's selling you a bicycle that they claim is very fast, whereas you can buy a motorbike and go even faster!

The problem with this line of thinking is that that most competitive laptops with an iGPU cost far less than a 13" MacBook Pro would. Once you get up to $1,300, a dedicated GPU is something that should be expected in a comparable Windows laptop.
 
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ultimatebob

Lifer
Jul 1, 2001
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Argument from authority. And no, just being big and successful doesn't make one right. There are people on this forum who, if you had plucked them up and put them in the role of Intel CEO six years ago, would likely have done a much better job.



Strawman. I'm saying that I think the average consumer will respond better to, say if you're 20% faster, actually showing that (eg. as AMD does at their events), rather than presenting incredibly generic graphs that are obvious approximations, combined with stratospheric claims that are obviously extremely cherry picked if not outright rigged. Consumers don't need to be technically savvy. Everyone has experienced snake oil, and the way Apple is marketing M1 just reeks of it. The inference is instinctual.

The sad thing about dubious benchmarks like this is that the mainstream media will repeat them as gospel without fact checking them. Sure, the tech blogs and magazines will eventually review them and release unbiased benchmarks, but by then the damage is done.

The result is uneducated consumers going to the Apple Store and buying a pretty but overpriced sub notebook, thinking that they're really getting something that's "98% faster than most new PC's". Odds are they'll probably never know otherwise, because it will still blow the doors off of the 10-year-old Windows 7 PC with a malware infection that they're using now.
 

Eug

Lifer
Mar 11, 2000
23,807
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The problem with this line of thinking is that that most competitive laptops with an iGPU cost far less than a 13" MacBook Pro would. Once you get up to $1,300, a dedicated GPU is something that should be expected in a comparable Windows laptop.
You could make the same argument about Intel Macs too, but that didn't stop them from being purchased.

MacBook Airs with el crappo integrated Intel graphics sold like hotcakes this year. And the M1 MacBook Air is cheaper.


The sad thing about dubious benchmarks like this is that the mainstream media will repeat them as gospel without fact checking them.
It seems you haven't be reading the tech articles or watching the YouTube summaries. Most of them are NOT doing as you say.
 

awesomedeluxe

Member
Feb 12, 2020
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@Eug I guess we finally have our answer - Apple didn't go with the A14 in the Air but gave it a best-in-class part instead. I have no doubt the MBA will be the best fanless notebook ever made and by a large margin.

On the other hand, I can feel the aura of disappointment from MBP13 fans. Even though the M1 is doubtless positioned to outperform a 28W Tiger Lake part (and by a lot!), it's clear this part was made for the Air and modified for the MBP.

It feels inevitable that we will see a MBP14 and MBP16 next year with an M1X, sporting 8 perf cores, 12 GPU cores, and LPDDR5. Given how conservative Apple was with this design, I'm not holding out a lot of hope Apple has something cool and creative prepared that can take down the 5600M in the MBP16--they'll just keep selling the Intel model until they do.
 

ultimatebob

Lifer
Jul 1, 2001
25,134
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You could make the same argument about Intel Macs too, but that didn't stop them from being purchased.

MacBook Airs with el crappo integrated Intel graphics sold like hotcakes this year. And the M1 MacBook Air is cheaper.

It seems you haven't be reading the tech articles or watching the YouTube summaries. Most of them are NOT doing as you say.

I was talking about your typical 6 PM TV newscast that your parents would watch, which will just regurgitate the Apple press release verbatim without attempting to figure out what those numbers mean.

I'm sure that the smarter YouTube tech reviewers like Linus Tech Tips and Gamers Nexus aren't going to fall for those benchmarking tricks. They benchmark stuff for a living, and this isn't their first rodeo reviewing tech products.
 
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