Question What do M1 desktops do with small CPU cores?

[Vegasus]

The M1 chip has big and small CPU cores. In a battery powered device, the small cores are useful for extending battery life when the device isn't doing much, but what do they do in a desktop? Allow the device to be slightly thinner? Save a few pennies per year off the electric bill?

 

[TheStu]

In MacOS Big Sur, almost all background tasks are shunted to the Efficiency cores, so when it comes time to do something more serious, the High Performance cores kick in and everything feels faster. The Efficiency cores handle the little stuff, which is valuable from a Quality of Service standpoint, because it makes the rest of the system feel more responsive.

 

[Justinus]

In MacOS Big Sur, almost all background tasks are shunted to the Efficiency cores, so when it comes time to do something more serious, the High Performance cores kick in and everything feels faster. The Efficiency cores handle the little stuff, which is valuable from a Quality of Service standpoint, because it makes the rest of the system feel more responsive.

But on desktop, they could just have more big cores....

 

[TheStu]

But on desktop, they could just have more big cores....

1: Having the background tasks managed by the efficiency cores means the fans kick on less frequently (beneficial), and more demanding tasks launch quicker and are more responsive (again, beneficial)
2: That will almost certainly happen, but the way M1 was designed doesn't allow for that.

 

[Doug S]

But on desktop, they could just have more big cores....

That would imply Apple had chips designed exclusively for desktop Macs, which they never will.

 

[Eug]

But on desktop, they could just have more big cores....

That would imply Apple had chips designed exclusively for desktop Macs, which they never will.

The current rumour for M1X is 8 performance cores and 2 efficiency cores. So, that would mean not only more performance cores, but also less efficiency cores. These would not be exclusive for desktop Macs though as they would be used in MacBook Pros as well.

However, there are other rumours of chips with up to 32 performance cores. The number of efficiency cores is unknown. Such a design would be desktop exclusive, as in specifically for the Mac Pro.

We'll see if these rumours pan out, but they make sense to me.

 

[manly]

The current rumour for M1X is 8 performance cores and 2 efficiency cores. So, that would mean not only more performance cores, but also less efficiency cores. These would not be exclusive for desktop Macs though as they would be used in MacBook Pros as well.

However, there are other rumours of chips with up to 32 performance cores. The number of efficiency cores is unknown. Such a design would be desktop exclusive, as in specifically for the Mac Pro.

We'll see if these rumours pan out, but they make sense to me.

I'm holding out for an iPhone 30 UberPro Max with 32 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores.

 

[biostud]

Having the same hardware available, makes it possible to optimize the OS to a higher degree, than running on different hardware. And no matter what, if the task can be handled by efficiency cores, no reason to use performance cores.

 

[Oyeve]

I dont know. The 2 new M1 macs I received today at my job are sluggish as crap. O365 chugs, CS chugs as well. Not seeing much performance gain from my 2013 but hey, it looks good. And thats what apple cares about.

 

[gdansk]

I dont know. The 2 new M1 macs I received today at my job are sluggish as crap. O365 chugs, CS chugs as well. Not seeing much performance gain from my 2013 but hey, it looks good. And thats what apple cares about.

Are you running ARM Native versions?
Even then... my M1 Pro seems exceedingly fast compared to my old 9750H

 

[Oyeve]

Are you running ARM Native versions?
Even then... my M1 Pro seems exceedingly fast compared to my old 9750H

I'm talking about the m1 imacs. They are sluggish IMO and now we have noticed that the very expensive program we use automatically smooths system fonts. Its a designing fabric software that I now have to have the developers tweak because the new imacs won't let you turn off smoothing or mess with any resolution settings. I find the 8 year old imacs these are replacing to be a better product overall.

 

[Oyeve]

I'm talking about the m1 imacs. They are sluggish IMO and now we have noticed that the very expensive program we use automatically smooths system fonts. Its a designing fabric software that I now have to have the developers tweak because the new imacs won't let you turn off smoothing or mess with any resolution settings. I find the 8 year old imacs these are replacing to be a better product overall.

My LORD! These are the CRAPPIEST computers I have ever had to deal with! They are so slow and sluggish. The design dept. totally regrets getting these. Adobe CS runs like ass, Chrome is garbage, basically anything not programmed by some d-bag apple coder just runs like garbage. I guess is all you do is IG then these are for you!

 

[radio3]

You gotta be trolling. Why would you use Chrome rather than Safari on a Mac, and I heard Adobe has been sceaming on Apple silicon for years. Photoshop and Lightroom on iPad Pro were already faster than their equivalents on Intel Mac years ago.

 

[nathanjo]

The M1 chip has big and small CPU cores. In a battery powered device, the small cores are useful for extending battery life when the device isn't doing much, but what do they do in a desktop? Allow the device to be slightly thinner? Save a few pennies per year off the electric bill?

The M1 chip has big and small CPU cores. In a battery powered device, the small cores are useful for extending battery life when the device isn't doing much and allowing the device to be slightly thinner.

 

[q52]

My LORD! These are the CRAPPIEST computers I have ever had to deal with! They are so slow and sluggish. The design dept. totally regrets getting these. Adobe CS runs like ass, Chrome is garbage, basically anything not programmed by some d-bag apple coder just runs like garbage. I guess is all you do is IG then these are for you!

Something is wrong with your systems because pretty much nobody has had such an experience before

 

[q52]

1: Having the background tasks managed by the efficiency cores means the fans kick on less frequently (beneficial), and more demanding tasks launch quicker and are more responsive (again, beneficial)
2: That will almost certainly happen, but the way M1 was designed doesn't allow for that.

honestly I dont really buy these kinds of arguments, because it seems like pretty much all CPU arch's these days are able to dynamically reduce their clock speed and power draws, even shut cores off completely, on a per-core basis, as needed by the system. I know Ryzen definitely does this to great effect. In a desktop setting there is quite literally zero reason to have a heterogeneous CPU core architecture when you can just make your "big" cores also run like "little" cores when they are idle or only handling background tasks, etc.. This is the same reason why Intel's latest lines of CPU's with big.LITTLE cores seems like such a dumb gimmick joke, because after looking at Ryzen you realize that LITTLE cores are useless and a waste of die space.

of course I am sure the other functional and operational requirements for M1, etc., are the primary reasons for this decision though

 

[igor_kavinski]

My LORD! These are the CRAPPIEST computers I have ever had to deal with! They are so slow and sluggish.

Maybe coz they are the base config with 8GB RAM and 256GB SSD and you probably need something like 16GB minimum for Adobe products.

I'm not an Apple fan but even the Intel iMacs I was forced to use with 8GB RAM and 256GB SSDs didn't feel as bad as you are describing. But then all I did was Safari browsing and code compiling.

 

[q52]

I had not considered that, they could be using the base config, my M1 MBA is the 16GB / 1TB model and its blazing fast on Adobe Lightroom, and pretty much everything. For general daily usages its indistinguishable in performance from the Ryzen 3950X pc that sits right next to it on my desk