Discussion Apple Silicon SoC thread

[Eug]

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:



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:

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M1 Ultra discussion here:

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M2 discussion here:

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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:

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[Thibsie]

Which one?

IDoceo

 

[igor_kavinski]

IDoceo

Other than the pretty colors, I think most of it could be done with HTML5, CSS and JS. Maybe there's something very complex in that app that they are not showing in the sample screens?

 

[MarkizSchnitzel]

I guess its partially more appealing to me(the UI), but on iPad espcially - focused experience. Nothing apart from the app itself, even if its just a PDF.

Doesn't availability of millions of apps, many of which are freemium time wasters, also provide distractions? I am sure it does for many people, maybe not you.

 

[reggie_fils_aime]

The thing everyone is missing with regards to important mac features is the one that matters the most to people who use them in a professional context; they are EXACTLY as performant on battery as they are on the wall, and not in a bad way. If you have a macbook pro, you can expect to tote it around and have full fat performance all day until your battery dies. There isn't a windows laptop around that can compete like that, not until the ARM devices get good.

 

[MarkizSchnitzel]

I have no idea how what the marketshare breakdown is, but of all the people I know who use laptops for work, they are mostly used as thin clients.
I imagine video and photo editors are a given there, maybe devs sometimes, but I doubt they make up a significant portion of business users?

 

[Eug]

I have no idea how what the marketshare breakdown is, but of all the people I know who use laptops for work, they are mostly used as thin clients.
I imagine video and photo editors are a given there, maybe devs sometimes, but I doubt they make up a significant portion of business users?

Interesting you should say that. While not really as a true thin clients, all of my family use our computers as sort of combo thin clients and light computers. Much of their software is web based, with the occasional local application thrown in. I use more local applications than they do, but my main work is actually done remotely through Citrix Workspace.

BTW, my family members use 8, 8, and 12 GB Macs with no problems. I can use an 8 GB Mac, but do benefit from 12-16 GB.

Tangential to the above discussion... It would seem that the 2xUltra chips are basically dead going forward. There was no M2 "Extreme" and I expect there will no M3 "Extreme" either. That means all SoCs in the Mac Pro are also available in the Mac Studio, as you guys and gals already know.

There are claims by some analysts that the Mac Pro actually outsells the Mac Studio, not just in terms of revenue, but also in terms of actual unit sales. I have a hard time believing that, but nonetheless that is the claim by some. Other data suggests the installed base of the Mac Pro might be something like a third of the Mac mini and close to that of the Mac Studio (although that Mac Pro installed base would include older Intel models).

Regardless of what the actual ratio is, there is that niche population that is still buying the Mac Pro. If they are getting the Mac Pro over the Mac Studio for the PCIe slots, then why? Cuz they aren't installing GPUs in them anymore. I know this was partially discussed before, but all I remember from that was drives and professional sound cards, but both of those have excellent external options now. However, I guess if you already own PCIe models, when upgrading your Mac, it may be cheaper and easier, as well as safer in terms of workflow, to get another Mac Pro than to buy all new drives and sound cards.

 

[igor_kavinski]

If they are getting the Mac Pro over the Mac Studio for the PCIe slots, then why? Cuz they aren't installing GPUs in them anymore. I know this was partially discussed before, but all I remember from that was drives and professional sound cards, but both of those have excellent external options now. However, I guess if you already own PCIe models, when upgrading your Mac, it may be cheaper and easier, as well as safer in terms of workflow, to get another Mac Pro than to buy all new drives and sound cards.

Heavy duty expensive video capture cards from Blackmagic Design etc.

 

[Doug S]

Tangential to the above discussion... It would seem that the 2xUltra chips are basically dead going forward. There was no M2 "Extreme" and I expect there will no M3 "Extreme" either. That means all SoCs in the Mac Pro are also available in the Mac Studio, as you guys and gals already know.

There are claims by some analysts that the Mac Pro actually outsells the Mac Studio, not just in terms of revenue, but also in terms of actual unit sales. I have a hard time believing that, but nonetheless that is the claim by some. Other data suggests the installed base of the Mac Pro might be something like a third of the Mac mini and close to that of the Mac Studio (although that Mac Pro installed base would include older Intel models).

The Mac Pro sells to companies that have a lot of people using stuff like Blackmagic that requires PCIe slots (though I wonder if they could use TB for that eventually) and since it had barely been updated since the original model came out in 2019 and obviously everyone knew as an x86 Mac it was a dead end long term. Mac Studio was not an option for that market due to the lack of PCIe. I'll bet that the Studio overwhelmingly sold to individuals and the Pro overwhelmingly sold to businesses, and the pent up demand made the Mac Pro a bigger seller. That may not continue once that pent up demand was mostly satisfied.

As for the "Extreme" I don't think we can pronounce it DOA until we see what M4 brings. It sure looks like there won't be an M3 Ultra, so that doesn't tell us anything about the chance of an Extreme. Unless Apple is really changing course I would expect an M4 Ultra, but if there's no M4 Extreme six months after the M4 Ultra safe to say Apple decided against it.

Apparently Blackmagic does not heavily load the CPU so there would be little point to running it on something 2x the power of the current Mac Pro, so if that's Apple's main market for Mac Pro then what's the point of an Extreme? More power than their current Pro userbase wants but still much less power than dual socket x86 workstations so unlikely to draw any of them in.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Have you people never even considered owning more than one laptop and giving each one its own purpose?

I do that. Got a special "Teams" laptop that I only use for important online work meetings.

 

[Glo.]

I used to tinker with my car a lot when I was younger, now I view it more as a hammer or that $99 Lowes tool set so I don't do anything to it other than adding fuel.

Why not?

You could buy an MG car(Windows machine) solely for the purpose of it breaking down, and you fixing it up. You can buy a Toyota Hybrid(Mac) so that it will never break, unless you will break it with your input.

Or you can buy yourself a Caterham Kit Car(DIY PC parts and install Linux, especially Gentoo) so that you can build a car for yourself.

Every platform is for a specific person.

 

[FlameTail]

Apparently Blackmagic does not heavily load the CPU so there would be little point to running it on something 2x the power of the current Mac Pro, so if that's Apple's main market for Mac Pro then what's the point of an Extreme?

Make the M Extreme for the sake of it. Show us what is possible at the very cutting edge of technology...48 CPU cores, 160 GPU cores, 2+ TB/s bandwidth...

One thing with the Ultra chips is that it's GPU is not powerful enough to compete with Nvidia xx90 tier GPUs. An Extreme chip that is 2x of the Ultra, will enable that.

Also another thing interesting use case for the M Extreme chip might be AI training/inference.

Let's take a hypothetical M3 Extreme. Sure it's beefy GPU and NPU, the 1.6 TB/s bandwidth etc... would be attractive for ML/AI stuff, but the kicker is the memory capacity. Upto 512 GB!

The Nvidia H100 has only 80 GB of memory and it sells for $40 000+. For that money instead, you could get a hypothetical Mac Pro with M3 Extreme and fully kitted 512 GB RAM. I think that would be very attractive to some ML/AI enthusiasts.

I am not the first to suggest the possible use of an M Extreme chip for AI/ML stuff. I recall it was discussed on reddit...

 

[Mopetar]

The thing everyone is missing with regards to important mac features is the one that matters the most to people who use them in a professional context; they are EXACTLY as performant on battery as they are on the wall, and not in a bad way. If you have a macbook pro, you can expect to tote it around and have full fat performance all day until your battery dies. There isn't a windows laptop around that can compete like that, not until the ARM devices get good.

I can confirm that the battery life is excellent. Unless I'm really hammering it, I can reliably get two days out of my MacBook Pro, which is pretty nutty because my previous Intel MBP wouldn't necessarily last a full day.

The other big difference for me is that it's pretty hard to get the fan to kick on so it's almost always completely quiet. Not having to put up with a noisy fan is another big benefit that's hard to exactly quantify, but on occasions where I use a Windows laptop and the fan spins up even doing something simple I'm definitely aware of it.

 

[mikegg]

Walmart is selling M1 Air for $699. Best Buy is selling it for $650 now. It's the best deal for a laptop, period.

Macbook SE for $750 - $799 should be on the menu. @Eug

 

[igor_kavinski]

Ah well now you can buy two and divide your tasks between them to make up for the RAM/storage deficit!

And you get an extra M1 SoC free!!!

 

[FlameTail]

Walmart is selling M1 Air for $699. Best Buy is selling it for $650 now. It's the best deal for a laptop, period.

Macbook SE for $750 - $799 should be on the menu. @Eug

Apple is coming after Microsoft for their bulk of laptops on the $500-$1000 segment

 

[FlameTail]

Walmart is selling M1 Air for $699. Best Buy is selling it for $650 now. It's the best deal for a

Only 8gb version? How much is the 16gb?

 

[mikegg]

Ah well now you can buy two and divide your tasks between them to make up for the RAM/storage deficit!

And you get an extra M1 SoC free!!!

Go use an 8/256 Macbook Air for a few weeks and come back here. If you don't do that, your opinions on this matter is pointless since you only have experience using crappy and slow AMD/Intel/Windows laptops on 8/256.

 

[Eug]

Walmart is selling M1 Air for $699. Best Buy is selling it for $650 now. It's the best deal for a laptop, period.

Macbook SE for $750 - $799 should be on the menu. @Eug

No, the M2 Air is the low priced model. They won't have a true SE model at least in the next couple of years, as that role is filled by the iPad. As much as I like the 12" size, I don't see them releasing another 11-12" MacBook anytime soon. And even if they did, it wouldn't be $799.

And as I've said all along, MacBooks go on sale all the time, but that doesn't count for retail pricing. Discontinued models like the M1 count even less. In fact, in terms of retail pricing, they've actually been going the other direction, further away from $799.

Old 13" model for US$999, current 13" model for $1099, and most recently (June 2023), the 15" model for $1299.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Modded M3 MacBook Air outperforms the more expensive M3 MacBook Pro — supercharged cooling solution delivers big performance

It takes this to get the M3 Macbook Air's performance to MacBook Pro levels of sustained performance.

www.tomshardware.com

I suppose MBA users don't care about sustained perf so Apple's chassis design is justified?

 

[Hitman928]

Modded M3 MacBook Air outperforms the more expensive M3 MacBook Pro — supercharged cooling solution delivers big performance

It takes this to get the M3 Macbook Air's performance to MacBook Pro levels of sustained performance.

www.tomshardware.com

I suppose MBA users don't care about sustained perf so Apple's chassis design is justified?

There’s clearly a trade off when buying a fanless laptop. If the sustained performance trade off for a zero noise cooling solution isn’t worth it to the user, buy something else.

 

[FlameTail]

AirJets, AirJets, AirJets,...

 

[Glo.]

No, the M2 Air is the low priced model. They won't have a true SE model at least in the next couple of years, as that role is filled by the iPad. As much as I like the 12" size, I don't see them releasing another 11-12" MacBook anytime soon. And even if they did, it wouldn't be $799.

And as I've said all along, MacBooks go on sale all the time, but that doesn't count for retail pricing. Discontinued models like the M1 count even less. In fact, in terms of retail pricing, they've actually been going the other direction, further away from $799.

Old 13" model for US$999, current 13" model for $1099, and most recently (June 2023), the 15" model for $1299.

For 599$ people will have M2 iPad Air, with vastly more software on it.

 

[Eug]

For 599$ people will have M2 iPad Air, with vastly more software on it.

Yup. No MacBook of any kind for US$799 or less retail anytime soon, but the M2 iPad Air will be released to meet those lower price points.

However, instead of an M2 iPad Air release at US$599 for 64 GB storage, I think it could get bumped to US$649 with 128 GB storage for the new base model (with the 64 GB model deleted).

This would follow a bump in storage to the iPad Pro. I'm thinking the new base model OLED iPad Pro 11.x" will be US$899 or $949 with 256 GB storage (with the 128 GB model deleted).

 

[soresu]

AirJets, AirJets, AirJets,...

I'm super sensitive to Noctua fan noise already despite basically everyone else being confused about it having not heard it themselves.

Given what I have heard about AirJet already vis a vis noise I am going to remain skeptical until I hear it in action.

 

[Doug S]

I suppose MBA users don't care about sustained perf so Apple's chassis design is justified?

I think many people value silence over performance, either because nothing they do is "slow" on today's hardware or the amount of time it takes is relatively immaterial. I remember a software developer once told me any compiler that finishes more quickly than it takes to go to the bathroom and get a fresh cup of coffee is pointless.

This was ~25 years ago when linking anything big would take multiple minutes - or longer if it was over NFS - so his workflow was probably messing with code for an hour or two until his coffee cup was empty and his bladder was full so he'd check where he stood with the compiler.