Can the M1 chip really beat Intel? Apple's actions suggest otherwise
Early this morning, Apple released its first self-developed arm architecture chip designed for the PC platform Apple M1, and used this chip to partially replace the Intel processor on the original MacBook. Officials also claim that it will improve performance over Intel's tenth generation Core IceLake (MacBook Pro 13 2020 i5-1035G1) by nearly three times.
So many netizens were surprised: Is it true that Apple's first PC chip has put Intel, the industry's big brother, on the ground? In fact, after careful examination, it is not true.
Brand new name, actually vest
Apple's first Apple Silicon product was not named the A14X or A14T as expected, but was given a new family name - Apple M1. But its 4 big core 4 small core 8 core GPU structure obviously exposed everything, this specification and the current A12X\/A12Z is the same, and there is no core number of improvement, combined with its 5nm process, it can be inferred that this should be the A14X vest that will be carried on the new iPad Pro next year.
However, Apple M1 chip is still remarkable in terms of integration, it is based on TSMC's N5 process manufacturing, integrated 16 billion transistors, an increase of 35% compared with A14's 11.8 billion (corresponding to two more CPU cores and four GPU cores), and basically the same as Huawei Kirin 9000's 15.3 billion.
Several times the upgrade, is still low
Although Apple claims that the new M1 chip has several times the performance of the previous processor, in the purchase page of the official MacBook Pro, only the low-configuration version uses the M1 chip; The premium version is still powered by the Intel i5-1038NG7 processor and is much more expensive. It's a similar story on the Mac mini, which is still powered by an eighth-generation Intel six-core i5 processor. It can be seen that Apple still regards the Intel processor version as high-end, which can not help but make people doubt the moisture of the M1 chip propaganda.
They're all called M1. They're not the same
The three terminal devices brought by this conference - MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini are equipped with models called Apple M1 chips, but the performance gap between them is not small.
First of all, according to the official website information shows that the number of CPU cores of the MacBook Air standard version is the same as that of the high version, while the GPU part has castrated a core, and its graphics performance must be reduced, and whether there is a difference in frequency is temporarily unknown.
Second, the previous generation of the Air and the entry-level Pro core specifications are also very close, but the main factor leading to the performance difference is heat dissipation. However, the new MacBook Air is also a fanless design, according to the previous generation of heat dissipation performance speculated that the probability of TDP is also near 10W, compared with the graphical performance of IceLake 4 times 5 times the improvement how to see is too exaggerated. After careful confirmation, it was found that this data was indeed obtained by Apple in the non-daily scene of \"3D subtitle rendering speed\
Moreover, the MacBook Air's standard adapter power is only 30W, while the MacBook Pro equipped with the \"same\" chip is equipped with 61W, which also proves that the M1 chip performance and power consumption gap of the two computers is not small, let alone the quasi-desktop platform Mac mini.
The real highlight is not the performance
Many people are too concerned about the performance of Apple's first self-developed PC chip, perhaps because it has long led the industry in the mobile phone and tablet market.
In addition, it is worth mentioning that the Apple M1 chip can also support Intel has been proud of the Thunder 3 standard, possibly because Apple is also one of the thunder protocol co-developers, no additional licensing is required. However, it should be noted that the M1 version of the MacBook only offers two lightning ports, rather than the Intel version of four.
summarize
It is true that Apple's promotion of the performance of the M1 chip has certain cheating and gimmicks, but it does have the incomparable advantages of the traditional X86 Win platform. From now on, Apple can design PC chips according to its own ideas, and then adapt software and establish an ecosystem, rather than the same heap of cpus and Gpus, which will undoubtedly bring a new landscape to the increasingly silent PC industry. I personally would like to believe that it is precisely because this chip is of great significance to Apple's future development that it will attract as much attention from consumers and developers as possible with this seemingly \"unmoral\" comparison