Microsoft Says Windows Laptops With Snapdragon X Elite Will Be Faster Than M3 MacBook Air

[soheil21]

This line is completely wrong: "announce laptops powered by the Snapdragon X Elite later this year, including the Surface Pro 10" surface pro completely in tablet form factor and even from very first surface device, it design to have ARM. so when it's came with power of a laptop, and an operating system that prepared for acting in touch environment. so at least Microsoft riches to destination, which alows power user to interact with a touch device. something that never happens in ipad pros, even with more powerful processor, and even there is no solution for mac operating system for became touch friendly. so we can say even if apple win merly in performance and efficiency battle. Microsoft at least wins in provide pro device battle.

 

[MacDaddyPanda]

Intel really needs a giant pivot or they're gonna go the way of the Dodo.

 

[ApplesAreSweet&Sour]

Not if every year Apple keeps recycling the old year chip and adding a +1 to the name as it’s being doing since M1.

Facts.

And M3 MBA would be a huge step up if Apple could spend some of its trillions on some minor r&d to add one or two fans. Even just minuscule ones would greatly up performance.

But you gotta buy a "Pro" product to get that.

But even at $1599, it's still just M1 version 1.3.

Nice laptops. But the prices are predatory when considering value/$.

 

[Taipan]

I have no doubt that Microsoft can manage to make Windows run slow an M3 MacBook Air.

 

[Darren.h]

YES!! Loving the competition !!

 

[August West]

Still runs Windows though which is deal killer. I'd rather dust off my retired 2012 mini and run that with Catalina than go back to windows. It was Windows Vista 64 Pro which drove me to Apple in the first place.

 

[chucker23n1]

Not sure about Qualcomm SnapDragon, but i am running windows native ARM on Ampere 128 Core CPU (for development purpose) and this $4000 mashine run blazing fast, with Visual Code and GCC native support for ARM

Ehhhhh. The Ampere's single-core performance is really weak. Even the M1 is about twice as fast.

That leaves multi-core, which raises the question of just how often you're going to be using those 128 cores. Or even half of them.

Apple develops SoC’s for a reason. The inclusion of beefed up media engines with new encoders take over jobs that were previously CPU bound.


Example:
The end result is the job gets done quicker, in some cases dramatically so. If your video conversion is done quicker on an M2 vs an M1, are we to care whether it’s strictly the CPU that did it? Not to mention it does it while sipping battery power (comparatively speaking). The SoC’s are not standing still by any means, that’s the point I’m driving at.

Be that as it may, it is nonetheless noteworthy that per-clock improvements y-o-y used to be 12-20% each time (before the A9, they were sometimes even more dramatic), and have since gone down to basically zero. That's either a sign they're preparing a big change, or they've run out of steam.

 

[smulji]

Multicore performance is 21% better than the entry level M3

The SD X Elite is using a 12-core design with no efficiency cores (as far as I understand) vs the base M3 which is an 8-core design utilizing 4P cores + 4E cores. I'm surprised the multi-core performance is only 21% better considering it has 4 more cores.

 

[@Brett]

I thought ARM was trying to halt this chip due to the Qualcomm purchaser of Nuvia. Also weird MS bragging about a chip that is not theirs.

 

[jdb8167]

Facts.

And M3 MBA would be a huge step up if Apple could spend some of its trillions on some minor r&d to add one or two fans. Even just minuscule ones would greatly up performance.

But you gotta buy a "Pro" product to get that.

But even at $1599, it's still just M1 version 1.3.

Nice laptops. But the prices are predatory when considering value/$.

I buy MacBook Airs because they don't have a fan. Under no circumstances do I want an Apple silicon MBA with a fan.

 

[FrozenDarkness]

Love the competition.

Although I don't think the speed and power really matters anymore for most use cases. All the improvements are marginal for most normal workflows. Apple is ahead of the game on deep vertical integrations with the operating system and battery life. Microsoft will need to pull ahead on something like gaming

 

[smulji]

🤣🤣🤣​

By the time it comes out, it’ll already likely going to be outpaced by the M4 chip.

Not going to matter in the grand scheme of things. Windows dominates the business world and commands around 80% (if not more) of the traditional PC space and I don't see that changing for a while, if at all. Between MS' AI efforts and Windows on ARM PC's, I think 2024 is a great year if you're a Windows user or fan.

 

[The_Martini_Cat]

It feels like you are just being an Apple spokesperson here and ignoring a much larger context. Just because Apple focuses on performance per watt does not mean that everyone wants a computer whose focus is that. If that is the entirety of how a computer is judged than "who cares" makes sense. But if there is more factors than that, then "who cares" is just a dismissal.

Also, any other company who wants to sell a laptop has no choice other than to look to solutions that aren't Apple since Apple won't sell their chips to anyone. Therefore everyone else will focus to build the best machines they can. If they can't put together a laptop with a processing unit that is an efficient as Apple should they just not build computers anymore? Or perhaps they can distinguish themselves in other ways for users who don't want / can't get an Apple laptop for the hundreds of reasons that make a lot of sense?

If you’re Microsoft comparing against the low end Apple chipset that runs without a fan and saying you’re faster … obviously Someone is going to call you on it and the funny thing is they will be right.

 

[NT1440]

Ehhhhh. The Ampere's single-core performance is really weak. Even the M1 is about twice as fast.

That leaves multi-core, which raises the question of just how often you're going to be using those 128 cores. Or even half of them.



Be that as it may, it is nonetheless noteworthy that per-clock improvements y-o-y used to be 12-20% each time (before the A9, they were sometimes even more dramatic), and have since gone down to basically zero. That's either a sign they're preparing a big change, or they've run out of steam.

I think it’s too early to say, but I suspect Apple is doing a tick-tock like release cadence. M4 will determine whether my hunch is right.

That said, we’ve gotten a completely new microarchitecture for the M3 GPU, ray tracing, etc.

Apple is not standing still, and I think people who focus solely on the CPU are missing why these are SoC’s in the first place (not you chuck).

 

[Manzanito]

The benefits of Apple Silicon are performance combined with energy efficiency. It's not impressive to just beat Apple in the performance metric, you have to also do it in the performance efficiency metric. Otherwise, who cares?

Those who need pure performance?

 

[DarthDon]

The only reason to buy such a thing is to install Linux.

 

[NT1440]

Not going to matter in the grand scheme of things. Windows dominates the business world and commands around 80% (if not more) of the traditional PC space and I don't see that changing for a while, if at all. Between MS' AI efforts and Windows on ARM PC's, I think 2024 is a great year if you're a Windows user or fan.

Assuming everything legacy *actually works* (the whole reason why Windows dominates in business), sure.

I speculated upon the release of the M1 that Microsoft is likely going to have to split Windows into a consumer and a business version at some point in the future. There’s no way consumers are going to accept 5-6 hour battery life in laptops that drop performance by 50% when unplugged from power, while Mac’s are handily running full strength and nearly doubling the battery life.

I think Windows on Arm is going to be consumer facing in the long run, which raises some serious questions about their Enterprise business model in the long term.

Food for thought…

 

[Powerbooky]

The benefits of Apple Silicon are performance combined with energy efficiency. It's not impressive to just beat Apple in the performance metric, you have to also do it in the performance efficiency metric. Otherwise, who cares?

In my experience with Microsoft, the rule still applies: no matter how fast the next new cpu is, Windows OS will nullify that just as fast.

 

[snashbar]

Now if MS would just update their ARM version of Windows to actually run Windows based games... Half the XBox store games won't play on ARM processors...

 

[smulji]

I think Windows on Arm is going to be consumer facing in the long run, which raises some serious questions about their Enterprise business model in the long term.

Good point and you could possibly be right. Legacy matters far less in the consumer market.

 

[Arsenikdote]

If you’re Microsoft comparing against the low end Apple chipset that runs without a fan and saying you’re faster … obviously Someone is going to call you on it and the funny thing is they will be right.

I am not sure if you read the whole article, but people on this forum seem to be making this into something that it is not. MS looking at how in a specific area their devices might perform better than Apple's can absolutely be true and legit. It doesn't mean that in some super broad perspective that MS/Snapdragon is unilaterally "better". MS isn't talking about performance with or without a fan. MS isn't talking about efficiency. Changing the scope of someone's statement (in this case MS) to make a point isn't really a fair thing to do.

Does it mean they will be right about being faster? Nope, that will come later. But at least try and stick with the original story being reported on.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

Microsoft will advertise that its upcoming Windows laptops with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite processor are faster than the MacBook Air with Apple's latest M3 chip, according to internal documents obtained by The Verge.

"Microsoft is so confident in these new Qualcomm chips that it's planning a number of demos that will show how these processors will be faster than an M3 MacBook Air for CPU tasks, AI acceleration, and even app emulation," the report says. Microsoft believes its laptops will offer "faster app emulation" than Apple's Rosetta 2.

Introduced in October, the Snapdragon X Elite has Arm-based architecture like Apple silicon. Qualcomm last year claimed that the processor achieved 21% faster multi-core CPU performance than the M3 chip, based on the Geekbench 6 benchmark tool.

There are a few caveats here, including that Microsoft and Qualcomm are comparing to Apple's lower-end M3 chip instead of its higher-end M3 Pro and M3 Max chips. MacBooks with Apple silicon also offer industry-leading performance-per-watt, while the Snapdragon X Elite will likely run hotter and require laptops with fans. Since being updated with the M1 chip in 2020, the MacBook Air has featured a fanless design. Apple can also optimize the performance of MacBooks since it controls both the hardware and macOS software.

Nevertheless, it is clear that Apple's competitors are making progress with Arm-based laptops. Microsoft plans to announce laptops powered by the Snapdragon X Elite later this year, including the Surface Pro 10 and Surface Laptop 6 on May 20.

Article Link: Microsoft Says Windows Laptops With Snapdragon X Elite Will Be Faster Than M3 MacBook Air

All marketing lies, comparing a company's high end against Apple's lowest end. Sheesh. Let them compare against an M2 or M3 Max chip. Apple should quickly make an ad that segues From the MS ad into a comparison against an M3 Max MBP with 128 GB RAM. Like the old "I am a Mac... and I am a PC" ads.

 

[.wojtek]

I don't care about MS per se, but having non-Apple ARM device would be awesome as I would be able to switch to Linux full time finally

(Asahi Linux is still based on reverse engineering so there's that…)

 

[FCX]

Windows is the preferred OS for the vast majority of people, so Windows is an advantage.

I'd say Windows is the mandatory default OS for the vast majority.

'Preferred' assumes a strong affinity that doesn't seem to correlate with most consumers that I encounter.

 

[LeeW]

All good. An additional option is good for everyone.