The thrill of Apple silicon is already gone

[kasakka]

There's more to building a pc than component prices and how easy it's supposed to be. You're glossing over a lot of market and manufacturer problems. Sorry.

None of this you have to deal with when you can just go to something like r/buildapc or whatever forum and ask if you don't know. They will point you to a good set of parts or might even have some "known good" options. It's not all that different from say following MacRumors buying guides.

With Apple you also end up with compatibility issues, whether it's a software not working with M series processors or a peripheral that refuses to work right due to Apple shenanigans. I mean there's lengthy threads of people trying to get their OLED TVs or ultrawides to work nicely with Macs where there's a lot of weird gotchas you won't find out from anywhere but...enthusiast forums like this one.

 

[sam_dean]

Let's be fair, the M1 MacBook Pro also has a 65W charger. The MacBook Air can get away with a cheaper 30W charger because the SoC will thermally throttle before stealing all the power from battery charging for a prolonged time. And perhaps MBA users don't mind longer charging times? Oh, and the M2 MBA with 10 GPU cores has a 35W charger (8 GPU cores only get you 30W). Apple is being a bit cheap here.

I highlighted the charger difference as an indicator that the Apple laptop consumes over half as less power.

Whether you see it as being cheap or not isn't my intent.

 

[Manzanito]

I hope you're right but I don't know if Apple is going to make a larger iMac with all the current economic and other issues going on. It would be risky to design and make something like this if it didn't sell. I suspect the starting price would be around 2k USD.

Is this the same apple that sells a monitor stand for a grand and a set of wheels for a friggin computer for 700$, and allegedly is aiming to sell an ar/vr for three thousand dollars we’re talking about?

 

[sam_dean]

Ok, but Apple’s been releasing ARM based devices pretty much continuously for 30 years now, since 1993 (all the NewtonOS devices, iPods, all iPhones, etc).

How orgasmic!

To think I was only talking about Macs and not the litany of other devices I was not talking about. I am so fortunate that people want to disrupt the stream of conversation by being off topic.

Hurray! Hurray!

 

[JonathanParker]

I am thrilled for 3nm

 

[Basic75]

I highlighted the charger difference as an indicator that the Apple laptop consumes over half as less power.

Whether you see it as being cheap or not isn't my intent.

But you can't just derive maximum or average power draw from the size of the charger. The 16" Intel MBP came with a 96W charger, the 16" M1 Max MBP comes with a 140W one. By that logic the Intel consumes less!

And it's "the Apple laptop consumes less than half", because "over half as less" doesn't work in English.

 

[sam_dean]

It was definitely manufacturing troubles bud. You can see it in the way they first "launched" 10nm chips as supremely supply limited tiny low power mobile parts and the fact they had to backport their 10nm to 14nm. You don't do that for fun and you don't do that while your competitor is nipping at your heels.

They definitely did rest on their laurels a bit while AMD was down which is why consumers were stuck on 4 cores max for so long but they definitely had 10nm manufacturing troubles.

Smaller players were able to deliver die shrinks within 12 months of schedule.

Why couldn't Intel?

Odds are they lied to save on capex.

From 2006-2020 Intel had all the PC OEMs as their customers. Making them a monopoly.

Apple left in 2020(?) because they were uniquely positioned to do so.

They already had priority to any leading edge die shrink. For decades they made sure their software is always Universal Binaries so it is easy to simply switch hardware platforms in months. iPhone money paid for over 90% of the R&D cost of developing their own chips. The less than 10% of additional R&D cost to add chip design requirements for a desktop OS is a trivial amount

In 2021 Intel miraculously was able to offer chips that are not on a 14nm process.

Coincidence? I think not!

For me the last good Intel Mac are 14nm chips from 2014-2015. If you are smart enough to buy and keep them until M2 was released in 2022 then you were very lucky.

 

[sam_dean]

But you can't just derive maximum or average power draw from the size of the charger. The 16" Intel MBP came with a 96W charger, the 16" M1 Max MBP comes with a 140W one. By that logic the Intel consumes less!

Its a simplified approach of measure.

If you want to spend the time and money to actually meter it at the wall socket then I await your anecdote.

 

[Philip Turner]

How about we quantify the power and price, so we have an honest answer comparing Mac to PC?

Device	Max Power	Compute Power	Cost
M2 SoC	~35 W	0.8 + 3.6 TFLOPS	$600 (Mac Mini)
M2 Pro SoC	~67 W	1.2 + 6.8 TFLOPS	$1,300 (Mac Mini)
M2 Max SoC	~96 W	1.2 + 13.6 TFLOPS	~$2,800 (Mac Studio)
M2 Ultra SoC	~200 W	2.4 + 27.2 TFLOPS	~$5,000 (Mac Studio)
RTX 4050	~130 W	~13 TFLOPS	~$3,00
RTX 4060	~170 W	~16 TFLOPS	~$450
RTX 4070	~220 W	~29 TFLOPS	~$700
RTX 4080	320 W	48.7 TFLOPS	$1,200
RTX 4090	450 W	82.6 TFLOPS	$1,600
Intel i3-13300HE	65 W	0.9 TFLOPS	~$150
Intel i5-13600K	181 W	2.0 TFLOPS	$320
Intel i7-13700K	253 W	2.4 TFLOPS	$410
Intel i9-13900K	253 W	3.6 TFLOPS	$590

* ~96 W (entire SoC), ~50 W (GPU only)

Next, we need the power and price of SSD, CPU RAM, thermal system, and case. That's already included with a Mac, but not a PC. For a fairer comparison, let's use the pre-built Alienware x17 R2 with an i9-12900HK and RTX 3080 Ti Mobile. To avoid generational advantage, use the M1-series Macs.

17" Alienwave x17 R2	16" M1 Max MBP
$3,799	$3,500
300 W	~96 W
18.71 TFLOPS GPU*	10.61 TFLOPS GPU

* The "mobile" RTX 3080 Ti is half as powerful as the desktop version.

 

[johannnn]

I'm so tired to these clickbait articles from people that expect earth shattering upgrades every single year.

Apple Silicon is awesome. I love my M1 devices.

 

[Zest28]

So it seems I was right. According to Dave2D, the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro has worse battery life than the 16" M1 Max MacBook Pro under heavy load. And it has a higher power drain too under heavy load.

But I was wrong that the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro would be noisy as it appears that Apple have changed the fan settings on the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro by allowing the machine to run hotter. So it will stay quite.

 

[jdb8167]

So it seems I was right. According to Dave2D, the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro has worse battery life than the 16" M1 Max MacBook Pro under heavy load. And it has a higher power drain too under heavy load.

But can the M2 Max also get more work done for the same battery as the M1 Max? It isn't just battery life but also how much work can be done with the same battery power.

 

[sam_dean]

So it seems I was right. According to Dave2D, the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro has worse battery life than the 16" M1 Max MacBook Pro under heavy load. And it has a higher power drain too under heavy load.

But I was wrong that the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro would be noisy as it appears that Apple have changed the fan settings on the 16" M2 Max MacBook Pro by allowing the machine to run hotter. So it will stay quite.

Any Mac with Apple silicon will run cooler and quiter than any PC.

So if you lean towards temp/noise at a sacrifice at clock/performance then 5nm M1 series.

When reverse then 5nm M2 series.

If you want both then wait for 2024 for the 3nm M3 series

 

[seek3r]

How orgasmic!

To think I was only talking about Macs and not the litany of other devices I was not talking about. I am so fortunate that people want to disrupt the stream of conversation by being off topic.

Hurray! Hurray!

I am on topic. You said you wondered if Apple got the idea to move to ARM from microsoft, what’s actually been happening is that Apple helped found ARM and then has been expanding it’s ARM usage up through its product stack for decades. And while Windows on ARM as a product has been around since 2011, Darwin on ARM as a product, which includes all iOS devices *and* Macs, has been around much much longer

 

[sam_dean]

I am on topic. You said you wondered if Apple got the idea to move to ARM from microsoft, what’s actually been happening is that Apple helped found ARM and then has been expanding it’s ARM usage up through its product stack for decades. And while Windows on ARM as a product has been around since 2011, Darwin on ARM as a product, which includes all iOS devices *and* Macs, has been around much much longer

You aren't.

ARM on the desktop wasn't in the cards and wasn't successfully executed by anyone else but Apple.

If it was then why not move from PPC to ARM back in 2005 with the first ARM Mac in Jan 2006?

I'm giving Microsoft its due by saying they popularized the concept of desktops using ARM chips. They just failed to execute after more than a dozen years.

 

[seek3r]

You aren't.

ARM on the desktop wasn't in the cards and wasn't successfully executed by anyone else but Apple.

If it was then why not move from PPC to ARM back in 2005 with the first ARM Mac in Jan 2006?

I'm giving Microsoft its due by saying they popularized the concept of desktops using ARM chips. They just failed to execute after more than a dozen years.

Dude…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risc_PC

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psion_Series_7

The Eidos Optima, which hit in many ways the same kind of niche the current Mac Pro with the afterburner card does

Just because you never heard of those machines doesnt mean they didnt exist and were popular relative to the markets at the times

 

[sam_dean]

Dude…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risc_PC

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psion_Series_7

The Eidos Optima, which hit in many ways the same kind of niche the current Mac Pro with the afterburner card does

Just because you never heard of those machines doesnt mean they didnt exist and were popular relative to the markets at the times

It isn't that I have never heard of them but the relevance of most of those failed attempts have little baring on ARM Macs.

Within the decade prior to the M1 only Microsoft showed any possible success of an ARM desktop.

In your head canon odds are you are right but for the tech business decisions at large see those links as largely failed endeavors.

So you do not reply with more proof I will give you a like to pacify you.

 

[sam_dean]

How about we quantify the power and price, so we have an honest answer comparing Mac to PC?

Device	Max Power	Compute Power	Cost
M2 SoC	~35 W	0.8 + 3.6 TFLOPS	$600 (Mac Mini)
M2 Pro SoC	~67 W	1.2 + 6.8 TFLOPS	$1,300 (Mac Mini)
M2 Max SoC	~96 W	1.2 + 13.6 TFLOPS	~$2,800 (Mac Studio)
M2 Ultra SoC	~200 W	2.4 + 27.2 TFLOPS	~$5,000 (Mac Studio)
RTX 4050	~130 W	~13 TFLOPS	~$3,00
RTX 4060	~170 W	~16 TFLOPS	~$450
RTX 4070	~220 W	~29 TFLOPS	~$700
RTX 4080	320 W	48.7 TFLOPS	$1,200
RTX 4090	450 W	82.6 TFLOPS	$1,600
Intel i3-13300HE	65 W	0.9 TFLOPS	~$150
Intel i5-13600K	181 W	2.0 TFLOPS	$320
Intel i7-13700K	253 W	2.4 TFLOPS	$410
Intel i9-13900K	253 W	3.6 TFLOPS	$590

* ~96 W (entire SoC), ~50 W (GPU only)

Next, we need the power and price of SSD, CPU RAM, thermal system, and case. That's already included with a Mac, but not a PC. For a fairer comparison, let's use the pre-built Alienware x17 R2 with an i9-12900HK and RTX 3080 Ti Mobile. To avoid generational advantage, use the M1-series Macs.

17" Alienwave x17 R2	16" M1 Max MBP
$3,799	$3,500
300 W	~96 W
18.71 TFLOPS GPU*	10.61 TFLOPS GPU

* The "mobile" RTX 3080 Ti is half as powerful as the desktop version.

Bottomline: Whole systems that are Macs uses less power in its totality & provides better performance per watt than just the listed PC components themselves.

What argument do you want to win here?

Better question... can you run a PC with just a GPU part or CPU part?

I'd like to apologize to you for wasting your time on this.

If you want to be a completist include total transistor count, node & month/year of commercial 1st shipment.

Design decisions made improvements that Intel/AMD could never ever commit to unless they change how their businesses work.

Qualcomm NUVIA is copy pasting Apple's playbook for the laptop space thus they're more likely to eat more into Intel/AMD's business.

 

[Philip Turner]

What argument do you want to win here?

Whatever argument is supported by evidence. I'm hoping to quantify some things said in this discussion, not take sides. For reference I think the Apple GPU architecture is the best out there. What we should really do is, find one specific mid-range DYI PC setup. Enumerate the cost of all parts combined. Then compare its GFLOPS + watts to a Mac with the same price. People often say "Macs are more expensive", "PCs have more compute power", "PCs require more energy" which doesn't provide much insight into "by how much"?

If you want to be a completist include total transistor count, node & month/year of commercial 1st shipment.

I was using similar nodes to create an accurate comparison. You usually compare what exists now, even if Apple's perpetually a node ahead. I couldn't find a decent RTX 4000-series laptop and the M2 Max just debuted. Therefore I rewind to 1 year in the past, and compare what exists "now".

 

[sam_dean]

Whatever argument is supported by evidence. I'm hoping to quantify some things said in this discussion, not take sides. For reference I think the Apple GPU architecture is the best out there. What we should really do is, find one specific mid-range DYI PC setup. Enumerate the cost of all parts combined. Then compare its GFLOPS + watts to a Mac with the same price. People often say "Macs are more expensive", "PCs have more compute power", "PCs require more energy" which doesn't provide much insight into "by how much"?


I was using similar nodes to create an accurate comparison. You usually compare what exists now, even if Apple's perpetually a node ahead. I couldn't find a decent RTX 4000-series laptop and the M2 Max just debuted. Therefore I rewind to 1 year in the past, and compare what exists "now".

Philip... spend quality in-person time with your loved ones rather than going down this rabbit hole. When you start doing tables on a spreadsheet then copy pasting them here is a sign that you need a time out on any online forum.

Does not make a diff that RTX 3090 part that performs similarly to a M1 Ultra's GPU will always consume 2x the power for roughly similar results.

Perhaps certain metrics PC part will outperform but odds are Apple designed their chips for specific known & popular uses cases.

For me these Macs are tools and not toys.

 

[Philip Turner]

Philip... spend quality in-person time with your loved ones rather than going down this rabbit hole. When you start doing tables on a spreadsheet then copy pasting them here is a sign that you need a time out on any online forum.

Your not my mom. I don't see how this argumentum ad hominem had any relevance to the conversation. I wish to put numbers to people's arguments, then see whether they actually hold up to evidence. Maybe yes, maybe no, but never assume!

Perhaps certain metrics PC part will outperform but odds are Apple designed their chips for specific known & popular uses cases.

Yes, they prioritized power efficiency over everything else, often sacrificing performance. The result is the industry's best battery life in a decent laptop.

 

[Philip Turner]

Nvidia's gotta start shipping nuclear power plants with their high-end GPUs, just so you can run em

Forget that, their low-end GPUs too!

 

[Philip Turner]

then copy pasting them here

If you discovered a way to copy-paste from a spreadsheet, please tell me how!

 

[sam_dean]

If you discovered a way to copy-paste from a spreadsheet, please tell me how!

Highlight spreadsheet cells

Click "Copy"

Move mouse to blank forum post

Click "Paste"

Post reply

 

[Philip Turner]

Highlight spreadsheet cells

Click "Copy"

Move mouse to blank forum post

Click "Paste"

Post reply

Oof.

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