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Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

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Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#381

Post by PaulRobinson »

alt227 wrote: post #361
PaulRobinson wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, but Apple Silicon is not a specialist chip in the way a SPARC chip was. It's a general purpose SoC & SiP stack. There is nothing stopping Intel being able to invest in SoC & SiP and being able to maintain backward compatibility while providing much better power/performance for a mobile (including laptop and tablet), product strategy. They could also just sit down with Microsoft and say "Right, we're goin…

> Right, we're going to go in an entirely different direction, and provide you with something absolutely mind-blowing, but we're going to have to do software emulation for backward compatibility and that will suck for a while until things get recompiled, or it'll suck forever if they never do For an example of why this doesnt work, see 'Intel Itanium'.

That's because the direction they took was awful. That does not mean other directions do not exist right now that they could raise money for and invest in.

The alternative is death - they do nothing, they're going to die.

Which option do you think they should take?

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#382

Post by anonymars »

deaddodo wrote: post #278
qcnguy wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the more relevant case for laptops is macOS, which is heavily optimized for battery life and power draw in ways that Linux just isn't, neither is Windows. A lot of the problems here can't actually be fixed by intel, amd, or anyone designing x86 laptops because getting that level of efficiency requires the ability to strongly lead the app developer community. It also requires highly competent operating system deve…

If x86 just officially said “we’re cutting off 32-bit legacy” one day (similar to how Apple did), they could toss out 95% of the crap that makes them power inefficient. Just think of the difference dropping A10 offered for memory efficiency. “Modern Standby” could be made to actually work, ACPI states could be fixed, a functional wake-up state built anew, etc. Hell, while it would allow pared down CPUs, you could hav…

> “Modern Standby” could be made to actually work, ACPI states could be fixed, a functional wake-up state built anew, etc. Hell, while it would allow pared down CPUs, you could have a stop-gap where run mode was customized in firmware.

I'm confused, how is any of this related to "x86" and not the diverse array of third party hardware and software built with varying degrees of competence?

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#383

Post by amazingman »

RajT88 wrote: post #366
ben-schaaf wrote: post #101

Battery efficiency comes from a million little optimizations in the technology stack, most of which comes down to using the CPU as little as possible. As such the instruction set architecture and process node aren't usually that important when it comes to your battery life. If you fully load the CPU and calculate how much energy a AI340 needs to perform a fixed workload and compare that to a M1 you'll probably find s…

> All that to say: M1 is pretty fast, but the reason the battery life is better has to do with everything other than the CPU cores. That's what AMD and Intel are missing. Apple is vertically integrated and can optimize at the OS and for many applications they ship with the device. Compare that to how many cooks are in the kitchen in Wintel land. Perfect example is trying to get to the bottom of why your windows lapto…

I remember a time when this was supposed to be Wintel's advantage. It's really strange to now be in a time where Apple leads the consumer computing industry in hardware performance, yet is utterly failing at evolving the actual experience of using their computers. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who would gladly give up a bit of performance if it were going to result in a polished, consistent UI/UX based on the actual science of human interface design rather than this usability hellscape the Alan Dye era is sending us into.

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#384

Post by jayd16 »

brookst wrote: post #344
stego-tech wrote: post #319

There’s a number of reasons, all of which in concert create the appearance of a performance gap between the two: * Apple has had decades optimizing its software and hardware stacks to the demands of its majority users, whereas Intel and AMD have to optimize for a much broader scope of use cases. * Apple was willing to throw out legacy support on a regular basis. Intel and AMD, by comparison, are still expected to run…

That sure sounds more like the reality of a performance gap than the appearance of one.

The broader audience/apples to oranges bit is fair. We're not choosing apple hardware for server. x64 is still dominant on the server with some cheap custom arm chips as an option, no?

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#385

Post by alt227 »

PaulRobinson wrote: post #381
alt227 wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Right, we're going to go in an entirely different direction, and provide you with something absolutely mind-blowing, but we're going to have to do software emulation for backward compatibility and that will suck for a while until things get recompiled, or it'll suck forever if they never do For an example of why this doesnt work, see 'Intel Itanium'.

That's because the direction they took was awful. That does not mean other directions do not exist right now that they could raise money for and invest in. The alternative is death - they do nothing, they're going to die. Which option do you think they should take?

> The alternative is death - they do nothing, they're going to die.

Thats a subjective opinion. Plenty of people still value higher power multi core chips over apple silicon, because they are still better at doing real work. I dont think they need to go in a new direction personally, but I was just showing an example of why your provided solution is not a silver bullet.

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#386

Post by throwawaylaptop »

rollcat wrote: post #268
ben-schaaf wrote: post #101

Battery efficiency comes from a million little optimizations in the technology stack, most of which comes down to using the CPU as little as possible. As such the instruction set architecture and process node aren't usually that important when it comes to your battery life. If you fully load the CPU and calculate how much energy a AI340 needs to perform a fixed workload and compare that to a M1 you'll probably find s…

> It's a fairly common issue on Linux to be missing hardware acceleration, especially for video decoding. I've had to enable gpu video decoding on my fw16 and haven't noticed the fans on youtube. I've worked in video delivery for quite a while. If I were to write the law, decision-makers wilfully forcing software video decoding where hardware is available would be made to sit on these CPUs with their bare buttocks. I…

I run Linux Mint Mate on a 10 year old laptop. Everything works fine, but watching YouTube makes my wireless USB dongle mouse stutter a LOT. Basically if CPU usage goes up, mouse goes to hell.

Are you telling me that for some reason it's not using any hardware acceleration available while watching YouTube? How do I fix it?

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#387

Post by [deleted] »

jayd16 wrote: post #384
brookst wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sure sounds more like the reality of a performance gap than the appearance of one.

The broader audience/apples to oranges bit is fair. We're not choosing apple hardware for server. x64 is still dominant on the server with some cheap custom arm chips as an option, no?

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#388

Post by dismalaf »

Apple designs their laptops to throttle power when they warm up too much. Framework gives theirs a fan.

It's a design choice.

Also, different Linux distros/DEs prioritize different things. Generally they prioritize performance over battery life.

That being said, I find Debian GNOME to be the best on battery life. I get 6 hours on an MSI laptop that has an 11th gen Intel processor and a battery with only 70% capacity left. It also stays cool most of the time (except gaming while being plugged in) but it does have a fan...

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#389

Post by dismalaf »

throwawaylaptop wrote: post #386
rollcat wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a fairly common issue on Linux to be missing hardware acceleration, especially for video decoding. I've had to enable gpu video decoding on my fw16 and haven't noticed the fans on youtube. I've worked in video delivery for quite a while. If I were to write the law, decision-makers wilfully forcing software video decoding where hardware is available would be made to sit on these CPUs with their bare buttocks. I…

I run Linux Mint Mate on a 10 year old laptop. Everything works fine, but watching YouTube makes my wireless USB dongle mouse stutter a LOT. Basically if CPU usage goes up, mouse goes to hell. Are you telling me that for some reason it's not using any hardware acceleration available while watching YouTube? How do I fix it?

Easiest way is to use Chrome or a Chrome based browser since they bundle codecs with the browser. If you're using Firefox, need to make sure you have the codecs. I know nothing about Mint specifically though to know if they'd automatically install codecs or not.

Re: Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

#390

Post by waffletower »

DanielHB wrote: post #280
jonwinstanley wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A huge reason for the low power usage is the iPhone. Apple spent years incrementally improving efficiency and performance of their chips for phones. Intel and AMD were more desktop based so power efficiency wasnt the goal. When Apple's chips got so good they could transition into laptops, x86 wasn't in the same ballpark. Also the iPhone is the most lucrative product of all time (I think) and Apple poured a tonne of t…

I don't think it is so much efficiency of their chips for their hardware (phones) so much as efficiency of their OS for their chips and hardware design (like unified memory).

The SoC benefits are being ignored by some people here. Apple doesn't control every piece of software as some here posit, however, OS optimizations and utilization of extra-efficiency cores (though still requiring SoC design they do also need specific OS code support) are part of the performance.
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