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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?

#391

Post by bitwize »

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…

Microsoft is pushing "Modern Standby" over actual sleep, so laptops can download and install updates while closed at night.

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

#392

Post by jhoechtl »

zipityzi wrote: post #290
DanielHB wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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).

It is likely the hardware effiency of their chips. Apple SoCs running industry-standard benchmarks still run very cool, yet still show dominant performance. The OS efficiency helps, but even under extreme stress tests like SPEC, the Apple SoCs dominate in perf & power. See Lunar Lake on TSMC N3B, 4+4, on-package DRAM versus the M3 on TSMC N3B, 4+4, on-package DRAM: https://youtu.be/ymoiWv9BF7Q?t=531 The 258V (TSMC N3…

> It is likely the hardware effiency of their chips. Apple SoCs running industry-standard benchmarks still run very cool, yet still show dominant performance

Dieselgate?

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

#393

Post by cesarb »

mschuster91 wrote: post #153
Rohansi wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A big thing is storage. Apple uses extremely fast storage directly attached to the SoC and physically very very close. In contrast, most x86 systems use storage that's socketed (which adds physical signal runtime) and that goes via another chip (southbridge). Why would PCIe SSDs need to go through a southbridge? The CPU itself provides PCIe lanes that can be used directly. > That means, unlike Mac devices that can…

> The CPU itself provides PCIe lanes that can be used directly. It does, but if you look at the mainboard manuals of computers, usually it's 32 lanes of which 16 go to the GPU slot and 16 to the southbridge, so no storage directly attached to the CPU. Laptops are just as bad. Intel has always done price segmentation with the number of PCIe lanes exposed to the world. Threadripper AMD CPUs are a different game, but I'…

> It does, but if you look at the mainboard manuals of computers, usually it's 32 lanes of which 16 go to the GPU slot and 16 to the southbridge, so no storage directly attached to the CPU.

AFAIK that's not the case at least on AMD (not Threadripper, but the mainstream AM5 socket). They have 28 lanes of which 16 go to the GPU slot, 4 go to the southbridge, 4 are dedicated to M.2 NVMe storage, and 4 go to either another PCIe slot or another M.2 NVMe storage. See for a random example this motherboard manual https://download.asrock.com/Manual/B650M-HDVM.2.pdf which has a block diagram on page 8 (page 12 of the PDF).

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

#394

Post by bob1029 »

In the general case, it appears to be impossible to beat a hardware vendor that is also entirely in charge of the operating system and much of the software on top of that (e.g. safari).

In special cases, such as not caring about battery life, x86 can run circles around M1. If you allow the CPU rated for 400W to actually consume that amount of power, it's going to annihilate the one that sips down 35W. For many workloads it is absolutely worth it to pay for these diminishing returns.

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

#395

Post by KingOfCoders »

KingOfCoders wrote: post #255
aurareturn wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great. Here's what you're getting between an M4 Max vs an AMD AI 395+: https://imgur.com/a/yvpEpKF And of course, the Mac Studio itself is a much more capable box with things like Thunderbolt5, more ports, quieter, etc. I can see why some people would choose the AMD solution. It runs x86, works well with Linux, can play DirectX games natively, and is much cheaper. Meanwhile, the M4 Max performs significantly better,…

AMD 395+/ Cachyos MT Geekbench 6 25334 - not sure where you get your Geekbench number from for the 395+ You: "If it helps you focus on what the actual discussion, we are comparing maximum CPU and GPU speeds for the dollar." You: "Mac Studio itself is a much more capable box with things like Thunderbolt5, more ports, quieter"

Source: https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/13318696

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

#396

Post by remify »

maxsilver wrote: post #374

> Why haven’t AMD/Intel been able to catch up? Is x86 just not able to keep up with the ARM architecture? When can we expect a x86 laptop chip to match the M1 in efficiency/thermals?! AMD kind of has, the "Max 395+" is (within 5% margin or so) pretty close to M4 Pro, on both performance and energy use. (it's in the 'Framework Desktop', for example, but not in their laptop lineup yet) AMD/Intel hasn't surpassed Apple…

I've got an AMD Ryzen 9 365 processor on my new laptop and I really like it. Huge autonomy and good performance when needed, it's comparable to the M3 version (not the Max).

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

#397

Post by E39M5S62 »

akho wrote: post #295
loudmax wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These figures are very plausible. Most Linux distros are terribly inefficient by default. Linux can actually meet or even exceed Window's power efficiently, at least at some tasks, but it takes a lot of work to get there. I'd start with powertop and TLP. As usual, the Arch wiki is a good place to find more information: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Power_management

Those numbers would imply 50W consumption at idle (for typical battery capacities). That's insane. I've used Linux laptops since ~2007, and am well aware of the issues. 12x is well beyond normal.

At least on Thinkpads over the years, I've never seen anything remotely close to that either. I've had my Thinkpad x260 power draw down to 2.5 watts at idle, and around 4 or 5 watts with a browser and a few terminals open. That was back in 2018! With the hot-swappable battery on the back, I could go for 24 hours of active use without concern.

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

#398

Post by ryao »

musicale wrote: post #103
pengaru wrote: post #22

My M1 Macbook Pro I used at work for several months until the Ubuntu Ryzen 7 7840U P14s w/32GB RAM arrived didn't seem particularly amazing. The only real annoying thing I've found with the P14s is the Crowdstrike junk killing battery life when it pins several cores at 100% for an hour. That never happened in MacOS. These are corporate managed devices I have no say in, and the Ubuntu flavor of the corporate malware i…

> That never happened in MacOS Oh you've gotten lucky then. Or somehow disabled crowdstrike.

That could be because crowdstrike is not inside the XNU kernel anymore:

https://www.crowdstrike.com/en-us/blog/crowdstrike-supports-...

They happily implement a userland version on macOS, but then claimed that being in the kernel is absolutely necessary on Windows after they disabled all Windows machines using it.

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

#399

Post by Hikikomori »

aurareturn wrote: post #272
Fluorescence wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a waste of time. "directionally correct"... so you don't know and made up some numbers? Great. AMD doesn't "endorse benchmarks" especially not fucking Geekbench for multi-core. No-one could because it's famously nonsense for higher core counts. AMD's decade old beef with Sysmark was about pro-Intel bias.

"directionally correct"... so you don't know and made up some numbers? Great. I never said it was exactly that size. Apple keeps the sizes of their base, Pro, and Max chips fairly consistent over generations. Welcome to the world of chip discussions. I've never taken apart and M4 Pro computer and measured the die myself. It appears no one has on the internet. However, we can infer a lot of it based on previously know…

Your source is an article based on someone finding a Geekbench result for a just released CPU and you somehow try to say its from AMD itself and its an endorsed benchmark, huh.

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

#400

Post by diffuse_l »

PaulRobinson wrote: post #342
skeezyboy wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The M1 and M2 were beating the best-in-class i7 when they were relased IIRC

Apple took the ARM base design (they licensed it), and then they modified and tweaked it. You get the ARM ISA, and compilers that work for ARM will compile to Apple Silicon. It's just that the actual hardware you get, is better than the base design, and therefore beats other ARM processors in benchmarks.

It's more than that. They have an unlimited license to arm designs, and can change them as they see fit, since they were an early investors (or something along those lines). Other manufacturers can't get these terms, or if they can, it will be prohibtly expensive
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