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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?

#511

Post by stinkbeetle »

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.

> Apple took the ARM base design (they licensed it), and then they modified and tweaked it.

More likely it was derived from PWRficient, or a clean sheet design that took lessons from it.

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

#512

Post by stinkbeetle »

NobodyNada wrote: post #332
lenkite wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hell, Apple CPU's are even optimized for Apple software GC calls like Retain/Release objects. It seems if you want optimal performance and power efficiency, you need to own both hardware and software. Looks like general purpose CPUs are on the losing train. Maybe Intel should invent desktop+mobile OS and design bespoke chips for those.

> Apple CPU's are even optimized for Apple software GC calls like Retain/Release objects. I assume this is referring to the tweet from the launch of the M1 showing off that retaining and releasing an NSObject is like 3x faster. That's more of a general case of the ARM ISA being a better fit for modern software than x86, not some specific optimization for Apple's software. x86 was designed long before desktops had mul…

> I assume this is referring to the tweet from the launch of the M1 showing off that retaining and releasing an NSObject is like 3x faster. That's more of a general case of the ARM ISA being a better fit for modern software than x86, not some specific optimization for Apple's software.

It's not really even the ISA, mainly the implementation. Atomics on Apple cores are 3x faster than Intel (18 cycles back to back latency vs 6). AMD's atomics have 6 cycle latency.

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

#513

Post by aurareturn »

Fluorescence wrote: post #481
aurareturn wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The industry has moved past Passmark because it does not correlate to actual real world performance. The standard is SPEC, which correlates with with Geekbench. https://medium.com/silicon-reimagined/performance-delivered-... Every time there is a discussion on Apple Silicon, some uninformed person always brings up Passmark, which is completely outdated.

Enough. You don't know what you are talking about. What's with posting 5 year old medium articles about a different version of Geekbench? Geekbench 5 had different multicore scaling so if you want to argue that version was so great then you are also arguing against Geekbench 6 because they don't even match. https://www.servethehome.com/a-reminder-that-geekbench-6-is-... "AMD Ryzen Threadripper 3995WX, a huge 64 core/…

GB6 measures MT the way most consumer applications use MT. GB5 was embarrassingly parallel. It reflects real world usage more.

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

#514

Post by throwawaylaptop »

olyjohn wrote: post #483
throwawaylaptop wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

It's probably the 2.4GHz WiFi transmitter interfering with the 2.4GHz mouse transmitter. You probably notice it during YouTube because it's constantly downloading. Try a wired mouse.

Interesting theory. The wired mouse is trouble free, but I figured that's because of a better sampling rate and less overhead over all. Maybe I'll try a bluetooth mouse or some other frequency, or the laptop on fired Ethernet to see if the theory pans out.

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

#515

Post by lights0123 »

dismalaf wrote: post #389
throwawaylaptop wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

You specifically don't want to use the bundled codecs since those would be CPU decode only.

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

#516

Post by throwawaylaptop »

dismalaf wrote: post #389
throwawaylaptop wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Im using Brave and it seems the enable hardware acceleration box is checked.

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

#517

Post by throwawaylaptop »

lights0123 wrote: post #515
dismalaf wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

You specifically don't want to use the bundled codecs since those would be CPU decode only.

Interesting. I'll look into that more.

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

#518

Post by sgerenser »

diffuse_l wrote: post #400
PaulRobinson wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

The thing about Apple having a “special license” due to being a partial founder of Arm is an urban legend. They have an architectural license, just like several other companies making custom Arm CPUs do.

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

#519

Post by jimbokun »

jonwinstanley wrote: post #185
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…

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…

Textbook Innovator’s Dilemma.

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

#520

Post by JustExAWS »

alt227 wrote: post #491
alt227 wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A huge reason for the low power usage is the iPhone. No, the main reason for better battery life is the RISC architecture. PC on ARM architecture has the same gains.

Any downvoters care to actually leave me a reply telling me why? Im not wrong!

Because it’s a take thst sounds like someone who has been reading comp.sys.mac.advocacy from 1995 when the PPC vs x86 wars were going on (and when PPC chips were already behind in performance) up through 2005 when Apple gave up and went to Intel.
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