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Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

bloomberg.com

61–70 of 123 posts

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#61
post #60
post #59

Why is Bloomberg not mentioning that Google announced it was working on the same thing? They mentioned vaguely that Amazon and Google both were working on AI, but nothing about the seemingly similar TPU and how Google announced they were going to bring it to phones at I/O just a bit ago. Am I wrong to be thinking that's pretty relevant here?

Because Google's TPU is for servers and not for Mobile.

Because Google announced they were going to bring it to phones at I/O just a bit ago.

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#62
post #60
post #59

Why is Bloomberg not mentioning that Google announced it was working on the same thing? They mentioned vaguely that Amazon and Google both were working on AI, but nothing about the seemingly similar TPU and how Google announced they were going to bring it to phones at I/O just a bit ago. Am I wrong to be thinking that's pretty relevant here?

Because Google's TPU is for servers and not for Mobile.

Pretty sure they announced during I/O that they were working on making a TPU for mobile.

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#63
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't put an FPGA in a device you're going to sell 200M+ of. The cost per unit would be way higher than an asic, and your just going to come out with a better version next year anyway so why bother? I foresee it as similar to their M series co-processors - the first one was pretty basic, and more sensors and jobs have been given to the newer ones each year.

IIRC there's already an FPGA in the iPhone.

[deleted]

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#64
post #20

Knowing them this will be pretty good. The A10 is a beast.

Knowing Apple's (software) prowess in AI the end-result will still likely be shit compared to Google.

(I think what we are seeing here is the usual thing where Apple's software/product/design people decide the iPhone hardware roadmap, rather than the hardware people.)

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#65
It's nice that the article is trying to deliver an intro that explains that Apple clearly has some catching up to do.

Except that now I'm pretty baffled, since I've seen an article a few months earlier, that says Apple is massively investing in AI, and already using it in several places in their products.

So what am I supposed to believe now? :/

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#66
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't put an FPGA in a device you're going to sell 200M+ of. The cost per unit would be way higher than an asic, and your just going to come out with a better version next year anyway so why bother? I foresee it as similar to their M series co-processors - the first one was pretty basic, and more sensors and jobs have been given to the newer ones each year.

IIRC there's already an FPGA in the iPhone.

There is a tiny one in the iPhone 7. But, that's for flexibility on current tasks not future proofing.

In terms of AI there is little reason to run it on the phone unless it's heavily used or needs or be low latency. Consider if they add a 100$ of computing power to a phone that sits unused 99% of the time they can just build a server using those same 100$ worth of parts that can then serve 100 phones saving 90+$ per phone including upkeep etc.

PS: This is the same logic why Amazon Echo is so cheap, it simply does not need much hardware.

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#67

It's nice that the article is trying to deliver an intro that explains that Apple clearly has some catching up to do. Except that now I'm pretty baffled, since I've seen an article a few months earlier, that says Apple is massively investing in AI, and already using it in several places in their products. So what am I supposed to believe now? :/

As I understand it, Apple simply hasn't been able to provide the same quantity of training data that other companies use.

Re: Apple Is Working on a Dedicated Chip to Power AI on Devices

#69
post #66
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC there's already an FPGA in the iPhone.

There is a tiny one in the iPhone 7. But, that's for flexibility on current tasks not future proofing. In terms of AI there is little reason to run it on the phone unless it's heavily used or needs or be low latency. Consider if they add a 100$ of computing power to a phone that sits unused 99% of the time they can just build a server using those same 100$ worth of parts that can then serve 100 phones saving 90+$ per…

Privacy is another reason to keep the computation local.
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