Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#111

Post by throwaway84742 » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:29 PM UTC

monocasa wrote: post #87

A transition to aarch64 would provide a unique challenge to Apple. The other transitions (68k->PPC, and PPC->x86) brought with them nearly an order of magnitude increased raw performance, which let them paper over some of the emulation overhead in Rosetta or their 68k emulator. They won't have the same intrinsic benefit working for them this time; it's hard to beat Intel at raw performance, especially single threaded…

It’s doable for them. For one thing, even their iPhone chips are currently nipping at the heels of Intel’s low-tdp mobile CPUs, exceeding some ULV parts in performance. For another, they could just push all the difficult stuff into specialized coprocessors. Wrap that into system frameworks and nobody will ever know.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#112

Post by vsipuli » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:29 PM UTC

joezydeco wrote: post #74

uptown wrote: post #69

Tim Cook has repeatedly stated that the iPad is "the clearest expression of our vision of the future of personal computing" and Apple only sells around 4M Macs per quarter, while iOS devices dwarf this stat. If their plan is to continue moving users from desktop/laptop devices to their iOS ecosystem, and the software can be transformed to cross between both classes of devices, then it only makes sense to unify the pr…

I still expect that they'll offer devices in traditional form factors What are iOS developers supposed to develop on?

A Mac emulator running on iOS.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#113

Post by masklinn » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:30 PM UTC

Talyen42 wrote: post #7

I think this was inevitable given the insane YoY performance increase we've seen from A-series chips. Anyone want to chime in on why Intel can't get more than 5% YoY while Apple has been getting 30-40%?

Because x86 was technologically mature in the 90s (superscalar, OoO, vector extensions, …) and basically hit its frequency ceiling in the mid-aughts (modern Core-series finally have frequencies beyond what P4 reached back in 2005~2006 but it took a long time).

ARM was nowhere near there (for it had no need to) before modern smartphones. ARM in 2007 was single-issue in-order single-core topping out at ~600MHz.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#114

Post by cjensen » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:30 PM UTC

Tloewald wrote: post #23

searine wrote: post #3

Because that worked so well last time?

To what are you sarcastically referring? Apple's switch to PowerPC which gave them a performance lead over Intel for five years and kept them competitive for another five or Apple's switch to its own ARM Core designs which have given them a 12-24 month performance lead over the entire Android ecosystem? Bear in mind that Apple dominates the high-end desktop / laptop market, both in market share and profit share* whic…

He is referring of course to the PowerPC architecture. It did not have a performance lead over Intel for as long as you suggest. Even when it had a lead, it wasn't that big. (I bought the best G5 when it came out, so it's a painful memory)

The problem with switching to a different architecture is that if it falls behind Intel, people will say "not as fast as a PC." If you stay with Intel and it falls behind, people say nothing. It's risk vs. no reward.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#115

Post by OnMyPhone » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:30 PM UTC

jweir wrote: post #24

Apple does have a good record of moving their OS and software from different architectures. 68XXX to PPC to Intel was not a horrible experience. Having gone through three transitions I don't remember a lot of pain - but maybe I am repressing it!

I've been through the PPC to Intel migrations so many times for so many school districts that I'm still fairly amazed at how well it usually went as long as the apps weren't trash.

The biggest issues I ran into was always with the low quality edu based applications. So many of the issues we had with those apps were because they were created in Windows and ported half way to OS X, an old PPC version that did something special that the Intel version couldn't do, or the worst one using a special baked in version of Adobe Flash..

/shivers

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#116

Post by banachtarski » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:31 PM UTC

Talyen42 wrote: post #7

I think this was inevitable given the insane YoY performance increase we've seen from A-series chips. Anyone want to chime in on why Intel can't get more than 5% YoY while Apple has been getting 30-40%?

Standard math failure. It's the same with programming languages. I never trust anything that got a "2x" speedup because if a gaping optimization like that exists, it's likely not ready for prime time.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#117

Post by endorphone » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:31 PM UTC

zitterbewegung wrote: post #22

Talyen42 wrote: post #7

I think this was inevitable given the insane YoY performance increase we've seen from A-series chips. Anyone want to chime in on why Intel can't get more than 5% YoY while Apple has been getting 30-40%?

Because they have moved past the easy parts of optimization. Apple's optimizations still have thermal throttling issues (sustained use of an A11 will not beat an Intel chip due to better cooling and IPC). Compared to other ARM licencees they do beat the pants off of. This is probably why Apple put in a T1 chip and a touch bar in the Macbook Pro and the T2 chip (dedicated power module) in the iMac Pro. They are protot…

sustained use of an A11 will not beat an Intel chip due to better cooling and IPC

In an iPad profile sure the heat dissipation is very limited. With even a basic passive heat sink (not just a spreader, but actual fins for surface area), much less active cooling like most laptop and desktops use, and the heat profile dramatically changes.

This change was inevitable -- recent A## chips have been just astonishing for passively cooled chips. The state of the art in binary translation, and the support for cross compiling across architectures, makes this a very doable transition.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#118

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:31 PM UTC

joezydeco wrote: post #74

uptown wrote: post #69

Tim Cook has repeatedly stated that the iPad is "the clearest expression of our vision of the future of personal computing" and Apple only sells around 4M Macs per quarter, while iOS devices dwarf this stat. If their plan is to continue moving users from desktop/laptop devices to their iOS ecosystem, and the software can be transformed to cross between both classes of devices, then it only makes sense to unify the pr…

I still expect that they'll offer devices in traditional form factors What are iOS developers supposed to develop on?

[deleted]

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#119

Post by jluxenberg » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:32 PM UTC

pertsix wrote: post #66

lambda_lover wrote: post #45

> "A decision to go with ARM technology in computers might lend it credibility where it has failed to gain a foothold so far." > "Apple is working on a new software platform, internally dubbed Marzipan, for release as early as this year that would allow users to run iPhone and iPad apps on Macs" Two things here: 1) I'm OK with breaking the Intel near-monopoly on x86. I'm not OK with moving to a walled garden where Ap…

Not having to emulate iOS apps on macOS will be a boon for Xcode developers.

iOS apps do not run via emulation on macOS; they are compiled for x86_64 and run as a normal process.

Re: Apple Plans to Use Its Own Chips in Macs from 2020, Replacing Intel

#120

Post by lambda_lover » Mon, Apr 02, 2018, 6:32 PM UTC

dwighttk wrote: post #105

mmcconnell1618 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iOS Apps on MacOS is a good reason for Apple to incorporate touch screens. Today, they say the trackpad is superior because you aren't raising your hands up to the screen. Touch optimized iOS apps would be a compelling reason to include this feature and motivation for many people to upgrade their MacBooks. Also, the Microsoft Surface Book Pro has a detachable screen that is a stand alone tablet. What if Apple is desi…

Maybe a trackpad with a screen behind it. Apple already has an A series chip running the touchbar. Why not an iPhone under the trackpad?

I believe it's a T series, though your point still stands. I think I'd personally far prefer a display under the trackpad (though I don't think it's necessary at all) to a TouchBar or a touchscreen laptop. But I think I'm very much in the minority.