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Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

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Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but I am pretty sure my chances of getting a mac in the future are zero Why?

Price for one, also I still consider PC and Linux (and god heavens even windows) more open than Mac. I also work with many windows-only automation software.

sorry but what's "PC" above, given it's not windows?

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#42
post #8

OK I love this, but I am pretty sure my chances of getting a mac in the future are zero. From which side should I expect the PC response? Intel? AMD? Microsoft? ARM? Samsung? I think Apple willingly or not has just obliterated the whole consumer pc market.

The new Ryzen mobile processors should be interesting. Their GPU drivers (while not of the best code quality) are in the mainline Linux kernel. So it all should just “work”

The new mobile chips are basically a mix of new and old stuff, with them rebranding ryzen 2 parts. Kind of disappointing.

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#43

OK I love this, but I am pretty sure my chances of getting a mac in the future are zero. From which side should I expect the PC response? Intel? AMD? Microsoft? ARM? Samsung? I think Apple willingly or not has just obliterated the whole consumer pc market.

You might have to bite the bullet and get a mac - I don't see much promise from others in this space.

Intel's CEO change may save them, but they're definitely facing an existential threat they've failed to adapt to for years.

Amazon will move to ARM on servers and probably some decent design there, but that won't really reach the consumer hardware market (probably - though I suppose they could do something interesting in this space if they wanted to).

Windows faces issues with third party integration, OEMs, chip manufacturers and coordinating all of that. Nadella is smart and is mostly moving to Azure services and O365 on strategy - I think windows and the consumer market matter less.

Apple owns their entire stack and is well positioned to continue to expand the delta between their design/integration and everyone else continuing to flounder.

AMD isn't that much better positioned than Intel and doesn't have a solution for the coordination problem either. Nvidia may buy ARM, but that's only one piece of getting things to work well.

I'm long on Apple here, short on Intel and AMD.

We'll see what happens.

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#44

[*Sure I get it, it's not interesting to talk meta about whether a post is interesting. I'm already downvoted off the planet. Fine.] I'm sure it's a good blog post for the right reader, but for something to land on HN front page, I generally look for either: 1) a story that, while specialized, reveals something accessibly technical and interesting to a semi-expert crowd, or 2) explains something at a sufficient level…

Are you saying this post is too nerdy for Hacker News ? Stories come all the time, if you don't like it don't read it. I didn't understand everything the author said, but I was able to get the gist of it. There GPU has a list of valid addresses and it's stored in a C style array with a terminator instead of a 1 indexed array with an object count in the Apple API style. The mismatch caused the author some confusion ev…

small correction: the author is a woman

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#45
post #31
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

M1 cores outperform Comet Lake cores and are basically tied with AMD Vermeer despite using a fraction of the power.

They are also on a different process shrug

Process node improvements don’ty bring that much performance.

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#46

[*Sure I get it, it's not interesting to talk meta about whether a post is interesting. I'm already downvoted off the planet. Fine.] I'm sure it's a good blog post for the right reader, but for something to land on HN front page, I generally look for either: 1) a story that, while specialized, reveals something accessibly technical and interesting to a semi-expert crowd, or 2) explains something at a sufficient level…

Are you saying this post is too nerdy for Hacker News ? Stories come all the time, if you don't like it don't read it. I didn't understand everything the author said, but I was able to get the gist of it. There GPU has a list of valid addresses and it's stored in a C style array with a terminator instead of a 1 indexed array with an object count in the Apple API style. The mismatch caused the author some confusion ev…

> even after he discovered

She, fwiw.

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#47

OK I love this, but I am pretty sure my chances of getting a mac in the future are zero. From which side should I expect the PC response? Intel? AMD? Microsoft? ARM? Samsung? I think Apple willingly or not has just obliterated the whole consumer pc market.

And Apple will court (allow) developers until competition shows up. Then they will shut it down and obfuscate. The fact that Apple refuses to provide FOSS drivers themselves indicates this.

Apple has never provided drivers for other operating systems, including windows. The drivers used for BootCamp aren’t even developed by them.

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#48
So Apple strategy seems to be to commit as little resources as possible to their products knowing that "open source" developers will do their work for free thus Apple will not have to pay extra salaries and taxes? I don't understand why people bother working for free to e.g. run Linux or even write a GPU driver? I get this is a nice developer challenge, and being involved with Apple stuff is still being seen as "cool", but why don't those developers actually support some truly open source projects instead of helping filthy rich company for nothing?

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#49

OK I love this, but I am pretty sure my chances of getting a mac in the future are zero. From which side should I expect the PC response? Intel? AMD? Microsoft? ARM? Samsung? I think Apple willingly or not has just obliterated the whole consumer pc market.

> but I am pretty sure my chances of getting a mac in the future are zero Why?

For me:

1. A huge catalog of apps and games, old and new, that are mostly windows and linux, but all exclusively x86.

2. I don't want to get locked in to an ecosystem with no variety. For example, if Dell's offering laptop has a keyboard I hate or poor selection of ports, then I can switch to Lenovo or HP or go for a gaming laptop with an Nvidia GPU and use it to train NN, etc, the variety is amazing. While if Apple's next machine has a flaw I dislike, then too frikin bad, I'll be stuck with whatever Apple bestowes upon me.

Re: Dissecting the Apple M1 GPU, Part II

#50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying this post is too nerdy for Hacker News ? Stories come all the time, if you don't like it don't read it. I didn't understand everything the author said, but I was able to get the gist of it. There GPU has a list of valid addresses and it's stored in a C style array with a terminator instead of a 1 indexed array with an object count in the Apple API style. The mismatch caused the author some confusion ev…

> even after he discovered She, fwiw.

Sorry. I completely forgot to check the byline.
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