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Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

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Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re not the only one — but just curious where this skepticism comes from. This is M 4 — Apple has now made four generations of chips and each one were class leading upon release. What more do you need to see?

As demonstrated by the M1-M3 series of chips, essentially all of that lead was due to being the first chips on a smaller process, rather than to anything inherent to the chip design. Indeed, the Mx series of chips tend to be on the slower side of chips for their process sizes.

Show your work.

Most people who say things like this tend to deeply misunderstand TDP and end up making really weird comparisons. Like high wattage desktop towers compared to fan-less MacBook Airs.

The process lead Apple tends to enjoy no doubt plays a huge role in their success. But you could also turn around and say that’s the only reason AMD has gained so much ground against Intel. Spoiler: it’s not. Process node and design work together for the results you see. People tend to get very stingy with credit for this though if there’s an Apple logo involved.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, the $1599 M4 Pro Mac mini beats the current $3999 M2 Ultra Mac Studio on GeekBench 6 multi-core: https://www.macrumors.com/2024/10/31/m4-pro-chip-benchmark-r...

Yes, but I suspect the 64GB of memory in the studio compared to 24GB in the mini the is going to make that studio a lot faster in many real-world scenarios.

And the bandwidth. A M4 Ultra would be a nice upgrade for large LLM inference on a budget.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am still astounded the huge change moving from an Intel Mac to an Apple Silicon Mac (M1) has had in terms of battery performance and heat. I don't think i've heard the fans a single time I've had this machine and it's been several years. Nor have I had any desire to upgrade.

Lol ... You were not around for the ppc -> Intel change ... Same thing happened then ... Remarkable performance uplift from the last instruction set ... And we had Rosetta which allowed compatibility... The m1 and arm took power efficiency to another level .... But yeah what has happened before will happen again

Yeah, but that Rosetta was usually delivering "i guess it works?" results. It was so slow.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#294

Am I missing something? I don't know where this informations came from, but you can check out GeekBench v6 single-core benchmarks here. https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/singlecore

Something is fishy when the top two claim to be Android phones running Ryzen chips, and the third is allegedly a 13GHz Core i3.

Followed by an i9 with 5 cores and a multicore benchmark score of zero.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#295

I have been out of the PC world for a long time, but in terms of performance efficiency, is Apple running away from the competition? Or are AMD and Intel producing similar performing chips at the same wattage?

Apple is slightly pulling away. AMD's top desktop chips were on par with M1/M2/M3 1T but now they cannot match even M4 despite releasing a new design (Zen 5) this year. It's partially because AMD is on a two year cadence while Apple is on approximately a yearly cadence. And AMD has no plans to increase the cadence of their Zen releases. 2020 - M1, Zen 3 2021 - ... 2022 - M2, Zen 4 2023 - M3 2024 - M4, Zen 5 Edit: I a…

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Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#296

Am I missing something? I don't know where this informations came from, but you can check out GeekBench v6 single-core benchmarks here. https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/singlecore

Something is fishy when the top two claim to be Android phones running Ryzen chips, and the third is allegedly a 13GHz Core i3.

Gosh, back in my day, we were lucky to squeeze out a few extra MHz. The overclockers today must be really skilled.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something is fishy when the top two claim to be Android phones running Ryzen chips, and the third is allegedly a 13GHz Core i3.

Followed by an i9 with 5 cores and a multicore benchmark score of zero.

Probably crashed before it could complete the test.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#298

So what is the role of the Mac Studio now? It only has: - faster memory and up to 192 GB. - 1 ekstra Thunderbolt port. That is not much for such a large price difference: Mac Mini (fastest CPU, 64 GB ram, 1 TB SSD, 10 GbE): $2500 Mac Studio (fastest CPU, 64 GB ram, 1 TB SSD, 10 GbE): $5000

AFAIK, memory bandwidth. M2 Ultra 800GB/s, whereas M4 Max is just 546GB/s. For example, local LLM inference has a big bottleneck on bandwidth. 50% extra is significant.

I wish the Studio received an upgrade, with a new M4 Ultra potentially going over 1TB/s. It also offers better cooling for long computations.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like they were building an aarch64 image, building an x86_64 image on Apple Silicon will also be slow - unless you are saying the M* builds x86_64 faster than an i9?

Are you saying it's faster to build a binary with native architecture? Why is that?

Because there two ways to get to the same result:

- use native toolchain to produce artifacts for a different architecture

- use emulation to run different arch toolchain to produce different arch artifacts

First one is fast, second one is slow. In docker only second variant is possible.

Re: Apple's M4 Max chip is the fastest single-core performer in consumer computing

#300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, the $1599 M4 Pro Mac mini beats the current $3999 M2 Ultra Mac Studio on GeekBench 6 multi-core: https://www.macrumors.com/2024/10/31/m4-pro-chip-benchmark-r...

Back in the early 90s, when Apple was literally building their first product line with the Mac, they would come out with their second big honking powerhouse Mac: the Macintosh IIx. It blew everything out of the water. Then they would come out with their next budget all-in-one machine. But computing was improving so fast, with prices for components dropping so quickly, that the Macintosh SE/30 ended up as impressive a…

I owned an SE/30. I watched my first computer video on that thing, marveling that it was able to rasterize (not the right word) the color video real-time. I wish I had hung onto that computer.
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