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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

#301

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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.

If it's a M1 Macbook Air there's a very good reason you've never heard a fan! Blows my mind how it doesn't even have a fan and is still rarely even anything above body temperature. My 2015 MBP was still going strong for work when I bailed on it late last year but the transition purely on the heat/sound emitted has been colossal.

It's not just that; at times I pushed all CPU cores to 100% in the M1 Mini and even after 30+ minutes I couldn't hear the fan. Too bad the Macbook Airs got nothing but a literal aluminium sheet as cooling solution.

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

#302

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Those MacBooks were designed when Intel was promising new, more efficient chips and they didn’t materialize. Apple was forced to use the older and hotter chips. It was not a good combination.

Another factor might be that Intel MacBook Pros got thinner and thinner. The M1 MBP was quite a bit thicker than its Intel predecessors, and I think the form factor has remained the same since then.

Yes, but I had about every generation of intel MPB - it never was as good at it as M1 MBP.

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

#303

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I was looking into this recently as my M1 Max screen suddenly died out of the blue within warranty and Apple are complete crooks wrt honouring warranties. The AMD mobile chips are right there with M3 for battery life and have excellent performance only I couldn't find a complete system which shipped with the same size battery as the MBP16. They're either half or 66% of the capacity.

> and Apple are complete crooks wrt honouring warranties Huh? I've used AC for both MBP and iPhones a number of times over the years, and never had an issue. They are known for some of the highest customer ratings in the industry.

10 years ago, the Genius Bar would fix my problem to my satisfaction in almost no time -- whether or not I had Apple Care. They'd send it off for repair immediately or fix it in less than an hour. 2 out of 3 iPhone 6 that had an issue, they just handed me a new device.

Today, Apple wastes my time.

Instead of the old experience of common sense, today the repair people apparently must do whatever the diagnostic app on the iPad says. My most recent experience was spending 1.5 hours to convince the guy to give me a replacement Airpods case. Time before that was a screen repair where they broke a working FaceID ... but then told me the diagnostics app told them it didn't work, so they wouldn't fix it.

I'm due for another year of AppleCare on my MBP M1, and I'm leaning towards not re-upping it. Even though it'd be 1/20th of the cost of a new one, I don't want to waste time arguing with them anymore.

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

#304

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It might be different post-Intel? I'm too lazy to dig up sources for Apple's past lost class action lawsuits, etc. That Rossman guy, the internet-famous repairman, built his youtube channel on videos about Apple's inadequate thermal management. They're probably still archived on his channel. Hell, I haven't owned a Mac post the year 2000 that didn't regularly hit temperatures above 90 celsius.

Do you disagree with Intel's stated Tjunction, or disagree that Intel is capable of controlling clocks to remain within its stated thermal limits? Like even with Intel chips that actually died early en masse (13th and 14th gen), the issue wasn't temperature.

2x correct amount of thermal paste... not good.

Insufficient airflow from blowers... not good.

110 celsius heat... not good for lead-free solder... not good for computer.

This whole thread is starting to feel surreal to me. Pretty soon everyone will have me believing I dreamt up Apple's reputation for bad thermal management.

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

#305

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I do wonder if PC desktops will eventually move to a similar design. I have a 7800x3d on my desktop, and the thing is a beast but between it and the 3090 I basically have a space heater in my room

I sincerely believe that the market for desktop PCs is completely coopted by the gaming machines. They do not care one whit about machine size or energy efficiency, with only one concern in mind: bare performance. This means they buy ginormous machines, incredibly inefficient CPUs and GPUs, with cavernous internals to chuck heat out with no care for decibels. But they spend voriously. And so the desktop PC market is…

Well because that's the audience that upgrades before something breaks and also lets you capture high-end market of professionals.

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

#306
post #73

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M3 Pro user here, agree with the same points. It's nice to be able to actually have your laptop on your lap, without burning your legs.

ARM processors have always been good at handling heat and low power (like AWS Graviton), but what laptop did you have before that would overheat that much during normal usage? That seems like a very poor design.

I had a MBP 2019 which with default fan settings was really hot from the 1h videocall in Bluejeans. Or 5 minutes navigating in Google maps and street view in Chrome.

Only solution was to increase fan speed profile to max rpm.

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

#307

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I sincerely believe that the market for desktop PCs is completely coopted by the gaming machines. They do not care one whit about machine size or energy efficiency, with only one concern in mind: bare performance. This means they buy ginormous machines, incredibly inefficient CPUs and GPUs, with cavernous internals to chuck heat out with no care for decibels. But they spend voriously. And so the desktop PC market is…

Yeah. It's been the case for a while now that if someone just wants a general computer, they buy a laptop (even commonly a mac). That's why the default advice if you're looking for 'value' is to buy a gaming console to complement your laptop. Both will excel at their separate roles for a decade without requiring much in the way of upgrades. The desktop pc market these days is a luxury 'prosumer' market that doesn't r…

Unless you play games where you stare at the map while balancing exel spreadsheets.

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

#308

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> and Apple are complete crooks wrt honouring warranties Huh? I've used AC for both MBP and iPhones a number of times over the years, and never had an issue. They are known for some of the highest customer ratings in the industry.

They claimed that it wasn't covered because the machine was brought in Germany. I live in The Netherlands and brought it here. Also I contacted Apple Support to checked my serial number and then gave me the address to take it to. Which I did. They charged me $100 to get my machine back without repair. Also bear in mind that the EU is a single market, warranties etc are, by law, required to be honoured over the ENTIRE…

I had a Macbook Pro 2018 that a friend of mine bought for me in Moscow because it was much cheaper there (due to grey import, I think). I didn't have Apple Care or anything. When its touchbar stopped working in 2020, I brought it to Apple Store in Amsterdam and complained about it and also about faulty butterfly keys (one keycap fell off, "t" and "e" key were registering double presses each time). So the guys at Apple Store simply took it and replaced the whole top case so I've got a new keyboard, new touchbar, and - the best part - a new battery.

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

#309

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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…

> Back in the early 90s, when Apple was literally building their first product line with the Mac,

cough

like saying, "Back in the 70s with Paul McCartney's first band, Wings (...)"

kids? get off my lawn

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

#310
post #202

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I'm not sure why you think it would be worse than a MacBook Air which literally has no fan

Are the new MacBook Airs the ones that have throttling issues due to heat?

Yes, but you only really encounter that when pushing the CPU to 100% for more than a few minutes. The cooling is objectively terrible, but still easily enough for most users, that's the crazy thing.
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