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Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

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Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#371

Post by coder543 »

vmception wrote: post #230
modeless wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, that's actually a pretty big limitation. I guess it's tough to do 64 GB with their on-package unified memory. I wonder if they're working on a version with discrete memory and GPU for the high end? They'll need it if they ever want to get Intel out of the Mac Pro.

Let's think about that a little bit. If the RAM is fast and the SSD is fast and the virtualization options are limited, then this is good enough? Or, inspire me. Which processes really require occupying and allocating bigger blocks of RAM? I personally don't want to purchase another machine with 16gb RAM but that's mainly because I want the option of having a powerful Windows guest or two running at the same time. Bu…

SSD latency is still several orders of magnitude higher than RAM latency. Having similar magnitudes of total throughput (bandwidth) isn't enough to make RAM and SSDs comparable and thus remove the need for more RAM. Random access latency with basically no queue depth is very important for total performance. Certainly, SSDs are far better at this than hard drives were... but, SSDs still serve a different purpose.

Intel's Optane SSDs are based on a completely different technology than other SSDs, and their low queue depth latency is significantly better than any other SSDs out there, but good luck talking Apple into using more Intel stuff just when they're trying to switch away, and even then... just having some more real RAM would be better for most of these creator/pro workloads.

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#372

Post by aledalgrande »

modeless wrote: post #19

Huh, the form factors for the Macs seem identical. I expected them to be thinner or something. Fanless is nice for the Air. But I'm really waiting to see what they do on the high end with the top MacBook Pro and even Mac Pro. Will we see an Apple discrete GPU? I guess we'll have to wait a year or two for that.

not exactly the same, less ports

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#373

Post by wmf »

mortenjorck wrote: post #338
whynotminot wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SSD performance with their integrated IO controller might close the gap here, the same way that pretty fast storage on their iPhones makes the lack of RAM there not so debilitating. But yeah, agreed that not having a 32GB option is somewhat disappointing. (sent from my MacBook Pro with 32GB of RAM)

This is an interesting line of inquiry. In the gaming console world, a similar principle has been explicitly espoused by Sony in the decision to only go with 16GB of RAM (a smaller factor increase than any previous generation) for the Playstation 5, as the speed of its custom SSD architecture should in theory make that 16GB go a lot further than it would have with a more traditional design.

And then PS5 load times are worse than Series X. Whoops.

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#374

Post by bredren »

bredren wrote: post #214
greenpresident wrote: post #89

Max 16GB of RAM on these new machines is really not that great to be honest. The mini supported up to 64GB before.

For reference, I have a maxed 2018 mini I've upgraded twice -> 32GB then to 64GB. Amazon price for 2x32gb modules is lower than it ever has been as of today ($218.58) [1] and I have had no problem making full use of that memory in MacOS. [2] [1] https://camelcamelcamel.com/product/B07ZLCC6J8 [2] https://i.imgur.com/BDWrGw3.png

A bit more: I also run the blackmagic rx580 egpu to the XDR pro display. The system outperforms the current entry Mac Pro in geekbench 5.

So I def have eyes on the new mini. My suspicion is the rx580 will still provide 2x or more graphical power than any of these machines.

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#375

Post by saagarjha »

lowbloodsugar wrote: post #305
greenpresident wrote: post #89

Max 16GB of RAM on these new machines is really not that great to be honest. The mini supported up to 64GB before.

Right? "Oh we can't give you a 64GB MBP because Intel can't use low power dram yet". Launches Apple Silicon with 16Gb.

> Launches

They purposefully launched with consumer-level hardware. There is no way that the "real" pro machines will not let you ratchet all those specs up.

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#376

Post by entropea »

highfrequency wrote: post #22
dreamer7 wrote: post #12

The iPhone-like speed of waking up from sleep itself is enough to convince many of us to go for the M1 macbooks

How long does it take the current gen of macbooks to wake from sleep, ~1 second?

With two external displays plugged in, 10-15 seconds, sometimes more. Without any, 1-2 seconds.

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#378

Post by BossingAround »

Skunkleton wrote: post #308
vmception wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's think about that a little bit. If the RAM is fast and the SSD is fast and the virtualization options are limited, then this is good enough? Or, inspire me. Which processes really require occupying and allocating bigger blocks of RAM? I personally don't want to purchase another machine with 16gb RAM but that's mainly because I want the option of having a powerful Windows guest or two running at the same time. Bu…

I have a project that won’t compile on systems with less than 32 GiB of RAM, and I refuse to refactor the hideously overgrown C++ template magic that landed me here.

I suspect "Apple silicon" will not really be very suitable for software engineering.

Re: Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers

#379

Post by Dunedan »

wmf wrote: post #342
Dunedan wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Considering the fact that the RAM won’t be upgradeable (it’s part of the SoC) While I agree that RAM won't be upgradeable (as it hasn't been in all new models the past few years), are you sure that the RAM is part of the SoC? I believe what they labelled with "DRAM" in the M1 schmatics is very likely the L3 cache instead. Adding RAM to the SoC would make little sense from a cost and yield perspective. I also believ…

It's on the SoC package not the die, just like in phones.

Thanks for pointing out. My bad.

Here is a picture of the SoC with the 16GB of DDR4 RAM: https://www.apple.com/v/mac/m1/a/images/overview/chip__fffqz...

And here is the picture which confused by and tricked me into thinking the OP talked about the RAM integrated into the CPU (although upon closer inspection that picture also seems to cover the whole SoC package): https://www.apple.com/v/mac/m1/a/images/overview/chip_memory...

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