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M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

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Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#391

Post by faeriechangling »

diffeomorphism wrote: post #34
pohl wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't prioritizing efficiency and thermals make sense for any device? Even a desktop has moments when it's doing almost nothing but has tasks that can adequately be handled by an E core where powering up a P core is overkill. Doesn't being efficient mean that more of the thermal budget can be held in reserve for when it's actually needed? Don't desktop users desire for their powerful machine to also be quiet?

Not really, no. Case in point: https://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Ryzen-9-7940HS-analysis-Ze... Adjusting the TDP from 80W all the way down to 35W costs you relatively little in performance and gives you about the same efficiency as an M2 Pro. That is not done because it does not sell. > Don't desktop users desire for their powerful machine to also be quiet? No. That is not an "also" but an "instead". People claim the…

>Same for "make it heavier but give me more battery life".

Consumers purchase large, heavy phones more than one would expect given their pricing and one of the reason they do so is that they have better battery life.

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#392

Post by mcphage »

whynotminot wrote: post #39
mcphage wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think you set your expectations too high. Well, they did announce it in an event called "scary fast". I mean there's always marketing exaggeration, but I did expect more than trying to understand if it's even faster at all . Otherwise I'm not entirely certain what the point was.

Literally the only point of confusion here is M3 Pro versus M2 Pro, where Apple seems to have simply made different choices around what the Pro chip should be. M3 Max is a massive gain over M2 Max. And M3 is a nice improvement over M2. Hope that helps.

That does, actually. Thanks.

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#393

Post by jeffbee »

camillomiller wrote: post #389
jeffbee wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these mainstream use cases? These always feel like they are chosen to demonstrate the processor's strengths, instead of talking about the ways the processor helps in real applications.

Is playing games with insane light effects and mesh shaded scenes on a family computer mainstream enough?

Not really? What are some examples of said games, which are available on macOS?

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#394

Post by Ographer »

bloopernova wrote: post #106
Ographer wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you name or link any specific hardware or software you're using? Last time I looked into how to run 2 monitors on my M1 Air I gave up after seeing $400 docks that seemed to have performance issues for some people.

I have this for my m1 pro: https://a.co/d/gD5q8G3 It uses the 6950 DisplayLink chip, which can do 4K@60Hz. It's 90 dollars and drives 2 screens. Software is less good. I had to enable Rosetta2 to get the pkg to install. Then you have to boot to recovery mode to allow signed 3rd party drivers. And you get a creepy notice that someone is watching your screen, which is how the display driver works. Performance is pretty…

Thanks, I'll probably end up trying this!

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#395

Post by _gabe_ »

BigJ1211 wrote: post #242
wtallis wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I honestly can’t remember the last time I was on Windows and performing an action failed to give me any visual indicator whatsoever that something happened I find that more often than not I can't make it through the Windows setup without worse janky stuff happening. Pretty often when toggling off all the bullshit privacy settings that shouldn't be opt-out to begin with, I'll get a visual indication of the switch st…

By default it jumps to the workspace that application is opened up on.

I’m not about to factory reset my machine to see what the defaults are, but I haven’t messed with any settings. It’s probably just another bug.

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#396

Post by DesiLurker »

deagle50 wrote: post #203
DesiLurker wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

have a handy link and few more sentences for my friend who does not gets it?

Search "M3 Pro" on Twitter and you'll see some decent comparisons.

you made the assertion so you provide the link, I am not doing this do your own research BS

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#397

Post by willseth »

mmcnl wrote: post #337
willseth wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a business decision. You don’t think Apple knows the demand for multiple external displays? If they thought it would sell more Macs, they would do it.

Ofcourse it's a business decision but it's one a lot of people disagree with. How can you keep repeating 99.9% of the customers don't care when it's one of the most repeated complaints on places like this over and over again? It's a stupid decision that doesn't make sense.

Hi, in case you forgot, you’re on an HN forum. That’s why 99.999% of people do not care about most things people here care about. Get some perspective.

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#398

Post by camillomiller »

jeffbee wrote: post #393
camillomiller wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is playing games with insane light effects and mesh shaded scenes on a family computer mainstream enough?

Not really? What are some examples of said games, which are available on macOS?

Stray, Resident Evil Village on iOS, Myst, Lies of P, and a long series of other games that will potentially follow because of this upgrades, and because Apple wants to make iOS - iPadOs - macOS a giant unified cross device platform powered by Metal and proprietary silicon that offers hardware accelerated ray tracing and mesh shading across the entire lineup.

In case you didn’t notice, A17 Pro on iPhone 15 has hardware accelerated ray tracing as well.

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#399

Post by euazOn »

Ographer wrote: post #89
euazOn wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sucks but at least DisplayLink works well enough. Driving 4 monitors this way with my M1 Mac Air with no issues.

Can you name or link any specific hardware or software you're using? Last time I looked into how to run 2 monitors on my M1 Air I gave up after seeing $400 docks that seemed to have performance issues for some people.

I was using a secondhand Dell D6000, hoping to connect one 4k monitor natively (dp alt mode) and the rest via DisplayLink. That didnt work, now I’m using cheap docks I bought for ~€50 secondhand from a company called i-Tec (have one at home and one at work).

The way I have it set up: the i-tec dock is connected to a regular USB-C hub (from Ugreen). The USB-C hub is also connected to a 4k monitor. This way I connect 1 cable to my Mac and get everything: power delivery, Ethernet, peripherals, 4k monitor running natively and 2 2K monitors running on displaylink. It is… perfect. I havent touched my desktop computer for about a year.

Basically it is better to use the Displaylink monitors for static content - running 4K video on a 4K monitor on Displaylink would probably take about 40% CPU on my M1 chip. So everything dynamic goes onto my native 4k monitor, whereas the Displaylink monitors have easier content - browsers, vscode, notes etc.

But like, I regularly also play video on my 2K displaylink monitors and honestly I never ran into issues, or noticed a difference. Just dont do this on 4k monitors I guess.

Sorry for the delay, still havent figured out a way to get notified about replies on HN.

Re: M3 Macs: there's more to performance than counting cores

#400

Post by euazOn »

mmcnl wrote: post #332
josu wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, you can actually use these dongles to connect more monitors. https://m1displays.com/

A DisplayLink is not a real dock. It's basically compressing the display output using the CPU and decompressing it using an external GPU in a box to output it to more displays. The performance is terrible, you get weird artifacts, there's lag, you can't use it for gaming, etc.

Sure, don't use it for gaming, but I wouldn't call it terrible. See my comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38131364
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