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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

#481

Post by pipodeclown »

bogeholm wrote: post #460
sho_hn wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this rings true. I'm not an Apple customer, but I certainly remember the days when Mac users had to justify the much worse bang-for-the-buck of Apple hardware (then) with it being the only ticket to their preferred software experience. These days it appears more that the hardware is fantastic, especially in the laptop form factor and thermal envelope, and perhaps the downside is a languishing macOS.

I use macOS daily for dev and office work, and to me it doesn’t feel languishing at all. Add Homebrew and Docker or Podman, and we’re off. The only places I can see there could be features missing are: - IT management type stuff where it looks like Apple are happy just delegating to Microsoft (eg. my workstation is managed with InTune and runs Microsoft Defender pushed by IT), - CUDA support if you’re into AI on NVID…

Just basic customisation functionality is missing in MacOS. Recently bought a MacBook and am constantly amazed about the stuff you can't do. Oh you want do use normal scrolling on your external Bluetooth mouse (like everybody that uses a mouse does) and natural scrolling on the trackpad? Nah bro, choose one for both. You wanna just plug in some generic usb hub connected to multiple monitors like you did with your 500 euro laptop? No can't do. Want to specify the SDR content brightness on an external display separately from HDR content brightness when enabling HDR on the display? Nah bro we're just gonna blast full brightness at you all the time, and I can go on. Hardware is second to none but the software is really.holding the machine back

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

#482

Post by whynotminot »

nabakin wrote: post #462
whynotminot wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Literally yes top single core performance. (And incidentally also efficiency)

I stand corrected, that's incredible. https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.html https://www.cpu-monkey.com/en/cpu_benchmark-cinebench_r23_si... https://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

I don’t see the M4 on any of these charts

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

#483

Post by rldjbpin »

besides the usual caveat of unreleased hardware leak, relying on geekbench as a metric for performance is as useful as userbenchmark.

semantics rant: on another note, where is the line between "consumer" and "prosumer"/"enthusiast" hardware in terms of pricing? over 3000 usd before taxes seems well in the latter camp in my books.

on other hand, most enterprise hardware is not optimized for single-core performance. even to my knowledge, the configurations for algo-trading machines are comparable to consumer hardware, if not slower.

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

#484

Post by numpad0 »

bogeholm wrote: post #460
sho_hn wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this rings true. I'm not an Apple customer, but I certainly remember the days when Mac users had to justify the much worse bang-for-the-buck of Apple hardware (then) with it being the only ticket to their preferred software experience. These days it appears more that the hardware is fantastic, especially in the laptop form factor and thermal envelope, and perhaps the downside is a languishing macOS.

I use macOS daily for dev and office work, and to me it doesn’t feel languishing at all. Add Homebrew and Docker or Podman, and we’re off. The only places I can see there could be features missing are: - IT management type stuff where it looks like Apple are happy just delegating to Microsoft (eg. my workstation is managed with InTune and runs Microsoft Defender pushed by IT), - CUDA support if you’re into AI on NVID…

Isn't it the other way around? Majority of noises around macOS seem to come from {front-end|back-end} {mobile|app|Web} {development|asset creation|content authoring}. The way I feel is macOS outside blogmedia hypesphere is still not a lot more relevant than OS like Haiku, and CUDA and gaming are just glitches in the Matrix: the distances between macOS hype-core to glitch walls is not uniform, and those two domains are the closest to the core.

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

#485

Post by api »

MBCook wrote: post #394
api wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There have always been higher performing x64 chips than the M series but they use several times more power to get that. Apple seems to be reliably annihilating everyone on performance per watt at the high end of the performance curve. It makes sense since the M series are mobile CPUs on ‘roids.

Irony being that’s the same thing Intel learned from the P4. They gave it up for Core, grown from their low power chips, which took them far further with far less power than the P4 would have used.

Since power is the limiting factor due to heat, optimize for power first then scale up.

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

#486

Post by MBCook »

abhinavk wrote: post #423
MBCook wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree it’s kind of weird. I do wonder if the ultra was part of their original M1 plan, or it came along somewhere in the middle of development and they just had to come up with a name to put it above the Max. That said it’s far better than any PC scheme. It used to be easy enough when everything was megahertz. But I left the Wintel world around 2006 or so and stopped paying attention. I’ve been watching performance…

Ryzen 9 refers to flagship CPUs, not year. Same scheme as i3...i9. The first number in 4-digits is the generation but they increment it by 2. This year's Zen 5 lineup consists of R9 9950x (has 16 cores), R9 9900x (12c), R7 9800x3d (8c with 3D Cache), R7 9700x (8c) and R5 9600x (6c).

Oh. I guess I accidentally reinforced my own point didn’t I.

Thanks.

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

#487

Post by MBCook »

rbanffy wrote: post #470
MBCook wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t thermals basically explode non-linearly with speed? It’s possible Apple’s chips could be dramatically faster if they were willing to use up 300W. I remember seeing an anecdote where Johny Srouji, the chief Apple Silicon designer, said something like the efficiency cores get 90% of the performance of the performance cores at like 10% of the power. I don’t remember the exact numbers but it was staggering. While t…

I’m now imagining an “M4 Hot” for the next MacPro with an Intel Xeon W power budget. > they could (theoretically) make a chip of only 32 efficiency cores and just sip power. Intel and AMD did that with their latest data-center chips to compete with Ampere and AWS’s Graviton. I’d love to build a workstation out of one such beast.

Yeah it makes a lot of sense for servers. For normal desktop/laptop users who don’t need much parallelism it would just be wasted silicon.

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

#488

Post by MBCook »

ddingus wrote: post #466
MBCook wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that, they seemed to get hotter with each subsequent generation. My 2015 could get hotter than my 2010. I think my work 2019 gets hotter still. I think the Intels were hotter than my G4, but it’s been too long and the performance jump was worth it. Got an M1 Air, it blows them all out of the water (even 2019, others aren’t a surprise). And it does it fanless, as opposed to emulating a jet engine. And if you…

My experience is the same. I only owned one Intel MacBook Pro. Was the only one I needed thankfully. Missed the whole port reduction and power bar mess. I love my M1 Air. It is the first general purpose computing hardware that felt like a real advance. I measured that two ways: How much closer to my mobile is it? How much faster is it? The Air feels like a Mobile Computer if that makes any sense. One USB port expande…

Same. Easily the best computer I’ve owned in the last 25 years in terms of satisfaction/niceness.

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

#489

Post by seec »

matwood wrote: post #103
radicalbyte wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

That was before the Tim Cook bean counter takeover. Apple used to be generous with accessories and stuff before too. Now they even remove stickers to save a few cents per device.

Apple still makes good hardware but the scrooge attitude is disgusting for such premium products.

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

#490

Post by seec »

tacker2000 wrote: post #191
rubslopes wrote: post #139

I have a M1 MacBook Air that I use for Docker, VSCode, etc. And it still runs very smoothly. Interestingly, the only times it slows down is when opening Microsoft Excel.

Excel performance on Mac is a disaster, and I dont understand why. Everytime I paste something it lags for 1-2 seconds… so infuriating!!

Because Microsoft takes a least effort approach to porting for macOS. Not that they should do otherwise in my opinion. Office runs much better on Windows and has more functionality.
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