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Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

extremetech.com

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Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#521

Post by CoolGuySteve »

echlipse wrote: post #465
skohan wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which Ryzen laptop currently competes with the latest macbooks in terms of form factor, performance, battery life and build quality? I'm honestly asking, I've been thinking about getting a Linux laptop in a while and I would be curious to see what the playing field is like

Probably a Thinkpad. But depends on completely the type of work you wanna do. With anything you end up buying it's a long term investment. So whichever gets your job done and whichever has a good build quality (also something which you can easily upgrade yourself and repair easily) is the one you should buy.

Thinkpads feel well made but the screens are mostly terrible and the trackpad design is very dated.

I’m not sure why Lenovo doesn’t use better IPS panels, they can’t be saving that much margin from them.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#522

Post by nashashmi »

monkmartinez wrote: post #15

You get an M1 with the new iPad Pro as well! I hadn't thought of the situation as the article presents. When shown in that light, it made me pause to reflect. The M1 doesn't make sense when its in every darn product. The only differentiator is screen size, RAM, and OS? I will admit that I switched to Thinkpad and Win10 about two years ago when I had to return my butterfly for the 5th time. I am not looking back eithe…

I think what apple may be trying to do is reduce macOS sales and full throttle on iOS sales. It no longer makes sense for a macOS if it is going to have the same chip as iPad Pro.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#523

Post by smoldesu »

skohan wrote: post #292
the_duke wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the marketing effort is immense, and it's really surprising to me how many eagerly lap up the angle Apple is pushing without much reflection, even on HN. Like the good old Apple hype days. Now to be fair, the M1 is an impressive iteration on the A* chip line. But the Ryzen 5000 mobile chips really don't look bad at all in comparison, and a 5nm version of those would level the field.

Which Ryzen laptop currently competes with the latest macbooks in terms of form factor, performance, battery life and build quality? I'm honestly asking, I've been thinking about getting a Linux laptop in a while and I would be curious to see what the playing field is like

I had an Ideapad 5 (4800u) for a few months, it was a great little Ryzen laptop. Battery life was 7-10 hours of "real" use, CPU performance is righteous, and build quality is pretty surprising for sub-$500. Great little Linux laptop!

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#524

Post by philistine »

rowanG077 wrote: post #148
izacus wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, so what is the point here? How exactly is that different from Intel generations? Why does Apple put different amount of cores and clocks into different products if the choice doesn't matter? It seems like there are performance differences there if they choose to install differently configured SoCs in different devices and even split them by pricing on the iMac. So, please, explain where's this big difference…

There are only two different M1 versions. The 7 GPU version and the 8 GPU version. All of the cpu cores are the same. All power envelopes are the same. That's much different then the vastly different form factors and power envelopes intel has.

We have yet to see any new iPad Pro with the M1. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a difference in clock speed with those.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#525

Post by dagmx »

akmarinov wrote: post #80
tyingq wrote: post #30

I remain interested in seeing how much of Apple's lead is the process size, and how much is engineering prowess. That is, would a more generic new ARM Neoverse on 5nm perform at roughly the same clip? I suppose AWS's Graviton 3 would be the first place to see that, or something close to it.

Apple can afford to exclude some hardware that other manufacturers need to support legacy OSs and apps, leaving more space on their SoC for more CPUs and specialized hardware. Want to ditch OpenGL? No problem for Apple.

I'm not sure what OpenGL has to do with here?

Generally no hardware today is designed for OpenGL. They all translate it into their own instruction set. The M1 is no different as it supports OpenGL as well.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#526

Post by oarsinsync »

izacus wrote: post #120
ipsum2 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No? That's the entire point of the article. The only difference is whether you get a 7 core or 8 core GPU. > If you want to buy a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro, Apple will sell you an M1. Want a Mac Mini? You get an M1. Interested in the iMac or the new iPad Pro? You get an M1. It’s possible that the M1 CPUs inside the iMac will have different thermal or clock behavior than those inside the systems Apple has already lau…

Exactly, so what is the point here? How exactly is that different from Intel generations? Why does Apple put different amount of cores and clocks into different products if the choice doesn't matter? It seems like there are performance differences there if they choose to install differently configured SoCs in different devices and even split them by pricing on the iMac. So, please, explain where's this big difference…

The M1 in the macbook air throttles when it gets too hot due to the thermal characteristics of the case (no active cooling).

The M1 in the macbook pro is actively cooled, and does not throttle.

When additional cooling is applied after-market to the macbook air, it has the same performance characteristics as the macbook pro.

The M1 is the same in both products. It throttles when hotter. It's more likely to throttle if not actively cooled and under heavy workload. It's not clocked differently. There's no artificial constraints.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#527

Post by cptnapalm »

kevstev wrote: post #466
hutrdvnj wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've always thought Intel's marketing was a bit confused - i7 stays the same over 10+ years I think that is because the performance has been the same for the past 10+ years.

I am continually astounded that the quad core sandy bridge core-i7 I bought in January 2011 is still completely serviceable for pretty much all tasks outside of gaming. The bezel and overall form factor is clownishly large by todays standards, and the screen is starting to look a bit faded, but as a portable but mostly stationary PC it still works great alongside my main laptop I use for work. I knew back in 2011 I w…

I got a 2009 Mac Pro with dual sockets at a state auction and put in a couple of inexpensive hexcore Xeons. The sum total after 2 graphics cards and 48 GB of RAM was less than $750 and it runs everything pretty well.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#528

Post by yoz-y »

reader_mode wrote: post #336
BadOakOx wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dave2D just reviewed the new surface laptop comparing it to the new MacBook Air: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKN9nvXTGHE ...and he got pretty good battery life (11 hours on his own benchmark). edit: form factor, performance, build quality.. is also up there, I just didn't mention it, because I think the battery life is the killer feature of the M1.

Microsoft is almost always a generation behind with tech in surface products it's ridiculous because they look so appealing otherwise. I just feel like I'm buying last years model on launch.

That is really a problem only if you watch tech news. In reality people use computers for years, so having a 4 or 5 year old tech doesn't really matter that much.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#529

Post by jean_tta »

Aperocky wrote: post #517
jean_tta wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people have no need to compare CPUs between mobile/non mobile or generation. They just need to know if the laptop they're looking at has the high end / middle end / low end CPU. You'd be comparing a new laptop with latest(-ish) CPUs. The i3/i5/i7 makes it plain & simple to know that. You don't need to figure out what the "middle end" CPU is called this year. It's the i5, problem solved.

Yeah and then they get surprised at why the mobile one suck. That was me trying to play games on laptops with 'i7' about a dozen years ago.

I am not arguing that the product naming is perfect, only that is not completely absurd as others claimed.

Comparing the performance of laptop and desktop is a niche case. Most people know whether they want a laptop or a desktop and then choose among those categories.

Re: Apple’s M1 Positioning Mocks the Entire x86 Business Model

#530

Post by MrDOS »

hkstm wrote: post #361
GordonS wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, if you're running big IDEs (e.g. Rider/IntelliJ, Visual Studio), containers and VMs, 32GB is really a must. There always seem to be people in these threads claiming that 16GB or even 8GB is enough - I just don't understand how that could possibly be for most of the HN demographic.

Do you think most of the HN demographic is actually running big IDEs, containers and VMs at the same time? I'm personally a CS student and never had to run more than a few lightweight docker containers + maybe one running some kind of database + VS Code and that has been working fine on a laptop with 8GB and pop_os. Could imagine that a lot of other people on HN are also just generally interested in tech but not nece…

> lightweight docker containers

If you're on macOS, there's no such thing as a “lightweight Docker container”. The container itself might be small, but Docker itself is running a full Linux virtual machine. In no world is that “lightweight”.

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