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But the M1 is a general purpose CPU and it is faster (without any help from Neural Engines etc) than competing devices.
by klelatti 6y ago
But the M1 is a general purpose CPU and it is faster (without any help from Neural Engines etc) than competing devices.
- mrtksn 6y agoWhy without any help from Neural Engines and etc.? They, the workload specific processors, are included in M1.
- klelatti 6y agoThey are but they don't account for the CPU performance jumps being quoted - these are the result of better standalone CPU performance. Your parent comment seemed to imply that the leap was due to an architecture shift like CPU -> GPU. It's not, it's just better CPU design.
- mrtksn 6y agoWell, there's no standalone CPU to talk about, is there? Purpose built architecture could mean many things, like having efficient cores and high performance cores, codec specific hardware, the way that the memory is accessed, cache configuration, co-processors, signal processors. Everything counts.
- wmf 6y agoPlenty of workloads like SPEC and compiling don't use GPUs, neural networks, etc. They just use CPU cores, cache, and memory. Fortunately Apple has gotten the basics right and they have also added accelerators.
- mrtksn 6y agoI would guess that the tight proximity of the components as well as the way their communication is designed also brings something on the table. People are used to complain that the ram is soldered to the board, now it is part of the IC.