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A node shrink is going to help AMD by 15% at best, they are much farther behind than that on performance per watt. AMD has done mobile CPUs that look as if the

A node shrink is going to help AMD by 15% at best, they are much farther behind than that on performance per watt. AMD has done mobile CPUs that look as if they are close to or even ahead of the M1 in performance, but they all use 2x to 4x as much power. When higher core count versions of Apple Silicon are available, they will be able to have double the core counts of AMD chips at the same power levels. And each those cores are significantly faster than individual AMD cores.

GeekyBear 6y ago
AMD's mobile chips are still on Zen 2 cores, so they are behind the M1 on single core performance in both integer and floating point. It's their desktop chips running Zen 3 cores that trade blows on single core integer math, depending on which benchmark you look at. https://www.anandtech.com/show/16252/mac-mini-apple-m1-tested/4 https://www.anandtech.com/show/16252/mac-mini-apple-m1-teste... Of course, on multi-core performance you can buy a desktop chip with a much higher Zen 3 core count than Apple offers.
- valuearb 6y ago
  The Ryzen 5950x has 135 watt TDP in actual use. That’s roughly 8x the M1. https://www.anandtech.com/show/16214/amd-zen-3-ryzen-deep-dive-review-5950x-5900x-5800x-and-5700x-tested/8 https://www.anandtech.com/show/16214/amd-zen-3-ryzen-deep-di... And Ryzen chips are offered with more cores, but that’s an extremely temporary advantage (reminds me of the friend who told me not to buy Apple stock because they didn’t have big screen phones). When Apple fits 32 Firestorm cores in a 135 watt TDP package, AMD isn’t going to have an answer.
  - adam_arthur 6y ago
    Power consumption is not linear as it relates to performance. CPUs designed for the desktop are going to use excessive power by design. They'll often use many times more power than mobile equivalent, but only have slightly better single core performance. Here's a great example, Intel Core i9 (Desktop, 125w TDP) vs Intel Core i7 (Laptop, 15W). Huge power difference, only ~10% difference in single core clock speeds. https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i9-10900K-vs-Intel-Core-i7-1185G7/4071vsm1268967 https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i9-10900K-v...
    - valuearb 6y ago
      It might not be linear in terms of single core performance, where Apple already dominates, but it sure has a nearly linear relationship to multicore performance.
      - adam_arthur 6y ago
        Ok, but their multicore score is only on par, not better than equivalent class chips on older fab generations. Where is the huge gap? https://wccftech.com/intel-and-amd-x86-mobility-cpus-destroy-apples-m1-in-cinebench-r23-benchmark-results/ https://wccftech.com/intel-and-amd-x86-mobility-cpus-destroy... Or check multicore scores here: https://browser.geekbench.com/mac-benchmarks https://browser.geekbench.com/mac-benchmarks m1 is better by 20% or so, but is 2 fab generations ahead of the intel chips
        valuearb 6y ago
        The M1 only has 4 Firestorm cores and 15 watts TDP. It’s other four cores are Icestorm cores offering roughly 1/10th the performance and 1/3rd the power draw. https://www.anandtech.com/show/16192/the-iphone-12-review/2 https://www.anandtech.com/show/16192/the-iphone-12-review/2 The Ryzen 4900H is a 55 watt TDP part with eight performance cores. Despite that it’s far behind the M1 in GeekBench single core and multicore scores. https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/search?q=4900H https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/search?q=4900H Now as you shown it’s way ahead in Cinebench 23 Multicore benchmark. Let’s assume that’s more representative of real world use, and that being a process behind it will add 15% higher performance when AMD makes a 5 nm successor. That would increase its Cinebench Multicore to roughly 12,700, roughly 60% higher than the M1. But all Apple has to do is come out with an M1X with eight Firestorm cores. That’s a multicore performance in the same range as the best possible 5 nm AMD CPU, and a TDP barely half of the AMD CPU. And far higher Cinebench single core, and GeekBench single/multicore ratings. Obviously to swap Firestorm for IceStorm cores they need more transistors or something else has to go (on chip GPU?). And Apple won’t be making 20 hour MacBook Airs out of this M1X, but they will be able to make 14 hour MacBook Pros with faster discrete GPUs. And they are about 6 months from doing exactly that. Which is likely going to before AMD 5 nm, so top of line 4900H laptops get smoked on all Cinebench and GeekBench scores while using nearly double the power.
fomine3 6y ago
Apple M1 is fully optimized for efficiency because it's delivered from mobile SoC and still aimed for portable laptop, meanwhile Zen3 (or Willow Cove) arch is aimed for all laptop/desktop/server category so they optimized for both efficiency and max performance. Even though M1 is designed for efficiency, it sometimes outperforms AMD/Intel for performance. That confuses the story.

GeekyBear 6y ago

AMD's mobile chips are still on Zen 2 cores, so they are behind the M1 on single core performance in both integer and floating point. It's their desktop chips running Zen 3 cores that trade blows on single core integer math, depending on which benchmark you look at. https://www.anandtech.com/show/16252/mac-mini-apple-m1-tested/4 https://www.anandtech.com/show/16252/mac-mini-apple-m1-teste... Of course, on multi-core performance you can buy a desktop chip with a much higher Zen 3 core count than Apple offers.

valuearb 6y ago
The Ryzen 5950x has 135 watt TDP in actual use. That’s roughly 8x the M1. https://www.anandtech.com/show/16214/amd-zen-3-ryzen-deep-dive-review-5950x-5900x-5800x-and-5700x-tested/8 https://www.anandtech.com/show/16214/amd-zen-3-ryzen-deep-di... And Ryzen chips are offered with more cores, but that’s an extremely temporary advantage (reminds me of the friend who told me not to buy Apple stock because they didn’t have big screen phones). When Apple fits 32 Firestorm cores in a 135 watt TDP package, AMD isn’t going to have an answer.
- adam_arthur 6y ago
  Power consumption is not linear as it relates to performance. CPUs designed for the desktop are going to use excessive power by design. They'll often use many times more power than mobile equivalent, but only have slightly better single core performance. Here's a great example, Intel Core i9 (Desktop, 125w TDP) vs Intel Core i7 (Laptop, 15W). Huge power difference, only ~10% difference in single core clock speeds. https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i9-10900K-vs-Intel-Core-i7-1185G7/4071vsm1268967 https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i9-10900K-v...
  - valuearb 6y ago
    It might not be linear in terms of single core performance, where Apple already dominates, but it sure has a nearly linear relationship to multicore performance.
    - adam_arthur 6y ago
      Ok, but their multicore score is only on par, not better than equivalent class chips on older fab generations. Where is the huge gap? https://wccftech.com/intel-and-amd-x86-mobility-cpus-destroy-apples-m1-in-cinebench-r23-benchmark-results/ https://wccftech.com/intel-and-amd-x86-mobility-cpus-destroy... Or check multicore scores here: https://browser.geekbench.com/mac-benchmarks https://browser.geekbench.com/mac-benchmarks m1 is better by 20% or so, but is 2 fab generations ahead of the intel chips
      - valuearb 6y ago
        The M1 only has 4 Firestorm cores and 15 watts TDP. It’s other four cores are Icestorm cores offering roughly 1/10th the performance and 1/3rd the power draw. https://www.anandtech.com/show/16192/the-iphone-12-review/2 https://www.anandtech.com/show/16192/the-iphone-12-review/2 The Ryzen 4900H is a 55 watt TDP part with eight performance cores. Despite that it’s far behind the M1 in GeekBench single core and multicore scores. https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/search?q=4900H https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/search?q=4900H Now as you shown it’s way ahead in Cinebench 23 Multicore benchmark. Let’s assume that’s more representative of real world use, and that being a process behind it will add 15% higher performance when AMD makes a 5 nm successor. That would increase its Cinebench Multicore to roughly 12,700, roughly 60% higher than the M1. But all Apple has to do is come out with an M1X with eight Firestorm cores. That’s a multicore performance in the same range as the best possible 5 nm AMD CPU, and a TDP barely half of the AMD CPU. And far higher Cinebench single core, and GeekBench single/multicore ratings. Obviously to swap Firestorm for IceStorm cores they need more transistors or something else has to go (on chip GPU?). And Apple won’t be making 20 hour MacBook Airs out of this M1X, but they will be able to make 14 hour MacBook Pros with faster discrete GPUs. And they are about 6 months from doing exactly that. Which is likely going to before AMD 5 nm, so top of line 4900H laptops get smoked on all Cinebench and GeekBench scores while using nearly double the power.

fomine3 6y ago

Apple M1 is fully optimized for efficiency because it's delivered from mobile SoC and still aimed for portable laptop, meanwhile Zen3 (or Willow Cove) arch is aimed for all laptop/desktop/server category so they optimized for both efficiency and max performance. Even though M1 is designed for efficiency, it sometimes outperforms AMD/Intel for performance. That confuses the story.