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I think a lot of the x86 performance per watt issues are really Intel issues. Intel has spent the last half decade increasing max power consumption to its limit
by kcb 4y ago
I think a lot of the x86 performance per watt issues are really Intel issues. Intel has spent the last half decade increasing max power consumption to its limits to eek out just a bit more performance to justify launching a new generation.
It's clear that they're turning a corner but even the just released 10nm big.little Alder Lake chips fall behind AMDs several year old TSMC 7nm chips in performance per watt.
- smoldesu 4y agoI mean, you're right. But that's not really a surprise considering that transistor density directly correlates with power efficency. You can have the best engineers in the world designing your chips, but it won't really matter if your competitor can undercut you on node size. Conversely, you can have the most efficient silicon but it won't always give you the performance crown. Considering how "bad" Intel's chips should be on paper, it's still fairly impressive to see the kind of single-thread performance they dish out. There's probably also something to be said for process efficiency too. Sure Apple's 5nm silicon isn't power hungry, but getting those chips into mass production is a hugely wasteful effort. 5nm's yield was awful for those first few years, and you could definitely tell Apple was feeling it with some of their binned chip options. Kinda makes me wonder how much water, silicon, neon and power was wasted manufacturing all those busted dies that never made the cut.