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Any efficiency comparison involving Apples chips also has to factor in that Tim Cook keeps showing up at TSMCs door with a freight container full of cash to buy

Any efficiency comparison involving Apples chips also has to factor in that Tim Cook keeps showing up at TSMCs door with a freight container full of cash to buy out exclusive access to their bleeding edge silicon processes. ARM may be a factor but don't underestimate the power of having more money than God. Case in point, Strix Point is built on TSMC 4nm while Apple is already using TSMCs second generation 3nm process.

acdha 2y ago
Process helps but have you seen benchmarks showing equivalent performance between the same process node? I think it’s less that ARM is amazing than the Apple Silicon team being very good and paired with aggressive optimization throughout the stack but everything I’ve seen suggests they are simply building better chips at their target levels (not server, high power, etc.).
- cubefox 2y ago
  > Our benchmark database shows the Dimensity 9300 scores 2,207 and 7,408 in Geekbench 6.2's single and multi-core tests. A 30% performance improvement implies the Dimensity 9400 would score around 2,869 and and 9,630. Its single-core performance is close to that of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 (2,884/8,840) and it understandably takes the lead in multi-core. Both are within spitting distance from the Apple A17 Pro, which scores 2,915 and 7,222 points in the benchmark. Then again, all three chips are said to be manufactured on TSMC's N3 class node, effectively leveling the playing field. https://www.notebookcheck.net/MediaTek-Dimensity-9400-rumoured-to-trade-blows-with-Apple-A17-Pro-thanks-to-remarkable-performance-uplift.873019.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/MediaTek-Dimensity-9400-rumour...
  - sroussey 2y ago
    I guess getting close to the same single thread score is nice. Unfortunately, since only Apple is shipping it is hard to compare if the others burn the battery to get there. I suspect the others two, like Apple with the A18 shipping next month, will be using the second gen N3. Apple is expected to be around 3500 on that node. Needless to say, what will be very interesting is to see the perf/watt of all three on the same node and shipping in actual products where the benchmarks can be put to more useful tests.
    - cubefox 2y ago
      Yeah, and GPU tests, since the benchmarks above were only for the CPU.
  - acdha 2y ago
    That appears to be an unconfirmed rumor and it’s exciting if true (and there aren’t major caveats on power), but did you notice how they mentioned extra work by ARM? The argument isn’t that Apple is unique, it’s that the performance gaps they’ve shown are more than simply buying premium fab capacity. That doesn’t mean other designers can’t also do that work, but simply that it’s more than just the process - for example, the M2 shipped on TSMC’s N5P first as an exclusive but when Zen 5 shipped later on the same process it didn’t close the single core performance or perf/watt gap. Some of that is x86 vs. ARM but there isn’t a single, simple factor which can explain this - e.g. Apple carefully tuning the hardware, firmware, OS, compilers, and libraries too undoubtably helps a lot and it’s been a perennial problem for non-Intel vendors on the PC side since so many developers have tuned for Intel first/only for decades.
    - cubefox 2y ago
      Since it's unclear whether Apple has a significant architectural advantage over Qualcomm and MediaTek, I would rather attribute this to relatively poor AMD architectures. Provisionally. At least their GPUs have been behind Nvidia for years. (AMD holding its own against Intel is not surprising given Intel's chip fab problems.)
      - acdha 2y ago
        Yes, to be clear I’d be very happy if MediaTek jumps in with a strong contender since consumers win. It doesn’t look like the Qualcomm chips are performing as well as hoped but I’d wait a bit to see how much tuning helps since Windows ARM was not a major target until now.
    - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
      > for example, the M2 shipped on TSMC’s N5P first as an exclusive but when Zen 5 shipped later on the same process it didn’t close the single core performance or perf/watt gap. That was Zen 4, but it did close the gap: https://www.notebookcheck.net/R9-7945HX3D-vs-M2-Max_15073_14975.247596.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/R9-7945HX3D-vs-M2-Max_15073_14... Single thread performance is higher (so is MT), TDP is slightly lower, Cinebench MT "points per watt" is 5% higher. We'll get to see it again when the 3nm version of Zen5 is released (the initial ones are 4nm, which is a node Apple didn't use).
hajile 2y ago
Let's do the math on M1 Pro (10-core, N5, 2021) vs HX370 (12-core, N4P, 2024). Firestorm without L3 is 2.281mm2. Icestorm is 0.59mm2. M1 Pro has 8P+2E for a total of 19.428mm2 of cores included. Zen4 without L3 is 3.84mm2. Zen4c reduces that down to 2.48mm2. Zen5 CCD is pretty much the same size as Zen4 (though with 27% more transistors), so core size should be similar. AMD has also stated that Zen5c has a similar shrink percent to Zen4c. We'll use their numbers. HX370 has 4P+8C for a total area of 35.2mm2. If being twice the size despite being on N4P instead of N5 like M1 seems like foreshadowing, it is. We'll use notebookcheck's Cinebench 2024 multithread power and performance numbers to calculate perf / power / area then multiply that by 100 to eliminate some decimals. M1 Pro scores 824 (10-core) and while they don't have a power value listed, they do list 33.6w package power running the prime95 power virus, so cinebench's power should be lower than that. HX370 scored 1213 (12-core) and averaged 119w (maxing at a massive 121.7w and that's without running a power virus). This gives the following perf/power/area*100 scores: M1 Pro — 126 PPA HX 379 — 29 PPA M1 is more than 4.3x better while being an entire node behind and being released years before.
- cyp0633 2y ago
  Power efficiency is a curve, and Apple may have its own reason not to make M1 Pro run at 110W as well
  - sm_1024 2y ago
    I think the OC might have mis-read the power numbers, 110 W is well into desktop CPU power range. Here is a excerpt from Anand Tech: > In our peak power test, the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 ramped up and peaked at 33 W. https://www.anandtech.com/show/21485/the-amd-ryzen-ai-hx-370-review/2 https://www.anandtech.com/show/21485/the-amd-ryzen-ai-hx-370...
    - hajile 2y ago
      You can read the notebookcheck review for yourself. https://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Zen-5-Strix-Point-CPU-analysis-Ryzen-AI-9-HX-370-versus-Intel-Core-Ultra-Apple-M3-and-Qualcomm-Snapdragon-X-Elite.868641.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Zen-5-Strix-Point-CPU-anal...

acdha 2y ago

Process helps but have you seen benchmarks showing equivalent performance between the same process node? I think it’s less that ARM is amazing than the Apple Silicon team being very good and paired with aggressive optimization throughout the stack but everything I’ve seen suggests they are simply building better chips at their target levels (not server, high power, etc.).

cubefox 2y ago
> Our benchmark database shows the Dimensity 9300 scores 2,207 and 7,408 in Geekbench 6.2's single and multi-core tests. A 30% performance improvement implies the Dimensity 9400 would score around 2,869 and and 9,630. Its single-core performance is close to that of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 (2,884/8,840) and it understandably takes the lead in multi-core. Both are within spitting distance from the Apple A17 Pro, which scores 2,915 and 7,222 points in the benchmark. Then again, all three chips are said to be manufactured on TSMC's N3 class node, effectively leveling the playing field. https://www.notebookcheck.net/MediaTek-Dimensity-9400-rumoured-to-trade-blows-with-Apple-A17-Pro-thanks-to-remarkable-performance-uplift.873019.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/MediaTek-Dimensity-9400-rumour...
- sroussey 2y ago
  I guess getting close to the same single thread score is nice. Unfortunately, since only Apple is shipping it is hard to compare if the others burn the battery to get there. I suspect the others two, like Apple with the A18 shipping next month, will be using the second gen N3. Apple is expected to be around 3500 on that node. Needless to say, what will be very interesting is to see the perf/watt of all three on the same node and shipping in actual products where the benchmarks can be put to more useful tests.
  - cubefox 2y ago
    Yeah, and GPU tests, since the benchmarks above were only for the CPU.
- acdha 2y ago
  That appears to be an unconfirmed rumor and it’s exciting if true (and there aren’t major caveats on power), but did you notice how they mentioned extra work by ARM? The argument isn’t that Apple is unique, it’s that the performance gaps they’ve shown are more than simply buying premium fab capacity. That doesn’t mean other designers can’t also do that work, but simply that it’s more than just the process - for example, the M2 shipped on TSMC’s N5P first as an exclusive but when Zen 5 shipped later on the same process it didn’t close the single core performance or perf/watt gap. Some of that is x86 vs. ARM but there isn’t a single, simple factor which can explain this - e.g. Apple carefully tuning the hardware, firmware, OS, compilers, and libraries too undoubtably helps a lot and it’s been a perennial problem for non-Intel vendors on the PC side since so many developers have tuned for Intel first/only for decades.
  - cubefox 2y ago
    Since it's unclear whether Apple has a significant architectural advantage over Qualcomm and MediaTek, I would rather attribute this to relatively poor AMD architectures. Provisionally. At least their GPUs have been behind Nvidia for years. (AMD holding its own against Intel is not surprising given Intel's chip fab problems.)
    - acdha 2y ago
      Yes, to be clear I’d be very happy if MediaTek jumps in with a strong contender since consumers win. It doesn’t look like the Qualcomm chips are performing as well as hoped but I’d wait a bit to see how much tuning helps since Windows ARM was not a major target until now.
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    > for example, the M2 shipped on TSMC’s N5P first as an exclusive but when Zen 5 shipped later on the same process it didn’t close the single core performance or perf/watt gap. That was Zen 4, but it did close the gap: https://www.notebookcheck.net/R9-7945HX3D-vs-M2-Max_15073_14975.247596.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/R9-7945HX3D-vs-M2-Max_15073_14... Single thread performance is higher (so is MT), TDP is slightly lower, Cinebench MT "points per watt" is 5% higher. We'll get to see it again when the 3nm version of Zen5 is released (the initial ones are 4nm, which is a node Apple didn't use).

hajile 2y ago

Let's do the math on M1 Pro (10-core, N5, 2021) vs HX370 (12-core, N4P, 2024). Firestorm without L3 is 2.281mm2. Icestorm is 0.59mm2. M1 Pro has 8P+2E for a total of 19.428mm2 of cores included. Zen4 without L3 is 3.84mm2. Zen4c reduces that down to 2.48mm2. Zen5 CCD is pretty much the same size as Zen4 (though with 27% more transistors), so core size should be similar. AMD has also stated that Zen5c has a similar shrink percent to Zen4c. We'll use their numbers. HX370 has 4P+8C for a total area of 35.2mm2. If being twice the size despite being on N4P instead of N5 like M1 seems like foreshadowing, it is. We'll use notebookcheck's Cinebench 2024 multithread power and performance numbers to calculate perf / power / area then multiply that by 100 to eliminate some decimals. M1 Pro scores 824 (10-core) and while they don't have a power value listed, they do list 33.6w package power running the prime95 power virus, so cinebench's power should be lower than that. HX370 scored 1213 (12-core) and averaged 119w (maxing at a massive 121.7w and that's without running a power virus). This gives the following perf/power/area*100 scores: M1 Pro — 126 PPA HX 379 — 29 PPA M1 is more than 4.3x better while being an entire node behind and being released years before.

cyp0633 2y ago
Power efficiency is a curve, and Apple may have its own reason not to make M1 Pro run at 110W as well
- sm_1024 2y ago
  I think the OC might have mis-read the power numbers, 110 W is well into desktop CPU power range. Here is a excerpt from Anand Tech: > In our peak power test, the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 ramped up and peaked at 33 W. https://www.anandtech.com/show/21485/the-amd-ryzen-ai-hx-370-review/2 https://www.anandtech.com/show/21485/the-amd-ryzen-ai-hx-370...
  - hajile 2y ago
    You can read the notebookcheck review for yourself. https://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Zen-5-Strix-Point-CPU-analysis-Ryzen-AI-9-HX-370-versus-Intel-Core-Ultra-Apple-M3-and-Qualcomm-Snapdragon-X-Elite.868641.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Zen-5-Strix-Point-CPU-anal...