Backward compatibility rules

[Aurelius]

It's beating AMD chips that are based on Zen2 and Vega grapics. Zen 2 is like two years old and Vega is five years old. Not to mention AMD is on 7nm while Apple is on 5nm. AMD is a sleeping giant that for some reason isn't selling their latest technology to everyone, and I think a lot of that is thanks to Sony and Microsoft putting restrictions on their technology.

Doesn't really change the reality on the ground, though — Apple's very first computer processor often outperforms the latest comparable chips AMD has to offer. If AMD can step up its game, it needs to do that quickly... and hope Apple's M1X/M2 chips aren't big leaps forward.

It's not too far off from the truth. I'm sure it took a lot of money and a lot of engineering to get the M1 where it is but at this point why doesn't Apple just make their own CPU architecture? They certainly don't have a problem making developers learn to code new hardware. It's far cheaper to use ARM design and modify it than build your own. It's no where near the same level of AMD where the only designs they're given from Intel are the old 286 designs that they barely got their hands on. AMD made an entire CPU from scratch while Apple edited ARMs and Imaginations.

Designing your own architecture is a massive undertaking for anyone, and doesn't always bear fruit (look at the Itanium that started this thread). I suspect ARM gave Apple a good foundation to work with that still allowed the flexibility to make it Apple's own. That and it might be easier for developers used to coding and optimizing for ARM.

AMD has also been designing x86 chips for decades. It might have started with just a little bit of info, but it hasn't exactly been operating in a vacuum since then.

I don't follow?

Let's say M1 was just a reference ARM design with equally stock Imagination graphics. If that were the case, then that would suggest x86 was so out-of-shape that a simple ARM/Imagination combo could beat it in common circumstances. In practice, M1 wins by marrying ARM's advantages with optimizations that overcome key weaknesses.

My prediction is that Apple at some point won't be as profitable while engineering their own chips and will have to switch to Nvidia or even Qualcomm to stay competitive. Everyone is scrambling to make something better because for nearly a decade they're using the same technology with small changes. That won't do anymore since AMD has clearly surpassed Intel and Apple has clearly surpassed Qualcomm. Switching to a new CPU architecture is a risky venture that does have great rewards but could easily destroy the market for Apple. There's a reason why Itanium failed and it isn't just because it was expensive and slow but it wasn't Wintel. Like I said, Intel and Microsoft have tried to kill Wintel and that's their market.

I don't see that happening. The work Apple puts into its Mac chips translates to benefits for most of its product line, and vice versa, so it's pretty easy to justify the effort. Also, a friendly reminder that Apple's market cap is, as of August 2021, about five times larger than NVIDIA's. NVIDIA made just shy of $2.8 billion in net income for the entirety of 2020; Apple made $21.7 billion just in the last quarter. Apple could find the money it needs in its couch cushions.

There certainly is a degree of risk, but Apple is also making this switch in a very different market, and for a very different audience. Itanium failed because it offered dubious improvements, aimed at a high-end workstation/server crowd, and arrived at a time when desktop PCs dominated. Apple is jumping to ARM with clear benefits (performance, battery life, cross-platform integration), a consumer focus that's already paying off, and a world dominated by phones, laptops, and the cloud. We're no longer chained to Wintel like we were 20 years ago.

 

[Armenius]

Yes and no. Apple was definitely helped by Intel's inability to move to 10nm, but Apple also has very, very good engineers. Remember, its first foray is also beating AMD chips in some areas, not just Intel's. And don't forget that Apple has made many, many customizations to the CPU and GPU. This isn't just a reference ARM design with PowerVR slapped on top. That's like saying some Call of Duty games are just Quake mods because they include some Q3A code. At a certain point you have to accept that it's different enough to be its own beast. And besides... if it really was 'just' ARM + Imagination, wouldn't it make the x86 landscape look that much worse?

The point is that you shouldn't count on the existing pecking order remaining in place. I don't picture Apple claiming a giant chunk of the computer market or outperforming every x86 chip (at least not by a wide margin), but there is a chance it could change the competitive landscape. I wouldn't underestimate the company that beat Qualcomm to 64-bit and makes mobile chips so fast that they often outperform rivals from the following year.

Intel 10nm became available a year before M1. Laptops with Ice Lake have been sold for almost 2 years.

 

[Aurelius]

Intel 10nm became available a year before M1. Laptops with Ice Lake have been sold for almost 2 years.

The key is that Intel made the leap to 10nm much later than it was supposed to. In theory, Intel was supposed to field something beyond 10nm by the time M1 showed up.

 

[Lakados]

Intel 10nm became available a year before M1. Laptops with Ice Lake have been sold for almost 2 years.

The key is that Intel made the leap to 10nm much later than it was supposed to. In theory, Intel was supposed to field something beyond 10nm by the time M1 showed up.

Intel’s initial roadmaps had 10 nm scheduled to launch back in 2015. Though their initial names for it were 11nm but the naming conventions changed in 2013 with the last revision of the ITRS (International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors). That same roadmap had them on 7nm for 2017. So they are some 5-6 years behind their initial roadmaps.