Apple dumps Intel and shows Final Cut Pro on new Mac with Apple CPU !

Samuel H said:
... I'm not so pessimistic about Apple's move to ARM anymore. It may just work. Or maybe it will be slow and just make batteries lighter, we'll see XD
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I think it'll work just fine after all the software tweaks have been finished. That may take a while. Early predictions for Mac Book were October'ish but now may take into Q1 of 2021. The same is the came with the ARM maximized Windows 10X. Expected by this fall, now delayed into 2021. One'd have to assume that Microsoft is loathe to cede the ARM territory to Apple entirely and needs an answer. Plus, they need an ample supply on the new Snapdragon chips from Qualcomm. Because, naturally, the lion portion of the CPU's will go to their smartphone vendors.

https://www.digit.in/news/mobile-phones/qualcomm-snapdragon-875-price-leaked-55100.html

(a tidbit from India, albeit with the SOC pricing in the U$)

The problem with the servers, however, is how they count the power consumption. I assume a large server farm spreads it out to the last blade before suffering from the heat build-up and the increased power consumption. On desktops, ARM's do 2.4-2.6 GHz while Intel/AMD can hit 4+ with the upcoming Intel CPU Tiger Lake hitting 5. And then they start talking a 15W power draw vs. 28 and I only get the information overload.
 
DLD said:
I think it'll work just fine after all the software tweaks have been finished. That may take a while. Early predictions for Mac Book were October'ish but now may take into Q1 of 2021. The same is the came with the ARM maximized Windows 10X. Expected by this fall, now delayed into 2021. One'd have to assume that Microsoft is loathe to cede the ARM territory to Apple entirely and needs an answer. Plus, they need an ample supply on the new Snapdragon chips from Qualcomm. Because, naturally, the lion portion of the CPU's will go to their smartphone vendors.

https://www.digit.in/news/mobile-phones/qualcomm-snapdragon-875-price-leaked-55100.html

(a tidbit from India, albeit with the SOC pricing in the U$)

The problem with the servers, however, is how they count the power consumption. I assume a large server farm spreads it out to the last blade before suffering from the heat build-up and the increased power consumption. On desktops, ARM's do 2.4-2.6 GHz while Intel/AMD can hit 4+ with the upcoming Intel CPU Tiger Lake hitting 5. And then they start talking a 15W power draw vs. 28 and I only get the information overload.
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Apple has the resources to design chips specifically for the desktops and power laptops. While I'm not in the MacOS eco system any more, I think their move to ARM might just kickstart a revolution, and the downfall of x86 platform. Companies like QualComm, MediaTek, Rockchip etc might start developing ARM chips aimed at this market too - while currently it's probably unfeasable to do so. Apart from the Intel / AMD duopoly, we'd have a wider choice, and even cheaper prices. The real question is if Software houses like Adobe, Blackmagic etc will be able to build their programs to run natively and effectively on the new hardware - with the complex number of APIs and libraries they depend on.
 
tull_power said:
I think their move to ARM might just kickstart a revolution, and the downfall of x86 platform...
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If Apple Silicon laptops work out the way envisioned it will definitely put pressure on x86, Microsoft and x86 computer vendors, esp. the laptop segment. Today there are very good thin/light upper-echelon x86 Windows laptops which are roughly equal in price, battery life, CPU/GPU performance to an Apple laptop. Yes MacOS is good but Windows is perfectly OK and highly customizable. The Windows laptops are about as expensive at that market segment but they're very nice products. Both Apple and the other vendors are constrained by the same x86 factors -- including availability, CPU price margins, power consumption, etc.

However with Apple Silicon everything may change. Suddenly there will be a major technical difference in performance or power/performance. How Apple exploits this remains to be seen but this will likely create a situation where Apple Silicon laptops truly are different. They may be lighter, faster or have dramatically longer battery life or some combination of those. If the Windows side just sits on x86 they cannot provide a closely similar product.

Moving up to desktop levels, it's less clear how that will play out since battery power consumption isn't a factor. But it's not a big stretch to imagine a 32-core Apple Silicon iMac or a 64 or 128-core Mac Pro. Today, Intel's 16-core i9 is a very expensive "enthusiast" product and Xeon is even more expensive. To this day, Intel refuses to put Quick Sync video acceleration on Xeon so this creates additional work and complexity for workstation-class systems. With Apple Silicon, Apple can put whatever accelerators they want on the chip. I don't know the CPU price margins but it seems likely Apple/TSMC can make a Xeon-class ARM-ISA CPU for much less than Apple pays Intel for Xeon.
 
"A14X performance extrapolated from leaked/suspected A14 info + average performance gains from previous X chips. Puts it around 7480 in Geekbench 5, nearly on par with an i9 9880H.”
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“Transferring to Apple Silicon…"2020: MacBook, MacBook Pro 13-inch. 2021: iMac (partly), MacBook Pro 16-inch (partly). 2022: iMac Pro, Mac Pro, iMac (rest), MacBook Pro 16-inch (rest)."
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https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewansp...l-macos-macbook-pro-macbook-air/#47c0b16e443b

It looks like the entry tier "some Big/some Small" chips will be ready soon and the OS that has been used on ARM won't need much tweaking but that more powerful Lots of Big/None Small chips along with the full mac OS will need a lot more development from Apple as well as it third party partners.
 
Yes, the Hot Chips conference is taking place as we speak. Alibaba might be targeting the entry level CPU for smartphones and other light portable (notebook/pad type) devices. It's unlikely to be aiming at the US but it's a big global market.


When it comes to smartphone processors, ARM enjoys the monopoly as most of the mobile processor designers like Apple, Samsung, Huawei, Qualcomm, and MediaTek use ARM cores. This might not be the case going forward, as Alibaba's XT910 RISC-V Core (X standard for Xuantie which stands for a heavy sword made using iron) has shown a significant performance improvement.

During the Hot Chips 2020 conference, Alibaba showcased the performance of the XT910 RISC-V Core processor and it managed to outperform the Kirin 970 SoC, an ARM Cortex-A73 architecture-based flagship Huawei processor from 2017.
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https://www.gizbot.com/computer/new...-than-kirin-970-soc-threat-to-arm-069474.html
 
Well, this is sort of related to laptops. And other portables. Including cameras.

SEOUL (Reuters) - Tesla Inc CEO Elon Musk has suggested the U.S. electric carmaker may be able to mass produce batteries with 50% more energy density in three to four years, which could even enable electric airplanes.

"400 Wh/kg *with* high cycle life, produced in volume (not just a lab) is not far. Probably 3 to 4 years," Musk tweeted on Monday ... Researchers have said the energy density of Panasonic's "2170" batteries used in Tesla's Model 3 is around 260 Wh/kg, meaning a 50% jump from the current energy density which is key to achieving a longer driving range.
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https://www.yahoo.com/news/teslas-musk-hints-battery-capacity-064716647.html
 
What do we collectively think ARM performance will be like with Apple's long-lost Motion 5? (I know it had a recent update but the software is generally ancient.)

16" might be refreshed any day now and would love one, but not if 13" silicon (speculated to be the first) will outperform it in Q4.
 
NorBro said:
What do we collectively think ARM performance will be like with Apple's long-lost Motion 5? (I know it had a recent update but the software is generally ancient.)

16" might be refreshed any day now and would love one, but not if 13" silicon (speculated to be the first) will outperform it in Q4.
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Maybe 12" will be first:

"In contrast to Kuo's prediction, today's report claims Apple's first Arm-based Mac will be a super-lightweight 12-inch MacBook, codenamed "Tonga," that will launch by the end of 2020. In addition, the report says the A14 chip to feature in Apple's upcoming *iPhone 12* lineup is codenamed "Sicilian.""

https://www.macrumors.com/2020/08/31/apple-silicon-imac-custom-gpu-2021/
 
DLD said:
Well, this is sort of related to laptops. And other portables. Including cameras.

SEOUL (Reuters) - Tesla Inc CEO Elon Musk has suggested the U.S. electric carmaker may be able to mass produce batteries with 50% more energy density in three to four years, which could even enable electric airplanes.

"400 Wh/kg *with* high cycle life, produced in volume (not just a lab) is not far. Probably 3 to 4 years," Musk tweeted on Monday ... Researchers have said the energy density of Panasonic's "2170" batteries used in Tesla's Model 3 is around 260 Wh/kg, meaning a 50% jump from the current energy density which is key to achieving a longer driving range.
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https://www.yahoo.com/news/teslas-musk-hints-battery-capacity-064716647.html
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That's crazy. When I started shooting in the 90's, my A/B nicad bricks were ~5.5lbs and 65Wh. Now it's possible that we could have a ~4.5lb 800Wh battery in the not too distant future. Think about the possibilities of not just running cameras "forever", but being able to power entire(decently sized) lighting set-ups with just a few batteries.
 
Not in the short term, but yes, it's more likely now. Also a new possibility: that nvidia may allow third parties to design their own GPU using nvidia building blocks, as ARM does now on the CPU
 
JAMedia said:
...https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/...s-premier-computing-company-for-the-age-of-ai
So we can expect ARM-cpu Nvidia-GPU Macs ?
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Apple has an architectural license for the ARMv8 instruction set, which is a beyond a perpetual license: https://semiaccurate.com/2013/08/07/a-long-look-at-how-arm-licenses-chips/.

They only license the instruction set not anything else. This is similar to Intel licensing AMD's 64-bit x86 instruction set. Intel can design whatever CPU they want, and extend that instruction set any way they want. No matter what AMD does this with their future CPU or GPU development, this does not constrain Intel or the x86-64 instruction they licensed from AMD. Apple already designs their own integrated GPU, and some industry people expect this to continue for future upgraded Apple Silicon Macs. It seems possible a future Apple Silicon Mac might use that, not nVidia or AMD GPUs: https://www.computerworld.com/article/3564527/apple-has-built-its-own-mac-graphics-processors.html
https://appleinsider.com/articles/2...on-suggests-third-party-gpu-support-in-danger

Unlike most other ARM licensees, Apple already designs their own CPUs, including the micro-architecture. If nVidia wanted to bundle their GPU on the same SoC as an ARM CPU, this has no impact on Apple's future plans. The lower-tier ARM licensees who license complete designs from ARM (not just the instruction set) could hypothetically be more affected in the future.
 
I didn't know most of that, thanks!
(also: a semiaccurate link, I hadn't seen one of those in many years! Since I moved from trying to do 3D animation to trying to shoot stuff with cameras XD)
 
So Apple just announced new iPads including the iPad Air with a the new A14 Bionic built in a 5nm process with 6 CPU cores and 4 GPU cores. The performance benefits Apple touts are in comparison to the A12 since they are comparing this new iPad Air to its immediate predecessor.

This might give us a frame of reference for what to expect from the A14X chips. From a performance perspective this new A14 powered iPad Air does raise questions about where the iPad Pro fits in their product line and how the iPad Pros will be differentiated from the iPad Airs. I wonder if Apple will dramatically increase the RAM in next generation iPad Pro?

A14 Bionic chip featuring 40% faster CPU, 30% faster graphics, and 70% faster machine learning with next-generation Neural Engine.
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https://www.apple.com/ipad-air/
 
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