[HN Gopher] Apple announces new flagship M2 processor
___________________________________________________________________
Apple announces new flagship M2 processor
Author : AlphaWeaver
Score : 153 points
Date : 2022-06-06 17:59 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theverge.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theverge.com)
| rbanffy wrote:
| I'm curious about what caused the 24GB limit. Does it have 3
| memory buses limited to 8GB each?
|
| Also a bit disappointed the Mini didn't get a refresh or, at
| least, the option.
| joneholland wrote:
| Isn't all memory on the SOC? I don't think it's a bus issue as
| much as it's just a space issue.
| qwytw wrote:
| Or more likely a market segmentation issue.
| rbanffy wrote:
| I think it's 3 memory buses. It's rated at 50% more memory
| bandwidth than the M1.
| jjcm wrote:
| A nice bump in specs, but nothing groundbreaking like the initial
| ship. Somewhat disappointed that AV1 isn't supported in hardware,
| and Apple's continued push with HEVC gives me doubts they'll
| support the codec in the future.
| simonh wrote:
| They have a balancing act to perform. It will take time to
| engineer the high end versions of M2 and they can't afford to
| eclipse the current high end M1 machines.
|
| Anyway it seems likely the engineering tradeoffs made in the
| overall M* architecture will be with us for several years to
| come at least, and the first few generations will be
| incremental improvements.
| kirbyfan64sos wrote:
| > Somewhat disappointed that AV1 isn't supported in hardware
|
| Given that the M2 is based on the A15, which doesn't have AV1,
| this was kind of expected. I'd imagine that, due to their
| general cycle, AV1 would come to iPhones first if/when it
| arrives.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| Apple has bought heavily into the HEVC ecosystem so they'll
| have to support it for at least a few generations just to make
| sure their hardware performs well combined with their
| previously released phones. And if you're already dumping money
| into the HEVC patent sinkhole, why bother also implementing a
| free codec?
| barkingcat wrote:
| the Apple chip development progression is well known - all
| apple M chips come from the corresponding iPhone chip that came
| before. It means that the M3 will follow from the next iPhone
| so you can easily tell what codecs will come.
|
| no need to be disappointed, you can just look to the iphone for
| the next macbook.
| Shikadi wrote:
| There are like two Apple M chips, is that something official
| or internally leaked?
| winrid wrote:
| Funny, I guess B&H were right:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31637122
| t7s wrote:
| How do they get away with infringing on BMW trademarks? M2, M3,
| etc..
| withinrafael wrote:
| A trademark can be registered for one or more _classes_ of
| goods /services [1]. The APPLE M1 mark [2], for example, is
| registered across multiple US classes (21, 23, 26, 36, and 38).
| I did not immediately find a registration for US M2-based marks
| by either BMW or Apple. Maybe that's coming soon. Or I didn't
| input the right incantation into TESS [3].
|
| [1]
| https://tmep.uspto.gov/RDMS/TMEP/current#/current/TMEP-1400d...
|
| [2]
| https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4806:q6...
|
| [3] https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/
| cheeze wrote:
| Two completely different industries. Same reason that M3
| medical imaging can.
| klempner wrote:
| And while there is a concept of a "famous trademark" that can
| provide general protection across all industries against
| trademark dilution, it is extremely unlikely something as
| generic as a letter and a number would receive such
| protection.
| hitpointdrew wrote:
| That is not how Trademarks work. It isn't "We used it first, so
| no one else can". If you are in an unrelated industry, selling
| unrelated products you can use any name that might be
| trademarked in another industry/product space.
|
| > For instance, the name "MY GIRL" is a registered trademark
| owned by Enertec Enterprises for a line of dolls and
| accessories. However, there is a second trademark registration
| for the same name "MY GIRL" that is owned by Acushnet Company
| for a line of golf putters. The reason that these two different
| companies could register a trademark for the exact same name is
| that they operate in totally unrelated industries, and offer
| totally unrelated products. One company sells dolls, whereas
| the other company sells golf equipment.
|
| https://secureyourtrademark.com/can-you-trademark/trademark-...
|
| No one is going to confuse a Mac Book for a luxury car, or
| vice-versa.
| jmpman wrote:
| If Solidworks would run on this, I'd buy four of them tomorrow.
| kappuchino wrote:
| Forgive me my specific view: The M2 itself is marvelous. But the
| highly integraded path apple chose with all its hardware ruins it
| for me. For me, its enviromentally insane to buy such a device
| that is nearly unrepairable.
|
| In context, my Macbook air just died yesterday ... the one from
| 2014. Luckily, its the replaceble SSD that went dead. And due to
| OpenCore, it still runs the latest MacOS.
|
| If I would by the new M2 with the new MacBook Air: Same problem
| would doom the complete hardware. And I would have been stuck
| with the OS that Apple deems I can have.
|
| Maybe this comes with age, but I see buzzwords + glitz + speedups
| ... but little to none envirmental progress. Which is a shame.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > Maybe this comes with age, but I see buzzwords + glitz +
| speedups ... but little to none envirmental progress.
|
| They are doing plenty of environmental progress considering
| MacBook Airs have no competition in terms of price to longevity
| and power usage relative to the performance and utility one can
| get out of them.
| kappuchino wrote:
| I think you did not misunderunderstand me on purpose, but the
| modularity/repairablity is abysmal, period. One example:
| Internal ssd dead - system cannot be used. And since its
| soldered in, thats it. Am I wrong?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Sure, but they are making tradeoffs, whether it be
| portability or profit. Either way, their machines and
| product tend to last very long relative to the competition,
| and they seem to be doing the most to drive down power
| consumption. Little to no environmental progress seems
| overboard from my perspective.
| lancesells wrote:
| You are not wrong and it's a really terrible thing they are
| doing with all their devices outside of the Mac Pro and
| maybe Mac Studio.
| least wrote:
| I think their point is there multiple ways that you can
| tackle the environmental impact of the devices you use and
| Apple is approaching that in multiple ways, just not in
| terms of easier repairability. That doesn't mean you can't
| be critical of what they're doing here, of course.
| tristor wrote:
| > For me, its enviromentally insane to buy such a device that
| is nearly unrepairable.
|
| I would generally feel the same, the only reason I don't is
| that Apple laptops tend to last a very long time for me and get
| replaced due to becoming obsolete, not due to becoming
| nonfunctioning. My 2011 MBA was in use until 2016, my 2015 MBP
| is still in use and due to be replaced soon. The lifespan of
| one of these devices is roughly 5 years in my use case, and I
| usually hand them down to someone else that needs a decent
| computer but where my use cases have outgrown it. I know one I
| handed off is still being used 10 years after it was purchased
| and it still works "fine" for some value of fine.
|
| That's not an argument against repairability, but to say that a
| well-made product often has a longer lifespan than a useful
| lifespan for its original owner.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| A large number of Macbook Pros from around 2013-2015 have had
| failed SSDs. Mine failed 4 years ago.
|
| Because I was able to put in a new SSD - one twice the size
| and about twice the speed, I might add - I was able to keep
| using the system, and still am. I had to use an adapter,
| because Apple tried to discourage SSD replacement by using a
| proprietary pinout on the NVMe connector.
|
| If the soldered-on SSD in an M1 mac fails, _you can 't even
| boot the system_. You can't send the system off to have
| someone do a board-level replacement, because apparently they
| do some bullshit to "pair" the flash chips with the flash
| controller.
|
| Apple has gone out of their way to take systems that used to
| be incredibly durable and long-lasting, and give them a very
| finite lifespan.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| At least in the US - the cost to repair a laptop is quite high
| & cumbersome - and the depreciation is quite fast - such that
| there aren't a lot of cases where it financially makes sense to
| repair.
|
| This is a problem not unique to laptops.
|
| I don't know how to feel about it.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| Maybe it failed because it was repairable...
|
| Sealing everything into one blob is going to be way more
| reliable than thousands of crusty connections.
| kappuchino wrote:
| Thats an interesting opinion. I wonder if there are
| statistics on failures of ssds that are soldered and that are
| modular ... ;-) You would be amazed how similar they are.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| I'm sure Apple has data. Ultimately user xp is better when
| device doesn't fail instead of easy repair when it does.
| smoldesu wrote:
| Huh, that's a new one.
|
| > Citation needed?
|
| > I'm sure Apple has data.
| makapuf wrote:
| Replacing cheaply the ssd with 4 times the capacity /
| speed a few years later sure seems good xp for me.
| kansface wrote:
| You can't make that form factor and a repairable laptop, no?
| sam0x17 wrote:
| Well, the framework laptop is really going places for one.
| They just need to hit that slightly higher high end with an
| i9 and an OLED imo
| thefz wrote:
| Check out the service manual for a Lenovo X1 Yoga. You can
| replace/repair almost everything and it's one of the thinnest
| devices. Apple goes for the soldered internals to spill you
| even more money since thy are the only ones able to repair
| it.
|
| https://download.lenovo.com/pccbbs/mobiles_pdf/tp_x1_carbon_.
| ..
| jeroenhd wrote:
| I don't see why not. With M.2 SSDs and DIMM sticks you've got
| quite a thin minimum footprint. Apple has decided that
| soldering everything onto the PCB is worth the cost of making
| the device unrepairable, and that's their business decision
| (and yours if you decide to buy such devices).
|
| There are downsides to normal solutions (i.e. higher latency,
| needing to design places for screws to go) but it's not
| nearly as impossible as modern tech companies would like you
| to believe.
|
| Framework has designed a laptop with some excellent
| repairability and they're just a small team with extremely
| limited funds. Tech giants like Apple should have no trouble
| coming up with similar devices if they actually cared to do
| so.
| nojito wrote:
| Idk where this idea of repairability = good for the
| environment came from.
|
| You'll be hard pressed to find a laptop that is built with
| more recycled material than a MacBook.
| TheMode wrote:
| Reusing instead of recycling will always be more
| environment friendly. No exception.
| kappuchino wrote:
| Are you open to ideas? Repairability = good for the
| environment comes from replacing a small piece of a
| larger hardware item so the whole hardware does not have
| to be recycled in the first place.
|
| Now what happens when the MacBook has a defect processor
| or ram or ssd or screen? The whole thing is trash. And
| thats much more footprint than any smolten
| copper/gold/... that was put into it.
|
| The only reusability is shredding - most of the time! -
| and smelting/separating the metals, which causes a lot of
| enviromental issues.
| jlg23 wrote:
| > Idk where this idea of repairability = good for the
| environment came from.
|
| > You'll be hard pressed to find a laptop that is built
| with more recycled material than a MacBook.
|
| How is swapping one part built with "recycled material"
| not better than swapping that one part plus the whole
| rest of the device with equally "recycled material"?
| spiffytech wrote:
| The old slogan "reduce, reuse, recycle" is written in
| priority order: buying recycled products is good, but
| extending life and avoiding consumption are better.
| nojito wrote:
| Apple forces people to buy base configs, they support
| their devices longer than others, and their laptops are
| built from more recyclable parts than the competitors.
| JohnTHaller wrote:
| > they support their devices longer than others
|
| They support the laptop/desktop hardware longer than
| others. Software-wise, Windows supports a given hardware
| set longer than macOS does. Note that you can mod macOS
| to support older hardware than it official does
| (dosdude1, ben216k, opencore).
| kappuchino wrote:
| "they support their devices longer than others" - true.
| its just after that time apple keeps the key to the
| device so they become insecure electronic ...
| paperweights? I mean, whats the use of an old phone /
| ipad / ... that you can infect with a single message, yet
| you can't run an alternate os on it. This is the point of
| the critcism: Unrepairable Hardware + Lockdown =
| Paperweights over time = less ecological than a modular,
| repairable and unlocked laptop, computer or phone.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| > I don't see why not. With M.2 SSDs and DIMM sticks you've
| got quite a thin minimum footprint.
|
| The memory used in Apple laptops is not the same type of
| memory that you find on a DIMM. The architecture is more
| like a GPU, with high-speed memory placed as close as
| possible to the CPU.
|
| Nobody complains that they can't upgrade the RAM on their
| GPU because we all understand the benefits of putting it on
| the same PCB. Apple did the same with CPUs.
|
| > Framework has designed a laptop with some excellent
| repairability and they're just a small team with extremely
| limited funds. Tech giants like Apple should have no
| trouble coming up with similar devices if they actually
| cared to do so.
|
| 99.9% of consumers do not care about upgrading. They
| wouldn't be opening their laptops and trying to swap out
| components even if they could. It's not reasonable to
| expect Apple to compromise the design of their system to
| cater to the vanishingly small minority of customers who
| demand such features.
|
| For that minority of users, companies like Framework exist
| to fill the void. However, let's not pretend like the
| Framework laptop is on par with an M1/M2 Apple laptop in
| terms of speed, size, power, battery life, or really any
| other metric beyond ability to swap out parts. They're cool
| laptops, but Apple's highly integrated products are on a
| different level entirely.
| thefz wrote:
| > The memory used in Apple laptops is not the same type
| of memory that you find on a DIMM. The architecture is
| more like a GPU, with high-speed memory placed as close
| as possible to the CPU.
|
| That was a design decision too. It's not that they bought
| a chip, they made it themselves.
|
| > It's not reasonable to expect Apple to compromise the
| design of their system to cater to the vanishingly small
| minority of customers who demand such features.
|
| I repaired an upgraded dozens of laptops for friends and
| family, extending their service life for _years_. Less
| rare earth in a landfill and more money in the pockets of
| my acquaintances. The "small minority" is "vanishing"
| because people are being trated more and more like
| consumers that throw away the current toy to buy a new
| one. Companies like Apple are the root cause to this.
| They want this.
| AshamedCaptain wrote:
| I have smaller x86 tablets that are more repairable.
| kappuchino wrote:
| You are right. But instead of making things smaller all the
| time, a company could chose to make things better repairable
| - like the framework laptop. Would Apple do that? No, why
| should they, since most if its hardware buyers are oblivious
| to the implications of bad repairability. It least thats what
| I think, but what do I know ...
| jeroenhd wrote:
| It's a real shame, but the people working on Ahasi Linux seem
| to be making steady progress. With a bit of luck, the device
| will remain usable when Apple eventually drops support for this
| machine, assuming the non-user-replaceable parts like the
| storage or the RAM don't wear out.
| Zanneth wrote:
| > If I would by the new M2 with the new MacBook Air: Same
| problem would doom the complete hardware. And I would have been
| stuck with the OS that Apple deems I can have.
|
| There is nothing preventing you from installing an alternate OS
| on AppleSilicon Macs. Apple supports this officially via
| something called Apple Secure MultiBoot.
| TheMode wrote:
| What alternate OS? The one where developers are still in the
| process of reverse engineering Apple's SoC?
| nobodywasishere wrote:
| Asahi Linux
| smoldesu wrote:
| This was not an option until MacOS 12.2, and AFAIK is not
| "officially supported" or even documented by Apple. Can you
| link to somewhere where they describe supporting this?
| collias wrote:
| Repairability is certainly something that could be improved,
| and extending the life of your machine is great for the
| environment.
|
| However, I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a machine with a
| better power-performance curve than the M1 (or now M2)
| machines. Reducing the electrical power needed for the same
| amount of processing power is absolutely helpful for the
| environment; the new chips are doing much more for much less.
|
| Additionally, Apple tends to support old hardware far longer
| than competitors. My personal machine is still a 2012 MBP and
| it's just now starting to not receive the latest OS updates.
| demouser345 wrote:
| great. on top of yearly environment destruction via phones. now
| there are whole displays, batteries, keyboards and a ton of other
| special material just to fuel this greed carbon monster.
| wollsmoth wrote:
| They aren't the only ones making new computers every year.
| rdw wrote:
| It's fun to be back in the age where every few years you want to
| upgrade your computer because the new ones are so much faster,
| not because the old one is worn out.
|
| 20% faster isn't enough to make me regret my M1 purchase, but
| after one or two more 20% speed gains I'll feel like upgrading to
| the latest is going to be worth it.
| Normille wrote:
| For as long as I can remember, every new Apple computer was "up
| to" 5... 10... 15... times faster than the one before. The use
| of "up to" is a clever marketing ploy. Because if all those
| were actual figures then, with all that compound
| multiplication, the current laptops must be about a million
| times faster than the one I had 20 or so years ago.
| gabereiser wrote:
| definitely feels a million times faster than a iMac circa
| 2000 with it's 333mhz CPU. I mean, we are talking 100000x
| performance at least.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I'd want the Wirth's law[1] to be not true regardless of where
| we are in the hardware scale.
|
| I recently tried using a 486 + CRT monitor setup. The speed at
| which your keystrokes appear on the screen is simply
| astounding. I'd like us to pay more attention to how software
| is written and debloating the layers of abstraction with
| hindsight.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirth%27s_law
| m463 wrote:
| I remember reading that 1/10 of a second response time is
| "interactive"
|
| I wonder how many systems don't qualify as interactive?
|
| I don't think typing into the amazon search bar qualifies.
| flatiron wrote:
| Boot on Linux and bash on a modern computer. Do you think the
| keystrokes are slower?
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I've tried FreeBSD (without desktop) on Thinkpad X1. I must
| admit, it is pretty good.
| giobox wrote:
| The problem isn't even the computer most times, its more
| often the display. Many modern flat panel displays have far
| more latency than even a crappy analog CRT, and yes the
| difference is definitely often noticeable if you have any
| experience with computers. Some of the most modern ones can
| be the worst offenders too, given the amount of signal
| processing a modern display does.
|
| To add to earlier example, I do some retro gaming on an old
| windows 98 box with a CRT, the lack of latency moving the
| mouse in first person shooters of this era compared to
| today can be incredible.
| ricardobeat wrote:
| Same reason most people playing FPS games today use a
| 144hz+ monitor, ideally with black frame insertion. The
| difference is night and day.
| teilo wrote:
| That's analog for you. You essentially have a speed of
| light connection from the frame buffer to the electron
| gun, with no processing involved. As fast as the bits can
| be read from the data buffer they appear on the screen.
| pradn wrote:
| Dan's famous article on this subject has benchmarks:
| https://danluu.com/keyboard-latency/
| User23 wrote:
| The most responsive computer I've ever used was a Mac 512ke
| upgraded with 2.5 MB of RAM. I booted and loaded applications
| all off a RAMdisk and every input was instantaneous,
| including launching applications.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| > I recently tried using a 486 + CRT monitor setup. The speed
| at which your keystrokes appear on the screen is simply
| astounding.
|
| Use a fast editor like Sublime Text or even something like
| JetBrains IDEA with the zero-latency mode enabled and the
| editor delay will be single-digit milliseconds.
|
| Get a modern 120Hz or more monitor (search for gaming
| monitor) with low latency and your display lag will be less
| than 10ms.
|
| More info here: https://pavelfatin.com/typing-with-pleasure/
| mekster wrote:
| I think you got that wrong. Speed isn't a bottleneck anymore
| and you won't get much better experience. This is same as
| phones.
|
| Soon, they'll have to be more creative for people to consider
| buying every few years.
|
| I wish MBA started having ProMotion.
| danieldk wrote:
| > I think you got that wrong. Speed isn't a bottleneck
| anymore and you won't get much better experience. This is
| same as phones.
|
| Well... I'm pretty sure that this _is_ Hacker News. And for
| many developers, any performance improvement is great.
|
| I first got an M1 Air, which was fantastic. Faster than my
| 3700X workstation for building Rust projects, while it was
| passively cooled and portable. Despite the awesome
| performance of the M1 Air, I upgraded to an M1 Pro when it
| came out. Moving from 4 performance + 4 efficiency cores to 8
| performance + 2 efficiency cores was yet another awesome
| upgrade, giving again much quicker builds.
|
| I work on machine learning stuff, so the AMX matrix co-
| processing unit in the M1 was really great for training small
| networks (sometimes convolution networks are still great for
| NLP + being able to train locally is nice for development).
| Then the M1 Pro/Max had double the AMX units, so it's again a
| great step forward.
|
| Getting 20% YoY improvements will definitely make me very
| happy (and I bet many other developers).
| bismuthcrystal wrote:
| >Soon, they'll have to be more creative for people to
| consider buying every few years.
|
| No, they will just stop the "security" updates and force you
| to buy a new one.
| sib wrote:
| I spend a lot of my (non-work) time doing photo editing using
| Adobe products while traveling.
|
| I'll happily take a laptop that is 10x as fast as my current
| one...
| eitland wrote:
| I am a Linux user.
|
| For me lagging on Windows is not only noticeable but also
| maddening.
|
| Typically my old laptop with a 3 year old processor and half
| the memory is snappier running a mainstream distro with KDE
| Plasma than a brand new one running Windows.
| adrr wrote:
| Depends what you do. Compiling/Building or Video/Photo
| editing, the speed makes a big difference. M1s cut compile
| time on xcode build by half compared to I9s. Also docker
| builds are faster. Shaving off a few minutes here and there
| makes a big difference in ROI when you factor in the a year
| lifespan. Let's say it saves you 15 minutes a day. That is 62
| hours a years.
| puranjay wrote:
| Small things add up. Freezing a track in Ableton, for
| instance, is substantially faster. This makes a huge
| difference to the workflow. When you're in a creative state
| of flow, stopping several seconds just for a track to
| freeze can take you completely out of your zone.
| maccard wrote:
| Completely agree here. Not only that, but I have faster
| compiles on my m1 mac than on my i7 mac, _and_ I can
| compile on batter on my M1 and still have it last all day.
| zimpenfish wrote:
| > Speed isn't a bottleneck anymore
|
| _stares in Mojang 's poorly optimised Java_
|
| (Also, as other people have pointed out, it absolutely can be
| when compiling, using Photoshop, doing billions of Prolog
| inferences, etc.)
| rdsubhas wrote:
| Higher speed _at the same power usage_ translates to better
| battery life.
| danieldk wrote:
| Right, and this is quite impressive, since they haven't yet
| been able to go from 5nm to 3nm. So, by the time the M3 is out,
| it will be a great update for the M1. (And the M1 will still be
| awesome for people who don't need the bump.)
| cogman10 wrote:
| IDK that I'd count on node shrinks to provide anywhere near
| the performance/power saving bumps that it used to. We are
| pretty close to the point were smaller nodes will mean more
| power consumption with the same design merely due to the fact
| that smaller nodes mean more leakage due to electron
| tunneling.
| jeffbee wrote:
| That doesn't seem new. Just taking the default single-thread
| benchmark from Anandtech, CPUs that are sequentially 20% slower
| than the current record, the Intel Core i9-12900K (Q4 2021),
| are the Ryzen 9 5900X (Q4 2020), the Core i9-10900K (Q2 2020),
| Core i3-7350K (Q1 2017), and Core i5-6500 (Q3 2015). That's a
| doubling in performance in about 6.25 years. So you needn't
| have waited for your fruity savior to bring you biennial 20%
| performance increases.
| julianbuse wrote:
| I wonder how this would stack up against my m1 pro equipped mbp
| 14.
| gnicholas wrote:
| It looks like it has more power efficiency, which will matter
| more for some people than others. They certainly didn't want to
| trash their previously-flagship laptop processors...
| EduardoBautista wrote:
| I am waiting on an M1 Pro MBP 16 (I currently have the Intel
| MBP 16). Although right now I am thinking of cancelling that
| and ordering a MacBook Air and using that until the M2 Pro
| chips are released.
| rpastuszak wrote:
| I switched to MacBook Air M1 from MBP 16 Intel a month ago,
| and
|
| a) it still feels weirdly faster then the MBP
|
| b) I can spend 6h outside working from the garden on one
| charge (running vitejs or react native + metro, plus slack,
| Spotify etc...)
|
| c) I'm still a bit pissed that I didn't wait a month for the
| 2nd gen
| dartdartdart wrote:
| return it!
| moneywoes wrote:
| Anything you miss from the 16?
| rpastuszak wrote:
| Having ports on both sides of the machine. I use a usb-c
| display and need to flip the laptop upside down when
| docking. Otherwise my cables would get a bit messy or I'd
| have to rearrange my desk to avoid direct sunlight
| falling on the main screen.
|
| Tbh, I have barely used the desk since I bought the
| machine, so we'll see how much of an annoyance this will
| become in autumn:)
| turtlebits wrote:
| I have a M1 Pro 16 as a work machine and a personal M1
| Air. The screen on the 16" is much better (higher refresh
| and brighter)
| kirbyfan64sos wrote:
| Do note that supply-chain issues plagued later orders of the
| M1 Pro/Max MBPs, so I wouldn't be surprised if it would take
| a decent bit of time to actually get an M2 Pro/Max, even
| after it actually gets announced in a few more months.
| cehrlich wrote:
| Think about what you do and what you need. I bought an M1
| MacBook Air to keep me going until the Apple Silicon 16" Pro,
| and ended up staying with the Air.
|
| 16GB is fine for a typical web dev setup with three Docker
| containers. When I go out for more than a day I take an
| external monitor with me, the total package weighs less than
| a 16" Pro and has way more screen real estate.
|
| Of course there's some people who definitely need the 16"
| Pro.
| ayewo wrote:
| Which external monitor do you use if I may ask?
| cehrlich wrote:
| Lenovo M14. The design and hinge is great and the panel
| is fine, but I actually wouldn't recommend this one as
| it's 1920x1080 which scales poorly with MacOS. For VSCode
| or a web browser it's fine though, I just use CMD+(+/-).
|
| Ideally I'd recommend anything with 2560x1440 or
| 2560x1600 resolution.
| rbanffy wrote:
| > I am thinking of cancelling that and ordering a MacBook Air
|
| An M1 Pro or Max laptop should still be faster than an M2
| Air, and can address a lot more memory (if that's what you
| ordered).
| ilrwbwrkhv wrote:
| Is it though? Still remains to be seen. I am considering
| the 14 inch Macbook Pro with the M1 Pro chip or the M2
| Macbook Air.
| rbanffy wrote:
| An M1 Pro starts at 6 CPU P-cores (2 e-cores) and 14 GPU
| cores at twice the memory bandwidth.
| skrowl wrote:
| Given that the die size is even bigger, I'd expect them to have
| even worse thermal issues than the M1 Pros, but only time will
| tell
| danieldk wrote:
| What thermal issues? I can build PyTorch with all cores and
| the fans do spin up, but they are barely audible in a normal
| environment. When you touch the laptop it's warmer than idle,
| but not hot at all.
| msbarnett wrote:
| Even worse thermal issues than ... a laptop with no thermal
| issues and a fan that never even seems to audibly turn on?
| kgermino wrote:
| The M1 Pros occasionally get hot enough you can hear the fan
| over a quiet conversation. Are you referring to the previous
| generation Intel MBPs which routinely maxed out their cooling
| system and thermal throttled?
| thebean11 wrote:
| The M1 pro is the coolest device I have ever used, not sure
| what you mean by "even worse"
| rbanffy wrote:
| > worse thermal issues than the M1 Pros
|
| What thermal issues?
| Melatonic wrote:
| And yet the Mac Pro is still on Intel with no Nvidia
| option.......
|
| When they make a chip for that machine that competes then I might
| be interested
| dartdartdart wrote:
| Regarding the Process-architecture-optimization model from intel,
| what do each of those upgrades mean to the user?
|
| I believe Process has the most to deal with energy efficiency due
| to the shrinkage, which is why M1 was so energy efficient when it
| was launched.
|
| M2 seems like an architecture/optimization change, seems like
| they are just able to cram more stuff which is why it's faster
| without increasing battery life.
|
| For those familiar with Intel, what does the consumer mainly gain
| out of optimization product launches?
| msbarnett wrote:
| > I believe Process has the most to deal with energy efficiency
| due to the shrinkage, which is why M1 was so energy efficient
| when it was launched.
|
| Eh, that's part of it, but a lot of it has to do with the M1
| having very very high IPC (much higher than comparable x86-64
| parts), meaning they could run the chip at a much lower max
| clock speed (3.2 GHz versus boosting to 5 GHz for most
| competitive x86-64 CPUs) for similar overall performance.
|
| This makes a _huge_ difference because power consumption
| increases exponentially with clock speed.
|
| edit: thinking about how it relates to Intel's process-
| architecture-optimization, it feels a bit tricky to compare.
| Apple's process seems to be something like:
| architecture(A-series chip for iPhones)-optimize-with-new-die-
| reusing-basic-cores-in-diff-arrangement-targetting-perf-in-
| small-thermal-envelope(M1 for iPad Pro and small
| Macbooks)-optimize-again-with-another-new-die-reusing-basic-
| cores-but-in-yet-another-arrangement-targetting-perf-in-a-
| wider-thermal-envelope(M1 Pro/Max/Ultra), and that all happens
| before you get to the next M-series increment, which begins
| with an A-series increment.
|
| So the M2 is less the optimization of the M1 than it is the re-
| use of the cores in the new A-series chip preceding it, which
| was an architectural change, plus optimizations and other SoC
| differences.
| megous wrote:
| > This makes a huge difference because power consumption
| increases exponentially with clock speed.
|
| It scales linearly with clock speed.
| msbarnett wrote:
| These graphs look linear to you?
|
| https://blog.stuffedcow.net/2012/07/ivy-bridge-power-
| consump...
|
| https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-
| qimg-61820a6b86759c354d41d...
| megous wrote:
| These graphs look like they depict _f_ only scaling?
| msbarnett wrote:
| Who said anything about _f_?
|
| I said "power consumption increases exponentially with
| clock speed" not "power consumption increases
| exponentially with _f_ ". That any modern processor has
| to crank up V to crank up its clock speed is a given.
|
| Hence, power consumption is exponential with clock speed
| (which is achieved by cranking up _both_ V - the
| polynomial term in P - and _f_ ).
|
| (Which, fine, if you want to be pedantic, is polynomial
| growth, but that changes nothing about the point, which
| is that you have to burn a shitload more power at 5 GHz
| than at 3.2 GHz, because your consumption isn't scaling
| anything close to linear).
| kec wrote:
| P = V^2 * f, yes, but V and f are correlated. You can't
| increase f without also increasing V, hence: exponential
| scaling.
| wormslayer666 wrote:
| That's polynomial scaling, not exponential.
| WithinReason wrote:
| That's still a polynomial, not an exponential
| DSingularity wrote:
| Just wait until docker and packages and everything is built for
| these beasts.
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| The environment is already pretty good. When it came out last
| year I had a few woes with x86_64 software, but nowadays I
| think most things you'd want are built for ARM, or you can get
| a very good experience with Rosetta 2.
| andrewnicolalde wrote:
| If you're referring to those pieces of software having support
| for Apple silicon, Docker already does (even without Rosetta
| installed) and I have yet to encounter a package on homebrew
| that isn't natively built for ARM.
| shakermakr wrote:
| This is all great and everything but when will enterprise
| customers like me see it? I've still my M1 Max on back order
| since February because "Apple is experiencing supply issues and
| prioritises consumer and education ahead of enterprise"
|
| The M2 Max will be with us when my Mac finally ships...
| kirbyfan64sos wrote:
| I ordered mine in February as well, and after being delayed so
| many times the estimates were landing in July...it actually
| shipped out, and it arrived around a week ago. Was debating
| just cancelling and getting something else, but after using it,
| I'm _very_ glad I didn 't.
| mths wrote:
| I ordered mine in mid-March and got it a week or two ago. I
| hate to say it, but it pays to call them and bitch about the
| delays. Squeaky wheel gets the grease and all that. They said
| they'd put me on priority and it seems from these comments
| maybe they actually did.
| tristor wrote:
| I hope we see a refresh with the M2 based SoCs in other systems
| as well this year. I intend to upgrade my old MBP and also
| probably acquire a Mac Mini or Mac Studio as a workstation later
| this year, and while the M1 Max/Ultra is pretty great, I'd love
| to see these incremental improvements up front.
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