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The Snapdragon X2 Elite top version also has 18 cores, but they say 12 Prime (Super) cores and 6 Performance (Performance) cores.

Yet the M5 Pro/Max is going to absolutely trounce the Qualcomm processors despite have a supposedly inferior mix of cores (fewer of the fastest cores).
 
The Snapdragon X2 Elite top version also has 18 cores, but they say 12 Prime (Super) cores and 6 Performance (Performance) cores.

Yet the M5 Pro/Max is going to absolutely trounce the Qualcomm processors despite have a supposedly inferior mix of cores (fewer of the fastest cores).
To be fair, you're comparing 2nd Gen Snapdragon to 5th Gen M-series. It's not surprising Apple is ahead.
 
Apple M5 Max chip
18‑core CPU with 6 super cores and 12 performance cores
32-core GPU
16‑core Neural Engine
614GB/s memory bandwidth

Configurable to:
40-core GPU


Apple M4 Max chip
14‑core CPU with 4 super cores and 10 performance cores
32-core GPU
16‑core Neural Engine
410GB/s memory bandwidth

Configurable to:
16‑core CPU with 4 super cores and 16 performance cores
40-core GPU (546GB/s memory bandwidth)
“Super cores” are the old efficiency cores. Performance cores are the same. So it’s plus 2 efficiency cores which makes sense with the uplift in multi. Their new terminology makes zero sense.
 
That’s GPU to onboard memory on the card itself. Bandwidth from a 5090 to your system RAM will be 128GB/s best-case, much slower than the M5 Max at 614GB/s.

So 5090 RAM is ridiculously fast locally but much slower if you need more RAM.

As soon as you fill up that 5090's 32GB of RAM, your AI models slow to a crawl as it has to swap in from system RAM. There's no slow down with Apple Silicon due to unified memory. You can run 80GB models on 96GB of unified memory at full speed, and eat the 5090's proverbial lunch.
 
“Super cores” are the old efficiency cores. Performance cores are the same. So it’s plus 2 efficiency cores which makes sense with the uplift in multi. Their new terminology makes zero sense.
I think that's wrong, but I'm not sure. They are clearly stating the super cores are the most high performing cores ever, and that wouldn't be the efficiency cores.

They just did this rebranding because some people thought "I don't want to pay for efficiency cores that is not hardcore and TikTok taught me to me hardcore ok"
 
Being on M1 Max 64GB, this 128GB max config is the excuse I needed to not pull the trigger. I was definitely expecting a 192GB config to make it more viable for LLM hosting. That and not having the new display tech.

Apple M4 Max chip
14‑core CPU with 4 super cores and 10 performance cores

But i must say that even if they rebranded eff cores as perf cores now, the OLD eff cores must still be considered eff cores, no? so the leap from m4 max to m5 max should be more significant in a multithreaded scenario here and we should think of the m4 max -> m5 max as going from 4 super + 10 eff to 6 super + 12 perf, with the caveat that "perf" really means "high efficiency perf" not to be confused with former perf (now super).
 
To be fair, you're comparing 2nd Gen Snapdragon to 5th Gen M-series. It's not surprising Apple is ahead.

Nuvia started on these processors 7 years ago. The head of Nuvia was Gerard Williams III, the former processor lead architect at Apple who left to form Nuvia (along with a few other Apple engineers). Qualcomm bought them 5 years ago.

Did you forget all the doom & gloom stories that Apple processor development was going to stall when Williams left and Nuvia (acquired by Qualcomm) were going to pull ahead?

7 years and nothing to show for it.

BTW, Williams recently left Nuvia. Can we all claim Nuvia will stall (even worse than now)?
 
They raised prices across the entire MBP lineup. Now that said you are generally getting more storage etc.
That's not true for the M5 pro lineup. It's the same price. The M5 Max is more expensive because they force you to get the 2TB drive. But it is the same price. I know it's the same price because I had an M4 pro config saved that was $3099. Same specced M5 pro is also $3099
 
I really hope 128GB is not the max on M5 Max because M5 ultra is too spendy and I have to imagine 512GB is a must on that just to keep parity with M3 Ultra's 512GB option. Which SHOULD mean 256GB should be offered for M5 Max. Maybe it will be offered, but only in an M5 Max Studio.

I also wonder if the reason they are using fusion in the Max and Pro chips is that it was a way to finally getting it to scale properly, in order to achieve something wild and new for Ultra (and hopefully Extreme)... With 614 on the Max then ultra should have 1.2TB/s and hopefully an extreme could have 2.4TB/s which will be a really nice halo product.
 
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Probably to keep up their margins as RAM prices increase. They’re tossing in much cheaper to acquire SSD capacity to offset it. Apple really doesn’t want the headline to be a price hike all on its own.
💯

Seems pretty straightforward to me. Apple is not likely to just eat the higher DRAM (and other) costs. Margins must be preserved. Bumping the SSDs gives them a bit of cover, and honestly it's a reasonable strategy. Pay more, get more. Not everyone wants the larger SSD but that's life.
 
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