Intel Alder Lake Chips for Desktops Faster Than M1 Max in Benchmarks, But Use Much More Power

[the8thark]

I read many comments pointing at the fact that Apple is yet to release a desktop-class M chip.
But actually it already has.

In my opinion you are only partially correct. M1 blurs the lines in the what is mobile vs what is desktop. Apple is pushing M1 to be both and neither of the above at the same time.

Desktop like performance with mobile like efficiency.

Getting in my soapbox - I feel we need to think differently with these chips in 2 major ways.

1. The notion that dedicated cpu plus dedicated gpu combinations are always better. Traditionally that was the case but Apple’s integration solution is showing this is where the future could lie.

2. Desktop hardware is better than mobile hardware.
Apple is trying to prove that both are flawed and the answer is a product that has desktop like power with mobile like efficiency. All with zero compromise.

Impossible? In the past, very impossible. But today it is getting closer and closer to being a reality. M1 is not there yet.

What M1 is showing us is, we need to think differently about what is the best way moving forward for computer internals.

 

[the8thark]

But it will be the absolute best for gamers right?

Nintendo Switch leads the pack here. Game availability trumps the need to push for bleeding edge visual specs.

 

[TheMacDaddy1]

"Intel Alder Lake Chips for Desktops Faster Than M1 Max"​

Everything is in the line, laptop chips vs desktop chips.

It is pretty clear that Apple has a strategy that currently makes no distinction between desktop and laptop with their silicon.

The M1 is used in the Mini and the 24 inch iMac. The new M1 Pro/Max will most likely be used in the current high end Mini (Intel) and the replacement mid to high end iMac soon. Making those lines pure Apple. So so low end laptop/desktop through mid/high end will be pure Apple.

Those mid to high end iMacs will compete directly with Intel desktops with theses new Intel chips in the creative market like the video cutting industry. Those people care way more about time to completion than how green their desktop computer is.

What will be interesting to see is the final round of Apple silicon. The Mac Pro and if they bring back the iMac Pro. Will those Apple chips only be desktop? Probably but with 3NM chips coming and how efficient the current M1 Max is, I could easily see the low end Mac Pro “M2 Max Plus” on 3 nm being a top end option for the 16 inch MacBook.

 

[cocoua]

The thing is that Intel chips have traditionally been a poor fit for iMacs, because the all-in-one form factor makes for inefficient cooling that in turn results in throttling. Alder Lake would not fare well in the iMac form factor either way. We see how Apple leveraged on the M1 design to make the new iMac as slim as it is. You will not be able to achieve a similar form factor using intel chips.

My guess is that this is how Apple will continue to differentiate their products, by leveraging on the strengths of their custom silicon to enable PC form factors that simply isn't feasible for the competition to ape. And I remain optimistic that Apple will be able to scale the M1 chips to at least match Alder Lake in performance, while requiring less cooling.

You are right but also have in mind the new MbP are thicker, so I hope iMacs 27 (32..) would be pro users focus where anorexic chasis arent important, but performance (and OK, power comsumption at some level in order to avoid throttling, to save the planet, keep the fans low, and save some money in electricity...)

Or maybe M1 in single core is all apple has for this next year and only adding cores is their only option.. sad but slighty better than intel xeon (where the more cores, the slower cpu single core).

Anyway, I hope apple made the switch as soon as they could, so ARM evolution still will be much better than x86 so in the next years the lap will be larger

And im hoping this not because I want Apple wind Intel, is because x86 has shown very poor advances in the latest years and evlotuion is far slower than other techs (8K, SSD...)

 

[quatermass]

Greta Thunberg is disappointed in you Intel!

Greta Thunberg should get an education.

 

[bradman83]

It is pretty clear that Apple has a strategy that currently makes no distinction between desktop and laptop with their silicon.

The M1 is used in the Mini and the 24 inch iMac. The new M1 Pro/Max will most likely be used in the current high end Mini (Intel) and the replacement mid to high end iMac soon. Making those lines pure Apple. So so low end laptop/desktop through mid/high end will be pure Apple.

Those mid to high end iMacs will compete directly with Intel desktops with theses new Intel chips in the creative market like the video cutting industry. Those people care way more about time to completion than how green their desktop computer is.

What will be interesting to see is the final round of Apple silicon. The Mac Pro and if they bring back the iMac Pro. Will those Apple chips only be desktop? Probably but with 3NM chips coming and how efficient the current M1 Max is, I could easily see the low end Mac Pro “M2 Max Plus” on 3 nm being a top end option for the 16 inch MacBook.

Current rumors suggest Apple's desktop solution will simply be multiple M1 Max dies in a single CPU in a sort of SMP style setup. I think the big question will be what Apple uses these chips for. The 27" iMac is popular because it's the only Mac that includes the highest performing Core series chips at a price that's far more reasonable than the Xeon-based Mac Pro or iMac Pro. Apple could just stick the M1 Pro/Max in the 27" iMac and call it a day, saving the multi-die desktop chips for the Mac Pro only. Doing so could create a hole in their product line for professionals who want something more performant than the M1 Max but who don't want/need the expense outlay of a Mac Pro that starts at $6000.

 

[dwsolberg]

Wow, Apple really undersold these M1 chips. The fact that Intel had to make a desktop chip that uses up to 240 Watts of power to get faster than Apple's MOBILE chip is quite a feat.

 

[dpackman]

As others have pointed out, for a preliminary comparison of two architecture (one desktop, one mobile), the results suggest that Intel has an energy/performance problem. This is due to a combination of the architecture itself and fabrication. The tight integration of GPUs on the M1 chip and the resultant gains in memory bandwidth are significant and it will be interesting to see where this goes. As other articles have suggested, they might tightly couple a group of M1 chips together. The computational folks running CUDA will be seeing where this goes...

 

[elmateo487]

Problem with this is that rumors are saying the exact M1 pro/max will be used in the refreshed iMac next year.

The modern iMacs use the same mobile processor architectures as laptops. They don’t use desktop CPUs

 

[Denzo]

Well WATT do you know!

 

[Eidorian]

It is pretty clear that Apple has a strategy that currently makes no distinction between desktop and laptop with their silicon.

The M1 is used in the Mini and the 24 inch iMac. The new M1 Pro/Max will most likely be used in the current high end Mini (Intel) and the replacement mid to high end iMac soon. Making those lines pure Apple. So so low end laptop/desktop through mid/high end will be pure Apple.

Those mid to high end iMacs will compete directly with Intel desktops with theses new Intel chips in the creative market like the video cutting industry. Those people care way more about time to completion than how green their desktop computer is.

What will be interesting to see is the final round of Apple silicon. The Mac Pro and if they bring back the iMac Pro. Will those Apple chips only be desktop? Probably but with 3NM chips coming and how efficient the current M1 Max is, I could easily see the low end Mac Pro “M2 Max Plus” on 3 nm being a top end option for the 16 inch MacBook.

Apple's route is to make a base line core and SoC package. After that it is up to scaling based around it. Isn't the current rumor for a Pro desktop that it takes M1 Pro/Max and scales it up again x2/4?

Apple is going to throw parallelization and GPU acceleration to maintain the illusion of performance gains. You can see it in the M1 Pro/Max. M2 is going to be an optimization. We are close to the edge of the limits of process nodes and transistors.

 

[mbmoore]

So Intel hates Mother Earth. Got it.

Mother Earth doesn’t care one way or the other--percentage-wise, the energy usage difference between them is minuscule, at least for desktops. Apple Silicon isn’t going to ‘save the earth’-- it’s just going to make portable devices last longer on a battery charge. It doesn’t matter to me because I don’t believe in manmade climate change—there’s no real proof of it; but if you really want to minimize use of fossil fuels, shy away from electric cars. They use more fossil fuels than a Chevy Tahoe and will overwhelm the power grid if they are employed en masse.

 

[elmateo487]

That's more than 65W AMD Ryzen desktop APU with built-in graphics plus ~8W for 16GB DDR4.

https://www.amd.com/en/processors/ryzen-with-graphics#Model-Specifications

And? That would be a WAY slower computer compared to the M1 Max for video editing and creative work. Despite the geekbench scores.

And those laptops have significantly less battery life than the M1 Max laptops.

Not to mention if you haven’t been following along, that 64w is not what it draws at those clocks and usages.

 

[lairdpopkin]

You think only Apple makes computers?

This is a Mac rumors site. In that context, Apple's moved on from Intel, so

This is obviously the only choice for a comparison now, as Apple has not released the desktop version of their processors. But, even this comparison is embarrassing for Intel...their top of the line processor is only 1.5 times faster than Apple's first mobile processor, and the power difference between the two is massive, almost three times as much. Apple really has built an impressive architecture with the M processors, it's going to be very interesting when they release their desktop processor that can take advantage of more power, space, and cooling capacity allowed in a desktop case.

Honestly, I can't wait to see what a truly unleashed M processor can do, and what Apple plans to do for the second generation of the processors they are building, which are the most efficient out there, and have a shot at being the fastest overall.

Exactly - Apple's laptop chips crush Intel's laptop chips, which run at half the performance of Intel's desktop chips because of their extremely high power drain - and even while losing on performance, Intel's laptop chips draw far more power than Apple's.

The relevant comparison to Intel's new highest-end desktop chip will be Apple's high-end desktop chips. So far the rumors are for them to be 2x and 4x the M1 Max, the same way the M1 Pro is 2x an M1, and the M1 Max is 4x an M1. If they really can do it by packing 2 and 4 M1 Max dies into one package, that would be pretty amazing. Getting 2-3x the performance of Intel's fastest chip in one package, drawing less power, which in theory is what you'd get, would be astounding. And since Apple's design is so modular, they could scale up GPUs and CPU, etc., relatively independently, since they already have the best memory cross-section throughput on the planet by a wide margin, and that's usually the limiting factor in any computer's performance.

 

[Pearple]

Clearly Intel builds the best desktop processors and it makes bootcamp available with ultimate flexibility for the owner but bean counter Tim Apple won't admit that those M1-iMacs are just a dead end.

 

[elmateo487]

The

M1 is a laptop AND desktop SoC.
It's already on iMac and Mac Mini.

The modern iMac and Mac Mini have used mobile chips… not desktop chips.

 

[elmateo487]

When did iMac and Mac Mini turn into laptops?

Those have used Intel laptop processors…. Not desktop. Is my MBP a desktop because I put it on a desk?

 

[elmateo487]

Yeah no. You could liquid cool a 12900k 3090 8TB 128GB for far less than a loaded MBP. Heck the cpu/gpu/mb are less than $3500.

CPU - $900
Motherboard - $400
3090 - $3000 (what they are actually going for)
8TB - 4 2TBs X 200 - $800
128GB ram - 64x2 - $750
Case, water cooling, power supply, fans, monitor, cables, keyboard, mouse etc - let’s just guess $1000

$6850

Maxed out M1 Max 16” is $6099

Did you even take a second to think about what you said? And once again… this is a desktop vs laptop discussion.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

But without battery to worry about and more space they can upclock it to close the performance gap, while still drawing less power and running cooler and quieter.

There is no performance gap to close. ALL Macs have to be is “suitably faster than the prior Mac of the same model”.

 

[GrumpyCoder]

Those have used Intel laptop processors…. Not desktop. Is my MBP a desktop because I put it on a desk?

We’re talking about AS, not Intel. Your MBP has a battery and monitor intended for mobile use, your MacMini and iMac don’t. With AS there’s not mobile and desktop anymore.

3090 - $3000 (what they are actually going for)

Shh, if you wait a few weeks, you can get these for retail at your local dealer that you have loyalty supported over the years. But I can play that game too. I know someone with a fully loaded MBP, which he was willing to sell it for $10k right now. With Apple, it’s a 6 week wait. So if you want one right now, it’s $10k. There… I broke the Apple sheep logic. ?

 

[Unregistered 4U]

It's only Apple that had heat issues with Intel chipsets, none of the leading PC laptop manufacturers had issues with noisy fans and heat with the same chipset

No, they all had issues and they all had to deal with it differently. Producing their subsequent systems larger, with power hungry RAM (because Intel still wasn’t supporting LPDDR), AND in some cases they were using desktop processors in laptop systems. If you check reviews of systems at that time, you’ll find all this. Intel messed up everyone’s plans, but when your casing is plastic, you just mold a larger plastic casing.

 

[pratikindia]

It will be interesting when Intel will launch mobile cpus with hybrid solution. I think Intel will stay competitive in near future.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

It does matter because Apple have to compete with Windows laptops and PCs.

Yup. This puts the onus on Apple to release a faster chip for their upcoming 27" (30"?) iMac and Mac Pros releases...

Unless Windows laptops and PC’s start running, say, Logic Pro overnight, there’s no competition. If you need speed in an app that’s cross platform, get a Windows system and an AMD or Intel processor. If you need a Mac app, you won’t be able to buy faster Macs than the ones Apple makes

 

[GrumpyCoder]

There is no performance gap to close. ALL Macs have to be is “suitably faster than the prior Mac of the same model”.

And that is indeed the case. Apple never had a performance advantage since the PPC days and they don't have one now. A Razer Blade Studio with RTX5000 is running circles around a fully loaded MBP16, at the cost of less battery life per charge. AS is optimized for video and photo work, hence the high fillrate of the GPUs, they designed the chips specifically around this.

Apple is a niche and it will be an even smaller niche when business can't run their x86 Windows software anymore. Apple doesn't care, that's not their core business. Their goal is to merge Macs with iPads at some point, the tablet and App market is where they make money.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

It will be interesting when Intel will launch mobile cpus with hybrid solution. I think Intel will stay competitive in near future.

Their mobile CPU’s have fewer cores and will come nowhere near these numbers. They’ll stay competitive on the desktop, but they just can’t do mobile very well (actually, I believe they COULD do mobile well, but they have to have multiple tiers of products and varying prices in order to charge a lot for their high end processors. They’ll never provide desktop performance in laptop products because of this).