Qualcomm Claims Snapdragon X Elite 21% Faster Than Apple's M3 Chip

[Analog Kid]

It wasn't the citation I disagreed with. It was your opinion " Apple didn't start by making Arm chips, they started by making Arm itself."

The claim was that Qualcomm has been making Arm chips longer than Apple has-- my point was that Apple has been part of Arm since it began. Apple/Acorn/VLSI, as the owners of Arm, made the first Arm chips (as opposed to Acorn chips).

Apple did NOT make the chips they invested. Also the perception of that option could've been skewed in term sof interpretation Apple began as a company more than 10yrs prior (but that's semantics, still I saw it that way too).

I have no idea what you mean here. Arm was owned in significant part by Apple. Apple made the first Arm chips through the Arm JV.

I've made similar mstake thinking X Elite was fabricated in house by Qualcomm yet I was wrong there.

The first Arm chips were fabricated at VLSI facilities, with VLSI also being part owners of the Arm JV. VLSI also fabricated the Acorn processors before the formation of Arm. Apple, as an owner of Arm, made the first Arm chips on VLSI's equipment.

Apple was using RISC chips in the 80's courtesy of IBM & Motorola for their computers

They used Motorola CISC chips. I don't think they used IBM chips until G5...

only the Newton handheld used Arm cpu's and thsu completely different code than the Mac.

The Mobius project was built on ARM2 and ran MacOS in emulation mode faster than it ran natively at the time. This is what motivated Apple to approach Acorn with the opportunity to form the Arm JV.

Every PDA of the 80's used Arm as well as just about any cellphone in the very late 80's and onward.

The term PDA wasn't even coined until Apple used it to describe Newton in 1992. The only other PDA anyone remembers anymore is the Palm line which didn't include an Arm processor until the early 2000's.

The precursors to PDAs in the 80's looked like this which ran on an 8bit Hitachi processor:

Acorn RISC chips were mostly used for Acorn computers, it wasn't until Apple, Acorn and VLSI formed the Arm JV that Arm processors were widely licensed to anyone else.

Even Intel made the XScale (via purchase originally) in POCKET PC devices - 1st Gen smartphones.

Yeah, Intel through some massive blunder of antitrust oversight acquired the StrongARM IP from DEC when DEC was acquired and dismantled. StrongARM led to what eventually became XScale which was later sold to Marvell (the semiconductor company, not Marvel the superhero franchise).

Pocket PCs and Windows mobile didn't exist before 2000.

Edit. By stating facts Qualcomm began in 85 and 'barely existed' when Apple invented into Arm shows even more just how quickly Qualcomm has adapted. I don't get your blinded hate towards thr company vs celebrating they developed - yet to ship - a competing product for another platform. Its not like theyre computing eith Apple on Apple's OS' .

You're confusing the correction of facts with hate. Just because I think something is good doesn't mean I'm going to let hype trample truth.

I don't hate Qualcomm's efforts here-- if you look at my comments elsewhere on their Arm series I'm quite excited to see computing move into a new era led by the more modern architectures.

Don't mistake refusal to ride the bandwagon as it ignores facts and history with a lack of excitement about the actual reality of the situation. I'm also not one to repeat "competition is good" in a cultish monotone with every news story but in this case I think Qualcomm, Nvidia and (I still assume eventually) AMD coming into the Arm PC market is a good thing for everyone even Mac and iPhone users. Making Arm computing more mainstream will develop it faster, as every manufacturer finds new improvements the others can build on their work. Getting modern computing out of the calcified hands of Intel is good for everyone.

 

[DanVM]

Windows 11 is NOT meant for ARM OS and it's far from being ready. Being native does not mean OS is completely ready.

From what I know, Windows 11 is available for ARM processors. And there is hardware available with it, so I could think it is ready.

Windows on Arm documentation | Microsoft Learn

 

[spcopsmac21]

• I could agree with you about the mobile ecosystem, but not with cloud ecosystem. IMO, MS has done a better job, especially if you include the business ecosystem.
• MS have made many changes in Windows 11, and I haven't seen issues with update cycles.
• This could be true with some devices and some workloads, but it's not true in all cases.
• I need to do more research before responding to the last point. 😁

Hey Bald dudes need love to. And generally have more testosterone than non bald men. I mean what woman would turn down Captain Picard and add a new entry on his “ captains log “

 

[sunny5]

From what I know, Windows 11 is available for ARM processors. And there is hardware available with it, so I could think it is ready.

Windows on Arm documentation | Microsoft Learn

Being available does not mean it's 100% ready. If you ever used it before, you will know it's a total mess due to x86 and ARM all together. Beside, Windows 11 is not ARM based OS.

 

[DeepIn2U]

Windows 11 is NOT meant for ARM OS and it's far from being ready. Being native does not mean OS is completely ready.

What are you talking about?
ArmOS IS NOT AN OS I think you're mixer up.

Windows OS for Arm has been ready for a whole now and ships on Microsoft Surface X.

faq:

Windows Arm-based PCs FAQ - Microsoft Support

Learn about using a Windows Arm-based PC and get answers to common questions about Arm-based PCs.

support.microsoft.com

Windows on ARM (Arm64EC)

Windows on Arm documentation

Learn more about running Windows on PCs powered by Arm processors. Find guidance on how to build Windows apps for Arm64 devices or iteratively update your existing Windows app to take advantage of Arm64 native capabilities.

learn.microsoft.com

Find tools for Arm development
Tools graphic

Windows offers a variety of tools and frameworks to support app development for Arm, on Arm.

The new Arm-native Visual Studio includes Visual C++, .NET & .NET Framework and Java and will enable developers to natively build and debug Arm apps on Arm-based devices. Learn more in the blog announcement.
Visual Studio Code natively supports Arm and can be installed on Arm devices. The VS Code C++ extension also offers C++ IntelliSense and build support for developing Windows apps that run natively on Arm64 devices.
.NET 6 already supports Arm, both for native Arm execution and x64 emulation. To develop .NET apps that run natively on Arm64 devices, we recommend installing the new Arm native Visual Studio 2022 17.4, and .NET 7 Arm64 SDK. Learn more about .NET 7 support for Arm and the performance improvements for Arm64 on the .NET Blog.
.NET 6 Arm64 SDK: By default, if you dotnet run a .NET 6 app with the Arm64 SDK, it will run as Arm64. The dotnet-runtimeinfo tool can be used to discover the environment that .NET is running on. See the .NET 6 blog announcement on Arm64 support to learn more.

Windows Insider preview (for the latest Windows kn Arm download)

Download Windows Insider Preview ARM64

I think you're waaaay behind on whata been going on. Time to catch up.

 

[sunny5]

What are you talking about?
ArmOS IS NOT AN OS I think you're mixer up.

Windows OS for Arm has been ready for a whole now and ships on Microsoft Surface X.

faq:

Windows Arm-based PCs FAQ - Microsoft Support

Learn about using a Windows Arm-based PC and get answers to common questions about Arm-based PCs.

support.microsoft.com

Windows on ARM (Arm64EC)

Windows on Arm documentation

Learn more about running Windows on PCs powered by Arm processors. Find guidance on how to build Windows apps for Arm64 devices or iteratively update your existing Windows app to take advantage of Arm64 native capabilities.

learn.microsoft.com

Windows Insider preview (for the latest Windows kn Arm download)

Download Windows Insider Preview ARM64

I think you're waaaay behind on whata been going on. Time to catch up.

lol if you really think Windows 11 is ready for ARM, than you are 100% wrong. There are too many legacy compatibility issues that they need to deal with and it's not even optimized for ARM well. Those documents are just a joke. Tell me who even use Windows 11 for ARM devices?

That's why they are making Windows 12 with proper ARM support. Clearly, you know nothing about it.

 

[Confused-User]

Qualcomm was targeting the M1 during development yet found the M2/M2 Pro was equally a decent comparison. Just 1 spec of the M3 was being highlighted just over a month after theie announcement & launch of the Elite X.

Purchase of Nuvia shakeup of offices and moving of the team etc. And still in just over a year they've caught up to Apple's 2nd generation of SoC's and you call it a JOKE?! [etc., with a diatribe about how lame the M3 is]

There is so much wrong with your statements it's not worth refuting point by point, since those points have been made here already (by me and by others). Keep believing whatever you like... for now. When devices actually ship, you'll have a much harder time with that.

Again this is Qualcomm's first major try to comoete eoth Aplle Silicon and their doing so on their 3rd version, same with Intel and it's a "game" because it's their lower end of Soc being compared?!

1st attempt vs 3rd and you're splitting hairs missing this major fact. Hmm.

I won't speak for others, but the points that matter are that QC is engaging in grossly deceptive marketing, and that they do not come even close to competing with Apple's M3, much less the M4 which may well be a more contemporary chip for the Oryon.

Would you congratulate QC if they had targeted a TI calculator, and exceeded their targets? It doesn't matter what they targeted. It matters what they achieved relative to their competition.

And with that in mind, their competition is more x86 than Apple, and there they may do OK.

Sales are shrinking. But apples laptop and desktop sales have been shrinking and shrinking for almost three years.
Way before the current economical issues.

I think you're completely in error. Cite?

 

[DanVM]

Being available does not mean it's 100% ready. If you ever used it before, you will know it's a total mess due to x86 and ARM all together. Beside, Windows 11 is not ARM based OS.

Can you post links with details on how it's not 100% ready, or how Windows 11 is not an ARM based OS?

 

[mentaluproar]

lol if you really think Windows 11 is ready for ARM, than you are 100% wrong. There are too many legacy compatibility issues that they need to deal with and it's not even optimized for ARM well. Those documents are just a joke. Tell me who even use Windows 11 for ARM devices?

That's why they are making Windows 12 with proper ARM support. Clearly, you know nothing about it.

I used my surface pro X at my last job because the company-provided intel-powered dell kept overheating. It worked absolutely flawlessly. It cant do CAD like my Mac can, but for general office use it was fast and reliable. ARM on windows is ready. Calm the **** down.

 

[spcopsmac21]

There is so much wrong with your statements it's not worth refuting point by point, since those points have been made here already (by me and by others). Keep believing whatever you like... for now. When devices actually ship, you'll have a much harder time with that.

I won't speak for others, but the points that matter are that QC is engaging in grossly deceptive marketing, and that they do not come even close to competing with Apple's M3, much less the M4 which may well be a more contemporary chip for the Oryon.

Would you congratulate QC if they had targeted a TI calculator, and exceeded their targets? It doesn't matter what they targeted. It matters what they achieved relative to their competition.

And with that in mind, their competition is more x86 than Apple, and there they may do OK.

I think you're completely in error. Cite?

Mac sales are down 40% year over year, says IDC

IDC claims that an end to COVID-driven demand means first-quarter 2023 sales of all computers are dramatically lower than a year ago, but Apple has reportedly been hit the hardest.

appleinsider.com

Apple sales in biggest fall since 2019

The decline came as people cut back in the face of higher living costs, said Apple's boss.

www.bbc.com

Sales have almost halved since 2019.

 

[deconstruct60]

AV1 encoding ... which Apple doesn't have.

Really? Just one example of how wrong you are:

... the media engine supports AV1 decoding, enabling power-efficient playback of streaming services to further extend battery life.

'encoding' and 'decoding' are two different words with substantively different meanings. 'decoding' is playback. Can't playback a file that doesn't exist yet ( which is created by encoding. ) . Apple only did 'half' of the 'equation'. Just about every other major GPU implementor is doing the whole thing at this point. Apple is still substantively behind the curve on AV1 standards adoption.

 

[Confused-User]

Mac sales are down 40% year over year, says IDC

IDC claims that an end to COVID-driven demand means first-quarter 2023 sales of all computers are dramatically lower than a year ago, but Apple has reportedly been hit the hardest.

appleinsider.com

Apple sales in biggest fall since 2019

The decline came as people cut back in the face of higher living costs, said Apple's boss.

www.bbc.com

Sales have almost halved since 2019.

Your citations do not say anything at all about halving since 2019.They talk about a bad year-over-year quarter at the start of 2023, which I was already aware of. Here's what IDC had to say the very next quarter:
Apple's Mac market share jumped even though PC sales fell. And around the same time, Apple's sales in the US are reaching ridiculously high levels.

More broadly, whether Apple's sales rise or fall, talking about them without the context of the broader PC market is just stupid. It says very little about Apple, but a lot about the state of the world economy.

This info is not so hard to find on line. Put up or shut up.

 

[Confused-User]

Oh, also, IDC is a terrible source. The only good source is Apple, in their quarterly earnings reports.

 

[spcopsmac21]

Your citations do not say anything at all about halving since 2019.They talk about a bad year-over-year quarter at the start of 2023, which I was already aware of. Here's what IDC had to say the very next quarter:
Apple's Mac market share jumped even though PC sales fell. And around the same time, Apple's sales in the US are reaching ridiculously high levels.

More broadly, whether Apple's sales rise or fall, talking about them without the context of the broader PC market is just stupid. It says very little about Apple, but a lot about the state of the world economy.

This info is not so hard to find on line. Put up or shut up.

I like lamp.

 

[9secondko]

You're right.

Qualcomm was targeting the M1 during development yet found the M2/M2 Pro was equally a decent comparison. Just 1 spec of the M3 was being highlighted just over a month after theie announcement & launch of the Elite X.

Purchase of Nuvia shakeup of offices and moving of the team etc. And still in just over a year they've caught up to Apple's 2nd generation of SoC's and you call it a JOKE?!

1YR VS 2.3YRs to equal or closely match performance is a joke to you?

What I'm finding a joke is:
Apple has less transistors on the M3 Pro than the M2 Pro. Metal graphics performance is far too similar between the two. Apple LOWERED the system bandwidth from 200GB/S to 13xGB/sec on the m3 vs the M2 !!! All while the M3 Max did not double its bandwidth loke the M1 to M2 had.

This is VERY telling.
So did Apple's vision too far exceed their grasp or did their grasp far exceed their vision here?!
Look up MaxTech's latest video of the Space Black M3 Pro tests vs the M2 Pro there are a few misses by Apple there to start to wonder what's gonna happen woth the m4 series.
I don't think an M3 Ultra will happen or barely best the Max performance by more than 15%.

When those silicon executives left Aplle lots were quick to ridicule with don't let the door foot the butt on the way out type of commentary. Yet here we are. Not too shabby for a first attempt. Fall 2024 will be quite interesting from these 2.

Yes. A complete JOKE. a huge company like QUALCOMM who’s no stranger to chip fab at scale, literally BOUGHT the chipset. It’s not some new company having to start from scratch. It’s EX APPLE SILICON engineers.

And they still have to compare to Apple’s inaugural effort. And not only that, they need more cores. The real competition considering core counts, etc. is m3 Max. Not base m1 or m2 or even m3.

And… the QC SOC is NOT EVEN OUT YET.

By the time it’s out, it will have the M4 breathing down its neck (right before feeding time).

It’s one thing if Qualcomm was honest and came out with “here’s our first batch. They are competitive chips in ARM universe.” Hey cool.

But no. They get all delusional with “yeah buddy! We just curb stomped Apple and we’re the best!”

Such nonsense deserves an in-kind take on the subject.

The whole thing is a joke right now. If they can somehow get competitive with unique tech, then we can talk at that point. But as of now…clown show.

I mean compare that to Apple first launching the M series at the beginning and blowing away the entire industry. That’s how it’s done. Not this me-too wannabe copycat stuff that isn’t even competitive.

As far as bus speeds, it’s obviously an upsell deal. The max having full speed transfers to the ultra. And I think you’re going to be disappointed with your Ultra prediction. This isn’t m1 ultra with the bsndwidth bottleneck. That was already remedied in m2 and won’t fall backward in m3.

 

[chucker23n1]

Windows 11 is NOT meant for ARM OS and it's far from being ready. Being native does not mean OS is completely ready.

It's been working fine for me. Some apps aren't ready. I don't see how the OS isn't.

After typing x86 and x64 forgive me for not typing xArm lol

Sales are shrinking. But apples laptop and desktop sales have been shrinking and shrinking for almost three years.
Way before the current economical issues.

This is misleading. The COVID era was an outlier; if you take that out of the equation, Mac sales are actually better than ever.

 

[chucker23n1]

Again this is Qualcomm's first major try to comoete eoth Aplle Silicon and their doing so on their 3rd version, same with Intel and it's a "game" because it's their lower end of Soc being compared?!

1st attempt vs 3rd and you're splitting hairs missing this major fact. Hmm.

We're simply judging Qualcomm by the very marketing claims they're making.

 

[chucker23n1]

They used Motorola CISC chips. I don't think they used IBM chips until G5...

They did use Motorola RISC chips in the 1990s. They also used various IBM PowerPC chips. For example, some iBooks G3 had an IBM PowerPC 750fx. Some G3s were Motorola, some IBM, and some both.

I believe most G1/G2 Macs, i.e. 601 and 603/603, were also IBM.

Mac sales are down 40% year over year, says IDC

IDC claims that an end to COVID-driven demand means first-quarter 2023 sales of all computers are dramatically lower than a year ago, but Apple has reportedly been hit the hardest.

appleinsider.com

Apple sales in biggest fall since 2019

The decline came as people cut back in the face of higher living costs, said Apple's boss.

www.bbc.com

Sales have almost halved since 2019.

This isn't even remotely true.

Recent Q1 sales numbers, in thousands, according to Gartner:

2016 Q1	4,611
2017 Q1	4,217
2018 Q1	4,264
2019 Q1	3,977
2020 Q1	3,555
2021 Q1	5,573
2022 Q1	7,005
2023 Q1	4,819

As you can see,

• there was a downturn in 2019 and 2020,
• there was a significant increase in 2021 and 2022,
• in 2023, we're back to slightly above the numbers of 2016-18.

4,189 isn't "almost half" 3,977.

 

[chucker23n1]

lol if you really think Windows 11 is ready for ARM, than you are 100% wrong. There are too many legacy compatibility issues that they need to deal with and it's not even optimized for ARM well. Those documents are just a joke. Tell me who even use Windows 11 for ARM devices?

That's why they are making Windows 12 with proper ARM support. Clearly, you know nothing about it.

Please do enlighten us what Windows 12 does regarding ARM support that Windows 11 doesn't do.

 

[Analog Kid]

They did use Motorola RISC chips in the 1990s. They also used various IBM PowerPC chips. For example, some iBooks G3 had an IBM PowerPC 750fx. Some G3s were Motorola, some IBM, and some both.

I believe most G1/G2 Macs, i.e. 601 and 603/603, were also IBM.

The claim was regarding the 80's, and PowerPC wasn't even formed until '92, but good point on the G3 IBM chips.

 

[sunny5]

Please do enlighten us what Windows 12 does regarding ARM support that Windows 11 doesn't do.

You are defending poor supports as almost nobody wish to support Windows ARM.

 

[ric22]

Will be interesting to compare real statistics once they have their chip in a Windows-running laptop...

By then, M4 will probably be out.

 

[chucker23n1]

You are defending poor supports

No, I'm asking what you think is poor. Is it the selection of available apps? Because earlier posts make it sound like you're saying something at the OS level is missing, broken, incomplete, and I don't see what that would be.

Will be interesting to compare real statistics once they have their chip in a Windows-running laptop...

By then, M4 will probably be out.

Maybe. Intel Arrow Lake may not even be far off.

 

[smulji]

f Apple had just let the Nuvia guys make the server chips at Apple like they wanted this would have never happened and they could have had the lead just a little longer.

If Apple did that, what would they have done with those server chips?

 

[appleappleuser]

For this to mean anything they need the bulk of Windows apps people use every day to be able to run natively on Arm. They still don't with no real incentive to do so.

Maybe Windows 12 will help change this.

Apple has a huge advantage, which is that they are able to force app developers to switch to ARM. If they don't want to, they're free to do it, but they'll miss out on an ever-increasing percentage of the Mac userbase. Also, Rosetta 2 was a pretty nice stopgap solution. I don't know if Windows has an equivalent program.