Apple M1 Max Archives - Gizmochina

Apple Silicon transition to reportedly be completed by WWDC this year

Jeet — Mon, 03 Jan 2022 04:45:43 +0000

In the year 2020, Apple began transitioning away from Intel chips in favor of Apple Silicon, and the process started with the MacBook and Mac Mini powered by the Apple M1 chips which have now been expanded to more devices and more chips.

When Apple had announced its move of transitioning to Apple Silicon, it had talked about completing the process within two years. In line with that, Mark Gurman of Bloomberg expects that the company could complete the process by WWDC 2022 in June.

This was reported in the latest edition of the Power On newsletter in which Mark Gurman further adds that the new Mac Pro, a powerful Mac Mini, and a large-screened iMac Pro will come powered by the new Apple Silicon chips.

If this turns out to be true, then it means that there could be multiple Apple Mac devices getting launched in the first half of this year.

After launching MacBook Air and Pro models as well as Mac Mini and iMac powered by the M1 chipset, the company recently launched the MacBook Pro in 14-inch and 16-inch versions, both of which are powered by the new Apple M1 Pro and M1 Max chips.

The company is expected to launch the M2 chipset as the direct successor of the M1 chip but if the reports are to be believed, then there won’t be any drastic improvement in terms of performance for the new SoC.

The report further adds that the MacBook Air lineup as well as the entry-level MacBook Pro, which were the first devices to get M1 chipset, will be updated this year. The MacBook Air is claimed to come with the biggest redesign in the product’s history.

Another report claims 27-inch Apple iMac Pro coming with Mini-LED display

Jeet — Wed, 22 Dec 2021 00:40:17 +0000

Apple revamped the iMac lineup earlier this year with the launch of a 24-inch iMac powered by the company’s own M1 chipset. Now, the company is expected to update the iMac Pro model sometime next year.

Recently, it was reported that the upcoming iMac Pro will feature a Mini-LED display along with an Apple Silicon processor. Now, a new report coming from DigiTimes (via 9to5Mac) also claims that the new iMac coming next year will feature a Mini-LED screen.

The report also claims that Apple’s suppliers have already started shipping components in small volumes for the new 27-inch iMac series models. While the launch date is not yet confirmed, it is said to go official sometime in Spring.

Last week, it was revealed that the device will feature a MiniLED screen and have support for 120Hz variable refresh rate and Oxide backplanes. This will also mark the introduction of Pro Motion display technology to the iMac lineup.

Further, the device is expected to have a starting configuration of 16GB RAM and 512GB of SSD storage, just like the recently launched MacBook Pro lineup. Further, users will likely get an option to choose between M1 Pro and M1 Max chipsets.

Apple has a few other devices lined up with a Mini-LED display, including new iPad models but if the recent reports are to be believed, then the iPad with Mini-LED screen is expected to go official in a couple of years and not anytime soon.

Qualcomm aims to take on Apple M-series chips with its next-gen PC chips

Jeet — Wed, 17 Nov 2021 05:39:08 +0000

During the 2021 Investor Day event, Qualcomm unveiled its next-generation technology that paves a path for the company to compete against Apple Silicon’s new M-series chips used for the new Mac devices.

Qualcomm has unveiled its new CPU hardware that is designed by Nuvia, a chip startup founded by three former Apple engineers. For those who are unaware, Qualcomm had acquired Nuvia earlier this year for $1.4 billion.

The company is looking to advance its PC processors with the next-generation Arm-based SoC which it says is “designed to set the performance benchmark for Windows PCs” that would be able to go head to head with Apple’s M-series processors.

The chipset company is also aiming to be a leader for “sustained performance and battery life.” Further, Qualcomm has also promised that it would be scaling up its Adreno GPUs for offering desktop-class gaming capabilities for its future PC products.

The new Qualcomm chips for PCs, designed by Nuvia, are slated to ship in consumer products sometime in 2023. This is quite a long time, giving Apple about two more years to unveil or showcase its future Apple Silicon chips.

It will be interesting to see Qualcomm’s new take for the PC chips as its previous attempts have been lackluster so far. So far, it has launched Snapdragon 8cx processors and partnered with Microsoft for the SQ1 and SQ2 chips on the Surface X.

Qualcomm aiming to compete with Apple isn’t surprising as the Cupertino-based giant stunned everyone when it announced its plan of transitioning Mac devices from Intel to its own Apple Silicon platform which so far has three chips — M1, M1 Pro, and M1 Max. These processors from the company, based on the ARM architecture, offer a revolutionary experience of power and battery life.

Apple M1 Max is 2x faster than the M1, its GPU could match the PS5: Report

Sean — Tue, 19 Oct 2021 09:50:18 +0000

Apple had recently announced the 14 inch hand 16 inch MacBook Pro laptops. These feature its new and powerful custom processors, including the M1 Pro and M1 Max chipsets. Now, early benchmarks has revealed that the high end M1 Max CPU performance is up to two times better than the M1 while its GPU could rival the Sony PS5.

For those unaware, the M1 Max chip features 10 core CPU and 32 core GPU. In a benchmarking result on Geekbench, the processor scored 1,749 points in single core and 11,542 points in multi core. This implies that the multi core score is double that of the previously launched M1 chip on the 13 inch MacBook Pro. Based on the performance of the M1 chip, NotebookCheck also shared its expectations for the GPU’s performance.

As per the report, the M1’s 8 core GPU offers 2.6 TF, so the the M1 Pro’s 14 core version could offer around 4.5 TF, while the M1 Pro with 16 core could offer 5.2 TF. On the other hand, the M1 Max 24 core could offer 7.8 TF and its 32 core could offer an impressive 10.4 TF. Keep in mind this is a rough estimate and not official so take it with a pinch of salt. Although, this estimate does offer us an interesting look at its potential GPU power.

M1 Max

While the M1 Max draws up to 100W less power than a high end laptop with a discrete GPU, its 32 core’s estimated performance seemingly rivals the desktop grade Nvidia RTX 2080 GPU, which offers 10.07 TF, and even the Sony’s latest PlayStation 5 that offers 10.28 TF. Despite this, the Cupertino based giant claims that the M1 Max can offer up to 21 hours of battery life.

Apple announces M1 Pro and M1 Max chips and new MacBook Pro with notches

Habeeb Onawole — Mon, 18 Oct 2021 21:09:48 +0000

Apple fans can finally rejoice as the long-awaited new MacBook Pro laptops have arrived with incredibly powerful processors….and a notch. Yes, Apple has brought over the notch on the iPhones to its computers but not for the reason you expect.

The new MacBook Pro computers are powered by two new Apple processors – the M1 Pro and the M1 Max. The two new processors have 10 cores but the M1 Max is the more powerful one.

Apple M1 Pro and Apple M1 Max

The Apple M1 Pro has up to 10-core CPU (8 high-performance CPU cores and 2 high-efficiency cores) and up to 16-core GPU. Apple says it has 33.7 billion transistors and a memory bandwidth of 200GB/s.

The Apple M1 Max has up to 32-core GPU, a memory bandwidth of 400GB/s, and 57 billion transistors. It can also be configured with up to 64GB of unified memory while the M1 Pro can be configured with up to 32GB of unified memory.

Apple claims the new processors bring up to 13x faster graphics performance, 3.7x faster CPU performance, 11x faster machine learning, and up to 21 hours of battery life. Apple also claims they deliver more performance and consume less power than a discrete PC laptop graphics and a compact pro laptop with a high-performing discrete GPU.

MacBook Pro 14” and 16”

The new MacBook Pro is available in two sizes – 14” and 16”. They both have a 120Hz ProMotion mini-LED display a.k.a. Liquid Retina XDR display with slimmer bezels and a notch for a 1080p camera. Sorry to disappoint you but Face ID isn’t coming to MacBooks, at least not this year. The 14” version has a 14.2” screen with a 3024 x 1964 resolution while the 16” version has a 16.2” screen with a 3456 x 2234 resolution.

While Apple has added a notch, it has removed the touchbar and replaced it with physical keys. There is a MagSafe three-port but you can also charge the computers through one of the Thunderbolt 4 ports. There is also an HDMI port, headphone jack, and an SDXC card slot. The new MacBooks pack six speakers (four force-canceling woofers and two high-performance tweeters) with spatial audio.

The MacBook Pro 14” starts at $1999 for the base model with an M1 Pro chipset that has an 8-core CPU and a 14-core GPU, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of SSD storage. The 10-core CPU version with the same RAM, 1TB SSD, and a 96W USB-C Power Adapter is priced at $2499.

The 16” model starts at $2499 for the base configuration with a 10-core M1 Pro processor, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD storage, a 140W USB-C power adapter. An extra $200 gets you 1TB of storage while an additional $1000 gets you the M1 Max with 32GB of RAM and 1TB of SSD. There are multiple configurations to choose from and you can choose a model with up to 64GB of RAM.

Both laptops are available in Silver and Space Gray. Pre-orders are open today and they will be available next week.

Apple M1 Pro and M1 Max chips could power upcoming MacBook Pro models

Jeet — Mon, 18 Oct 2021 03:17:45 +0000

In just a few hours, Apple will be hosting its “Unleashed” event where the technology giant is expected to launch its next-generation MacBook Pro devices. The new Mac models are said to be powered by a new chipset developed by the company under Apple Silicon.

The new chipset is said to be an upgraded version of the M1 chip, which is being referred to as M1X for the past few months. But now, a new report claims that the company is likely to call the upcoming chips M1 pro and M1 Max.

Apple M1 Chipset

This was revealed by Mark Gurman of Bloomberg in the latest Power On newsletter. He notes that a Mac developer has informed him about the chip names M1 Pro and M1 Max appearing in app logs. However, he notes the possibility of Apple not taking up the potentially confusing naming approach.

The Apple M1 Pro is likely to come with a 16-core GPU while the higher-end chipset model named Apple M1 Max is said to have a 32-core GPU. There are also reports claiming that a direct successor to the M1 chipset, named Apple M2, could launch in early 2022 when the company announces the next-generation Apple MacBook Air model.

The naming scheme that Apple adopts for its in-house developed chips will play a major role in marketing the devices as it’ll help understand the differences between them to the potential customers. For those who are unaware, Apple has already confirmed that it is moving away from using Intel chips and will be replacing its Mac devices with its own chipsets developed under Apple Silicon.

Apple MacBook Pro 2021 Render | Credit: Apple Unleashed

Coming to the new MacBook Pro models, it has been said that there will be two different models based on the display size — 14-inch and 16-inch. Both of them are said to come with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of internal storage.

The laptop will feature a Mini-LED display and the bezels around the screen will be minimal, so thin that the bottom bezel won’t have a MacBook branding. Apple was testing a 120Hz refresh rate for the MacBook series but it is not yet confirmed if the laptop will come with support for the high refresh rate at launch.

There are reports about a major upgrade in terms of the webcam as the upcoming laptop models are said to feature a 1080p webcam. It is also said that both base models will come with the same configuration and M1X chipset. The device is likely to be shipped with a new charging brick as the MacBook Pros are expected to have a new MagSafe charging port.

As for the pricing, the report hints that the pricing of the upcoming MacBook Pro models will be similar to how the laptops are priced right now. For more details, we will have to wait for the launch event in a few hours.