Can you back that statement up with anything, or at least clarify it? You seem to suggesting a non-mac i7 with a separate GPU. Also, just an FYI, "i7" says pretty much nothing. The i7s have existed since 2009.
I don't know. The statement is just so vague and ridiculous. The M1 is probably the worst hardware you could have picked in 2020-2021 if computational power was your main concern. For highly parallelizable work tasks, the top end GPU alone has 10x the computation power than the M1, and a top end CPU has around 4x the computation power than the M1. Not to mention a rather limiting 16GB of memory. That the M1 is computationally powerful is a myth started out by exceedingly misleading marketing and reinforced with hard-to-compare benchmarks.
To possibly save someone the trouble, the responses to a comment such as this, from experience will be:
1. "power consumption is much much better on M1 than anything else." True, but, then again, your use case must then prioritize power consumption, and not computation power. So which is it? The use case for a compute cluster on a train is rather contrived.
2. "When apple scales up the M1 to more cores, they will magically be able to retain all the benefits possible with a low core count, and scale it up without any problems or compromises, just you wait.". Ok, I'll wait.
3. "It's not fair to compare a laptop with a desktop". Of course it is. The constraints for comparison are already stated: computation power being the main priority. If someone buys hardware to do heavy computations, you can pick and chose depending on your needs. If you need it to be a laptop, or you need it to draw little power, then I'm sure you can factor this in accordingly.
Apple themselves changed their tune about the difference almost overnight.
It feels like you've constructed quite the straw-man to tear down.
Praise for the M1 is in the context of the form factors it exists in and the efficiency it works at.
Of course you can find more powerful hardware in larger form factors drawing 10x the power from the mains. The M1 runs in an iPad for crying out loud.
> The constraints for comparison are already stated: computation power being the main priority.
Then don't buy a bloody M1. The M1 has always been Apple's entry-level efficiency-first processor. We haven't even seen the "Pro" stuff yet.
> Then don't buy a bloody M1. The M1 has always been Apple's entry-level efficiency-first processor.
No, I gotta disagree. Apple's marketing around the M1 was intentionally deceptive: they were forced to revoke their claim of having the "fastest CPU cores" after it was vehemently disproven. Their "faster than 97% of Windows laptops" conveniently didn't compare itself to AMD laptops or laptops with dedicated graphics. I'm just not really impressed. I seriously worry for Apple if this is all they were able to get out of the 5nm node on ARM. Considering how poorly ARM scales with higher TDPs, I don't think I want to see their "Pro stuff".
My point is that this isn't even an interesting conversation to have. Your desktop can outperform a chip that runs an iPad? Cool story bro.
> they were forced to revoke their claim of having the "fastest CPU cores" after it was vehemently disproven.
Their announcement explicitly said "when it comes to low power silicon." So many of you insisted on missing this part it's practically a meme now.
Watch the accouncement video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AwdkGKmZ0I and scrub to 8:45 and actually listen to what is said.
> laptops with dedicated graphics
Why should they be forced to compare their integrated graphics to laptops with dedicated graphics? This is yet another uninteresting comparison. Of course a machine with some dedicated mobile 3080 is going to win the day in a head to head. But it's an absurd comparison because said machine will draw vastly more power and be heavier to boot. It's a different category of machine at that point.
> I seriously worry for Apple if this is all they were able to get out of the 5nm node on ARM
I think you're the only one who's worried.
Apple very clearly laid out their design goals with the M1: supremacy at performance per watt. And the fanboys protested with "I can build a faster desktop" or "my 4.5 lb laptop with dedicated graphics can get more FPS." It's just baffling. You've missed the whole point.
The desktop I'm comparing it to is 7 years old and cost $600 new. You can't even buy an M1 iPad for that price today.
> Their announcement explicitly said "when it comes to low power silicon."
Which is an arbitrary goalpost that means nothing. The M1 uses 7w at full tilt, does that mean we can compare it to an AMD 5800u running at the same wattage? It's a nothingburger, and that's why Apple doesn't use that zinger anywhere else in their marketing material.
> Why should they be forced to compare their integrated graphics to laptops with dedicated graphics?
Because that's what you can buy for $1000. That's the performance standard. If Apple wanted the M1 to be compared to machines with integrated graphics, they should have released a computer at that price point.
> Apple very clearly laid out their design goals with the M1: supremacy at performance per watt.
Sure, they have it. But I frankly don't care, and I have a hard time believing that other people do too. Performance-per-watt is Apple's neat way of giving performance a denominator, because they simply can't compete with the rest of the industry wholesale. It's something they've done over and over, insisting on pointless metrics like thinness and beauty to measure a product of objective capability. The datacenter market is looking at the M1 and laughing. Unless your business was already Mac-based, it's not like enterprise customers are going to be interested in beta-testing Apple's new hardware either. Honestly, I'm more impressed with Apple's social engineering than hardware engineering here.
Which desktop is this with what components? What's the metric you're comparing? Show me the benchmarks. This still feels like the world's dumbest comparison but hey I'm at least curious now.
> Which is an arbitrary goalpost that means nothing.
But it's the goalpost they very clearly set--you're the one who either missed it or willfully chooses to ignore it, which means you're the one being misleading, not them.
> Because that's what you can buy for $1000. That's the performance standard. If Apple wanted the M1 to be compared to machines with integrated graphics, they should have released a computer at that price point
A pure price comparison on its own is missing so many relevant factors and you know it. You can also buy a desktop that outperforms a smartphone that costs the same. Is that a fair comparison? How much energy do these machines consume, what's their battery life under load, how much do they weigh, etc etc. I don't just walk into Best Buy and say "here's a $1,000 bring me the thing with the best Geek Bench score, no other criteria."
>The datacenter market is looking at the M1 and laughing
What are you even talking about now. Since when was the datacenter in the design goals for the M1.
>But I frankly don't care, and I have a hard time believing that other people do too
No one cares about battery life or the weight of their laptop? This is news to me. I have a feeling it's news to all the people who buy ultrabooks, too.
>Performance-per-watt is Apple's neat way of giving performance a denominator, because they simply can't compete with the rest of the industry wholesale.
Because they're not trying to outcompete the entire industry in every form factor with the M1, since the goal is to provide stellar performance while still achieving efficiency that enables small form factor designs. You are exhausting with this "willfully missing the whole point" thing.
Again, they haven't even released the parts that are actually meant to compete at the higher wattages you're trying to compare against the M1.
I'll make an analogy--maybe it'll help. Car Company A just came out with a brand new sedan with industry best Miles Per Gallon. And beyond just the MPG rating, it can actually tow some pretty heavy loads, too! Heavier than other sedans in its weight class. Impressive stuff.
You're the guy with the F-350 dually pumping his chest saying "mine can still tow more!"
Basically all of them, as long as you aren't training your models on your CPU like it's 2011.
Who compares ultrabook to desktop for the multithreaded computation power? Assume you only want that without any regards to power or space or cost, by your logic you could buy 1000 mac mini and the computational power will be more than any desktop computer.
This statement is so banal that I am not sure how to comment on it. I never understood the logic of people who point out that an entry-level, low power chip targeted at ultraportable laptops and kitchen computers cannot compete with high-end desktops. It's just as ridiculous as to complain that AMD EPYC is too big to fit into a laptop.
M1 is obviously a terrible choice if you are looking for a deskbound HPC workstation. It's a terrific choice if you are looking for an ultraportable laptop with excellent battery life that you would still like to prototype your ML code on before running the full workload on a mainframe.
> That the M1 is computationally powerful is a myth started out by exceedingly misleading marketing and reinforced with hard-to- > compare benchmarks.
More like a myth perpetuated by people who like to take facts out of the context. In terms of the underlaying IP, M1 is terrific technology. It can deliver the same performance as state of the art designs at a fraction of the power consumption. In terms of absolute performance, it's obviously an entry-level chip, and it performs exceedingly well compared to other offerings in this segment. And even outside its segment it is no slouch either. It runs my database scripts and builds code faster than my Intel i9 laptop, despite using 70% less power and half as many performance-oriented CPU cores.
> M1 is obviously a terrible choice if you are looking for a deskbound HPC workstation ...
So, in one breath you say my statement is banal, in the next you agree with it. The thing I take issue with is having to deal with the misconception that it is a replacement for a HPC workstation, because many (not you obviously) think it actually is a powerhouse.
You go on to repeat the stuff about power performance, which I've already listed, and you could have spared yourself the trouble.
If you haven't already, I'd suggest looking at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. And I mean that too in a polite way, as it is easy to get carried away and assume the worst in anonymous conversations with strangers.
So, to summarize. Apple originally made highly misleading statements on the computational power of the M1, and since then, this misconception is repeated quite often. After a while, it gets annoying to see new posts on HN, week after week. Now, alluding that an M1 is 3x faster at training models than discrete GPUs can only be true if it is a decade old hardware. And as that stands, your original comment was asked to be clarified. After all, it's not unheard of for M1 benchmarks to disable the discrete GPU of the PC it is compared to, for "fairness". Limiting the training to a single CPU core for "even more fairness" would be par for the course.
So, I did not suggest you were an "appleboy", as you put it. I asked what kind of hardware you actually experienced a 3x speedup on, as the i7 goes back to 2009, and "GPU", well, further back.
In any case, and this might come as a surprise, feel free to not answer. But, then, I can only wish that you refrain from making the effort at a rude response.