Apple Silicon M1 Chip – An Invention for Next-Gen Computing

Apple Silicon M1 chip is the next-gen invention to power up the Mac and MacBook computers. It will replace Intel CPU that powered Apple computers for many years, but Intel is not going away ultimately.  This new chipset developed by Apple for better speed, improved battery life and to run iOS apps on computers.

How will Apple Silicon M1 Chip impact for Mac or MacBook computer performance?

Apple developed a new logic board with System-on-a-Chip (SoC) that replaces various parts for the computers. The newly developed M1 chipset has four power-efficient cores and four high-performance cores. Apple also added powerful 8 cores GPU in the SoC which outperforms the Intel Iris graphics installed on some previous-gen MacBooks.

Apple Silicon M1 chip developed to perform 2X faster than the latest computer chipset available in the market. M1 MacBook Air will perform 3.5 times faster, and graphics will perform five times faster than the previous version. Apple added, M1 chip is 11 times faster for Artificial Intelligence computing and 2.8 times faster for Xcode app development.

Apple Silicon M1 Chip Performance Test Result

Image Credit: Apple

Apple has done some test, and result outcomes proved to be extremely satisfied. As per Apple performance test, M1 chip will outperform 98% of Windows computers of old generations. However, Apple hasn’t made more details available on the test environment they used to record the M1 chipset performance report.

The Apple Silicon M1 chip built for faster performance, and it will take less time to wake from sleep mode. It does also have twice run time with a single charge for 13-inch MacBook Pro, and no fan requires for cooling down the processor.

Will Apple Silicon M1 Chip support the existing apps?

Apple Silicon M1 Chip will come with the lots of benefits and some drawbacks as well. The advantage is, you can run the iPhone or iPad apps on Apple computers with the latest M1 processor. But the downside is, you may need Rosetta emulator to run some apps initially that developed for Intel processor. Apple recommends its Rosetta 2 emulator for better and smooth performance.  The emulator will allow extra time to developers to adapt Apple’s latest M1 chipset technology for apps.

Another drawback of Apple Silicon M1 Chipset is, it supports only 16GB of RAM max, which might be a concern for some users. It has a lack of additional high-end graphics if needed for some particular purpose like video editing.

What are the reasons behind Apple Silicon M1 Chip development?

Well, Apple is the fifth largest manufacturer of computers and share 5% stake only worldwide. Apple also is far behind in the enterprise market, where Windows-based computers dominating the corporate industry.

Another growing industry is the cloud computing and data centre where Linux is the market leader. So Apple may have a long-term vision of entering the enterprise market where they can provide the solutions from laptops and desktops to servers.

Apple is trying to get native apps for some popular apps to please Mac users. Especially, graphics and video editing apps will be the primary focus as M1 Chipset built for speed and graphics performance.

Conclusion:

Apple Silicon M1 Chip is the first generation ARM processor that built for performance. Faster CPU and built-in GPU sound change in the gaming industry as well as the graphics industry. The performance for Macs and MacBooks will increase drastically as per Apple performance test result. But benchmark testing is pending from third-party testers so the actual outcome may vary.

This new invention by Apple may help them to get in the enterprise world or increase the share in the market. But there are possibilities to have some bugs and glitches in performance as it is very new in the market.

The first generation Apple Silicon M1 Chip surprised everyone with the current performance test and ready to enter the market. Apple releasing 13-inch MacBook Air and MacBook Pro soon along with Mac Mini installed with new M1 chipset. And they will continue to offer some other models with Intel chipset too if someone still wants to buy it.