1. I dont get how part of the story about Samsung getting orders for A8 as well. Because they simply isn't. Unless Apple decide to make 20nm A8 and 28nm A8 as well. Samsung's 20nm isn't ready, ( that was three months ago ) and they have been concentrating on 14nm.
2. Intel 14nm isn't coming in 2015. It is the end of this year or have product shipping for Holiday season. If you include the ULP series then Intel is at most delaying 14nm by a quarter or two. Not a year or more as some of you have stated.
3. I personally believe Intel is milking the market rather then 14nm having yield problem. All new nodes have yield problem when they first ramp up, but this time intel isn't putting the same resources into solving it simply because they dont need to with no competition in Desktop, Laptop or even Server market. More and more R&D are being shifted over to the SoC version of 14nm node. Which is scheduled for 2015. My guess is that SoC node isn't doing too well.
4. Rumours goes that Samsung already have Apple on broad with their 14nm. I am still slightly sceptic of that. Especially when TSMC is working on a new 16nm+ and collaborating with a major partner on 10nm development. um.....
5. Pls, Intel and x86 Atom isn't power hog. It may be when they started. But that is no longer the case.
6. Quad Core? Or has Apple secretly masted the big.Little technique?
I wonder if Apple is also looking at alternatives to Intel for OS X too in their lower end Macs? It's not my area of expertise but I would imagine an optional BTO Intel chip could be added for those who requiring to run VMs or Bootcamp (does anyone bother with Bootcamp these days given the speed of VMs?).
I really don't think that is possible, unless they attempt to clone intel's processors (and what would be the point of that) simply because all of the OS X software is intel binary. They could (possibly) run iOS software on such a chimera (a series in a macbook) but iOS is -strongly- tablet based, and at that point haven't we really crippled and removed the point of getting a Mac (i.e. -running OS X software-) over an iPad Air and a keyboard.
Intel's process advantage is significant, but unfortunately there's no way right now they'd allow their cutting edge node to be used to produce competing ARM-based chips.
Since foundaries name their own process, it's easy for TSMC to call their current, brand new process 20nm, but it's still generally an inferior process to Intel's 22nm node with finfet that's been in volume production for 2 years.
Intel's first 14nm chips are supposed to be available for the holiday buying season, though probably in relatively low numbers.
So basically TSMC's 20nm process without finfets are ramping up with the A8 being the first chip at the same time as Intel's 14nm process. TSMC's future 14nm process is their 20nm process finally with finfet and based on their prior history, that's a good deals way out.
So an A9 using Intels' cutting edge node would be killer, but unfortunately won't happen for a long time.
I think we'll see two versions of the A8, dual-core (A8) and quad-core (A8X). Quad-core processors in an iPhone are just not necessary when iOS makes so much use of other processors, including the GPU and ISP. iOS7+A7 proves that a dual-core system is still an extremely viable option.
However, with Apple positioning the iPad in the enterprise, we will more than likely see a quad-core A8 that will run circles around anything competitors, including Intel, will be able to produce in terms of efficiency (performance per power consumption).
I would rather see Apple do something else entirely. If they instead increased per core performance significantly again, as they have been doing, and added inter chip communication the way Intel has done with the Xeon, then Apple would have a lot of opportunities. The chip could still be used in the phone, where I disagree with your contention that it's powerful enough. But in an ipad, Apple Apple could use two of these two core SoC's. They could then get perhaps four times the performance of today's iPad, which would be particularly true if they do come out with the 12" model sometime next year. This would also allow twice the graphics performance.
I have some other ideas for the SoC that I think would work, but I'll hold off on that for now, though I mentioned it in an earlier discussion.
Intel's current Haswell processors use a 22 nm process, whereas the forthcoming Broadwell is 14 nm. However Intel has been experiencing product yield problems with their 14 nm process, resulting in Broadwell's delay from mid-2014 to an estimated 4Q-2014.
Which is more important, bragging rights to the smallest process size, or having a product to ship?
That's an obsolete estimate, as it's been pushed back to second half of 2015.
So what does that mean for iMac refresh? I need at least two. I don't want to buy at the end of the model refresh cycle so I've been waiting.
Is he lying? What would INTC shareholders say? (We realize that he was making a forward-looking statement.)
Please provide a reference where it says that 14nm Intel is slipping to the second half of 2015.
These are the ultra low power Broadwell chips. I said that the low power, low end chips will be seen by the end of the year. But the bigger, higher power chips will be delayed further. Notice that you won't find anything about them.
Exactly and wouldn't their own chips, something akin to an A8 do the same job and help Apple make more profits? As I said, I realize that would be the end of running Windows ... not a great loss these days.
Well, if they are coming out with a four core A8, I don't think they can do it. If they do come out with a new two core chip with inter chip links, they may be able to. But talking about a Mac of some kind with this still presents problems, because now you're talking about emulation again, and we all know how well that worked out for them in the past. Estimates are that a chip that needs to emulate another processor family needs to be about five times as powerful to run an OS and software in emulation with the same speed as on the native processor. That kills emulation in any real practical way.
But Apple could work around this if they want to. They can, without getting a license from Intel, implement processes in their chip that duplicates some functions in x86 that cause the biggest emulation problems. These relatively few functions cause most of the slowdown. The OS could call for these alternative functions if the OS or software required them instead of emulating them.
The A7 already is as powerful as the midline Atom Bay Trail series. Actually more powerful than the midline chip. And that runs Windows, though not as well as their faster chips. No reason why two two core A8’s with these functions couldn't run OS X well. If the result was four times as fast as the current A7, it would be well within the range of the i3, actually, closer to the high end of the range. That would run a MacBook, at least the entry level model. It could also run iOS.
So what does that mean for iMac refresh? I need at least two. I don't want to buy at the end of the model refresh cycle so I've been waiting.
That's why we've been reading that it will be a problem. I don't know what Apple can do other than to make minor CPU refreshes. The entire industry is dependent on this.
Exactly and wouldn't their own chips, something akin to an A8 do the same job and help Apple make more profits? As I said, I realize that would be the end of running Windows ... not a great loss these days.
Well, if they are coming out with a four core A8, I don't think they can do it. If they do come out with a new two core chip with inter chip links, they may be able to. But talking about a Mac of some kind with this still presents problems, because now you're talking about emulation again, and we all know how well that worked out for them in the past. Estimates are that a chip that needs to emulate another processor family needs to be about five times as powerful to run an OS and software in emulation with the same speed as on the native processor. That kills emulation in any real practical way.
But Apple could work around this if they want to. They can, without getting a license from Intel, implement processes in their chip that duplicates some functions in x86 that cause the biggest emulation problems. These relatively few functions cause most of the slowdown. The OS could call for these alternative functions if the OS or software required them instead of emulating them.
The A7 already is as powerful as the midline Atom Bay Trail series. Actually more powerful than the midline chip. And that runs Windows, though not as well as their faster chips. No reason why two two core A8’s with these functions couldn't run OS X well. If the result was four times as fast as the current A7, it would be well within the range of the i3, actually, closer to the high end of the range. That would run a MacBook, at least the entry level model. It could also run iOS.
Not really. That's a special edition of "Windows" called RT. That's an ARM edition of Windows that doesn't run Windows software. It runs the Modern UI. It doesn't run on x86. It's Microsoft's answer to iOS, it hasn't done well.
These are the ultra low power Broadwell chips. I said that the low power, low end chips will be seen by the end of the year. But the bigger, higher power chips will be delayed further. Notice that you won't find anything about them.
I don't know where you said it, but I don't see it in this thread.
Anyhow, that sounds about right. Low-end chips suitable for MacBooks, maybe the Mac mini would come out first, with the high-performance chips sometime next year. I wouldn't be surprised if the Mac Pro-suitable chips are a year away.
Seems to me a speed bumped version of the A7, in an enclosure with wall power and increased cooling, and a use case that demands all the performance you can throw at it, while also being a low volume product, would be ideal for ramping production of these chips. And, well, a gaming focused Apple TV with app store sounds exactly like that, now doesn't it?
There are a fair number of apps other than games these days which take advantage of the GPU (most modern web browsers, for example). Using the GPU under emulation is still pretty quirky.
My OP has become reversed in its intent lol ... I was asking if people did not want to use Windows wouldn't a low end Mac be able to run OS X with some new Apple Chip in the not too distant future? VMs came up as I was suggesting low end Mac users don't need Windows anymore and if they did, Apple could offer either a BTO Intel chip or obviously retain Macs with Intel for the higher end.
I don't know where you said it, but I don't see it in this thread.
Anyhow, that sounds about right. Low-end chips suitable for MacBooks, maybe the Mac mini would come out first, with the high-performance chips sometime next year. I wouldn't be surprised if the Mac Pro-suitable chips are a year away.
At the beginning of the thread, in my response to SpamSandwich, the first sentence:
"Intel is making a few smaller lower performance 14nm chips, just recently begun. But the majority of their 14nm production is well behind original estimates, by about two years!"
Right. But the secondary discussion about Bootcamp vs VMs came about because of this question you posed in post #7:
Quote:
does anyone bother with Bootcamp these days given the speed of VMs?
melgross mentioned getting the full power of the graphics card in Bootcamp as being one reason (post #14). You thought that was only necessary for gamers (post #17), and I was pointing out why people other than gamers might require Bootcamp too.
Anyways, Apple has never really held back on new hardware simply for compatibility reasons. So I can't imagine Bootcamp being the holdup for putting A series processors in Macs. My guess is that full-blown OS X requires a lot more from the hardware than iOS does, and the A series architecture isn't quite advanced enough yet to support it (since it's been designed from the start for much simpler mobile devices).
Well, if they are coming out with a four core A8, I don't think they can do it. If they do come out with a new two core chip with inter chip links, they may be able to. But talking about a Mac of some kind with this still presents problems, because now you're talking about emulation again, and we all know how well that worked out for them in the past. Estimates are that a chip that needs to emulate another processor family needs to be about five times as powerful to run an OS and software in emulation with the same speed as on the native processor. That kills emulation in any real practical way.
But Apple could work around this if they want to. They can, without getting a license from Intel, implement processes in their chip that duplicates some functions in x86 that cause the biggest emulation problems. These relatively few functions cause most of the slowdown. The OS could call for these alternative functions if the OS or software required them instead of emulating them.
The A7 already is as powerful as the midline Atom Bay Trail series. Actually more powerful than the midline chip. And that runs Windows, though not as well as their faster chips. No reason why two two core A8’s with these functions couldn't run OS X well. If the result was four times as fast as the current A7, it would be well within the range of the i3, actually, closer to the high end of the range. That would run a MacBook, at least the entry level model. It could also run iOS.
You point on emulation is on the mark. Apple was able to do it before (rosetta) because of the -HUGE- speed difference that had accumulated between the neglected PPC architecture and Intel's new core. Because they had a 2 to 4 fold speed increase and some added array operators to the core series (to speed the PPC/altivec code execution) Apple -was-able to pull off the PPC—>Intel transition (but certanly not without dipping into "a big bag of hurt" for a few years)
Here however, (A series in a macbook) we don't have that. Any A-series emulating (RTI) an intel core i series would almost asuridly be horribly, unacceptably, slow. Porting OS X would not be the problem (as a matter of fact I'm fairly sure that already exists in One of Sir Jon's development labs somewhere in Cupertino) The big problem (with an A-series mac) IMHO is not the processor or the OS it is third party software, they simply can't ask developers to again port their software and offer it in twin binary format meanwhile offering a poor performing emulator to bridge the gap. That just isn't going to fly (perhaps not much better than MS's horrid little baby surface did)
And.. if you think the press is going to give Apple a "pass" on a total failure (like they did for MS's surface fiasco) you would be -very- wrong. They would crucify Apple and it would damage the Apple brand profoundly.
At the beginning of the thread, in my response to SpamSandwich, the first sentence:
"Intel is making a few smaller lower performance 14nm chips, just recently begun. But the majority of their 14nm production is well behind original estimates, by about two years!"
Comments
1. I dont get how part of the story about Samsung getting orders for A8 as well. Because they simply isn't. Unless Apple decide to make 20nm A8 and 28nm A8 as well. Samsung's 20nm isn't ready, ( that was three months ago ) and they have been concentrating on 14nm.
2. Intel 14nm isn't coming in 2015. It is the end of this year or have product shipping for Holiday season. If you include the ULP series then Intel is at most delaying 14nm by a quarter or two. Not a year or more as some of you have stated.
3. I personally believe Intel is milking the market rather then 14nm having yield problem. All new nodes have yield problem when they first ramp up, but this time intel isn't putting the same resources into solving it simply because they dont need to with no competition in Desktop, Laptop or even Server market. More and more R&D are being shifted over to the SoC version of 14nm node. Which is scheduled for 2015. My guess is that SoC node isn't doing too well.
4. Rumours goes that Samsung already have Apple on broad with their 14nm. I am still slightly sceptic of that. Especially when TSMC is working on a new 16nm+ and collaborating with a major partner on 10nm development. um.....
5. Pls, Intel and x86 Atom isn't power hog. It may be when they started. But that is no longer the case.
6. Quad Core? Or has Apple secretly masted the big.Little technique?
I wonder if Apple is also looking at alternatives to Intel for OS X too in their lower end Macs? It's not my area of expertise but I would imagine an optional BTO Intel chip could be added for those who requiring to run VMs or Bootcamp (does anyone bother with Bootcamp these days given the speed of VMs?).
I really don't think that is possible, unless they attempt to clone intel's processors (and what would be the point of that) simply because all of the OS X software is intel binary. They could (possibly) run iOS software on such a chimera (a series in a macbook) but iOS is -strongly- tablet based, and at that point haven't we really crippled and removed the point of getting a Mac (i.e. -running OS X software-) over an iPad Air and a keyboard.
Intel's process advantage is significant, but unfortunately there's no way right now they'd allow their cutting edge node to be used to produce competing ARM-based chips.
Since foundaries name their own process, it's easy for TSMC to call their current, brand new process 20nm, but it's still generally an inferior process to Intel's 22nm node with finfet that's been in volume production for 2 years.
Intel's first 14nm chips are supposed to be available for the holiday buying season, though probably in relatively low numbers.
So basically TSMC's 20nm process without finfets are ramping up with the A8 being the first chip at the same time as Intel's 14nm process. TSMC's future 14nm process is their 20nm process finally with finfet and based on their prior history, that's a good deals way out.
So an A9 using Intels' cutting edge node would be killer, but unfortunately won't happen for a long time.
I would rather see Apple do something else entirely. If they instead increased per core performance significantly again, as they have been doing, and added inter chip communication the way Intel has done with the Xeon, then Apple would have a lot of opportunities. The chip could still be used in the phone, where I disagree with your contention that it's powerful enough. But in an ipad, Apple Apple could use two of these two core SoC's. They could then get perhaps four times the performance of today's iPad, which would be particularly true if they do come out with the 12" model sometime next year. This would also allow twice the graphics performance.
I have some other ideas for the SoC that I think would work, but I'll hold off on that for now, though I mentioned it in an earlier discussion.
I was hoping this to be all TSMC with no participating from Samsung!
Intel's current Haswell processors use a 22 nm process, whereas the forthcoming Broadwell is 14 nm. However Intel has been experiencing product yield problems with their 14 nm process, resulting in Broadwell's delay from mid-2014 to an estimated 4Q-2014.
Which is more important, bragging rights to the smallest process size, or having a product to ship?
That's an obsolete estimate, as it's been pushed back to second half of 2015.
So what does that mean for iMac refresh? I need at least two. I don't want to buy at the end of the model refresh cycle so I've been waiting.
These are the ultra low power Broadwell chips. I said that the low power, low end chips will be seen by the end of the year. But the bigger, higher power chips will be delayed further. Notice that you won't find anything about them.
I first forgot to include this link:
http://www.macrumors.com/2014/07/09/broadwell-early-to-mid-2015/
Well, if they are coming out with a four core A8, I don't think they can do it. If they do come out with a new two core chip with inter chip links, they may be able to. But talking about a Mac of some kind with this still presents problems, because now you're talking about emulation again, and we all know how well that worked out for them in the past. Estimates are that a chip that needs to emulate another processor family needs to be about five times as powerful to run an OS and software in emulation with the same speed as on the native processor. That kills emulation in any real practical way.
But Apple could work around this if they want to. They can, without getting a license from Intel, implement processes in their chip that duplicates some functions in x86 that cause the biggest emulation problems. These relatively few functions cause most of the slowdown. The OS could call for these alternative functions if the OS or software required them instead of emulating them.
The A7 already is as powerful as the midline Atom Bay Trail series. Actually more powerful than the midline chip. And that runs Windows, though not as well as their faster chips. No reason why two two core A8’s with these functions couldn't run OS X well. If the result was four times as fast as the current A7, it would be well within the range of the i3, actually, closer to the high end of the range. That would run a MacBook, at least the entry level model. It could also run iOS.
That's why we've been reading that it will be a problem. I don't know what Apple can do other than to make minor CPU refreshes. The entire industry is dependent on this.
Exactly and wouldn't their own chips, something akin to an A8 do the same job and help Apple make more profits? As I said, I realize that would be the end of running Windows ... not a great loss these days.
Well, if they are coming out with a four core A8, I don't think they can do it. If they do come out with a new two core chip with inter chip links, they may be able to. But talking about a Mac of some kind with this still presents problems, because now you're talking about emulation again, and we all know how well that worked out for them in the past. Estimates are that a chip that needs to emulate another processor family needs to be about five times as powerful to run an OS and software in emulation with the same speed as on the native processor. That kills emulation in any real practical way.
But Apple could work around this if they want to. They can, without getting a license from Intel, implement processes in their chip that duplicates some functions in x86 that cause the biggest emulation problems. These relatively few functions cause most of the slowdown. The OS could call for these alternative functions if the OS or software required them instead of emulating them.
The A7 already is as powerful as the midline Atom Bay Trail series. Actually more powerful than the midline chip. And that runs Windows, though not as well as their faster chips. No reason why two two core A8’s with these functions couldn't run OS X well. If the result was four times as fast as the current A7, it would be well within the range of the i3, actually, closer to the high end of the range. That would run a MacBook, at least the entry level model. It could also run iOS.
Windows 8 runs on ARM doesn't it?
Not really. That's a special edition of "Windows" called RT. That's an ARM edition of Windows that doesn't run Windows software. It runs the Modern UI. It doesn't run on x86. It's Microsoft's answer to iOS, it hasn't done well.
Beat me to it.
" src="http://forums-files.appleinsider.com/images/smilies//lol.gif" />
These are the ultra low power Broadwell chips. I said that the low power, low end chips will be seen by the end of the year. But the bigger, higher power chips will be delayed further. Notice that you won't find anything about them.
I don't know where you said it, but I don't see it in this thread.
Anyhow, that sounds about right. Low-end chips suitable for MacBooks, maybe the Mac mini would come out first, with the high-performance chips sometime next year. I wouldn't be surprised if the Mac Pro-suitable chips are a year away.
And, well, a gaming focused Apple TV with app store sounds exactly like that, now doesn't it?
My OP has become reversed in its intent lol ... I was asking if people did not want to use Windows wouldn't a low end Mac be able to run OS X with some new Apple Chip in the not too distant future? VMs came up as I was suggesting low end Mac users don't need Windows anymore and if they did, Apple could offer either a BTO Intel chip or obviously retain Macs with Intel for the higher end.
At the beginning of the thread, in my response to SpamSandwich, the first sentence:
"Intel is making a few smaller lower performance 14nm chips, just recently begun. But the majority of their 14nm production is well behind original estimates, by about two years!"
My OP has become reversed in its intent lol ...
Right. But the secondary discussion about Bootcamp vs VMs came about because of this question you posed in post #7:
melgross mentioned getting the full power of the graphics card in Bootcamp as being one reason (post #14). You thought that was only necessary for gamers (post #17), and I was pointing out why people other than gamers might require Bootcamp too.
Anyways, Apple has never really held back on new hardware simply for compatibility reasons. So I can't imagine Bootcamp being the holdup for putting A series processors in Macs. My guess is that full-blown OS X requires a lot more from the hardware than iOS does, and the A series architecture isn't quite advanced enough yet to support it (since it's been designed from the start for much simpler mobile devices).
Well, if they are coming out with a four core A8, I don't think they can do it. If they do come out with a new two core chip with inter chip links, they may be able to. But talking about a Mac of some kind with this still presents problems, because now you're talking about emulation again, and we all know how well that worked out for them in the past. Estimates are that a chip that needs to emulate another processor family needs to be about five times as powerful to run an OS and software in emulation with the same speed as on the native processor. That kills emulation in any real practical way.
But Apple could work around this if they want to. They can, without getting a license from Intel, implement processes in their chip that duplicates some functions in x86 that cause the biggest emulation problems. These relatively few functions cause most of the slowdown. The OS could call for these alternative functions if the OS or software required them instead of emulating them.
The A7 already is as powerful as the midline Atom Bay Trail series. Actually more powerful than the midline chip. And that runs Windows, though not as well as their faster chips. No reason why two two core A8’s with these functions couldn't run OS X well. If the result was four times as fast as the current A7, it would be well within the range of the i3, actually, closer to the high end of the range. That would run a MacBook, at least the entry level model. It could also run iOS.
You point on emulation is on the mark. Apple was able to do it before (rosetta) because of the -HUGE- speed difference that had accumulated between the neglected PPC architecture and Intel's new core. Because they had a 2 to 4 fold speed increase and some added array operators to the core series (to speed the PPC/altivec code execution) Apple -was- able to pull off the PPC—>Intel transition (but certanly not without dipping into "a big bag of hurt" for a few years)
Here however, (A series in a macbook) we don't have that. Any A-series emulating (RTI) an intel core i series would almost asuridly be horribly, unacceptably, slow. Porting OS X would not be the problem (as a matter of fact I'm fairly sure that already exists in One of Sir Jon's development labs somewhere in Cupertino) The big problem (with an A-series mac) IMHO is not the processor or the OS it is third party software, they simply can't ask developers to again port their software and offer it in twin binary format meanwhile offering a poor performing emulator to bridge the gap. That just isn't going to fly (perhaps not much better than MS's horrid little baby surface did)
And.. if you think the press is going to give Apple a "pass" on a total failure (like they did for MS's surface fiasco) you would be -very- wrong. They would crucify Apple and it would damage the Apple brand profoundly.
At the beginning of the thread, in my response to SpamSandwich, the first sentence:
"Intel is making a few smaller lower performance 14nm chips, just recently begun. But the majority of their 14nm production is well behind original estimates, by about two years!"
Ah, I see it now, thanks!
It's my understanding intel is already making chips in the 14 nanometer range. These TSMC chips are 20 nanometer?
But not ARM-based 14-nm chips, right?
It's never too late. Maybe Intel will be grinding out A9 chips for the MacBook Air next year.