M1 Pro and M1 Max GPU performance versus Nvidia and AMD
Apple's M1 Pro and M1 Max have GPU speeds competitive with new releases from AMD and Nvidia, with higher-end configurations expected to compete with gaming desktops and modern consoles
During Apple's keynote, the company boasted about the graphical performance of the M1 Pro and M1 Max, with each having considerably more cores than the M1 chip. It was said that the M1 Pro's 16-core GPU is seven-times faster than the integrated graphics on a modern "8-core PC laptop chip," and delivers more performance than a discrete notebook GPU while using 70% less power.
The M1 Max was said to have even more performance, with it apparently comparable to a high-end GPU in a compact pro PC laptop, while being similarly power efficient.
In estimates by NotebookCheck following Apple's release of details about its configurations, it is claimed the new chips may well be able to outpace modern notebook GPUs, and even some non-notebook devices.
The reference for the publication is the known quantity, namely the M1, which has an eight-core GPU that manages 2.6 teraflops of single-precision floating-point performance, also known as FP32 or float32.
In the case of the M1 Pro, the 14-core variant is thought to run at up to 4.5 teraflops, while the advertised 16-core is believed to manage 5.2 teraflops. For the M1 Max, the 24-core version is expected to hit 7.8 teraflops, and the top 32-core variant could manage 10.4 teraflops.
If the estimates turn out to be accurate, it does put the new M1 chips in some esteemed company.
The 16-core GPU in the M1 Pro is thought to be 5.2 teraflops, which puts it in the same ballpark as the Radeon RX 5500 in terms of performance. The Nvidia equivalent would be the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti, which is slightly faster at peak performance with 5.4 teraflops.
At the high end, the M1 Max's 32-core GPU is at a par with the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56, a GPU that Apple used in the iMac Pro. Its Nvidia equivalent would be something like the GeForce RTX 2060.
Against game consoles, the 32-core GPU puts it at a par with the PlayStation 5's 10.28 teraflops of performance, while the Xbox Series X is capable of up to 12 teraflops.
For the moment, these are estimates based on what Apple said during its special event and in the following press releases and product pages, and therefore can't really be considered perfectly accurate, aside from the M1's performance.
Tflops are not the ultimate comparison of GPU performance. Real-world performance varies depending on if a task is CPU-bound, or if the GPU has a constant flow of data at the theoretical maximum data transfer rate. The performance estimates by the report also assume that the chips are running at the same clock speed as the M1.
No one outside of Apple will truly know the performance of the new chips until the latest 14-inch MacBook Pro and 16-inch MacBook Pro ship to consumers. At that time, benchmarks will reveal how powerful the new M1 chips truly are.
Read on AppleInsider
During Apple's keynote, the company boasted about the graphical performance of the M1 Pro and M1 Max, with each having considerably more cores than the M1 chip. It was said that the M1 Pro's 16-core GPU is seven-times faster than the integrated graphics on a modern "8-core PC laptop chip," and delivers more performance than a discrete notebook GPU while using 70% less power.
The M1 Max was said to have even more performance, with it apparently comparable to a high-end GPU in a compact pro PC laptop, while being similarly power efficient.
In estimates by NotebookCheck following Apple's release of details about its configurations, it is claimed the new chips may well be able to outpace modern notebook GPUs, and even some non-notebook devices.
The reference for the publication is the known quantity, namely the M1, which has an eight-core GPU that manages 2.6 teraflops of single-precision floating-point performance, also known as FP32 or float32.
| Apple Silicon processor | M1 | M1 Pro | M1 Pro | M1 Max | M1 Max |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GPU core count | 8 | 14 | 16 | 24 | 32 |
| Teraflops | 2.6 | 4.5 | 5.2 | 7.8 | 10.4 |
| AMD equivalent GPU | Radeon RX 560 (2.6TF) | Radeon RX 5500M (4.6TF) | Radeon RX 5500 (5.2TF) | Radeon RX 5700M (7.9TF) | Radeon RX Vega 56 (10.5TF) |
| Nvidia equivalent GPU | GeForce GTX 1650 (2.9TF) | GeForce GTX 1650 Super (4.4TF) | GeForce GTX 1660 Ti (5.4TF) | GeForce RTX 2070 (7.4TF) | GeForce RTX 2080 (10TF) |
In the case of the M1 Pro, the 14-core variant is thought to run at up to 4.5 teraflops, while the advertised 16-core is believed to manage 5.2 teraflops. For the M1 Max, the 24-core version is expected to hit 7.8 teraflops, and the top 32-core variant could manage 10.4 teraflops.
If the estimates turn out to be accurate, it does put the new M1 chips in some esteemed company.
The 16-core GPU in the M1 Pro is thought to be 5.2 teraflops, which puts it in the same ballpark as the Radeon RX 5500 in terms of performance. The Nvidia equivalent would be the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti, which is slightly faster at peak performance with 5.4 teraflops.
At the high end, the M1 Max's 32-core GPU is at a par with the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56, a GPU that Apple used in the iMac Pro. Its Nvidia equivalent would be something like the GeForce RTX 2060.
Against game consoles, the 32-core GPU puts it at a par with the PlayStation 5's 10.28 teraflops of performance, while the Xbox Series X is capable of up to 12 teraflops.
For the moment, these are estimates based on what Apple said during its special event and in the following press releases and product pages, and therefore can't really be considered perfectly accurate, aside from the M1's performance.
Tflops are not the ultimate comparison of GPU performance. Real-world performance varies depending on if a task is CPU-bound, or if the GPU has a constant flow of data at the theoretical maximum data transfer rate. The performance estimates by the report also assume that the chips are running at the same clock speed as the M1.
No one outside of Apple will truly know the performance of the new chips until the latest 14-inch MacBook Pro and 16-inch MacBook Pro ship to consumers. At that time, benchmarks will reveal how powerful the new M1 chips truly are.
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
Also note the 64 GB of vRam is unheard of in the GPU industry for pro consumer products. For some tasks, the new MacBook Pros will be the best graphics processor on the market. Better even than desktop computers.
That means the Pro is more entry-level dGPU, and the Max is kind of middle-of-the-road dGPU. I guess that's fine in laptops, but then hopefully we'll see more cores in the desktops that are coming (mini 'Pro', bigger iMac, etc.). I'm sure we'll see another 'Uber' version for the new Mac Pro, but I'm disappointed in terms of anything below that level if these same chips will go in them. Maybe there is still hope for eGPUs?
And, then there is still the issue Metal (vs OpenGL, etc.) and apps kind of emulating until they get ported (if they ever do), which further degrades performance.
True, but this will, IMO, largely come down to software where we're already at a disadvantage. But, yes, for apps like were shown (C4D, Resolve, etc.) it will probably be pretty good. Will it match high end GPUs though? I missed that 'compact' laptop thing when watching the event. You can get laptops with an Nvidia 3080, and I think I even saw a 3090 the other day, which are considerably faster than a Vega 56/64.
Except note the are talking about 'compact laptops'. As mentioned above, some of the bigger laptops have Nvidia 3080 (maybe 3090) in them, which I don't think this will compete with, at least in every way. That RAM thing could be a game-changer, true, but probably only for certain things.
Of course we don't know how far Apple will advance in the next year, but now seeing this, I really, really hope we'll be getting eGPU support back, as this might not cut it for higher end pros until the Mac Pro. I was hoping we wouldn't be in that situation again (where the Mac Pro was the only option). I was really hoping this transition would enable a more prosumer machine like the Wintel market has in spades.
But, as has been said, this (article subject matter) is only one (hopefully highly flawed) take on the situation.
I have just replaced a Vega 64, the top Radeon in its days and higher spec, with a base 6600XT, and the 6600XT does higher frame rates at higher settings. Technically, the Vega 64 has double the bandwidth.
who knows what the sum of the M1 and M1 pro max can do until real world testing.
Should have a better idea Monday when the review embargo is over.
Using the discrete GPU model, requests and data are formatted in main memory by the CPU, compressed, transmitted by the CPU over PCIe, received by the GPU into GPU memory, decompressed, then executed by the GPU. All this results in realtime clock tick loss which has nothing to do with putting pixels on screen.
Compute tasks returning results have to go through the same process in the opposite direction.
All this overhead means that despite the possibly superior speed of a discrete GPU, the actual speed can come surprisingly close the the M1's 7 or 8 cores.
This applies to all Wintel graphics workflows, no mater the internal speed of the GPU.
For integrated GPUs, the same basic process involves copying data from main memory to the GPU's memory partition, replacing the compress, transfer over PCIe, and decompress portions of the cycle.
CSGO (Rosetta2 I think) also plays wonderfully at 1680x1050 with everything turned on and set to high on the internal screen.
Also Apple listed the laptops they used for the GPU performance comparisons, here they are (footnote 26 on the M1Pro/M1Max MBP info page):
Discrete PC laptop graphics performance data from testing Lenovo Legion 5 (82JW0012US).
https://www.newegg.com/p/1TS-000E-0SX24
https://www.digitweek.com/lenovo-legion-5-15-82jw0012us-review/
High-end discrete PC laptop graphics performance data from testing MSI GE76 Raider (11UH-053).
https://www.newegg.com/titanium-blue-msi-ge-series-ge76-raider-11uh-053-gaming-entertainment/p/N82E16834155868
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/msi-ge76-raider-review
PC compact pro laptop performance data from testing Razer Blade 15 Advanced (RZ09-0409CE53-R3U1).
https://www.razer.com/gaming-laptops/Razer-Blade-15/RZ09-0409CE53-R3U1
Also, I wonder how we are going to benchmark them properly, most GPU heavy games don't run a mac, and the Pro Apps don't run on PC's..Maybe only Cinebench? Adobe apps skew heavily towards the Windows platform.
In the end maybe it doesn't matter, since most people buying these will using the Pro Apps anyway. 3D and ML has moved to other platforms.
The Apple M1 scores ~18,000 in OpenCL (1) and ~20,000 in Metal (2) on Geekbench.
A 130W version of the RTX 3080 in a laptop scores ~120,000 in OpenCL (3) on Geekbench.
Apple used a 165W version of the RTX 3080 in their comparison:
I'm reasonably sure that the M1 Pro and Max will measure up favorably to comparable laptops in "real world" comparisons, but a teraflops comparison is really kind of secondary, or maybe even tertiary, where actual application benchmarks are concerned.
The other advantages they tout is the untethered or unplugged performance, and unified memory where the GPU has direct access to all of main memory which will be advantageous for memory constrained GPU processes. A lot of these 100+ W GPU laptops are in 17" 6 lb laptops, so they have a handling qualities advantage too. They are really great machines. miniLED at 250 PPI is awesome for me. Can't wait for work to issue me one.
Now, the branding of PC laptop GPUs... sheesh, can it get anymore confusing?