On performance, Apple Silicon is eating the PC industry lunch

This couldn’t go unnoticed: As I had expected the first M4 Pro and M4 Max benchmark tests show phenomenal performance – so much say that Windows makers should be terrified, particularly as these Macs are so fast they can run Windows in VM better than some Windows PCs. Apple Silicon is a light that shines brightly in the Apple sky.

Kickstart Mac Heart

It is early days, of course. The first Macs powered with these chips have not officially reached customers at this time, though some may reach them early. All the same the first test data is being collected and shows a really impressive number. We’re looking at 4,060 in single- and 26,675 in multi-core scores for the M4 Max.

That’s the fastest chipset in its category and bodes well for whatever absolute monster of a chip Apple plans for its Mac Studio. The M4 Pro comes in with 3,925 and 22,669.

These results are fast, fast, fast, and mean the new M4-powered Macs will absolutely live up to all the expectation. The M3 Max-powered MacBook Pro reaches 3,128-single and 20,928 multi-core, according to Geekbench.

Now the Mac mini eats that performance all by itself, with an average of 22k, which means you can pick up a Mac mini with an M4 Pro chip and get more performance than from a $4k Mac Studio. At least until the latter product also sees an upgrade.

A Whole New World

In other words, these new M4 Mac chips are a passport to a whole new experience of super-fast Mac usage. For many, that just makes for a better experience in general terms, but for professional users it means you’ll get so much more done so much faster. In some cases, the productivity gains implicit in the upgrade will pay for the device itself.

They are also exciting. In part because they have put both Intel and AMD on the back foot for chip performance, and also given Mac users yet another reason to evangelize their own machines; but also, because Apple has a solid road map for processor evolution that means the Macs we use in just another two to three years will perhaps double the current performance.

We’ve never had this kind of leadership in hardware terms on a Mac. Now we do.

I Gotta Wear Shades

This is a huge opportunity and the company knows it. Not only do its chips deliver outstanding performance, but they do so at low energy. The company’s move to put an M4 chip inside iPads first told us everything we need to know about this, as it means it can create devices that offer both speed and thinness, without needing to compromise or build gadgets that are way too hot to handle. (At least not in the sense of personal safety).

This is a significant sea change for the platform, one we’ve not seen anything like the complete consequences of yet and mean that in future the company will be able to explore a myriad of different product families and designs.

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