Apple is making impressive and eye-catching claims about the performance of its new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips, and on paper, the highest-end M1 Max chip actually has more raw GPU performance than Sony's PlayStation 5.
The M1 Max chip can be configured to include up to a 32-core GPU, a gigantic leap compared to the 8-core GPU option offered in the M1 chip. Apple says that the M1 Max chip uses 70% less power at peak graphic performance than a PC laptop with a discrete graphics card. Apple also claims that the M1 Max chip offers "similar performance" to a "pro laptop with high-performing discrete GPU" while using 100 watts less power.
To make the claims, Apple tested the 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M1 Max chip, featuring a 10-core CPU, 32-core GPU, and 64GB of RAM compared to the MSI GE76 Raider and the Razer Blade 15 Advanced. For a further breakdown of the GPU performance, Notebookcheck estimated how many teraflops the new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips can handle based on Apple's information about the new chips. These are their findings:
M1 8-core = 2.6 TF
M1 Pro 14-core = 4.5 TF
M1 Pro 16-core = 5.2 TF
M1 Max 24-core = 7.8 TF
M1 Max 32-core = 10.4 TF
On paper, the M1 Max chip maxed out with 32-cores of GPU can tackle more teraflops of graphics than Sony's PlayStation 5, which maxes out at 10.28 teraflops. Notebookcheck's numbers are based on estimations and not real-world testing, but until the new laptops begin arriving in the hands of customers next week, they are all we have to rely on. As noted by YouTuber ZoneOfTech on Twitter, the M1 Max chip can also read up to 7.4GB per second, higher than the PlayStation 5's 5.5GB read speed.
The new MacBook Pros cost more than the PlayStation 5, but nonetheless, Apple's ability to make claims about a portable laptop that rivals a high-end gaming console is impressive. As stated above, these claims are just on-paper, and proper performance and speed tests will surely come shortly after the new MacBook Pros start arriving for customers next week.
Tuesday January 21, 2025 12:46 pm PST by Joe Rossignol
A leaker known as "Majin Bu" today shared an alleged image of a component for the rumored, ultra-thin "iPhone 17 Air" model.
The blurry, pixelated image shows a pair of rear iPhone shells with a pill-shaped, raised camera bar along the top. On the left side of the bar, there is a circular cutout that appears to be for a single rear camera. On the right side of the bar, there appears to be an ...
Friday January 17, 2025 2:42 pm PST by Joe Rossignol
iOS 19 is still around six months away from being announced, but a new leak has allegedly revealed a completely redesigned Camera app.
Based on footage it obtained, YouTube channel Front Page Tech shared a video showing what the new Camera app will apparently look like, with the key change being translucent menus for camera controls. Overall, the design of these menus looks similar to...
Tuesday January 21, 2025 4:31 pm PST by Juli Clover
Apple provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate version of iOS 18.3 today, and with it comes release notes confirming what's new. While we knew about several of the features that are in the update, there are some lesser known tweaks and bug fixes.
The update adds new Visual Intelligence features for iPhone 16 models, it tweaks Notification summaries on all...
Monday January 20, 2025 9:01 am PST by Joe Rossignol
A new iPhone SE is widely rumored to launch this year, and the device has potentially been confirmed today by known leaker Evan Blass.
In a private social media post, Blass shared an image of what appears to be source code mentioning an iPhone SE (4th Gen), which casts doubt on the alternative "iPhone 16E" name rumored for the device. However, the name in the source code could be a...
Sunday January 19, 2025 6:58 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple on late Saturday removed TikTok from the App Store in the U.S., and it has now explained why it was required to take this action.
Last year, the U.S. passed a law that required Chinese company ByteDance to divest its ownership of TikTok due to potential national security risks, or else the platform would be banned. That law went into effect today, and companies like Apple and Google...
Sunday January 19, 2025 8:11 am PST by Joe Rossignol
After a four-year wait, a new AirTag is finally expected to launch in 2025. Below, we recap rumored upgrades for the accessory.
A few months ago, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said Apple was aiming to release the AirTag 2 around the middle of 2025. While he did not offer a more specific timeframe, that means the AirTag 2 could be announced by the end of June.
The original AirTag was announced...
Tuesday January 21, 2025 6:40 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple plans to release at least one new iPad Pro model this year, according to a supplier-focused report today from Korean website The Elec. It is likely that the 11-inch and 13-inch iPad Pro models would be updated simultaneously.
After receiving an OLED display last year, the report said the iPad Pro will receive only "minor" changes this year. Overall, the next iPad Pro is expected to...
Wednesday January 22, 2025 2:07 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Popular caller ID app Truecaller is rolling out an update that brings real-time caller ID support to its iOS subscribers.
Apple introduced Live Caller ID Lookup in iOS 18, allowing third-party caller ID apps to securely retrieve information about a caller from their servers, hence today's Truecaller update.
iPhone users can enable the Live Caller ID Lookup feature by going to Settings ➝ ...
Saturday January 18, 2025 10:28 am PST by Joe Rossignol
iOS 19 will not drop support for any iPhone models, according to French website iPhoneSoft.fr.
The report cited a source who said iOS 19 will be compatible with any iPhone that can run iOS 18, which would mean the following models:
iPhone 16
iPhone 16 Plus
iPhone 16 Pro
iPhone 16 Pro Max
iPhone 15
iPhone 15 Plus
iPhone 15 Pro
iPhone 15 Pro Max
iPhone 14
iPhon...
Such an illiterate logic ?. Apple’s marketing and their fanbase never fails to impress me, especially on MacRumors…
10.4TF doesn’t mean that it can actually use 10.4TF if it’s power limited to +-60W and probably even bandwidth starved, (lack superior L1 and L2 caches, don’t use unified L3 chance, lacks a geometry engine, doesn’t support techniques such as VRS and storage APIs…)
The AMD Radeon V is actually 14.9 TF and the AMD VEGA 64 is 13.4 TF, and both are slower than the PS5 and Series X, significantly slower in fact!
Don’t fall for the fake marketing people. By no mean these MacBooks are slow or anything, but if you actually believe that it’s faster than a PS5 you have to seek help…
For consoles to consistently hit their maximum TFlops performance they actually uses these kind of heatsink.
The problem is that there are no real AAA games on the Mac. We want to see games like COD modern warfare, red dead redemption 2 and cyber punk etc run on these M1 Pro chips.
