Today marks one year since Apple unveiled its own silicon for the Macs. While at that time, people had been cautious about making the switch, the M1 processor was an amazing surprise for analysts, reviewers, and, of course, customers. After one year and three different M1 processors, have you made the switch?
Going back in time, the first M1 chip was an 8-core, 5-nanometer processor with unified memory architecture. This afforded faster performance on Mac computers using M1 versus separate CPU, GPU, RAM, and other components. Not only that, but M1 also touted better power efficiency with higher performance during usage with 3x performance per watt.
M1 Mac users were able to get up to 17 hours of battery life while doing daily tasks. Apple also surprised people with a fanless MacBook Air, which was powerful enough for regular usage and even a bit of video editing and without making any noise.
To deeply integrate its product lines, the M1 chip, which is based on the iPhone’s A processor series, is able to run iPhone and iPad apps on the Mac for the first time.
During last year’s event, Apple announced a two-year plan to switch all the Macs to its own silicon. So far, the company has introduced the 2020 MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and Mac Mini; the 2021 24-inch iMac; and the new 2021 MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and M1 Max chips and a brand new design.
While the company was focused on making a great first impression, the M1 chip had some limitations. For example, it didn’t have more than an 8-core CPU, couldn’t handle more than 16GB of unified memory, and only supported a single external display.
Fortunately, the true power of these chips was finally unveiled during the “Unleashed” event in October, thanks to the M1 Pro and M1 Max processors. The M1 Pro is 70% faster than its predecessor with up to 10-core CPU and 16-core GPU. The M1 Max, on the other hand, has a 32-core GPU and up to 64GB of unified memory while consuming 70% less power and supporting up to four external displays.
Once again, Apple impressed reviewers, analysts, and general customers. Not only that, but big tech companies are also making a big fuss about offering fully equipped MacBook Pros with 64GB of RAM and the M1 Max processor.
Knowing there’s still more to come and the company is yet to unveil some new Macs through the next year, have you already made the switch to the M1 processor over Intel? Or are you waiting for a new model? Vote in the poll and share your thoughts in the comment section below.
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