Tag: chip
Gurman: Apple Testing ‘M3 Pro’ Chip for MacBook Pro With 12-Core CPU and 18-Core GPU
In his Power On newsletter today, Gurman said this chip could be the base-level M3 Pro for the next-generation 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models launching next year. The chip is expected to be manufactured based on TSMC’s 3nm process for significant performance and power efficiency improvements.
The current base-level M2 Pro chip in the 14-inch MacBook Pro has a 10-core CPU and 16-core GPU, and starts with 16GB of memory, so the M3 Pro chip would have at least two extra cores for both the CPU and GPU. Apple last updated the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro in January, so the laptops are unlikely to be updated again until at least 2024.
Apple still has to release the standard M3 chip before moving on to the M3 Pro and M3 Max chips. Gurman said Apple is working on new iMac, MacBook Air, and low-end MacBook Pro models with the M3 chip, and he continues to believe the first Macs with the M3 chip will be released towards the end of this year or early next year.
In the meantime, Gurman said the long-rumored 15-inch MacBook Air will be released this summer with the M2 chip. He previously said the laptop would be announced at WWDC, which begins with Apple’s keynote on June 5.
This article, “Gurman: Apple Testing ‘M3 Pro’ Chip for MacBook Pro With 12-Core CPU and 18-Core GPU” first appeared on MacRumors.com
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This company secured billions to reboot Japan’s chip industry in just 4 years
Apple Watch Series 9 to Feature Updated Processor Based on A15 Chip
The Apple Watch Series 8, like the Series 7 before it, uses a chip that’s essentially identical to the S6 chip that was used in the Apple Watch Series 6. Apple calls the Apple Watch Series 8 chip the “S8,” but it is a two-year-old chip with no speed improvements.
Gurman says that the Series 9 chip will be a “new processor” rather than a rebranding of the prior-generation chip, and when asked whether the chip would be based on the A15 chip, he said that he believed that would be the case.
With an updated chip that’s built using the A15 technology, the Apple Watch Series 9 could see speed and efficiency improvements, resulting in quicker load times and better battery life. The new chip could help power some of the updated features that Apple plans to introduce in watchOS 10. Apple is working on overhauling the watchOS interface in watchOS 10, with a specific focus on a new widget system.
While we are expecting some notable changes to watchOS this year, the Apple Watch Series 9 will be largely similar to the Series 8. No major design updates are expected, but we will see a modest speed boost due to the new chip.
This article, “Apple Watch Series 9 to Feature Updated Processor Based on A15 Chip” first appeared on MacRumors.com
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China’s AI Industry Barely Slowed By US Chip Export Rules
Part of the U.S. strategy in setting the rules was to avoid such a shock that the Chinese would ditch U.S. chips altogether and redouble their own chip-development efforts. “They had to draw the line somewhere, and wherever they drew it, they were going to run into the challenge of how to not be immediately disruptive, but how to also over time degrade China’s capability,” said one chip industry executive who requested anonymity to talk about private discussions with regulators. The export restrictions have two parts. The first puts a ceiling on a chip’s ability to calculate extremely precise numbers, a measure designed to limit supercomputers that can be used in military research. Chip industry sources said that was an effective action. But calculating extremely precise numbers is less relevant in AI work like large language models where the amount of data the chip can chew through is more important. […] The second U.S. limit is on chip-to-chip transfer speeds, which does affect AI. The models behind technologies such as ChatGPT are too large to fit onto a single chip. Instead, they must be spread over many chips – often thousands at a time — which all need to communicate with one another.
Nvidia has not disclosed the China-only H800 chip’s performance details, but a specification sheet seen by Reuters shows a chip-to-chip speed of 400 gigabytes per second, less than half the peak speed of 900 gigabytes per second for Nvidia’s flagship H100 chip available outside China. Some in the AI industry believe that is still plenty of speed. Naveen Rao, chief executive of a startup called MosaicML that specializes in helping AI models to run better on limited hardware, estimated a 10-30% system slowdown. “There are ways to get around all this algorithmically,” he said. “I don’t see this being a boundary for a very long time — like 10 years.” Moreover, AI researchers are trying to slim down the massive systems they have built to cut the cost of training products similar to ChatGPT and other processes. Those will require fewer chips, reducing chip-to-chip communications and lessening the impact of the U.S. speed limits.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Arm , Apple’s chip design partner, plans US stock listing
Apple’s iPhones, Macs, iPads, and other devices all make some use of reference chip designs from Arm, the UK processor design company.
Now the company plans to list its shares on the US NASDAQ stock exchange in a move that once again confirms the poor performance of the UK economy.
Apple and Arm: The back story
Most Apple watchers will remember that Apple, with Acorn and VLSI, was a launch partner for Arm more than two decades ago. At the time, it was to make chips destined for the Apple Newton.
UK chip giant Arm files for blockbuster US share listing
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ASML, Europe’s Most Valuable Tech Firm, Is at the Heart of the US-China Chip War
Over his nearly four decades at the company, ASML has gone from a bit player competing with the likes of Nikon, Canon and Ultratech to the world’s only maker of very high-end semiconductor lithography equipment. Its ascent has made it Europe’s most valuable technology company, with a market capitalization of over $247 billion — more than twice that of its customer Intel. In an industry where devices typically cost $10 million, ASML commands about $180 million for its current top-end machine. And although the chip market has softened recently, ASML is still growing and its long-term outlook seems intact, thanks to the insatiable demand for computing power.
“This is a company that the world can’t exist without,” said Jon Bathgate, a fund manager at NZS Capital in Denver, which has about $2 billion under management, with ASML as one of its biggest holdings. “They’ve got a 20-year head start… Investors have clearly realized how important ASML is as a company and how difficult it would be to replicate. It’s a natural monopoly with secular growth winds. That’s unique.” As chips become for geopolitics in the 21st century what oil was in the last one, ASML’s singular success has thrust it squarely in the crosshairs of the intensifying tensions between the US and China. With the US focused on the strategic importance of semiconductors, Presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden have done everything to ensure that China is a couple of generations behind in chips. No company is more critical to that effort than ASML.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.