Update On Apple's M5 -- November 8, 2024

Locator: 48739AAPL.

The Apple M5.

Link here.

Work on the M5 and A19 was said to have started back in 2023, suggesting that the company wanted to stay well ahead of the competition. In Mark Gurman’s latest ‘Power On’ newsletter, the Bloomberg correspondent reveals that updated iPad Pro models will arrive in the second half of 2025, with the display sizes remaining unchanged at 11 inches and 13 inches. Both tablets are said to feature the codenames J607 and J637, and given that it is the first time that Apple introduced tandem OLED technology last year, the technology giant should have no reason or encouragement to switch to a different panel.

For all those wondering if Apple will transition to TSMC’s next-generation 2nm process for the M5, we highly doubt it. Instead, the new chipset could be mass produced on the 3nm ‘N3P’ node, which is the Taiwanese semiconductor manufacturer's third variant after ‘N3E,’ which was used to fabricate the M4, A18, and the A18 Pro. Earlier, TF International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo commented that Apple will not introduce any 2nm chipset in 2025 due to insanely high wafer costs and predicted that the launch of silicon on such advanced lithography would happen in 2026 when Apple announces the iPhone 18 series.

One advantage that the M5 could flaunt over predecessors is that it could employ TSMC’s Small Outline Integrated Circuit Packaging, or SoIC. This type of packaging was first introduced in 2018 and allows the stacking of chips in a three-dimensional structure, resulting in better thermal management, reduced current leakage, and better electrical performance compared to the two-dimensional chip design. The specifications of the M5 are currently unknown, but a move to the improved 3nm process can mean that Apple may have the liberty to add more performance cores, just like what it did with the M4.

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Meanwhile, The Mess Over At Intel Continues

Link here.

A Linux patch suggests that Intel engineers plan to implement a feature that tags your system as vulnerable if you're running outdated microcodes, (via Phoronix). This comes in light of the recent Intel 13th Generation and 14th Generation degradation fiasco, which is now pushing Team Blue towards a class action lawsuit.

The patch argues that you cannot run a system with old microcode and consider it safe. Microcode is basically a set of instructions in the CPU that can be updated post-launch to fix critical flaws and security vulnerabilities. The patch proposes that users should be informed clearly and concisely that their PC is potentially unsafe - marking the system as vulnerable or not vulnerable. The author calls to report this vulnerability in "/sys/devices/system/cpu/vulnerabilities/old_microcode", so that a single file can be used to prompt the user to update their microcode.

Update, Saturday, November 9, 2024: with regard to the "mess over at Intel," link here:

Or, direct to The Verge.

From the linked article:

Reviews of Intel’s new Arrow Lake-based Core Ultra 9 200S-series processor have been lackluster, specifically when it comes to gaming performance, but Intel says that’s not the end of the story.

Its new chips should be performing better, and the company will have an ETA on getting them there soon, according to Robert Hallock, Intel’s VP and GM of client AI and technical marketing, in a new interview with HotHardware’s Dave Altavilla and Marco Chiappetta.

Intel was up-front in saying these new chips wouldn’t beat AMD’s chips for gaming. But reviewers’ findings have been unexpectedly poor. Despite some efficiency gains like those noted in Tom Warren’s Verge review of the Core Ultra 9 285K, the new chip seems to lag behind even Intel’s earlier Raptor Lake chips in gaming. That’s to say nothing of its performance versus AMD’s very good Ryzen 9800X3D.

It will be interesting to see if analysts read these reports.