Apple surprised this year with its SoC M1. The M1 SoC is the company’s first attempt at providing a processor and it appears the company has more than succeeded.
This processor is a low-end product, but it still offers amazing performance. But that’s not the most impressive part, it also consumes very little power. The performance per watt is staggering and everyone is looking forward to what Apple can achieve with larger versions of its Apple Silicon.
Now there is some news on what Apple has in store for 2021 and 2022. Bloomberg reports that Apple is developing chips that will significantly outperform Intel’s best offerings.
This is what to expect:
MacBook Pro e iMac
The current M1 SoC, used for low-end Mac mini, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro systems, has 4 high-performance cores and 4 low-power cores. The next-generation Apple Silicon for MacBook Pro and iMac will offer up to 20 cores, with 16 high-performance cores and 4 energy-efficient cores. The Bloomberg report indicates that the 20-core model may be released later and that initial models may include high-performance 8-core or 12-core SoCs. These systems are expected to be available in the first half of 2021.
Mac Pro with up to 32 high-performance CPU cores
Later in 2021, we can expect high-end desktop models, and there is a mid-size Mac Pro on the cards for 2022. Apple is said to be testing high-performance 32-core chips for these high-end offerings.
And also more GPU cores …
The higher-end versions of Apple Silicon will also get a lot more GPU cores. The current SoC is offered with both 7 and 8-core GPUs, but the upcoming MacBook Pros and mid-range desktops will reportedly get 16- and 32-core graphics parts. And that is just the beginning. Future Apple desktops could get configurations with 64 and 128 graphics cores.
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