According to Bloomberg, Apple is currently heavy engaged in the development of its next-generation high-performance chips for 2021-2022 products.
Apple preparing 32-core high-performance processors
Last month Apple introduced its M1 chip featuring four high-performance and four high-efficiency cores paired with up to 8 graphics cores. This silicon is used by three products: MacBook Air, MacBookPro, and Mac Mini. Apple is slowly shifting its product stack away from x86 architecture which relied on Intel-supplied processors and will continue to do so till replacements are ready.
Bloomberg today reported about the plans for next-generation chips for the new products. The article is based on the information gathered from people familiar with current Apple roadmaps, but who chose not to be named till the information is not public.
According to the article, Apple is now actively developing a new chip with up to 16 high-performance cores. A variant featuring 8 and 12 cores might be released first though. Interestingly enough, a 32-core chip is also in development, which should launch as a successor to Apple’s 28-core high-end desktop systems featuring Intel CPUs (Mac Pro). It is unclear how many small cores would such a chip have, but it does seem that both Apple and Intel will be heavily invested in hybrid CPU designs in the coming years. Intel is currently developing its Alder Lake CPUs which are also based on hybrid CPU designs. No
Apple also developing up to 128-core GPUs
The article further reveals the plans for Apple’s high-performance GPU solutions. Apple is currently using AMD’s discrete GPUs that can be found in laptops and workstations. Earlier this year, the company released Navi 12 based Macbook Pro 16-inch laptop.
It appears that Apple might soon have a replacement for those solutions as well. According to Bloomberg, the company is working on 16 and 32-core graphics solutions. The M1 chip features up to 8 GPU cores, thus we are looking at high-end mobile and mid-range desktop solutions.
It is also rumored that Apple might have GPU solutions for its high-performance desktops as well. A 64-core and 128-core GPUs are also in development that should be ‘several times faster’ than graphics modules from AMD and NVIDIA that the company currently uses.
All those chips are set to release between 2021 and 2022, Bloomberg reports.
| Upcoming Apple Chips | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple M1 SoC | 16-core SoC | 32-core SoC | 32-core GPU | 128-core GPU | |
| Architecture | 5nm ARM-based | TBC | TBC | TBC | TBC |
| CPU Cores (P+E) | 4+4 | 8+? 12+? 16+4 | 32+? | – | – |
| GPU Cores | 7, 8 | TBC | TBC | 16, 32 | 64, 128 |
| Release | Nov 2020 | TBC | 2021-2022 | 2021-2022 | 2021-2022 |
| Products | MacBook Air, Macbook Pro, Mac Mini | MacBook Pro, iMac | High-end desktop, Mac Pro | Discrete GPU | Discrete GPU |
Source Bloomberg
