The first M1 Macs have been in nature for almost three full months, and the fear is starting at Intel. The company shared a detailed slideshow of benchmark results this week with Tom’s hardware (via Six colors), which aims to show that on Apple Silicon there are several ways it still has a leg up … depending on how you look at things.
One of Intel’s focuses is on what it calls ‘productivity’. The company compares its 11th generation “Tiger Lake” processors to Apple’s M1 for things like web browsing and Microsoft Office use. Intel says:
The comparison of Microsoft Office 365, which uses both Intel and Apple processors: the 11th generation system performs some functions such as PDF export up to 2.3x faster (compared to Apple M1)
Compare the most popular web browser (Chrome), with original versions on both Intel and Apple processors: the 11th generation system is generally more than 30% faster and almost three times faster in the online photo enhancement subtest (compared to Apple M1 )
Other Intel standards also focus on things like content creation, using Adobe and Topaz Labs software, as well as games.
Intel also compares the M1 to Intel Evo, which “is its second-generation upgrade to Project Athena to make the best portable devices.”
There are some weird test results between the M1 and Evo, with Intel claiming that the M1 in the MacBook Pro failed in things like using Zoom and PowerPoint. Tom’s hardware explain:
Intel claims that the M1 in the MacBook Pro he tested failed eight of the 25 tests he used, including ‘Switch to Calendar’ in Outlook, ‘Start Video Conference’ in Zoom and ‘Select Picture Menu’ in PowerPoint. The workload of Intel does not explain how it is performed, but it is also simple tasks that work well for almost any modern processor, so these are strange choices. (I had a lot of Zoom conferences while testing the MacBook Pro without any problems.)
There are several things to keep in mind with this test. In the first place, these tests were performed by Intel and should therefore be treated with skepticism; of course, the company is going to pick the specific tasks where Intel chips can still perform better than Apple’s M1.
For example, Tom’s hardware points out some suspicious choices Intel made while testing battery life:
In battery life, Intel switched to an Intel Core i7-1165G7 laptop, the Acer Swift 5, rather than sticking with the Core i7-1185G7 in the white paper it used for performance testing. It also tested a MacBook Air. They ran Netflix streams and tabs and found that the MacBook Air appeared with a difference of six minutes.
Intel did not list the battery life for the MacBook Pro. In our tests, Intel computers beat by hours.
Intel’s timing with the release of this counter-argument to Apple Silicon is also interesting. Jason Snell by Six colors points out that the M1 is a low-end chip for low-system, and Intel ‘has only a small window’ left to find favorable comparisons:
Inconsistent testing platforms, shifting arguments, omitted data and the not so faint scent of desperation. Today’s M1 processor is an inexpensive chip for low-end systems, so Intel only has a small window to compare itself favorably with these systems before Apple’s higher quality silicone Macs and its make work so much harder.
If you’re interested, you can find the full Intel slideshow at Tom’s hardware.
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