William Gallagher
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says that Apple will move away from its current processor designs that keep the CPU and GPU cores on the same chip — and see a performance gain.
One of the reasons for Apple Silicon's speed over the previous Intel processors has been that each M-series chip has been a single unit. This System-on-a-Chip (SoC) idea cuts bottlenecks by having all the processor's elements together on one chip package.
According to Kuo, however, Apple is going to change this for the M5 Pro, M5 Max, and M5 Ultra. Only the M5 will remain as a single unit.
Instead, the M5 Pro and other chips will use manufacturer TSMC's latest chip packaging process. Called the System-in-Integrated-Chips-Molding-Horizontal (SoIC-mH), it puts together different chips into one package.
Apple M5 series chip
— (Ming-Chi Kuo) (@mingchikuo) December 23, 2024
1. The M5 series chips will adopt TSMC's advanced N3P node, which entered the prototype phase a few months ago. M5, M5 Pro/Max, and M5 Ultra mass production is expected in 1H25, 2H25, and 2026, respectively.
2. The M5 Pro, Max, and Ultra will utilize https://t.co/XIWHx5B2Cy
The advantage, according to Kuo, is that this will produce "server-grade" packaging. Apple "will use 2.5D packaging" that has "separate CPU and GPU designs," and which will "improve production yields and thermal performance."
Kuo says that mass production is expected in 2H25 for the M5 Pro and the M5 Max, and then 2026 for the M5 Ultra. The M5 has reportedly been in the prototyping phrase for a few months, and mass production is believed to be planned for 1H25.
That M5 processor will be produced by TSMC using its N3P technology, which is expected to be seen first in the iPhone 18 range.
Kuo also claims that the M5 Pro processors will be used in Apple Intelligence servers. Specifically, it will be utilized for the company's Private Cloud Compute technology.
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If Apple wants to optimize Apple Intelligence servers it builds with its own chips, I can see the attraction to a roadmap that includes both "pure" CPU chips with the new packaging and chipsets that are tuned for maximum GPU performance on AI tasks. But for laptops/desktops.... that new packaging would have to be really nice to make such major design changes.
Everyone currently trying to come out with a chip using SoC by the end of 2025 or 2026 but apple is already one step ahead. Although would this still share memory or will it go back to the dedicated ram for CPU and other for GPU?
Does that mean there will be no M4 Ultra, just M5 Pro/Max and Ultra later on? The rumors int he past suggest M4 Ultra will be processed on NPX process (designed for high end computing) and then after that, they start the M5 for base Macs using 2nm.
If this new chip can be used in all the current devices that Apple makes laptops, Mac Studios without delay no problem, if it can’t or if there is a delay for example, the Mac Studio M4 Ultra isn’t coming in 2025 that is a problem. I am glad however the writing is on the wall, Apple needs to roll up it sleeves and make a in house server using Apple Silicon which has too many good characteristics to leave on the sideline.
Oh, and separating the memory from CPU/GPU appears to be a step backwards to UMA, whatever AMD is pursuing right now it isn’t better than Apple Silicon when it comes to wattage used efficiency and performance, yes they (AMD) are closer than Intel but Nvidia is just completely out of the ballpark when it comes to energy wasted, yes it’s faster for certain tasks now but 1000-1500 watts liquid cooled systems are an eventual dead end which Apple used at one time when they were at the heights of their G5 hell.
https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/why-nvidia-rtx-4090s-are-melting/ butterfly keyboards, antenna gate, bend gate, power button location, or upside down mice are nothing to this….. I don’t think Apple will go away from power efficiency.