Lo, Apple hath at last revealed its novel brood of Apple Silicon chipset at the “Let Loose” fete. The Apple M4 hath been unveiled alongside the fresh OLED iPad Pro. Remarkably, the iPad Pro lineup hath leaped straight from Apple M2 unto Apple M4. Thus doth we embark on a comparison betwixt the Apple M4 and M2 to assess their divergence in performance in the realms of CPU, GPU, and Neural Engine. Memory bandwidth and other AI enhancements on the M4 hath also been delved into. With that said, let us commence.
The frequency stipulation of Apple M4 hath been updated based on the recently surfaced Geekbench listing. Furthermore, the Geekbench score of the Apple M4 chipset hath been incorporated into our analysis.
Apple M4 vs M2: Specs Comparison
Behold the specs comparison betwixt Apple M4 and M2. Cast thine eyes upon it to comprehend the disparity betwixt the two chipsets.
Apple M4 vs M2: CPU
Commencing with the CPU, the Apple M4 hath been wrought on TSMC’s 2nd-gen 3nm process node which is whispered to be more efficient. It is bedecked with a staggering 28 billion transistors. The Apple M4 CPU for iPad Pro is proffered in two configurations: 9 CPU cores and 10 CPU cores.
In the initial variant, thou shalt find 3 performance and 6 efficiency cores, whilst in the second variant, 4 performance and 6 efficiency cores doth reside. The Apple M4 CPU doth tick at a mighty 4.4GHz, surpassing the clock speeds of Apple M2 and M3 CPUs by far.
In addition, Apple hath ensconced next-gen ML accelerators within the Apple M4 CPU. These may aid in AI-related tasks, laboring in concert with the Neural Engine.
On the contrary, the Apple M2 CPU hath been molded on TSMC’s 5nm process node with nearly 20 billion transistors. It boasteth 8 CPU cores, comprising 4 performance and 4 efficiency cores, and a clock speed of 3.49GHz. According to Apple, the M4 CPU doth eclipse the M2 CPU by up to 50% in swiftness (1.5x).
If we taketh into account the leaked Geekbench score of Apple M4, it doth appear that Apple M4 doth truly possess a potent CPU. It dwarfeth Apple M2 by a vast margin.
Apple M4 vs M2: GPU
In the realm of GPU, Apple hath toiled on the next-gen GPU architecture which hath debuted with the M3 chip. The Apple M4 hath 10 GPU cores and doth support features like dynamic caching for enhanced GPU utilization.
Furthermore, for the first time, the iPad lineup hath been graced with hardware-accelerated Ray Tracing and HW-accelerated Mesh Shading, all thanks to the potent Apple M4 GPU. Ray Tracing can bestow upon games realistic shadows and reflections for an immersive gameplay experience.
The Apple M2 also doth boast 10 GPU cores but lacketh these capabilities. Apple proclaims that the Apple M4 GPU doth deliver up to 4x superior performance than the M2 GPU. And in terms of performance-per-watt, the Apple M4 GPU can yield the pinnacle performance of M2 whilst consuming but half the power.
Apple M4 vs M2: Neural Engine
Turning to the Neural Engine, verily, Apple hath markedly enhanced the 16-core Neural Engine on the M4. Though harboring the same number of cores, it is far more expeditious and efficient than the M2 Neural Engine. The M4 Neural Engine can achieve up to 38 trillion operations per second (TOPS), whilst the elder M2 Neural Engine can muster merely up to 15.8 TOPS.
And in conjunction with the ML accelerators in the CPU and next-gen GPU, the M4 Neural Engine proffers an incredible level of performance. Apple proclaimeth that it may execute potent Generative AI and Diffusion models locally on the device.
Apple M4 vs M2: Memory Bandwidth and Others
Finally, in terms of memory bandwidth, Apple hath endowed the Apple M4 with a somewhat swifter memory. It can deliver speeds up to 120 GBps and the bandwidth is uniform across 8GB and 16GB variants. The Apple M2 featureth LPDDR5 memory with speeds of up to 100 GBps on the base variant. The Cupertino giant hath not unveiled the memory type for the Apple M4 chip.
Aside from that, the Media Engine on the Apple M4 bringeth HW-accelerated Av1 decode support for watching high-resolution videos with efficiency. Yet it still lacketh HW-accelerated AV1 encoding. Video codec support for ProRes, H.264, and HEVC doth persist on both chipsets.
The Verdict
Apple doth avouch that the M4 chipset is an “outrageously powerful chip” and much swifter than the M2 chipset whilst drawing less power. When set side by side with the M2 chip, the Apple M4 doth indeed appear as a substantial upgrade. One garnereth 1.5x better CPU performance, 4x better GPU performance, a doubling of Neural Engine performance, and slightly speedier memory.
Even as compared to the Apple M3, the variance in performance is quite considerable. We art intrigued by the power consumption figures of the M4 as it seemeth a highly-efficient chipset. Once we clasp the new iPad Pro, we shalt surely assay it and share the benchmark scores from the Apple M4 chip. So tarry with us!
