Apple introduced its grand plan to move away from Intel to using its own in-house designed chips in the Mac at WWDC 2020. At the keynote, CEO Tim Cook said that the transition would take two years to complete – the deadline being June 2022. While most of the Mac models have already transitioned to M-series chips, the powerhouse tower styled Mac Pro continues to use Intel chips.
Last month, Apple introduced the high power versions of the M1 chip – the M1 Pro and the M1 Max. The two chips power the “Pro” MacBooks – 14” MacBook Pro and 16” MacBook Pro – the smaller version being a new addition replacing the 13” MacBook Pro and the 16” MacBook Pro being tweaked to fix issues present on the previous iteration.
A massive increase in the CPU core count
The Information reports that Apple is preparing to introduce new next generation chips in 2023. The new chips are likely to be named M2, M2 Pro, and M2 Max – the codenames of which being ‘Ibiza’, ‘Lobos’, and ‘Palma’. All three chips will reportedly be based on a new 3nm manufacturing process; the current generation M1 series chips are based on 5nm architecture.
The recently released, M1 Pro and M1 Max chips offer upto 10 CPU cores at the max. The upcoming 3nm M2 series chips will reportedly offer upto 40 CPU cores – massive upgrade over the current generation chips. The chips will reportedly use two dies – it will allow for the usage of more cores.
It is unclear whether the upcoming rumoured tower Mac Pro will use a M1 branded chip with higher clock and more CPU & GPU cores or altogether use a new series. Apple has committed to completing the transition in two years which ends mid next year. If the M2 series is to release in 2023, the upcoming Mac Pro will likely use a new version of the M1 series.
