A benchmark test released Tuesday shows a large performance gap between Apple-powered Mac M1 chips and Windows on ARM machines running the latest 64-bit x86 applications using an official emulator.
Driven by PCWorld, the evaluation compares a Microsoft Surface Pro X with the new MacBook Air M1, two devices that incorporate ARM processors.
As the post points out, there are few ARM-based Windows boxes to choose from with only two Qualcomm chips (Snapdragon 8cx and Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2) powering the platform. Microsoft’s SQ1 and SQ2 derived processors, designed in collaboration with Qualcomm, are on the Surface Pro X.
PCWorld’s The Windows test bench was based on a first-generation SQ1, although the gains from the latest SQ2 are considered negligible.
The MacBook Air crushed the Surface Pro X in both single and multiple score Geekbench 5 tests. Apple’s new laptop scored 1730 points in the single-core process, surpassing the Surface score by just over 1000 points. Multi-core testing revealed an even greater disparity, as the MacBook Air recorded 7454 points to 2734 Surface points.
The results of Maxon’s Cinebench also gave the M1 a major advantage with single- and multi-core scores landing at 1496 and 6838, respectively, easily surpassing Surface Pro X’s 371 and 1604.
Switching to the Handbrake open source video transcoding tool, the MacBook Air finished transcoding a 12-minute 4K video into a 1080p 1080p H.265 file six times faster than the Surface.
Please note that Microsoft’s 64-bit x86 emulator is still in beta. Still, even with a concerted software development effort, Windows at ARM doesn’t have the hardware ribs to catch up with Apple’s macOS and M1 integration.
The first in the planned line of home-designed Mac chips, the M1 debuted in November and currently runs on the new MacBook Air, 13-inch MacBook Pro and Mac mini. Reference principles i AppleInsider its own revisions have revealed incredible computing speeds and extremely high levels of energy efficiency compared to legacy Intel models.
With high-performance chip designs on the horizon, Apple Silicon could soon represent a paradigm shift in personal computing.