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- Hacker News
- Nice and organised work!
My only reservation wrt the core of it is that it tests the cpus on a matrix operations task, and power efficiency in this case refers specifically to doing matrix operations. This is fine if that's the kind of task one wants to optimise for, but it does not necessarily translate to general energy efficiency for a broader spectrum of tasks that most people may do most of the time.
And thus, if one wants to optimise for matrix operations, wouldn't it make sense to use apple's accelerate framework instead of blis/openblas (I think you used blis?)? I compiled hpl to use accelerate [0] on my m1 max (macbook), and ran it with settings almost identical to the original m1 max settings [1]. I get 422 Gflops vs 264 Gflops in m1 max mac studio (docker) [2]. My average draw (using a wall power meter, but not interfaced with computer to keep a log, just me looking at it) is around 55-57W (probably less because it peaked at 57W but the last half was getting around 52W). With the most conservative estimate of 57W, this gave a 7.4 Gflops/W which is second place, just below the m4 mac mini in the benchmark table. The m1 max in the original did 4 Gflops/W (at 66W).
So tbh I do not really trust the conclusion of the benchmark page, except if I miss sth. It is quite nice, organised work anyway.
[0] https://github.com/tycho/hpl/blob/master/setup/Make.MacOSX_A...
[1] I just fixed the p:q ratio, which was prob not really meant to be 1:10 there, I assume, also judging from the settings in the other tests. I put p=2,q=4. Also I was unable to put more than 8 processes in total.
[2] The original m1 max benchmark: https://github.com/geerlingguy/top500-benchmark/issues/4
by dimask - This field (XPS 13 and Neo) includes the Chromebook Plus Spin 514 with Mediatek Kompanio Ultra inside, which is superior to both in performance and hardware (and default OS, IMHO) and sells for $100 less.
- In Germany the Dell XPS 13 2026 is 56% more expensive (over 1000 Euros) than the MacBook Neo (below 700). So the claim does not hold World wide, maybe only in US on local prices.by therealmarv
- Intel wins, in HPL FP64. Its a stretch to take a single metric and apply it's outcome broadly to the chip's general functionality. Especially when by large the A18 chip with half the power requirement beats it in almost every other benchmark.
- Intel’s low end SoCs are such an undervalued gem.
A couple of years ago I got tired of dealing with OpenWRT and various Tomato based firmware or hunting down compatibility between ARM and MIPS based routers. I finally took the plunge and bought myself a mini pc with an Intel N100.
The thing has 4 cores (no SMT), a 6W TDP and boosts to 3.4 GHz and can support 16GB of ram. The mini pc I bought cost me $200, includes the processor as well 4x Intel 10Gbps Ethernet ports. At 6W, it needs no fan, and the whole chassis is metal and specifically designed to act as a heatsink, which means 0 noise and 0 moving parts.
I ran a power virus on it for a few hours to test the thermals, and on a warm day in Melbourne, after hours of having all 4 cores running full throttle, CPU temperature never exceeded 90 C and the chassis barely hit 55 C.
The best thing about it? Full upstream support for any Linux distro and FreeBSD. No more wondering if this particular Broadcom chipset needs a weird binary blob, no more being hostage to an OEM and having to run old forked kernels.
I installed OPNSense on it, VESA mounted it behind our TV, and it hasn’t been seen or heard since. Not only has it been the most reliable router I’ve ever had at home, it’s providing various other services such as DNS server, apt cache, WireGuard server and client etc for my homelab.
I’ve been waiting for ARM to get here since ARMv8 was announced in 2011, but it just hasn’t happened.
Long live x86.
by aryonoco - The improved efficiency is great!
The Apple Neo was still 2x faster for graphics and around 1.4x faster for single core cpu. And remember the Apple Neo is running an iPhone CPU that is much slower than the M series.
It is strange that this chip is so crazy efficient though. I would love to know the details of exactly why it is? It seems like some new tech or process?
I do want 1.5x battery life for free out of my next laptop. Who wouldn’t?
by bhouston
I am fully old man screaming at the clouds here, but what does this cost for Dell to include? I insist on a wired headset - telecommunications already barely works, I don't want to add wireless+battery problems into the mix.> no headphone jackby 3eb7988a1663- Rather than the Hackaday article, which doesn't add anything to the original, here's Jeff's actual video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2B7oI0FYqo
and post:
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2026/excited-for-intel-eff...