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Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series?

447 points stephenheron | 1 comments | 25 Aug 25 21:50 UTC | HN request time: 0.207s | source

Hi,

My daily workhorse is a M1 Pro that I purchased on release date, It has been one of the best tech purchases I have made, even now it really deals with anything I throw at it. My daily work load is regularly having a Android emulator, iOS simulator and a number of Dockers containers running simultaneously and I never hear the fans, battery life has taken a bit of a hit but it is still very respectable.

I wanted a new personal laptop, and I was debating between a MacBook Air or going for a Framework 13 with Linux. I wanted to lean into learning something new so went with the Framework and I must admit I am regretting it a bit.

The M1 was released back in 2020 and I bought the Ryzen AI 340 which is one of the newest 2025 chips from AMD, so AMD has 5 years of extra development and I had expected them to get close to the M1 in terms of battery efficiency and thermals.

The Ryzen is using a TSMC N4P process compared to the older N5 process, I managed to find a TSMC press release showing the performance/efficiency gains from the newer process: “When compared to N5, N4P offers users a reported +11% performance boost or a 22% reduction in power consumption. Beyond that, N4P can offer users a 6% increase in transistor density over N5”

I am sorely disappointed, using the Framework feels like using an older Intel based Mac. If I open too many tabs in Chrome I can feel the bottom of the laptop getting hot, open a YouTube video and the fans will often spin up.

Why haven’t AMD/Intel been able to catch up? Is x86 just not able to keep up with the ARM architecture? When can we expect a x86 laptop chip to match the M1 in efficiency/thermals?!

To be fair I haven’t tried Windows on the Framework yet it might be my Linux setup being inefficient.

Cheers, Stephen

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purpleidea ◴[26 Aug 25 07:06 UTC] No.45023226[source]▶
Honestly, I have serious FOMO about this. I am never going to run a Mac (or worse: Windows) I'm 100% on Linux, but I seriously hate it that I can't reliably work at a coffee shop for five hours. Not even doing that much other than some music, coding, and a few compiles of golang code.

My Apple friends get 12+ hrs of battery life. I really wish Lenovo+Fedora or whoever would get together and make that possible.

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wutwutwat ◴[26 Aug 25 07:47 UTC] No.45023502[source]▶
> I seriously hate it that I can't reliably work at a coffee shop for five hours

just... take your charger...

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merelysounds ◴[26 Aug 25 08:17 UTC] No.45023740[source]▶
They’re relatively heavy, take up space and there’s no guarantee there will be an outlet near your table. When connected, the laptop becomes more difficult to move or pack. It’s all doable but also slightly less convenient.
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1. pdimitar ◴[28 Aug 25 12:37 UTC] No.45051412[source]▶
Always found that take fascinating -- are you sitting at a sofa or those inflatable chair-like things in the coffee shop? Are you changing your body's position multiple times, like, significantly so?

At least from my side, if I have to work on a laptop outside, I'll just find a good table, plug it in an outlet and, you know, work on it, with almost no changes of body position.

Not to be dismissive but I genuinely don't understand what's the problem with your laptop being plugged in when working from a coffee shop.