Apple takes aim at Intel with Mac chips

Apple Inc. took the most aggressive step yet to strip Intel Corp. chips from its computers, announcing more powerful homegrown Mac processors alongside an end-to-end revamp of the MacBook Pro.

The company showcased the chips at an event Monday called “Unleashed” that also included its latest audio products. The new components, called the M1 Pro and M1 Max chips, are 70 per cent faster than its M1 predecessors, the company said.

With the new processors and devices, Apple is aiming squarely at the high-end chips that Intel has provided for the MacBook Pro and other top-end Macs for about 15 years. Last year, Apple started transitioning its low-end Macs to its own M1 Apple Silicon chip. The new chips, however, are a bolder stroke, aiming at far outclassing Intel’s highest-performing products.

The chips include 10 total CPU cores — the components that handle processing — up from the eight in the M1 chip. The 10 cores are split into eight highperformance cores and two cores for tasks that require less energy. That compares with four high-performance and four low-performance cores in the M1.

Apple is also upping the graphics performance for the M1 Pro and M1 Max, which come with 16 and 32 graphics cores, respectively. That’s up from the seven- or eight-core options offered with M1 Macs.