Apple M3 Max 40-Core GPU vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 SLI (Laptop) vs Apple M3 Max 30-Core GPU

Apple M3 Max 40-Core GPU

The Apple M3 Max 40-Core GPU is a self-designed graphics card in the Apple M3 SoC and according to Apple with forty cores. According to Apple, the GPU uses a new architecture and now offers dynamic caching, mesh shading and ray tracing acceleration.

The GPU can access up to 128 GB LPDDR5-6400 unified memory via a 512 bit memory bus (max 400 GBit/s). Thanks to dynamic caching, the GPU should only reserve as much memory as is required.

Since the SoC is manufactured in the current 3nm (probably N3B) at TSMC. According to powermetrics, the GPU requires up to 60 watts (chip incl. CPU total 78 watts).

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 SLI (Laptop)

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 SLI for laptops is a combination of two GTX 1080 graphics cards in SLI mode. Each card renders one frame at a time (AFR mode) but depends for most games on a good profile in the driver. Therefore, the performance can range from no gains over a single GTX 1080 to up to 90% faster performance. Sometimes, the combination may also suffer from micro-stuttering. The technical details of the card are identical to a single GTX 1080 (see for more information) and the power consumption is doubled. Therefore, the 1080 SLI combination is only found in huge clunky laptops.

Apple M3 Max 30-Core GPU

The Apple M3 Max 30-Core GPU is a self-designed graphics card in the Apple M3 SoC and offers 30 of the 40 cores that are included in the chip. According to Apple, the GPU uses a new architecture and now offers dynamic caching, mesh shading and ray tracing acceleration.

The graphics card can access up to 96 GB LPDDR5-6400 unified memory via a 512 bit memory bus (max 400 GBit/s). Thanks to dynamic caching, the GPU only reserves as much memory as is required.

Since the SoC is manufactured in the current 3nm (probably N3B) at TSMC.