Intel Processor N100 vs Apple M1 Max vs Intel Processor N50

Intel Processor N100

The Intel Processor N100 is an entry-level mobile CPU for thin and light laptops from the Alder Lake-N series. It was announced in early 2023 and offers no performance cores and 4 of the 8 efficient cores (E-cores, Gracemont architecture). The chip does not support HyperThreading and clocks with 1 to 3.4 GHz. The performance of the E-cores should be similar to old Skylake cores (compare to the Core i7-6700HQ). All cores can use up to 6 MB L3-cache.

Performance

The average N100 in our database delivers unimpressive multi-thread benchmark scores that are most similar to those of the Core i3-1115G4. The chip is fast enough for many day-to-day tasks, but not much more than that; the other thing to keep in mind is that of the two N100-toting systems tested by us as of October 2023, both have rather high CPU power limits. The chip will be noticeably slower if limited to just six or seven Watts.

Features

The Alder Lake-N chips only support single channel memory with up to DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 or LPDDR5-4800. The chip also supports Quick Sync and AV1 decoding (most likely same engine as in Alder Lake). Furthermore, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 are partly integrated (but no Thunderbolt). External chips can be connected via PCIe Gen3 x9 (via the PCH).

The integrated graphics adapter is based on the Xe-architecture and offers only 24 of the 32 EUs (Execution Units) operating at only 450 - 750 MHz. Due to the single channel memory, low clock speeds, and low shader count, the gaming performance of the iGPU is very limited.

Power consumption

The N100 has a base power consumption of only 6 W and is therefore suited for fanless cooling. The CPU is built with a further improved 10nm SuperFin process at Intel (called Intel 7).

Apple M1 Max

The Apple M1 Max is a System on a Chip (SoC) from Apple that is found in the late 2021 MacBook Pro 14 and 16-inch models. It offers all 10 cores available in the chip divided in eight performance cores (P-cores with 600 - 3220 MHz) and two power-efficiency cores (E-cores with 600 - 2064 MHz). There is no Turbo Boost for single cores or short burst periods. The cores are similar to the cores in the Apple M1.

The big cores (codename Firestorm) offer 192 KB instruction cache, 128 KB data cache, and 24 MB shared L2 cache (up from 12 MB in the M1). The four efficiency cores (codename Icestorm) are a lot smaller and offer only 128 KB instruction cache, 64 KB data cache, and 4 MB shared cache. CPU and GPU can both use the 48 MB SLC (System Level Cache). The efficiency cores (E cluster) clock with 600 - 2064 MHz, the performance cores (P cluster) with 600 - 3228 MHz.

The unified memory (32 or 64 GB LPDDR5-6400) next to the chip is connected by a 512 bit memory controller (200 GB/s bandwidth) and can be used by the GPU and CPU. This is the main difference to the M1 Pro and the CPU performance is quite similar.

The biggest difference to the M1 Pro is the bigger integrated GPU with 24 or 32 cores (up from 16).

Furthermore, the SoC integrates a fast 16 core neural engine, a secure enclave (e.g., for encryption), a unified memory architecture, Thunderbolt 4 controller, an ISP, and media de- and encoders (including two ProRes engines).

The M1 Pro is manufactured in 5 nm at TSMC and integrates 57 billion transistors. The peak power consumption of the chip was advertised around 30W for CPU intensive tasks. 

Intel Processor N50

The Intel Processor N50 is an entry-level mobile CPU for thin and light laptops from the Alder Lake-N series. It was announced in early 2023 and offers no performance cores and 2 of the 8 efficient cores (E-cores, Gracemont architecture). The chip does not support HyperThreading and clocks with up to 3.4 GHz. The performance of the E-cores should be similar to old Skylake cores (compare to the Core i7-6700HQ). All cores can use up to 6 MB L3-cache. 

Performance

The performance is clearly lower than the Processor N100 (4 cores, 3.4 GHz) due to the reduced core count. The single thread performance however, should be similar. Compared to older processors, the N50 should be comparable to dual core Skylake based CPUs like the Intel Core m3-8100Y (2x 3.4 GHz, 5W).Features

The Alder Lake-N chips only support single channel memory with up to DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 or LPDDR5-4800. The chip also supports Quick Sync and AV1 decoding (most likely same engine as in Alder Lake). Furthermore, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2 are partly integrated (but no Thunderbolt). External chips can be connected via PCIe Gen3 x9 (via the PCH).

The integrated graphics adapter is based on the Xe-architecture and offers only 16 of the 32 EUs (Execution Units) operating at only up to 750 MHz. Due to the single channel memory, low clock speeds, and low shader count, the gaming performance of the iGPU is very limited.

Power consumption

The N50 has a base power consumption of only 6 W and is therefore suited for fanless cooling. The CPU is built with a further improved 10nm SuperFin process at Intel (called Intel 7).