Apple’s Vice President of Mac Product Marketing, Tom Boger, and Vice President of Platform Architecture, Tim Millet, recently revealed the key factors behind the success of Apple Silicon in an in-depth interview.
According to Millet, Apple’s unique advantage lies in its early access to cutting-edge process technologies, such as second-generation 3nm manufacturing, which competing chipmakers “cannot immediately adopt.” This access, he says, “benefits Apple products and customers directly” and provides a huge strategic advantage.
“We’re not a chip company,” Millet emphasized, “but designing our own chips means we never have to compromise on performance.”
Boger echoed this sentiment, stressing that no other platform matches Apple’s performance per watt — a critical advantage for energy-efficient design in portable devices like the MacBook and iPad.
The success of Apple Silicon, they explained, stems from the synergy between architecture, design, and process technology — but the real differentiator is Apple’s deep collaboration between hardware and system design teams.
🚀 M4 Ultra: Pushing the Limits of Apple Silicon #
Recent reports suggest that the upcoming M4 Ultra may even outperform NVIDIA’s flagship RTX 4090 in some compute benchmarks. YouTuber Vadim Yuryev from Max Tech predicts a Geekbench 6 OpenCL score above 330,000, surpassing the RTX 4090’s 317,162.
The Apple M4 series is now central to Apple’s ecosystem — powering everything from iPads to MacBooks, iMacs, and even the compact Mac mini. Beyond versatility, the chips demonstrate Apple’s growing ability to challenge Intel and AMD in desktop-class performance.
⚙️ Architecture and Performance #
The M4 features a 10-core CPU (4 Performance + 6 Efficiency cores) and Apple’s fastest Neural Engine yet, delivering 38 TOPS of AI compute power. While slightly below Intel’s second-gen Core Ultra in TOPS, it still surpasses both the previous Core Ultra and AMD Ryzen 7000 series in overall efficiency.
In single-core performance, the M4 shines — scoring 28% higher than the A17 Pro and 24% above Intel’s i9-14900K. Its architecture also enables sustained multi-core performance that rivals high-end desktop processors.
On the GPU side, Apple has enhanced ray tracing performance dramatically, allowing real-time rendering and even the ability to play AAA titles like Assassin’s Creed: Mirage — though gaming remains a secondary use case.
🔋 Efficiency and Real-World Benefits #
One of Apple’s greatest strengths remains power efficiency. MacBooks powered by the M4 can achieve up to 24 hours of battery life, freeing users from daily charging anxiety.
Among the new M4 products, the Mac mini stands out for its value. It now offers 16GB of unified memory by default, a major upgrade over the M2 model, with only a modest price increase.
🧠 Summary #
Apple’s relentless focus on vertical integration, from silicon to software, has allowed it to redefine the performance–efficiency balance across its devices.
By uniting architecture, design, and manufacturing, Apple continues to prove that its in-house chips aren’t just competitive — they’re reshaping the boundaries of modern computing.