Apple M3 Pro 12-Core vs Intel Core i5-14450HX

Apple M3 Pro 12-Core

The Apple M3 Pro (12 Core) is a system on a chip (SoC) from Apple for notebooks that was launched in late 2023. It integrates a new 12-core CPU with 6 performance cores with up to 4.06 GHz and 6 efficiency cores with 2.8 GHz. There is also a slimmed-down 11-core variant with a 14-core GPU.

Compared to the M2 Pro the M3 Pro has been slimmed down somewhat and swaps two performance cores for efficiency cores. This is due to the changed core configuration, as 6 cores are now used per cluster (the M2 Pro and M3 still have 4 cores per cluster). Furthermore, the memory bus has been reduced from 256 bits to 192 bits (150 GB/s vs. 200 GB/s). However, thanks to the new architecture and higher clock rates, the new M3 Pro is still slightly faster.

The M3 Pro also integrates a new graphics card with dynamic caching, mesh shading and ray tracing acceleration via hardware. In the top model, all 18 cores of the chip are used and support up to 3 displays simultaneously (internal and 2 external).

GPU and CPU can jointly access the shared memory on the package (unified memory). This is available in 18 or 36 GB variants and offers 150 GB/s maximum bandwidth (192 bit bus).

The integrated 16-core Neural Engine has also been revised and now offers 18 TOPS peak performance (compared to 15.8 TOPS in the M2 but 35 TOPS in the new A17 Pro). The video engine now also supports AV1 decoding in hardware. H.264, HEVC and ProRes (RAW) can still be decoded and encoded.

Unfortunately, the integrated WLAN only continues to support WiFi 6E (no WiFi 7), unlike the small M3 SoC thunderbolt 4 is also supported (max 40 Gbit/s).

The chip is manufactured in the current 3nm process (N3B) at TSMC and contains 37 billion transistors (-7.5% vs. Apple M2 Pro).

Intel Core i5-14450HX

The Intel Core i5-14450HX is a mid-range CPU with 10 cores based on the Raptor Lake refresh series for large and heavy notebooks.

The total of 16 threads are divided into P-cores and E-cores, which we already know from Alder Lake. The 13450HX offers 6 performance cores (P-Cores, Raptor Cove or Golden Cove) with hyperthreading and 4 efficiency cores (E-Cores, Gracemont) without hyperthreading. The P-cores clock from 2.4 GHz (base clock) to 4.8 GHz (all cores) or 4.6 GHz (single core). The E-cores clock from 1.8 - 3.5 GHz. Compared to the older Core i5-13450HX the CPU cores are clocked slightly higher.

Compared to Alder Lake, the new Raptor Lake architecture offers improved P-cores (Raptor Cove architecture with more cache), more E-cores (same Gracemont architecture) and higher clock rates thanks to the improved Intel 7 process. In addition, Intel now supports faster DDR5 main memory in the top models (up to 5600 MHz, in the refresh now also in the i5).

The 14450HX is manufactured in the further improved 10nm FinFET process at Intel (Intel 7 process) and is specified with 55 watts base power and 157 watts turbo power.