Memory in Apple’s M1 Chip

Unified Memory Access in M1 Chip

In Apple’s implementation of unified memory, the available RAM is on the M1 system-on-a-chip (SoC). While it’s not located within the processor itself, it’s still part of the same silicon seated to the side of the other fundamental components.

With Apple’s UMA, your CPU and graphics processor share a common pool of memory. Since the GPU and CPU are using that common pool of memory, the CPU doesn’t have to send data anywhere. It just tells the GPU, grab the stuff from this memory address and do your thing.

• Memory bandwidth? (Source:2021-MacBook-Features)
  • M1: 32GB, 200GB/s
  • M1 Max: 64GB, 400GB/s

Reference

• Understanding Apple’s Unified Memory Architecture
• UMA and NUMA