Reviews of Apple's latest M6 SoC are out, and the new chip looks hella impressive. Sadly, that probably won't be a huge direct benefit to PC gamers, what with the Mac's limited library of titles and patchy game optimisation.
But wait, because there's one really important detail regarding the M6 that is highly PC relevant. It uses TSMC's latest N2 silicon node.
Historically, of course, a new node was pretty much a nailed-down certainty in terms of the benefits it would bring. You could expect improved transistor density, better power efficiency and even lower cost.
More recently, ye olde Moore's Law that pertained to such matters has been looking a bit patchy. Intel famously got stuck on 14 nm for about a decade instead of the usual two-year cadence, a problem so serious the company's future was in doubt.
Anyway, the point is that you can no longer safely assume a new node is goi...
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