why was the M1 chip so revolutionary? What did it do that combined power with efficiency so well that couldn’t be done before?

Question

I ask this because when M1 Mac’s came I felt we were entering a new era of portable PCs: fast, lightweight and with a long awaited good battery life.

I just saw the announcement of the Snapdragon X Plus, which is looking like a response to the M chips, and I am seeing a lot of buzz around it, so I ask: what is so special about it?

In: Technology

Answer 1

ELI5: older computer chips do math 100 different ways. However, if we program our code a little differently turns out we can do pretty much all of the same stuff but with only 10 kinds of math.

this allows us to devote more of the computer chip to doing those 10 types of math really fast and efficiently.