Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 vs Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)

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CPU comparison with benchmarks


Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 CPU1 vs CPU2 Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)

CPU comparison

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 or Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) - which processor is faster? In this comparison we look at the differences and analyze which of these two CPUs is better. We compare the technical data and benchmark results.

The Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 has 4 cores with 8 threads and clocks with a maximum frequency of 4.00 GHz. Up to 64 GB of memory is supported in 2 memory channels. The Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 was released in Q4/2015.

The Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) has 11 cores with 11 threads and clocks with a maximum frequency of 4.06 GHz. The CPU supports up to 36 GB of memory in 2 memory channels. The Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) was released in Q4/2023.
Intel Xeon E3 (43) Family Apple M series (25)
Intel Xeon E3 v5 (17) CPU group Apple M3 (6)
5 Generation 3
Skylake S Architecture M3
Desktop / Server Segment Mobile
-- Predecessor Apple M2 Pro (10-CPU 16-GPU)
-- Successor --

CPU Cores and Base Frequency

The Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 is a 4 core processor with a clock frequency of 3.70 GHz (4.00 GHz). The Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) has 11 CPU cores with a clock frequency of 0.70 GHz (4.06 GHz).

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Characteristic Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
4 Cores 11
8 Threads 11
normal Core architecture hybrid (big.LITTLE)
Yes Hyperthreading No
No Overclocking ? No
3.70 GHz (4.00 GHz) A-Core 0.70 GHz (4.06 GHz)
5x P-Core
-- B-Core 0.74 GHz (2.75 GHz)
6x E-Core

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Processors with the support of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can process many calculations, especially audio, image and video processing, much faster than classic processors. Algorithms for ML improve their performance the more data they have collected via software. ML tasks can be processed up to 10,000 times faster than with a classic processor.

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Characteristic Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
-- AI hardware Apple Neural Engine
-- AI specifications 16 Neural cores @ 35 TOPS

Internal Graphics

The integrated graphics unit of a processor is not only responsible for the pure image output on the system, but can also significantly increase the efficiency of the system with the support of modern video codecs.

no iGPU GPU Apple M3 Pro (14 Core)
GPU frequency 0.39 GHz
-- GPU (Turbo) 1.40 GHz
-- GPU Generation --
Technology 3 nm
Max. displays 3
-- Compute units 224
-- Shader 1792
No Hardware Raytracing Yes
No Frame Generation No
-- Max. GPU Memory 36 GB
-- DirectX Version --

Hardware codec support

A photo or video codec that is accelerated in hardware can greatly accelerate the working speed of a processor and extend the battery life of notebooks or smartphones when playing videos.

no iGPU GPU Apple M3 Pro (14 Core)
No Codec h265 / HEVC (8 bit) Decode / Encode
No Codec h265 / HEVC (10 bit) Decode / Encode
No Codec h264 Decode / Encode
No Codec VP9 Decode / Encode
No Codec VP8 Decode
No Codec AV1 Decode
No Codec AVC Decode
No Codec VC-1 Decode
No Codec JPEG Decode / Encode

Memory & PCIe

The Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 supports a maximum of 64 GB of memory in 2 memory channels. The Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) can connect up to 36 GB of memory in 2 memory channels.

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Characteristic Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
DDR4-2133 Memory LPDDR5-6400
64 GB Max. Memory 36 GB
2 (Dual Channel) Memory channels 2 (Dual Channel)
34.1 GB/s Max. Bandwidth 153.6 GB/s
Yes ECC No
-- L2 Cache 36.00 MB
8.00 MB L3 Cache --
3.0 PCIe version 4.0
16 PCIe lanes --
15.8 GB/s PCIe Bandwidth --

Thermal Management

The TDP (Thermal Design Power) of a processor specifies the required cooling solution. The Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 has a TDP of 80 W, that of the Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) is 35 W.

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Characteristic Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
80 W TDP (PL1 / PBP) 35 W
-- TDP (PL2) --
-- TDP up --
-- TDP down --
-- Tjunction max. 100 °C

Technical details

The Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 has a 8.00 MB cache, while the Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) cache has a total of 36.00 MB.

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Characteristic Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
14 nm Technology 3 nm
Monolithic Chip design Chiplet
x86-64 (64 bit) Instruction set (ISA) Armv8-A (64 bit)
SSE4.1, SSE4.2, AVX2 ISA extensions Rosetta 2 x86-Emulation
LGA 1151 Socket --
VT-x, VT-x EPT, VT-d Virtualization Apple Virtualization Framework
Yes AES-NI Yes
Windows 10, Linux Operating systems macOS, iPadOS
Q4/2015 Release date Q4/2023
-- Release price --
show more data show more data


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Average performance in benchmarks

⌀ Single core performance in 1 CPU benchmarks
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 (49%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) (100%)
⌀ Multi core performance in 1 CPU benchmarks
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 (32%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) (100%)

Geekbench 5, 64bit (Single-Core)

Geekbench 5 is a cross plattform benchmark that heavily uses the systems memory. A fast memory will push the result a lot. The single-core test only uses one CPU core, the amount of cores or hyperthreading ability doesn't count.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 4.00 GHz
1131 (49%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 4.06 GHz
2305 (100%)

Geekbench 5, 64bit (Multi-Core)

Geekbench 5 is a cross plattform benchmark that heavily uses the systems memory. A fast memory will push the result a lot. The multi-core test involves all CPU cores and taks a big advantage of hyperthreading.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 3.90 GHz
4286 (32%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 3.80 GHz
13255 (100%)

Cinebench 2024 (Single-Core)

The Cinebench 2024 benchmark is based on the Redshift rendering engine, which is also used in Maxon's 3D program Cinema 4D. The benchmark runs are each 10 minutes long to test whether the processor is limited by its heat generation.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 4.00 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 4.06 GHz
139 (100%)

Cinebench 2024 (Multi-Core)

The Multi-Core test of the Cinebench 2024 benchmark uses all cpu cores to render using the Redshift rendering engine, which is also used in Maxons Cinema 4D. The benchmark run is 10 minutes long to test whether the processor is limited by its heat generation.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 4.00 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 4.06 GHz
847 (100%)

Cinebench R23 (Single-Core)

Cinebench R23 is the successor of Cinebench R20 and is also based on the Cinema 4 Suite. Cinema 4 is a worldwide used software to create 3D forms. The single-core test only uses one CPU core, the amount of cores or hyperthreading ability doesn't count.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 4.00 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 4.06 GHz
1889 (100%)

Cinebench R23 (Multi-Core)

Cinebench R23 is the successor of Cinebench R20 and is also based on the Cinema 4 Suite. Cinema 4 is a worldwide used software to create 3D forms. The multi-core test involves all CPU cores and taks a big advantage of hyperthreading.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 3.90 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 3.80 GHz
13289 (100%)

Geekbench 6 (Single-Core)

Geekbench 6 is a benchmark for modern computers, notebooks and smartphones. What is new is an optimized utilization of newer CPU architectures, e.g. based on the big.LITTLE concept and combining CPU cores of different sizes. The single-core benchmark only evaluates the performance of the fastest CPU core, the number of CPU cores in a processor is irrelevant here.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 4.00 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 4.06 GHz
3125 (100%)

Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)

Geekbench 6 is a benchmark for modern computers, notebooks and smartphones. What is new is an optimized utilization of newer CPU architectures, e.g. based on the big.LITTLE concept and combining CPU cores of different sizes. The multi-core benchmark evaluates the performance of all of the processor's CPU cores. Virtual thread improvements such as AMD SMT or Intel's Hyper-Threading have a positive impact on the benchmark result.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 3.90 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 3.80 GHz
13755 (100%)

iGPU - FP32 Performance (Single-precision GFLOPS)

The theoretical computing performance of the internal graphics unit of the processor with simple accuracy (32 bit) in GFLOPS. GFLOPS indicates how many billion floating point operations the iGPU can perform per second.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
@ 0.00 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
Apple M3 Pro (14 Core) @ 1.40 GHz
4970 (100%)

Estimated results for PassMark CPU Mark

Some of the CPUs listed below have been benchmarked by CPU-monkey. However the majority of CPUs have not been tested and the results have been estimated by a CPU-monkey’s secret proprietary formula. As such they do not accurately reflect the actual Passmark CPU mark values and are not endorsed by PassMark Software Pty Ltd.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 3.90 GHz
8382 (100%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 3.80 GHz
0 (0%)

Cinebench R15 (Single-Core)

Cinebench R15 is the successor of Cinebench 11.5 and is also based on the Cinema 4 Suite. Cinema 4 is a worldwide used software to create 3D forms. The single-core test only uses one CPU core, the amount of cores or hyperthreading ability doesn't count.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 4.00 GHz
172 (100%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 4.06 GHz
0 (0%)

Cinebench R15 (Multi-Core)

Cinebench R15 is the successor of Cinebench 11.5 and is also based on the Cinema 4 Suite. Cinema 4 is a worldwide used software to create 3D forms. The multi-core test involves all CPU cores and taks a big advantage of hyperthreading.
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 3.90 GHz
866 (100%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 3.80 GHz
0 (0%)

Performance for Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML)

Processors with the support of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can process many calculations, especially audio, image and video processing, much faster than classic processors. The performance is given in the number (trillions) of arithmetic operations per second (TOPS).
Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5
4C 8T @ 3.70 GHz
0 (0%)
Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU) Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
11C 11T @ 0.70 GHz
35 (100%)

Devices using this processor

Intel Xeon E3-1280 v5 Apple M3 Pro (11-CPU 14-GPU)
Unknown Apple MacBook Pro 14 (2023)
Apple MacBook Pro 16 (2023)

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