If Apple had two product lines..

[v0lume4]

Really?

Apple sales in biggest fall since 2019

The decline came as people cut back in the face of higher living costs, said Apple's boss.

www.bbc.com

....Sales of its popular iPhones were down more than 8%, and sales of Mac computers dropped 29%......

I’m no Apple sympathizer as you can see from my other posts. But I think the drop in Mac sales are due to the uncharacteristically high sales of the M1 generation of Macs. The sales have simply dropped back down to their regular levels now that the hype has died down.

As for the iPhone… well, we’ll see. I do think Apple’s greed has gotten their customer base right at their tipping point. I do think Apple’s unadulterated greed is going to bite them in the rear.

 

[Tagbert]

I need a laptop on which I can run a virtual machine with Windows for Intel processors.

So the Windows software that you need to run cannot be run on Windows 11 for Arm (which does dynamic cross-compilation similar to Rosetta 2)?

 

[KENESS]

I can still work on my 2018 MacBook Pro. I'd like to be able to do this on a macbook currently sold in the Apple Store

I'd like to have won that $2 billion dollar lottery...

 

[whwang]

Use VirtualBox to run x86 Windows on Mac M1/M2

1. Go to https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
2. Click the “Developer preview for macOS / Arm64 (M1/M2) hosts” link

*Edit*

This uses emulation to run x86 Windows on M1/M2, not necessarily ARM Windows. It is slow but free and published by Oracle so maybe worth a try.

Interesting. Have you tried it with USB external devices? I use quite some USB devices in Windows on my intel Mac under Parallels. I kind of wonder if I can still do that on an ARM Mac.

 

[zenodux]

Hi,

would you buy a brand new Macbook (Air/Pro) with an Intel processor today? I'm not talking about laptops before changing the processor to M1. The question is: if Apple had two lines of computers/laptops in its offer: one with M1/M2/Mx processors and the other with Intel processors, which processor would you choose? I'm asking because for me M1/M2 processors mean the need to use a laptop from 2018, which, as everyone knows, is Apple's biggest failure in the last decade. It has had two matrix replacements and I know that in two years at most I will have to repair it again. But for professional reasons, I must have on my laptop at least a virtual machine with Windows (version for Intel processors), so Apple has no offer for me. The day my laptop finally fails will be the first time since 1986 that I will buy a laptop from a company other than Apple. It's a bit of a pity, but I have no other choice. And I don't really feel like using two separate laptops. Plus, it's bad for the environment.

Have you tried running WINE / CrossOver on your Apple Silicon Mac? WINE (https://www.winehq.org/) is an open source project that implements Windows compatibility on UNIX-like systems like Linux & MacOS. CrossOver (https://www.codeweavers.com/crossover) is a commercial supported version of WINE. I use CrossOver on my M1 Macs to run a few apps and even games. Both the Wine & CrossOver websites have software compatibility lists. Check if WINE/CrossOver runs your software. Chances are good that it does.

*The cool thing is that CrossOver is an Intel app, so Rosetta 2 is working in concert with WINE - neat! And fast. I believe Rosetta 2 translates both WINE/CrossOver itself & whatever Windows app you're trying to run from Intel code to Apple ARM64 code, and stores that to disk. Then when you run the Windows app, it's really running Apple ARM64 code for the app itself as well as WINE, which translates Windows API calls to native MacOS calls on the fly. Magic. (If anyone has more detailed information or if I got something wrong, please let me know!) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_(software))

 

[Yebubbleman]

Hi,

would you buy a brand new Macbook (Air/Pro) with an Intel processor today? I'm not talking about laptops before changing the processor to M1. The question is: if Apple had two lines of computers/laptops in its offer: one with M1/M2/Mx processors and the other with Intel processors, which processor would you choose? I'm asking because for me M1/M2 processors mean the need to use a laptop from 2018, which, as everyone knows, is Apple's biggest failure in the last decade. It has had two matrix replacements and I know that in two years at most I will have to repair it again. But for professional reasons, I must have on my laptop at least a virtual machine with Windows (version for Intel processors), so Apple has no offer for me. The day my laptop finally fails will be the first time since 1986 that I will buy a laptop from a company other than Apple. It's a bit of a pity, but I have no other choice. And I don't really feel like using two separate laptops. Plus, it's bad for the environment.

Would I buy something with current era Intel today? Software support would be the key determining factor. The ability to virtualize x86-64 operating systems and to run x86-64 games is kind of a big deal for me and it makes it so that my performance needs in the Apple Silicon era (given that both use cases that aren't as well addressed by Apple Silicon Macs as they were by Intel Macs) are otherwise limited to that of either a top-end 13-inch M1/M2 MacBook Pro or a low-end/binned variant Mx Pro based 14-inch MacBook Pro or Mac mini with only RAM and SSD upgrades. (I don't need a full M1 Pro or full M2 Pro, and I certainly don't need anything with "Max" or "Ultra" in the SoC name.) Certainly, Windows 11 Support in Boot Camp is another huge determining factor. If Apple made another Intel 16-inch MacBook Pro that had all that and was coupled with a discrete GPU that didn't suck, an H-series i7 or i9 that didn't suck, and a battery that was closer in terms of removability/replaceability to the 2021 and 2023 16-inch MacBook Pro than the 2019 16-inch MacBook Pro, I'd definitely give strong thought to buying it. As it stands, my personal Mac arsenal will be an M1 13-inch MacBook Pro and an Intel 16-inch MacBook Pro. Once Intel Macs, even ones with the T2, are dropped altogether, my Mac needs go way down, with most of the things I would've specifically used Intel Macs for being replaced by PCs.

That all being said, one is not limited to 2018 Intel Macs in order to still use Intel Macs. 2019 16-inch MacBook Pros aren't bad Intel Macs, even in the era of Apple Silicon. A 2020 27-inch iMac is still a beast if what you need is a performant Intel Mac. Sadly, I'm not sure I'd recommend any other model of Intel Mac in 2023. But that also entirely depends on what needs an Intel Mac specifically (and can't be done on an Apple Silicon Mac just as well).

 

[CraigJDuffy]

I need Windows on my laptop for three years. Since the introduction of a document workflow management in the company I work for, which runs only on Windows...

Sounds like you should be given a company provided work laptop…

 

[Skoobunny]

With a 29% decrease in sales, you have to think about every possible reason.

 

[Skoobunny]

....If Apple made another Intel 16-inch MacBook Pro that had all that and was coupled with a discrete GPU that didn't suck, an H-series i7 or i9 that didn't suck, and a battery that was closer in terms of removability/replaceability to the 2021 and 2023 16-inch MacBook Pro than the 2019 16-inch MacBook Pro, I'd definitely give strong thought to buying it. As it stands, my personal Mac arsenal will be an M1 13-inch MacBook Pro and an Intel 16-inch MacBook Pro. Once Intel Macs, even ones with the T2, are dropped altogether, my Mac needs go way down, with most of the things I would've specifically used Intel Macs for being replaced by PCs. ....

This is just my case. No matter how "amazing" the next Mx processor will be, the inability to run Intel versions of Windows eliminates MacBooks from my shopping list.

 

[HouseLannister]

Thread title sucked me in… if Apple had two product lines, neither of them would be Mac. iPhone and Apple watch would be my guess.

 

[leman]

I often enjoy your posts in the “Alternatives” board, so I’d like to ask for your take on this.

Intel and AMD’s recent mobile offerings are incredibly impressive. On synthetic benchmarks, Intel’s CPUs are literally double their performance of the M2 Pro/Max chips. DOUBLE. This comes at the expense of efficiency — the power consumption of the Intel chips are just stupid. It’s kind of a joke.

Now, I know synthetic benchmarks are not the end-all. And power consumption is a huge consideration with laptops. Apple cannot be beat in that regard. But the point is, those Intel numbers are incredible.

What do you think will happen if and Intel and AMD continue to pull away at this rate? They’ve been making CPU’s for decades longer than Apple. If the divide between Apple Silicon performance and the competitors becomes too great, we’ll start to have a PowerPC/Intel situation again, no?

Hardly. Intel is achieving this extreme performance by pushing the frequencies and core counts to absurd levels. AMD does much better but still needs 2x power of Apple for the same peak performance. The thing is, Apple can always choose to push the thermal design a bit more if they want - they certainly have plenty of headroom left. But improving energy efficiency is much more difficult.

Apple sales in biggest fall since 2019

The decline came as people cut back in the face of higher living costs, said Apple's boss.

www.bbc.com

....Sales of its popular iPhones were down more than 8%, and sales of Mac computers dropped 29%......

Looks really bad for Apple, right? Until you remember that Q1 2022 saw a bunch of new Macs released and had massive sales while Q1 2023 had zero new products.

P.S. And yet Q1 2023 with its 30% drop in sales is still better than any Intel Mac quarter ever: https://www.statista.com/statistics...macintosh-computers-since-first-quarter-2006/

 

[Skoobunny]

Hardly. Intel is achieving this extreme performance by pushing the frequencies and core counts to absurd levels. AMD does much better but still needs 2x power of Apple for the same peak performance. The thing is, Apple can always choose to push the thermal design a bit more if they want - they certainly have plenty of headroom left. But improving energy efficiency is much more difficult.



Looks really bad for Apple, right? Until you remember that Q1 2022 saw a bunch of new Macs released and had massive sales while Q1 2023 had zero new products.

I'm not an Apple shareholder so it doesn't matter to me. Also the battery life of MacBook is of marginal importance to me. I have been an Apple customer since 1986 who now would like to buy a product that Apple no longer manufactures. Because Apple does not listen to its customers, but thinks that it knows better than them what they really need. From my point of view, this is a mistake. Because most likely I will give up the Macbook first, then the iPad and finally the iPhone.

 

[leman]

I'm not an Apple shareholder so it doesn't matter to me. Also the battery life of MacBook is of marginal importance to me. I have been an Apple customer since 1986 who now would like to buy a product that Apple no longer manufactures. Because Apple does not listen to its customers, but thinks that it knows better than them what they really need. From my point of view, this is a mistake. Because most likely I will give up the Macbook first, then the iPad and finally the iPhone.

I can absolutely understand that your needs are not addressed by current Apple strategy. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to listen to every customer. As it stands, rolling their own technology stack has been a good business decision for Apple and is likely to pay even more dividends for them in the future. Customers like you will be disappointed, but the majority seem to like the new tech.

 

[maflynn]

I often enjoy your posts in the “Alternatives” board, so I’d like to ask for your take on this.

Thank you, though most people here at MR, would disagree with my perspectives.

What do you think will happen if and Intel and AMD continue to pull away at this rate? They’ve been making CPU’s for decades longer than Apple. If the divide between Apple Silicon performance and the competitors becomes too great, we’ll start to have a PowerPC/Intel situation again, no?

Interesting topic, and one that I've been mulling for a little while - especially since the M2's computational performance increase was rather mundane.

Intel and AMD are locked in a battle for supremacy. The competition has been such that the PC buying consumer benefitted. Meanwhile Apple has lost some of the brain trust that created the M series. The M2's computational performance increase wasn't as much as people were hoping (though the M2's graphic power is). I think the M3 definitely has to hit it out of the park to remain on par with Intel and AMD. If we see apple lashing CPUs together, ala M1 Ultra, then we know that they're not keeping up.

I think Apple's approach to having incredibly efficient processors benefits them in the laptop realm, but what makes the M series great laptop processors hinders them for being great desktop processors. The M1 Ultra is evidenced by this, instead of having a desktop processor going head to head with intel, they lashed two M1 Maxs togethers. The Mini and iMac are no faster or more powerful then the MBPs.

Unfortunately, it’s impossible to listen to every customer.

Apple has made the absolutely right decision in focusing on what they're good at, at least in terms of the mobile market. I think Apple hit it out of the park with the M1 series MBA and MBP. The M2 series is less exciting but a decent improvement. As I stated where apple is falling behind is desktop arena, as witnessed by the continual delay of the Mac Pro.

 

[Skoobunny]

Unfortunately, it’s impossible to listen to every customer.

But this is not the case where each of the millions of customers wants something different. This is a case where some of the customers are happy with the change and some are not. Even if the dissatisfied part is only 10%, looking at Apple's revenues we are talking about really big money. As a shareholder, I wouldn't be thrilled.

 

[JustAnExpat]

I often enjoy your posts in the “Alternatives” board, so I’d like to ask for your take on this.

Intel and AMD’s recent mobile offerings are incredibly impressive. On synthetic benchmarks, Intel’s CPUs are literally double their performance of the M2 Pro/Max chips. DOUBLE. This comes at the expense of efficiency — the power consumption of the Intel chips are just stupid. It’s kind of a joke.

Now, I know synthetic benchmarks are not the end-all. And power consumption is a huge consideration with laptops. Apple cannot be beat in that regard. But the point is, those Intel numbers are incredible.

What do you think will happen if and Intel and AMD continue to pull away at this rate? They’ve been making CPU’s for decades longer than Apple. If the divide between Apple Silicon performance and the competitors becomes too great, we’ll start to have a PowerPC/Intel situation again, no?

You pointed out the problem with Intel and AMD's chips:

They use lots of power.

Apple can crank up the power as well, making their processors faster, but then you'll get loud fans and hot machines with low battery life.

 

[maflynn]

But this is not the case where each of the millions of customers wants something different.

Millions? Do you have evidence that Millions of apple customers are being left behind? I think you're conflating an issue that isn't fully there - at least in the volumes you speak of. I won't deny the move to ARM has impacted a segment of Apple customers but by the flip side the move to ARM opened the door to countless others as the M1 series laptops transition increased sales.

You pointed out the problem with Intel and AMD's chips:

They use lots of power.

I only see this being reported as a problem here - at least to the point where they want to choose something else. Yes, people have complained about the power usage of the RTX series GPUs to be sure, but that sure hasn't slowed anyone from buying them.

Don't get me wrong, the power efficiency of the M series is astounding and it makes for a great laptop, but people don't compare processor TPD's or saying that M2 Pro uses X amount of electricity vs 13900hx using y.

More so on desktops, I only see Apple fans cite the power efficiency and how the M series is so much better at sipping electricity then an intel 13900k. People looking for fast desktops or wanting an i9/i7 class processor are not going to be bemoaning the wattage rating.

 

[Skoobunny]

Millions? Do you have evidence that Millions of apple customers are being left behind? I think you're conflating an issue that isn't fully there - at least in the volumes you speak of. I won't deny the move to ARM has impacted a segment of Apple customers but by the flip side the move to ARM opened the door to countless others as the M1 series laptops transition increased sales.



I only see this being reported as a problem here - at least to the point where they want to choose something else. Yes, people have complained about the power usage of the RTX series GPUs to be sure, but that sure hasn't slowed anyone from buying them.

Don't get me wrong, the power efficiency of the M series is astounding and it makes for a great laptop, but people don't compare processor TPD's or saying that M2 Pro uses X amount of electricity vs 13900hx using y.

More so on desktops, I only see Apple fans cite the power efficiency and how the M series is so much better at sipping electricity then an intel 13900k. People looking for fast desktops or wanting an i9/i7 class processor are not going to be bemoaning the wattage rating.

Energy efficiency is the one thing Apple keeps repeating. For some it works because they need to reassure themselves that they made the right choice. For me, it doesn't matter in the slightest. Whether my laptop uses x or 1.5x watts is still in power saving mode anyway, because running office programs doesn't require any power. However, what matters to me is whether I can run specific programs on my laptop or not. Let's put it this way: the energy efficiency of the Toyota Prius is incomparably greater than that of the Toyota Land Cruiser. But I need 4 wheel drive.

 

[joehohoho]

I thought there were apple silicon compatible virtual machines that run windows now?

 

[Skoobunny]

I thought there were apple silicon compatible virtual machines that run windows now?

Only this version of Windows: https://www.androidauthority.com/windows-on-arm-explained-3100713/

 

[progx]

would you buy a brand new Macbook (Air/Pro) with an Intel processor today?

Nope. I wouldn’t prefer any Intel Macs. Haven’t been a fan of their stuff in a while. They only kicked out better products since Apple departed since they were fat and lazy for a good decade while AMD was fixing their issues. If Apple would’ve stuck with X86, then I would hope they ditched Intel for AMD’s Ryzen line. Power draw was significantly better and energy friendly, plus their straight cores on Ryzen have always been better than anything Intel could put out.

 

[leman]

Interesting topic, and one that I've been mulling for a little while - especially since the M2's computational performance increase was rather mundane.

Intel and AMD are locked in a battle for supremacy. The competition has been such that the PC buying consumer benefitted. Meanwhile Apple has lost some of the brain trust that created the M series. The M2's computational performance increase wasn't as much as people were hoping (though the M2's graphic power is). I think the M3 definitely has to hit it out of the park to remain on par with Intel and AMD. If we see apple lashing CPUs together, ala M1 Ultra, then we know that they're not keeping up.

I think Apple's approach to having incredibly efficient processors benefits them in the laptop realm, but what makes the M series great laptop processors hinders them for being great desktop processors. The M1 Ultra is evidenced by this, instead of having a desktop processor going head to head with intel, they lashed two M1 Maxs togethers. The Mini and iMac are no faster or more powerful then the MBPs.

M2 family uses the same main processor cores as M1, so lack of performance improvements there shouldn't be surprising. But I wouldn't interpret this as Apple losing track of its roadmap. There are some impressive improvements in the M2 series as well, such as: doubled throughput of matrix coprocessors, much improved E-cores, significant improvements to the on-chip network and GPU scalability. Looking at this it is possible that the rumours about brain drain and design stagnation at Apple could be exaggerated.

But you are entirely correct in saying that the desktop game has been lacklustre. The M1 and M2 series are still very much mobile-oriented and cannot challenge the mainstream desktop CPUs in their current form. If things will not change in considerable manner with M3, then it's time to worry about desktop Mac future.

But this is not the case where each of the millions of customers wants something different. This is a case where some of the customers are happy with the change and some are not. Even if the dissatisfied part is only 10%, looking at Apple's revenues we are talking about really big money. As a shareholder, I wouldn't be thrilled.

Apple can afford to lose those 10% of customers, because they are likely to attract more. By moving to their own hardware, their devices gained unique value proposition that you can't have anywhere else. By the way, Mac sales have experienced rapid growth after they moved to Apple Silicon, and that's in a shrinking market. Their worst Apple Silicon Mac quarter has seen more revenue than the best Intel Mac revenue ever.

Apple Mac shipments worldwide by quarter 2024 | Statista

In the final quarter of 2024, Apple Mac shipments stood at 6.28 million units worldwide, a decrease from the 6.35 million Mac shipments that were recorded in the fourth quarter of the previous year. Apple Mac products Apple first launched the Macintosh, commonly known as Mac, in 1984.

www.statista.com

Apple Mac revenue by quarter 2006-2024 | Statista

In the fourth quarter of Apple's 2024 fiscal year, sales of Apple Mac computers generated around 7.7billion U.S.

www.statista.com

Of course, none of this is any consolation for you. If you can't use a tool, you can't use it. As I said before, it's unfortunate. But there is not much you can do about it. By the way, Microsoft does officially support running Windows in a Parallels virtual machine on Apple Silicon. Don't know if this has been mentioned already. Maybe this would be a solution for you?

 

[maflynn]

However, what matters to me is whether I can run specific programs on my laptop or not.

Indeed, I've said many times here at MR, get the best tool that fits your needs. As said a single product cannot please all people

I thought there were apple silicon compatible virtual machines that run windows now?

MS has a version of windows that can run on ARM, and so Parallels, and Vmware have ARM native apps to virtualize ARM windows

Nope. Intel makes trash
...
There’s no intelligence in Intel.

LOL - such ignorant statements

The M1 and M2 series are still very much mobile-oriented and cannot challenge the mainstream desktop CPUs in their current form.

Which makes total sense, the M1 traces its roots to the A series and so Apple's philosophy has long been one of incredible power efficiency coupled with excellent performance.

 

[leifp]

Absolutely not. From Apple’s time Intel went from outright performance and performance per watt champ to last in both. At least for everything I care about. (Photo editing, gaming)

edit: I have an AMD gaming PC

 

[phenste]

I'm asking because for me M1/M2 processors mean the need to use a laptop from 2018, which, as everyone knows, is Apple's biggest failure in the last decade.

Apple fixed everything that was wrong with MacBooks post-Ive and into the M2 era. my M2 MBP is the best laptop I’ve ever owned, bar none.

next thread, please.