Putting all this into perspective

[Joelist]

Hi!

A lot of the discussion here seems to be not taking into account both what Apple specifically stated at WWDC and basic facts about the platform. To wit:

- We need to stop calling it ARM on Apple. Even if you don't like the phrase Apple Silicon then use something else. All ARM is with regards to Apple is an ISA they license - every other element of the A Series is Apple designed from the ground up. If anything, their microarchitecture reminds one more of the Core 2 (Conroe) microarchitecture. We need to stop doing this because it leads to incorrect assumptions.

- Apple was very specific at WWDC; they are rolling out a family of SOCs specifically for Mac. And they specifically stated SOC. Based on past experience they will have a host of different blocks in the SOC - CPU, GPU, Secure Enclave, Neural Engine, Image Processing and so forth. They will no doubt continue to do so because....

- As Rene Ritchie put it very well - Apple is in the business of selling experiences. They added the Neural Engine so that (among other tasks) they could add Face ID. The Secure Enclave was so they could have the leading mobile security and so that Apple Pay could be secure. So it is with this move to their own SOCs for the Mac - it is about them being able to provide experiences that otherwise they cannot provide in a practical sense.

I actually got into a dispute with someone on another forum who claimed Apple went to their own silicon on iPhones and iPads purely to save money. I pointed out that adding together their investments Apple pays a LOT more for their SOCs in iPhones than if they had (for example) used Snapdragons. So why do they accept this cost? Because they are not a seller of chips they sell a complete set of devices and their user experiences - if people pay their price for these experiences then they are successful.

How does this translate to the Mac? Basically it means Apple could care less about Benchmarks or how many TFLOPS their GPU block processes - what they care about is how fast and smooth the user experience is or for a game that it runs with no chop and at the correct acceleration, that they deliver real hardware security and things like Face ID and also that the user is not annoyed by a noisy machine and such. And going to their own silicon lets them go down this path.

 

[JMacHack]

How does this translate to the Mac? Basically it means Apple could care less about Benchmarks or how many TFLOPS their GPU block processes - what they care about is how fast and smooth the user experience is or for a game that it runs with no chop and at the correct acceleration, that they deliver real hardware security and things like Face ID and also that the user is not annoyed by a noisy machine and such. And going to their own silicon lets them go down this path.

This is true, but I have a feeling that they'll trot out benchmarks should their own silicon be significantly faster in said benchmarks.

 

[pshufd]

If what we've seen is correct, sign me up. I would be quite happy with an iPad with Keyboard and Trackpad only able to run iOS Apps. But we'll be getting a lot more. Even if it's only Apple's Apps.

 

[Realityck]

How does this translate to the Mac? Basically it means Apple could care less about Benchmarks or how many TFLOPS their GPU block processes - what they care about is how fast and smooth the user experience is or for a game that it runs with no chop and at the correct acceleration, that they deliver real hardware security and things like Face ID and also that the user is not annoyed by a noisy machine and such. And going to their own silicon lets them go down this path.

Benchmarks are just indicative to how well a computer is able to do when pushed, not that normal routine applications will show this like word processing, surfing with a browser, reading mail.

Still this pitch about real hardware security and privacy being more important than a noisy machine is contrary to how power users of a computer see things. If and when processors become more capable with amount of processing they are capable of the machines will naturally become less noisy.

 

[leman]

I think you summed it up pretty well. Apple has some really good tech on their hands and they will probably be able to make some exceptional products on the baes of that tech. And yes, we should stop projecting our ARM associations onto Apple Silicon.

 

[Joelist]

Benchmarks are just indicative to how well a computer is able to do when pushed, not that normal routine applications will show this like word processing, surfing with a browser, reading mail.

Still this pitch about real hardware security and privacy being more important than a noisy machine is contrary to how power users of a computer see things. If and when processors become more capable with amount of processing they are capable of the machines will naturally become less noisy.

The point is you need to understand how Apple thinks in order to understand their decisions. They sell experiences not a piece of silicon or a display or things like that. To them, if their Mac experience has the OS butter smooth with nice, tight security (because they emphasize privacy as part of their experience) and your programs run nice and fast and smooth and your games don't stutter and run well then they are successful. HOW they get there is less important than getting there.

 

[Daoi]

- We need to stop calling it ARM on Apple. Even if you don't like the phrase Apple Silicon then use something else. All ARM is with regards to Apple is an ISA they license - every other element of the A Series is Apple designed from the ground up. If anything, their microarchitecture reminds one more of the Core 2 (Conroe) microarchitecture. We need to stop doing this because it leads to incorrect assumptions.

No, no we don't.

This hysterical obsession some have against referring to the new Macs as ARM Macs is insanely pedantic and silly.

The term is a colloquial one. When people use the term "ARM Mac" they are simply referring to the new Macs in contradistinction to Macs powered by Intel processors. The idea that it means something beyond this is just projection on your part.

What you fail to realize about language is that it really doesn't have an independent existence that goes beyond that people use it. If everyone used the word "up" to mean what we understand to be "down", then that's what it would mean. There is no "wrong" use of language, merely popular and impopular. Likewise, if the new Macs are popularly referred to as ARM Macs, then that's what they are. That's how language works. Signifiers and signifieds.

From a technical perspective, I can understand the concern you have, but it is actually irrelevant. The layman/end user/consumer does not know or care about any of the things that you are saying. ARM Mac is just an innocent colloquial term, and at this point it is looking likely to stay. You'll just have to learn to get used to it.

 

[Joelist]

Try actually reading around - you already have people making incorrect assumptions based on the use of the phrase "ARM" (which Apple was at pains NOT to use) such as that they use Cortex designs - Apple stopped using Cortex with the A6.

Apple Silicon is actually the exact phrase Apple is aiming at the consumer and so that is what laypeople will be calling it - not ARM which is decidedly NOT a street phrase.

Oh, and dropping into a discussion just to insult people is not the best way to make yourself known; especially for someone with 2 posts.

 

[Realityck]

The point is you need to understand how Apple thinks in order to understand their decisions. They sell experiences not a piece of silicon or a display or things like that. To them, if their Mac experience has the OS butter smooth with nice, tight security (because they emphasize privacy as part of their experience) and your programs run nice and fast and smooth and your games don't stutter and run well then they are successful. HOW they get there is less important than getting there.

I don't trust sales people that use buzz words to pitch technology. Which is Apple modus operandi to a fault. We have so many recent Apple enthusiasts online they don't know the years of Apple always creating marketing terms to gloss over what's underneath the products.

Examples from keynote.

At Apple, integrating hardware and software is fundamental to everything we do. That’s what makes our products so great. And Silicon is at the heart of our hardware. So, having a world-class Silicon design team, is a game changer.

The iPhone demanded performance and capabilities that were seen as impossible any device that small. This is where we developed our relentless focus on performance per watt. Generation after generation, we’ve pushed the boundaries of technology, which enabled us to improve performance and energy efficiency while building advanced and industry leading features. Our team delivered 10 generations of increasingly complex and rich designs, always improving performance. In fact, CPO performance in the iPhone has improved by over a hundred times, keeping the iPhone’s performance ahead of every other phone in the industry.

While iPhone chips could drive our mainstream iPads, we wanted to push the iPad even further. It began with the iPad’s retina display, which demanded a custom chip. So the team scaled our architecture and design the most optimized and the highest performance chip possible, for the iPad. Starting with A5X, we built a line of SOCs specifically designed for the iPad. We doubled the iPhone’s graphic performance through a larger GPU and a wider memory subsystem. This put the iPad in a class by itself. Compared to the very first iPad, the latest iPad Pro, delivers over 1000 times faster graphics performance in just 10 years. This is part of the reason why the iPod Pro is faster than the vast majority of PC laptops. And this foreshadows how well our architecture will scale into the Mac.

Our SOCs enable each of these products with unique features and industry leading performance per watt. And it makes each of them best in class.

And now we’re bringing all of that expertise and that same focus and discipline approach, to the Mac. The first thing this will do is give the Mac a whole new level of performance. Now, when we talk about performance, we have to talk about power, because all systems built today are constrained by power consumption, thermals, or both. Among today’s consumer systems, desktops deliver the highest performance, but consume the most power.

You want to deliver the highest performance at the lowest power consumption. And that’s exactly where we want to take the Mac. Building upon our years of experience, designing the world’s most energy efficient chips, our plan is to give the Mac a much higher level of performance, while at the same time, consuming less power. So, much better performance is a reason enough to transition the Mac to Apple SOCs.

So when someone pitches that the power consumption is more paramount to the Mac experience compared to faster computers, I tend to think of this as all being environmental, eco friendly, green then making better computers. Seriously I do think this is one the motivation for pitching that Apple Silicon buzzword. Next I expect Apple and Apricot seeds with your Mac also when you get it.

 

[Joelist]

I don't trust sales people that use buzz words to pitch technology. Which is Apple modus operandi to a fault. We have so many recent Apple enthusiasts online they don't know the years of Apple always creating marketing terms to gloss over what's underneath the products.

Examples from keynote.
So when someone pitches that the power consumption is more paramount to the Mac experience compared to faster computers, I tend to think of this as all being environmental, eco friendly, green then making better computers. Seriously I do think this is one the motivation for pitching that Apple Silicon buzzword. Next I expect Apple and Apricot seeds with your Mac also when you get it.

That may be so, but again the point is understanding how Apple thinks so as to understand why they make the decisions they do. And the keynote (which was indeed marketing fluff to a good extent) showed the fact that to them they sell experiences not a particular piece of silicon or a screen et al. This is how they have sold iPhones and iPads for a long time. They have been a bit more component centric on the Macs but note even there they have of late been speaking more about experiences than about any particular piece of hardware or software.

So to Apple they would not care if their new Mac Apple Silicon had a Geekbench score of 1 if when the user turns on their Mac the experience is smooth and fast.

 

[leman]

So when someone pitches that the power consumption is more paramount to the Mac experience compared to faster computers, I tend to think of this as all being environmental, eco friendly, green then making better computers. Seriously I do think this is one the motivation for pitching that Apple Silicon buzzword. Next I expect Apple and Apricot seeds with your Mac also when you get it.

Its because you don’t understand what power consumption means. What they are telling you is they can make stuff run much faster in the same chassis. Unlike Intel who has been stuck in the same place for years.

 

[dmccloud]

Try actually reading around - you already have people making incorrect assumptions based on the use of the phrase "ARM" (which Apple was at pains NOT to use) such as that they use Cortex designs - Apple stopped using Cortex with the A6.

Apple Silicon is actually the exact phrase Apple is aiming at the consumer and so that is what laypeople will be calling it - not ARM which is decidedly NOT a street phrase.

Oh, and dropping into a discussion just to insult people is not the best way to make yourself known; especially for someone with 2 posts.

Your last second insult aside, there is a big reason so many people are referring to these new Macs as ARM based, which is correct from a technical perspective. Since we have no specific information regarding the new processors or their names at this time, using ARM is a way to distinguish these new processors from the Intel processors currently in use. It's a reference to the underlying instruction code for the CPUs. At this point, we do not know any of the following things about the new processors or the machines they will be in:

• Processor name
• Machine names (will the existing product lines remain, or will we see a new naming convention going forward?)
• Any detailed specifications of "Apple Silicon" beyond it being built on the ARM instruction set.

Right now, the people most interested in the upcoming Macs are developers and enthusiasts who need to know the differences between Apple and Intel processors. For those groups, it is critical to know and understand the differences between the x86/AMD64 instruction set and the ARM instruction set. When Apple officially unveils the new silicon, we'll have an official name to use in regards to those processors. But at the present time, ARM based is just as valid a term to distinguish between processors as "Apple Silicon".

 

[Joelist]

You're dropping on me for an insult when the post that the other poster dropped was a giant insult dripping with condescension?

In any event, Apple is calling it Apple Silicon and we know that while they license the instruction set there are additional instructions originating from Apple. Since Apple calls it Apple Silicon and has pointedly declined to call it ARM it makes little sense for us to call it ARM.

 

[Boil]

ASi Macs...

There you go, still only three letters to type, and one less to hold the shift key down with...!

 

[dmccloud]

"Apple Silicon" is a placeholder name, nothing more at this time. When Apple officially unveils the new processors, then we'll have an official name to go by. Also, "ARM Mac" is quite the common term being used to describe these new computers:

Search - The Verge

The Verge is about technology and how it makes us feel. Founded in 2011, we offer our audience everything from breaking news to reviews to award-winning features and investigations, on our site, in video, and in podcasts.

www.theverge.com

arm macs search results

www.cnet.com

https://www.macworld.com/search?q=ARM%20mac

Like it or not, that is how many people are referring to the new systems at this time, and actually have been referring to them for some time now going back to when the transition to ARM was merely speculation instead of confirmed fact.

 

[majus]

Given their cost, maybe ARM should stand for Adjustable Rate Mortgage.

 

[Realityck]

Its because you don’t understand what power consumption means. What they are telling you is they can make stuff run much faster in the same chassis. Unlike Intel who has been stuck in the same place for years.

When we see their green computer desktops we will judge, but not before.

 

[Waragainstsleep]

There is no "wrong" use of language

While I take your point on the evolving use of language and agree that "ARM Macs" is fine for broadly the same reasons, as an Englishman I have to take issue with the words I've quoted. There is most definitely a host of wrong ways to use a language.

Given their cost, maybe ARM should stand for Adjustable Rate Mortgage.

Do you know something we don't?

 

[Joelist]

Okay, enough of the linguistics thread jack

The overall point of this was Apple's decisions make sense if you try to think like Apple. And to Apple, it is about the experience they are selling as opposed to "tech gearhead" sorts of things. While they may like the geek press something like a high Geekbench provides they are more interested in whether everything runs smoothly and quickly and their special "sales point" items work as they intend them to.

An iPhone example is Face ID. Yes the camera is impressive with it being both 3D and thermal and yes Secure Enclave is impressive as a technology. But the real experience point of this stuff is Face ID is easy to use, works and is secure (VERY difficult to spoof).

 

[matrix07]

Given their cost, maybe ARM should stand for Adjustable Rate Mortgage.

I‘m intrigued. How much does it cost?

 

[pshufd]

I‘m intrigued. How much does it cost?

5.4% with two points.

 

[xgman]

5.4% with two points.

Ouch. I guess that's the "Apple tax"

 

[burgerrecords]

They sell experiences

? Let’s not make it weird. I don’t expect Apple to really do anything important I can’t get done elsewhere. But if it looks nice, runs my software and has some unique “nice to have” features I’ll pay more, within reason, for it (because I can afford to and wish to.).

Also please have it work with as much of my other stuff as possible, because I’m not going to buy everything just from you.

 

[Joelist]

The concept that they sell experiences is actually straightforward and not weird in the least. All it means is they are less concerned with hardware specs than with the user experience. Remember when they finally rolled out Face Id? It waited until they had both Secure Enclave and the Neural CPU and the 3D thermal sensor for the front camera on the iPhone?

Could they have done something like it sooner? Yes but the experience would not have been what they wanted. They wanted it to work reliably and be very difficult to spoof. Remember the early (and indeed current in some cases) attempts at this on other platforms? They were flaky and could be spoofed with a photograph.

We will no doubt see the same approach taken to the Mac...while we as techno nerds may care about the core count, TFLOPS and stuff like benchmarks they will be pushing the new capabilities it offers and the user experience. Understand this and you can understand their decision making better.

 

[burgerrecords]

The concept that they sell experiences is actually straightforward and not weird in the least.

im very familiar with the concept and am just more cynical than you. I see it used by companies that want a certain type of well healed customer to pay more for an intangible quality that doesn’t necessarily cost more to deliver since there’s a market for that.

face id and the related “neural engines” is just not important to me. I would like bluetooth to switch from my car to my AirPods without everything going silent 60% of the time and having to call the person I’m speaking to back.

What you call experiences I think are often gimmicks or just literally rebranding a well established technology so people believe they are having some sort of premium experience in ignorance.