Soldered Storage: A Design Choice

[Gudi]

Of course Apple would say that. In some industries that may be true, but for mine.... I look around and there are zero Apple products, everything is HP or Dell.

But Apple's claims are backed by research and your industry's practice is backed by “Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM”. It needs balls as Chief Information Officer (CIO) to go to your board and claim, buying soldered in luxury notebooks will eventually end up producing lower total costs of ownership (TCO) for the company. Somebody will want you to prove your claim! Whereas when you buy stupid DELL boxes, nobody will doubt that you honestly tried to save the company some money. Usually businesses only switch to Apple, if the boss is already in love with the brand. 

 

[BellSystem]

I think the opposite. W/o the ability to upgrade, people will just dump their old computer and get a new one. So throwing a computer in the trash is certainly going create more ewaste then one tiny little ram stick

Considering the laptop is going to be ewaste one day anyway, that is a moot point. The laptop will get made no matter what happens. The RAM stick didn't need to be made. In all arguments the laptop is ewaste no matter what happens.

 

[Gudi]

This design philosophy is a key reason why I've never really liked Macs even though I've been primarily a Mac user for ~15 years.

Who's holding you hostage?

Capabilities (such as RAM/SSD size and the number/types of ports) determine what a computer can do.

Wrong! cpu, memory and storage speed determine what a computer can do. And quelle surprise with faster cpu's come larger memory. Tell me you don't see this clear upgrade path?

M1 = 8 or 16 GB RAM
M1 Pro = 16 or 32 GB RAM
M1 Max = 32 or 64 GB RAM
M1 Ultra = 64 or 128 GB RAM

At the same time, they are always trying to sell the least capable computers they can get away with.

That's why the entry level M1 beats the **** out of the competition with 16 billion transistors on a bleeding edge 5 nm process. I'd like to see Intel go and say, we don't do i3 and i5 anymore. From now on we start with i7 as entry level and go with i9, i11, i13 for Pro users.

When it's time to upgrade, it's always a gamble whether Apple is selling anything worth upgrading to.

Yes and no! Apple is busy advancing the platform. They have no excess engineering capacity to offer something "new" every quarter. But that's how they are even capable to make revolutionary advancements, like becoming the world's leading chipmaker.

Today the laptops are good but the desktops are underwhelming.

Nonsense. I'm sitting at a 24" iMac and it's running insanely great at 7 decibel and 22 watts.

 

[120FPS]

Considering the laptop is going to be ewaste one day anyway, that is a moot point. The laptop will get made no matter what happens. The RAM stick didn't need to be made. In all arguments the laptop is ewaste no matter what happens.

Just to be clear again I have no problem with the RAM but the storage. Computers are usually able to perform tasks for years except for storage as data needs are always going up and Apple tends to underspec storage. I think being able to upgrade storage after purchase would significantly increase the lifespan of a computer.

 

[ahurst]

Enterprises, they "recycle" computers that are replaced and when I say recycled, I mean destroyed and much of the stuff ends up in a landfill.

Right, but they're tossing those computers out regardless of whether they can be upgraded since that equipment is usually on a fixed corporate life-cycle with IT.

This fall my colleagues and I were quite surprised to find an entire room of 2015 iMacs suddenly missing in our university department, which we had been planning on using for data collection for our various cognitive psych experiments. The department head said that IT Services had deemed them obsolete and unsupported, so they were all taken away.

When I went to IT services to see if we could get them back, they said that University data security policy was to throw all decommissioned computers into the e-waste, even if someone else in the department wanted to put them back into academic use. The guy I talked to was clear that he thought it was a ridiculous policy, but said the rules were strict and from on high and that there was nothing they could do.

 

[theorist9]

I do hope that they will move all of their computers to use slotted SSDs, like what they do on Mac Studio. It doesn't look like their SSD connector uses that much more more vertical space compared to a soldered on solution, and it would address the repairability concern. It would probably also make sense to Apple as it could reduce their costs (they can use same modules across more devices). Of course, it still won't be user-upgradeable, but that ship has sailed.

As you may know, an SSD has four components: NAND flash memory, DRAM, controller, and firmware.

I've read that, in the Studio, the NAND is removable, and the controller is not; not sure about the DRAM. If so, that means their slotted solution won't help reparability if controller (and DRAM?) fails.

I don't know if Apple did this purely for financial reasons (to prevent customers from instead purchasing aftermarket SSDs), or if there is additionally some technical benefit to the controller (and DRAM?) being on-die.

Regardless of whether there is some technical benefit, I'm sure Apple is still *really* happy about transitioning to a technology that completely precludes customer upgrades. I.e., their view of AS is probably: It's a superior tech, plus the icing on the cake is that now we have an excuse for blocking customer upgrades that we didn't have before, particularly on desktops: "Ah, sorry, this superior tech simply doesn't allow that." [E.g., I think Apple would have loved making the RAM on the Intel Mini and iMac non-upgradeable, but knew they couldn't get away with that; the furthest they went was making it hard to upgrade on the small iMac.]

 

[ahurst]

Just to be clear again I have no problem with the RAM but the storage. Computers are usually able to perform tasks for years except for storage as data needs are always going up and Apple tends to underspec storage. I think being able to upgrade storage after purchase would significantly increase the lifespan of a computer.

I'm not entirely sure this is true for most people: like I showed in the plot I posted before, storage sizes haven't really changed that much in the past 10 years (definitely not to the extent they changed in the previous decade), and more and more media is being offloaded to the cloud so most people don't need to dedicate disk space to music or shows/movies. The only thing I think has really increased for non-video editors (who now have had to deal with 4K/RAW/etc) over the past decade are photo libraries, since phone cameras are sporting higher megapixels and thus bigger photos/videos.

Of course, there will always be exceptions (video editors, high-end photographers, genetic biologists, media hoarders, etc.), but most of the people in those categories already rely on network/external storage for their massive files.

 

[kingtj1971]

I'm not entirely sure this is true for most people: like I showed in the plot I posted before, storage sizes haven't really changed that much in the past 10 years (definitely not to the extent they changed in the previous decade), and more and more media is being offloaded to the cloud so most people don't need to dedicate disk space to music or shows/movies. The only thing I think has really increased for non-video editors (who now have had to deal with 4K/RAW/etc) over the past decade are photo libraries, since phone cameras are sporting higher megapixels and thus bigger photos/videos.

Of course, there will always be exceptions (video editors, high-end photographers, genetic biologists, media hoarders, etc.), but most of the people in those categories already rely on network/external storage for their massive files.

Yeah.... as much as I used to be a big advocate for ability to upgrade storage capacity? We really have reached a point where it's only people buying the smallest capacity setups who wind up with problems. (I tell everyone I know not to be content to save a bit to get a 128GB or 256GB configuration of a notebook computer because of the promise "most stuff is in the cloud these days anyway". That's only true until it's not ... such as deciding to sync some large folders of videos or presentations from your cloud drive to local storage for easy offline access.)

Apple's soldered on storage isn't ideal, but it puts *most* users in the situation where they simply need to plan ahead a bit on the initial purchase and buy larger capacity up-front. (It helps resale value, regardless ... so some of the cost will get recouped when you resell.) It might be a liability for a minority where the storage dies out of warranty and means they need a whole new main board to repair it. But it really should last as long as other components of the machine in most cases.

 

[theorist9]

There are a few things that should be mentioned here I think. First, customers don’t care about upgrades. They really don’t. If they did you wouldn’t have an entire industry moving to the non-upgradeable model (with Apple at the forefront). Upgradeability is a niche demand and will likely stay that way.

Well, not so fast. I'll take you at your word that the industry is moving away from upgrades. But let's consider this a bit more closely, starting with laptops:

1) Most computer buyers are purchasing low-end laptops, so when one sees the industry moving away from upgrades, it's probably reflecting changes in that sector, as it's by far the largest. But you can't use the preferences of buyers in that segment to assess the preferences of, say, MacBook Pro buyers, since they are a much more specialized clientele. I.e., the very niche you're saying does care about upgrades may in fact include a large portion of higher-end Apple customers.

2) I'd characterize the 14"/16" MBP's as high-end mobile workstations. So if we want to see if the PC industry is doing the same thing as Apple, we need to see if high-end PC mobile workstations are also moving away from upgradeable RAM and storage. In doing a quick check, I don't think they are (e.g., Dell Precision 5570 Workstation). Some higher-end thin-and-lights have abandoned upgradable RAM, but those seem to be more in the category of the Air (and even those still have upgradeable storage).

Now let's consider desktops:

Feel free to show me evidence indicating otherwise, but I don't see any broad industry movement away from upgradeable storage and RAM for desktops by anyone *except* Apple, particularly for higher-end desktops selling at Apple prices.

 

[JouniS]

Who's holding you hostage?

The lack of good options. Right now, I'm using macOS on the main display and an Ubuntu VM on the second display. macOS is generally better at handling the hardware and for consumer-oriented tasks, while Linux is better for serious work. Mostly because Apple likes to break things with OS updates, while Ubuntu LTS just works.

Wrong! cpu, memory and storage speed determine what a computer can do. And quelle surprise with faster cpu's come larger memory. Tell me you don't see this clear upgrade path?

Performance is a capability only in real-time applications. When you are doing batch processing, a system that does something in two hours is as capable a faster system doing it in an hour. You simply need more time or more hardware with slower systems.

As for RAM, 128 GB has been in the consumer desktop territory for years. The Mac Studio has really good CPU performance for its price, but it's crippled from my perspective by limited memory capacity. A maxed-out Mac Studio is only a bit more capable than the iMac I bought in 2020, but it's much more expensive, especially if you want a 5k display.

 

[theorist9]

I'm not entirely sure this is true for most people: like I showed in the plot I posted before, storage sizes haven't really changed that much in the past 10 years (definitely not to the extent they changed in the previous decade),

But that's not what your chart shows—it shows the minimums offered by Apple, not what people are actually purchasing (which I understand you of course don't have access to). So as Apple's minimums stay the same, the percentage of people purchasing SKU's with non-base storage could be moving upwards (which I'd imagine Apple would be happy about, given their upgrade prices). [Indeed, Apple may be keeping its minimums unchanged specifically because it drives more of its customers to upgrading, thus increasing its profit margins.]

Plus even knowing what people actually purchase doesn't indicate their preferences, since the former are some balance between what would best meet their needs and what their finances are (this is particularly true for students, especially with Apple's upgrade prices).

 

[Gudi]

The lack of good options.

In other words, the Mac is your best option and you still don't love it.

As for RAM, 128 GB has been in the consumer desktop territory for years. The Mac Studio has really good CPU performance for its price, but it's crippled from my perspective by limited memory capacity. A maxed-out Mac Studio is only a bit more capable than the iMac I bought in 2020, but it's much more expensive, especially if you want a 5k display.

You forget that the maxed-out 2020 Intel iMac did not have unified memory. It's Radeon Pro 5700 XT operated on only 16 GB of graphics memory or one-eighth of 128 GB RAM. And there are a thousand more system architecture advancements, you conveniently overlook by equaling 128 GB = 128 GB ergo no progress has been made. This is typical Windows user behavior, comparing spreadsheets instead of system performance. And don't complain about the price, if only the largest ever M1 Ultra meets your needs.

 

[JouniS]

You forget that the maxed-out 2020 Intel iMac did not have unified memory. It's Radeon Pro 5700 XT operated on only 16 GB of graphics memory or one-eighth of 128 GB RAM. And there are a thousand more system architecture advancements, you conveniently overlook by equaling 128 GB = 128 GB ergo no progress has been made.

In practice, unified memory means that the maxed-out Mac Studio has less RAM available than my much cheaper iMac.

I write software that runs on Linux servers. Because Apple GPUs don't support CUDA, I don't find them particularly useful for professional purposes. And because I have a separate Windows PC for gaming, I don't find them particularly relevant for personal use either.

It's true that the M1 Max/Ultra Macs look more impressive if you use them for purposes that benefit from large amounts of GPU memory. But if you don't, the SoC/unified memory compromise may make Macs less useful for your purposes.

 

[Queen6]

Enterprises, they "recycle" computers that are replaced and when I say recycled, I mean destroyed and much of the stuff ends up in a landfill.

But that can change, secure wiping erase

Q-6

This design philosophy is a key reason why I've never really liked Macs even though I've been primarily a Mac user for ~15 years.

Capabilities (such as RAM/SSD size and the number/types of ports) determine what a computer can do. Performance determines how quickly it can do it, and efficiency determines how much power it will use. In terms of performance and efficiency, Apple is always trying to make the best computers they can, within the constraints they have. At the same time, they are always trying to sell the least capable computers they can get away with.

I use computers as data processing tools, which makes capabilities important to me. When it's time to upgrade, it's always a gamble whether Apple is selling anything worth upgrading to. Today the laptops are good but the desktops are underwhelming.

Nailed it

Q-6

 

[Queen6]

Of course, because people who don’t share your opinion are hostages and folks who don’t need uogradeable storage are idiots. Well done. What a way to deliver an argument.

Sounds to me like you are in an industry with very special requirements, so that’s of course an entirely different game. Time Machine works quite well over network. You can even set it up via Organisation profile so that all your clients automatically back up to your data server while in the network.

Time to back off and we've been between hell and high water. I like to call the cards as they fall and that you know..

Q-6

 

[mikethemartian]

There’s a difference between the Mac Studio and a MBP, though. One sits on a desk, the other faces vibration and shocks. Connectors will be less reliable in a portable device. Despite everyone‘s speculative insistence that it’s a money grab, there are also legitimate technical reasons as well. I’m sure each machine goes through a reliability and service strategy analysis during development.

For the MS, the vibration constraints are minimal and the cost of swapping a motherboard with an Ultra is high. For a MBP, the vibration requirements are higher. For a 24” iMac the cost of replacing the mother board is lower.

Socketed interconnects are used all the time in avionics systems including fighter jets like the F35 which has to deal with vibrational issues much more than someone carrying around a laptop.

 

[mikethemartian]

This is so wrong I don't even know where to start. Apple has no right to assume we can fortune-tell our future requirements based on what we buy now. And who other than some BS spreader told you that making the storage upgradeable, or even the memory upgradeable, would compromise the performance in any way that couldn't be circumvented by a design-tweak? Just how magic do you think solder tabs are on a circuitboard compared to a socket? In any case they've already halved the SSD speed of the 256GB M2 Air compared to its predecessor just to save money and the consensus seems to be that in practical everyday use no one will even notice.

In what world fifteen years ago would even you agree that a computer should not be upgradeable? The brainwashing is strong in you, and you don't even know it.

Also there is no need for the pompousness. People who think Apple could achieve expandability without noticeably compromising performance and reliability are not all bottom-feeding proletariats envious of others with bigger bank accounts. Some of us just think it's morally wrong.

There is no signal integrity disadvantage using connectors vs soldered joints. Companies like Molex design connectors that operate at much higher data rates than the rates used by Apple’s SSDs.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

As much as I hate to say it.....upgradable Macs probably make more eWaste. Think of how many RAM sticks went straight in the bin and never got used. I can say 99% of my past Macs and most of the people I knew. They were rarely worth any money selling them so they just were waste. So really soldered on memory is a better solution. The only sensible compromise would be an empty expansion slot.

Yeah, not to mention the packaging and shipping of all those parts, some of which went unsold and hopefully ended up recycled (a probably not). Plus, low power high performance memory is surface mounted anyway.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Apple went to soldered RAM 10 years ago, and soldered storage 6 years ago. What's the point in complaining about this now?

Because, you see, 10 years ago? Those were MY days. And I’d like to take this opportunity to ensure that everyone is fully aware that things, in general, were better in my days. Now, I shall take my leave before you provide facts indicating that my thinking MAY be based on “Being young is awesome so everything that was around when I was young must have also been awesome!” /s

 

[fakestrawberryflavor]

They want you to buy storage space in their iCloud as a service man, it’s all by design. Lock em in, keep them subscribed. It’s a strategy, not here to give you what you want but to keep you giving them money.

 

[leman]

As you may know, an SSD has four components: NAND flash memory, DRAM, controller, and firmware.

I've read that, in the Studio, the NAND is removable, and the controller is not; not sure about the DRAM. If so, that means their slotted solution won't help reparability if controller (and DRAM?) fails.

With Apple Silicon, SSD controller is a coprocessor inside the SoC and SSD DRAM is just the system DRAM* . If those things fail you have a much bigger issue than your SSD.

*which is also a beauty of Apple's solution — you are not limited by whatever meagre RAM buffer the SSD vendor provides but can use as much of the super fast system RAM as you need. They have a large capacitor to flush the caches to the persistent storage in case of power failure.

Well, not so fast. I'll take you at your word that the industry is moving away from upgrades. But let's consider this a bit more closely, starting with laptops:

1) Most computer buyers are purchasing low-end laptops, so when one sees the industry moving away from upgrades, it's probably reflecting changes in that sector, as it's by far the largest. But you can't use the preferences of buyers in that segment to assess the preferences of, say, MacBook Pro buyers, since they are a much more specialized clientele. I.e., the very niche you're saying does care about upgrades may in fact include a large portion of higher-end Apple customers.

2) I'd characterize the 14"/16" MBP's as high-end mobile workstations. So if we want to see if the PC industry is doing the same thing as Apple, we need to see if high-end PC mobile workstations are also moving away from upgradeable RAM and storage. In doing a quick check, I don't think they are (e.g., Dell Precision 5570 Workstation). Some higher-end thin-and-lights have abandoned upgradable RAM, but those seem to be more in the category of the Air (and even those still have upgradeable storage).

That's a fair point. My response would be that Apple did not lose market share after moving their prosumer hardware to be non-user-serviceable and non-upgradeable. I interpret this as the user base mostly being ok with this.

Feel free to show me evidence indicating otherwise, but I don't see any broad industry movement away from upgradeable storage and RAM for desktops by anyone *except* Apple, particularly for higher-end desktops selling at Apple prices.

I was talking not about desktops but about enterprise computing. Next-gen datacenter solutions are all about LPDDR or HBM. I think I wrote somewhere here that desktops will be the last to lose modularity as it's a form factor favoured by the DYI user base (as niche as it might be these days).

 

[theorist9]

That's a fair point. My response would be that Apple did not lose market share after moving their prosumer hardware to be non-user-serviceable and non-upgradeable. I interpret this as the user base mostly being ok with this.

I'd interpret it as the Mac's prosumer user base having a strong preference for MacOS over Windows, and being willing to take the bad along with the good. I.e.: "Well, I really don't like the loss of upgradeability, but I can tolerate it, and what choice do I have if I want to continue to use MacOS?"

I speculate that's also why you don't see the loss of upgradeability in high-end PC mobile workstations—manufacturers can't get away with it there, because they don't have as captive of an audience.

I was talking not about desktops but about enterprise computing. Next-gen datacenter solutions are all about LPDDR or HBM. I think I wrote somewhere here that desktops will be the last to lose modularity as it's a form factor favoured by the DYI user base (as niche as it might be these days).

Except the PC analog to the Mac Studio wouldn't be a DIY machine, it would be a desktop workstation. Those stay modular because they can expand with user's needs, not because they're intended for DIY-ers.

 

[Gudi]

Because Apple GPUs don't support CUDA, I don't find them particularly useful for professional purposes.

I see, then you should go to Nvidia and ask them to build you a computer. You're obviously looking for a PC, as in IBM-compatible PC. That's the platform Nvidia builds expansion cards for.

And because I have a separate Windows PC for gaming, I don't find [Macs] particularly relevant for personal use either.

PC does whaaat?! Windows gaming is another great reason to buy a Wintel box. I mean, you can't go to Sony and insist to play Mario on a PlayStation either. You've got to go to Nintendo and buy their Super Mario Entertainment System. That's how intellectual property works.

General Computing only means that you can build all kinds of programs on a Mac, not that every program ever written will be compatible with a Mac. You want to run software written for Windows? Fine, do it! On a PC.

 

[leman]

I'd interpret it as the Mac's prosumer user base having a strong preference for MacOS over Windows, and being willing to take the bad along with the good. I.e.: "Well, I really don't like the loss of upgradeability, but I can tolerate it, and what choice do I have if I want to continue to use MacOS?"

Either way the point is that loss of upgradeability is not a deal-breaker for the users. And as such, there is no incentive for Apple to bring it back.

 

[theorist9]

Either way the point is that loss of upgradeability is not a deal-breaker for the users. And as such, there is no incentive for Apple to bring it back.

You're changing the goalposts. I was responding to your original statement: "First, customers don’t care about upgrades." That was the point under discussion. And I still maintain just because people are willing to put up with it doesn't mean they're happy about it.

That's particularly the case with Mac hardware, since there's no other way to run MacOS. With PC makers, unhappy customers can just switch to another manufacturer. Not so with Macs.