The thrill of Apple silicon is already gone

[Philip Turner]

- making whole food plant-based meals that are macro & micro nutritionally complete
- sun exposure to generate Vitamin D & not to the extent of skin tanning

I would question the accuracy of these statements and severity of certain nutrient deficiencies. Plus, how what you eat even relates to whether you game. Whether you eat organic natural raw uncooked literal unprocessed wheat stalks whole bread doesn’t quantifiably affect your health except for more fiber, which you could also accomplish by eating an Apple (pun intended). Vitamin D prevents rickets (a disease regarding how bones develop in children) but adults don’t get rickets. Besides that I do agree with the point.

About a year ago I played Destiny 2 for elapsed ~5 hours on Nvidia GeForce NOW. It was fun, but I’ve lost interest. I’d rather spend my precious time working for the good of humanity, as long as it’s not a futile effort.

 

[sam_dean]

I would question the accuracy of these statements and severity of certain nutrient deficiencies. Plus, how what you eat even relates to whether you game. Whether you eat organic natural raw uncooked literal unprocessed wheat stalks whole bread doesn’t quantifiably affect your health except for more fiber, which you could also accomplish by eating an Apple (pun intended). Vitamin D prevents rickets (a disease regarding how bones develop in children) but adults don’t get rickets. Besides that I do agree with the point.

About a year ago I played Destiny 2 for elapsed ~5 hours on Nvidia GeForce NOW. It was fun, but I’ve lost interest. I’d rather spend my precious time working for the good of humanity, as long as it’s not a futile effort.

You should ignore all I said and continue doing what you want.

 

[Gudi]

I for one wish Apple was doing business with AMD right now. But that’s me. Maybe one day.

Maybe you're the only one? Apart from the huge designing-your-own-silicon advantage, there's the little appreciated fact that all iPhones, iPads and Macs are now running on the same platform, which is a great benefit to everyone. So unless you're suggesting an AMD 5nm x86 chip is ready to meet the size, heat, efficiency and performance requirements of an iPhone mini, that's a non-starter.

AMD could very well not even exist and it wouldn't change the equation. They are forgettable, unless you still live in the Windows world with so many failed attempts to create a phone- and tabletOS, and you only seek to replace Intel as a maker of PC CPUs. Heck, Apple needs its silicon to work in a watch, so forget about both AMD and INTEL!

 

[sam_dean]

Maybe you're the only one? Apart from the huge designing-your-own-silicon advantage, there's the little appreciated fact that all iPhones, iPads and Macs are now running on the same platform, which is a great benefit to everyone. So unless you're suggesting an AMD 5nm x86 chip is ready to meet the size, heat, efficiency and performance requirements of an iPhone mini, that's a non-starter.

AMD could very well not even exist and it wouldn't change the equation. They are forgettable, unless you still live in the Windows world with so many failed attempts to create a phone- and tabletOS, and you only seek to replace Intel as a maker of PC CPUs. Heck, Apple needs its silicon to work in a watch, so forget about both AMD and INTEL!

Intel's negligence and greed at keeping to 14nm from 2014-2020 because they became a monopoly from 2006-2020 lead to Apple taking the pioneering step of transitioning from Intel to Mac chips.

Apple has a 6+ year node advantage over Intel.

I am forever grateful for this.

What is lacking is at the current MSRP all M2 Macs have base 8GB RAM & 256GB SSD. It should be double that at the same MSRP.

Doing so will get more people to buy as it becomes an obvious and blatant advantage over any AMD/Intel PC.

 

[Philip Turner]

you only seek to replace Intel as a maker of PC CPUs.

Remember that this company's hardware currently backs the world's most powerful supercomputer and has deep investment in servers (Linux). PCs are a portion of their income, just like Nvidia. They also took correct inspiration from Apple and their CDNA3 chip is an SoC.

 

[leman]

Indeed. I for one wish Apple was doing business with AMD right now. But that’s me. Maybe one day.

Why? Apple has superior tech considering the thermal envelope if their products.

AMD’s Ryzen 7000 for laptops sound ridiculously promising. You probably saw that recent article here on MR where they’re saying up to 30 hour battery life and 30% faster performance than the M1 Pro (or was it the Max? I can’t remember).

Those are marketing claims with a lot of fine print behind them. The 30% faster performance claim for example used a specific niche benchmark where x86 is known to hold a substantial advantage. In the real world, 45W Zen4 parts are very unlikely to outperform M2 Pro, and they will use more energy on average. The 30 hour claim is even more outlandish. Maybe using low-performance parts in battery saver mode on a machine with a low-end display at minimal brightness. AMD already made similar claims for Zen3 mobile chips. None of the actually existing laptops even came close.

 

[Yebubbleman]

I simplified and condensed the key points that are important.

It does not help that you do not see it as such and go off tangent to muddle the waters with superfelous details that does not add any value to the post.

I challenged notions in your post. This is the internet. If you can't handle people challenging your notions, maybe forums aren't for you?

There are parts of the world that $/kWh is much higher than where you live. As such halving of power consumption for a device that is turned on for at least 12 hrs/day, 365 days of a year for the next decade is helpful in lowering power bills.

The change from 5nm to 3nm won't result in halving your power bill. Especially if we're talking about the power draw of a 96-Watt or 140-Watt power adapter (you do realize that 96-Watt was the highest power brick of the highest end Intel Mac, yeah?).

If you only see it as marketing nonsense then you are not as smart as you think you are.

You are very unpleasant. In future you may want to write with the aim to be pleasant.

He says after insulting intelligence in the previous post. Report me if you have difficulty with me participating in your thread. I entreat you to not post if you can't handle people challenging your views.

 

[Joe Dohn]

Maybe you're the only one? Apart from the huge designing-your-own-silicon advantage, there's the little appreciated fact that all iPhones, iPads and Macs are now running on the same platform, which is a great benefit to everyone.

It's amazing in paper, but in practice how many people do you see seamlessly using their MacOS applications on the iPhone or vice-versa?

Usually, porting the interfaces takes some extra effort. And not only that, but Apple restricting applications to their store also restricts you automatically running MacOS software into iOS (unless the developer specifically ports it).

Guess who has a much better approach? Microsoft, who allows you to run Android apps without much effort under Windows. Heck, even Linux has a better approach with Android applications.

 

[NT1440]

It's amazing in paper, but in practice how many people do you see seamlessly using their MacOS applications on the iPhone or vice-versa?

Usually, porting the interfaces takes some extra effort. And not only that, but Apple restricting applications to their store also restricts you automatically running MacOS software into iOS (unless the developer specifically ports it).

Guess who has a much better approach? Microsoft, who allows you to run Android apps without much effort under Windows. Heck, even Linux has a better approach with Android applications.

You mean “Apple gives devs the choice of allowing the app to run on macOS with the click of a checkbox” right?

I thought we were all about giving developers choices…

 

[Joe Dohn]

I thought we were all about giving developers choices…

Next time you try to come up with an objection, try to make it more coherent.

If I'm saying interoperability is easier under Linux and Windows, why would I be AGAINST allowing developers more choice? It doesn't make sense.

What I'm saying is that you running a MacOS app actually requires going through Apple's AppStore, which means you'll also have to pay an extra tax as a developer for that. With Linux and Windows, you can either emulate a whole Android device or simply emulating the Android subsystem.

This puts the choice of what applications to run in the hands of the user. So there's MORE choice. The developers can specifically port their apps to Android OR the user can configure them to run seamlessly under the desktop OS.

And if the Android device allows it, you can install ARM Windows and run Windows natively.

 

[seek3r]

Remember that this company's hardware currently backs the world's most powerful supercomputer and has deep investment in servers (Linux). PCs are a portion of their income, just like Nvidia. They also took correct inspiration from Apple and their CDNA3 chip is an SoC.

The irony there is that, except for a very few top500 machines (usually DOE weapons lab clusters) that the architects went all out on performance and didn’t care about power (ORNL I’m looking at you) performance/watt is one of the most important metrics in building out a new HPC setup. If Apple wanted to they could probably compete in that space, it’s not like everything there is x86 with bog standard interconnects (IBM still have some pull with power machines and their solid internal interconnects for ex).

Seriously, if you attend one of the IEEE/ACM SC conferences I think the most common single phrase uttered by vendors on the expo floor is “performance per watt” (at least now that, as of maybe 8 years ago, they finally got rid of booth babes trying to seduce customers, which was a awful relic of an earlier age of the industry - especially since at least half the purchasing managers at a typical SC are women these days). I much prefer the baristas and boutique coffee at booths that basically replaced booth babes )

 

[Captain_Mac]

While I've not read this entire 7 page thread, I'll simply address the main title of the thread.

The thrill of Apple Silicon for me means I've got the performance of a modern 16+ thread Core i7 desktop PC in a 1.5kg 14" laptop that runs ~15 hours on a battery charge.

That's pretty damn good.

Is it the best performing computer workstation that money can buy at any price? No, but it doesn't need to be, nor was it meant to be.

I fully agree with this comment.
Just bought a MBP 14', M2 Pro 12/19, 32GB Memory, 1TB SSD, and this is absolutely a beast of a machine.
Can't speak for others but I can speak for myself, the thrill of Apple Silicon is absolutely not gone for me

 

[StuAff]

I've had this M1 Pro MBP for just over a week. Goes like stink, consumes power at near-abstinence level, runs cool yet the fans barely spin up. I'm using it as my daily driver and the only thing I'm missing from my 5,1 so far is all the disc space (and Windows for gaming, but that's another story). I don't think that'll get old any time soon…

 

[MBAir2010]

I aRm extremely happy with all my apple products
even my Mac mini 2012 running Catalina and streaming Golf on a tv and sound through a BT JBL Go2 speaker.
imagine if the mini was SILICON.....wow!

 

[AirpodsNow]

I fully agree with this comment.
Just bought a MBP 14', M2 Pro 12/19, 32GB Memory, 1TB SSD, and this is absolutely a beast of a machine.
Can't speak for others but I can speak for myself, the thrill of Apple Silicon is absolutely not gone for me

i understand why people like to share their views on what they have read about these devices, i do the same. But also I think, once it’s your money paying for a device, one Might not be super rational Or buy the best specced device. Eventually it’s also about the entire picture.

I got The mbp 16 m1p since launch, and must also admit that the use of Apple silicon has been a game changer for my use case. its silent, very quick, and I never really have to think about plugging in when using during the day. I was one of those unfortunate ones getting the 2019 intel mbp 16, when they finally changed the keyboard, but It was so noisy and the battery could sometimes run out during a 2 hour zoom meeting / presentation. Kinda surprising for such costly laptop. So nothing of this has happened so far with the apple silicon one, so i Can’t stop recommending people to jump over to apple silicon if they still have intel macs. (Btw to my surprise that most people that Did replace their Mac, dont even know / care what processors they had, which i Thought was surprising).

 

[dgdosen]

I hope it's not just me who thinks of this whenever I see this thread...

 

[mcnallym]

I hope it's not just me who thinks of this whenever I see this thread...

No you aren’t alone, runs through my head whenever read the title.

however I would say the thrill hasn’t gone. never got the thrill in the first place and moved from a Mac mini 2018 and a hack that the equiv of iMac with i9900k/sapphire pike rx580 to a base max studio.

yes is quicker on the video editing I do have been on mac since 2008 so just another computer that sat in front of doing tasks.

 

[Gudi]

It's amazing on paper, but in practice how many people do you see seamlessly using their MacOS applications on the iPhone or vice-versa?

Everyone, because it simplifies Apple's maintenance efforts for macOS, iPadOS and iOS. The operation system itself is the application people run the most and now Aplpe can target the same silicon across the board. The M1 isn't just a faster chip, it allows for countless of efficiency optimizations developed for iPhone to be transferred back to the Mac. For example since the A10 in 2016 Apple Silicon chips have high-efficiency cores and OS support to always make use of the right type of cores. The image signaling processor ISP developed for the iPhone camera can be used for the iSight camera of Macs etc.. You're not even aware of all the times the same code runs on different devices.

Guess who has a much better approach? Microsoft, who allows you to run Android apps without much effort under Windows. Heck, even Linux has a better approach with Android applications.

I think Microsoft is a dead company with no future and no redeemable accomplishments to even be remembered when its gone. But that's just me.

 

[Joe Dohn]

Everyone, because it simplifies Apple's maintenance efforts for macOS, iPadOS and iOS. The operation system itself is the application people run the most and now Aplpe can target the same silicon across the board. The M1 isn't just a faster chip, it allows for countless of efficiency optimizations developed for iPhone to be transferred back to the Mac.

That's obviously not what I'm talking about, if you read my explanations in the previous replies.
Even code to very different OSes can be ported if the company a enough.

What I'm saying is that the user is not really able to transparently execute MacOS apps in iOS, and iOS apps in MacOS.
Running iOS apps in MacOS is easier, but there are many reports of apps not working well with simulated touch.

The REAL problem starts when you want to run a MacOS app in iOS. It's just impossible UNLESS a developer specifically ports the app to the Apple Store.

Not only that, but by definition, there are apps that Apple forbids on the iPhone / iPad. They expressly forbid emulators and virtual machine software. Even though your iPhone and your iPad is perfectly capable of running virtual machines, Apple goes out of their merry way to block the hypervisor, which is a key piece to get a virtual machine running at full speed.

It's not that the hypervisor is not available. It IS available. But they actively block it, and it is only available through an exploit (or if Apple themselves use it).

Their effort to block emulators was for nothing though, because now there are browser-based emulators. Specifically, some now run locally, but in the browser. They make use of WebASM (Assembly language for the web). This results in code that is not as fast as native code, but that is obviously fast enough for applications like these. Since the code runs on the browser, it doesn't need to be installed.

Here is an example of a browser-based emulator: https://afterplay.io/

Apple could go all their merry way to block it too, but in doing so, they would make their phones much slower and clearly inferior to Android.

 

[Gudi]

The REAL problem starts when you want to run a MacOS app in iOS. It's just impossible UNLESS a developer specifically ports the app to the Apple Store.

And why would you want to run software on unsupported hardware, without developer support even?

 

[dmr727]

I hope it's not just me who thinks of this whenever I see this thread...

Heh - same for me too. Fantastic song.

 

[Joe Dohn]

And why would you want to run software on unsupported hardware, without developer support even?

You're moving the goalposts now, because a while ago you agreed this was a good thing. That's a reality in MacOS, where there's a lot more freedom than in iOS. You can run whatever piece of software you want without being forced to go to the Apple Store.

Of course this has many uses. Suppose I need to run the Windows version of Microsoft Office. I could just virtualize Windows on my computer instead of buying a PC just for that (or subscribing to their cloud service).

Or if I need to run something that's only available in Android, I can run Android on an emulator and run that software. Sometimes, that is enough.

 

[Gudi]

You're moving the goalposts now, because a while ago you agreed this was a good thing.

I didn't, I said it's a great benefit to everyone. Less work for developers, more choice for users, lower costs for Apple. I didn't suggest that a user could take a developers software, use in an unintended way and still expect it to work flawlessly. That would be silly.

That's a reality in macOS, where there's a lot more freedom than in iOS.

No. iOS is clearly easier to use and more accessible to users, who haven't spend years studying computer science. Therefore there's a lot more freedom. iOS is the future of computing. Just like the graphical user interface replaced the command line.

You can run whatever piece of software you want without being forced to go to the Apple Store.

That's just an issue of anti-trust regulation. Not an inherent characteristic of iOS.

Apple moves to open up App Store as tough EU laws loom

Of course this has many uses. Suppose I need to run the Windows version of Microsoft Office. I could just virtualize Windows on my computer instead of buying a PC just for that (or subscribing to their cloud service).

You're describing the benefits of a multi-tasking OS versus a (mostly) single-tasking OS. This has nothing to do with the choice of silicon or wether it's a good idea to run software programmed for one OS on another OS, without explicit developer support or if we all should talk more about AMD instead of Intel.

Suppose I need to run the Mac version of Microsoft Office on a Windows machine! Is it possible, should it be possible?

Or if I need to run something that's only available in Android, I can run Android on an emulator and run that software. Sometimes, that is enough.

That's why there is plenty of virtualization software on the Mac.

 

[ADGrant]

No. iOS is clearly easier to use and more accessible to users, who haven't spend years studying computer science. Therefore there's a lot more freedom. iOS is the future of computing. Just like the graphical user interface replaced the command line.

Did it? I use a command line shell every day.

 

[seek3r]

Did it? I use a command line shell every day.

Yup, I spend half my time in a shell… if anyone thinks cli usage is dead they’re crazy