Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#191

Post by bredren » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

hn_check wrote: post #173

Cu3PO42 wrote: post #102

I'm surprised we didn't get any performance numbers. Either raw power or at least power efficiency and projected battery life improvements. Seeing as this is a major reason for the transition (according to them), it feels very weird. They're shipping a 'Development Transition Kit' Mac mini with an A12Z this week, so it's not like the numbers are going to stay private for a long time. Even if there's an NDA, someone's…

It doesn't seem weird at all, and the fact that they're sending out devices on the A12Z seems to be intentional sandbagging: they know that people are going to benchmark and the results will likely be simply comparable to current hardware (from a performance perspective...energy efficiency will clearly be much better). When they release the actual devices, where their power and thermal profile is dramatically higher…

I would also expect this hw to be nerfed compared to what actually goes out to customers. That way no matter what is achieved on this it is better for real users.

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#192

Post by lawrenceyan » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

Post with official announcement: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23604457

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#193

Post by fomine3 » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

theshrike79 wrote: post #161

Cu3PO42 wrote: post #102

I'm surprised we didn't get any performance numbers. Either raw power or at least power efficiency and projected battery life improvements. Seeing as this is a major reason for the transition (according to them), it feels very weird. They're shipping a 'Development Transition Kit' Mac mini with an A12Z this week, so it's not like the numbers are going to stay private for a long time. Even if there's an NDA, someone's…

The A12Z is already faster than every tablet and phone in existence. Depending on the benchmark, it smokes about 80% of off the shelf PC hardware. They really don't need to do that much.

I believe Apple can make processors for laptop and normal desktop in A-series way but I'm curious how they make for Mac Pro. Adopting architecture like chiplet?

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#194

Post by boring_twenties » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

Wow, after a couple of decades of pointing and laughing, I might finally have to buy a Mac. Assuming, of course, they don't stick their own Management Engine-alike in there.

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#195

Post by zrail » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

mavhc wrote: post #127

Do you think they rewrote Mac OS for ARM, or altered iOS to look like Mac OS? Or have they secretly been in sync for the past 10 years? It's been 9 years since they rewrote Final Cut, and 7 years for Logic Pro, both rewritten for this day

OS X was running on internal x86 machines basically from the beginning, if I remember my folklore correctly. NeXTSTEP could run on x86 as well.

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#196

Post by hn_check » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

bredren wrote: post #158

Cu3PO42 wrote: post #102

I'm surprised we didn't get any performance numbers. Either raw power or at least power efficiency and projected battery life improvements. Seeing as this is a major reason for the transition (according to them), it feels very weird. They're shipping a 'Development Transition Kit' Mac mini with an A12Z this week, so it's not like the numbers are going to stay private for a long time. Even if there's an NDA, someone's…

It wasn't just lack of performance numbers, there were no actual products announced. They would have had to tip their hand on a lot of info that is not helpful to customers or their ability to keep selling Intel stuff. One big question though will be how this devkit benchmarks against the current maxed Intel mac mini. I'm curious if GPU performance beats the current BlackMagic eGPU. (rx 580)

It's an integrated GPU so it isn't going to compete against serious dedicated GPUs, and no one should expect that. I imagine much like existing Apple devices (and Windows laptops) with dedicated GPUs it will switch as necessary. But at least the integrated GPU will be better.

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#197

Post by nouveaux » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

Here is a bit of history of the migration to Intel based CPUs.

"Apple's initial press release indicated the transition would begin by June 2006, and finish by the end of 2007, but it actually proceeded much more quickly. The first generation Intel-based Macintoshes were released in January 2006 with Mac OS X 10.4.4 Tiger, and Steve Jobs announced the last models to switch in August 2006, with the Mac Pro available immediately and with the Intel Xserve available by October 2006.[2] The Xserve servers were available in December 2006.[3]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple%27s_transition_to_Intel_...

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#198

Post by QuixoticQuibit » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

I really wonder what this says about the x86 platform going forward.

Mobile completely passed it by.

I’ve been seeing more hype about ARM servers for a while with AWS Graviton instances, the new #1 supercomputer in the TOP500, etc.

And of course today we see that Apple plans to transition their Macs to their own ARM chips. Even Microsoft made an ARM-based Windows/Surface product but it didn’t seem to amount to much. I wonder if they’ll want to make another stab at it seeing Apple’s direction with strong vertical integration.

While I don’t think x86 as a platform is going away anytime soon, I feel like its market share and by extension its relevance will slowly dwindle over the next decade or two. Interesting times.

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#199

Post by AlexandrB » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

snuxoll wrote: post #25

AlexandrB wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to be going the other way actually. MacOS Big Sur looks like iPadOS with a menu bar tacked on.

What they did to Finder is just...unacceptable.

Hoping there's a way to switch to a more compact view, but as shown in the keynote it looks terrible. What is with the insistence on wasting space in modern operating systems? Were people getting too productive with new, large displays?

Re: Apple announces it will switch to its own processors for future Macs

#200

Post by ianai » Mon, Jun 22, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

hn_check wrote: post #173

Cu3PO42 wrote: post #102

I'm surprised we didn't get any performance numbers. Either raw power or at least power efficiency and projected battery life improvements. Seeing as this is a major reason for the transition (according to them), it feels very weird. They're shipping a 'Development Transition Kit' Mac mini with an A12Z this week, so it's not like the numbers are going to stay private for a long time. Even if there's an NDA, someone's…

It doesn't seem weird at all, and the fact that they're sending out devices on the A12Z seems to be intentional sandbagging: they know that people are going to benchmark and the results will likely be simply comparable to current hardware (from a performance perspective...energy efficiency will clearly be much better). When they release the actual devices, where their power and thermal profile is dramatically higher…

That’s my takeaway too. But imagine the impact of the speed is as good or faster? They’re shipping with 16 gigs ram too so it’s at least not the typical 8 gig minimum.