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Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

macrumors.com

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Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#31

Post by mathisfun123 »

Aperocky wrote: post #12
majestik wrote: post #8

Ok, I didn’t want to take the bait but this one’s just too much. > “He also described a shift toward running AI locally rather than in the cloud – a move motivated by privacy, security, and the rising cost of inference as agents consume more tokens.” Classic Apple. No more just beating the “security and privacy” drum, now its “tokens are expensive!” Cloud scary. Cloud expensive. Mac good. Buy Mac! > “He also singled…

But why should apple invest in developing their own models? Why would it be correct? Or phrase it in a very similar ask, why don't they invest in power plants? The model space is truly crowded, what do they gain or recover suppose they are SOTA? Across the Pacific they are pumping out free models that are only 6-12 months behind. What business sense does it make for Apple to develop their own models?

apple has invested in training models

https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/introducing-third...

they just suck

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#32

Post by bigyabai »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #23
mmoustafa wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The out-of-stock $6000 M3 Ultra Mac Studios with 800GB+ memory bandwidth are going for $24,000 on eBay, so yes definitely

Let me clarify, I think Apple could sell a device at the scale Apple sells at around the $10 to 25 thousand price point. Like, take out the price sheets for the Apple Car. Then sell me an AI tower at those price points.

Or they could use that same amount of memory to ship 64x Macbook Neos, and probably make higher margins off the hardware volume.

Those Macbook Neo users would be very reliant on Apple intelligence, enough maybe to pay for a service with it. I think Apple's much happier going this path.

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#33

Post by robotswantdata »

huragok wrote: post #24

If I had the capital I’d make an household inference appliance. No peripherals except Ethernet, integrated compute (cpu+gpu+mem) and secondary storage (+mobo, psu). No accoutrements, just the minimum amount of hardware to run a model as a utility. Even the appliance faceplate would be a display showing stats like an old HiFi stereo. Edit: something like a series of modules consisting of a RISC-V CPU + Vortex GPGPU +…

build a Xeon / epyc 4u server. 12 channel ram.

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#34

Post by iknowstuff »

Oh please the neural engine is mostly useless for LLMs. Siri in iOS 27 is laughably pathetic and slow compared to GPT Live DESPITE sending personal context to their (attested) cloud to execute anything but the most basic queries. Still years behind.

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#36

Post by huragok »

Aperocky wrote: post #25
huragok wrote: post #24

If I had the capital I’d make an household inference appliance. No peripherals except Ethernet, integrated compute (cpu+gpu+mem) and secondary storage (+mobo, psu). No accoutrements, just the minimum amount of hardware to run a model as a utility. Even the appliance faceplate would be a display showing stats like an old HiFi stereo. Edit: something like a series of modules consisting of a RISC-V CPU + Vortex GPGPU +…

You're describing the mac mini/studio with some facelift.

Absolutely, but not under the control of Apple.

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#37

Post by permalac »

huragok wrote: post #24

If I had the capital I’d make an household inference appliance. No peripherals except Ethernet, integrated compute (cpu+gpu+mem) and secondary storage (+mobo, psu). No accoutrements, just the minimum amount of hardware to run a model as a utility. Even the appliance faceplate would be a display showing stats like an old HiFi stereo. Edit: something like a series of modules consisting of a RISC-V CPU + Vortex GPGPU +…

Is that the nvidia spark?

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#38

Post by arthurcolle »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #20

Apple could probably sell a machine starting at $10,000 if they architected it as the sole place one’s Private Cloud Compute [1] ran. It would need a path to a $2,500 machine, I think. But this is a niche I don’t think another consumer-facing brand could do like Apple. [1] https://security.apple.com/blog/private-cloud-compute/

100%

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#39

Post by dracotomes »

huragok wrote: post #24

If I had the capital I’d make an household inference appliance. No peripherals except Ethernet, integrated compute (cpu+gpu+mem) and secondary storage (+mobo, psu). No accoutrements, just the minimum amount of hardware to run a model as a utility. Even the appliance faceplate would be a display showing stats like an old HiFi stereo. Edit: something like a series of modules consisting of a RISC-V CPU + Vortex GPGPU +…

Isn't that what what George Hotz is doing over at tiny? https://tinycorp.myshopify.com/

Re: Apple Silicon Exec Explains Mac Mini AI Demand and On-Device Future

#40

Post by ben_w »

chvid wrote: post #35

I don’t understand why they are not reintroducing the Apple Xserve?

My guess is the OS. People who want a server often enough want to choose the OS, Apple wants to supply the OS and the hardware together so they're not blamed every time the two turn out to be incompatible, as happened the other way round in the 90s.
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