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

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

#91

Post by SietrixDev »

apparent wrote: post #56
iknowstuff wrote: post #34

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.

I think the relevant comparison is the developer beta, which has access to the Gemini-powered Siri that will roll out publicly later this year. From the reviews I've seen, Apple won't be "years behind" (which surely they were) for long.

But not in the EU, because of the DMA :/

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

#92

Post by [deleted] »

esskay wrote: post #87
chvid wrote: post #35

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

whos going to buy one? You cant trust them not to kill it within a few years and cease all software updates AND make it impossible to install a different OS to keep it going. Until they stop being dicks about what you can do with the hardware you own it's a non starter.

[deleted]

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

#93

Post by jiqiren »

bigyabai wrote: post #32
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

When I was at Apple we never wanted or. We wanted all. If that push to use Chinese memory works out it will be great for us and Apple.

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

#94

Post by Alpha3031 »

throw1234567891 wrote: post #85
boredatoms wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but like running linux hopefully

so you have invent unified memory for linux first because that’s the limitation today

Fairly sure most iGPUs these days are zero-copy and can dynamically allocate memory so what does "unified memory" mean to you exactly? A wider bus would be nice but it's not exactly a groundbreaking new invention.

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

#95

Post by t-3 »

uejfiweun wrote: post #48
thephyber wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think we should use current prices as landmarks for large scale demand. That Studio’s current prices is inflated because of a (presumably) short term supply crunch, not because the average user is willing to pay $24k for a home AI inference device. It assumes that RAM remains supply constrained and that none of the existing RAM contracts are cut short. But Meta and xAI putting A TON of AI compute onto the mar…

What makes you think the supply crunch is short-term?

If the increased demand is not short term, production capacity will eventually increase. In the meantime, the logistics disruptions and industrial material shortages and energy inflation will disappear as soon as the wars disrupting them stop, which should bring prices down.

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

#96

Post by windex »

Sebastian_09 wrote: post #89

What I’m not sure to understand is that if you want to just run Claude code or openclaw type software with llm apis or subscriptions (and not run local models) to benefit from a local file system and always-on capability for ‘second brain’ type of workflows, I guess you don’t need a Mac mini but can run it on a raspberry pi or an old laptop ? Does anyone have experience with that ?

Yup, for openclaw and APIs you dont need a big PC. I run something lightweight on the RPI4 8gb. Many people run local LLMs which is where a mac is useful. Frankly I dont think you can beat the value of an openrouter subscription and API calls.

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

#97

Post by throw1234567891 »

Alpha3031 wrote: post #94
throw1234567891 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so you have invent unified memory for linux first because that’s the limitation today

Fairly sure most iGPUs these days are zero-copy and can dynamically allocate memory so what does "unified memory" mean to you exactly? A wider bus would be nice but it's not exactly a groundbreaking new invention.

I was actually pretty far off:

> Unified memory in Linux creates a single address space accessible to both the CPU and GPU, eliminating the need to manually copy data between system RAM and video memory. It is enabled via NVIDIA's CUDA, AMD's ROCm/HIP, or generic kernel-level Heterogeneous Memory Management (HMM).

So it does exist and is available for platforms that matter.

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

#98

Post by coffeekid »

Sebastian_09 wrote: post #89

What I’m not sure to understand is that if you want to just run Claude code or openclaw type software with llm apis or subscriptions (and not run local models) to benefit from a local file system and always-on capability for ‘second brain’ type of workflows, I guess you don’t need a Mac mini but can run it on a raspberry pi or an old laptop ? Does anyone have experience with that ?

Pretty much. Running a local harness calling an llm via APIs doesn't necessarily take a lot of resources. But whatever tasks you want that agent to do via tool calling will be limited by the resources of the machine it runs on if you run those locally, so that's what should inform your choice of specs in this case

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

#99

Post by dom3k »

Sebastian_09 wrote: post #89

What I’m not sure to understand is that if you want to just run Claude code or openclaw type software with llm apis or subscriptions (and not run local models) to benefit from a local file system and always-on capability for ‘second brain’ type of workflows, I guess you don’t need a Mac mini but can run it on a raspberry pi or an old laptop ? Does anyone have experience with that ?

...or any cheap VPS? I now do most of "second brain" things via pi harness with Opencode Go subscription, and it costs me like 20 bucks a year, with added benefit of "you can have tmux and open session realtime on whatever device".

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

#100

Post by not-a-llm »

IsTom wrote: post #54
uejfiweun wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think the supply crunch is short-term?

If demand doesn't fall down or current manufacturers supply go up, somebody (presumably in China) will spin up fabs. Apple wanted to use blacklisted Chinese RAM already.

where is this cheap Chinese RAM? I'd like to buy some
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