3 ms·
I shouldn't be surprised I guess, but I'm tired of seeing tech press make such ignorant articles re: tech. > this year's Kaby Lake You mean the processor whic
by jsjohnst 10y ago
I shouldn't be surprised I guess, but I'm tired of seeing tech press make such ignorant articles re: tech.
> this year's Kaby Lake
You mean the processor which was announced two months before the MBP? The one that isn't available in a mobile processor with quad cores?
> lack of 32gb RAM option
You mean the fact that Intel doesn't support LPDDR4 on Skylake (or even Kaby Lake until ~2018) mobile processors? So was Apple supposed to just switch to desktop class processors in their unrealistically thin laptops? Have you used a laptop with it, they typically run extraordinarily hot and have terrible battery life, even with laptops with twice the battery.
The real story that the new MacBook Pros reveal is that Intel is REALLY dropping the ball. If Apple thought they were ready to switch to ARM, my money is on they would've. The fact they didn't indicates to me that despite every effort, they couldn't yet (yet being the opporative word).
(Now waiting for the downvotes from the folks who'd rather be cry Apple has lost its way rather than actually think about what could be the reasons. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot to bash Apple for, but the above two aren't them)
- mercer 10y agoJust a nitpick, but it's Kaby Lake, not Kalby Lake. That is all.
- jsjohnst 10y agoThanks! Not sure how I typo'd twice when even A/C doesn't like the wrong spelling. (Edit: looking back on my posts here and elsewhere, seems I misspelled it more often than not, ugh)
- RotsiserMho 10y agoI'm pretty sure the mobile CPUs support at least 64GB of DDR3. So the memory subsystem would be desktop class but they could use the same mobile CPUs. Seems to me that might have been an option if they didn't also shrink the battery.
- jsjohnst 10y agoActually, they don't. Per the Intel data sheet [0], the Skylake mobile processors don't even support DDR3, they support DDR3L (lower power variant of DDR3), LPDDR3 (what the MacBook Pro uses), and DDR4. Here's the max system memory per memory type: DDR3L: 16gb (page 20) DDR4: 32gb (page 21) LPDDR3: 16gb (page 21) So the only way Apple could've supported more than 16gb RAM would've been to support DDR4. [1] I am far from an expert, but I believe DDR4 is only available in an SO-DIMM package [3]. Sure, we would all LOVE Apple to support upgradeable memory again, but that's very likely not going to happen. Just think how much thicker (teh horror!) the laptop would have to be to support that! [2] I also suspect that Apple is using the Y-processor line which only supports LPDDR3 memory (per page 19), so that further negates the ability to use DDR4 memory. Again, this part is unconfirmed, but would make sense. [0] http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www/public/us/en/documents/datasheets/6th-gen-core-family-mobile-u-y-processor-lines-datasheet-vol-1.pdf http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www/public/us/en/documents/... [1] I'm still curious how Intel claims the processor supports up to 64gb RAM on the short form of the processor specs. I could not find a configuration in the detailed data sheets that allowed 64gb of RAM. [2] (sarcasm intended there, obviously it could be easily thicker and most people wouldn't mind) Edit: [3] Seems I likely am wrong. DDR4 is supported in a "Memory Down" configuration as well. This would've allowed Apple to use DDR4 memory if they used a U-processor line and also used DDR4 memory. From what I am reading online (no official sources, so not linking to more speculation), this would've had a battery impact of up to 20%, thus very likely why Apple didn't do it. More info on "Memory Down" here: http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www/public/us/en/documents/white-papers/ia-system-memory-down-paper.pdf http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www/public/us/en/documents/...