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This is speculation, but I’m betting that we will see a GPU-backed external display (sort of an iMac minus the Mac) sometime in the next year. Apple never build

This is speculation, but I’m betting that we will see a GPU-backed external display (sort of an iMac minus the Mac) sometime in the next year. Apple never builds out support like this unless they plan on having a product to sell. And they seem to generally "dislike" putting discrete GPUs in laptops, going all the way back to the Titanium G4 days.

solarkraft 9y ago
While I find your prediction very plausible I could also imagine them just wanting to support 3rd party accessories.
Alex3917 9y ago
> Apple never builds out support like this unless they plan on having a product to sell. Developers have been starting to leave the platform because there aren't any MBPs that can be used to create VR content. While I agree that they will likely release something, their hand was also forced here.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  Not all developers care about VR, and Apple OS never were much relevant on CAD or gaming development anyway, other than those targeting iOS devices. For those devices, even current hardware is good enough. It is no point being able to produce VR with a level of detail that an iPhone is not able to cope with.
  - mietek 9y ago
    > Apple OS never were much relevant on CAD “Development of ArchiCAD started in 1982 for the original Apple Macintosh.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ArchiCAD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ArchiCAD
    - pjmlp 9y ago
      Relevant in money, market share, not what started on the Mac. Excel was also released initially on the Mac.
      - walshemj 9y ago
        And well before that viscalc was a big selling point for Apple ][ 's back in the day.
- jimmcslim 9y ago
  > Developers have been starting to leave the platform because there aren't any MBPs that can be used to create VR content. Developers have also been leaving the platform because they can’t buy a Mac laptop with physical function keys without making other performance sacrifices.
giobox 9y ago
It could happen, but from Apple's own announcements it seems like they were worried that the Mac was increasingly marginalized as a platform for AR/VR development, which Tim Cook constantly tells us (for AR at least...) is something he's super excited about for the future of computing. Not arguing this is the sole reason, but it definitely seems like a feature to cover high end edge cases like this for the time being. Much of Apple's own discussions on the eGPU feature at WWDC/the marketing blurb for their own eGPU devkit refer to VR a lot too. Apple added VR support to Final Cut Pro at roughly the same time as well. > And they seem to generally "dislike" putting discrete GPUs in laptops, going all the way back to the Titanium G4 days. Not so sure I'd agree with this - every single Titanium PowerBook model ever made had a discrete GPU. Even the iBooks had dedicated GPUs. It wasn't until the adoption of Intel processors that integrated GPUs was even an option for Apple really.
- aphextron 9y ago
  >It could happen, but from Apple's own announcements it seems like they were worried that the Mac was increasingly marginalized as a platform for AR/VR development, which Tim Cook constantly tells us (for AR at least...) is something he's super excited about for the future of computing. Because it is. High end AR/VR is exclusively DirectX Wintel 64 based. There's pretty much no exception except for the toy implementation of things like Samsung Gear. Google abandoned Tango, and Daydream is on life support. Apple's ecosystem will remain irrelevant until they release their own hardware.
  - giobox 9y ago
    For software sure. VR video content production is still a thing as well though, and plenty of video creators use Apple platforms. I imagine it was no accident FCP gained VR support shortly after the eGPU support announcement.
  - robotresearcher 9y ago
    The iPhone is their AR hardware.
    - 9y ago
zitterbewegung 9y ago
Nah , I think this is one of the best solutions as is. I have a MacBook Pro 13 that I carry around with me for software development. I also have a basic AMD 2600 G setup with a GTX650 for gaming . I only game at home or do deep learning. These thunderbolt systems do exactly what I want . Get rid of the need for an extra computer . I am thinking of selling the system and then buying one of the recommended systems .
- jsgo 9y ago
  This. My hope when I saw the Surface Pro 3 was that the middling eGPU (Thunderbolt 2) thing going on with Macbook Pros would eventually make its way to the Surface Pro line where the Surface pro essentially becomes a hub and it could be the tablet/gaming console-pc/desktop I had hoped. At this point, I'm just waiting on an updated MacBook Pro 15in (ready to buy in again, but too far into the current MBP product cycle. Might as well wait it out) and that Sonnet box and calling it a day.
- TheRealDunkirk 9y ago
  I bought a dev kit when they became available, hoping to move my gaming from my 10-year-old PC to my 15" MBPr. What I figured out was that, despite the graphics performance being great, I was still hampered by the fact that the AAA games available on the Mac are still just Windows ports. Civ V and VI ran smooth to scroll around the screen, even at high detail and resolution, but actually performing the actions, and waiting for the computer to process the AI players' turns, was abysmal. Against everything I hold right and proper, I installed Windows 10 with Boot Camp. I only ever got the external display to work once, and couldn't repeat it. I wound up just moving the RX580 to my aging PC as an upgrade. I REALLY want to live in this world, but it's going to take natively-developed games to get there. But hey, they're coming. I'm buying them, and, often, not even playing them; just trying to send the message.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
JumpCrisscross 9y ago
> I’m betting that we will see a GPU-backed external display Does iOS show any signs of supporting external GPUs?
ris58h 9y ago
It would be great! My question is: Is it possible to have a GPU-backed external display and charge the laptop simultaneously with one wire?
- dijit 9y ago
  Since thats the case today with eGPU thunderbolt 3 docks I would assume so.
- josephg 9y ago
  Yes. I do exactly this today with a 1080ti in an Akitio Node Pro. Unfortunately NVIDIA cards still aren’t supported properly though, so my laptop crashes if I pull the thunderbolt cable out. I’m hoping this stuff gets ironed out over the next year or two - it’s a great solution otherwise.
saudioger 9y ago
aren't they completely out of the stand-alone display business now?
- bhj 9y ago
  Not for long, probably thanks in part to the total shitshow that was/is LG's TB3 display. "As part of doing a new Mac Pro — it is, by definition, a modular system — we will be doing a pro display as well. Now you won’t see any of those products this year [2017]; we’re in the process of that. We think it’s really important to create something great for our pro customers who want a Mac Pro modular system, and that’ll take longer than this year to do." https://daringfireball.net/2017/04/the_mac_pro_lives https://daringfireball.net/2017/04/the_mac_pro_lives
pvg 9y ago
they seem to generally "dislike" putting discrete GPUs in laptops, going all the way back to the Titanium G4 days. The Tibook g4 had a discrete GPU. Not having one wasn't even an option until Intel's integrated doodads got good enough.
hengheng 9y ago
I've been making the same guess for years now. Ever since hwtools (supplier of expresscard/mini pcie breakout boards) said they were not allowed to release a thunderbolt version, it was clear to me that this generation, the dma-exposing peripheral interface was finally meant for external graphics processing. And who, oh who could be the prime customer? ... Who seems to have the slowest product pipeline in the world, blocking technology adoption for years? Not too many candidates :)
savoytruffle 9y ago
PowerPC Macs never had "integrated" GPU's. If they didn't have a discrete chip they just had a dumb frame buffer.
phodo 9y ago
Or an Augmented Reality / Vr headset with AirPods support.
pryce 9y ago
In many ways, the display is a more sensible place for it. This could be a good thing long as they make the GPU component replaceable. There is such a high difference between the expected lifespan of an upmarket display and a performant GPU.

solarkraft 9y ago

While I find your prediction very plausible I could also imagine them just wanting to support 3rd party accessories.

Alex3917 9y ago

> Apple never builds out support like this unless they plan on having a product to sell. Developers have been starting to leave the platform because there aren't any MBPs that can be used to create VR content. While I agree that they will likely release something, their hand was also forced here.

pjmlp 9y ago
Not all developers care about VR, and Apple OS never were much relevant on CAD or gaming development anyway, other than those targeting iOS devices. For those devices, even current hardware is good enough. It is no point being able to produce VR with a level of detail that an iPhone is not able to cope with.
- mietek 9y ago
  > Apple OS never were much relevant on CAD “Development of ArchiCAD started in 1982 for the original Apple Macintosh.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ArchiCAD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ArchiCAD
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    Relevant in money, market share, not what started on the Mac. Excel was also released initially on the Mac.
    - walshemj 9y ago
      And well before that viscalc was a big selling point for Apple ][ 's back in the day.
jimmcslim 9y ago
> Developers have been starting to leave the platform because there aren't any MBPs that can be used to create VR content. Developers have also been leaving the platform because they can’t buy a Mac laptop with physical function keys without making other performance sacrifices.

giobox 9y ago

It could happen, but from Apple's own announcements it seems like they were worried that the Mac was increasingly marginalized as a platform for AR/VR development, which Tim Cook constantly tells us (for AR at least...) is something he's super excited about for the future of computing. Not arguing this is the sole reason, but it definitely seems like a feature to cover high end edge cases like this for the time being. Much of Apple's own discussions on the eGPU feature at WWDC/the marketing blurb for their own eGPU devkit refer to VR a lot too. Apple added VR support to Final Cut Pro at roughly the same time as well. > And they seem to generally "dislike" putting discrete GPUs in laptops, going all the way back to the Titanium G4 days. Not so sure I'd agree with this - every single Titanium PowerBook model ever made had a discrete GPU. Even the iBooks had dedicated GPUs. It wasn't until the adoption of Intel processors that integrated GPUs was even an option for Apple really.

aphextron 9y ago
>It could happen, but from Apple's own announcements it seems like they were worried that the Mac was increasingly marginalized as a platform for AR/VR development, which Tim Cook constantly tells us (for AR at least...) is something he's super excited about for the future of computing. Because it is. High end AR/VR is exclusively DirectX Wintel 64 based. There's pretty much no exception except for the toy implementation of things like Samsung Gear. Google abandoned Tango, and Daydream is on life support. Apple's ecosystem will remain irrelevant until they release their own hardware.
- giobox 9y ago
  For software sure. VR video content production is still a thing as well though, and plenty of video creators use Apple platforms. I imagine it was no accident FCP gained VR support shortly after the eGPU support announcement.
- robotresearcher 9y ago
  The iPhone is their AR hardware.
  - 9y ago

zitterbewegung 9y ago

Nah , I think this is one of the best solutions as is. I have a MacBook Pro 13 that I carry around with me for software development. I also have a basic AMD 2600 G setup with a GTX650 for gaming . I only game at home or do deep learning. These thunderbolt systems do exactly what I want . Get rid of the need for an extra computer . I am thinking of selling the system and then buying one of the recommended systems .

jsgo 9y ago
This. My hope when I saw the Surface Pro 3 was that the middling eGPU (Thunderbolt 2) thing going on with Macbook Pros would eventually make its way to the Surface Pro line where the Surface pro essentially becomes a hub and it could be the tablet/gaming console-pc/desktop I had hoped. At this point, I'm just waiting on an updated MacBook Pro 15in (ready to buy in again, but too far into the current MBP product cycle. Might as well wait it out) and that Sonnet box and calling it a day.
TheRealDunkirk 9y ago
I bought a dev kit when they became available, hoping to move my gaming from my 10-year-old PC to my 15" MBPr. What I figured out was that, despite the graphics performance being great, I was still hampered by the fact that the AAA games available on the Mac are still just Windows ports. Civ V and VI ran smooth to scroll around the screen, even at high detail and resolution, but actually performing the actions, and waiting for the computer to process the AI players' turns, was abysmal. Against everything I hold right and proper, I installed Windows 10 with Boot Camp. I only ever got the external display to work once, and couldn't repeat it. I wound up just moving the RX580 to my aging PC as an upgrade. I REALLY want to live in this world, but it's going to take natively-developed games to get there. But hey, they're coming. I'm buying them, and, often, not even playing them; just trying to send the message.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]

JumpCrisscross 9y ago

> I’m betting that we will see a GPU-backed external display Does iOS show any signs of supporting external GPUs?

ris58h 9y ago

It would be great! My question is: Is it possible to have a GPU-backed external display and charge the laptop simultaneously with one wire?

dijit 9y ago
Since thats the case today with eGPU thunderbolt 3 docks I would assume so.
josephg 9y ago
Yes. I do exactly this today with a 1080ti in an Akitio Node Pro. Unfortunately NVIDIA cards still aren’t supported properly though, so my laptop crashes if I pull the thunderbolt cable out. I’m hoping this stuff gets ironed out over the next year or two - it’s a great solution otherwise.

saudioger 9y ago

aren't they completely out of the stand-alone display business now?

bhj 9y ago
Not for long, probably thanks in part to the total shitshow that was/is LG's TB3 display. "As part of doing a new Mac Pro — it is, by definition, a modular system — we will be doing a pro display as well. Now you won’t see any of those products this year [2017]; we’re in the process of that. We think it’s really important to create something great for our pro customers who want a Mac Pro modular system, and that’ll take longer than this year to do." https://daringfireball.net/2017/04/the_mac_pro_lives https://daringfireball.net/2017/04/the_mac_pro_lives

pvg 9y ago

they seem to generally "dislike" putting discrete GPUs in laptops, going all the way back to the Titanium G4 days. The Tibook g4 had a discrete GPU. Not having one wasn't even an option until Intel's integrated doodads got good enough.

hengheng 9y ago

I've been making the same guess for years now. Ever since hwtools (supplier of expresscard/mini pcie breakout boards) said they were not allowed to release a thunderbolt version, it was clear to me that this generation, the dma-exposing peripheral interface was finally meant for external graphics processing. And who, oh who could be the prime customer? ... Who seems to have the slowest product pipeline in the world, blocking technology adoption for years? Not too many candidates :)

savoytruffle 9y ago

PowerPC Macs never had "integrated" GPU's. If they didn't have a discrete chip they just had a dumb frame buffer.

phodo 9y ago

Or an Augmented Reality / Vr headset with AirPods support.

pryce 9y ago

In many ways, the display is a more sensible place for it. This could be a good thing long as they make the GPU component replaceable. There is such a high difference between the expected lifespan of an upmarket display and a performant GPU.