5 ms·

Source for the A chips in Mac line-up?

butterthebuddha 7y ago
This from Feb 2019: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/apple-mac-arm-cpus-2020-intel,38668.html https://www.tomshardware.com/news/apple-mac-arm-cpus-2020-in...
mindfulhack 7y ago
Informative YT video covering the significance of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1hnTKrbq2I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1hnTKrbq2I
jeromegv 7y ago
None, pure guess.
- wtmt 7y ago
  With Apple’s secrecy, it may not be easy to get a source for certain product developments. But it’s a guess that one could wager on, since Apple values complete control over its design, components, etc. Relying on Intel, while a lot better than how it was relying on PowerPC, has forced Apple to work with Intel’s delayed schedules for newer processors and to wait for the right ones for different device classes (mobile vs. desktop). In the same vein that Apple is now working on designing and building its own modem chips (with the Qualcomm agreement being a stop gap thing), I’m sure (as are thousands of others) that Apple has been working on an ARM based Mac for some years. It’s just a matter of getting enough performance to use it on a low end MacBook and getting the related details on the software side (porting x64 apps to it with lesser effort) ironed out.
threeseed 7y ago
Lots of suspicion because of the move to force App Store apps to have Bitcode enabled for submission. This would allow them to potentially transpile x86 apps for ARM: https://lowlevelbits.org/bitcode-demystified/ https://lowlevelbits.org/bitcode-demystified/ Also as we've seen with iPad Pro + AWS M6G instances the performance is now there to power desktops.
- scarface74 7y ago
  This is not true. It would not allow them to transpile between architectures. This myth was dispelled by no less than Chris Lattner on ATP. Even though he did later admit that he wasn’t completely being honest. Part of the purpose of the bitcode requirement for the Watch was that Apple knew that they would be shipping a 64 bit chip for the Watch two years later. https://atp.fm/205-chris-lattner-interview-transcript https://atp.fm/205-chris-lattner-interview-transcript Bitcode is not [12:30] a magic solution, though. You can't take a 32-bit app, for example, and run it on a 64-bit device. That kind of portability isn’t something that Bitcode can give you, notably because that is something that's visible in C. As you're writing C code, you can write #ifdef pointer size equals 32, and that’s something that Bitcode can't abstract over. It's useful for very specific, low-level kinds of enhancements, but it isn't a panacea that makes everything [13:00] magically portable. John Siracusa: The same thing I would assume for architecture changes, especially if there was an endian difference, because endianness is visible from the C world, so you can't target different endianness? Chris Lattner: Yep. It's not something that magically solves all portability problems, but it is very useful for specific problems that Apple's faced in the past.
  - Rolcol 7y ago
    In the case of a Mac transition, applications would go from little-endian 64bit x86_64 to little-endian 64bit AArch64.
  - threeseed 7y ago
    All of the OSX apps are 64-bit. And ARM I believe has runtime-selectable endianness.
    - scarface74 7y ago
      He wasn’t saying that the only difficulty in using bitcode was translating from 32 bit to 64 bit and endianness but just thst was one of the issues.
- kristianp 7y ago
  On one hand, an ARM powered mac would increase Apple's profitability by not having to pay Intel for processors, on the other hand there's a. the disruption and confusion an architecture switch would cause, and b. Apple's lack of interest in the laptop platform relative to Ipad pro and mobile. Someone demoed transpiling bitcode to x86_64, it seems going the other direction wouldn't be a big problem, it's stock clang: https://www.highcaffeinecontent.com/blog/20190518-Translating-an-ARM-iOS-App-to-Intel-macOS-Using-Bitcode https://www.highcaffeinecontent.com/blog/20190518-Translatin...

This from Feb 2019: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/apple-mac-arm-cpus-2020-intel,38668.html https://www.tomshardware.com/news/apple-mac-arm-cpus-2020-in...

mindfulhack 7y ago

Informative YT video covering the significance of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1hnTKrbq2I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1hnTKrbq2I

jeromegv 7y ago

None, pure guess.

wtmt 7y ago
With Apple’s secrecy, it may not be easy to get a source for certain product developments. But it’s a guess that one could wager on, since Apple values complete control over its design, components, etc. Relying on Intel, while a lot better than how it was relying on PowerPC, has forced Apple to work with Intel’s delayed schedules for newer processors and to wait for the right ones for different device classes (mobile vs. desktop). In the same vein that Apple is now working on designing and building its own modem chips (with the Qualcomm agreement being a stop gap thing), I’m sure (as are thousands of others) that Apple has been working on an ARM based Mac for some years. It’s just a matter of getting enough performance to use it on a low end MacBook and getting the related details on the software side (porting x64 apps to it with lesser effort) ironed out.

threeseed 7y ago

Lots of suspicion because of the move to force App Store apps to have Bitcode enabled for submission. This would allow them to potentially transpile x86 apps for ARM: https://lowlevelbits.org/bitcode-demystified/ https://lowlevelbits.org/bitcode-demystified/ Also as we've seen with iPad Pro + AWS M6G instances the performance is now there to power desktops.

scarface74 7y ago
This is not true. It would not allow them to transpile between architectures. This myth was dispelled by no less than Chris Lattner on ATP. Even though he did later admit that he wasn’t completely being honest. Part of the purpose of the bitcode requirement for the Watch was that Apple knew that they would be shipping a 64 bit chip for the Watch two years later. https://atp.fm/205-chris-lattner-interview-transcript https://atp.fm/205-chris-lattner-interview-transcript Bitcode is not [12:30] a magic solution, though. You can't take a 32-bit app, for example, and run it on a 64-bit device. That kind of portability isn’t something that Bitcode can give you, notably because that is something that's visible in C. As you're writing C code, you can write #ifdef pointer size equals 32, and that’s something that Bitcode can't abstract over. It's useful for very specific, low-level kinds of enhancements, but it isn't a panacea that makes everything [13:00] magically portable. John Siracusa: The same thing I would assume for architecture changes, especially if there was an endian difference, because endianness is visible from the C world, so you can't target different endianness? Chris Lattner: Yep. It's not something that magically solves all portability problems, but it is very useful for specific problems that Apple's faced in the past.
- Rolcol 7y ago
  In the case of a Mac transition, applications would go from little-endian 64bit x86_64 to little-endian 64bit AArch64.
- threeseed 7y ago
  All of the OSX apps are 64-bit. And ARM I believe has runtime-selectable endianness.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    He wasn’t saying that the only difficulty in using bitcode was translating from 32 bit to 64 bit and endianness but just thst was one of the issues.
kristianp 7y ago
On one hand, an ARM powered mac would increase Apple's profitability by not having to pay Intel for processors, on the other hand there's a. the disruption and confusion an architecture switch would cause, and b. Apple's lack of interest in the laptop platform relative to Ipad pro and mobile. Someone demoed transpiling bitcode to x86_64, it seems going the other direction wouldn't be a big problem, it's stock clang: https://www.highcaffeinecontent.com/blog/20190518-Translating-an-ARM-iOS-App-to-Intel-macOS-Using-Bitcode https://www.highcaffeinecontent.com/blog/20190518-Translatin...