4 ms·

I honestly expected more. While compute performance and power efficiency seems to be really good, the M1 chip is apparently limited to 16GB RAM, 2TB storage and

I honestly expected more. While compute performance and power efficiency seems to be really good, the M1 chip is apparently limited to 16GB RAM, 2TB storage and 2 Thunderbolt/USB4 controllers. Comparing the new 13" MacBook Pro with the previous one that's a regression in every aspect as the Intel-based ones allow up to 32GB RAM and 4TB storage and offer 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports.

stcredzero 6y ago
While compute performance and power efficiency seems to be really good, the M1 chip is apparently limited to 16GB RAM, 2TB storage and 2 Thunderbolt/USB4 controllers. In other words, M1 is for the majority of consumers. - power efficiency - 16GB RAM - 2TB storage - 2 Thunderbolt/USB4 That looks like a really good feature set for ordinary consumers. My guess is that there's going to be 2 "Pro" variants for a high powered laptop and a professional workstation.
- beezle 6y ago
  Lets be honest - Apple has not really expanded its share of PC/Laptop market in a long time. Ordinary consumers are not going to care about this, especially with the Apple premium tacked on. I think combined it runs 10% +/- year to year variation.
  - billyhoffman 6y ago
    Be interesting to see what market share actually is now. Tim said at the beginning that 50% of Mac buyers were buying their first Mac. Apple’s quarter that just concluded at the end of Oct was massive for the Mac. $7.1B which is a 22% YoY growth. And 50% of those macs went to first time Mac buyers. That is insane growth in new users for a 36 year old product
- Dunedan 6y ago
  > My guess is that there's going to be 2 "Pro" variants for a high powered laptop and a professional workstation. My guess is that they'll introduce one other ARM-based chip for Macs in 2021, targeted at all remaining Macs (except for the Mac Pro). I believe the differences in performance can be achieved with a single chip simply by binning and different power envelopes. I expect (or rather I hope) that chip then supports at least 64GB of memory, 8TB of NVMe storage and 4 Thunderbolt 4 ports.
  - jmisavage 6y ago
    I'm thinking we might see a M1X which might add a couple cores to all the compute units in the SoC.
- zamadatix 6y ago
  If every model had the 16 GB I'd say it's a really good feature set for ordinary consumers but a new MacBook Pro having 8 GB of shared memory seems quite limiting even just for ordinary browsing. It's a great step but I think the 2nd gen of this is going to be what knocks it out of the park.
  - judge2020 6y ago
    Seems like Apple is relying on MacOS's (arguably good) memory compression and fast ssd swap performance to get high margins from the 8gb ram while still not cripping regular users' light workloads.
    - raihansaputra 6y ago
      I definitely feel like that's the case. I'm still on an 8GB 2015 MBP and it still works pretty well for multiple windows of Chrome + VSCode + node servers + spotify etc even at 1-4GB swap. The only thing that really bothers me is 4k performance and not being able to run multiple Docker containers (especially ones that needs a lot of RAM).
TazeTSchnitzel 6y ago
It's not a regression if you compare like with like: https://www.apple.com/mac/compare/?modelList=MacBookPro-13-M1,MacBookPro-13_2,MacBookPro-13_4 https://www.apple.com/mac/compare/?modelList=MacBookPro-13-M... (M1 “two ports” compared with Intel “two ports” and “four ports”) I assume there will be a “four ports“ Apple Silicon version down the road.
selsta 6y ago
They only upgraded the entry level Macs, as expected. The previous 2 port 13" MBP was also limited to 16GB RAM. The 4 port 13" MBP will most likely get upgraded early next year and also support more RAM. Apple did announce the transition will take them two years, not sure why people are surprised that their high end hardware is not updated yet on day one.
totalZero 6y ago
I don't think the devices' RAM is limited to 16GB by anything other than choice. Think about it. If you want to introduce a new architecture, you can sell a bunch of entry-level devices to pandemic-constrained consumers during the holiday season. Their take-up of the product will spur development and flesh out the software ecosystem for Apple Silicon devices. Once you cultivate the software ecosystem, more advanced users (professionals with very specific needs) can migrate toward the new architecture. They're basically using Christmas to slingshot the new chip into the mainstream.

stcredzero 6y ago

While compute performance and power efficiency seems to be really good, the M1 chip is apparently limited to 16GB RAM, 2TB storage and 2 Thunderbolt/USB4 controllers. In other words, M1 is for the majority of consumers. - power efficiency - 16GB RAM - 2TB storage - 2 Thunderbolt/USB4 That looks like a really good feature set for ordinary consumers. My guess is that there's going to be 2 "Pro" variants for a high powered laptop and a professional workstation.

beezle 6y ago
Lets be honest - Apple has not really expanded its share of PC/Laptop market in a long time. Ordinary consumers are not going to care about this, especially with the Apple premium tacked on. I think combined it runs 10% +/- year to year variation.
- billyhoffman 6y ago
  Be interesting to see what market share actually is now. Tim said at the beginning that 50% of Mac buyers were buying their first Mac. Apple’s quarter that just concluded at the end of Oct was massive for the Mac. $7.1B which is a 22% YoY growth. And 50% of those macs went to first time Mac buyers. That is insane growth in new users for a 36 year old product
Dunedan 6y ago
> My guess is that there's going to be 2 "Pro" variants for a high powered laptop and a professional workstation. My guess is that they'll introduce one other ARM-based chip for Macs in 2021, targeted at all remaining Macs (except for the Mac Pro). I believe the differences in performance can be achieved with a single chip simply by binning and different power envelopes. I expect (or rather I hope) that chip then supports at least 64GB of memory, 8TB of NVMe storage and 4 Thunderbolt 4 ports.
- jmisavage 6y ago
  I'm thinking we might see a M1X which might add a couple cores to all the compute units in the SoC.
zamadatix 6y ago
If every model had the 16 GB I'd say it's a really good feature set for ordinary consumers but a new MacBook Pro having 8 GB of shared memory seems quite limiting even just for ordinary browsing. It's a great step but I think the 2nd gen of this is going to be what knocks it out of the park.
- judge2020 6y ago
  Seems like Apple is relying on MacOS's (arguably good) memory compression and fast ssd swap performance to get high margins from the 8gb ram while still not cripping regular users' light workloads.
  - raihansaputra 6y ago
    I definitely feel like that's the case. I'm still on an 8GB 2015 MBP and it still works pretty well for multiple windows of Chrome + VSCode + node servers + spotify etc even at 1-4GB swap. The only thing that really bothers me is 4k performance and not being able to run multiple Docker containers (especially ones that needs a lot of RAM).

TazeTSchnitzel 6y ago

It's not a regression if you compare like with like: https://www.apple.com/mac/compare/?modelList=MacBookPro-13-M1,MacBookPro-13_2,MacBookPro-13_4 https://www.apple.com/mac/compare/?modelList=MacBookPro-13-M... (M1 “two ports” compared with Intel “two ports” and “four ports”) I assume there will be a “four ports“ Apple Silicon version down the road.

selsta 6y ago

They only upgraded the entry level Macs, as expected. The previous 2 port 13" MBP was also limited to 16GB RAM. The 4 port 13" MBP will most likely get upgraded early next year and also support more RAM. Apple did announce the transition will take them two years, not sure why people are surprised that their high end hardware is not updated yet on day one.

totalZero 6y ago

I don't think the devices' RAM is limited to 16GB by anything other than choice. Think about it. If you want to introduce a new architecture, you can sell a bunch of entry-level devices to pandemic-constrained consumers during the holiday season. Their take-up of the product will spur development and flesh out the software ecosystem for Apple Silicon devices. Once you cultivate the software ecosystem, more advanced users (professionals with very specific needs) can migrate toward the new architecture. They're basically using Christmas to slingshot the new chip into the mainstream.