4 ms·

I wish articles would be more specific about the loads and use cases under which the new Macs shine versus are not much better than the old Intel macs. I thoug

I wish articles would be more specific about the loads and use cases under which the new Macs shine versus are not much better than the old Intel macs. I thought the main strengths distinguishing the performance of the M1 were the idle power chips that saved a lot of energy, and the shared CPU/GPU memory. For loads running flat out all the time and emphasizing GPU, the difference is not as great, I thought? Apple is still selling Macbooks with Intel inside. That cannot be just stupidity, right?

floatingatoll 6y ago
The article author seems to assume that Apple will steadily increase the performance of part or all of their entire product line in 2021 with Apple Silicon. Since Apple has been doing that with the iPhone for ten years, it’s quite reasonable to assume this will affect their laptop and desktop lines too. The first Apple Silicon release is better than nearly everything available from Intel. That same first release will likely be obsolete by the end of 2021, as Apple advances with M1X or M2. That annual obsolescence may well continue for the next ten years, too. So the used Apple laptop market is going to look a lot more like the used iPhone market - and in the used iPhone market, you get 15% of what you paid, not 85%, because there’s an endless supply of new phones forcing the used market down.
kleinsch 6y ago
The only reason they’re selling MacBooks with Intel is bc they haven’t updated the whole line yet. They did the entry level models for MacBook, Air, and mini. They’ll do the rest when they roll out the M1X (higher end first party chip) later this year to the rest of the line. Look up the performance stats, for loads running flat out or using GPU, M1 is insanely faster. People are replacing their two year old $5K top of the line MacBooks with an entry level M1 and seeing massive real world performance gains. That’s the point of this article - why would anyone pay $2-3K for a used 15” MacBook Pro that retailed for $5K in 2018 when they can buy an M1 that blows it out of the water brand new for half the price? There are still limiting factors (if you need ports, more RAM, etc) since these are entry level models, but the rumors about the next gen MBPs coming in H2 of this year sound like they’ll tackle those easily.
- rubicon33 6y ago
  Would you say it's worth waiting for the M1X if one hasn't already picked up an M1?
  - jurmous 6y ago
    M1X will be a lot faster with multicore loads. So if you are daily depending on heavy multi core payloads it will be worth the wait.
  - diebeforei485 6y ago
    I think the best reasons to wait are: - Needing support for more than one external monitor - Needing a larger screen - Needing more ports - Needing more RAM or more internal storage I don't think it's worth struggling with a slow computer until the end of the year if you'll eventually buy a "spec bump" of the current two-port M1 macbooks.
apozem 6y ago
> Apple is still selling Macbooks with Intel inside. That cannot be just stupidity, right? No, it just means the transition to ARM is not done. At WWDC they said it’ll take two years to convert the whole product line [1]. We are only a few months into that. Judging by the last couple years, the Apple HW ship turns slowly, but it does turn. Also, there’s no need to be so harsh. When other people do something you don’t understand, it’s bad to assume they’re stupid. They probably have reasons you don’t know about. [1]: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/this-is-apples-roadmap-for-moving-the-first-macs-away-from-intel/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/this-is-apples-roadm...
qbasic_forever 6y ago
It's not really about the raw speed or single core perf anymore. These M1 processors have huge caches and flat-out workloads can really scream on them. Apple engineers took a holistic approach to optimizing the processor for general computing workloads, and it shows.

floatingatoll 6y ago

The article author seems to assume that Apple will steadily increase the performance of part or all of their entire product line in 2021 with Apple Silicon. Since Apple has been doing that with the iPhone for ten years, it’s quite reasonable to assume this will affect their laptop and desktop lines too. The first Apple Silicon release is better than nearly everything available from Intel. That same first release will likely be obsolete by the end of 2021, as Apple advances with M1X or M2. That annual obsolescence may well continue for the next ten years, too. So the used Apple laptop market is going to look a lot more like the used iPhone market - and in the used iPhone market, you get 15% of what you paid, not 85%, because there’s an endless supply of new phones forcing the used market down.

kleinsch 6y ago

The only reason they’re selling MacBooks with Intel is bc they haven’t updated the whole line yet. They did the entry level models for MacBook, Air, and mini. They’ll do the rest when they roll out the M1X (higher end first party chip) later this year to the rest of the line. Look up the performance stats, for loads running flat out or using GPU, M1 is insanely faster. People are replacing their two year old $5K top of the line MacBooks with an entry level M1 and seeing massive real world performance gains. That’s the point of this article - why would anyone pay $2-3K for a used 15” MacBook Pro that retailed for $5K in 2018 when they can buy an M1 that blows it out of the water brand new for half the price? There are still limiting factors (if you need ports, more RAM, etc) since these are entry level models, but the rumors about the next gen MBPs coming in H2 of this year sound like they’ll tackle those easily.

rubicon33 6y ago
Would you say it's worth waiting for the M1X if one hasn't already picked up an M1?
- jurmous 6y ago
  M1X will be a lot faster with multicore loads. So if you are daily depending on heavy multi core payloads it will be worth the wait.
- diebeforei485 6y ago
  I think the best reasons to wait are: - Needing support for more than one external monitor - Needing a larger screen - Needing more ports - Needing more RAM or more internal storage I don't think it's worth struggling with a slow computer until the end of the year if you'll eventually buy a "spec bump" of the current two-port M1 macbooks.

apozem 6y ago

> Apple is still selling Macbooks with Intel inside. That cannot be just stupidity, right? No, it just means the transition to ARM is not done. At WWDC they said it’ll take two years to convert the whole product line [1]. We are only a few months into that. Judging by the last couple years, the Apple HW ship turns slowly, but it does turn. Also, there’s no need to be so harsh. When other people do something you don’t understand, it’s bad to assume they’re stupid. They probably have reasons you don’t know about. [1]: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/this-is-apples-roadmap-for-moving-the-first-macs-away-from-intel/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/this-is-apples-roadm...

qbasic_forever 6y ago

It's not really about the raw speed or single core perf anymore. These M1 processors have huge caches and flat-out workloads can really scream on them. Apple engineers took a holistic approach to optimizing the processor for general computing workloads, and it shows.