5 ms·

A sly comment I saw elsewhere was this gives them a nice bump they can use when the M4 is released and they go back to 4x4 Edit: my personal feeling is this is

A sly comment I saw elsewhere was this gives them a nice bump they can use when the M4 is released and they go back to 4x4 Edit: my personal feeling is this is just a cost savings they are doing like they did with the base SSDs

alwillis 3y ago
From someone who was briefed by Apple [1], this is Apple segmenting these processors. The M1 Pro and the M2 Pro were closer to their respective Max variants. With the M3 series, the M3 Pro is more of a mainstream processor vs. being closer to the M3 Max. [1]: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/upgrade/id918152703?i=1000633269988 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/upgrade/id918152703?i=...
- alberth 3y ago
  What’s strange about this strategy is it’s less cost effective because Apple is now designing a completely different Pro & Max chiplet, as opposed to just scaling up the base chiplet as done in the M1 & M2. This is a lot of extra complexity they are inflicting on themselves if accurate.
  - chii 3y ago
    > extra complexity if this extra complexity is mitigated by hiring a larger, separate team (rather than strain existing engineers), then they might win overall because of the customer segmentation.
  - 3c6bYDXLMj 3y ago
    I trust that Apple knows significantly more about the efficiency of their chip design process.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - Aaargh20318 3y ago
    > What’s strange about this strategy is it’s less cost effective because Apple is now designing a completely different Pro & Max chiplet That may be true for the M3, but they undoubtedly are already working on the M4 and M5; they may have bigger differences planned for future releases that require the Pro and Max designs to be separate. Could be that they are just doing the initial work to split the design into two branches for M3 so they can make more changes from M4 onwards.
    - cyanydeez 3y ago
      [flagged]
alberth 3y ago
Probably not because they will compare the M4 to the M2 (because M3 owners are less likely to upgrade).
- KeplerBoy 3y ago
  Oh come on. They will compare to whatever makes their product look good.
  - reroute22 3y ago
    They will compare to the generation of products that yields the largest expected number of potential buyers. The largest expected number of potential buyers equals "the probability of upgrading when properly advertised to" * (multiplied by) "the total number of macOS users currently owning the hardware of the generation in question". Where "the probability of upgrading when properly advertised to" depends on how big the jump is, not only in performance, but cumulatively with every other change made to the product. It also depends on how old it is as people are more likely to make another expensive purchase if the previous one was long time ago, just distributing financial burden over time. And where "the total number of macOS users currently owning the hardware of the generation in question" is merely measured as Apple has direct access to those statistics at any time. For instance, perhaps the probability that an M2 user will upgrade is only 10%, given how recently M2 released, and how small the difference between M2 based products (as a whole, not just performance of the SoC) and M3 based products is. And perhaps there is 10 million of M2 users. Expected number of potential buyers is 10M * 0.1 = 1M. Then perhaps the probability that an M1 user will upgrade is 30%. And perhaps there is 20 million of M1 users. Expected number of potential buyers is 20M * 0.3 = 6M. Then perhaps the probability that an Intel user will upgrade is 40%. And perhaps there is only 10M of Intel users. Expected number of potential buyers is 10M * 0.4 = 4M. Therefore: most focus is given to comparing to M1. Second tier amount of focus (only mention in speech occasionally, and show on charts) is given to comparisons with Intel. And third tier amount of focus is given to comparisons with M2 (never mention in speech, but do show on charts). Give 0 focus to anything else to keep the total amount of information presented manageable and avoid getting negative results by confusing and overloading people. There is nothing malicious here. Just practicality which in this case, dare I say, benefits not only Apple themselves, but their users as well: those who are most likely to feel the need to upgrade as is will receive the most direct and clear information on what they will get out of it.
bjoli 3y ago
I was downvoted to oblivion for suggesting that was the reason the last couple of years of intel MacBooks had botched thermal solutions. They were really indefensibly bad, but then again: the jump to m1 was enormous. I have a hard time feeling I was the only one conspiratorial enough to suggest something like that.
- znpy 3y ago
  Knowing how much apple exploits its users a d knowing how apple fanatics are willing to buy whatever and in retrospect… it makes perfect sense. I believe you.
  - 3c6bYDXLMj 3y ago
    Comments from someone that speaks as if they always expect the worst of Apple, telling everyone that they expect the worst of Apple, are a dime a dozen and do nothing to add to the conversation.
  - qeternity 3y ago
    Solid take, couldn't possibly be that you simply don't understand why people buy Apple. Everyone else is wrong.
- alpaca128 3y ago
  Three reasons that make me disagree: Firstly M1/M2 Macbooks don't have great cooling either. The Air models use basically nothing but a thin sheet of metal, maybe they'd run longer without throttling otherwise. Secondly Intel Macbooks had subpar cooling (and power delivery) much longer than the last couple of years. A video on YouTube shows more than doubled performance on a watercooled 2015 Macbook. And let's not forget that other manufacturers are sometimes even worse than Apple: Microsoft once sold a Surface Pro where the upgraded i7 version was slower than the model with i5 CPU because the cooling was so terrible! No, I don't see how that's more than a conspiracy theory. I am using an M2 Air right now and it has 2-3x better performance than my older i7 Thinkpad while being completely silent and running 3x longer on battery. Apple didn't have the need to pull any tricks.

alwillis 3y ago

From someone who was briefed by Apple [1], this is Apple segmenting these processors. The M1 Pro and the M2 Pro were closer to their respective Max variants. With the M3 series, the M3 Pro is more of a mainstream processor vs. being closer to the M3 Max. [1]: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/upgrade/id918152703?i=1000633269988 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/upgrade/id918152703?i=...

alberth 3y ago
What’s strange about this strategy is it’s less cost effective because Apple is now designing a completely different Pro & Max chiplet, as opposed to just scaling up the base chiplet as done in the M1 & M2. This is a lot of extra complexity they are inflicting on themselves if accurate.
- chii 3y ago
  > extra complexity if this extra complexity is mitigated by hiring a larger, separate team (rather than strain existing engineers), then they might win overall because of the customer segmentation.
- 3c6bYDXLMj 3y ago
  I trust that Apple knows significantly more about the efficiency of their chip design process.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- Aaargh20318 3y ago
  > What’s strange about this strategy is it’s less cost effective because Apple is now designing a completely different Pro & Max chiplet That may be true for the M3, but they undoubtedly are already working on the M4 and M5; they may have bigger differences planned for future releases that require the Pro and Max designs to be separate. Could be that they are just doing the initial work to split the design into two branches for M3 so they can make more changes from M4 onwards.
  - cyanydeez 3y ago
    [flagged]

alberth 3y ago

Probably not because they will compare the M4 to the M2 (because M3 owners are less likely to upgrade).

KeplerBoy 3y ago
Oh come on. They will compare to whatever makes their product look good.
- reroute22 3y ago
  They will compare to the generation of products that yields the largest expected number of potential buyers. The largest expected number of potential buyers equals "the probability of upgrading when properly advertised to" * (multiplied by) "the total number of macOS users currently owning the hardware of the generation in question". Where "the probability of upgrading when properly advertised to" depends on how big the jump is, not only in performance, but cumulatively with every other change made to the product. It also depends on how old it is as people are more likely to make another expensive purchase if the previous one was long time ago, just distributing financial burden over time. And where "the total number of macOS users currently owning the hardware of the generation in question" is merely measured as Apple has direct access to those statistics at any time. For instance, perhaps the probability that an M2 user will upgrade is only 10%, given how recently M2 released, and how small the difference between M2 based products (as a whole, not just performance of the SoC) and M3 based products is. And perhaps there is 10 million of M2 users. Expected number of potential buyers is 10M * 0.1 = 1M. Then perhaps the probability that an M1 user will upgrade is 30%. And perhaps there is 20 million of M1 users. Expected number of potential buyers is 20M * 0.3 = 6M. Then perhaps the probability that an Intel user will upgrade is 40%. And perhaps there is only 10M of Intel users. Expected number of potential buyers is 10M * 0.4 = 4M. Therefore: most focus is given to comparing to M1. Second tier amount of focus (only mention in speech occasionally, and show on charts) is given to comparisons with Intel. And third tier amount of focus is given to comparisons with M2 (never mention in speech, but do show on charts). Give 0 focus to anything else to keep the total amount of information presented manageable and avoid getting negative results by confusing and overloading people. There is nothing malicious here. Just practicality which in this case, dare I say, benefits not only Apple themselves, but their users as well: those who are most likely to feel the need to upgrade as is will receive the most direct and clear information on what they will get out of it.

bjoli 3y ago

I was downvoted to oblivion for suggesting that was the reason the last couple of years of intel MacBooks had botched thermal solutions. They were really indefensibly bad, but then again: the jump to m1 was enormous. I have a hard time feeling I was the only one conspiratorial enough to suggest something like that.

znpy 3y ago
Knowing how much apple exploits its users a d knowing how apple fanatics are willing to buy whatever and in retrospect… it makes perfect sense. I believe you.
- 3c6bYDXLMj 3y ago
  Comments from someone that speaks as if they always expect the worst of Apple, telling everyone that they expect the worst of Apple, are a dime a dozen and do nothing to add to the conversation.
- qeternity 3y ago
  Solid take, couldn't possibly be that you simply don't understand why people buy Apple. Everyone else is wrong.
alpaca128 3y ago
Three reasons that make me disagree: Firstly M1/M2 Macbooks don't have great cooling either. The Air models use basically nothing but a thin sheet of metal, maybe they'd run longer without throttling otherwise. Secondly Intel Macbooks had subpar cooling (and power delivery) much longer than the last couple of years. A video on YouTube shows more than doubled performance on a watercooled 2015 Macbook. And let's not forget that other manufacturers are sometimes even worse than Apple: Microsoft once sold a Surface Pro where the upgraded i7 version was slower than the model with i5 CPU because the cooling was so terrible! No, I don't see how that's more than a conspiracy theory. I am using an M2 Air right now and it has 2-3x better performance than my older i7 Thinkpad while being completely silent and running 3x longer on battery. Apple didn't have the need to pull any tricks.