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At this point does the hardware division really innovate that much ? There is significant improvement from the M4 to the M5, but how much of it is comes from T

At this point does the hardware division really innovate that much ? There is significant improvement from the M4 to the M5, but how much of it is comes from TSMC and how much from Apple ? They have exclusivity on the latest processes, so it's harder to compare with what Qualcomm or AMD is doing for instance, but right now Strix Halo is basically on par with the M3~4 developped on the same node density. On the other hardware parts, form factor has mostly stagnated, and the last big jump was the Vision Pro...

gsibble 11mo ago
I still think the future for the Vision Pro is very bright. I think this version is more to get developers working on applications for it. Spatial computing is a fascinating idea.
- makeitdouble 11mo ago
  It has a reasonable probability to get somewhere(that would require a lot of redesign, but they have th money to do so), but to be honest I wouldn't be happy with the most restrictive and closed ecosystem winning again in a new field. If it was by design excellence and truly providing a better proposition it would sweeten the pill, but as of now it would be only because the way better products are from a company everyone hates. In a weird way, Meta has been good at balancing hardware lockdown, and I'd see a better future with them leading the pack and allowing for better alternatives to come up along the way. Basically the same way the Quest allowed for exploration, and extended the PCVR market enough for it to survive up to this point. That wouldn't happen with Apple domining the field.
- adastra22 11mo ago
  In my own lived experience, every person I have met IRL who is dismissive of the Vision Pro has never actually used it seriously for more than a handful of minutes. People I know who have swear by spatial computing being the next UI/UX revolution. I own an AVP, and I agree. Now I bought it secondhand for half the price, so I acknowledge that necessarily means there is at least one counterparty out there who disagrees. Using the AVP for one work day, once I got the right fit and optical inserts, was such an eye opener. It’s like using an ultraportable laptop after living an entire life with large CRT monitors & desktop rigs tied to an actual desk. An experience, btw, which also lived through. It just radially opened my eyes to fresh new possibilities and interaction mechanisms I never before thought possible. But at $3.5k? No sane company exec could have been serious in thinking that would take off.
  - fastball 11mo ago
    My company-issued laptop isn't far off $3.5k. The tail end of AVP development and release was happening during the pandemic. I can absolutely imagine sane company execs who looked at the new remote work reality (at the time), and figured every single major enterprise would buy every one of their remote employees (all of them) an AVP.
    - makeitdouble 11mo ago
      I kinda hope someone would have the sanity to stop that. Zoom calls with mandatory camera on were already barbaric, asking employees to strap a headset for team meeting sounds like a generally cruel idea to me.
    - adastra22 11mo ago
      AVP is just the display monitor though. For work you’d need to use th Mac Virtual Display denature to connect it to a MacBook or something.
      - fastball 11mo ago
        An AVP is a fully-fledged computer. It has the same chip my Macbook Pro does.
        adastra22 11mo ago
        But you can't use it as one. It has a very small selection of native apps, and can of course run iPad apps in an emulation mode. That's it. Most of the people actually using it for daily work are using the Mac Virtual Display. I work on my couch or bed, touch typing on my MacBook while my entire vision is filled with a projected, wraparound virtual display. Immensely productive. But I'm basically coding on my MacBook while using a $3.5k external monitor, just in an unusual form factor.
al_borland 11mo ago
The Vision Pro was still pretty recent. They also refreshed the hardware designs of everything when moving to the M-series chips. They also made that new wireless chip recently, the chips for the headphones, and some for the Vision Pro. The camera in the iPhone also gets a lot of attention, which takes a lot of hardware engineering. In the iPhone more generally we saw fairly big changes just a month or so ago with the new Pro phone and the Air. The Pro models on the MacBook and iPad are almost as thin, if not more thin than the Air line, which I’m sure took a considerable amount of work, to the point of making the Air branding a little silly.
- makeitdouble 11mo ago
  The Vision Pro is a technical marvel, but as a hardware product it's uncomfortable (too heavy), bloated (useless front screen) and badly designed (straps are finally getting decent if we can trust the reviews). These decisions IMHO fall on the hardware team, and they're not doing a good job IMHO. Meta's hardware team is arguably pulling more weight, as much as we can hate Meta for being Meta. > headphones Here again, the reception wasn't that great. The most recent airPod Pro was a mixed bag, the airPod max had most of the flaws of the Vision Pro and they didn't learn anything from it. > camera The best smartphone cameras aren't the iPhone by far now, they're losing to the Chinese makers, but don't have to compete as the market is segmented. > MacBook and iPad are almost as thin I wouldn't put the relentless focus on thinness as a net positive though. All in all I'm not saying they're slacking, I'm arguing they lost the plot on many fronts and their product design is lagging behind in many ways. Apple will stay the top dog by sheer money (even just keeping TSMC in their pocket) and inertia, but I wouldn't be praising their teams as much as you do.

gsibble 11mo ago

I still think the future for the Vision Pro is very bright. I think this version is more to get developers working on applications for it. Spatial computing is a fascinating idea.

makeitdouble 11mo ago
It has a reasonable probability to get somewhere(that would require a lot of redesign, but they have th money to do so), but to be honest I wouldn't be happy with the most restrictive and closed ecosystem winning again in a new field. If it was by design excellence and truly providing a better proposition it would sweeten the pill, but as of now it would be only because the way better products are from a company everyone hates. In a weird way, Meta has been good at balancing hardware lockdown, and I'd see a better future with them leading the pack and allowing for better alternatives to come up along the way. Basically the same way the Quest allowed for exploration, and extended the PCVR market enough for it to survive up to this point. That wouldn't happen with Apple domining the field.
adastra22 11mo ago
In my own lived experience, every person I have met IRL who is dismissive of the Vision Pro has never actually used it seriously for more than a handful of minutes. People I know who have swear by spatial computing being the next UI/UX revolution. I own an AVP, and I agree. Now I bought it secondhand for half the price, so I acknowledge that necessarily means there is at least one counterparty out there who disagrees. Using the AVP for one work day, once I got the right fit and optical inserts, was such an eye opener. It’s like using an ultraportable laptop after living an entire life with large CRT monitors & desktop rigs tied to an actual desk. An experience, btw, which also lived through. It just radially opened my eyes to fresh new possibilities and interaction mechanisms I never before thought possible. But at $3.5k? No sane company exec could have been serious in thinking that would take off.
- fastball 11mo ago
  My company-issued laptop isn't far off $3.5k. The tail end of AVP development and release was happening during the pandemic. I can absolutely imagine sane company execs who looked at the new remote work reality (at the time), and figured every single major enterprise would buy every one of their remote employees (all of them) an AVP.
  - makeitdouble 11mo ago
    I kinda hope someone would have the sanity to stop that. Zoom calls with mandatory camera on were already barbaric, asking employees to strap a headset for team meeting sounds like a generally cruel idea to me.
  - adastra22 11mo ago
    AVP is just the display monitor though. For work you’d need to use th Mac Virtual Display denature to connect it to a MacBook or something.
    - fastball 11mo ago
      An AVP is a fully-fledged computer. It has the same chip my Macbook Pro does.
      - adastra22 11mo ago
        But you can't use it as one. It has a very small selection of native apps, and can of course run iPad apps in an emulation mode. That's it. Most of the people actually using it for daily work are using the Mac Virtual Display. I work on my couch or bed, touch typing on my MacBook while my entire vision is filled with a projected, wraparound virtual display. Immensely productive. But I'm basically coding on my MacBook while using a $3.5k external monitor, just in an unusual form factor.

al_borland 11mo ago

The Vision Pro was still pretty recent. They also refreshed the hardware designs of everything when moving to the M-series chips. They also made that new wireless chip recently, the chips for the headphones, and some for the Vision Pro. The camera in the iPhone also gets a lot of attention, which takes a lot of hardware engineering. In the iPhone more generally we saw fairly big changes just a month or so ago with the new Pro phone and the Air. The Pro models on the MacBook and iPad are almost as thin, if not more thin than the Air line, which I’m sure took a considerable amount of work, to the point of making the Air branding a little silly.

makeitdouble 11mo ago
The Vision Pro is a technical marvel, but as a hardware product it's uncomfortable (too heavy), bloated (useless front screen) and badly designed (straps are finally getting decent if we can trust the reviews). These decisions IMHO fall on the hardware team, and they're not doing a good job IMHO. Meta's hardware team is arguably pulling more weight, as much as we can hate Meta for being Meta. > headphones Here again, the reception wasn't that great. The most recent airPod Pro was a mixed bag, the airPod max had most of the flaws of the Vision Pro and they didn't learn anything from it. > camera The best smartphone cameras aren't the iPhone by far now, they're losing to the Chinese makers, but don't have to compete as the market is segmented. > MacBook and iPad are almost as thin I wouldn't put the relentless focus on thinness as a net positive though. All in all I'm not saying they're slacking, I'm arguing they lost the plot on many fronts and their product design is lagging behind in many ways. Apple will stay the top dog by sheer money (even just keeping TSMC in their pocket) and inertia, but I wouldn't be praising their teams as much as you do.