Riding on the Success of the M1, Apple Readies 32-core Chip for High-end Macs

So when is Mac getting CyberPunk 2077? Say what you want but if the game isn't being natively ported to a Mac then that's because Apple doesn't make their laptops powerful enough on average to play their game.

Weird, it's running just fine on my Mac (other than half of the NPCs copping a Jesus pose randomly).
 
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Weird, it's running just fine on my Mac (other than half of the NPCs copping a Jesus pose randomly).
Are you cheating using your eGPU?
also how much was your setup again? (Macbook + eGPU)

I'm guessing $3600 for that 13inch plus whatever GPU you got and maybe add $200 For the eGPU dock
 
So when is mobile getting CyberPunk 2077?

I hate to break it to you, but... not everyone cares about "AAA" PC titles. There are different kinds of games for different kinds of gamers.

How easy does Apple make it again?

So easy that people probably don't even realize they are making backups?

Not saying your wrong but it is able to be done. Then again so is repairing the ram on a 2012 Macbook Air. Wanna see?

Er, what does this prove? That some people can/will go to extreme lengths to modify and/or repair hardware? Yes, but, this is [H], we knew that already. The point wasn't that it was impossible, just that it was significantly more difficult than backing up to iCloud.

So when is Mac getting CyberPunk 2077? Say what you want but if the game isn't being natively ported to a Mac then that's because Apple doesn't make their laptops powerful enough on average to play their game. It's not like Apple doesn't have enough market share to justify it. Think a 32 Core Apple ARM can handle it with it's built in GPU?

Well, since we have no idea what Apple's GPU will look like at the high end, I'll just say, sure, I think whatever they put together for a high end system with 32 cores will be able to play "AAA" PC games.

And again, you're just dismissing entire segments of the market to feed your narrative.

HDD: MP-only 50 GB, 175 GB for all game modes How's that 256GB drive holding up on the Apple M1? You probably won't run it at Ultra settings but then again you can't either.

ugh, you've resorted wccftech links. I can't argue with that, they're always so spot-on, they must know more than the actual call of duty website.

Though, I have no idea what you're on about now. I thought we were talking about the consoles and their SSDs?

Better hardware means bigger textures and larger disk space. As much talk as I've heard for the Sony PS5 SSD rabble about the magic of the PS5 SSD, none of it came true. Games from now on will get much larger and therefore more demanding on disk storage. Call of Duty won't be the only game. Apple putting in a 256GB SSD for $1.3k is a joke for gaming. Perfectly fine for web browsing but not gaming.

So we're talking about consoles AND Mac systems now, okay. I'm glad the topic is now two things you don't like because they're not high-end Windows gaming PCs.

But you've got your answer there already, you just said it - no one is going to buy a Mac Mini (which is $700 with a 256GB SSD, I again have no idea where you're getting this $1300 figure from) for high end PC gaming. Because it's not a high end PC, it's a $700 Mac that will probably be used for web browsing and casual app store type games (of which plenty will fit on a 256GB SSD just fine).

What is the actual point you are trying to make? Try to distill it into like three sentences. Here's mine:

Apple makes some things easier for their users and the tradeoff is the loss of repairability/upgradability. And they can do this because, as it turns out, most of their users don't actually care. And believe it or not, most of the technology-buying public doesn't care either.

This is not something you should take personally. It also has nothing to do with a rumor about Apple (expectedly) working on a bigger version of their M1 to use in higher-end Mac systems.
 
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You don't have a zfs server that's has 3 cold storage backups in different geographic regions along with 3 cloud backups for your 20 years worth of tax returns and random documents? Doesn't everyone?
And all of them offline, as well as rotating USB HDD’s for the end of every month.

seriously though I am legally required to keep pension data for 99 years and routinely have to fend off crypto attacks. Haven’t had one stick yet.... but they will get me eventually. Then I will see how good my backups actually are.
 
I seriously doubt that Apple could come up with a GPU powerful enough to run cyberpunk at acceptable settings and framerate, unless it has GDDR6 or HBM2 on the chip... The GPU would also have to be separate from the CPU or else the die would be too monstrous!
 
I seriously doubt that Apple could come up with a GPU powerful enough to run cyberpunk at acceptable settings and framerate, unless it has GDDR6 or HBM2 on the chip... The GPU would also have to be separate from the CPU or else the die would be too monstrous!
Reports have Apple developing up to 32-core GPUs for MacBook Pros and iMacs, and up to 128-core GPUs for high-end desktops (Mac Pro and maybe iMac Pro). Don't know how well Apple's tech scales, but given that even an eight-core GPU in a MacBook Air is better than Intel's integrated Xe, that might be a good sign.

The tricky part is the feature support. Can Apple do hardware ray tracing on a level that competes with AMD or NVIDIA? How about something equivalent to DLSS? I wouldn't rule it out given that Apple has lots of expertise (and the money to hire the experts it needs), but there's still a lot we don't know.

As it stands, it feels like there's a certain myopia on display here — this tendency for hardcore PC gamers to assume a computer can only be good if it caters to hardcore PC gamers. It would be great for Apple to 'get' PC gaming, but it's aiming at a general audience. High-end gaming represents a tiny fraction of the PC market. I'm sure Apple would rather cater to a broader crowd (those who can spend at least $700, anyway) than a small subset of people who often have an Anything But Apple chip on their shoulder to start with.
 
Reports have Apple developing up to 32-core GPUs for MacBook Pros and iMacs, and up to 128-core GPUs for high-end desktops (Mac Pro and maybe iMac Pro). Don't know how well Apple's tech scales, but given that even an eight-core GPU in a MacBook Air is better than Intel's integrated Xe, that might be a good sign.

The tricky part is the feature support. Can Apple do hardware ray tracing on a level that competes with AMD or NVIDIA? How about something equivalent to DLSS? I wouldn't rule it out given that Apple has lots of expertise (and the money to hire the experts it needs), but there's still a lot we don't know.

As it stands, it feels like there's a certain myopia on display here — this tendency for hardcore PC gamers to assume a computer can only be good if it caters to hardcore PC gamers. It would be great for Apple to 'get' PC gaming, but it's aiming at a general audience. High-end gaming represents a tiny fraction of the PC market. I'm sure Apple would rather cater to a broader crowd (those who can spend at least $700, anyway) than a small subset of people who often have an Anything But Apple chip on their shoulder to start with.
GPUs need memory bandwidth, there's no getting around that. Even the GPU with the most "efficient" mem bandwidth usage that's high end is the 6900xt which has 500+ GB/sec and competes with the 3090 which has about 1TB/sec. System DDR4 RAM is not going to cut it, they need GDDR6 or better to come up with a fast GPU. Its hard to believe that their first high end GPU would compete with AMD/Nvidia's top dogs...
Also, being slightly faster than Intel iGPUs has never been considered a "great accomplishment", although that's starting to change with Xe.
 
Its hard to believe that their first high end GPU would compete with AMD/Nvidia's top dogs... Also, being slightly faster than Intel iGPUs has never been considered a "great accomplishment", although that's starting to change with Xe.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/16252/mac-mini-apple-m1-tested/3

Ultimately, these benchmarks are very solid proof that the M1’s integrated GPU is going to live up to Apple’s reputation for high-performing GPUs. The first Apple-built GPU for a Mac is significantly faster than any integrated GPU we’ve been able to get our hands on, and will no doubt set a new high bar for GPU performance in a laptop. Based on Apple’s own die shots, it’s clear that they spent a sizable portion of the M1’s die on the GPU and associated hardware, and the payoff is a GPU that can rival even low-end discrete GPUs.

Anyone believing that the Apple GPU will not scale up and will compete with the best that Nvidia and AMD can offer, must be fooling himself.
 
https://www.anandtech.com/show/16252/mac-mini-apple-m1-tested/3



Anyone believing that the Apple GPU will not scale up and will compete with the best that Nvidia and AMD can offer, must be fooling himself.
I mean "rivaling low-end discrete GPUs" is a pretty good accomplishment, but they have yet to build anything fast enough for the high end.
Also if you just "scale up" the GPU cores, you will hit a major bottleneck with using DDR4 System RAM (Surely Apple knows this).
Is there an ARM SOC using a GPU with GDDR6 or HBM2? I'm sure there is, but I don't think Apple has done one yet.
 
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I mean "rivaling low-end discrete GPUs" is a pretty good accomplishment, but they have yet to build anything fast enough for the high end.
Also if you just "scale up" the GPU cores, you will hit a major bottleneck with using DDR4 System RAM (Surely Apple knows this).
Is there an ARM SOC using a GPU with GDDR6 or HBM2? I'm sure there is, but I don't think Apple has done one yet.
I think this is a fair point, however we should also consider that having unified on-die CPU and GPU memory may offset some (or much?) of the delta.
 
I think this is a fair point, however we should also consider that having unified on-die CPU and GPU memory may offset some (or much?) of the delta.
Like AMD's "Infinity Cache".
I wouldn't be surprised to see that used in AMD's APUs with RDNA2.
That will MASSIVELY help their iGPU's performance.
Now question, would any other company be able to use such something like it? or would it be considered "patent infringement"?
Cause to me, it just seems like a L4 cache... Like what Intel did at one point...
 
I mean "rivaling low-end discrete GPUs" is a pretty good accomplishment, but they have yet to build anything fast enough for the high end.
Also if you just "scale up" the GPU cores, you will hit a major bottleneck with using DDR4 System RAM (Surely Apple knows this).
Is there an ARM SOC using a GPU with GDDR6 or HBM2? I'm sure there is, but I don't think Apple has done one yet.

As mentioned before, Apple is preparing a high-end GPU. Fujitsu is using HBM2 in its CPU. I don't know what technology will use Apple.
 
As mentioned before, Apple is preparing a high-end GPU. Fujitsu is using HBM2 in its CPU. I don't know what technology will use Apple.
It's no secret that Apple doesn't like how little documentation AMD has on their hardware and it given how much customization Apple does to their hardware on a firmware and software level not having access to the information they want is probably something that irks them to a small degree. So them wanting to move off AMD for their high-end stuff comes as no surprise. That and those custom cards AMD did up for Apple for their high-end workstations apparently not only sold well but Apple has a very hard time getting more of or replacements too
 
Are you cheating using your eGPU?
also how much was your setup again? (Macbook + eGPU)

I'm guessing $3600 for that 13inch plus whatever GPU you got and maybe add $200 For the eGPU dock

LMAO, using a GPU is cheating?

First of all, let's put the price issue to rest:

Dell XPS 13
Core I7 processor
32GB Ram
2TB SSD
3yrs accidental damage

$2998.99

Macbook Pro 13
Core I7 processor
32GB Ram
2TB SSD
3yrs Applecare+ with Accidental Damage

$3048

Great, so we established that Apples to Apples, they are the same price. And Dell doesn't offer a 4TB SSD option (which Apple does) or 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports.

Now, let's talk about your hilarious statement that "Are you cheating using a GPU?"

LMAO, no shit I'm using an eGPU. That's part of the feature-set that both Mac and Dell offer. It's not "cheating" any more than using a GPU in a desktop computer is - good luck playing Cyberpunk on your desktop with Intel Integrated graphics.

So yeah - Cyberpunk works great on my Mac, and it's the exact same price as if I played it on a Dell XPS 13.
 
LMAO, using a GPU is cheating?

First of all, let's put the price issue to rest:

Dell XPS 13
Core I7 processor
32GB Ram
2TB SSD
3yrs accidental damage

$2998.99

Macbook Pro 13
Core I7 processor
32GB Ram
2TB SSD
3yrs Applecare+ with Accidental Damage

$3048

Great, so we established that Apples to Apples, they are the same price. And Dell doesn't offer a 4TB SSD option (which Apple does) or 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports.

Now, let's talk about your hilarious statement that "Are you cheating using a GPU?"

LMAO, no shit I'm using an eGPU. That's part of the feature-set that both Mac and Dell offer. It's not "cheating" any more than using a GPU in a desktop computer is - good luck playing Cyberpunk on your desktop with Intel Integrated graphics.

So yeah - Cyberpunk works great on my Mac, and it's the exact same price as if I played it on a Dell XPS 13.
I was more being funny adding that eGPU bit, but I failed to realize that text isn't good for expressing that tone. My bad there.

I do have one complaint, the ultrabook style laptop just seems like a terrible value no matter the brand. At that point it just seems like a tablet with a keyboard, with the specs of a year old base model gaming laptop, but with the price of a desktop built with the latest near flagship hardware...
At least you actually use everything that it's good at... Most people would just use it for Word docs, reading emails, and powerpoints
 
I was more being funny adding that eGPU bit, but I failed to realize that text isn't good for expressing that tone. My bad there.

I do have one complaint, the ultrabook style laptop just seems like a terrible value no matter the brand. At that point it just seems like a tablet with a keyboard, with the specs of a year old base model gaming laptop, but with the price of a desktop built with the latest near flagship hardware...
At least you actually use everything that it's good at... Most people would just use it for Word docs, reading emails, and powerpoints

It is a terrible value for sure - unless you actually value the thinness, lightness, and battery life of it more than raw compute power.

If I never traveled and valued compute power above all else, I'd never consider an ultrabook. If I traveled a lot and spent the majority of my life on the road, I'd never consider a 17in laptop or a desktop.

This is why I tend to find myself switching back and forth between different computing styles every couple years as my life evolves and my needs change. But I think "ultrabooks" like the XPS 13 and Macbook Pro 13 are finally at the point where they, with sufficient Thunderbolt peripherals at the desk, can serve double duty without that much compromise for most people.
 
I hate to break it to you, but... not everyone cares about "AAA" PC titles. There are different kinds of games for different kinds of gamers.
Not everyone cares about mobile games either. Yes the market is big and the money is there but they're mainly puzzle games. Monster Strike is a HearthStone type of puzzle game. Puzzle and Dragons, Pokemon Go, Candy Crush Saga, you get the idea. You do have games like PUBG, and Fortnite, well.. Fortnite on Android anyway. iOS and Android devices don't have the capability to play most console and PC games, and never will future phones due to thermodynamics.

So easy that people probably don't even realize they are making backups?
I think you're making excuses for what is a bad and yet accepted practice by Apple.
Well, since we have no idea what Apple's GPU will look like at the high end, I'll just say, sure, I think whatever they put together for a high end system with 32 cores will be able to play "AAA" PC games.
I can't wait to find out.
Though, I have no idea what you're on about now. I thought we were talking about the consoles and their SSDs?
Storage of the M1, which seems to be 256GB for the $1.3k model. My point was that amount of storage for $1.3k is criminally low, and won't be able to play PC games in the near future without the user needing to constantly delete and re-download it, just like console users may need to do.

Apple makes some things easier for their users and the tradeoff is the loss of repairability/upgradability. And they can do this because, as it turns out, most of their users don't actually care. And believe it or not, most of the technology-buying public doesn't care either.
Maybe but I think these issues will eventually creep up and upset people.
This is not something you should take personally. It also has nothing to do with a rumor about Apple (expectedly) working on a bigger version of their M1 to use in higher-end Mac systems.
If the design doesn't change beyond more cores then the bigger core M1 will just have the same problems with more cores. Like it or not people play games on their computers and I don't see the M1's doing that too well with these limitations. 2021 will be an interesting year for computer hardware.
 
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The tricky part is the feature support. Can Apple do hardware ray tracing on a level that competes with AMD or NVIDIA?
We have a hint already in the market to answer that, not from the gaming world, but from the professional ray-tracing world. For eight years I've used Octane rendering for tv commercials and web video. Historically it's always required Nvidia's proprietary CUDA. It now also runs (beta) on Apple's M1. https://twitter.com/JulesUrbach/status/1332900194141175809/photo/1
 
Storage of the M1, which seems to be 256GB for the $1.3k model. My point was that amount of storage for $1.3k is criminally low, and won't be able to play PC games in the near future without the user needing to constantly delete and re-download it, just like console users may need to do.
Very valid point. Apple does get greedy selling it's storage and RAM. But that's purely a business decision related to the target audience for a sub compact. Nobody buys such a machine to play serious games, and Apple knows it.

The entire M1 System-on-a-chip is TINY with crazy-good thermals, so Apple could have elected to put whatever size storage they wanted in the system. It will be interesting to see what base specs and options they provide for their mid-high level systems.
 
Very valid point. Apple does get greedy selling it's storage and RAM. But that's purely a business decision related to the target audience for a sub compact. Nobody buys such a machine to play serious games, and Apple knows it.
Yea but I hope Apple doesn't make the mistake of ignoring the gaming market, which has shaped modern PC's. It could literally destroy the company. More people had more copies of Doom than Windows 95. The modern GPU we use, was used mainly for playing games. It became so common that we use this GPU to accelerate everything now, because otherwise the hardware was sitting there doing nothing. There's a surprisingly large amount of Mac owners who want to play PC games on it. What little straws those people are grasping onto will be gone with the M1. If Apple keeps up with this limited hardware then they might find the market shrinking.
The entire M1 System-on-a-chip is TINY with crazy-good thermals, so Apple could have elected to put whatever size storage they wanted in the system. It will be interesting to see what base specs and options they provide for their mid-high level systems.
It does have good thermals but I wonder about the GPU performance, which oddly matters more for production than ever before. Like how much VRAM are they putting, if any?
 
Yea but I hope Apple doesn't make the mistake of ignoring the gaming market, which has shaped modern PC's. It could literally destroy the company.
Apple's ignored AAA games forever...and they are valued at $2 trillion with $193 Billion cash in hand. Don't think we need to lose sleep worrying about them.;)

As for early sales of M1...even with only the M1 Mac mini (no M1 iMac or MacPro) Apple has taken #1 sales position in Japan for desktops. I don't have data for any other countries.
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=ja&tl=en&u=https://www.bcnretail.com/research/detail/20201129_201698.html

I'm in the market for 3090 and 5950x. But customers like us are unusual.
 
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Storage of the M1, which seems to be 256GB for the $1.3k model. My point was that amount of storage for $1.3k is criminally low, and won't be able to play PC games in the near future without the user needing to constantly delete and re-download it, just like console users may need to do.
The Mac Mini starts at $700 and has 256gb of storage. If you’re going to complain about something at least try to pick the middle option (MacBook Air with 256gb is $1000) instead of the most expensive one (MacBook Pro 13”, $1300).

also while this might seem like Apple is overcharging right from the start, Dell, with its very popular XPS 13 laptop, starts at $1000 (same price as the MacBook Air) with... 256gb of storage and 8gb of RAM as well.

I don’t think Dell has updated anything else with 11th gen processors yet so I don’t know if there’s really a good comparison to be made for the Pro, but the starting price of the mini compares very favorably to Dell’s optiplex Micro systems, the lowest end of which (optiplex 3080 micro) start at $620 with... an i3, 4gb of ram and a 500gb mechanical hard drive (7200 rpm, though!).

Dell’s time-of-purchase upgrade options are less expensive / better than Apple’s - the optiplex micro has upgradable ram and storage, and the XPS 13’s upgrade to 16gb onboard memory only $100 with the SSDs both cheaper and user-upgradable - my point is: Apple’s initial pricing is right in line with a laptop generally considered to be one of, if not the best “ultra book” you can get, and better than a desktop comparable (in size) to the Mini, so calling it “too high” for 256gb is a complaint I’d level more generally at high end laptops, not just Apple in particular.
 
Apple's ignored AAA games forever...and they are valued at $2 trillion with $193 Billion cash in hand. Don't think we need to lose sleep worrying about them.;)
Hate to break it to you but Mac sales are only 12% of the companies revenue. Their real money maker comes from iPhone sales, which accounts for nearly 60% of their revenue. While iPhones don't have AAA games, (because they can't), they are the primary gaming platform for toddlers and young children. You think those kids holding iPhones are having a business meeting? They're playing Roblox on those things.

As for early sales of M1...even with only the M1 Mac mini (no M1 iMac or MacPro) Apple has taken #1 sales position in Japan for desktops. I don't have data for any other countries.
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=ja&tl=en&u=https://www.bcnretail.com/research/detail/20201129_201698.html
Japan is Japan. Pretty sure PC gaming is not big there either. I bet they're using the M1 as a ultra portable web browser.
I'm in the market for 3090 and 5950x. But customers like us are unusual.
CyberPunk 2077 huge sales on PC are telling a very different story.
 
Hate to break it to you but Mac sales are only 12% of the companies revenue. Their real money maker comes from iPhone sales, which accounts for nearly 60% of their revenue. While iPhones don't have AAA games, (because they can't), they are the primary gaming platform for toddlers and young children. You think those kids holding iPhones are having a business meeting? They're playing Roblox on those things.
That's because smartphones represent a much larger market than PCs, not because there's a thriving games market on those devices.

Gaming isn't the center of the universe; most tech products don't live or die based on how well they cater to gamers, and that includes computers. Gaming PCs do help fuel the computer market, but the average selling price of a computer has been around $630 for the past few years — in other words, gaming rigs don't really define the market. They're mostly budget PCs and business machines.

It would be great if Apple used this opportunity to improve gaming, but I doubt that'll happen the way you'd like it to (I see it pushing more for Arcade and the App Store than, say, Steam or EGS). It's safe to say Apple isn't worried about losing sales when many gamers wouldn't buy its computers regardless.
 
Hate to break it to you but Mac sales are only 12% of the companies revenue. Their real money maker comes from iPhone sales, which accounts for nearly 60% of their revenue. While iPhones don't have AAA games, (because they can't), they are the primary gaming platform for toddlers and young children. You think those kids holding iPhones are having a business meeting? They're playing Roblox on those things.


Japan is Japan. Pretty sure PC gaming is not big there either. I bet they're using the M1 as a ultra portable web browser.

CyberPunk 2077 huge sales on PC are telling a very different story.
-Your claim was that if Apple didn't score well in AAA games...the entire company was doomed. I can already tell that I like your posts, but perhaps we set aside that silliness?
-I can assure you AAA gaming is just as big in Japan as in North America–if not more so. I have a lot of first-hand experience with folks from Japan. They can geek w/the best.

The integrated graphics of the M1 are already the leading integrated graphics chip. This with a mere 8 cores. What Apple delivers in mid/high end laptops and true desktops remains to be seen. Perhaps we wait before we judge.

I have a MacBook Pro and two high end PC builds, each with multiple high-end GPUs. I'm not a fanboy either way. I just appreciate serious engineering and factual discussion.
 
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I think everyone knows my position on Macs and Pro work, but the thing that gave me real pause for the first time in a decade was the Rack Pro. They actually have an official rack mount case, which is a first.

Maaaaaaybe Apple makes a 16 or 32 core CPU and bungs one ore two of them in a real case with a shit load of PCIe 5 slots. Maybe they add back in all the professional fine grained features to the OS. Maybe the New Mac Pro has 8 NVME slots or some shit. Its not the cost that is the issue. Shit pays itself off. Its not chipset immaturity, this is not Apples first CPU or GPU. Its whether you are going to invest in this whole work flow and train everyone to use it and then Apple will turn around and slam the door on your dick.

I would want Apple back at NAB, if that's a thing after COVID, and them to stop advertising to "the professional in all of us" because that's amateurs who don't have their life savings invested in the workflow.

Outside of that these look like amazing machines to keep your receptionist happy. If Apple wanted to go after gaming they would make a console, and they would murder xBox for sure. They don't. They don't give a fuck about hard core gamers or media pros. We are the most annoying customers ever and a tiny population. But their technology is very good and elegant if it actually meets your needs. There is a section of people who want it to meet their needs when it doesn't and just go to the most extreme lengths to cope.
 
I think everyone knows my position on Macs and Pro work, but the thing that gave me real pause for the first time in a decade was the Rack Pro. They actually have an official rack mount case, which is a first.

Maaaaaaybe Apple makes a 16 or 32 core CPU and bungs one ore two of them in a real case with a shit load of PCIe 5 slots. Maybe they add back in all the professional fine grained features to the OS. Maybe the New Mac Pro has 8 NVME slots or some shit. Its not the cost that is the issue. Shit pays itself off. Its not chipset immaturity, this is not Apples first CPU or GPU. Its whether you are going to invest in this whole work flow and train everyone to use it and then Apple will turn around and slam the door on your dick.

I would want Apple back at NAB, if that's a thing after COVID, and them to stop advertising to "the professional in all of us" because that's amateurs who don't have their life savings invested in the workflow.

Outside of that these look like amazing machines to keep your receptionist happy. If Apple wanted to go after gaming they would make a console, and they would murder xBox for sure. They don't. They don't give a fuck about hard core gamers or media pros. We are the most annoying customers ever and a tiny population. But their technology is very good and elegant if it actually meets your needs. There is a section of people who want it to meet their needs when it doesn't and just go to the most extreme lengths to cope.

Funny you mention NAB. My studio created video walls and interactive trade show content for NAB, SuperCom, SIGGRAPH, and other shows. Some years back. We used Intel MacPros. Then Apple fumbled away that market. Needing good 3d animation machines I moved to Windows. But I still keep an eye on Apple and do use a Mac laptop.

Apple has a fresh start w/some advantages. We'll see if they hit a home run or fart it away.
 
Intel is in the mud with their process and AMD si not trying to go ahead, just sits a little behind intel so they make money. Apple is using 5nm and pays a lot to take advantage of the most advanced process at TSMC. Not sure there is another way for Apple to stay in front. Finaly a core for a core there si no advantage for ARM. It's not smaller than that of AMD. This is like the Dec Alpha performance leadership back in the days. Intel still won the sales and even Dec was mostly using their CPU.
However, I'm glad they're good and X86 has some competition again. However, bootcamp vanished with ARM and that was a point in getting a Macbook : having both systems in one computer.
 
Intel is in the mud with their process and AMD si not trying to go ahead, just sits a little behind intel so they make money. Apple is using 5nm and pays a lot to take advantage of the most advanced process at TSMC. Not sure there is another way for Apple to stay in front. Finaly a core for a core there si no advantage for ARM. It's not smaller than that of AMD. This is like the Dec Alpha performance leadership back in the days. Intel still won the sales and even Dec was mostly using their CPU.
However, I'm glad they're good and X86 has some competition again. However, bootcamp vanished with ARM and that was a point in getting a Macbook : having both systems in one computer.
Except, unlike in the 1990s, computers weren't in nearly every single aspect of our lives, and beyond.
Also, DEC wasn't a trillion+ dollar megacorp with a global market share of mobile devices that has the capability of reshaping the consumer and prosumer tech landscape to its will.

This is not the RISC vs. CISC competition of the 1990s, and it has little in common with anything back then.
The lack of Bootcamp is a small market share loss Apple is willing to take for the market share gain it is now making; the Apple of 2020 is not the Apple of the 1990s, much as I do miss their 1990s business and server focus.
 
Finaly a core for a core there si no advantage for ARM. It's not smaller than that of AMD.

There are lots of advantages for ARM cores, because the ARM64 ISA is more efficient and modern than AMD64.

When comparing the sizes of Firestorm and Zen3 cores one is not comparing only the ISAs, but comparing the microarchitectures as well. Firestorm cores are relatively large because their microarchitecture is much more advanced and wider than that of Zen3 cores. To compare only the ISAs we would compare Zen3 to a similar ARM core such as the TX3.
 
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CyberPunk 2077 huge sales on PC are telling a very different story.
Suppose CyberPunk sales reach 20 mil sales in U.S., Europe, Asia, Russia, etc. Let's assume for a moment that all 95% of such customers demand PC's.

How will Apple survive trying to sell Macs to the remaining 1.8 of 2 billion folks remaining?

But anyways, Macs are soon going to enjoy a console-style advantage with their hardware. A developer friend explained to me:
"The funny thing I first noticed about game development is that a $400 console often seriously outperforms the same game on a $2,000 PC. I came to understand later that when a game is made for a console, it’s targeted specifically to that hardware, and has maximum efficiency, using all the hardware to its fullest potential"
 
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