Are Apple waiting for Skylake for 12" rMBA?

Jobsian said:

Broadwell seems to be a stretch for the rumored rMBA specs, so it's going to power a retina display...in a smaller enclosure...without a fan!

The fans on the new Dell XPS 13 run high constantly when taxing it or in performance mode. How would it not need constant throttling, and how is it going to maintain any proximity to current battery life if it's driving all the extra pixels with presumably less battery space?

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It doesn't necessarily take a huge amount of CPU/GPU power to drive a large number of pixels. Look at the iPads, they drive over 3M pixels (including 3-D games) with a CPU/GPU that takes ~2W max.

Also, I can plug my current MBA into my desktop monitor which is 2560x1440, which is a likely resolution for a rMBA, and it works well.

There has been absolutely no substantiation of the rumor that the next MBA will not have a fan. To my knowledge the only reason anybody thinks it might not have a fan is because Intel made a big deal about fanless computing when previewing and announcing Broadwell so everybody with an IQ of less than 80 got confused and thought that Broadwell computers wouldn't have fans.

That turned out to be a bunch of optimistic bulls*** on Intel's part since almost all of the Broadwell laptops that are currently available have (and need!) fans.

The size of a laptop's chassis has very little to do with how hot it gets or how much CPU power it can have, at least with the sizes we're talking about (MBAs and Dell XPS 13s). Look at the 11" MBA--just as fast as the 13" MBA and it runs just as cool too.

motrek said:

There has been absolutely no substantiation of the rumor that the next MBA will not have a fan. To my knowledge the only reason anybody thinks it might not have a fan is because Intel made a big deal about fanless computing when previewing and announcing Broadwell so everybody with an IQ of less than 80 got confused and thought that Broadwell computers wouldn't have fans.

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Glad somebody said it. Not even the Lenovo Yoga 3 is purely fanless, and it carries a Core-M with a 4,5W TDP... So please people stop with this fanless design stuff, you won't get deaf because of its noise (which is barely audible).

WildCowboy said:

From what we've seen, there really is no room for a fan inside the chassis. It's almost all battery, with a small logic board and a trackpad mechanism.

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What have you seen? All I've seen so far are some leaked photos of a lid/screen that was separated from the rest of the laptop. No information about how much room the bottom part has or doesn't have.

WildCowboy said:

From what we've seen, there really is no room for a fan inside the chassis. It's almost all battery, with a small logic board and a trackpad mechanism.

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Ha ha - are you talking about those artist renders? Those are pure imagination on the part of the artist, I do hope you understand...

WildCowboy said:

I can't share details, so you'll have to trust (or not). Those artist's renditions are based on the real deal and we know what the layout is inside.

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I trust you. Besides, what you have said seems at least somewhat reasonable to me.

WildCowboy said:

I can't share details, so you'll have to trust (or not). Those artist's renditions are based on the real deal and we know what the layout is inside.

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If you mean the renderings by Martin Hajek, I don't trust you. None of those renderings look remotely like the leaked pictures of the 12" screen assembly. They aren't all black in the front like MacBook Pros and the logos on the back are glowing, not solid black.

Edit: I should add that the taper is all wrong too.

^^^
I agree, those renderings are off (except for the trackpad, keyboard layout and speakers). Apple will get rid of of the wide silver bezel (it will be black, like the Pros). The one side will not just have a headphone jack, it will at least be paired with the new usb type-c connector.

WildCowboy said:

The renderings aren't perfect (and we don't know 100% of the details anyway), but in terms of general shape and features, they're pretty much on target. The black display bezel and Apple logo aren't aspects I can speak to specifically, but yes it certainly seems from the part leak that those may not have been accurately depicted. But based on what we know (completely separate from and prior to the renderings), the machine will look very much like them.

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I guess this site is called MacRumors and you can make up and repeat whatever you want but as far as I can tell, what we "know" is extremely little.

As one example, everybody was dead certain that the rMBA was coming out a year ago. How'd that go?

WildCowboy said:

...But based on what we know (completely separate from and prior to the renderings), the machine will look very much like them.

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haha! Nice walking of the NDA tight rope there!

tmarks11 said:

haha! Nice walking of the NDA tight rope there!

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What tightrope? WildCowboy made a definitive statement about whether or not the rMBA will look like a particular set of renders. That would be a blatant violation of any NDA in the world.

Apple is known to use the local SF police force to track down leaks. Since MacRumors is based in SF it should be easy enough to leverage government agencies to determine WildCowboy's identity, track him down, bang down his door, and prosecute him vigorously for violation of confidentiality, or get him to roll on whoever told him confidential information.

If WildCowboy makes any posts in the next few weeks I think it's probably safe to say that he doesn't have the inside track on any actual confidential information.

motrek said:

... determine WildCowboy's identity, track him down

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He is a Macrumors Admin/Editor. No tracking down needed.

But he does make it sound like he has an insider view to the future. Time will tell how close his predictions are to reality.

I think that Apple carefully crafts "leaks" to maximize hype before a new product launch. I am betting the WSJ MBA article was carefully guided by Apple.

What does it take to have Apple track you down? Well, we have seen in the past that they don't like people actually stealing hardware from them and than trying to sell it to the media (gawker iPhone fiasco?). And Foxconn takes a dim view of employees walking out with bits of disassembled iPhones... although I bet that have caught a minuscule percentage of the offenders in those cases.

But news articles claiming the writer knows all but can't tell yet? Just part of the hype machine. Apple loves that sort of thing. Here we are yammering on about a product that has been rumored for more than a year now. When was the last time HP or Toshiba had fans predicting what the next laptop would look like, and saying that they wanted it released NOW! because their 11 month old laptop was no good any more? Never? Apple loves the hype. It makes people line up on release day to throw down cash.

I went and compared the specifications of the Broadwell vs Skylake cpus, here are my observations:

1. Skylake will not be available until probably late 2015 in enough quantity for mass sales.

2. Skylake seems to be a bit more powerful and broader design. It can be used in more than laptops.

3. Skylane's biggest feature is this, wireless battery charging! This is the killer feature for a very thin 'Air' and would allow the elimination of the magsafe plug. One might notice the adapters for the older magsafe have been discontinued. Hmmmm.....

4. There is already another processor in development to come out in 2016/17.

5. What will Apple do? Personally I believe for Apple to not make a visible update change in the MBA very soon would be a marketing mistake. My 2014 11" looks no different than my previous 2010 11." Yes it performs way better in terms of speed, but that's about it.

It's time for both and external, a screen change (size and resolution), and even a small performance change in the MBA line. Maybe tomorrow?

According to an email I received this AM, Best Buy just knocked $100.00 off the 13" MBA this AM.

tmarks11 said:

He is a Macrumors Admin/Editor. No tracking down needed.

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Right, so he has even less of an incentive to violate an NDA.

tmarks11 said:

But he does make it sound like he has an insider view to the future. Time will tell how close his predictions are to reality.

I think that Apple carefully crafts "leaks" to maximize hype before a new product launch. I am betting the WSJ MBA article was carefully guided by Apple.

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I have little doubt that Apple leaks to the WSJ. What good would it do for them to leak to MacRumors? MacRumors is already going to repeat whatever they leak to the WSJ plus whatever else is on the internet. What would be the point?

And sorry, but any schoolchild could come up with those MBA renders if you told them "make it look like the current MBA as much as possible, but with a 12 inch display, and thinner, and more narrow."

It's not like the renders offer any special insight and they're coming from some guy in Holland who seems very talented at 3-D modeling but 90% of his website seems to be what amounts to Apple "fan fiction" like curved Apple Watches etc.

I'll prefer to trust the leaked pictures of the 12" screen assembly which look completely different from the renders.

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bjet767 said:

I went and compared the specifications of the Broadwell vs Skylake cpus, here are my observations:

1. Skylake will not be available until probably late 2015 in enough quantity for mass sales.

2. Skylake seems to be a bit more powerful and broader design. It can be used in more than laptops.

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Broadwell is simply the next iteration of Intel's line of chips. It covers the same spectrum as Haswell. Anything that uses Haswells (including desktop computers, etc.) can also use Broadwell.

You're probably confused because the first Broadwells to be released were the Core Ms which were low power laptop/tablet chips but Broadwell is not limited to Core M.

bjet767 said:

3. Skylane's biggest feature is this, wireless battery charging! This is the killer feature for a very thin 'Air' and would allow the elimination of the magsafe plug. One might notice the adapters for the older magsafe have been discontinued. Hmmmm.....

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No, Skylake (not Skylane) has almost nothing to do with wireless charging. Intel is just promoting some technically-unrelated wireless charging system with its Skylake reference designs.

And you can't have wireless charging with a metal case and I doubt Apple is going to go back to making plastic MacBooks.

What happened to the rumor that this 12" MBA was going ARM fanless? How come all the chips are lining up with Broadwell or Skylake now?

mtneer said:

What happened to the rumor that this 12" MBA was going ARM fanless? How come all the chips are lining up with Broadwell or Skylake now?

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There's no indication that anything is lining up with anything, this is all just rampant speculation.

There are a million reasons why Apple wouldn't do ARM though.

mtneer said:

What happened to the rumor that this 12" MBA was going ARM fanless?

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I don't recall a single rumor that stated apple was going to ARM in the MBA (other than some long term product discussions).

Some rumors did point to Core-M, which is the low power Broadwell CPU, and has showed up in a number of fan-less applications.

tmarks11 said:

I don't recall a single rumor that stated apple was going to ARM in the MBA (other than some long term product discussions).

Some rumors did point to Core-M, which is the low power Broadwell CPU, and has showed up in a number of fan-less applications.

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I was recalling this topic:

Intel CEO Responds to Rumors of ARM-Based Macs, Says Relationship With Apple Is 'Strong'

The rumor winds were strong enough to get the CEO of Intel to come out and make a statement. That is why I thought it was not all unfounded speculation and there was something going on with ARM. After all, where there is smoke, usually there is a fire.

Motrek:

I guess I don't get any of your points other than to correct spelling and technical details. However, you really do is make the case that waiting for Skylake really gains very little, which was my point.

Now as far as the wireless charging thing goes; do you have some insider info on what type of case can be used or if Apple is actually considering (or not) such an idea?

Give us some meat about what you think, not just some technical corrections.

I give again:

ARM chips will probably not be used in the future because the programing tools and languages are still behind such a change. Apple and Microsoft have to make some major changes in their compilers to be able to use the same code and libraries seamlessly for a transition to ARM cpus.

Apple succeeded, mainly because they were headed down the BK trail, when Jobs returned and brought Intel based computers (Next) with him. He also brought the objective C coding as the main way to develop OSX programs. In today's market it would be almost impossible to make such a move again at Apple.

Now iOS could evolve essentially into iOSX keeping both platforms with very similar APIs to work with. I find it quite a bit easier in 2015 to cross program iOS & OSX apps through XCode than just a few years ago.

Thanks for the corrections.

I'm looking forward to seeing what they announce tomorrow. Personally I have yet to see a killer app or reason to buy the watch, except to be seen having one.