Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Apple Releasing macOS Big Sur on November 12

DO NOT update to this if you have older Mac. I had beta on my late 2015. It was running slow as a snail. The iMac got slower and slower with each macOS released. At the end I trashed everything and re-install with OS X El Capitan, it back to normal speed. It seems Apple is using the same tactics like iOS before. Slow down older Macs to force people getting newer models! Never upgrade macOS again with existing macs
 
jonobin said:
God no



So a lot of people just forget the keyboard tilted and crack their screen
Click to expand...

tilting the keyboard doesn’t affect the screen. I’ve had many computers which allow you to tilt the keyboard - they just put some sort of retractable or pivotable feet on the bottom of the case.

As for touch screen, i wouldn’t use it either, but then it doesn’t affect me if it’s there. (make the screen fold all the way back so the machine is flat and i might enjoy apple pencil support, though.)
 
  • Like
  • Disagree
Reactions: Big Ron and RandomDSdevel
maj88 said:
Is GM available? Will be it the same version as tomorrow's release?

I have today a day off, so I can experiment :)
Click to expand...
Apple isn't using the GM term anymore. There's a second release candidate which seems likely to be the final version.
 
cmaier said:
Some suggestions:
1) the touchbar either needs to be spaced farther from the keyboard or needs to be pressure sensitive/Taptic (so that brushing it while typing 90wpm doesn’t launch Siri, etc.)

2) or make the touchpad a display with configurable controls. Or get rid of the touchbar entirely.

3) touch screen (especially now that we are getting bigger controls/click targets in Big Sur)

4) 1080p front camera

5) face id

6) mechanism to allow some level of tilting of keyboard

7) “floating” display (like the ipad keyboard)
Click to expand...
Sounds like you want an iPad Pro, not a MacBook.
 
Last edited:
I do have RC2 installed in my MacBook Air. I restored the defaults, in order to stop receiving betas. Today (12th), will I see any update, or the RC2 is already the same final public version, and nothing will show up here?
 
BuddyRich said:
I didn't watch the stream and not sure if they mentioned it but are x86/x64 apps still compatible with Big Sur and can you still install apps from outside the app store?

and the reverse if you use an Intel based Mac with Big Sur can you use the Arm optimized apps (I am assuming the native apps are Arm optimized)?

Is there a virtualization layer like Rosetta.

Also I guess Bootcamp to run Windows is now out.
Click to expand...
All support for x86 apps was totally deleted in Catalina, and that will be carried forward to Big Sur.

x64 apps will be the ONLY supported operating mode for Intel-based Macs which are upgraded to Bug Sur. They will NOT be capable of running apps which are distributed exclusively in the ARM instruction set.

ARM-based Macs released with Big Sur will run ARM optimized apps natively, and a translation layer will be available to allow it to run most x64 apps.

Apple is resurrecting their Universal Binary tech to allow software vendors to ship apps which contain both x64 and ARM versions of their apps in a single package so that it will run with best-possible performance on both Intel and ARM Macs.

Boot Camp will not be an option on ARM Macs, at least for the foreseeable future. Not really sure about what their plans might be for Intel Macs that are upgraded to Big Sur.

The tech to allow x64 apps to run on ARM Macs is called Rosetta 2. Unlike the approach of the original Rosetta from PPC/Intel days (which translated from PPC to x86 on the fly, and jumped over to native x86 code as soon as it hit a kernel or built-in library system call), Rosetta 2 will allow ARM-based Macs to re-compile x64 apps at install time, so that the version which actually runs will actually be running ARM instructions all the time.

(Of course, the potential still exists that a program that was compiled from source code right from the outset to target the ARM instruction set might achieve better optimization than any form of binary translation. Also, the emulation provided by Rosetta was incomplete; some PPC apps didn't run perfectly on Intel Macs, and it is reasonable to expect that the same may prove to be true of x64 apps running on ARM Macs too.)

If we look at the PPC to x86 transition for guidance, Rosetta was included in Tiger 10.4.4 (the transitional OS), carried forward to Leopard as a default component of the OS, and remained available as an optional install in Snow Leopard. It was permanently removed in Lion - that added up to support for somewhat longer than 5 years, from January 2006 up until July 2011.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
chineseguy38 said:
DO NOT update to this if you have older Mac. I had beta on my late 2015. It was running slow as a snail. The iMac got slower and slower with each macOS released. At the end I trashed everything and re-install with OS X El Capitan, it back to normal speed. It seems Apple is using the same tactics like iOS before. Slow down older Macs to force people getting newer models! Never upgrade macOS again with existing macs
Click to expand...
Is that Mac using a mechanical hard drive, a hybrid drive, or an SSD?

APFS (made mandatory in recent versions of macOS) causes mechanical hard drives (or the mechanical component of a hybrid drive) to become demonstrably slower, given the same payload, than they would have been using HFS+.

It seems that APFS may have discarded algorithms which (in HFS+) used to attempt to strategically allocate files in a way that would account for the movement of hard drive heads; that makes no real difference to SSDs because they are essentially random access, and it allows for tech like Copy-on-Write to provide significant SSD performance boosts. But for hard drives it can be a real performance killer.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
sideshowuniqueuser said:
Oh come on, so the design department just sits there twiddling it's thumbs waiting for it's turn? Where's the courage!?
Click to expand...
Right, because that's how it works. Forget sourcing components in the supply chain, ramping up manufacturing, testing and everything else that goes along with totally redesigning a major part of your product line. It's almost like there are lots of complexities to account for that are on their own timelines. Reusing similar/familiar enclosures that can be reliably sourced cuts out a lot of risky variables, which is a smart approach.

I'd be willing to bet the design for the next major revision of of the laptop was locked a year+ ago. The timelines for the other dependencies didn't line up with Big Sur, and it'd be foolish to hold back Apple Silicon completely until everything is ready at the same time. That just pushes the 2 year transition further back. Instead of letting the perfect (launched together) be the enemy of the good, you create a bridge from one era to the next. That's what Apple did, and usually do. Ever notice how iPhone designs—especially the exterior—are mostly similar for multiple years?

Dismissing the big picture, oversimplifying, and chalking it up solely to something like "Apple is just {lazy, greedy, etc}. They could've easily done it, just didn't want to." completely ignores the strategic elements. New designs don't exist in a vacuum.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RandomDSdevel
Silverstring said:
Right, because that's how it works. Forget sourcing components in the supply chain, ramping up manufacturing, testing and everything else that goes along with totally redesigning a major part of your product line. It's almost like there are lots of complexities to account for that are on their own timelines. Reusing similar/familiar enclosures that can be reliably sourced cuts out a lot of risky variables, which is a smart approach.

I'd be willing to bet the design for the next major revision of of the laptop was locked a year+ ago. The timelines for the other dependencies didn't line up with Big Sur, and it'd be foolish to hold back Apple Silicon completely until everything is ready at the same time. That just pushes the 2 year transition further back. Instead of letting the perfect (launched together) be the enemy of the good, you create a bridge from one era to the next. That's what Apple did, and usually do. Ever notice how iPhone designs—especially the exterior—are mostly similar for multiple years?

Dismissing the big picture, oversimplifying, and chalking it up solely to something like "Apple is just {lazy, greedy, etc}. They could've easily done it, just didn't want to." completely ignores the strategic elements. New designs don't exist in a vacuum.
Click to expand...
Yep, and they've been doing nothing.
 
  • Haha
Reactions: Silverstring
goosnarrggh said:
Is that Mac using a mechanical hard drive, a hybrid drive, or an SSD?

APFS (made mandatory in recent versions of macOS) causes mechanical hard drives (or the mechanical component of a hybrid drive) to become demonstrably slower, given the same payload, than they would have been using HFS+.

It seems that APFS may have discarded algorithms which (in HFS+) used to attempt to strategically allocate files in a way that would account for the movement of hard drive heads; that makes no real difference to SSDs because they are essentially random access, and it allows for tech like Copy-on-Write to provide significant SSD performance boosts. But for hard drives it can be a real performance killer.
Click to expand...
Good to know. But I'm too scared to upgrade my 2017 MacBook Pro even it is with SSD hard drive.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back