Apple Reportedly Working on Touchscreen Macs, Including MacBook Pro

[TundraKing]

macOS comes on Macs.

What you are really asking is for iPadOS to have better windowing options and maybe a Desktop type app so you can see documents sitting on a surface and not just in a file manager.

Windows 8 tried to do touch optimized OS with merged tablet/desktop functions and it gave users a heart attack, but maybe it can be done the iPadOS way of doing it.

There’s no need to hot swap both OS on an iPad.

This whole discussion of Macs are Macs and iPads are iPads is becoming silly and absurd. These machines are a far cry from the Macbooks and iPads of 2010

The two are already integrated to a large degree except where it really matters.... The user! A Mac can already run iPad apps (it could run ALL of them if developers would allow it) and an M1 iPad Pro is essentially a MacBook Air (yes it is folks there is virtually no technical difference save for some external hard ports which can be changed).

The restriction on what software each can run is now totally arbitrary

Apparently allowing dual use or having the ecosystems become more flexible or even interchangeable rubs some the wrong way.

 

[NEPOBABY]

This whole discussion of Macs are Macs and iPads are iPads is becoming silly and absurd. These machines are a far cry from the Macbooks and iPads of 2010

You will most likely disagree with everything you said after some thought and conversation.

A Mac is a Mac and an iPad is an iPad.

It helps to understand product segmentation is important not just for consistency and preventing too many bugs, but also for marketing and sales.

The two are already integrated to a large degree except where it really matters.... The user! A Mac can already run iPad apps (it could run ALL of them if developers would allow it) and an M1 iPad Pro is essentially a MacBook Air (yes it is folks there is virtually no technical difference save for some external hard ports which can be changed).

Others have chimed in on this thread that macOS running on an iPad would consume more resources than iPadOS does. macOS apps would consume a lot more resources than iPadOS apps. Battery life won’t last long and then some people who aren’t technically savvy will complain “why can’t macOS have the same battery life as iPadOS?”

These devices might share some frameworks and architecture, but the hardware design and overall needs of both systems are very different. Their memory management also differs, which is why iPadOS can run decently with much less memory.

Could you run a dozen macOS apps smoothly on macOS with 4GB or 8GB RAM? Of course not, especially with some of that RAM now shared with the GPU.

So no, an iPad Pro is not equal to a MacBook Air. Geekbench numbers don’t tell the full story.

 

[darngooddesign]

Others have chimed in on this thread that macOS running on an iPad would consume more resources than iPadOS does. macOS apps would consume a lot more resources than iPadOS apps. Battery life won’t last long and then some people who aren’t technically savvy will complain “why can’t macOS have the same battery life as iPadOS?”

These devices might share some frameworks and architecture, but the hardware design and overall needs of both systems are very different. Their memory management also differs, which is why iPadOS can run decently with much less memory.

Could you run a dozen macOS apps smoothly on macOS with 4GB or 8GB RAM? Of course not, especially with some of that RAM now shared with the GPU.

So no, an iPad Pro is not equal to a MacBook Air. Geekbench numbers don’t tell the full story.

There is no reason why the MacOS version of Microsoft Office wouldn't run equally well on an 8GB M1 MacBook Air and an 8GB M1 iPadPro. Both would multitask equally well assuming the iPad doesn't thermally throttle under load. I don't think anyone is expecting to simultaneously run a dozen intensive apps on the iPad.

 

[NEPOBABY]

There is no reason why the MacOS version of Microsoft Office wouldn't run equally well on an 8GB M1 MacBook Air and an 8GB M1 iPadPro.

It’s not exactly made in Xcode and the resources the macOS version and iPadOS version consume when multi tasking or running in the background is very different because of the way the operating systems manage memory and background apps.

Office running on macOS running on an iPad would definitely consume more memory and battery life. Office is a minimal example. You just know some people will try to run apps that are much more resource hungry, and then they’ll cry about heat and slowness.

There are things iPadOS does much better than macOS because it is built for tablets. There are things that macOS does much better than iPadOS could because it is a desktop operating system where it can gobble up much more memory, much faster drives and load a lot more system AND third party background processes (Including a variety of drivers) at boot up time.

 

[darngooddesign]

It’s not exactly made in Xcode and the resources the macOS version and iPadOS version consume when multi tasking or running in the background is very different because of the way the operating systems manage memory and background apps.

Of course Mac Office will use more resources than the lighter iPad Office. Im not talking about running iPad Office vs Mac Office, Im talking about running Mac Office on an M1 Air and M1 iPad with he same RAM and SSD size.

Office running on macOS running on an iPad would definitely consume more memory and battery life. Office is a minimal example. You just know some people will try to run apps that are much more resource hungry, and then they’ll cry about heat and slowness.

They would likely cry about battery life when 3D rendering on a MacBook Air, but that's their fault not the device's fault. Mac apps would use more power than iPad apps, but that's the tradeoff you would get running them on a device with a smaller battery.

There are things iPadOS does much better than macOS because it is built for tablets. There are things that macOS does much better than iPadOS could because it is a desktop operating system where it can gobble up much more memory, much faster drives and load a lot more system AND third party background processes (Including a variety of drivers) at boot up time.

I know iPad apps are better for tablety things and creative things, but I don't think the hardware differences are as great as you claim. In the end you would get less battery life because its a smaller battery, not because of great hardware differences.

 

[NEPOBABY]

Im not talking about running iPad Office vs Mac Office, Im talking about running Mac Office on an M1 Air and M1 iPad with he same RAM and SSD size.

Same RAM and same SSD size is only part of the picture.

Last time I checked, iPadOS consumes about 700MB of RAM at boot up. On my Mac, macOS consumes 4 to 5 times more than that with Creative Cloud background processes, third party daemons and some third party drivers installed. macOS and macOS apps needs these things to run at launch, but iPadOS doesn’t.

That’s half of an iPad’s RAM consumed before we even start to run heavy apps. The rest of the RAM has to be shared with the apps and graphics.

They would cry about it on a MacBook Air as well. Mac apps would use more power than iPad apps, but that's the tradeoff you would get running them on a device with a smaller battery.

Right, but they’ll cry harder trying to run macOS and macOS apps on an iPad. They’ll run out of memory in no time If they tried to run the macOS versions of Photoshop or Premiere. These apps can already easily consume 32 or 64GB of RAM - that’s a lot more than the top iPad Pro has right now.

I know the iPad is better for tablety things, but I don't think the hardware differences are as great as you claim. In the end you would get less battery life because its a smaller battery, not because of great hardware differences.

We’re not talking only about the hardware. As said above, the way these two systems manage resources are very different.

If they ever converge it is miles away, because macOS and macOS apps will always demand more memory, more CPU cores and faster drives than you could fit in an iPad and keep them running cool under the type of stress that apps like After Effects are known for.

If people just want to run Office, there’s no point to running macOS on an iPad. Just use the iPad version.

 

[jbfly]

UI changes. Why do you think Windows 8 happened and was hated? Windows 8 is a far better UI than Windows 11 is for touch. But they want a UI to fit both needs.

Apple is not Microsoft.

 

[jbfly]

I don't think that the OS would need a full top to bottom redesign to allow touch. Touch would not be the primary interaction mode. Most of us use multiple interaction modes now with keyboard and mouse or trackpad. When the mouse came along, we didn't stop using the keyboard and only use the mouse. It expanded our options for how to interact with the device. When I have used a touchscreen laptop, some things made sense with a touchpad, somethings with touch, and many things with they keyboard. I would dynamically switch modes to fit the action and interface. Touch is good for tapping buttons, scrolling and pushing things around. Any of you who have used an iPad with a touchpad or mouse and keyboard will understand that you can switch between the three at any time.

I’ve always been tempted to use my fingers for the MacOS drag-and-drop feature. I haven’t ever owned anything touch screen besides a cell phone.

 

[darngooddesign]

Same RAM and same SSD size is only part of the picture.

Last time I checked, iPadOS consumes about 700MB of RAM at boot up. On my Mac, macOS consumes 4 to 5 times more than that with Creative Cloud background processes, third party daemons and some third party drivers installed. macOS and macOS apps needs these things to run at launch, but iPadOS doesn’t.

That’s half of an iPad’s RAM consumed before we even start to run heavy apps. The rest of the RAM has to be shared with the apps and graphics.

Thats fine, it will use resources just like it would on a MacBook Air. We aren't comparing iPadOS vs MacOS, we're comparing MacOS on an iPad vs MacOS on a Mac.

Right, but they’ll cry harder trying to run macOS and macOS apps on an iPad. They’ll run out of memory in no time If they tried to run the macOS versions of Photoshop or Premiere. These apps can already easily consume 32 or 64GB of RAM - that’s a lot more than the top iPad Pro has right now.

They wouldn't run out of RAM any quicker than if they did the same thing on a Mac with the same amount of RAM.

We’re not talking only about the hardware. As said above, the way these two systems manage resources are very different.

No one expects the two systems to behave the same.

If they ever converge it is miles away, because macOS and macOS apps will always demand more memory, more CPU cores and faster drives than you could fit in an iPad and keep them running cool under the type of stress that apps like After Effects are known for.

If someone has a bad time running something like After Effects or Maya on an iPad, well, they should have done better research.

If people just want to run Office, there’s no point to running macOS on an iPad. Just use the iPad version.

The iPad version of Office is not as full featured as the Mac version.

I agree that if your workload requires an M1-Max with 32 or 64GB RAM and 2 or 3 displays, don't use an iPad... bit that goes without saying. Then again, those people would be unhappy with a 8GB MBA. Meanwhile people with more moderate needs would like to only carry one device.

 

[jbfly]

Thats fine, it will use resources just like it would on a MacBook Air. We aren't comparing iPadOS vs MacOS, we're comparing MacOS on an iPad vs MacOS on a Mac.

They wouldn't run out of RAM any quicker than if they did the same thing on a Mac with the same amount of RAM.

No one expects the two systems to behave the same.

If someone has a bad time running something like After Effects or Maya on an iPad, well, they should have done better research.

The iPad version of Office is not as full featured as the Mac version.

I agree that if your workload requires an M1-Max with 32 or 64GB RAM and 2 or 3 displays, don't use an iPad... bit that goes without saying. Then again, those people would be unhappy with a 8GB MBA. Meanwhile people with more moderate needs would like to only carry one device.

All of this exactly. Why is everyone’s line of thinking so narrow that they take this to mean anything other than more choices?

 

[seadragon]

Word.

 

[ignatius345]

Why is everyone complaining? It's not like they're going to take away the trackpad. Just don't use the touch screen if you don't want to.

Except for the part where 1) you're paying extra for hardware you don't want, and 2) they gimp the Mac interface to "optimize" it for fat-finger touch input.

 

[Apple.Fanatic]

I want an iPad to be able to run macOS and iPadOS. Allow it to plug into a monitor and ability to use it as a desktop as well. That is the perfect device for me. iPads now have M1 chips...these can run macOS easily.

Sale an iMac type monitor where the iPad docks with it. Honestly, would sell like crazy IMO but likely dreaming since it would hurt the sales of other devices Apple sales. Maybe one day...

 

[SoldOnApple]

It would be nice to use Apple Pencil directly on Adobe apps on a Mac. I guess you'd want the MacBook screen to be detachable though or bend behind the body of the MacBook or something.

 

[NEPOBABY]

Thats fine, it will use resources just like it would on a MacBook Air. We aren't comparing iPadOS vs MacOS, we're comparing MacOS on an iPad vs MacOS on a Mac.

They wouldn't run out of RAM any quicker than if they did the same thing on a Mac with the same amount of RAM.

This shows a misunderstanding of how iPadOS manages memory and background apps compared to macOS.

There have been attempts to make macOS behave more like iOS/iPadOS but that isn’t there yet.

macOS will always have a larger footprint regardless. it loads a lot more into memory and so do macOS apps compared to their iOS equivalents.

 

[OriginalBaki]

This shows a misunderstanding of how iPadOS manages memory and background apps compared to macOS.

There have been attempts to make macOS behave more like iOS/iPadOS but that isn’t there yet.

macOS will always have a larger footprint regardless. it loads a lot more into memory and so do macOS apps compared to their iOS equivalents.

Larger footprint is fine. MacBook Air has identical hardware to the iPad pro. They would mostly perform the same .

 

[Phoenix1000]

So I will have to carefully look for the latest MacBook Pro without a touch screen and perhaps just buy two of it. MBP with touch screen is a "no go". And simply not using it is not an option. I don't even want to pay for this needless and terrible "feature".

 

[mr.datsun]

I don't want a touchscreen MacBook Pro and I don't want to pay for a feature I won't use. Worst idea since the touch bar. Further evidence that Apple are losing the plot. Tim Cook's honeymoon period as head of Apple is surely a long long time over. And Apple get a new talent as head of design.

 

[The Game 161]

I don't want a touchscreen MacBook Pro and I don't want to pay for a feature I won't use. Worst idea since the touch bar. Further evidence that Apple are losing the plot. Tim Cook's honeymoon period as head of Apple is surely a long long time over. And Apple get a new talent as head of design.

you could well you know....not touch the screen

 

[Phoenix1000]

you could well you know....not touch the screen

As I wrote: I don't even want to pay for such a rubbish

 

[NEPOBABY]

Larger footprint is fine. MacBook Air has identical hardware to the iPad pro. They would mostly perform the same .

That’s simply not true and anyone posting on a Mac or iPad board should know better.

It should be general knowledge by now after 16 years that iOS/iPadOS suspends the state of background apps to free up memory and the CPU.

On macOS this doesn’t exist in the same way because suspending background apps isn’t suitable for most desktop computing environments.

If you are running all the Microsoft Office apps on an iPadOS, only the foreground app is active. The rest are suspended.

On macOS if you are running all the Microsoft Office apps they will all be occupying CPU time and memory regardless of how many are in the background. So running macOS and macOS apps on an iPad would be a drain.

Not only that, but when macOS boots up a bunch of Microsoft services will be running in the background.

If you are using a suite of more ‘intensive’ products such as Adobe Creative Cloud then even more resources are consumed.

macOS and macOS apps would easily consume all of an iPad Pro’s limited resources and the device would run hotter than if it ran the system optimized for it.

You can’t say X has the same hardware as Y therefore they are the same, when the way X and Y manage resources are completely different.

There are people posting right now, today, about how Ventura is making their Mac feel hotter and draining battery life. Please don’t think macOS is suitable for a tablet when it is hard enough optimizing for a laptop.

Please learn how things work before opining.

 

[darngooddesign]

This shows a misunderstanding of how iPadOS manages memory and background apps compared to macOS.

There have been attempts to make macOS behave more like iOS/iPadOS but that isn’t there yet.

macOS will always have a larger footprint regardless. it loads a lot more into memory and so do macOS apps compared to their iOS equivalents.

You are either accidentally or willfully misunderstanding my point because I never said that MacOS is the same as iPadOS. What I actually have been saying is that if an 8GB or 16GB M1 MacBook Air meets your needs then an 8GB or 16GB iPad Pro with MacOS would as well with the added benefit of only needing to carry one device. The tradeoff is only one USB port and shorter battery-life when used like this, but people often compromise ports, performance, and/or battery life to get a smaller more convenient computer (see the Powerbook Duo, Powerbook 2400C, 12" Powerbook, 11" MacBook Air, 12" MacBook, etc.).

 

[darngooddesign]

...

 

[NEPOBABY]

You are either accidentally or willfully misunderstanding my point because I never said that MacOS is the same as iPadOS. What I actually have been saying is that if an 8GB or 16GB M1 MacBook Air meets your needs then an 8GB or 16GB iPad Pro with MacOS would as well with the added benefit of only needing to carry one device. The tradeoff is only one USB port and shorter battery-life when used like this, but people often compromise ports, performance, and/or battery life to get a smaller more convenient computer (see the Powerbook Duo, Powerbook 2400C, 12" Powerbook, 11" MacBook Air, 12" MacBook, etc.).

Respectfully I didn’t misunderstand your point. I reiterate that it is wishful thinking that running macOS on an iPad would be just as performant as running macOS on a MacBook Air just because they can have the same CPU and memory specs. It’s even more wishful thinking for anyone to assume macOS on an iPad Pro would be as performant as iPadOS is.

Unlike the MacBook Air, the iPad Pro‘s components more compact and have a display (that generates a little heat) mounted directly above the CPU. It doesn’t have a great thermal design to run something as intensive as macOS.

iPadOS is lightweight and suspends background apps. That makes it perfectly tuned for tablets. macOS is too heavy for it.

As for memory consumption, here’s an example that everyone should know by now. In fact I’m a little gobsmacked that we are having this debate at all.

When I boot up macOS on my Mac it already consumes 8GB Of RAM, the same amount of RAM I have on my iPad. That includes 1GB of third party services.

This is without any apps running.

That number grows. After a few hours it’s almost double. Adobe‘s background services consume about half a GB. Tolerable on a desktop environment, not tolerable for handhelds like tablets.

The Wacom driver alone grows from a few hundred megabytes at boot up to almost 2 GB after using it for a day. Tolerable on a desktop environment, not tolerable for handhelds like tablets.

Other third party services and drivers do the same thing.

This is simply not a suitable system for an iPad Pro. It could run, but one shouldn’t assume that they can switch from iPadOS to macOS on an iPad Pro and get equal performance and that the heat generated by macOS apps would be tolerable in a tablet.

Knowing how people already complain about the heat or stability of different products, there’s no point giving them something sub-optimal or they just complain even more.

Let it go. macOS is for Macs. iPadOS is for iPads. We would just like to see better apps and better windowing options for iPadOS.

If there was macOS for a tablet, it would just be a chunkier tablet with higher specs and it wouldn’t be called an iPad.

 

[karranz]

the kind of innovation Steve Jobs and his team brought was so high that apple lived with of that hype for 10 years, know that is fading away apple is in trouble because they don't have enough innovation and vision anymore. Steve was one of his kind not only because his ideas (not all of them) where miles ahed but also because he was able to bring amazing talent and put them together around his visions.