We don't even know if the A8 really exists, it's pure speculation until Apple announces it - so whether it uses DDR4 memory or not is just another layer of 'maybe'.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Testing ARM Based Mac Prototypes with Large Magic Trackpad?
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
We don't even know if the A8 really exists, it's pure speculation until Apple announces it - so whether it uses DDR4 memory or not is just another layer of 'maybe'.
Yeah it is.
In this one
You may not but others do. If they didn't, the Ultra portable market wouldn't exist.
ARM is tested and true, the iPhone/iPad/Apple TV run on ARM chips even, but that's not what worries me.
ARM-powered laptops already exist on the market, they're called Chromebooks.
While the novelty is cute and all, it's a weird limited device bound to a specific ecosystem (whether it's Google's or Apple's, who cares) that offers no technological benefit other than bounding a consumer to one company's business.
I've always found it odd that software for one processor doesn't work on another. I suppose it's like petrol and diesel they are basically the same but different enough to break the engine.
I wish there was some hardware chip that could let the two play nice or part software that handed off work to the that the processor that it could compute.
This arm approach is in the past for now. Arm for laptop would have been a disaster as intel have really stepped up and changed their areas of focus.
I wish there was some hardware chip that could let the two play nice or part software that handed off work to the that the processor that it could compute.
This arm approach is in the past for now. Arm for laptop would have been a disaster as intel have really stepped up and changed their areas of focus.
Actually Apple is in pretty good shape here. MS's had (has) problems that Apple wouldn't:
- MS couldn't / didn't want to port the massive, crusty, and incredibly antiquated Win32 API and the stuff that has grown up around it to ARM. Apple's OS X APIs on the other hand, are well suited to to ARM, especially their own 64-bit chip.
- MS also switched from a pointer-based UI to a touch-optimized one which broke compatibility with everything that came before. But the rumor here seems to suggest a desktop UI so no need for Apple to do the same.
It may be mostly a recompile and testing for most software with only a small set of changes needed in the end... Like the switch from 32-bit to 64-bit for Coco-based apps. Where apps will get stuck is if Apple drops support for old or obscure APIs like with Carbon.
Yes, it could, but third-party applications and drivers need to be recompiled and retested for it.
In that case, the real news would be a geographically divided business model instead of unified one. I'd rather think that Apple has seen, that buying power will also go down in the west and simultaneously a fresh wave of capable and affortable is appearing. They will be forced to offer cheaper IT for us. By using ARM they can "think different" and not be just a computer manufacturer among others.
Interestingly though, Mini was once just like that, affordable, innovative with unseen form factor and had unbeatable value by having also that superior OSX by default. But it was also open and compatible, and that's essentially why people have always loved it so much.
One would suspect, that by not updating Mini and letting it purposefully stay behind other Macs, they try to kill that market now and will offer ARM based solutions for home users and commentator-workers and only Macbook and Mac Pros for pros instead. Light and hard work will be separated by tools again.
That was a feature that brought me to the Mac also. However these days it means nothing for me. I do run a VM but that is to support Linux. I just don't see a lot of people caring anymore in the general sense. Sure there are professionals that have no choice, but the Windows capability is no longer a mainstream concern.
Not exactly! If the OS is Mac compatible it may mean a recompile, no big deal. It does not imply though that you will never see MS office or other I86 products as the vendors of these products can make a choice to support the platforms with a recompile.
There are other alternatives too. Apple could simply require that App Store apps support two different Binaries. Doing so with the current infrastructure should be a snap.
Another alternative is to make use of LLVM and have the compilers target an intermediary file that gets translated to native code at run time. LLVM has become surprisingly good for such things and this is not far fetched at all. So future versions of Mac OS could come with LLVM per installed to generate native binaries of an application at run time.
As a side note if you check up on recent WebKit releases you will see that they have just recently enabled and LLVM powered Safari that compiles JavaScript to native code. The nightlies are impressive to say the least. If you look at the WebKit web site and find the blogs they go into great detail as to what they have been doing for performance including the use of LLVM. This isn't generating the complete app, just the downloaded JavaScript but it does demonstrate feasibility.
In any event I don't see a big software issue. Hell they could setup the Mac to emulate iPad functionality, in a window and have an immediate huge pile of software for the machine.
This would be an absolute disaster if Apple did this, I appreciate why they would want to do it as it gives them even more control over their platform and everything on it, and, ultimately, even more profit.
But it would also make their platform a joke.
I see only a few places where ARM should be, my mobile phone, my tablet, my Smart TV, and my car.
I do not want a low power low performance CPU in my computer. It would mean also that Apple is conceding to Microsoft, it would be selling a direct competitor to the Surface Pro that was the same price but not as powerful or was capable of half as much, an ARM MacBook Air certainly isn't going to run Photoshop! And that's even mentioning all those far cheaper Windows laptops.
I mean do people really want the iPad version of Office on their laptop? As opposed to the full version a $400 Windows laptop can run?
As for the Power PC argument, this IMO is flawed, when Apple made Power PC computers it's install user base was tiny, not even a blip on a radar, since it moved to Intel it has grown from strength to strength and has a pretty good user install base. And I would claim that is solely down to the adoption of Intel processors, it made it MUCH easier for developers to code their software to run on Mac's.
So yes, whilst Microsoft is advancing as it should be, combining tablets with PC power, I don't consider doing the opposite and combining PC's with tablet power as a combination anyone would truly want on a device that costs as much as a MacBook Air.
I can see it now, look at the mac Range, the wonderful MacBook Air or iMac, both powered by powerful ARM processors and capable of running the entire range of apps from the iPad app store....
Or we have our Pro range, yes a LOT more expensive but powered by the latest range of Intel processors and capable of running all those productivity programmes your $300 Windows laptop can.
Yes I feel if Apple did ever change the CPU in it's iMac and MacBook Air range to ARM CPU's, it will have truly and utterly lost it's way and got swallowed up in it's own self believing arrogance and big headedness.
Think different indeed...
But it would also make their platform a joke.
I see only a few places where ARM should be, my mobile phone, my tablet, my Smart TV, and my car.
I do not want a low power low performance CPU in my computer. It would mean also that Apple is conceding to Microsoft, it would be selling a direct competitor to the Surface Pro that was the same price but not as powerful or was capable of half as much, an ARM MacBook Air certainly isn't going to run Photoshop! And that's even mentioning all those far cheaper Windows laptops.
I mean do people really want the iPad version of Office on their laptop? As opposed to the full version a $400 Windows laptop can run?
As for the Power PC argument, this IMO is flawed, when Apple made Power PC computers it's install user base was tiny, not even a blip on a radar, since it moved to Intel it has grown from strength to strength and has a pretty good user install base. And I would claim that is solely down to the adoption of Intel processors, it made it MUCH easier for developers to code their software to run on Mac's.
So yes, whilst Microsoft is advancing as it should be, combining tablets with PC power, I don't consider doing the opposite and combining PC's with tablet power as a combination anyone would truly want on a device that costs as much as a MacBook Air.
I can see it now, look at the mac Range, the wonderful MacBook Air or iMac, both powered by powerful ARM processors and capable of running the entire range of apps from the iPad app store....
Or we have our Pro range, yes a LOT more expensive but powered by the latest range of Intel processors and capable of running all those productivity programmes your $300 Windows laptop can.
Yes I feel if Apple did ever change the CPU in it's iMac and MacBook Air range to ARM CPU's, it will have truly and utterly lost it's way and got swallowed up in it's own self believing arrogance and big headedness.
Think different indeed...
We had those Ultra portables already. They were called Netbooks and they were HORRIBLE and so is the idea of going to ARM. If you like ARM so well, go play with your iPad and leave REAL computers to those of us that know how to use them and what to use them for.
ARM would destroy the Mac (and possibly Apple too in the long run). But then I'm thinking that might already happen if Beats is to be the "new direction" for Apple products (i.e. cheap celebrity gimmicks targeted for popularity among those that know little about quality products, similar to Bose relative to true high-end speaker products. Bose costs as much as quality gear, but sells based on advertising and being "small" gimmicks rather than high-end quality sound. Yeah, their clock radio sounds good for a clock radio, but WTF listens to a clock radio for serious music listening? You could get so much better speakers for half the price of that thing alone (e.g. Klipsch 2.1 tied to an Airport Express is what I use in my bedroom and blows away my mother's Bose radio and cost half the price). Beats headphones have gotten a lot of headlines, but they're nowhere near the quality of Grado or Sennheiser, but costs similar amounts of money. I can just picture this "Mac by Dre" advertising campaign with a low-end CPU and the same high-end prices. It's what Dre uses! So you should want one too just like Michael Jordan selling Nike shoes. Yeah, Brooks shoes are 10x the quality at the same price. Their money went into the shoe, not a celebrity's pocket.
Last edited:
Guys, I think you're missing the big picture here. You might not be able to run Windows or existing OS X apps on your Mac anymore, but you'd be able to run iOS apps. Who needs real Office or iWork when you can have Office and iWork for iOS on a MacBook Air!
Motorola... Let me think...
They spun off their hardware business in 2004. Called Freescale. Then they split into Motorola Solutions and Motorola Mobility. Motorola Mobility was bought by Google. Motorola Solutions is what remains. A shadow of its former self.
I would be really surprised if they let you run iOS applications, because the interface doesn't make sense on a desktop, even less so if you use a large 27" monitor.
Actually, from a software developer's point of view, ARM and x86 processors are very, very similar. Unless a developer writes assembler code, explicitly uses SSE or NEON instructions, or uses the "long double" data type, code compiled for one can be recompiled and will run on the other type of processor. (And all three of these are rare). They are so similar, the "iPhone simulator" and "iPad simulator" that iOS developers use is actually running x86 code.
I'll tell you how much development effort it would take me to make my MacOS X code run on an ARM based MacOS X system? Zero. Literally zero.
Last edited:
Apple crearly wants fan-less MBA so they look at ARM as an option.
When Apple switched to Intel it was a compleatly different situation in terms of performance, costs and efficiency.
Intel is still a leader in desktop/notebook CPUs and delivers incredible performance, power efficiency and low temperature. In the last 4 generations of Intel i's procesors, Intel increased two times the performace and reduced two times the power consumption while makeing their processors cooler. If you compare the first MBA with C2D and the lattest one, there is huge improvment over time and if im Apple I wouldnt worry much about the future. What Apple may do is increase the cooperation with Intel in the development of specific Mac processors optimized for MacOS while improving MacOS inteself in terms of power consumtion, thermal efficiency engineering and so one. There are many improveement that can be done first on software and hardware level in Apple computers before looking for other options.
When Apple switched to Intel it was a compleatly different situation in terms of performance, costs and efficiency.
Intel is still a leader in desktop/notebook CPUs and delivers incredible performance, power efficiency and low temperature. In the last 4 generations of Intel i's procesors, Intel increased two times the performace and reduced two times the power consumption while makeing their processors cooler. If you compare the first MBA with C2D and the lattest one, there is huge improvment over time and if im Apple I wouldnt worry much about the future. What Apple may do is increase the cooperation with Intel in the development of specific Mac processors optimized for MacOS while improving MacOS inteself in terms of power consumtion, thermal efficiency engineering and so one. There are many improveement that can be done first on software and hardware level in Apple computers before looking for other options.
People pay big bucks for MBA that have significantly less performance than the MBP. These days you buy the performance you want, nothing will change with a few ARM based machines.
Seethe above, people regularly purchase Airs which are significantly slower than the MBP's. However you make fatal assumptions here. One is that these machines would be offered at current Apple laptop prices when they could be significantly cheaper. The second assumption is that the performance would be poorer. Let's take on poorer, poorer to what a Mac Pro, an iPad, iPhone or a MBA? Because I can say with confidence that a well designed ARM based laptop will out perform two of those easily and would give the other one a run for its money.
Again it isn't the old days anymore. The market simply isn't wrapped up in performance figures anymore, beyond that if this was an issue iPad would be getting all sorts of heat for using an ARM based processor. It doesn't get that slagging public commentary due to the fact that people have recognized other factors as more important when it comes to valuing systems.
Really get a grip here, it isn't the old days anymore.
PowerPC was developed by multiple companies (Motorola and IBM) which both were _not_ interested in the market that Apple was interested in. If you haven't noticed, Apple is actually developing ARM processors itself and is ahead of everyone else.
We had those Ultra portables already. They were called Netbooks and they were HORRIBLE and so is the idea of going to ARM. If you like ARM so well, go play with your iPad and leave REAL computers to those of us that know how to use them and what to use them for.
ARM would destroy the Mac (and possibly Apple too in the long run).
Drama Queen much. The point is that 95% of people use an air to surf the web and maybe write a document or 2 or do some iPhoto stuff. They would have to keep the i7s as they are still waaaaaay faster than ARM.
If they could bring in a $600 Arm machine that is as powerful as a 3 year old macbook pro why not. Doesn't mean they would swap completely to ARM.
BUT it would have to be a seamless OSX integration. Still only one OSX not a 'RT' Version and I am not sure if that is possible.
iOS does have the same kernel as OSX but a lot of the technologies may be specific to intel Chips. I know that the whole point of ARM is a reduced instruction set.
But whole know this could just be a another sensationalist macRUMOR which is the point of this site.
Besides that, the larger battery and case on a laptop may allow them to clock the chip at a higher frequency. Also, there is a limit in terms of how much the transistors on a CPU can shrink, when that limit is reached improvements will have to happen on the design side. Intel has a lot of backwards compatibility built into x86, since Apple has their own chip design team it's not strange if they are at least experimenting with what may come in the future (5-10 year a head).