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The Samurai

macrumors 68020
Dec 29, 2007
2,055
750
Glasgow
Can't wait!

Surprised MR haven't posted anything about it yet, read it on AI yesterday too.

I've seen a lot of fire sales recently on the MB lineup, most recently here in the UK you can pick up the 512gb varian for £900 at Currys - the cheapest its ever been. The same machine is £1549 on the Apple website!

Hopefully a sign of inventory being cleared.
 

Trhodezy

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Dec 29, 2010
310
140
Can't wait!

Surprised MR haven't posted anything about it yet, read it on AI yesterday too.

I've seen a lot of fire sales recently on the MB lineup, most recently here in the UK you can pick up the 512gb varian for £900 at Currys - the cheapest its ever been. The same machine is £1549 on the Apple website!

Hopefully a sign of inventory being cleared.

I know, that’s what I was thinking. MR are usually really hot on things like that.

I didn’t know that you could pick a 512gb up for £900 at Curry’s! I’m buying one ASAP. Was looking for a good value high capacity SSD MB. Thanks!
 

scrappygolucky

macrumors member
Sep 15, 2018
41
56
I wonder if the ARM macbooks will come this year or if there will be a refresh to bridge the gap. My guess is it will be the latter.

But if they don't improve the keyboard I guess I will skip the refresh too. All I use a laptop for is typing.
 

Plutonius

macrumors G3
Feb 22, 2003
9,189
8,806
New Hampshire, USA
I wonder if the ARM macbooks will come this year or if there will be a refresh to bridge the gap. My guess is it will be the latter.

But if they don't improve the keyboard I guess I will skip the refresh too. All I use a laptop for is typing.

Apple is usually not that quick (look at the Mac Pro) so I think it will be some time before we see ARM MacBooks.
 
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Dave245

macrumors G3
Sep 15, 2013
9,840
8,072
ARM would definitely give the 12" Macbook a differentiating factor from the other Mac laptops. The 12" Macbook could be the experiment with ARM, but that spec "leak" mentions 10 cores, that seems like a lot for a laptop, even the 15" MacBook Pro currently has 6. I wonder if it's for a desktop like the iMac, iMac Pro or even Mac Pro?
 

fokmik

Suspended
Oct 28, 2016
4,909
4,689
USA
If its ture ...that 12cores ARM leak
I mean only the imac pro or mac pro can handle 12 cores right now...12 cores ARM i think can be placed into the 16" macbook pro ...but again, if that leak its true
i still think the 12" macbook will be the first, it will be faster than the current one and from 9-10 hours battery life we can get around 14-15 hours
 

multitudes

macrumors newbie
Feb 12, 2019
6
6
This is the current view of the website. The story is super fake, but still.,... I am waiting for the ARM MacBooks... :)

s8svjJa.png
 

msp3

Suspended
May 9, 2015
489
608
FWIW, even before the Intel transition Jobs said they built an Intel Mac capable of running each version of Mac OS X, so I wouldn't read too much into this
 

radiologyman

macrumors 6502a
Jul 23, 2011
755
271
Apple is usually not that quick (look at the Mac Pro) so I think it will be some time before we see ARM MacBooks.
Kuo last year predicted ARM MacBook in 2020, thus corroborating that its not coming anytime soon
 
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frou

macrumors 65816
Mar 14, 2009
1,381
1,978
It makes sense for some kind of ARM Mac to be made available sooner rather than later, because developers outside Apple Park will want real hardware to test ARM builds of their software on.

ASIDE: Did you know that Microsoft sent out PowerMac G5's which were used as early test platforms for Xbox 360 code?
 

Falhófnir

macrumors 603
Aug 19, 2017
6,146
7,000
ARM would definitely give the 12" Macbook a differentiating factor from the other Mac laptops. The 12" Macbook could be the experiment with ARM, but that spec "leak" mentions 10 cores, that seems like a lot for a laptop, even the 15" MacBook Pro currently has 6. I wonder if it's for a desktop like the iMac, iMac Pro or even Mac Pro?
I wouldn't read too much into the core count - the A12X in the iPad pros is octa-core, remember! At 7nm, they will be able to cram a lot more into the lower TDP than intel currently are with their 14nm chips. These supposed chips are so performant though, I wonder if they would want to put it in a MacBook which would then sit alongside the much more expensive pros but offer similar performance? Maybe they are destined for a higher end (actively cooled) machine and the rMB will run on the iPad A12X chip (the two currently run similar TDP chips so presumably have similar (passive) cooling capacity).
 

Dave245

macrumors G3
Sep 15, 2013
9,840
8,072
I wouldn't read too much into the core count - the A12X in the iPad pros is octa-core, remember! At 7nm, they will be able to cram a lot more into the lower TDP than intel currently are with their 14nm chips. These supposed chips are so performant though, I wonder if they would want to put it in a MacBook which would then sit alongside the much more expensive pros but offer similar performance? Maybe they are destined for a higher end (actively cooled) machine and the rMB will run on the iPad A12X chip (the two currently run similar TDP chips so presumably have similar (passive) cooling capacity).

Good thinking! The MacBook 12” I think could be the experimental device, Apple have the Air and the Pro that’s Intel. They could start with the 12” MacBook, see how it goes and then move ARM across the entire line, over a number of years.

The iPad Pro 3rd gen is insane with the power it has, even rivals the MacBook Pro. The only problem at this point is that there are not many Pro apps to take advantage of that power. I hope that changes at WWDC :)

Personally I love the iPad Pro, but I also like to use a Mac. I’m currently in mind to get the new MacBook Air, to accompany my 2017 iPad Pro which I use for a drawing and playing some games (Tropico).
 
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radiologyman

macrumors 6502a
Jul 23, 2011
755
271
Don't forget that ARM is a lot cheaper for Apple given in house development and shared cost of R&D. I am sure they already negotiated a good price on manufacturing 7 nm ARM chips. Apple will also be able to add to Macs features developed for IOS devices and differentiate their offerings from Intel based computers
 
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Dave245

macrumors G3
Sep 15, 2013
9,840
8,072
Don't forget that ARM is a lot cheaper for Apple given in house development and shared cost of R&D. I am sure they already negotiated a good price on manufacturing 7 nm ARM chips. Apple will also be able to add to Macs features developed for IOS devices and differentiate their offerings from Intel based computers

Also is the T2 chip considered an experimental effort towards that goal? Apple builds some great chipsets, the bionic chip in the iPhone and the Bionic X in the iPad Pro are speedy and powerful chips. I think Apple could do great things with ARM chips.
 

fokmik

Suspended
Oct 28, 2016
4,909
4,689
USA
we really have some info that current A12X is superior for x86 apps in terms of cpu raw power and iGPU than an current 8th gen i5/i7 quad cores ?
 

Moonjumper

macrumors 68030
Jun 20, 2009
2,744
2,925
Lincoln, UK
Apple is usually not that quick (look at the Mac Pro) so I think it will be some time before we see ARM MacBooks.

Apple don’t have to be quick to bring out an ARM Mac soon as they have almost certainly been testing that choice for many years. It has already been a couple of years since they started describing iOS devices as having desktop-class processors, which I took as prepping us for ARM Macs.

Keeping busy with ARM Macs maybe the reason the Mac Pro is taking so long (I’m not suggesting the MP will be ARM, although that would be bold, just that their priorities have been split), I cannot think of another reason why. Apple probably started on ARM Macs before developing the current Mac Pro, never mind the new one.
 

Falhófnir

macrumors 603
Aug 19, 2017
6,146
7,000
we really have some info that current A12X is superior for x86 apps in terms of cpu raw power and iGPU than an current 8th gen i5/i7 quad cores ?
There are numerous tests of the iPad pros completing tasks like video rendering in a similar timeframe to a MacBook pro. To what extent software optimisation might help the CPU in this regard is debatable, but given the fact it's a 7W passively cooled chip up against a 45W actively cooled CPU with dedicated GPU, it's astonishing it can even get anywhere near it doing tasks like these. I know there's a lot of hesitancy to put stock in benchmarks too, but in terms of measuring raw power they do have their uses as well as limitations.

While at first glance it might seem difficult to believe, remember intel's chips have been largely stagnant for 4 whole years now, outside of a core count bump that helped with multi-core performance last year. The fact is, Apple's chips have crept up and are now matching what Intel can do at 14nm in terms of single core performance, and at much lower power levels. From that base it's not as difficult as it seems to start matching some of intel's chips that you'd think would be out of reach.
 

fokmik

Suspended
Oct 28, 2016
4,909
4,689
USA
i was talking about 25W quad core cpu not those 6 cores 15"MBP 45 W
A12X is still far away from x86 since it needs to emulate and lose power as well here...ok A12X i think surpass the today 12"Macbook thats on the 6th gen cpu if im not mistaken
Ok , i bet Apple will never put A12X into a mac , even if it will release it this day...but still i think the A12X is between 12"macbook and 2018 Macbook air performance
I would love to se an 12" Macbook ARM this year
 

frou

macrumors 65816
Mar 14, 2009
1,381
1,978
If a new 12" MacBook had a kickass bespoke ARM CPU wouldn't that embarrass the dual-core MacBook Air that they just released?

I'd love to see it this year, but it seems more likely that the step will be made in 2020 with multiple products at the same time. The various news stories have mentioned 2020 also.
 
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