I really thought with the original HomePod that this is what Apple was planning on doing. With Sonos and Sony having individual speakers that you can network into a surround sound system it would have put Apple at the forefront of new surround sound systems, and the price of 4 or 5 HomePod speaker system wouldn’t be that different from what a Sony HT-A9 system is today. Give it the flexibility to be an easily re-configurable room to room music system and the $500 price per speaker isn’t out of line with the systems that Sony and Sonos and Bose are releasing now.
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Gurman: Apple Planning M2 Pro Mac Mini, New Apple TV With A14 Chip, Revamped HomePod With S8 Chip, and More
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First, Gurman used to work for Macrumors. There are "front page" articles in the archives from several years ago that have his by-line .
Second, Gurman is mainly employed by Bloomberg which is a bit different that being a Youtube influencer. If Apple wants to do a directed leak into the business news cycle that is a better path than to some "Youtube influencer". It is an established Business (and stock trading) news information source. Technically his "PowerOn" newsletter isn't a "normal" Bloomberg source feed, but the signup are on Bloomberg's site and the 'bonus' features are if you are Bloomberg subscriber. He has a job and an employer.
Gurman's rumors tend to 'drift' from "Apple sources says ..." to "I think Apple will do .." . I suspect in part because this newsletter has to come out every week now. And Apple isn't going to drop directed leaks on a weekly schedule. Even if have unofficial sources, still won't be a a weekly leak like clockwork ( at least of leaker doesn't want to get caught.)
Many new Macs! Looking forward to seeing the 15” MacBook Air. If iMac misses out on M2, it will be surprising.
That somewhat presumes that the actual TV doesn't have an upscaler/correction function. And upscaler piled on top of an upscaled is far more likely to produce unwanted side effects. Is it a IPS screen , OLED screen, VA screen (with varying pixel layouts ) ?
AppleTV+ is on a substantive fraction of medium-high quality modern TVs. Passing to the in unit upscaler/corrector is more directly important.
Probably a major contributor there is not being a slacker loser , but the fact that the iPhone team actually 'owns' the screen. So can do .1% to just a small handful of screens built to your narrow specs. Whereas the TV team has to do validation on many dozens of screens not developed to narrow Apple specs.
That's because iPhones are where the money is. ATV? I can't name even one person I know who owns one. It's all Amazon Firesticks which they use to launch Netflix and Disney apps: those two huge players in the streaming arena who ironically don't have their own branded streaming hardware.
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First question on M2 / M2 Pro Mac mini: will the SSD be slower than the M1 Mac mini?
If Apple 'thins out" out the low end Mini ( only a plain Mx (M2, then M3, etc) more plastic , less aluminum , smaller power supply , etc. ) then they probably can get the costs down.
At one point the base configuration of the Mini was $499. If Apple could squeeze a "smaller" Mini case with an M2 down to $599 then folks who want the "bigger home A/V unit" could be pointed to stretch to that price point and the Mini. When the Mini was around $499-599 it was used more as a "Home Theater PC" (HTPC). [ If they were looking specifically for the HTPC use case could chop the SSD back to 128GB. That is double the current ATV 4K max capacity of 64GB and there are USB/TB ports on it if will to stick on an external drive. Could also likely weave in the much of the kiosk and digital display use cases also with 128GB . ]
AppleTV is already relatively expensive. Calls for even more expensive bill of materials is highly likely going to end up with an AppleTV that is substantially more expensive. ( Apple is probably not going to take lower margins.).
If willing to pay more than $500 ... get a Mini. It has the Apple TV app. The Siri Remote primarily uses Bluetooth; the Mini has bluetooth ( old school Mini's had a IR receiver, but don't really need that these days. Between HDMI-CEC and bluetooth. )
New Siri Remote support comes to Mac for presentations, media, more with Remote Buddy - 9to5Mac
The all-new Siri Remote that launched with the second-gen Apple TV 4K has been a hit. And with the refreshed...
9to5mac.com
A more expensive AppleTV device isn't going to help it with the major market forces it faces.
1. The AppleTV app is already on (or downloadable to) the "more than decent" TVs from the top 3-5 vendors. (at least in the USA).
Also on Playstation and XBox and the other streaming boxes ( XFinity , Roku , Andriod/Google TV , FireTV , etc.)
2. Most of the streaming competition is below $100 , let alone $300. Most of the primary market is price anchored to double digit price number.
For the gaming box segment Apple is just highly unlikely to follow the "Sell box at almost no margin and make it up on game licensing". Apple doesn't "loss leader" products are a basic practice. All the devices make their own money. The software products are gravy on top. By the time have thrown in the higher end bill of materials and toss on top Apple's desired margins... probably in the zone of what the low end point what the Mini used to be.
This is fundamentally flawed. The UltraFusion connector doesn't automagically fall out of the iPhone SoC. It is relatively myopically focused on CPU and GPU cores and basically ignores the 'uncore' differences. The packaging processes and technics are different across the M series line up.
The internal bus that scales past the iPhone sized core counts is a substantial factor also.
The MBP 13" M2 2022 is far more an exercise of using "hand me down" parts to shave margins. The headphones are inherited ( Studio , MBP 14/16) part. Same with the Charger. Why make a different on just for this model? Can't generalize that to the whole Mac product line up. [ except where yes.... Apple reuses components across multiple product lines all the time to narrow the supply chain volume to a smaller set of components. ]
There is a dual edge sword with using the iPhone cores and exact same fabrication process. The iPhone has demand bubbles. Apple likely will not always try to sync up Mac demand bubbles with iPhone ones. From time to time it may happen, but as a deliberate plan for every year ... that's just deeply flawed. Fab process updates are not exactly 12 months every year. There is little good reason to pigeonhole the Mac into the same corner that the iPhone is in. If there is a way to ship a substantially better M-series SoC in the Spring then Apple should take those when they can.
Except the Pro/MaX/Ultra didn't come out at the same time. Nor should they be.
Look at any other vendor with a substantially diverse SoC product line up. Once span a wide variety of die sizes and complexities and a much wider user base (and use cases ) , 12 month updates don't really make sense. Few others are following that path.
Apple's watch S-series has been relatively comatose. Have been slapping different labels on basically same microarchitecture.
It isn't the M2 that is slowing things down. It is "save a buck" Apple.
"... It's unclear why the new base model 13-inch MacBook Pro is only equipped with a single NAND chip, but costs and/or supply constraints are two possible factors. We've reached out to Apple for comment and will update this story if we hear back. .."
Base 13-Inch MacBook Pro With M2 Chip Has Significantly Slower SSD Speeds
Following the launch of Apple's new 13-inch MacBook Pro with the M2 chip, it has been discovered that the $1,299 base model with 256GB of...
www.macrumors.com
Conveniently for Apple's margins, customers have to pay more ( get at least a 512GB SSD) if want the old speed back.
P.S. Not likely a problem for the "Mini Pro" as probably will get the baseline minimums of a M-x Pro chip ( 16GB RAM minimal ) and 512GB SSD ( Current Intel model still for sale creeping up on 2 years later starts at 512GB) .
If Apple tries to shoot for a 128GB 'bare bones' entry M2 model then wouldn't be surprising if they were buying enough 128GB NANDs chips at that point to pair two of them up for a less ridiculous M2 Mac Mini SSD implementation. [ the one 128GB would still take a bandwidth hit , but most non-edge case users would take the 256GB as a starting point. ]
[ Actually to be a bit more fair , there have been some NAND production problems so this may be a chip shortage issue, that "using one NAND" could disappear later. Depends upon how Apple has structured their orders and if they want to drive the revised M2 Mini price even lower ( with lower bill-of-material costs. ). ]
P.P.S. depending upon how much other costs Apple chops out of the base Mini bill of materials, they could also shift to a 512GB minimum for the M2 Mini. ( MBP 13" has a touchbar screen to pay for, the Mini doesn't even come with a keyboard , let alone a screen. )
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The M2 is not the cause of the slow down, Apple is. Rather, Apple not using the two NAND chips on their boards.
Since when is the Apple TV app comparable to an actual Apple TV 4K?
At the very least it doesn’t provide same quality of bit rate video, and you need to use ARC/eARC to get multi ch audio. Not going to discuss the many other differences offered. See this post for more differences.
tvOS is all many people use an Apple TV for, but Apple also is targeting gamers, as a faster chip can be useful for these purposes.
Thank you for the thoughtful reply. I guess I‘m just frustrated with Apple because I believe they are missing a huge opportunity. I believe with their chip building tech that they could build the perfect device between the current top of the line Apple TV and bottom of the line Mac Mini. It would be a device designed for use on high quality TVs such as OLEDs with an interface that makes it feasible to do things like web browsing and shopping and such, along with more importantly, excellent video game capabilities.If Apple 'thins out" out the low end Mini ( only a plain Mx (M2, then M3, etc) more plastic , less aluminum , smaller power supply , etc. ) then they probably can get the costs down.
At one point the base configuration of the Mini was $499. If Apple could squeeze a "smaller" Mini case with an M2 down to $599 then folks who want the "bigger home A/V unit" could be pointed to stretch to that price point and the Mini. When the Mini was around $499-599 it was used more as a "Home Theater PC" (HTPC). [ If they were looking specifically for the HTPC use case could chop the SSD back to 128GB. That is double the current ATV 4K max capacity of 64GB and there are USB/TB ports on it if will to stick on an external drive. Could also likely weave in the much of the kiosk and digital display use cases also with 128GB . ]
AppleTV is already relatively expensive. Calls for even more expensive bill of materials is highly likely going to end up with an AppleTV that is substantially more expensive. ( Apple is probably not going to take lower margins.).
If willing to pay more than $500 ... get a Mini. It has the Apple TV app. The Siri Remote primarily uses Bluetooth; the Mini has bluetooth ( old school Mini's had a IR receiver, but don't really need that these days. Between HDMI-CEC and bluetooth. )
New Siri Remote support comes to Mac for presentations, media, more with Remote Buddy - 9to5Mac
The all-new Siri Remote that launched with the second-gen Apple TV 4K has been a hit. And with the refreshed...
A more expensive AppleTV device isn't going to help it with the major market forces it faces.
1. The AppleTV app is already on (or downloadable to) the "more than decent" TVs from the top 3-5 vendors. (at least in the USA).
Also on Playstation and XBox and the other streaming boxes ( XFinity , Roku , Andriod/Google TV , FireTV , etc.)
2. Most of the streaming competition is below $100 , let alone $300. Most of the primary market is price anchored to double digit price number.
For the gaming box segment Apple is just highly unlikely to follow the "Sell box at almost no margin and make it up on game licensing". Apple doesn't "loss leader" products are a basic practice. All the devices make their own money. The software products are gravy on top. By the time have thrown in the higher end bill of materials and toss on top Apple's desired margins... probably in the zone of what the low end point what the Mini used to be.
They would need to build a custom M1 with less cpu cores and more gpu cores and more cache. This is essentially what AMD does when they build their custom CPUs for the PS5 and XBOX. Apple could cut out all the extra unnecessary stuff and really just focus on game performance for this SOC. I believe they could easily build a monster chip that would be more powerful than a PS5. They need to put DLSS functionality in there too so it doesn’t go obsolete any time soon.
Figure out a way to make it just about the same size as the Apple TV, to keep costs down and cut out any unnecessary features and expenses. All plastic, cheap cooling, no unneccessary ports and so forth. I believe they could build such a device, and compete with current consoles prices and still make a nice profit because of their cost control advantages.
Then they just need to get a few triple A game developers on board. You really don’t need that much to start. Maybe get Epic on board cause games like Fortnite and Fall Guys are often the only games a lot of people play (maybe Apple could unburn that bridge). Then maybe pick a few other developers. I would say make a deal with From Software to offer Elden Rings 2 as a one year exclusive. And maybe do that with 2 or 3 other big games. Maybe release 1 triple A exclusive a month and also try to incentivize their current game developers to go big with triple A games and I bet that’s enough to start building a base. The console video game market will be 50 Billion a year soon.
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Since when is the Apple TV app comparable to an actual Apple TV 4K?
It is comparable if actually already own the TV app and buying an Apple TV is even more. The notion that there is an extremely low degree of overlap here is laughable when the they almost entirely share the same name. The primary function is basically the same.
No they are not exactly the same, but that isn't accounting for the very real market forces at play here.
ARC/eARC is basically also useful for the rest of the apps on the TV you just paid for and if not trying to do everything with solely Apple's Siri Remote. For the user base who 'stretch the budget' to buy the better TV, then using what you paid for does have high utility.
The newest 4K Apple TV does all its audio over HDMI cables too. So "have to use ARC" is a major crutch/differentiation?
But the market forces issues are those differences enough.
The appstore size pissing contest doesn't work all that well with the gaming consoles. Roku also when it comes to streaming apps diversity. Google/Android TV and FireTV not that far behind on streaming apps.
HomeKit and other deep Apple eco system items also have less traction with folks who just bought a new TV because they wanted/needed a new one. If all folks have is an iPhone, then if the iPhone can be a remote and spawn video on the big screen , then the value add is where? For folks who are knee to eyeball depth already in Apple ecosystem, then yes there are highly value add effects.
There is a market for the AppleTV. But if trying to make it into a larger addressable market cranking up the cost is a dubious way to expand the available market. AppleTV already struggles to do price/value justification with the narrowly targeted feature set you are trying to showboat here. An even higher cost will likely be even more problematical.
Apple has supposedly been targeting "gamers" for ten years, with nothing to show for it.
The "traditional" gamer market is toxic along multiple dimensions, but the ones most relevant to Apple are that
- they're cheap, and
- they hate Apple as part of their identity.
The best Apple can do is target the "casual gamer" market; but this market appears to be a mirage, at least in the context of aTV. They're primarily playing what boils down to disguised slot machines, just don't require very much CPU/GPU, and work fine on a phone.
That assumes that the TV can do a better job than the Apple TV. Why should that be so? The Apple TV has vastly better hardware. The only difference is that the TV manufacturer has a motivation to at least try to do the job (to the level that they can market it) while the Apple TV team hve zero motivation to do anything whatsoever.
Problem is, Apple massively screwed this up with the previous HomePod/aTV hookup. I tried that for two years, and it would basically work for a week then randomly stop. There were OS versions where it worked (barely) and OS versions where it stopped working for months. Utterly unacceptable!
Meanwhile my LG wireless soundbar+multispeaker system may not be perfect, but it glitches (in the sense that I have to power cycle the sound bar) perhaps once every three months, and power cycling the sound bar takes a few seconds and fixes it; as opposed to the hours of random futzing I spent trying to get HomePod+aTV to work.
No thank you! Apple can do some things well, but I'm not going to give them $1000+ for a sound system that (on past experience) I fully expect to an on-going pain in the ass for four years then be abandoned when the company decides it's no longer an interesting project.
Not so much "faster" as newer. AppleTV ( and rest of the HDMI outputting line up) is still on HDMI 2.0. Not really the CPU or GPU cores per se , but the DisplayPort output that needs some updating. And Apple should move to a newer common shared component HDMI converter than can go to HDMI 2.1
Not so much to get to "8K" but to get to more robust variable refresh in the 4K (and down) regions.
However, I wouldn't expect the A14 to bring that to the table.
".. Apple TV with an A14 chip and an increased 4GB of RAM ..."
A14 with 4GB is more likely not because "faster" but because available in higher volume. Apple had to buy them in bulk for a another device so just toss them into the AppleTV also for higher economies of scale. ( e.g., moving the base level iPad to A14 so slide the AppleTV over at the same time. ) . Trickle down from the iPad Air (which moved on ) and iPhones.
If HomeKit video processing was smarter then the "faster" would have better traction. I suspect the more RAM is to be better able to 'walk and chew gum at the same time' as opposed to poor all of it into a single use. For users not very deep into the Apple ecosystem (and multiple functions thrown at the AppleTV) it isn't going to be all that useful.
Thank you.
While I agree apples isn’t perfect, it’s certainly better than what used to exist.
The Intel I5 clocked at 3.1 ghz, or the I7 clocked at 2.5?
I7 sounds better than I5, but 3.1 ghz sounds faster than 2.5
And haswell, skylake?
Meaningless terms.
Yes of course I know the difference, so no one come in here and correct me.
But the majority of people don’t.