They can purchase the same ASML lithography equipment that TSMC, Intel and Samsung buy but they would have to be able to beat TSMC’s processes that gives them advantages over Intel and Samsung.
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iPhone 14 Pro and Redesigned MacBook Air Reportedly Stuck Using Technology Behind A15 Chip
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That was before Covid and lockdowns threw a spanner in the works.
If it doesn't come with an M2 polishing cloth, I'm out.
We need more fabs in US, Canada, Europe anyway to have greater production diversity.
Jeeez....Everybody's getting chumed up. Relax. Tomorrow planet Earth will again rotate into the Sun's rays, beginning another day.
I was expecting the same. I figured they'd bump clock speed to get higher single core plus add cores especially in the desktop versions (Mac Studio mainly). There are very slight differences, however. Desktop implementations can (and do) provide more substantial cooling solutions. It was puzzling to me that they didn't do that. It's part of what makes the Air and Mini such great deals. For any single core task they are just as fast as Macs that cost several times as much. Kind of a missed opportunity, if you ask me.
I don’t know if you are going for humor, but “behind” in the headline “Stuck Using Technology Behind A15 Chip” means “from which the A15 is made” or “A15-generation technology.”
But isn’t the family complete even if they call this M1? It can act not as a new chip in the family, just as a new core variant of M1. They already sell 7 and 8 core GPU versions anyway. So adding to it 9 and 10-core versions can easily be sold as such. Even if it’s cpu cores were based on A15, that can not matter in the way of marketing it, if Apple chooses so.
Apple needs CPU jumps to make people throw away their perfectly working phones for the next cool new thing...
honestly, YoY improvements is ridicolous fast. I mean what could you discover in 12 months that a CPU much faster. In the automobile world a car model will last between 4-7 years.
honestly, YoY improvements is ridicolous fast. I mean what could you discover in 12 months that a CPU much faster. In the automobile world a car model will last between 4-7 years.
More storage is more useful than more CPU at this point. And/or add a few more graphics units.
"The biggest complaint I have with the M1 variants is they're all just more cores- single-core (and in most cases, perceived computer speed) is equal amongst all the machines."
Physics is a bear that way. Intel hit 3.8 GHz way back in Pentium 4 days. They had plans for 10 GHz. Physics laughed at them and suggested a compromise with liquid nitrogen cooling at 6 GHz.
Similarly today's very best jetliner is no faster than a 707 from the 1960's. The SST, which was faster, couldn't make any money because Physics demanded a rather large fuel bill for the extra speed.
Eventually shrinking the process is going to reach the point where diffusion will limit the lifetime of the the transistors to unreasonably short values. And that will end Moore's law for good. I'm actually surprised that it hasn't happened already.
Physics is a bear that way. Intel hit 3.8 GHz way back in Pentium 4 days. They had plans for 10 GHz. Physics laughed at them and suggested a compromise with liquid nitrogen cooling at 6 GHz.
Similarly today's very best jetliner is no faster than a 707 from the 1960's. The SST, which was faster, couldn't make any money because Physics demanded a rather large fuel bill for the extra speed.
Eventually shrinking the process is going to reach the point where diffusion will limit the lifetime of the the transistors to unreasonably short values. And that will end Moore's law for good. I'm actually surprised that it hasn't happened already.
News flash! This year’s phone will not be manufactured with next year’s chip!🍸😹
The Mac has ALWAYS, save for a few quarters, been a bigger REVENUE generator than the iPad. However, when Apple looks at the raw numbers of HOW MANY individuals are wanting and buying iPads versus those wanting and buying Macs, iPad unit sales have always been greater than the Mac.
iPads have had a 25 million unit sales quarter in the past (2013 I think), but the Mac has NEVER had a 25 million unit sales quarter.
M2 will suck for whoever already has M1. Tick and tock model people.
It’s not about iPhone performance as it is to users on this forum who believe that they are being screwed over when there isn’t enough “change”, “forward progress”, “new shiny tech” to either crow or bitch about when Apple releases a new product. They want to be able to brag or compare or complain and tend to benchmark against Intel to either justify their Windows PC or sticking with Apple because they are more cutting edge. There are numerous examples of users here stating that the M2 should already be out, that 3nm is already old tech and they’re waiting on 1nm. They chase specs but are utterly clueless about what it takes to launch a new node and the supply chain constraints that we are still dealing with almost halfway through 2022.
There will be complaints no matter what, but the fact is that many people here are simply spec chasers and when the specs don’t change according to their standards they get itchy and restless and testy. It’s going to be a long grumpy summer for a lot of the spec chasers here.
This is going to be a challenging year for Apple, and after 2021, I thought there was a small light at the end of the tunnel. Guess not.
The issue with the M1 is not the performance but the features, most importantly on the graphics side... the lack of multi-display support is a bit of an issue. DisplayPort MST would finally be nice as well, but as we know that's an OS limitation that in 2022 Apple still didn't fix (correct me if I'm wrong).
While we are on it, add eGPU support as well (and get us the drivers to use those eGPUs).
While we are on it, add eGPU support as well (and get us the drivers to use those eGPUs).
Most buyers.
You're right - they don't know anything about the core code names or how many nm the process is....all they know is "That is last year's model, the M1...I'm waiting for the M2"
They absolutely are. They know that the M1 is Apple's 2021 chip, and they won't recognize a new model as an "upgrade" until it says "M2" on it.
The chip name is the ONE thing they do track. Apple makes sure of that on every product page and at every product introduction. Average non-pro consumers know that the M1 is the "old" chip.
It may be "just a number", but that's exactly why non-technical consumers will not recognize an M1 as a "new" or "improved" model, regardless of the core changes.
More like "The one that says "M2" - that's the new one. The M1 is last year's model."
Apple’s produced a new line of computers where they all outperform their Intel predecessor by a significant margin. While doing so, they didn’t lock the performance improvements away at some higher echelon like AMD and Intel does. That similar single threaded performance is available all down the line.
Because of the way people are used to thinking of the world in terms of what AMD and Intel produces, I think people just don’t recognize the significance of Apple having delivered an entire line of systems where they ALL perform roughly at the same impressive single threaded level. AMD and Intel will never copy this, of course. It’s not curious why the higher end doesn’t have greater single threaded performance, it’s remarkable that the low end has the impressive single threaded performance that it has.
My M1 Air still feels plenty snappy to me so there's no downside to hanging onto it if the M2 version isn't wowing me enough to upgrade.
I'm still very interested to see what exactly the M2 Air will be, though. There has been rumors galore they may even introduce a 15" option to go along with the redesign and any improvement we do get with the chip will still be better than we are now but the question is will it be enough to entice M1 owners to make the jump?
I'm still very interested to see what exactly the M2 Air will be, though. There has been rumors galore they may even introduce a 15" option to go along with the redesign and any improvement we do get with the chip will still be better than we are now but the question is will it be enough to entice M1 owners to make the jump?
I think I'll wait for the next iteration. I was in the market for a new M1/M2 Macbook Air but not in a rush now after upgrading my mid 2015 Macbook Pro with a new 2tb Samsung 970 EVO Plus SSD and loading up Monterey. Runs faster than ever. That'll last me a few more years.
I know someone just last week that bought “the Green iPad”. I’m assuming they’re talking about the iPad Air 4 because green isn’t available in the newer iPad Air 5. But, they wouldn’t know one from the other OR even care that one’s newer than the other. They just wanted one that was green.
Most consumers are of that type. They may know something about how much storage they want OR if they want to use it cellular, but those two and the color’s what’s most important.
A: when Apple began planning the transition to Apple Silicon all the way back in 2016, how were they supposed to know that there was going to be a worldwide pandemic and chip shortage a short four years later?
B: Under Intel the MacBook Air was barely touched between March 2015 and October 2018 besides a small gigahertz upgrade in June 2017. And even when they did upgrade the computer, it was still not great, with heat issues and short and disappointing battery life.
It’s been a year and a half since the M1 MBA, which absolutely smash it’s predecessor and pretty much every metric from performance to heat management to efficiency.
Not even a full two years later and, even if the MacBook Air stays on the 5nm process and just ups to the blizzard/avalanche cores of the A15, that’s still a minor but nice speed boost and pretty decent efficiency gain.
Doesn’t seem that disappointing to me.