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Sketchy Rumor Claims Apple Plans to Announce High-End Gaming MacBook or iMac at WWDC 2020

nt5672 said:
Not sure about this? Cook's process so far seems to be to throw new product against the wall and see what sticks. Unfortunately for Cook, not much has stuck recently. But I see this, if true, as just another thing that Apple will try for a year or two and then abandon.

The other problem is that gamers are not easily fooled by flashy gimmicks, which are Apple's stock and trade these days.
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Hardly. Cook’s process starts with understanding Apples market and developing products and services that people will find appealing.

Apple Watch, AirPods, AirPods Pro, HomePod, Apple Music, etc are great examples. And why Apple is doing incredibly well under Cooks leadership.
 
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It doesn't make sense for Apple or for gamers. There are those gamers who build their PCs from off-the-shelf parts and there are gamers who buy them from gaming PC companies. I can't imagine Apple would waste time trying to invade some market where brand loyalty doesn't exist. The gaming market is quite competitive and not worth the financial risk for Apple. Apple doesn't need to enter another saturated market. The smartphone market is bad enough. Besides, what game companies are going to build titles to run on MacOS? This rumor is ridiculous.
 
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Justanotherfanboy said:
I’m a bit embarrassed that I bothered doing a quick duck duck go search just to confirm I wasn’t crazy- that statement is so obviously intensely incorrect!

FYI, since I already did the legwork:
$43.4 billion + $19.1 billion is NOT less than $2.25 billion.

afterthought:
to be fair - in statistics that add all gambling machines revenue to “video games profit” that does indeed change the statistics immensely... however, I don’t think anyone here thinks Apple is going to start manufacturing one arm bandits for the casino industry, so that’s probably a bit moot
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It's literally the truth that video games are bigger than music, movies, or tv.
fortunly.com

Video Game Industry Revenue | Fortunly.com Blog

In 2019, video game industry revenue was set to surpass $152 billion. In 2020, the experts say the industry is set to break even more records.
fortunly.com fortunly.com
 
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maflynn said:
I'm not sure how many gamers will want to spend 5,000 and up for a computer that doesn't play many games. Windows is the clear winner in supply. As a for instance, I picked up a RTX 2060 Super, and an EGPU, the cost was about 600 and I'm getting much better performance then what any mac can provide.
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That's where the article falls down big time. Any Mac user who wants to game would just be better off building a PC rather than spend $5k on a Mac and then consider bootcamp. It's not just the hardware - Windows has multiple years advantage on software too.

That's why going down the games console route with an enhanced AppleTV 4k Pro makes more sense to me.
 
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Apple has never been big on games, certainly not on AAA or Mac games. In the past they invited game devs on the WWDC stage to talk about some title they were going to launch for the Mac at the same time and with the same capabilities and speed as the Windows version (remember ID’s RAGE), with the developer backtracking on those plans only a few months later because Apple never provided them with proper support.
 
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sublunar said:
I'm sure most of the current generation consoles only upscale to 4k for most of their games. As long as an A14X is competitive with the AMD SoC being sold for the PS5 and Xbox Series X Apple could have a device that could interest folks.

4k at 120Hz would be something that a Mac would have to handle with full-on AMD 5700XT (even though Nvidia appears to be the better gamers choice on the Windows side of things) and even then macOS has no hope in catching up with Windows gamers thanks to outdated OS support.

Maybe if they would unveil some work being done to help matters in WWDC there could be some developer support for it but it would require Apple to make powerful GPU replacement possible in a much discussed but always unlikely xMac - aka headless iMac or Mac mini Pro. Something that will be leapfrogged within 6 months by newer PC hardware.

It makes more sense for Apple to tackle the consoles with an A14X powered tvOS AppleTV 4k Pro rather than get eviscerated by poor software in a macOS vs Windows confrontation.
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"It makes more sense for Apple to tackle the consoles with an A14X powered tvOS AppleTV 4k Pro rather than get eviscerated by poor software in a macOS vs Windows confrontation. "

Agreed.
 
smulji said:
I agree. A gaming-dedicated Mac doesn't make any sense. But doubling down on ATV and re-positioning it as a high-end gaming console with 4K 60fps gaming does. This is what I prefer Apple do.
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This is about how I see it going down. Apple TV meshed with a mac Mini gives you Apple's version of an Xbox.

However, I don't see any gamer paying $5k. For under $2K you can build a decent Hackintosh gaming rig.
 
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A Mac with possible LED lighting effects? Perhaps it will be pretty to look at but what can I play on it since macOS Catalina pretty much killed all my Mac games
 
Sounds awesome, but I hope it's not just for the Pro models and $3000 will be my budget.
 
How fast is $52,000 maxed out Mac Pro for gaming with boot camp compared to one the fastest gaming PC for Windows like Corsair One that cost less than one tenth of the price? I am really curious. I know people don’t buy Mac Pro for gaming, but still.
 
Sodium Chloride said:
How fast is $52,000 maxed out Mac Pro for gaming with boot camp compared to one the fastest gaming PC for Windows like Corsair One that cost less than one tenth of the price? I am really curious. I know people don’t buy Mac Pro for gaming, but still.
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This is not gaming but this should give you an idea

 
Consider that the A12X in the iPad Pro 11" appears to have similar graphics performance to the Xbox One S, Apple could drop an A13X in the next 6 months for a 2019 iPad Pro refresh and - if they have a cooling solution sorted - could really shake things up if they could squeeze Xbox One X performance out of it.

I would wait for an A14X to drop in September/October 2020 for maximum effect though - to see how it compares to an Xbox Series X console and Playstation 5.

Let's not forget that a successful execution in the console games arena will also give consumers an idea of the power of the ARM CPUs making it less likely that they dismiss the prospect of an A-series powered Mac in the future (no matter how unlikely). It would also give considerable respect to iPad and iPhones too.
 
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I would echo the sceptical tone of others, quite simply the Mac will never be more than a niche player for gaming, even if they made significant gains. The gaming industry is heavily optimised for Windows, and Nvidia graphics. That's where the market is, and it's unlikely even if Apple made an i9/GTX 1080 monster of a machine it'd get any market share, because the price would be stratospheric in comparison to the same windows machine, and the catalogue of games isn't there in the first place. The Apple TV platform does seem to make more sense in this regard. Bringing out more powerful hardware and proper gaming accessories (controller, headset, VR Cam etc) would be a good first step in this regard. We've seen willingness to port games that you'd expect only on PS/XBOX/PC to Switch, getting the same treatment for Apple TV seems the most obvious choice if Apple wants a slice of that market.
 
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I saw this rumor yesterday on other sites. IMO "gaming" really means "consumer" class modular Mac tower.

Think Ryzen 3950X or Core i9-9990K type system with 5700XT GPU.
 
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While I want this to happen, I just don’t see why Apple would do it. So many e-sports titles are windows only...and Apple ditched 32 bit apps and OpenGL support, so porting things sucks for developers.

Also if it starts at $5000 you can buy an insane gaming desktop rig and a gaming laptop and still have a few hundred left over...and you’ll likely have a better keyboard for gaming as well.

Just make amends with nVidia, and put 2080’s as MBP GPU options, then gamers may consider macs again. The equivalent AMD GPU’s are just way too expensive.
 
This doesn't sound too unrealistic to me.
  • Apple launched a subscription gaming service
  • Apple added Xbox and PS controller support
  • Apple is partnering with Valve
  • AMD will probably launch there next GPU family around WWDC time
  • iMac / iMac Pro are due for an upgrade
  • The most popular esport titles already run on MacOS. Overwatch might be soon to be ported if Apple worked more closely with Blizzard.
If Apple is serious about gaming, they could throw a lot of money towards developers in helping them port games to the Mac, or making it more lucrative to do so in the first place. They could work on making Metal easier to port to.

I for one would greatly welcome this. I have an iMac for work and I refuse to buy an extra PC just for gaming. Dual booting an iMac with windows for games is a great way to have the best of both worlds in one nice package.

But still, gaming under MacOS would be a much better experience (not having to dual boot, no lower FPS), and the GPU options for the iMac could be better.
 
sublunar said:
Consider that the A12X in the iPad Pro 11" appears to have similar graphics performance to the Xbox One S, Apple could drop an A13X in the next 6 months for a 2019 iPad Pro refresh and - if they have a cooling solution sorted - could really shake things up if they could squeeze Xbox One X performance out of it.

I would wait for an A14X to drop in September/October 2020 for maximum effect though - to see how it compares to an Xbox Series X console and Playstation 5.

Let's not forget that a successful execution in the console games arena will also give consumers an idea of the power of the ARM CPUs making it less likely that they dismiss the prospect of an A-series powered Mac in the future (no matter how unlikely). It would also give considerable respect to iPad and iPhones too.
Click to expand...

I am also fairly skeptical about this position too. I don’t see Apple able to convince dev studios to convert their AAA titles from PlayStation and Xbox to yet another platform. The issue lies within who the demographics are on Apple TV. They don’t fit the same demographics as Xb1/PS4 users.
 
Lol. “Boomer.”

Here’s a tip. If you’re going to write on a message board, then learn to actually write. You know, with punctuation. You’re embarrassing yourself with the way you communicate.
 
RogueWarrior65 said:
Bring back 32-bit app support and I'd be all over this.
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Boot Camp. I'd imagine most gamers that would want a Mac tower for MacOS (and thus avoiding dealing with a Hackintosh) would game in Windows.

I think that $5000 in the rumor is really "up to $5000" which wouldn't be out of line for a maxed out 8TB 64GB RAM SKU.
 
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