Skylake CPUs for next MB. (merged)

[dubydoo]

20% off a brand new Mac, I'd jump on it, rather then wait for Rev 2 which won't see the light of day until 2016, regardless of when Skylake hits the streets.

Yes, the deal was too god to ignore so I bought the 1.2/512.
Only problem is the delivery time. I was told that brand new Macs sometimes takes them uptil 4 months to get in!! I'm hoping that won't be the case this time... though the deliveries so far haven't exactly been fast.

 

[magbarn]

Found this:
http://www.crn.com/slide-shows/comp...d-data-center-growth.htm/pgno/0/2?itc=refresh

Is he saying that the onboard GPU on Skylake will be 50% faster than the onboard GPU on Broadwell?

With the recent overhyped lackluster Intel igpu 'upgrades' over the last 3 generations (a high end game unplayable on ivy bridge igpu at 'decent' resolutions of at least 1080p is still unplayable with broadwell - only crystalwell chips buck this trend), I'll beleive it when I see it. The biggest upgrade apple could do is add a second port. Skylakes biggest advance,net is supposed to be better battery life when the cpu is running full bore and since that's not the primary mission of the rmb, it'll be of little improvement.

 

[deleder]

Hmm... don't know. If I had to guess I would say no. Additionally, the exchange rate between NOK and SEK isn't as crazy as it used to be before the oil prices plummeted. But it would save me some money if it was possible.

Didn't Expert in Sweden file for chapter 7 bankruptcy?
The offer is not valid in Sweden nonetheless. The new Macbook is $100 more expensive than in Norway btw. 1670 USD in Norway (12495 NOK) versus 1756 USD (14495 SEK) in Sweden.

Swedish people should go to Norway and buy it


I bought 3 Macbooks at Expert in Norway on Thursday. I will get them for 10500 SEK each, or 9600 NOK, 1283 with a massive VAT of 25% included.

 

[MyopicPaideia]

Didn't Expert in Sweden file for chapter 7 bankruptcy?
The offer is not valid in Sweden nonetheless. The new Macbook is $100 more expensive than in Norway btw. 1670 USD in Norway (12495 NOK) versus 1756 USD (14495 SEK) in Sweden.

Swedish people should go to Norway and buy it


I bought 3 Macbooks at Expert in Norway on Thursday. I will get them for 10500 SEK each, or 9600 NOK, 1283 with a massive VAT of 25% included.

Ha ha ha, yeah, if our functional currency was USD, then yes. But it isn't

We'd still save about a 1000 SEK if we went and bought it in Norway (12495 NOK is approx. 13800 SEK today)

Thing is that most consumer goods, like clothes for example, are priced equal in both markets (ie 900 NOK 900 SEK) so it is a no brainer for Norwegians to come down for shopping weekends.

 

[Aphid Acer]

Still, my fears are buying a Macbook now and having Apple upgrade it this fall with Skylake and Skylake being a huge upgrade (such as 20% better performance... the same jump or even more on the battery side...).

These "waiters" are grossly misinterpreting chip availability and OEM device availability. In reality there is a two month (very poor performance) to seven month (optimized performance) lag between Intel release dates and OEM releases. Not to mention the fact that Apple has never shown the propensity to be the first to release new technology -- their company mantra is more akin to offering superb designs of tried-and-true technology. This is the basis of Samsung fanboy arguments, why do people ignore this when choosing to hate on Broadwell?

Case in point: M-5Y10/a was available from Intel on Sept 5th, 2014 and you didn't see the first devices shipping until early November. These early devices widely panned as being underwhelming and a depressing picture was painted for Core-M promises. The M-5Y31/51 were released by Intel on Oct 27th, 2014 and this time OEMs seemed to optimize their architecture and devices weren't released until early spring 2015, for Apple in April (with a dramatically resigned motherboard).

I'd expect OEM collusion and an even longer shelf life for OEM Broadwell-Y designs than tech reporters seeking clicks are suggesting. There is no chance that Apple will upgrade the rMB this fall, only a few weeks after Intel releases the chip. You must consider changing socket designs for the CPU itself, new motherboards that have to be designed, new charging mechanisms (Skylake features wireless charging), and of course case design and then Apple's strong history of extensive product testing.

There are simply too many changes Broadwell to Skylake to expect a 2015 release of an Apple product featuring the chip. Buy rMB now, sell it later if you want to upgrade. How much time have you spent worrying about the cost effectivity of 2015 rMB? Since you can "tick-tock" your days left on the Earth, how valuable is your time?

My money is that Apple won't release a Skylake rMB until they master wireless charging (also why there will never be more than one USB-C port). Engineering wireless charging can't start fully until they have chips in hand, in late fall. A 300+ day update window actually looks pretty realistic...

 

[newellj]

20% off a brand new Mac, I'd jump on it, rather then wait for Rev 2 which won't see the light of day until 2016, regardless of when Skylake hits the streets.

Definitely agree. At that price even if you sell it for the Gen 2 version you will have eliminated a lot of the financial friction.

 

[deleder]

Ha ha ha, yeah, if our functional currency was USD, then yes. But it isn't

We'd still save about a 1000 SEK if we went and bought it in Norway (12495 NOK is approx. 13800 SEK today)

Thing is that most consumer goods, like clothes for example, are priced equal in both markets (ie 900 NOK 900 SEK) so it is a no brainer for Norwegians to come down for shopping weekends.

USD/EUR/SEK/NOK/JPY/NOK/DKK/KRW/RUB - all currencies can be used making the same point! It doesn't matter. But as you say you could save some money by buying it here. One can get it for 11989 NOK in Norway and 14245 in Sweden. That is a difference of 1000 SEK as you say. I wonder why that is... Both countries carry the same VAT rate.

 

[Phantom Gremlin]

Engineering wireless charging can't start fully until they have chips in hand, in late fall.

I don't know about this silicon, but I was previously involved with Intel silicon for cellphones. At that time customers received preliminary silicon many months before the official Intel release date. And internally Intel plays around with preliminary silicon for literally years before it is released. Intel is a class act in terms of validation. They very extensively validate chips before they are officially released.

Wikipedia claims Skylake might launch on August 15th. If that's true, it's almost guaranteed that Apple has already been playing with this silicon. Most of the engineering work by OEMs is completed well before chips are officially released.

 

[Aphid Acer]

I don't know about this silicon, but I was previously involved with Intel silicon for cellphones. At that time customers received preliminary silicon many months before the official Intel release date. And internally Intel plays around with preliminary silicon for literally years before it is released. Intel is a class act in terms of validation. They very extensively validate chips before they are officially released.

Wikipedia claims Skylake might launch on August 15th. If that's true, it's almost guaranteed that Apple has already been playing with this silicon. Most of the engineering work by OEMs is completed well before chips are officially released.

Great insight, thanks!

But if that's the case, then what's up with the 6 month delay between M-5Y31/M-5Y51 "official release" and then the first OEM products featuring the component that all hit within 3 weeks of each other? Especially after M-5Y10a products came out in November, were largely panned, and the 31/51's use the same socket. To me, seems like ASUS or Lenovo would have rushed a 31/51 device to capitalize on Apple's stringent QC if they did in fact receive the chip prior to October 27th. Additionally, why would the 71 chips ship later than initial release?

Also, Intel has hardly any marketshare of mobile chips compared to Qualcomm and Samsung. Since Atom was a disaster it seems like they have incentive to give OEMs advanced access to mobile chip lithography steps in hopes to garner orders that determine production plant investment. I don't think the same time frame for advanced access would hold with Y and U, since they already dominate these markets and are 12 months ahead of competition in lithography scale.

So to summarize my reply, I'd think that mobile OEMs might have access to say step C0 (with A, and B being fully Intel internal) whereas desktop and notebook OEMs might get access starting at step D or E. The "release version" of 31/51/71 was step F0...

 

[tom vilsack]

So, for the ones that are waiting for rev. 2, what are your main reasons?

 

[SusanK]

Yes, the deal was too god to ignore so I bought the 1.2/512.

Enjoy it! You got a great deal on the newest, shiniest Mac

 

[Abazigal]

Since the announcement I´ve been going back and forth between buying a Macbook now or waiting for rev. 2 (with Skylake). My main concern has been performance, but going by feedback from users both here and on reddit, the performance issues seems to be somewhat overblown.

Still, my fears are buying a Macbook now and having Apple upgrade it this fall with Skylake and Skylake being a huge upgrade (such as 20% better performance... the same jump or even more on the battery side...).

I now have the possibility to buy the 1.2/512 for 20% off and it´s getting extremely difficult to not go for it.

So, for the ones that are waiting for rev. 2, what are your main reasons?

I am mostly just waiting for my 2012 MBA to die. Not that it isn't working well (it is) but it is starting to show its age (lagging a bit on Yosemite, seems to require reboots more often, battery life is a tad short at under 3 hours, and the 64gb storage is feeling a tad claustrophobic (yes, I cheaped out, don't judge me).

This will be another 2 years at least, so no pressure. Enough time for USB-C peripherals to become more mainstream. And I just got a thunderbolt dock for my workplace as well....

 

[Aphid Acer]

I am mostly just waiting for my 2012 MBA to die. Not that it isn't working well (it is) but it is starting to show its age (lagging a bit on Yosemite, seems to require reboots more often, battery life is a tad short at under 3 hours, and the 64gb storage is feeling a tad claustrophobic (yes, I cheaped out, don't judge me).

This will be another 2 years at least, so no pressure. Enough time for USB-C peripherals to become more mainstream. And I just got a thunderbolt dock for my workplace as well....

Replacing the battery yourself costs $65 (I did this last week on a 2011 MBA, battery off eBay). While you are in there, you can swap in a new 240 GB HD (OWC) for $165 including the enclosure to clone your current disk.

iFixit and OWC are great resources, and <$250 to maintain a device for 2 more years is a great investment! Unless you crave the fanless design or screen, I'd keep that '12...just like you said.

 

[Abazigal]

Replacing the battery yourself costs $65 (I did this last week on a 2011 MBA, battery off eBay). While you are in there, you can swap in a new 240 GB HD (OWC) for $165 including the enclosure to clone your current disk.

iFixit and OWC are great resources, and <$250 to maintain a device for 2 more years is a great investment! Unless you crave the fanless design or screen, I'd keep that '12...just like you said.

My battery has 337 charge cycles so far, so it doesn't need replacing anytime soon.

It's a combination of stuff, from the haswell chip (longer battery life + better GPU to the better screen to simply having more ram to work with. The Macbook honestly doesn't feel all that much lighter than my 11" MBA.

That said, the SSD prices at OWC are pretty attractive (looking at the website now, thanks for the headsup). I might contemplate dipping the waters with the 240gb expanded storage, and I will definitely keep the battery replacement suggestion in mind should it ever fail in the future.

Thanks again!

 

[MyopicPaideia]

USD/EUR/SEK/NOK/JPY/NOK/DKK/KRW/RUB - all currencies can be used making the same point! It doesn't matter. But as you say you could save some money by buying it here. One can get it for 11989 NOK in Norway and 14245 in Sweden. That is a difference of 1000 SEK as you say. I wonder why that is... Both countries carry the same VAT rate.

Yeah, it has to do with delayed exchange rate correction, I think. That and the Scandinavian market has traditionally been treated as one economic market, partly due to our common VAT rates, even though NOK/SEK/DKK have fluctuated relative to each other enough to make it worth separating them out. What that means for us, is that a short drive (in USA terms at least) over a border can net a savings that may or may not be worth it depending on th price of gas

Another big factor here is the consumer electronics retail war that has been going here in Scandinavia ever since the big German chains decided to enter the market. Expert and El Giganten initiated a war of attrition to the bottom when they entered the retail space in this region, and it looks like Expert is losing out, they already have given up here in Sweden. Probably why there is such a fantastic price is on the MB in Norway...you guys have a bit more money than us even with the drop in oil prices, so Expert is still fighting there

 

[Phantom Gremlin]

... what's up with the 6 month delay ...

Two reasons for any possible delay.

First, when Intel ships initial silicon to customers, it might be dozens, hundreds, even thousands of chips. But Apple needs hundreds of thousands or millions of chips. Intel doesn't want to make huge amounts of silicon until after they and their customers have done final validation, confirmed that known bugs are fixed, no new bugs added, etc...

Second, and I think this is a bigger reason, Apple is not a "rational" player. They're far more inscrutable and unpredictable than other any large company out there. Sometimes they're first to market, sometimes they ignore a product for a year or two after they should have updated it. Plenty of cliches come to mind, e.g. "reality distortion field", "marching to a different drummer", etc.

I don't think it's possible for an outsider to understand why and when Apple does things. I used to drive myself crazy trying to. I've given up.

You seem willing and able to try to understand their behavior. Good luck with that. I think you'll need it.

 

[thadoggfather]

valid point like most 1st gen products. that one especially didn't last long though it was a dud of a model. having it be like a built in hub was a bad design period. i liked seeing one of my friends who had it but never wanted it.

but i don't regret making the leap for the iPhone once it hit $399 pricing fall 07, just a season after it came out. jailbroken and glorious even though 3g dropped after. i got that one too, and 3gs and 4 and 4s and 5 skipped 5s and 6 and traded up for 6+ so here iam.. the body was still better on 1st gen than the 3g.

same with this first gen rMB regardless if i make a leap or not. the experience is awesome.

i tried the zenbook ux305 too which is great for the money but still lacking for my daily driver and i hated windows 8.1 on it. 10 was glitchy on it even though it seemed like a nicer os in general than 8.1. the screen and speakers and certainly trackpad weren't as good, anywhere near it. and i missed butterfly mechanics too even though key travel is little. its kind of addicting. feels like a premium surface keyboard, those are a little too weird for my liking and mushy. in other words, i have more appreciation for it.

went 2nd gen macbook air of the redesign, had a 2011 for 3.5 years before this. might have gone for the first gen 2010 of the redesign if not for no backlit keyboard. that sort of made me have to wait knowing the next would definitely get it.


same with first gen iPad though i sold the one i got a month later for nearly same price as clearance and loved ipad2.its what got me interested.

i had a first gen core duo 13" white macbook. first intel 13" that was some hot ish. for years before progressing to the pro line.

tl;dr come to think of it, i've had nearly all positive first gen experiences just being honest and looking back. iPad probably being the least of fruitful because i flipped it early on wanting dual core and double ram and lighter design that carried until the iPad air came out. and a5 carried its weight too performance wise, its still supported. wouldn't have been happy with first gen mini either i lusted after that small form factor but the screen was a deal breaker coming from retina. glad i waited 2nd gen on that.

 

[batman75]

you guys are suckers. In 5 years, when SwanLake comes out with it's power sipping 4nm processesor, I"ll be laughing at all of you behind my first rMB

I think we will be laughing at you since we will be on our third macbook at that time, while you will have been suffering like a pauper with a crappy screen for the previous 5 years.

 

[seong]

To be honest, I hope my machine was just tad bit better. Having said that, I love the design and have no idea how Apple can make this any better (this came up to my mind after seeing someone post a pic of first gen MBA.)

 

[Barna Biro]

It's unlikely that they'll upgrade it anytime soon. Your best bet is next year around this time. Either way, I would personally not see a small CPU bump as "rev 2." ( were it to happen this year ). It's still rev 1. but it would be a sign that they think that the current one is not good enough and it is in dire need of that bump... IMHO, it would be a stupid ( image ) move from Apple and it's unlikely to happen.

Performance is also my main concern, I'll be waiting for next year's model ( I'm not expecting it to be a HUGE improvement over the current one, but this model simply does not cut it for my needs in it's current state ).

It's more likely that you'll see a 15" rMBP upgrade this year.

 

[polee]

I was waiting so long for the Macbook Air retina that I just could not wait any longer. I am very happy with the Macbook. Initially there was some adjustments that I had to make.

What I cannot understand is how difficult it is to find the multi-adapter usb-c accessory in stores. Did Apple not anticipate that we would need an adapter that would allow us to charge and use the usb port at the same time? I hope Apple does not repeat similar mistakes in the future.

 

[braindamage-89]

Macbook Retina skylake

Is there any chance that Apple will update the core m with skylake core m before October ??
I want to buy a new macbook in September October and macbook seems to suit me well but i would not get it in its current state
Thanks guys

 

[iRun26.2]

Is there any chance that Apple will update the core m with skylake core m before October ??
I want to buy a new macbook in September October and macbook seems to suit me well but i would not get it in its current state
Thanks guys

I'd say no way.

 

[braindamage-89]

Intel said core skylake its coming on second half of 2015
I would say that the cpus will be available by then but the issue whether apple is willing to update the macbook so soon

 

[thekev]

You can take a look at the buyer's guide for a broad overview of mean times between refresh as it relates to other Apple notebooks. Take a look at the availability of cpus and Apple's implementation of them, and you'll see that it varies considerably. Sometimes official launch dates differ by several months. I'm not sure exactly when the Skylake m types ship.