I think it's pretty clear by now; Apple is no longer interested in computer making.
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What to Expect at Apple's 'Let Us Loop You In' Media Event
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I think it's pretty clear by now; Apple is no longer interested in computer making.
In my mind there is a huge chance that apple will announce the new rMBP redesigned on Monday. My 2013 rMBP is crapping out and I set up an appointment on march 21st for a repair through applecare at 2:15pm 2 hours and 15 minutes after the announcement (according to apple they just may replace it because it's been 4 repairs so far on this one) so here I am hoping that I won't have it replaced with a 2015 rMBP, but with a brand new shiny rMBP 2016.
I hope it'll be an apple watch 2 that is in the large shape of a rMBP 2016 redesigned and all.
Mines mid 2012 13" MacBook Pro not even retina. Has a disc drive! It feels very sluggish and batt is horrible. This is my second Apple laptop and both seemed to become slow snails so quickly. I don't know if I'll buy another one again. My iPad 2 and iPhone 6 do everything I need it to pretty much.
Timing. Everything.
So far, Apple has released ARM chips for mobile devices.
Do we know for certain that it hasn't developed ARM chips suitable for laptops and desktops?
Lots of hurdles as you rightly highlight, but Steve did say that Apple needs to own the silicon to create great hardware, and Apple has been working in the last few years to close the gap between iOS and OS X. Are we heading to a single iOS X hybrid platform?
Think it is a possibility.
Really!
What exactly do you think the iPhones are; pocket size cordless telephones?
Most personal computers are used for nothing more than surfing the web, emails, viewing video, etc. "Smart" phones more than fill those needs, as seen by people walking off flat surfaces into void, or traffic.
Yes, "computers" of old are given the bums rush by all manufacturers, and Apple is sadly the leader in not progressing as it had thru' the years it fought to gain the market share back from MS-PC - Mac minis and Mac Pros the biggest losing products by Apple.
Meanwhile, Apple designs and produces its iPhone processors - relying on outsiders for "peripherals". Their best real computers are still best useful for graphics and CAD professional, not the number crunchers or the next great novelist.
Some of their ploys are childish, if not greedy; are they punishing their customers for embracing the MS and abandoning Apple for a decade-and-a-half?
Why don't they not own a storage company yet? Sandisk just went to a rival, other big names merged just to survive. They will realize how ridiculous it is to even manufacture a 16GB module.
Yet they tried to manufacture sapphire!
If they do ever move the Mac to ARM I would expect it to be announced at WWDC in the same way the move to Intel was announced there because all the current apps will need to be recompiled for the new platform.
When they moved to Intel they also had the Rosetta emulator which took advantage of the powerful new Intel CPUs and enabled you run most PPC Mac apps. I don't think you would have this luxury with a move to ARM so they will need time to for developers to adapt and test their apps before releasing the new Macs.
Yes we do. The A10X performance is impressive, on the other hand Core-M has Intels lowest TDP yet. So the fanless 12" MacBook and the iPad Pro are closer to each other than any laptop and tablet before. But to get rid of Intel you need an ARM chip for every Mac, maybe not the Mac Pro but every other performance class. The two worlds of chip design must overlap by a huge margin not just come close at the edges. That's still a long way to go.
But here's another idea, why can't AMD license its chip design like ARM does? And have the same market success! A while ago AMD split into two separate companies for chip design and chip manufacturing. Isn't it now possible for Apple to buy a license and build its own AMD-based chips for Macs as well?
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At the risk of sounding whiny, this sounds like a really boring special event.
Some things that would NOT be boring:
- Skylake MacBook Pro
- Skylake quad-core Mac Mini
- A retina MacBook Air with 14" screen (by removing current bezels)
- Updated Mac Pro
- Anything about HomeKit that gives you hope it will become something
- A new wireless protocol that's better and more reliable than Bluetooth, which is terrible
- A redesigned iOS Music app
- A redesigned OS X iTunes
- A redesigned Mac App Store backend and app
- More features for Photos, including some on iOS that already exist on OS X, like vignetting
- A new controller for Apple TV that doesn't suck
Some things that would NOT be boring:
- Skylake MacBook Pro
- Skylake quad-core Mac Mini
- A retina MacBook Air with 14" screen (by removing current bezels)
- Updated Mac Pro
- Anything about HomeKit that gives you hope it will become something
- A new wireless protocol that's better and more reliable than Bluetooth, which is terrible
- A redesigned iOS Music app
- A redesigned OS X iTunes
- A redesigned Mac App Store backend and app
- More features for Photos, including some on iOS that already exist on OS X, like vignetting
- A new controller for Apple TV that doesn't suck
They really need to get their head out of their arses and start inspiring us again. iPhone 5s 2.0, iPad Pro Mini, and "new" watch bands? Seriously who the hell needs new watch bands? I really want them to announce Apple Watch 2, now that would actually be something worth having an event for. All the other crap would suffice with a press release.
They need to get around to updating the portables and iPads they're both getting a little long in the tooth. I don't think any of the SW updates will be anything more than a mention in passing. Perhaps they'll delve into OS X's replacement / new naming scheme possibly doing rolling update style like Windows did.
I have a feeling Apple might focus on education in this keynote. There are substantial upgrades for educators such as myself in iOS 9.3 that may, if not given a publicity bump, go unnoticed. Tie that in with new iPads which are very popular in the sector and I think it could happen. I know it won't be relevant to many, but Apple have never shied away from putting the spotlight on specialist uses of their products, e.g. medical applications.
I think everything on the lower half of that list would take years to make (and most are probably not even on the list). Everything on the upper half should have been in the works for years now.
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The problem with the iPad right now is they need a version of iOS that treats it as more than just "a bigger iPhone". I feel like they are afraid to differentiate it because then the migration from iPhone -> iPad would have more of a learning curve.
But they need to make it more of a productivity device. The pencil is a good first step, but the way the UI works on phone does not translate as well to a device with more screen space. Anything to do with text also sucks on iOS, but it shouldn't when you have that much screen space to work with.
- Skylake MacBook Pro
How is that not boring?
- Skylake quad-core Mac Mini
Starting at $999. No, thank you!
- A retina MacBook Air with 14" screen (by removing current bezels)
Yeah, that could be something. Still with a fan, but taking some design cues from the new MacBook.
- Updated Mac Pro
Absolutely uninteresting to 99% of all Apple customers.
- Anything about HomeKit that gives you hope it will become something
But it won't, so why bother?
Why would they go quad-core and lower the price of the third tier? Quad means they will have to pay more to Intel and their margin is shrinking anyway.
Depends. If they introduce another $2999 video editing workstation with bargain basement video cards and stuff, yeah I guess.
If they'd release a ~$1500-2000 X99/i7 5820k machine with a PCIe slot and a standard GTX 970 in it? Maybe not.
But who am I kidding, Apple making a piece of moderately interesting prosumer desktop hardware? Yeah right.
I'm hoping for a 'rebuilt' iTunes launch at this event, something that improves every corner of the software, also improvements to Apple Music and Apple TV OS.