Will Apple still going to sell intel Macs for a limite of time?

[msummers]

Hi
I am planning on buying a custom Macbook pro next month and I am planning on sticking with intel for now probably my next computer will be the apple silicon. I just don't want to run to any problems i heard rumors saying there might be a macbook pro being release with the silicon and i heard a 12 inch macbook but if the macbook pro gets release will Apple continue to sell intel macbooks and custom made macbooks for a limited of time ?

 

[thenewperson]

We don't know. However it's best to just wait until they do release the first ASi Mac and if they replace the current model just buy it from another retailer.

 

[nothingtoseehere]

We don't know. However it's best to just wait until they do release the first ASi Mac and if they replace the current model just buy it from another retailer.

Indeed. To develop it further: When there is a new iPhone, Apple itself usually continues to sell some older models but not all of them. This has also bee seen with Macbooks. For example, the non-retina MBP remained until 2016 at Apple or something like that. And the 15" model of 2015 was sold until 2017 (or something like that) alongside the newer design of 2016. But you can't rely on that, and the BTO options are generally limited.
You say that you are planning on sticking with Intel for now. If there should be a new MBP as early as next month (I do not believe this as the refresh hast just been this year) and if the Intel models should be completely discontinued, there is still a good chance to get a fitting device in Apple's refurbished store or, as stated, from another retailer.

 

[jz0309]

I am speculating that you will be able to continue to buy Intel MBPs for some time ...
. the current 13" come in 4 processor flavors, I doubt they will all 4 be moved to Apple Silicon right away ...
. the 16" are all high end, doubt they will get Apple silicon first ...
My guess is that the first Apple Silicon Macs will be announced in Oct, if you can wait that long with your purchase I believe that the Intel models will sell at discounts.

 

[Jyby]

I am speculating that you will be able to continue to buy Intel MBPs for some time ...
. the current 13" come in 4 processor flavors, I doubt they will all 4 be moved to Apple Silicon right away ...
. the 16" are all high end, doubt they will get Apple silicon first ...
My guess is that the first Apple Silicon Macs will be announced in Oct, if you can wait that long with your purchase I believe that the Intel models will sell at discounts.

I’m pretty sure Apple will definitely replace all models of MPB 13” at the same time.. They would want to simplify supply chains and design teams ASAP.. my guess is the current 13” MBP with 10th Gen Intel is the last model. They said two years to transition. But I don’t think that means 13” will get a slow transition.

My guess:

Macbook 12” (no processor configuration)
MacBook Pro 14” (no processor configuration)

MacBook Air (dead)

Three models of iMac (three processor configurations)
One MacMini (no processor configuration, same as iMac 1)
One MacPro (3 processors configurations)
One MacBook Pro 16” (2 processor configurations)

MacBook Pro 16” and MacPro might share the firs base processor.. then they each get 1-2 custom high speed processor

 

[thenewperson]

MacBook Pro 16” and MacPro might share the firs base processor.. then they each get 1-2 custom high speed processor

Why limit the Mac Pro that way?

 

[Jyby]

Why limit the Mac Pro that way?

Because I don’t think Apple will see a need to make 5 different CPUs for the MacPro.. At most you will get three options. Otherwise Apple would be designing and releasing 10 CPUs a year. I don’t think that’a what they plan to do.

1) Base CPU (same as MacBook Pro 16 inch)
2) Upgrade 2 with a few more cores and a lot more clock speed
3) Upgrade 3 with a lot of cores and slightly higher clock speed

 

[thenewperson]

Because I don’t think Apple will see a need to make 5 different CPUs for the MacPro.. At most you will get three options. Otherwise Apple would be designing and releasing 10 CPUs a year. I don’t think that’a what they plan to do.

1) Base CPU (same as MacBook Pro 16 inch)
2) Upgrade 2 with a few more cores and a lot more clock speed
3) Upgrade 3 with a lot of cores and slightly higher clock speed

I understand the fewer CPU options point and I agree. I was asking more about the MBP16 and Mac Pro sharing the same base CPU. Why? The Mac Pro has so much more headroom to have something that can do more work in its base configuration, I feel.

 

[jz0309]

I’m pretty sure Apple will definitely replace all models of MPB 13” at the same time.. They would want to simplify supply chains and design teams ASAP.. my guess is the current 13” MBP with 10th Gen Intel is the last model. They said two years to transition. But I don’t think that means 13” will get a slow transition.

My guess:

Macbook 12” (no processor configuration)
MacBook Pro 14” (no processor configuration)

MacBook Air (dead)

Three models of iMac (three processor configurations)
One MacMini (no processor configuration, same as iMac 1)
One MacPro (3 processors configurations)
One MacBook Pro 16” (2 processor configurations)

MacBook Pro 16” and MacPro might share the firs base processor.. then they each get 1-2 custom high speed processor

You could be right, or not.
Consumers are used to choices for PCs for a very long time, Intel will continue to provide those choices. Apple will want to increase market share, so they will have to bring in customers that are used to choices.
of course I could be wrong but we will all know more in a year or 2...

 

[joema2]

...if the macbook pro gets release will Apple continue to sell intel macbooks and custom made macbooks for a limited of time ?

During the June announcement, Apple said the entire transition of all systems to Apple Silicon would take two years. If they meant from that date, it would be finished by June 2022.

Whether they would continue selling x86 Macs depends on how you interpret "transition". The word itself implies a phase-out of prior versions, otherwise it would not be a transition but an added product line.

They said they'd continue selling some x86 Macs until the transition was over. Existing x86 Macs would be supported for several years after the transition.

I can't see them doing a major upgrade on an x86 Mac scheduled for imminent replacement by an Apple Silicon version. It's true the 10-core iMac 27 was a decent "spec bump" upgrade, but the Apple Silicon version of that was likely 1.5 years out from the time the 10-core x86 machine was designed. It seems likely as we get deeper into the transition there would be fewer upgrades on x86 machines.

By the end of the two-year period, even if the x86 version was still manufactured and sold, most models might be several-year-old designs by that point, vs a brand-new Apple Silicon design. This is because except for a few exceptions like the 10-core iMac 27, most x86 Macs were not brand-new designs even when the transition *began* -- they were already some years old.

As Jyby mentioned, it benefits Apple to not maintain redundant design and manufacturing lines for similar products. This implies they will phase out manufacturing and sales of x86 models soon after the Apple Silicon version is available.

 

[Jyby]

I understand the fewer CPU options point and I agree. I was asking more about the MBP16 and Mac Pro sharing the same base CPU. Why? The Mac Pro has so much more headroom to have something that can do more work in its base configuration, I feel.

Or maybe the share the same MBP16 high end. MacPro would use it as the base.

Suggesting that because I feel it’s combined with fewer CPU options. I think the CPU will be shared across the products

 

[Jyby]

You could be right, or not.
Consumers are used to choices for PCs for a very long time, Intel will continue to provide those choices. Apple will want to increase market share, so they will have to bring in customers that are used to choices.
of course I could be wrong but we will all know more in a year or 2...

Well I know from experience that Apple does these transitions pretty quickly. They definitely won’t keep Intel after the two year transition mark. They also want software to convert to ARM ASAP if they can get it.

 

[xraydoc]

Well I know from experience that Apple does these transitions pretty quickly. They definitely won’t keep Intel after the two year transition mark. They also want software to convert to ARM ASAP if they can get it.

It will be interesting to see what they do on the Mac Pro. Not sure they can replicate the power of a $20,000 Mac Pro system on home-grown ARM silicon within the next two years.

 

[Jyby]

It will be interesting to see what they do on the Mac Pro. Not sure they can replicate the power of a $20,000 Mac Pro system on home-grown ARM silicon within the next two years.

Unless they put two chips together. Then they easily could beat Xeon... Design one that’s 80% of Xeon and put two or three in the MacPro. Will be interesting for sure. I’m actually really excited about Apple technology. Haven’t been this excited since the Intel switch maybe.. Or when they introduced 64bit Macs

 

[mcnallym]

It will be interesting to see what they do on the Mac Pro. Not sure they can replicate the power of a $20,000 Mac Pro system on home-grown ARM silicon within the next two years.

depends upon what consider by power.

do you mean raw cpu horsepower in benchmarks or actual running of applications.

apple has various co-processors already, it’s afterburner card. AS systems only metal for the gpu.

as such Apple already worked out how to offload work to various other components not neccearily using the cpu.

lots of people already complained about the Mac Pro basically being an fcp x machine so clearly Apple have an idea what they want the Mac Pro to be.

they already have h264 and h265 decode and encode, prores decode, etc and other functions available outside of cpu. Add prores encode and starting to get less for the CPU and GPU to have to do.

to use the power of that 28 core cpu then software has to be able to be run across multiple cores. Apples frameworks hiding the Hardware so look at things like videotoolbox, where can use T2, Quicksync, or amd GPU for hardware acceleration depending upon what available.

already had the ability to offload compressor across multiple computers, so pretty sure that they will have figured out how to use multiple cpu‘s now as well.

with there own silicon then add own peices in, not just raw cpu

along with fact that announced it and this isn’t something like the wireless charging pad that can drop, this is something that really have to be 100% on.

so will it match raw cpu grunt, probably not, will the system run apps just as quick or quicker, I would say yes.

 

[xraydoc]

depends upon what consider by power.
...
lots of people already complained about the Mac Pro basically being an fcp x machine so clearly Apple have an idea what they want the Mac Pro to be.

So Apple is going to cede Photoshop, graphics rendering and scientific applications completely to Windows/Intel/AMD and think they can sell a high-priced Final Cut Pro X workstation? That would be very short sighted, even for Apple.

 

[Krevnik]

So Apple is going to cede Photoshop, graphics rendering and scientific applications completely to Windows/Intel/AMD and think they can sell a high-priced Final Cut Pro X workstation? That would be very short sighted, even for Apple.

This.

Not everything can be accelerated by single-purpose ASICs or FPGAs.

My work in particular requires a Mac (Mac/iOS development), and cannot be done via Metal or any of this other specialized hardware. But I’ve worked on projects where we would take all the CPU grunt we could get within our budget, because compile times were not short. And saving minutes per build meant productivity gains for the whole team.

 

[deconstruct60]

It will be interesting to see what they do on the Mac Pro. Not sure they can replicate the power of a $20,000 Mac Pro system on home-grown ARM silicon within the next two years.

They don't have to do it "all" in Apple Silicon (AS). A Mac Pro 2019 with two MPX Vega Duo modules in it the bulk the the "embarrassingly parallel" , computational horsepower is in the MPX modules not in the Intel Xeon W package. The same thing could straightforwardly be done with AS SoC if it has enough I/O throughput coming out of it. ( e.g., 64 (or more) PCI-e v4.0 lanes . ). [ if get to most of the $20K by throwing $10.8K at the MPX modules then that is a large chunk of the system cost. Or even $5k at two Vega Solo modules and much bigger SSDs. ]

The large stretch for Apple is more so the I/O subsystem(s) they'd put in the SoC than the cores. They probably won't "out core count" the AMD and Intel contemporary options, but beating the current MP 2019 28 top end would be a limited stretch past what they where already doing on application cores (and GPU cores is pretty easy slam dunk because the Xeon W has none. ) ; at least technically. Economically, might be a different issue.

Similarly, the rest of the AS Mac SoC line up probably will be no where near RAM max capacity in quad digit GB or have ECC abilities.

The huge I/O jump and the huge memory capacity jump are probably the biggest leaps away from Apple comfort zone for mobile Macs and iPad Pros. It also quite likely a relatively much larger die ( or even set of dies) which means it will be harder to put on a bleeding edge fab process. Pretty good chance the Mac Pro SoC will lag behind the leading iPhones on fab process for 12-18 months.

It is probably going to take a larger chunk of the 2 years window than lots of the more rabid fanboys are allocating. The other part that probably will only get clearer substantively later is how they are doing 3rd party GPUs. ( If this is all suppose to be 3rd party GPU less completely then yes the two year window has lots of doubts. )


While there is probably a standard embedded Apple GPU ( to run iOS / iPad OS apps and do mainstream video code processing. ) I doubt Apple is going to try to 'win' the computational war there. More so playing the role the 580X plays of a minimal GPU for the folks who don't need big GPU 'guns'.

 

[deconstruct60]

I’m pretty sure Apple will definitely replace all models of MPB 13” at the same time.. They would want to simplify supply chains and design teams ASAP..

Depends highly on how ready Apple is to cover four Thunderbolt ports or not. I suspect they are not and that the four port MBP 13" will slide into the future on a different timeline than the two port model. Similarly if Apple is injecting a much more expensive microLED screen into the mix. The timelines will be disconnected at the 13-14" size options.

my guess is the current 13” MBP with 10th Gen Intel is the last model. They said two years to transition. But I don’t think that means 13” will get a slow transition.

My guess:

Macbook 12” (no processor configuration)
MacBook Pro 14” (no processor configuration)

MacBook Air (dead)

Depends upon where Apple goes with Thunderbolt 4 . If looking for a USB-C only wonder to share die costs with a iPad Pro then MBA may not be dead. ( perhaps good opportunithy to flip the MacBook back to eonomy MacBook and MBA to some ultra thin portable. Or just leave them with the names flipped).

Apple is going to need a more afforable 13-14" model. Turning to push the "ecommical" buyer into 12" into isn't going to work well at all. ( primarly display being small is that good. Epecially when the rest of the market don't have to take that kind of 'pain" to get something decent and affordable. )

Three models of iMac (three processor configurations)
One MacMini (no processor configuration, same as iMac 1)
One MacPro (3 processors configurations)
One MacBook Pro 16” (2 processor configurations)

iMac 3 across the whole 24" - 27" range? That is a bit of stretch.

The Mini probably would share with either the MBP 16" or iMac. Depends upon which way Apple would have it "lean" . If the iMac then chop down some cores and/or clocks on the ARM front (and perhaps GPU). If attached to the MBP 16" then perhaps upclocked at bit.

The Mini with just one SoC at a fixed clock and core count makes about zero sense in terms of a product . Unless going to differentiate with a discrete GPU or not it is just too rigid to cover a wide enough user base.

the Mac Pro all by itself is going to be very hard pressed to cover 3 different processor configurations in terms of volume. The overall volume is so low variations will cost.

Pretty likely Apple is going to use some AS die sharing between multiple products. That will mean don't have to clock limited to one option get more volume.

MacBook Pro 16” and MacPro might share the firs base processor.. then they each get 1-2 custom high speed processor

The I/O requirements for the Mac Pro are no where in the same zipcode as those for the MBP 16". Driving 8 PCI-e slots is something that MBP 16" doesn't have to deal with at all. So why would those SoC look the same. The pins outs of the Mac Pro SoC package are just going to be vastly larger in number than that of for any of the laptops. That is just going to drive a much bigger package that won't fit comfortably in any of the laptops.

Mac Pro is more likely coupled to an iMac Pro successor. ( whether the iMac has "Pro" suffix on it or not probably hindges on what else Apple adds to differentiate from the mainstream "big" iMac. For example 6k , 32" screen versus 5k 27" screen. Similarly if take far more of the I/O boost the Mac Pro SoC provisions and allocate that to the user in terms of ports an external I/O bandwidth ( two 10GbE ports. more Thunderbolt 4 , etc. )[/quote][/QUOTE]

 

[deconstruct60]

We don't know. However it's best to just wait until they do release the first ASi Mac and if they replace the current model just buy it from another retailer.

While there will be systems in the retail inventory channel for a while the variety may not be all that high. Apple has standard configurations which the push into the retailers ( min quotas that retailers have to take to be a player) . Apple tends to pick out a couple of folks to flush any inventory they get caught with (or "backflows" to them).

However, once they shutdown the production line the BTO configurations are going to dry up much faster. The inventories on those are typically much leaner ( even 3rd parties take orders and bundle them for Apple to request the subcontractor make "just in time". ). If need a specific , non standard configuration then probably not good to play a game of "chicken" with Apple. For "made to order", they'll likely win in just a couple of days.

[ If Apple continues on this "won't boot anything other than macOS " path there is a good chance there will be a demand bubble for Intel Macs as more folks become aware of it. the 'scramble' at the end of this initial Mac laptop conversion is probably going to be larger than a normal upgrade transition . ]

 

[deconstruct60]

Indeed. To develop it further: When there is a new iPhone, Apple itself usually continues to sell some older models but not all of them. This has also bee seen with Macbooks. For example, the non-retina MBP remained until 2016 at Apple or something like that. And the 15" model of 2015 was sold until 2017 (or something like that) alongside the newer design of 2016....

The problem with the non-Retina to Retina and the Unibody transitions is that Apple didn't openly give themselves are deadline to make the move. Apple has to the end of 2022 to dump all of the Intel Macs.

When they do one specific model it is probably going to be toast. Especially if they are left some others that are close behind. For example drop the MBA intel and just point those who need a intel laptop to the MBP ( or vice versa).

IMHO this is going to be a more gradual roll out than the Intel (x86) transition was. Intel has a full , complete (even more processor options that apple could use) line up at the transition point. Apple currently has nothing. No line up at all. Yes they have probably been making some , but jumping to a vendor who hasn't do it all over the scope the Mac demands. To offset that Apple is likely going to 'herd' as many folks onto the subset they get transitioned as fast as they can. That means cutting folks off at price points ( and making for pay to move to something they want/need).

At some point though in the volume transition Apple is going to loose some of their Intel "volume" discounts. So the prospect of keeping older , much slower moving products in the line up is dim. Unless Apple has some huge contract that drives tons of volume that makes them keep making the older model it is likely in trouble. [ somewhat of a rumor that the MBP 13" non retina somewhat fell into that catagory on some school contracts. But I wouldn't count on that this time around. ]

 

[ght56]

If nothing else, you will probably have BTO refurb options for quite a few years to come.

 

[Hexley]

Hi
I am planning on buying a custom Macbook pro next month and I am planning on sticking with intel for now probably my next computer will be the apple silicon. I just don't want to run to any problems i heard rumors saying there might be a macbook pro being release with the silicon and i heard a 12 inch macbook but if the macbook pro gets release will Apple continue to sell intel macbooks and custom made macbooks for a limited of time ?

I expect to slowly replace Intel Macs from today until June 2021 when they will finish the transition by WWDC 2021.

They may opt to have one SKU Intel Mac for people who insist on an Intel Mac like they did with the last Mac with a Superdrive. Just do not expect it to receive any updates beyond what is being sold today.

Why? Because after WWDC 2021 I expect demand for Intel Macs to dwindle to ~1% of all Macs shipped.

 

[deconstruct60]

I expect to slowly replace Intel Macs from today until June 2021 when they will finish the transition by WWDC 2021.

Prepare to be disappointed. That didn't even happen in the PPC -> x86 transition. And Intel had a full set of CPU products available before Apple even started the transition. Apple does not. They have had nothing that fully completes in the desktop space. That is why the Mac Mini backslid on ports and number of displays supported. Apple is pretty unlikely going to "fix that" in less than 8 months.

For the x86 transition Apple slid the WWDC to August to have their claim victory party. So June? There is not even a "broken analog clock is right twice a day" precedence for that.

Additionally look at the developer transition kit in the two transtions. For Intel could support driver development for PCi-e cards. Apple Silicon transtion. eGPU are absent. macOS 11 can't do anything except Apple GPU because drivers for nothing else. (or other accerlators/processors that normal sit on PCI-e). So that is delayed also.

The rumors of a "half" sized Mac Pro ... which is probably a move to prune features off the Mac Pro to backslid back to what their later SoC is another indication that they don't have a broad SoC line up on the near term horizon.

The only way Apple completely polishes off the transition to Apple Silicon by the end of 2021 is by dragging the whole back to laptop constraints. There is pretty good chance Apple will finish the laptops in 2021. Given that is 70+ % of the Mac business they would have gotten to the high volume status. Doing the last 10% will be much harder for them given their desired to stay tightly coupled to the iPhone and iPad Pro. ( The M1 die is pretty likely going to show up later as a A14X with some features turned on/off. It is approximately the same size as previous A12X and A10X. )

They may opt to have one SKU Intel Mac for people who insist on an Intel Mac like they did with the last Mac with a Superdrive. Just do not expect it to receive any updates beyond what is being sold today.

There could have been an Intel product that was scheduled for end of 2020 that slid into Jan-March 2021. Pandemic slid many products. There have been impacts.

By April-June 2021, I wouldn't expect anything new. There is a substantive problem with macOS 11 being so behind of PCI-e card driver support though. And the huge disruption that Apple has done to device drivers in general ( going from kernel extension IO-Kit to IO-MMU leveraged evictions from the kernel System Kit. ). That probably won't completely settle done to broad completion until macoS 12. So there is a major software component here also that isn't likely to close before another OS iteration. ( similar to the hype where Apple said they were going to "wipe out" HFS+ in a year and ....... did not. Once got into the pragmatic weeds of Fusion drives , HDD support , etc. of which large number of people had it was much more complicated than rolling out to single drive SSD homogenous environment of iOS devices. )

Why? Because after WWDC 2021 I expect demand for Intel Macs to dwindle to ~1% of all Macs shipped.

Probably, not going to happen in desktop space; nor with a healthy fraction of the MBP 16" space.

The other problem for Apple TSMC doesn't have that kind of 5nm capacity to soak up 6-7% of Intel output without robbing other customers of capacity. Can grumble about Intel's fab problems but they do have large capacity. It is going to be difficult for Apple to show up and order up 2-3 M more dies of 2-3x the size of the M1 and actually get those wafer starts. (and zero impact on the iPhone SoCs. ).

Apple has lots of money to pragmatically buy up exclusive 5nm lock outs for a short period of time but isn't going to last for a very long time. TSMC will bring up more capacity over 2021, but the problem is that there are dozens of folks with deep pockets that want to feed at the 5nm trough.

 

[1240766]

Even if it does continue to sell Intel for a limited number of time, I don't see people buying it anymore. The value (price/performance) getting of the M1 is just incredible. The Intel guys are taking a hit already on resale value.