Apple Silicon has a clear path to better GPUS

9secondkox2

And that path is… hardcore gaming. 

Historically, the big leaps in GPU capability have come about due to a relentless AJ Dr better capabilities for the purpose of gaming. This is true both on the computing side and the console side. Even the iPhone started with a GPU that was derived from the Dreamcast. 

Apple has a serious uphill battle with the likes of Nvidia in the GPU DEPARTMENT and it’s one they are sadly losing badly. Apples GPUs compare well against your run of the mill low and some midrange cards, but get blown away by the higher end GPUs. 

Apple has historically been averse to the gaming scene and the leadership culture has seemed to view gamers as “the unwashed masses.” Eventually, the iPhone started getting graphically impressive games (for a phone), but nothing serious. Even the launch of “Apple Arcade,” which would have been the perfect console name, was just a mobile game subscription (where you don’t even get the whole catalog). 

Apple has an opportunity. They make their own hardware across the board. They have a nice, secure ecosystem, and they have the engineering talent to build whatever they want and be the best at it. 

But they are currently limited in the GPU department because they have nothing really pushing that arena. Soon enough, M3 SOCs will be out and the ray tracing enhanced GPUs will be a huge upgrade over M2. But by then, NVIDIA WILL BE FURTHER AHEAD as well. 

So there is a huge upside to embracing gaming at apple and making it a core business. They could even brand it differently so as to distance “snobby apple” from “unwashed apple.” They could buy sets or Atari or both and get major IP to start as well as opening up an sdk for all the third parties. Add the establish mobile catalog and boom. Massive built in success. 

Why would Apple do this, consider the untapped market potential of games as a core business. Gaming is an entertainment category much larger than music, movies, etc. as much as apple has profited from mobile, there is a whole new world out there with the AAA “hardcore” stuff. 

Apple has the hardware solution, the loyal customer base, the delivery platform, and the software integration to nail this. 

And almost as a side-benefit, Apple gets better GPU input and engineering. 

It’s time for an “Apple Arcade” console. And they need to move quick. The traditional gaming landscape is a bit wonky at the moment as the big players seem unsure of what to do or in Microsoft’s case, how to do it. 

An Apple Arcade that plays the best and most hardware demanding games as well as the mobile stuff would be the way to go. It can have Apple TV built in, web browsing, apple music, etc. the baseline SOC would be great as newer powerful macs increase that level of performance can tap into that potential as well. But all the games for Apple Arcade would be set to run perfectly on the console while also being able to take advantage of more powerful Macs they come out later. The console can last 5-7 years between updates and be a killer business. 

Apple Arcade. It’s time. Benefit to Apple by getting a huge piece of the gaming pie plus another big push to hyper accelerate the development of their GPUs to be leading the industry, not playing second fiddle. 

chutzpah

You do realise that deciding you're going to do a games console doesn't mean your GPUs magically get better, don't you?  Apple could massively invest in R&D for GPUs if they want to, they probably just don't see much upside given the niche appeal, and a massively risky foray into a field well outside of their cultural milieu and expertise is little encouragement.  Other companies have made the mistake of building hardware and assuming the games will come, and even with the same "establish[ed] mobile catalog and boom. Massive built in success" approach.  Hubris about finding an audience in a pretty saturated market is rarely a path to success.

9secondkox2

chutzpah said:

You do realise that deciding you're going to do a games console doesn't mean your GPUs magically get better, don't you?  Apple could massively invest in R&D for GPUs if they want to, they probably just don't see much upside given the niche appeal, and a massively risky foray into a field well outside of their cultural milieu and expertise is little encouragement.  Other companies have made the mistake of building hardware and assuming the games will come, and even with the same "establish[ed] mobile catalog and boom. Massive built in success" approach.  Hubris about finding an audience in a pretty saturated market is rarely a path to success.

Let’s see:

1)  No one mentioned “magic.” The reasoning was that it puts GPU prowess on the front burner in terms of priorities for Apple. And developer input along with engineering justification go a looong way in creating a superior product. 

Now that such silliness is out of the way, let’s move on to the other fallacies:

2). Niche appeal. GPUs are more and more at the forefront of actual computing. From the Adobe suite, 3d rendering, etc. it matters. I don’t know where you have been, but the days of cpus doing all the real work have been done for a bit. 

Or perhaps you meant the “niche” appeal of those dirty grimy video game systems… you know, those silly things that currently generate 100 billion dollars… 

3) risky? iTunes wasn’t risky when the world was getting mp3s free on Winamp and cd players dominated the industry? The iPhone wasn’t risky when the cell phone market was beyond saturated and offered free subsidized phones? 

4) outside their culture? Again, see phones, music, add Apple TV Plus, creating Hollywood style content, news aggregation and curation, health and fitness, etc. 

5) mistakes? other companies have indeed lacked the foresight to ensure success. That’s not Apple. It’s not difficult for good management. A bold move would also be attractive to those who feel that taking a shot on the Mac is a bad decision, when Apple currently doesn’t care about gaming because they have historically not cared about gaming. But with cap I’m making some effort recently and others already developing for Apple silicon in the limited playground they have, along with aaa developers ready to jump in with a trusted hardware vendor - which also has the best distribution platform and marketing ability - in addition to Apples ability to acquire developers for a gaming initiative, it would be a huge win. Current Apple, as far as we know, is not a gaming company.  They’d need to establish a division for that and hire the right people.  They’re pretty good at tht. The examples you’re thinking of are like the ouya and the like,  it that’s just running Android junk and mobile games. We are talking aaa hardcore games. try to keep up. 

6) finding an audience in a red ocean. Again, see music, phones, fitness, watches, and Apple TV plus, which kind of sucks actually. Every night, my gf and I try to find something good to watch, outside of a few decent episodes of various shows, most of it is boring or just not tht good. It’s going to get better, but in light of the competition like Disney plus kicking their butt, they’ve made a commitment and are seeing it Sould happen if there were any rough early stages with gaming as well. But the gaming thing would be an easier road to success. 

And again, the fully intended side benefit is much better GPUs. Developer input, unforeseen technical needs, a culture of constant push for more and better, and having a more focused attention on emerging GPU tech will all work together to create a much better GPU for the Arcade, the Mac, iPhone, ipad, and perhaps even the watch  

it’s about turning GPU R&D into a business that pays back, rather than existing as a spending pit. It’s one of the few things that is easy to justify and makes all the sense in the world to businessmen, engineers, end users, etc. 

9secondkox2

Interestingly, Apple just had a secret gaming event …

Most fascinating. 

tenthousandthings

Well, that’s certainly one solution for the low-volume problem when we’re talking about the economics of building variable Apple Silicon GPU modules/components for the Mac Pro. 

9secondkox2

tenthousandthings said:

Well, that’s certainly one solution for the low-volume problem when we’re talking about the economics of building variable Apple Silicon GPU modules/components for the Mac Pro. 

That’s pretty much where I’m coming from. Thought the X-R glasses may help too. 

tht

It’s time for an “Apple Arcade” console. And they need to move quick. The traditional gaming landscape is a bit wonky at the moment as the big players seem unsure of what to do or in Microsoft’s case, how to do it.

I wouldn't be surprised if Apple gives up on getting gaming on xnu platforms (macOS, iOS, et al). If server gaming, er, cloud gaming, becomes good enough, it's basically over as it levels the playing field. You could play console games from every platform as long as you have good enough connection.

For Apple, the big thing they are missing is being a game publisher. Arcade is perhaps a quarter way step, but they need to take it seriously like its Apple TV+ service. Find good games, buy the rights, publish. Find good game studios, buy the studio, publish. Develop more tools for game watching, publishing tools for game watching. Keep at it for a long time. They need hits not hardware.

The GPU performance is fine. They could put a M1 Pro into a Mac mini and sell it for $400. That's basically the level of performance of the cheap PS5, Xbox consoles. There's no point to doing it there isn't a games portfolio to convince people to buy it.

9secondkox2

tht said:

It’s time for an “Apple Arcade” console. And they need to move quick. The traditional gaming landscape is a bit wonky at the moment as the big players seem unsure of what to do or in Microsoft’s case, how to do it.

I wouldn't be surprised if Apple gives up on getting gaming on xnu platforms (macOS, iOS, et al). If server gaming, er, cloud gaming, becomes good enough, it's basically over as it levels the playing field. You could play console games from every platform as long as you have good enough connection.

For Apple, the big thing they are missing is being a game publisher. Arcade is perhaps a quarter way step, but they need to take it seriously like its Apple TV+ service. Find good games, buy the rights, publish. Find good game studios, buy the studio, publish. Develop more tools for game watching, publishing tools for game watching. Keep at it for a long time. They need hits not hardware.

The GPU performance is fine. They could put a M1 Pro into a Mac mini and sell it for $400. That's basically the level of performance of the cheap PS5, Xbox consoles. There's no point to doing it there isn't a games portfolio to convince people to buy it.

Unfortunately, streaming games just isn’t as solid as it needs to be to satisfy expectations of Apple quality. Stadia went down for 3 reasons;

1. Streaming reliably is still a challenge. 

2. Their games suck. 

3. They were lazy, thought ‘hey were google. Everyone will flock to us.’’ Without actually building something amazing. 

Apple isn’t immune to outages with its services either, unfortunately. Beyond that, there are issues with various ISPs and home setups which are beyond Apples control. 

It will need to be downloadable games, with a streaming option like GamePass - for the one two punch of reliability and convenience. 

The GPU can’t just be “fine.”

‘it must be exceptional, causing The M series to continue to gain mindshare and marketing momentum, instead of cooling off like it has done currently (though M3 being a knockout will help). 

As far as power, targeting the performance of ps5 is not a good benchmark since it’s been through nearly half its lifespan already. If Apple just dropped an m2 pro, Sony comes out and beats the GPU portion with its ps5 pro. Xbox series x is already notably more powerful than ps5 where the GPU is concerned. 

An m3 class GPU (around Max range) would be nice and would run cooler than the notoriously hot consoles. 

Apple could storm the industry with a series of AAA games by building it own first party IP, preferably after purchasing a major studio or three - and also continue to grow its APIs, which seem to be the best in the business right now. 

Apples developer support is already amazing compared to the other guys and would make the hardware Apple Arcade a dev friendly platform. 

This puts Apple in a great position of having the best hardware, the best software and developer friendliness, the best marketing, and will open a whole demographics eyes to see Apple in a new, valuable light. 

The best thing about this is that this is a win-win. Apple adds a lucrative and far reaching business, they amortize Mac and other device R&D much more cost effectively as they have added justification, and every mac, iphone, etc. as well as the customer base, benefits greatly. 

Though Apple “could” go into this halfhearted and still win, it’s a cutthroat space, so they’d need to really care from the leadership level down. They seem to really care about Apple TV+ in spite of it getting whooped by competitors due to too little content and original content that doesn’t appeal broadly - outside of very few titles. 

If Apple put the same (hopefully much more) effort into Apple Arcade console, it would be insane, probably dominate the industry or. At least go neck and neck with the leader. 

The GPU tech resulting from this would be better than if it didn’t happen, the R&D would pay for itself multifold, and Apple gets a new market and revenue generator. 

programmer

It is a common refrain that a platform vendor ought to become a "top rated game vendor" in order to turn their platform into a top games platform.  Nintendo, Sega, 3DO, Sony, Microsoft (XBox), and many more have all tried that.  It does not guarantee success, and it is a wildly expensive undertaking which distracts the platform vendor from its core competency -- being a platform vendor.  The best companies for delivering games to a platform are the game companies whose primary focus is delivery great games in order to turn a profit.  Those companies can be motivated to port to a platform by making that platform easy to port to, and by supplying money to subsidize the porting efforts.  Buying game studios to do such ports creates a very strange business situation which is hard for a public company (like Apple) to manage -- they can't drop the support for existing profitable platforms without destroying the business they bought, but if they don't then they're undermining their platform.  This is not a path I would want to see Apple take.

Apple is a very good platform company, if they chose to, they could leverage that to make their platforms much lower barrier-to-entry for developers than they currently do.  They could even enable the existing catalog on PC to run on their platforms without changes to the games.  Suddenly being able to run most of the PC game catalog on the Mac would immediately make the Mac more interesting to average gamers (you won't capture the high end gamers this way because there will always be a performance penalty for doing this), but that's where Apple could start making porting easier and subsidized (for key titles).  Apple needs to focus on removing barriers in the way of gamers and game developers.  Rather than trying to push the game market piecemeal onto their platform, get out of the way and let it move there on its own.