First ARM Mac said to arrive in 2021 with custom Apple chip
A new report claims that the first ARM Macs are on the way in 2021, with a chip design based on the A14 expected in the "iPhone 12."
A MacBook or a MacBook Air as shown here is likely going to be the first ARM Mac
Apple is reportedly well on the way to delivering an ARM Mac to consumers, according to a new report on Thursday morning. The chips will reportedly be based on a 5nm chip produced by TSMC, and be similar -- but not identical -- to the A14 expected in the "iPhone 12."
According to the report by Bloomberg on Thursday morning the first shipping machines will have eight high-performance cores and at least four energy-efficient cores. Allegedly, Apple is exploring iterations of the processor with more than 12 cores.
Bloomberg expects the first device to be a new laptop. A second generation of chip designs are reportedly already in the planning stages, based on the 2021 iPhone processor, presumably called the "A15."
No specific timetable for arrival was predicted, beyond 2021.
This isn't the first report of ARM Macs being imminent, but Bloomberg was one of the first venues to discuss the possibility in 2017. In 2019, Intel officials said that they expected an ARM Mac as soon as 2020.
Ming-Chi Kuo has chimed several times about the shift, saying that he expects the transition to begin in 2020 or 2021. A "Project Kalamata" has also been discussed, with prototypes of the device from Pegatron said to utilize a touchscreen, SIM card slot, GPS, compass, and a water resistant housing -- suggesting a different form-factor entirely than the MacBook Air or MacBook.
As a general rule, ARM-based processors provide better performance per watt than Intel processors deliver, leading to better battery life. And, at the same time, for many engineering reasons, an ARM processor has the bonus that it also produces lower heat than Intel given the same performance.
Apple has convinced its devout to shift to new hardware architectures in the Mac itself twice, once with 68000-series to PowerPC processors, and again from PowerPC to Intel. But, Apple has hurdled the potential marketing nightmare of large shifts for users many times.
Any ARM shift won't be immediate, and won't span the entire product line in one fell swoop. It will likely start on Apple's low-end, with the MacBook a likely candidate for resurrection, or an ARM-based Mac mini migration. Additionally, Microsoft has Windows on ARM, with a 32-bit software compatibility layer, so virtualization or even Windows on top of one of these new machines isn't out of the question -- but isn't likely at launch.
High-end ARM chips aren't out of the question. Data centers use high-power ARM chips now, with Apple manufacturing partner TSMC a producer of much of the high-end ARM silicon.
A MacBook or a MacBook Air as shown here is likely going to be the first ARM Mac
Apple is reportedly well on the way to delivering an ARM Mac to consumers, according to a new report on Thursday morning. The chips will reportedly be based on a 5nm chip produced by TSMC, and be similar -- but not identical -- to the A14 expected in the "iPhone 12."
According to the report by Bloomberg on Thursday morning the first shipping machines will have eight high-performance cores and at least four energy-efficient cores. Allegedly, Apple is exploring iterations of the processor with more than 12 cores.
Bloomberg expects the first device to be a new laptop. A second generation of chip designs are reportedly already in the planning stages, based on the 2021 iPhone processor, presumably called the "A15."
No specific timetable for arrival was predicted, beyond 2021.
This isn't the first report of ARM Macs being imminent, but Bloomberg was one of the first venues to discuss the possibility in 2017. In 2019, Intel officials said that they expected an ARM Mac as soon as 2020.
Ming-Chi Kuo has chimed several times about the shift, saying that he expects the transition to begin in 2020 or 2021. A "Project Kalamata" has also been discussed, with prototypes of the device from Pegatron said to utilize a touchscreen, SIM card slot, GPS, compass, and a water resistant housing -- suggesting a different form-factor entirely than the MacBook Air or MacBook.
As a general rule, ARM-based processors provide better performance per watt than Intel processors deliver, leading to better battery life. And, at the same time, for many engineering reasons, an ARM processor has the bonus that it also produces lower heat than Intel given the same performance.
Apple has convinced its devout to shift to new hardware architectures in the Mac itself twice, once with 68000-series to PowerPC processors, and again from PowerPC to Intel. But, Apple has hurdled the potential marketing nightmare of large shifts for users many times.
Any ARM shift won't be immediate, and won't span the entire product line in one fell swoop. It will likely start on Apple's low-end, with the MacBook a likely candidate for resurrection, or an ARM-based Mac mini migration. Additionally, Microsoft has Windows on ARM, with a 32-bit software compatibility layer, so virtualization or even Windows on top of one of these new machines isn't out of the question -- but isn't likely at launch.
High-end ARM chips aren't out of the question. Data centers use high-power ARM chips now, with Apple manufacturing partner TSMC a producer of much of the high-end ARM silicon.
Comments
Count me out. Projects like this are a complete waste of resources.
What would be the point of that? If you have an iPad with a keyboard you've got the same thing.
Or will this be one of the things that differentiates a Mac from an iPad? Both will be based around Arm, but one hardware/software configuration is geared more towards having lots of having multiple accounts on the same device, will be more flexible, but also more complicated.
The new iPad Pro and keyboard does look a bit clunky with its heavy screen requiring an over-engineered and expensive keyboard/stand combo. Reviews say that it works great though as a laptop replacement. Could an even more optimised for laptop-style usage iPadOS installed in a touchscreen MacBook enclosure be a way forward?
As iPadOS improves and gains capabilities over time it would begin to make a strong case for itself against the Intel-only MacBook Pros. After a couple of revisions there would probably be enough optimised for iPadOS professional software available to make iMac/Mac mini go ARM.
What we should see is the ability to install macOS on iPad Pros in conjunction with the keyboard/trackpad, and the addition of a third UI mode.
We already have windowed and full-screen modes in macOS, all that’s required is to add a touchUI mode.
But I’m sick of the limitations of iOS and iPadOS, you can’t even look at the raw message of an e-Mail to analyze headers or embedded URL to see if something is real or a phishing attempt.
There’s no decent file system, no ability to check on background tasks, so if your device is hacked, you have no way of telling, you can’t install any network analysis software, because you’re not given access to MAC-addresses, etc. etc.
iOS and iPadOS are NOT useful as a work platform, they are media consumption platforms which also allow some convenience features like occasional e-Mail checking. Nothing more, nothing less.
Been waiting for years for something more, and the potential to see a real OS i.e. macOS on an iPad-like device, THAT is something to get excited about. Not another f*ing iteration of iOS/iPadOS 🤮
On 5nm, perhaps that's even for the 14" MBP, since on the Intel side we should also be getting up to 6 cores on there.
k2kw said:There's an article linked, folks, it's macOS, thankfully!
It is also important to do it as fast as possible, late 2020 is already a bit late.
Maybe no one sees this coming but competition from opensource hardware and software designs will be intense.
Pine64 makes ARM hardware with Linux on it (not Android!) which is a decision as good as Apples macOS (Unix) on ARM.
The point is that a Pine phone costs $150, and no it isn’t junk at all it is pretty impressive.
On such hardware it is possible to install (for example) openbsd, one of the most secure and unhackable oses of this time,..
I’m doing that as a project on my Rock64.
Not being in a closed system has a lot of important benefits.
Especially on the low end, Apple sells MacBooks to college freshman who have their whole lives invested in their iPhone, but who use their Mac *exclusively* to "run" googledocs. And if a file ever does download to their harddrive, they have no idea how to find it.
https://everymac.com/systems/apple/messagepad/stats/emate_300.html