Intel promises to support two-year transition to Apple Silicon

Posted:
in General Discussion edited June 2020
Intel says it will continue to support Apple "across several areas of business," while insisting that its processors give a better experience than Apple Silicon.

Tim Cook says the transition away from Intel will take two years
Tim Cook says the transition away from Intel will take two years


In a statement to AppleInsider, Intel says that Apple remains a customer and that the company plans to continuing supporting them. This comes after Apple's announcement that it is transitioning away from using Intel processors, which Tim Cook says will take two years to complete.

"Apple is a customer across several areas of business," said an Intel spokesperson, "and we will continue to support them."

"Intel remains focused on delivering the most advanced PC experiences and a wide range of technology choices that redefine computing," continued the statement. "We believe Intel-powered PCs-- like those based on our forthcoming Tiger Lake mobile platform-- provide global customers the best experience in the areas they value most, as well as the most open platform for developers, both today and into the future."





At the end of Tim Cook's keynote, the Apple CEO stressed that the company was not cutting off Intel immediately.

"We expect to ship our first Mac with Apple silicon by the end of this year, and we expect the transition to take about two years," he said. "We plan to continue to support and release new versions of Mac OS for Intel based Macs for years to come."

"In fact, we have some new Intel based Macs in the pipeline that we're really excited about," he continued.

Apple released its first Apple Silicon-based Mac alongside the announcement, although solely a Developer Transition Kit which will not go on sale to the public.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 40
    FLMusicFLMusic Posts: 17member
    Give it up, Intel. You can't win this time. Though the fact that they dedicated a chip solely to Apple...
    magman1979jony0viclauyycwatto_cobra
  • Reply 2 of 40
    KTRKTR Posts: 280member
    FLMusic said:
    Give it up, Intel. You can't win this time. Though the fact that they dedicated a chip solely to Apple...
    I bet you there will be some people out there will try to persuade apple to License the chip to other hardware vendors. I wonder if the apple soc is capable of running windows natively?
    edited June 2020 watto_cobra
  • Reply 3 of 40
    saareksaarek Posts: 1,523member
    Had a discussion with someone today who flat out refuses to accept that Apple chips based on RISC could ever match or exceed Intel Chips based on CISC for Pro users in multi core processing.

    It will be interesting to see the benchmarks and what Apple comes up with.
    magman1979watto_cobrakillroy
  • Reply 4 of 40
    magman1979magman1979 Posts: 1,293member
    saarek said:
    Had a discussion with someone today who flat out refuses to accept that Apple chips based on RISC could ever match or exceed Intel Chips based on CISC for Pro users in multi core processing.

    It will be interesting to see the benchmarks and what Apple comes up with.
    I bet there will be a LOT of deniers coming out of the woodwork over the coming days, weeks and months, poo poo'ing Apple's SoC's in favour of the old laggard Intel. Hell, I'd go with AMD over an Intel chip any day these days regardless!

    Having seen how Apple just wiped the floor of the ARM competition with their A-series chips over the years, I have no doubt it'll do the same with Intel next.
    cat52fastasleeplolliverrazorpitwilliamlondonviclauyycwatto_cobrakillroy
  • Reply 5 of 40
    KTRKTR Posts: 280member
    saarek said:
    Had a discussion with someone today who flat out refuses to accept that Apple chips based on RISC could ever match or exceed Intel Chips based on CISC for Pro users in multi core processing.

    It will be interesting to see the benchmarks and what Apple comes up with.
    Remember, the new os is beta.  Not yet FULLY optimize.  Time will tell. 
    razorpitwatto_cobra
  • Reply 6 of 40
    KTRKTR Posts: 280member
    saarek said:
    Had a discussion with someone today who flat out refuses to accept that Apple chips based on RISC could ever match or exceed Intel Chips based on CISC for Pro users in multi core processing.

    It will be interesting to see the benchmarks and what Apple comes up with.
    I bet there will be a LOT of deniers coming out of the woodwork over the coming days, weeks and months, poo poo'ing Apple's SoC's in favour of the old laggard Intel. Hell, I'd go with AMD over an Intel chip any day these days regardless!

    Having seen how Apple just wiped the floor of the ARM competition with their A-series chips over the years, I have no doubt it'll do the same with Intel next.
    Can't wait to see and hear the apple haters............lol
    cat52magman1979watto_cobra
  • Reply 7 of 40
    😂 so intel will maybe have one new cpu or even just a speed bump by the end of the transition and the mac pro cpu will have had no improvements.

    meanwhile apple shows final cut, creative cloud and office on the nearly 2yr old A12z running in a $500 mac mini with no discrete gpu - smoother and with real time video effects at 4k.

    bahahahahaha, i have been waiting for this moment for about 8yrs now, seeing each intentional step by Apple.
    TomEjony0cat52magman1979fastasleepwilliamlondonviclauyycwatto_cobraDetnatorkillroy
  • Reply 8 of 40
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    😂 so intel will maybe have one new cpu or even just a speed bump by the end of the transition and the mac pro cpu will have had no improvements.

    meanwhile apple shows final cut, creative cloud and office on the nearly 2yr old A12z running in a $500 mac mini with no discrete gpu - smoother and with real time video effects at 4k.

    bahahahahaha, i have been waiting for this moment for about 8yrs now, seeing each intentional step by Apple.
    Well, you have to learn to take what so-called techies say with a grain of salt.
    cat52williamlondonjony0watto_cobra
  • Reply 9 of 40
    sflocalsflocal Posts: 6,093member
    KTR said:
    FLMusic said:
    Give it up, Intel. You can't win this time. Though the fact that they dedicated a chip solely to Apple...
    I bet you there will be some people out there will try to persuade apple to License the chip to other hardware vendors. I wonder if the apple soc is capable of running windows natively?
    Windows runs under the x86(64) architecture, so no.  ARM is an entirely different architecture.  For now, I suspect it will be a cold day in Hell before Intel ever grants Apple a license to use x86(64), but I suppose stranger things have happened.  AMD is the only one allowed, and even then Intel took AMD to court (and lost) to stop it due to some archaic agreement that I think Intel regrets to this day.
    jony0viclauyycwatto_cobrakillroy
  • Reply 10 of 40
    wood1208wood1208 Posts: 2,913member
    On surface, Tim cook said, excited about in pipeline Intel based MACs; will support Intel for next few years but also said first MACs will be released by the end of year and fully transition away from Intel in 2 years.
    If I am a customer and planning to buy MACs towards the end of the year than why buy any Intel MAC's if the same product is available with ARM based ? Future of MAC is ARM based so customers will mentally geared and than purchase wise behind ARM MACs.
    edited June 2020 watto_cobra
  • Reply 11 of 40
    maltzmaltz Posts: 454member
    sflocal said:
    KTR said:
    FLMusic said:
    Give it up, Intel. You can't win this time. Though the fact that they dedicated a chip solely to Apple...
    I bet you there will be some people out there will try to persuade apple to License the chip to other hardware vendors. I wonder if the apple soc is capable of running windows natively?
    Windows runs under the x86(64) architecture, so no.  ARM is an entirely different architecture.

    And there is a version of Windows 10 that runs on the ARM architecture.  But as many times as I've heard people point that out - it misses the point.  Even if that does run on "Apple Silicon", which we don't know for sure, people don't run Windows on Macs to run Windows per se.  They do it to run Windows applications, which very rarely have ARM versions.
    cat52razorpitelijahgwatto_cobraDetnatorgregoriusm
  • Reply 12 of 40
    KTRKTR Posts: 280member
    sflocal said:
    KTR said:
    FLMusic said:
    Give it up, Intel. You can't win this time. Though the fact that they dedicated a chip solely to Apple...
    I bet you there will be some people out there will try to persuade apple to License the chip to other hardware vendors. I wonder if the apple soc is capable of running windows natively?
    Windows runs under the x86(64) architecture, so no.  ARM is an entirely different architecture.  For now, I suspect it will be a cold day in Hell before Intel ever grants Apple a license to use x86(64), but I suppose stranger things have happened.  AMD is the only one allowed, and even then Intel took AMD to court (and lost) to stop it due to some archaic agreement that I think Intel regrets to this day.
    I guess this could be hit or miss for apple.  We will have to see if the emulations ( vmware and parallel) pull a rabbit out of the hat.  
    razorpitwatto_cobra
  • Reply 13 of 40
    aderutteraderutter Posts: 604member
    In the short and medium terms ahead, we will likely have a choice of Intel or ARM.
    People that need to run Bootcamp or Windows under emulation can still buy an Intel Mac.

    In time, it will ultimately become a choice of better performance or Windows support.
    I'll be buying ARM for better performance.

    The demos shown running on that A12Z were pretty impressive, I especially liked the Maya demo.
    The A12Z is a tweaked version of the 2-year-old silicon, so what chip will the first ARM Mac launch with?
    My guess is it will be an A13Z :)

    What happens if they can release a MacPro with multiple A14Z processors in two years' time?

    I've upgraded with Apple the first generation of each move; first-gen PowerPC, and first-gen Intel.
    Apple has always got it right.
    My first day bought Intel MacBook Pro lasted me over 7 years with not a single fault.

    The next few years are gonna be exciting!

    Intel has no-one to blame but themselves for not advancing. I wouldn't be buying Intel stock right now...
    magman1979Rayz2016razorpitwilliamlondonjony0viclauyycwatto_cobragregoriusm
  • Reply 14 of 40
    dewmedewme Posts: 5,362member
    Andy Grove is spinning in his grave.

    I hope the Apple-Intel divorce remains amicable. I guess it’ll come down to who gets custody of the dog.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 15 of 40
    larryjwlarryjw Posts: 1,031member
    Why use of Mac for Windows when you can buy a new PC for, what is it now, $200?


    williamlondon
  • Reply 16 of 40
    Something tells me Intel won't be so smug in 2 years.  Apple has none of the constraints that tie the hands of Intel / AMD. Apple will move forward much faster than they can imagine.  Looking at what they did the last few years should be proof of that.  Apple will hit 5nm sooner than Intel and AMD will be there as well but even AMD won't be able to keep up for long.  Apple chips won't be sucking down hundreds of watts and they will be going much faster than chips that do.  

    But the real threat is if Apple decides to start producing server class silicon or perhaps licensing it...
    fastasleeprazorpitwatto_cobra
  • Reply 17 of 40
    The ARM A12Z is just to get the developers running on the new silicon.  It's not what Apple will be shipping in production but it's enough for development testing and porting, etc.  It is currently not too shabby but I am waiting for the real architecture.  I fully expect it will be stunning and there will be rapid progress year after year.
    fastasleeprazorpitviclauyycwatto_cobragregoriusm
  • Reply 18 of 40
    fastasleepfastasleep Posts: 6,417member
    wood1208 said:
    On surface, Tim cook said, excited about in pipeline Intel based MACs; will support Intel for next few years but also said first MACs will be released by the end of year and fully transition away from Intel in 2 years.
    If I am a customer and planning to buy MACs towards the end of the year than why buy any Intel MAC's if the same product is available with ARM based ? Future of MAC is ARM based so customers will mentally geared and than purchase wise behind ARM MACs.
    Presumably they're not going to be launching both Intel and ARM-variants of the same Mac at the same time. My guess is, for example, the iMac refresh that was expected today is Intel-based using higher-powered chips and maybe even a Pro Xeon-based variant if there's anything to upgrade to in that realm, and we'll see that sometime this year. Sometime later this year we'll also see the first ARM Mac which would be something else, like maybe a lower-end MacBook or a mini or both, at which point they'd no longer be selling the Intel variants of those Macs. Then over the next two years we'll see ARM variants of MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac Pro etc as they build out their higher end SoC systems. OR, maybe it'll be more random than that — but either way, when the ARM variant of a form factor is released, I'd expect them to stop producing the Intel variant.

    Either way it's going to be years of macOS and software support on Intel Macs, and ARM Macs will start with far fewer native 3rd party apps but those will increase with time. So if you need an iMac this year, buy the one that comes out next and you'll have a solid machine for years. If you need a MacBook and they release a new ARM-based one when you need it, consider getting that one assuming it runs everything you need it to, and you're set for the future. Seems pretty clear.
    razorpitviclauyycwatto_cobraDetnatorgregoriusm
  • Reply 19 of 40
    KTRKTR Posts: 280member
    larryjw said:
    Why use of Mac for Windows when you can buy a new PC for, what is it now, $200?


    what are the specs for that $200 pc?

    razorpitmwhitewilliamlondonmaltzfahlmanwatto_cobragregoriusm
  • Reply 20 of 40
    ITGUYINSDITGUYINSD Posts: 515member
    So how do discrete GPU's work with Apple Silicon?  Do current AMD GPU's work with it?  

    And, what about the Mac Pro?  There isn't Apple Silicon that can match the performance of a souped-up Mac Pro...
    GeorgeBMac
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