So my son is getting tired of his Xbox OneX after 3 years of good use, claiming that all of his friends now have gaming PCs and that he absolutely needs to upgrade.
I’d rather get him an M1 Mac Mini or some other Mac so that I wouldn’t have to constantly play Windows IT manager (which I’d stumble at miserably).
Would the M1 Mac Mini be a good solution for at least 1080P 60 FPS gaming with minimal fussing?
And if the rumors are true of an imminent improved Mac Mini then hopefully this would be more compelling for gaming.
Intel drops the ball, AMD picks it up and Apple decides they'd go with ARM. Intel is now in the process of doing damage control.
Apple on the other hand never targeted gamers and has always been a joke for gamers. Deprecating OpenGL and leaving it in a seemingly unmaintained state does not help the game developers who do want to port to macOS. On the other hand, while this is a barrier for a certain number of game developers, that iOS has a healthy selection of games, may mean there is a chance that these games will be ported to macOS. Also, I wonder how many Apple users simply turn to a console for the gaming experience?
Intel drops the ball, AMD picks it up and Apple decides they'd go with ARM. Intel is now in the process of doing damage control.
Apple on the other hand never targeted gamers and has always been a joke for gamers. Deprecating OpenGL and leaving it in a seemingly unmaintained state does not help the game developers who do want to port to macOS. On the other hand, while this is a barrier for a certain number of game developers, that iOS has a healthy selection of games, may mean there is a chance that these games will be ported to macOS. Also, I wonder how many Apple users simply turn to a console for the gaming experience?
And to me gamers have always been a joke, a tiny, minuscule market niche of people with questionable social skills. sort of like the gear-heads of the 1950s and 60s with their super chargers and Holley 6 packs trying to outdo one another on the street.
Intel does have a point that macOS sucks if you are a gamer. The latest blockbuster titles just aren’t available on Mac, and that is a fact. Of course many people buy macs for reasons other than gaming, but the gaming market is a still a relatively big market.
Also, Apple could have chosen to use tiger lake and nvidia gpus, but famously opted not to do so, of course, and intel is just highlighting that.
Finally, tiger lake launched with 4 cores, so it couldn’t keep up with m1 and mobile Ryzen 5000 in multithreaded heavy benchmarks, but tiger lake h with up to 8 cores is out, and it smokes m1 in multithreaded tasks and has taken the gaming crown from AMD, according to a recent Linus Tech Tips review of the 11800H.
Actually macOS could be a great gaming platform, it needs marketshare. macOS is much more stable and simpler than Windows, Metal is super fast. Apple Silicon is great and it is just the beginning. Time will tell.
I think apple chould have a contest for a m1 first, or m1 only game with the winner getting a million dollar developer contract. What’s are the thoughts on the idea.
Intel drops the ball, AMD picks it up and Apple decides they'd go with ARM. Intel is now in the process of doing damage control.
Apple on the other hand never targeted gamers and has always been a joke for gamers. Deprecating OpenGL and leaving it in a seemingly unmaintained state does not help the game developers who do want to port to macOS. On the other hand, while this is a barrier for a certain number of game developers, that iOS has a healthy selection of games, may mean there is a chance that these games will be ported to macOS. Also, I wonder how many Apple users simply turn to a console for the gaming experience?
And to me gamers have always been a joke, a tiny, minuscule market niche of people with questionable social skills. sort of like the gear-heads of the 1950s and 60s with their super chargers and Holley 6 packs trying to outdo one another on the street.
The global pc games market was valued at about $27.73 billion in 2018
That is one big niche. I can still understand why Apple doesn't care since even moderate share would still be just a blip for them but it is pretty big nevertheless.
Like breaking up with a crazy girlfriend and she starts bringing up random crap to the surface.
I don’t get this. Intel seems selective and all over the place here. “ Gelsinger told Intel employees in January that "we have to deliver better products to the PC ecosystem than any possible thing that a lifestyle company in Cupertino makes.”
A lifestyle company makes better chips than a chip developer company? Wow that’s sad.
What a desperate logical leap. So (read in the voice of the late, great Terry Jones in The Holy Grail); “Computers running new Intel chips run fast” ”What else runs Intel chips? Macs” ”Macs running games on (old) Intel chips run slower than Windows PCs running games on (new) Intel chips” ”And what else do gamers do? Create content” ”Therefore, Windows PCs are faster at creating content than Macs”
By employing this Pythonesque logical fallacy, Intel has dodged a direct comparison of content creation between current Windows PCs and current Macs which doesn’t work out well for them.
”Ah, I see you are a man of science” R.I.P Terry & Graham.
The Mac gaming audience is just much smaller, at least 1/10th-1/20th the size of the Windows platform. Making 10% extra revenue for years of support isn't worthwhile. The OpenGL/Metal/Vulkan issue doesn't help matters but loads of developers support iOS so the main issue is the audience.
Is that accurate? Mac total markets hare is nudging 10% in 4th position. Remove the mandatory corporate machines and sub $900 PCs (if that’s your minimum gaming spec) and what’s the real proportion? I’m guessing way more than 10% in fact, I think Apple own the $1000+ laptop market.
Intel does have a point that macOS sucks if you are a gamer. The latest blockbuster titles just aren’t available on Mac, and that is a fact. Of course many people buy macs for reasons other than gaming, but the gaming market is a still a relatively big market.
Also, Apple could have chosen to use tiger lake and nvidia gpus, but famously opted not to do so, of course, and intel is just highlighting that.
Finally, tiger lake launched with 4 cores, so it couldn’t keep up with m1 and mobile Ryzen 5000 in multithreaded heavy benchmarks, but tiger lake h with up to 8 cores is out, and it smokes m1 in multithreaded tasks and has taken the gaming crown from AMD, according to a recent Linus Tech Tips review of the 11800H.
Actually macOS could be a great gaming platform, it needs marketshare. macOS is much more stable and simpler than Windows, Metal is super fast. Apple Silicon is great and it is just the beginning. Time will tell.
I think apple chould have a contest for a m1 first, or m1 only game with the winner getting a million dollar developer contract. What’s are the thoughts on the idea.
Maybe but I think they’re more likely to create dedicated channels for Apple Arcade, they could use this for Steam, xcloud and, oh yeah, Epic. I think that’s where we land on this.
The Mac gaming audience is just much smaller, at least 1/10th-1/20th the size of the Windows platform. Making 10% extra revenue for years of support isn't worthwhile. The OpenGL/Metal/Vulkan issue doesn't help matters but loads of developers support iOS so the main issue is the audience.
Is that accurate? Mac total markets hare is nudging 10% in 4th position. Remove the mandatory corporate machines and sub $900 PCs (if that’s your minimum gaming spec) and what’s the real proportion? I’m guessing way more than 10% in fact, I think Apple own the $1000+ laptop market.
Apple makes up a significant portion of premium laptops but only the 16" model has been capable of gaming (Intel GPUs were < 0.5TFLOP) and that starts at $2400, the entry 27" iMac starts at $1800. Those models make up a small portion of Apple users, Apple's ASP would be much higher otherwise. The large majority of Apple's new Mac sales are on M1 just by migrating the Air, mini, 13" MBP and entry iMac. The 16" MBP, 27" iMac and Mac Pro make up less than 20% of Mac users.
This can be worked out from their earnings when they reported unit sales and some other reported numbers like laptop/desktop split being 70-80% laptops and pro machines being around 1% and iMacs being around 70-80% of all desktop models:
Mac revenue = $25.4b, units = 18.2m Entry prices were: mini = $799, Macbook Air = $999, MBP13" = $1299, 21" iMac = $1299, 27" iMac = $1799, 16" MBP = $2399, iMac Pro = $4999, Mac Pro = $5999 40% Air + 20% MBP13 + 20% iMac21 + 5% mini = $17.2b 10% MBP16 + 5% iMac27 + 1% iMacPro/MacPro = $6.8b This adds up to $24b but only accounts for entry models, the upgraded models in each category would make up the rest. Bumping MBP16 up 10% adds another $4b so those rough percentages have to be close.
Steam is the most popular gaming service and they measure some stats:
Steam has over 100 million users. 96% are on Windows, 3% on Mac, 1% on Linux. That's for the OS so not including Bootcamp but Bootcamp would show up in the hardware. 75% are on Nvidia GPUs, which Apple hasn't used for years. Even if the assumption was that Apple made up half the AMD gamers, that would still be around 10%.
M1 Macs could change things because now the entire Mac userbase will have gaming-capable hardware, around 20-25 million units per year but that would need more native ports of games or for Parallels/Crossover to become used more for gaming. That change would come slowly though. If 25% of new Apple Silicon Mac users start gaming on them, it will only grow the total share of gaming by about 5% every year and as long as the total is a low minority, game devs won't give a lot of support to it. This is why the Wii U didn't get much developer support.
Mac gaming pretty much only exists at all due a handful of companies like Aspyr and Feral Interactive:
For the foreseeable future, buying a gaming PC will remain the most reliable route for Windows gamers and Apple Silicon Macs will vastly improve the experience of native Mac gamers and will expand the market for native Mac ports.
Intel drops the ball, AMD picks it up and Apple decides they'd go with ARM. Intel is now in the process of doing damage control.
Apple on the other hand never targeted gamers and has always been a joke for gamers. Deprecating OpenGL and leaving it in a seemingly unmaintained state does not help the game developers who do want to port to macOS. On the other hand, while this is a barrier for a certain number of game developers, that iOS has a healthy selection of games, may mean there is a chance that these games will be ported to macOS. Also, I wonder how many Apple users simply turn to a console for the gaming experience?
And to me gamers have always been a joke, a tiny, minuscule market niche of people with questionable social skills. sort of like the gear-heads of the 1950s and 60s with their super chargers and Holley 6 packs trying to outdo one another on the street.
The global pc games market was valued at about $27.73 billion in 2018
That is one big niche. I can still understand why Apple doesn't care since even moderate share would still be just a blip for them but it is pretty big nevertheless.
The more important question is: wat is the return? A market can have a huge value, but still be only marginally profitable.
While I have to laugh at Intel here (again), I will say I miss gaming on my Powerbooks. There were never as many titles, but playing Medal of Honor titles, COD, and Starcraft was a blast. I even have the remastered Starcraft on my MBP now. It would be great to see Apple take gaming seriously once the Apple Silicon transition is complete.
What a desperate logical leap. So (read in the voice of the late, great Terry Jones in The Holy Grail); “Computers running new Intel chips run fast” ”What else runs Intel chips? Macs” ”Macs running games on (old) Intel chips run slower than Windows PCs running games on (new) Intel chips” ”And what else do gamers do? Create content” ”Therefore, Windows PCs are faster at creating content than Macs”
By employing this Pythonesque logical fallacy, Intel has dodged a direct comparison of content creation between current Windows PCs and current Macs which doesn’t work out well for them.
”Ah, I see you are a man of science” R.I.P Terry & Graham.
So my son is getting tired of his Xbox OneX after 3 years of good use, claiming that all of his friends now have gaming PCs and that he absolutely needs to upgrade.
I’d rather get him an M1 Mac Mini or some other Mac so that I wouldn’t have to constantly play Windows IT manager (which I’d stumble at miserably).
Would the M1 Mac Mini be a good solution for at least 1080P 60 FPS gaming with minimal fussing?
And if the rumors are true of an imminent improved Mac Mini then hopefully this would be more compelling for gaming.
"I asked for a gaming PC. I got an M1 Mac. How's that for being born under a bad sign?" - Your son paraphrasing Ferris Bueller. lol
Mac has never been a great gaming choice - not because it's particularly inferior, but because of the dearth of games available for it and/or the crap support and quality of many of the games that are ported to it. There are, of course, exceptions (Blizzard comes to mind) but by and large, Apple is and always has been a terrible choice if one of your primary uses is gaming. M1 Macs are even worse since Bootcamp is not an option.
I'm of the opinion that there are many, many fantastic games on the Mac, it's just that the vocal so-called "gamers" only want the flash bang graphics of the latest murder simulators. I play games a lot and I'm more than happy with what the Mac offers.
So my son is getting tired of his Xbox OneX after 3 years of good use, claiming that all of his friends now have gaming PCs and that he absolutely needs to upgrade.
I’d rather get him an M1 Mac Mini or some other Mac so that I wouldn’t have to constantly play Windows IT manager (which I’d stumble at miserably).
Would the M1 Mac Mini be a good solution for at least 1080P 60 FPS gaming with minimal fussing?
And if the rumors are true of an imminent improved Mac Mini then hopefully this would be more compelling for gaming.
"I asked for a gaming PC. I got an M1 Mac. How's that for being born under a bad sign?" - Your son paraphrasing Ferris Bueller. lol
Mac has never been a great gaming choice - not because it's particularly inferior, but because of the dearth of games available for it and/or the crap support and quality of many of the games that are ported to it. There are, of course, exceptions (Blizzard comes to mind) but by and large, Apple is and always has been a terrible choice if one of your primary uses is gaming. M1 Macs are even worse since Bootcamp is not an option.
Appreciate the explanation, and Ferris Bueller reference!
Based on several comments posted it unfortunately seems I have no choice but a PC for my son’s gaming. As good as Apple Arcade may be, he needs to play the popular games online with his friends. I REALLY DON’T WANT WINDOWS to manage. I’ll hold off on any decision until the WWDC announcements this month, one can hope.
I bought my son a PC because he wants to game, otherwise at home we are a Mac house.
There is a bit of an issue if you want the laptop to be used for other purposes than gaming though, as a gaming laptop are big, noisy, heavy and the battery gets to two hours on a good day. stepping back to say, an XPS or thinkpad for portability and battery life you end up with a lesser GPU for gaming, just like the MBP.
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I’d rather get him an M1 Mac Mini or some other Mac so that I wouldn’t have to constantly play Windows IT manager (which I’d stumble at miserably).
Would the M1 Mac Mini be a good solution for at least 1080P 60 FPS gaming with minimal fussing?
And if the rumors are true of an imminent improved Mac Mini then hopefully this would be more compelling for gaming.
Apple on the other hand never targeted gamers and has always been a joke for gamers. Deprecating OpenGL and leaving it in a seemingly unmaintained state does not help the game developers who do want to port to macOS. On the other hand, while this is a barrier for a certain number of game developers, that iOS has a healthy selection of games, may mean there is a chance that these games will be ported to macOS. Also, I wonder how many Apple users simply turn to a console for the gaming experience?
That is one big niche. I can still understand why Apple doesn't care since even moderate share would still be just a blip for them but it is pretty big nevertheless.
I don’t get this. Intel seems selective and all over the place here.
“ Gelsinger told Intel employees in January that "we have to deliver better products to the PC ecosystem than any possible thing that a lifestyle company in Cupertino makes.”
A lifestyle company makes better chips than a chip developer company? Wow that’s sad.
“Computers running new Intel chips run fast”
”What else runs Intel chips? Macs”
”Macs running games on (old) Intel chips run slower than Windows PCs running games on (new) Intel chips”
”And what else do gamers do? Create content”
”Therefore, Windows PCs are faster at creating content than Macs”
By employing this Pythonesque logical fallacy, Intel has dodged a direct comparison of content creation between current Windows PCs and current Macs which doesn’t work out well for them.
”Ah, I see you are a man of science” R.I.P Terry & Graham.
This can be worked out from their earnings when they reported unit sales and some other reported numbers like laptop/desktop split being 70-80% laptops and pro machines being around 1% and iMacs being around 70-80% of all desktop models:
https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0000320193/68027c6d-356d-46a4-a524-65d8ec05a1da.pdf
Mac revenue = $25.4b, units = 18.2m
Entry prices were: mini = $799, Macbook Air = $999, MBP13" = $1299, 21" iMac = $1299, 27" iMac = $1799, 16" MBP = $2399, iMac Pro = $4999, Mac Pro = $5999
40% Air + 20% MBP13 + 20% iMac21 + 5% mini = $17.2b
10% MBP16 + 5% iMac27 + 1% iMacPro/MacPro = $6.8b
This adds up to $24b but only accounts for entry models, the upgraded models in each category would make up the rest. Bumping MBP16 up 10% adds another $4b so those rough percentages have to be close.
Steam is the most popular gaming service and they measure some stats:
https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
Steam has over 100 million users. 96% are on Windows, 3% on Mac, 1% on Linux. That's for the OS so not including Bootcamp but Bootcamp would show up in the hardware. 75% are on Nvidia GPUs, which Apple hasn't used for years. Even if the assumption was that Apple made up half the AMD gamers, that would still be around 10%.
M1 Macs could change things because now the entire Mac userbase will have gaming-capable hardware, around 20-25 million units per year but that would need more native ports of games or for Parallels/Crossover to become used more for gaming. That change would come slowly though. If 25% of new Apple Silicon Mac users start gaming on them, it will only grow the total share of gaming by about 5% every year and as long as the total is a low minority, game devs won't give a lot of support to it. This is why the Wii U didn't get much developer support.
Mac gaming pretty much only exists at all due a handful of companies like Aspyr and Feral Interactive:
https://www.aspyr.com/search?search_term=&platform%5B%5D=Mac
https://www.feralinteractive.com/en/mac-games/
For the foreseeable future, buying a gaming PC will remain the most reliable route for Windows gamers and Apple Silicon Macs will vastly improve the experience of native Mac gamers and will expand the market for native Mac ports.
Based on several comments posted it unfortunately seems I have no choice but a PC for my son’s gaming. As good as Apple Arcade may be, he needs to play the popular games online with his friends. I REALLY DON’T WANT WINDOWS to manage. I’ll hold off on any decision until the WWDC announcements this month, one can hope.
stepping back to say, an XPS or thinkpad for portability and battery life you end up with a lesser GPU for gaming, just like the MBP.