melgross

GeorgeBMac said:

What we don't know is what is going on behind the scenes between Apple and Qualcomm.

It sounds strange that Apple would have swallowed their pride and kissed and made up with Qualcomm so they could use Qualcomm modems for only a single year.

So, that leaves two possibilities:

1)   The Apple-Qualcomm reunion didn't work and Apple is going its own way on their own as quickly as possible -- like next September

2)   This is, as has always been thought, a long term project much like Apple Silicon replacing the Intel CPU's.

The iPhone 12 reportedly does not have the latest and greatest of Qualcomm modems -- that may have influenced this and its timing.   That is:  Did Qualcomm stick it to Apple and pawn off an inferior modem on them?

Apple has Qualcomm’s latest and greatest modem, the x55. The x60 won’t be in new devices until mid 2021, a few months before apple comes out with their new phones. It’s the timing of product cycles, nothing more.

It’s a 6 year deal that Apple signed. Apple saw, according to reports, that Intel couldn’t have a 5G modem this year. Apparently, Apple felt that for competitive purposes, they needed to have 5G this year, and couldn’t wait, and that the newer x55 modem from Qualcomm was good enough.

even if Apple has their own modem for late 2021, which is something I’m not so sure about, they will continue selling products from previous years for some years afterwards, and those will contain the Qualcomm modem. So they need a license for those. They don’t have to buy modems from Qualcomm for the entire 6 years, but this gives them the option, in case their own designs are late.

these modems are a big deal. The x50 wasn’t very good. It was huge, power hungry, lacked features and frequency bands, etc. there was never a chance Apple would use it. The x55 they are using is much better as a second gen product. Next years x60 is better yet. So Apple has to produce a modem that will be at least as good as Qualcomm’s third generation part, with a first generation part. How likely is that? Apple has to hedge their bets. There’s no point in rushing one of these things out, only to get criticized as they did over Intel’s competent, but not leading edge, modems.

tht said:

drdavid said:

tht said:

Feels like they should have started 4 years ago, but good to hear they are committed. They could have switched Macs to Apple Silicon in 2018. And their own cellular modems could have been started in 2016 or 2017. They basically wasted billions and 4 years to groom Intel to be a secondary or primary modem provider, but Intel has poorly performed in virtually everything they have touched the past 3 to 4 years.

Lol, right. I mean really they should have started 8 years ago so they could switch Macs to Apple silicon in 2014. And their own cellular modems could have been started in 2012 or 2013. Making a technological roadmap after the fact is a breeze. I wonder if there are any paying jobs in that field. 

2018 is when TSMC caught up to Intel in fab. That would have been the perfect time to make the switch as Apple could have rode a six year tick tock cycle of TSMC going from 10nm, 7nm, 5nm. And if they are on cadence with 3nm, 8 years. It would have been relentless march. Before that, Intel had the best fabs, and the best decision was to stay with Intel. 

Apple’s chips weren’t ready in 2018. You think you know more about it than Apple? And the question about fabs isn’t so direct either. TSMC, Samsung and others have been using very relaxed, as they call it, manufacturing rules for this. Intel’s problem wasn’t so much that their fans were behind, as it was that they refused to do the same, struggling with something others gave up on. I’m not saying that Intel was doing the right thing.

But a couple of years ago Intel made a proposal that instead of using process node, which these others aren’t totally honest about, they should use transistor density. That’s a much more useful way of measurement, as it actually accounts for all the manufacturing points. But the others said no. Why, because it takes the marketing advantage of using smaller numbers, which they can do, and using bigger numbers instead, which they can’t.

‘’admittedly, Intel has screwed itself because of their stubbornness. But it’s not really so much a matter of technical superiority, as it was then trying to make 10nm transistors in a 10nm space, which was something the others had given up on before.

tht said:

Feels like they should have started 4 years ago, but good to hear they are committed. They could have switched Macs to Apple Silicon in 2018. And their own cellular modems could have been started in 2016 or 2017. They basically wasted billions and 4 years to groom Intel to be a secondary or primary modem provider, but Intel has poorly performed in virtually everything they have touched the past 3 to 4 years.

I don’t think it’s that simple. Apple knew that Intel was starting years behind in R&D and patents. I think that Intel did a pretty good job considering that starting position. In fact, if 5G had come in one year later, it’s possible that Intel would have made Apple’s 5G modem.

it’s only because Qualcomm now seems to have been forced to license its essential patents as FRAND, as they should have been made to do years before, that Apple can even do this.

What a load of crap. You exploit flaws in an OS security system to start a business, and as those flaws are fixed over time, and you go out of business as a result, you then think, because right now, everyone is seeing dollar signs as they try to claw money out of Apple because of some ill advised and legally dubious claims of monopoly, that you can do so as well.

it’s amusing, in a way. We can look to Android as a comparison. There are stores other than the Google Play store, to be sure, which is one reason given as to why Android is so “open”. But what is everyone advised to do by almost everyone who writes about these things for Android users? Only use the Google Play store for security reasons and piracy reasons. So here we have writers and security experts advising to never use any of those independent stores, just as it was advised to not use Cydia.

sooo...

DuhSesame said:

Still waiting on my M1 Air get processed.

Does anyone have experience with expercom?  Do they really take at least 3 weeks to get it processed?

I’ve never seen anything like this before. I’ve bought a lot of computers from Apple from their site, and from their app. It’s never been more than three days for processing. This time, I ordered on November 17th, and it’s just today, this morning, that I got a message that my Macbook Pro was shipped, and that I’d get it by the 17th, rather than the 10th as originally stated.

at least it’s in the way and I can start tracking its worldwide travels.