linuxplatform

razorpit said:

Agree with this. Don't think Intel is going anywhere soon, but if you have stock I think now is a good time to sell. Intel is vulnerable right now.

There's a lot of laziness and content out there right now. Apple Silicon is going to wake a few business units up at MS and Intel, at least it better for their sake.

commentzilla said:

mariowinco said:

Apple will lower the price of 100usd (or aligned to whatever is the trend on PC market) and advertise how much more powerful than INTEL based are the Apple Silicon based machines. Margins will increase and so shareholder value.

It makes more sense for Apple to drop the price without increasing margins to bring more switchers onboard, since their cash cow is software and services where the margins are much higher.

Another person who thinks that Intel's CPUs cost a lot more than they do. Reality:

The 10th gen i3 is in both the MacBook Air and HP Pavilion x360 2-in-1. Despite the only real advantage the HP enjoys over the MBA being the Retina screen AND HP needing to pay for Windows where Apple gets their OS for free, the MBA literally costs twice as much. Switch to machines that cost the same as the entry level MacBook Air and you will see devices - again name brands like Dell, HP, Lenovo etc. - offering 10th gen Intel i7s with either 16 GB of RAM or Nvidia graphics card with 8 GB of RAM. Realize that this is hundreds less than what Apple charges for their REFURBISHED Intel i5 machines. 

Were you guys honestly thinking that Intel charges like $500-$1000 or something for their CPUs? If so, to what did you attribute Dell, HP, Lenovo and the rest selling computers with comparable specs for half the cost (or less)? Again, note that it isn't Apple who is claiming that switching to Apple Silicon will lower the cost of devices. It is Apple consumers who believe that unless it is made by Apple it will crash every other day until it becomes a doorstop after 9 months. (Yes, lots of alleged "tech writers" fall into this category, which is why some of them bizarrely believe that Apple Silicon will mean cheaper MacBook Airs too. Despite being "tech writers" they have never gone to a local electronics store and seen just how cheap the Intel i3 is OFF THE SHELF TO CONSUMERS).

StrangeDays said:

You are aware that Apple probably pays only $50 - if that - for the Intel i3 that goes into the $1000 MacBook Air. I don't know where the idea that Apple is going to save all this money by using their own chips comes from. 

Even if that figure is true, $50 is an expensive chip component.

It is most certainly true. You can get one retail for $130, and you KNOW that OEMs - especially Apple with their legendary negotiating prowess with suppliers - don't pay retail. And no, $50 isn't expensive at all. To put it another way, you can get the same 10th gen Intel i3 in a Dell - meaning not some cheap junk that will break in 2 years - that costs $450 and an touchscreen HP (where the only real advantage the MBA has on it is speakers and Retina display) for $500. So even if Apple was getting the CPU for free - which the A14 absolutely will not be ... do you think that it will cost LESS than the $160 that Qualcomm charges Samsung for their flagship chips? - the MBA would still cost twice as much as comparable competition.

Now my point IS NOT to rehash the Apple versus Windows versus Android pricing wars. I am just pointing out that if people think that Intel has been ripping off Apple all these years for some bizarre reason and that Apple is going to be able to make cheaper Macs that will increase market share as a result etc. yeah that isn't true at all. I am willing to consider the possibility that Apple Silicon will be cheaper than Intel i7 and i9 chips. An i9 10th gen runs about $450 retail so let's say that Intel charges Apple maybe half that. (In reality, it is probably 1/3 or less but let's give Apple the benefit of the doubt.) But first we are going to have to see if Apple's ARM SOCs can have similar performance given the same type of real workloads - by this I mean engineering, programming, scientific etc. applications and not merely the Final Cut Pro X and Adobe stuff - that the Mac Pros and top of the line Macbook Pros are currently doing with Intel chips.

GeorgeBMac said:

Interesting that he forecasts lower prices from higher volumes.

A big part of the cost of any product are fixed and semi-fixed costs (costs that only vary with wide swings in volume such as when you start laying off white collar workers).  And those fixed and semi-fixed costs are a major part of the cost of any Mac (they include the cost of OS, software and Apple's ecosystem).

So, although those fixed and semi-fixed costs allocated down to a unit basis are critical to pricing strategies, volume is usually the weakest part of any forecast.   So, predicting an increase in volume on a major switch to a new technology isolated from the industry is gutsy at best.

For example, let's assume the following:

Total Macs sold:    5 million

Variable cost to manufacture:   5M x $600 = $3,000M

Fixed & semi-fixed costs:   $3,000M

Cost per mac:   ($3,000m + $3,000M) / 5M = $1,200

Now, assuming variable costs go down and volume increases:

Total Macs sold:    6 million

Variable cost to manufacture:   5M x $500 = $2,500M

Fixed & semi-fixed costs:   $3,000M

Cost per mac:   ($2,500m + $3,000M) / 6M = $900

In this hypothetical example volume played a far bigger role in the price of a Mac than did a decrease in its variable (manufacturing) costs.

But, only Apple's internal cost accountants have any idea what the breakdown in costs are.   But, even knowing that, volume projections are always speculative.   Ya just don't know....

In fact, volume could decrease for two reasons:

1)  People may fear a new technology that could block them from doing what they need and want to do and may hold off making a purchase,

2)  The market may have already been saturated with a massive increase in computer sales as a result of stay at home orders from the virus.   Essentially, every kid who ever had a shot at getting a Mac already has one -- and the same for many adults.

You are aware that Apple probably pays only $50 - if that - for the Intel i3 that goes into the $1000 MacBook Air. I don't know where the idea that Apple is going to save all this money by using their own chips comes from. 

EsquireCats said:

Read between the lines: the title is in decline, they can’t maintain it forever. It’s ~ 6 years old now and players have long moved onto the next multiplayer fad. 

Mario - around since 1981 - says hi. 

In reality both you and the guy that you presumably are responding to are both wrong. Instead what is actually going on is that Psyonix, the original developer of Rocket League made multi-platform and cross-platform play a priority. A major part of accomplishing this was primarily making the game for Steam, because:

A. Steam runs on Windows, macOS and Linux and
B. porting Steam games to other platforms like Android, iOS and even XBox - which is at its core Windows 10 anyway - isn't that difficult. 

Which meant that apart from Steam getting/maintaining it on PlayStation - accomplished at launch - and Nintendo were the only "big jobs" and even there PlayStation is based on BSD - like macOS - and the Nintendo Switch is a lot more similar to Android than Nintendo will ever admit.

The current problem: Psyonix was bought by Epic Games. And Epic Games considers Steam their #1 competitor. So rather than saying "Rocket League will no longer be supported on Linux and Mac" it is more accurate to say "Epic Games is beginning the process of migrating Rocket League from Steam to its own Epic store and during the transition they will only support the Steam version of the game on Windows." Epic Games will not/cannot publicly admit this for a host of reasons but it is what is happening.
When the transition is complete, those who own the game on Steam will need to re-download the game from Epic. This will be true of both Windows and Mac, and at that time the game will be fully supported on Mac. 

As far as "the future" ... TBH it will be true multi-platform cloud gaming that will make hardware irrelevant. This model is very much in the interests of the gaming industry. Developing, patching, updating, patching etc. games for one platform is expensive and difficult to the point where a game on one platform is literally entirely different from allegedly the same game on another because the hardware specs are so different and sometimes they were developed by entirely different teams. Yet if you only release a desirable game for one platform - or merely release it first and/or better - the gamers on the other platforms will hate you forever. This nonsense actually has caused gaming companies to fail. The only people who will not benefit from this are the console makers. And even that is only to a degree. If Microsoft makes money selling 5 million XBox consoles a year, it isn't much. Sony would take a bigger hit from no longer pushing 15-20 million PlayStations a year, but they'd still be Sony. The only big loser is Nintendo, as they're the only one where video games is any more than a side business. However, there are those who think that Nintendo would make more money were the billions of owners of Android, iOS/macOS and Windows devices to be able to play Smash Bros and Super Mario Odyssey instead of merely the < 45 million people who own the Nintendo Switch. Sega was able to have nearly $3 billion in revenue even in a down year last year due to not releasing major games (Shenmue, Sakura Wars ... and Super Monkey Ball) so Nintendo ought to be be able to outdo that easily.