robaba

designr said:

rob53 said:

designr said:

This appears to be more evidence of the commoditization of CPU/compute capability. More specifically the commoditization of two aspects: 1) fab, and 2) chip design. Much to Intel's chagrin of course.

The lower-level components become more and more commoditized enabling even more (and more powerful) higher-level products for us. No one cares about the specific chips, display technology, etc. in things like smartphones, tablets, TV "set-top" boxes, etc.

I disagree. Google will simply try and copy Apple but won't be able to. Apple's M- and A-series chips/SoCs are not commoditized chips. They won't be available to other companies and even if they were, the other companies won't benefit from them because it's Apple's programming that makes these chips sing. Google will need to change Android to run exactly the same apis and other processes Apple is running to get the most out of their chip design. Remember, Apple only licenses the ARM architecture, nothing else (I believe that's still true). Everything Apple does to their chips is their design, not ARM's. ARM has their own chip designs but they don't work for macOS, iOS, WatchOS or TVOS. Intel, AMD and ARM designed chips are commodity items but Apple-design ARM chips are not.

I probably wasn't very clear in what I meant.

I wasn't suggesting that Apple's chips are/will be commodity chips. What I meant is that the chip-making capability (design + fab) has become commoditized. So the capability is much more widely available than it once was (and likely much less expensive too). At one point the CPU was a very large part of the value stack. That's less true now. The value is moving "up the stack."

You have a very strange definition of “commodity”.  Chip design and chip fabrication are SERVICES and furthermore, they are highly expensive and proprietary services at that.  If all cpus were the same and produced by huge numbers of players (thousands at least) then THE UNIVERSAL CPU could be considered a commodity, but this is not happening.  After many many years of centralization and commodification (x86) we are finally getting diversity in Chip design once again.  But the over reliance on ARM, to the detriment of developing new and innovative forms of computational logic and their corresponding implementation in discrete hardware, is not a positive thing.  Apples brilliant implementation of proprietary logic blocks in the M1 are where their approach really shines.  We need more of this, not just copy-cat “commodity” designs.

sbdude said:

kimberly said:

tycho_macuser said:

robaba said:

This is how change happens.

Lol.
If the “change” you’re talking about is where an uppity self-aggrandizing employee like Gjovik can go to Twitter with a complaint like this:

”My boss respectfully asked me if I could lead meetings with slightly less aggressive tone, so more people would feel comfortable sharing their opinions. When I did, my boss thanked me afterwards for the more appropriate tone set in that meeting. What a jerk, right?! Ugh. I’m such a victim.”

and have it not recognized for what it is (a self-important, attention seeking, bitter person), then yeah- CHANGE!!

I agree .. a jerk.

A bully is a bully except when it's a woman, right? Because strong women in the workplace! Yeah!

Hate to break it to you, but it's not off the table to ask someone to tone it down, regardless of their gender, ideology, race, status, etc.

So long as the power dynamics are equal.  Punching down is never cool.

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

robaba said:

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

It should have been home robots based on the technology Apple created to operate its automated factories all over the world ... but Apple did none of that. Cook is an amazing CEO. He has consistently created excellent products with amazing build quality and design containing some of the latest silicon on the market and got it produced in sufficient quantities to satisfy the market and released them on time year after year. Unfortunately he never had the kind of vision for the future that Steve Jobs did. Cook never disrupted the market the way Jobs did routinely. The lack of a $300 Mac Nano which would have moved Apple's 8% computer market share to 25% is the clearest evidence of this fact.

What’s clear to me is that you have offered zero evidence to suggest that a $300 Mac Nano (is offered) would significantly increase the Mac market share let alone skyrocket it to 25%.  I believe that it’s current plan to push the performance envelope, while maintaining a pro-sumer market strategy and building out a more robust handheld market will continue to gain market share worldwide.

Because (duh) it's price to performance ratio would be well outside of anything a current Intel or AMD PC could achieve. I can run GTA V on Windows 11 with Parallels on my M1 Mac Mini at playable frame rates. Native games would run a lot faster.

Not sure $300 even covers the cost of an M1 SiP right now.  In 5 years?  Ok, but by then it’s advantage will be gone.  Apple can’t play at $300 unless you want the to burn through cash-in-hand to buy market share.  And then what?  Continue to burn through cash trying to support  25% of a market that appears to be shrinking?  Not sure when the winning is supposed to start.

uktechie said:

Amazing technology and a big step but is it really “huge” as many commentators claim?

Personally, in the UK at least, I find the 4G network to be very good and pretty much available everywhere. I can’t see it would offer any manor benefit to me but let me know if you can see really use cases for the average user.  

Of course, for sailors, mountaineers and remote explorers this is absolutely huge and will no doubt save many lives. Don’t get me wrong - the technology is awesome, I just wonder if many users will appreciate or even notice it. 

I can drive 45 minutes out of my city limits and not get cel coverage due to the dense rock hills in the area.  This would definitely find use in the US.  Of course it would mean when hiking in every Wilderness area I would now be serenaded with the dulcet tones of YouTube bloggers that someone else just can’t live without.

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

A nod to Parallels: Bootcamp is a lot less necessary now you can run DX 12 apps in a VM. I tested Grand Theft Auto V running in Windows 11 via Parallels 17 on an M1 Mac Mini. It is quite playable. There were a few graphics glitches in the far distance but everything else looked fine. The x86 emulation is being done using Windows 11 rather than Rosetta in Mac OS but the performance was acceptable. The TPM 2 requirement is emulated via a hardware setting you add to the Windows 11 VM. As far as Windows is concerned, the Parallels VM is a fully compatible computer.

Impressive.