john-useless

tenthousandthings said:

The part of this story that catches my eye is “Apple is working on multiple new monitors” — that is the lede, IMHO. The promise of Mac Studio and the enhanced Mac mini is they give Apple incentive to provide more choices when it comes to displays.

Apple can’t possibly be sitting still.

I agree. A good chunk of Apple's Mac customers are willing to pay a (reasonable) premium for Apple-branded products like monitors, despite the fact that there are plenty of third-party alternatives. I certainly am — because Apple's products typically have superior build quality and I can easily trust that Apple will be around years from now to support the product, both with software updates and hardware service, if needed.

I would like to see Apple offer a 4K version of the Studio Display, for example, at a price that's few hundred less than the existing (5K) Studio Display but presumably more than the best-quality 4K monitors from Dell, HP, and Samsung.

Eric_WVGG said:

I was just lamenting that the Studio Display doesn’t work as a HomeKit hub… I was going to fire off a Feedback suggestion, when I realized that there’s no Wi-Fi in there. 

Pity for all that A13 power to mostly go to waste. What a bizarrely over-engineered product.

I have tended to think of the A13 chip in my Studio Display as providing the smarts only for Center Stage (for the webcam), spatial audio (such as it is — not sure how "spatial" it feels to me, although the speakers sound fantastic) and the like. As such, yeah, it's not unreasonable to call it over-engineered.

That said, didn't Apple have some chips in early iPhone models whose functionality wasn't used, or at least wasn't fully utilized? I wonder if this is just part of the normal development cycle for hardware. "Version 1.0" of a product line (the Studio Display, in this case) has a chip that can clearly do more than the product needs it to do. But if & when Apple releases a "version 2.0" of this specific monitor, or a different monitor entirely — perhaps a 4K display with smart home capabilities, for a price point that's less than the 5K Studio Display but more than competitors' 4K monitors — maybe that's when we'll really see what Apple silicon can do in an Apple monitor.

Like live theater, there's always something magic and electric about live presentations when things go well and the audience reacts with delight, surprise, and approval. Apple has had plenty of famous live demos — and a handful of infamous ones, too.

I don't necessarily want to see the return of live demos by third-party developers or live music performances to Apple keynotes, as too often either the presenter was not particularly compelling or the segue to/from those performances was awkward. I don't even necessarily want to see the return of live demos by Apple's own people (as in the Steve Jobs days) because Apple's recent prerecorded demos of new products have been produced so beautifully that I'd miss them.

A hybrid approach would be great, in my view. I'd like to see Tim Cook back on stage as the master of ceremonies for a live audience, delivering Apple's wide-angle viewpoint and introducing various Apple staffers to do focused product announcements. If the product demos themselves are slick, prerecorded videos, fine by me — prerecorded videos are likely more informative to the countless viewers watching online than the live on-stage demos were.

When Steve Jobs introduced the original iPhone? Magic. When Tim Cook opened their October 2018 event to an enthusiastic live audience in New York City? Electrifying. When Phil Schiller said "Can't innovate anymore, my ass" and the audience rewarded him with laughter and sustained applause? Quite entertaining.

I would like Apple's keynotes to have at least some live aspects because moments like those are worth seeing and remembering.

The number of people in this world who know what Apple is truly planning is small, and most of them probably work at Apple. But I will be surprised if Apple actually ever builds its own car. Think they have problems these days with supply chain management, chip shortages, employee unionization efforts, bad press, and the like? Becoming an auto manufacturer is all that multiplied by 1,000. Yes, Apple (currently) has money to burn and could likely afford start-up costs far more easily than other modern EV-maker wannabes like Fisker, Faraday, and others. But should Apple go there?

I think it would be far better for Apple to establish a partnership with one or more respected, well-established automakers. Convince a company like BMW to let Apple design the various driver- and passenger-facing controls inside their cars (certainly the software, if not also the hardware). If and when that proves successful, establish additional partnerships with downmarket brands like Honda, Toyota, Subaru, and/or Chevrolet — brands whose buyers don't usually compete with Apple's initial upmarket partner brands. But let the auto companies retain control over the general mechanical designs and manufacturing of their vehicles. Apple doesn't need to control the whole stack to be successful here in the automotive space — and heaven knows that the designs of user-facing controls and software inside cars desperately need Apple's expertise.

At the very least, if Apple opts to design and build cars all on its own, they should create an all-new brand for it. What none of us needs is for the Apple brand itself to be tarnished by news reports of faulty autonomous-driving software (think Tesla), or for recalls, or for online image galleries to be full of rusty or crashed vehicles with Apple logos within a few years of their first car being sold.

sflocal said:

I also remember reading a while ago that Apple was the top contributor to Intel's CPU errata.  Basically, Intel's latest CPU's (during Apple's Intel days) had so many bugs in Intel's CPU's, that Apple spent a significant amount of resources telling Intel to get its act together.

Interesting. If Apple isn't doing much troubleshooting on Intel's behalf nowadays, is another company finding the bugs for them or has Intel stepped up its own game? It makes me even more glad not to be dependent on "Wintel" computers during my day job or at home!