killroy

theotherphil said:

killroy said:

"Developers will also be required to ask a user for consent before obtaining their location"

That old bugaboo, consent. There goes find my wife or find my 16 year old kid.

You can do that easily if they all have iOS devices and you have a family iCloud account. We use it all the time and is great for scheduling events/ reminders.

linuxplatform said:

killroy said:

Oh Intel, where is thy sting?

First of all this is very insensitive to religious people. Second, I do not understand how Intel - who worked hard to maintain a great relationship with Apple, provided outstanding driver support and never got involved in lawsuits or IP concerns with Apple as tons of other Apple suppliers do - is now regarded as "the enemy" whose demise Apple fans are rooting for. I can get the animus against Microsoft, Google, Samsung and Qualcomm. While I disagree with it I at least GET it. But Intel has done NOTHING but be as good a partner to Apple as they were capable of. Stuff like this is why so many people hate Apple fans with a passion.

After all, suppose Windows does switch to ARM causing Intel to fall flat on its face. Who benefits? Qualcomm. (You folks weren't thinking that Apple is going to sell its ARM chips to the likes of Dell or Lenovo to make Windows PCs to compete with Apple ones and do so at generally lower prices did you?) Did anyone think of that? Qualcomm will become the primary manufacturer of both mobile devices that have 85% market share against AND and servers/PCs that have 93% market share against macOS. And Qualcomm - unlike Intel - HAS gotten into plenty of conflicts with Apple over IP and lawsuits over the years. Since Qualcomm buys chips in much bigger volume than Apple ever will - again see market share - what on earth will happen if Qualcomm decides to buy up as much of TSMC's capacity as possible in order to delay their #1 competitor's pipeline? (This isn't theory ... Qualcomm HAS done this very thing before AND MORE THAN ONCE.)

Third, Samsung entered 3nm risk testing this year and will produce the world's first 3nm chips next year. It will be their own Exynos chips, likely the ones used in the international version of the Galaxy Note 30. It will not be ready in time for the Galaxy S30, as their new 5nm chip will be used instead, as well as in international versions of the Galaxy Note 20. So Samsung is going to beat Apple getting to 3 nm by 1 year.

Qualcomm will introduce their own 5nm chips with integrated 5G modems next year, the 875, a few months after Apple launches their own 5nm A14. Rumor has it that they are going to charge $100 more than the 865 and people are not pleased. While previously Qualcomm's chips were made by TSMC, their 5nm chips will be made by Samsung. Who knows when Qualcomm will reach 3nm as - unlike Samsung - they likely don't have a design ready yet.

Finally Intel states that they will reach 3nm by 2025. AMD will reach 3nm - using TSMC's foundries - around 2023. However, Intel's transistor design is denser, so a 3nm AMD chip is roughly equivalent to a 5nm Intel chip, a 5 nm AMD chip equal to a 7nm Intel chip and so forth. Thanks to the work of Bill Keller, who got Intel past their road block, Intel will release their first 7nm chip later this year, and that is when all the people who are crowing "AMD has surpassed Intel!" will basically be silenced. And yes, Intel's 7nm chips will add performance and efficiency to their already considered "best available" desktop, workstation and server i7, i9 and Xeon chips. So, Intel is going to be releasing new chip generations on a smaller process every 2 years just like Apple and everyone else. 

Bottom line: Intel isn't going anywhere. Even if Apple Silicon beats them - which I still sincerely doubt but I will concede that point to those who feel otherwise - the performance and efficiency improvements are going to make the gap between Macs and Windows machines more than close enough for Lenovo, Dell, HP, Acer and Asus to continue to use them rather than try to find a better performing ARM replacement than Qualcomm (which currently does not exist and there are none on the horizon) and in the process of being stuck with Qualcomm chips that already are no better than half as powerful as Apple Silicon but will have to run most applications in emulation. 

Now what WILL happen is a shift from Intel to ARM for CHROMEBOOKS. The only reason why it happened yet is Oracle's copyright lawsuit against Google. That FINALLY ends in October. Shortly after Google will certify ChromeOS Linux for Qualcomm and Exynos - and likely take it out of beta also - which means we will see Exynos-based Chromebooks from Samsung and a raft of Qualcomm-based Chromebooks from Lenovo, HP, Acer, Asus and possibly even one from LG (who doesn't make many Chromebooks) though likely not Dell (who is an x86-64 loyalist and also doesn't make many Chromebooks) in 2021. But even there, the only reason why this will happen is because ChromeOS on ARM performs similarly to ChromeOS on Intel and there are no app compatibility issues (if anything Android apps run better on the ARM-based Chromebooks than the x86-64 ones, and most of the main Linux applications were ported to ARM ages ago, which is why Apple is encouraging Windows bootcamp and virtualization users to switch to Linux instead for Apple Silicon). But because ChromeOS is more of a tablet OS akin to iPadOS than a desktop/workstation/server OS akin to macOS, Windows and Ubuntu, the Chromebooks will only cost Intel sales of devices in the Celeron, i3 and i5 range. It won't affect Intel's i7, i9 or Xeon business at all.

Marvin said:

rotateleftbyte said:

I've been pondering replacing my 2015 15in MBP for about 6 months now. Ever since the 16in MBP was released I've been thinking about it. Then along came CV-19 and everything stopped dead. There is some sense for me to wait for the ARM MBP in 2021/22 but my backup Macbook won't run Big Sur (AFAIK as it is a 2012 15in MBP) I run Lightroom and Photoshop but these days my main apps are Scrivenor and Libre Office. I've written two novels this year (250K word) so a great keyboard is very important to me. The big unknown is what keyboard will Apple put on the next generation Mac's? We simply don't know. (where is my crystal ball) The jury is out and a decision is not imminent. I suspect that I'm not alone in that.

After the transition to Intel, it was still possible to buy PPC machines and the prices dropped when people realized they were obsolete machines. Intel machines have more residual value than PPC but it depends on what Apple brings out. If they bring out a 16" machine that has the same or faster CPU and GPU than the top-end ~$3400 MBP priced at $2000-2500, the price of that model will surely drop quickly too, especially if it does on Apple's refurb site. That's what happened to the Vega 20 model when the new 5300M/5500M GPUs came out, it lost about $600-800 in value because the new GPUs were much cheaper.

It's usually possible to buy full warranty Macs at least up to 12 months after a new model arrives. Apple refurbs go back 3 years. There is a rare chance that the Intel models would gain a higher asking price but I think the volume of people wanting to clear effectively obsolete inventory will counter it.

I think waiting until after the first Apple Silicon Macs arrive would be the safest bet at this point, even if it's just the Macbook Air first. Reviewers will put it through its paces and it will be clearer what is going to be gained and lost in the transition. If the improvements in performance-per-watt are too good to pass up, then it's the best time to buy. If there's too much compatibility lost in the short-term, it's a good time to get a deal on an Intel model. Should only be another 8-12 weeks before we find out.

I'm pretty sure the new models will use the Magic Keyboard (scissor). They are still lower profile than the 2012 keyboard but have similar comfort level. It'll be easier to make the decision after the new models arrive.