mark fearing

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mark fearing
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  • M2 Ultra benchmarks show performance bump over M1 Ultra

    mark fearingmark fearing
    thadec said:

    Double the Intel performance — ouch, indeed!

    Way to go, Apple. Keep up the good work.
    Someone should sell stickers that say "Apple Inside."
    When the comparisons aren't being made against a 4 year old chip made on a 9 year old process node that was retired 2 years ago:
    https://wccftech.com/apple-m2-ultra-soc-isnt-faster-than-amd-intel-last-year-desktop-cpus-50-slower-than-nvidia-rtx-4080/

    And even the Intel 13900K and AMD 7950X are 2022 chips. Also, neither are workstation chips. A comparison with the AMD Threadripper 7000 and 7000 Pro that gets released in September, which will be made on the same node as the M2 Ultra, won't be particularly favorable. The M3 Extreme - which I am betting that Apple is going to launch on TSMC's 2nd gen 3nm process in 2025 - will be needed to compete, except that in 2025 the AMD Threadrippers made on TSMC's 1st gen 3nm process will be out, as will - and this is a worst case scenario for them - Intel's 5nm desktop and workstation chips.

    Going forward Apple is likely going to de-emphasize direct comparisons between Apple Silicon and Intel - note that they have avoided mentioning AMD altogether - in favor of comparisons with previous generations of Apple Silicon. In a way that will be appropriate. The software that most people are going to run on the Mac Pro and Mac Studio are going to be so different from the software that most people are going to run on Threadripper and Xeon-W workstations and servers that direct comparisons will be impossible anyway.
    The point is to be more efficient. You want to power your computer with three coal plants, Intel is there. 
    watto_cobradav

  • The new Apple Silicon Mac Pro badly misses the mark for most of the target market

    mark fearingmark fearing
    timmillea said:
    Three awful mistakes in a row - the wedge-less MBA, the monstrosity Studio and now the Mac Pro which alienates all its key markets. I was present for the second coming of Apple but I feel that golden era has sadly passed. I doubt the 'Vision Pro', with such limited use cases and such a high entry price will alter Apple's destiny. 

    As an investor, I would start buying up unopened Macs from a few years ago and putting them into storage. They will never be as good again. 
    Predicting the future is pretty tough. And defining 'golden eras' and dark ages usually happens hundreds of years later. I think it's possible that Apple doesn't really care about the Pro market but hasn't come to terms with it yet institutionally. But as others have said, there is nothing to stop them from introducing the support of external or internal video cards in the future. But is it even worth it? What they have is good for, let's say 90% of the market. Do they want/need that other 10% (or less) of the Pro market? That's the question. Not 'golden age' or 'dark age'.
    dewmewilliamlondonrobin huberAlex1Nwatto_cobracurtis hannah

  • The new Apple Silicon Mac Pro badly misses the mark for most of the target market

    mark fearingmark fearing
    It seems really ...silly to just cast aside video cards for Pro machines. These are not actually pro machines now. I'm having flashbacks to the late 90's when Apple badly lost the pro market as they had no video card support.
    lam92103Alex1Nwatto_cobraFileMakerFellercurtis hannahspliff monkey

  • Minnesota passes a right to repair bill that actually matters

    mark fearingmark fearing
    Dumb law. Dumb issue. The entire 'right to repair' thinking is stuck in the 17th century for gads sake. Move along. The future is different than the past!
    williamlondonStrangeDays

  • France doesn't understand why different iPhone models have varying parts

    mark fearingmark fearing
    mfryd said:
    If the concern is planned obsolescence, a real concern is that Apple prohibits the loading of third party operating systems, and at some point, Apple stops releasing security updates for old models.

    An iPhone with a known security flaw, that you can't patch, is essentially unusable on the public Internet.

    If you really want iPhones/iPads to have long life spans, you should require Apple to unlock a device to allow third party operating systems when Apple stops releasing security updates for that device.   At the very least, that would allow a motivated group to port a modern Android release to that device.  Alternatively, an enterprising individual you could port Linux to the device.

    I do understand that there are some good arguments for Apple to maintain complete control over the underlying OS.  However, great authority brings along great responsibility.   If Apple is going to maintain control over the OS, then they have a responsibility to patch security issues.   Otherwise, Apple is effectively obsoleting a device the moment it stops patching security flaws.


    Nope. Doesn't take much to conceive of how your idea is not better for anyone. And it makes no sense in manufacturing and economics. When I can buy a Ford with a Chevy built engine and a VOLVO dashboard I'll but into this. My 1998 VCR doesn't record either. Things do become obsolete. Where we should fight this is with things like badly made HVAC systems, tires, large household appliances. Not on technology driven devices that can literally be recycled down to almost nothing. And don't end up in a dump. I hate to tell you but MS DOS isn't very secure on my 30 year old PC either these days.

    watto_cobratmaywilliamlondon