Michal Ždanský Last year, reports began to spread that Apple was planning to switch its computers from X86 to ARM architecture. Many caught on to the idea and began to see it as a step in the right direction. The thought of a Mac with an ARM processor made me roll my eyes. It is finally necessary to refute this nonsense with factual arguments.
There are basically three reasons for using ARM:
- Passive cooling
- Lower consumption
- Control over chip production
We'll take it in order. Passive cooling would certainly be a nice thing. Just start a flash video on the MacBook and the laptop will start an unprecedented concert, especially the Air has very noisy fans. Apple partially solves this problem. For the MacBook Pro with Retina, he used two asymmetric fans that reduce noise with different blade lengths. It is far from equal to the passive cooling of the iPad, but on the other hand, it is not such a big problem that it would be necessary to radically solve it by switching to ARM. Other technologies are also under development, such as noise reduction using reverse sound waves.
Probably the strongest argument is low energy consumption, ergo better battery life. Until now, Apple offered a maximum of 7 hours for MacBooks, which made them one of the most durable among the competition, on the other hand, the iPad's ten-hour endurance was definitely more attractive. But all that changed with the generation of Haswell processors and OS X Mavericks. Current MacBook Airs will offer a real endurance of around 12 hours, still on OS X 10.8, while Mavericks should bring even more significant savings. Those who have tried the beta report that their battery life has increased by up to two hours. So, if the 13″ MacBook Air could last 14 hours under normal load without any problems, it would be enough for almost two working days. So what good would a less powerful ARM be if it lost one of the advantages it had over Intel chips?
[do action=”quote”]What would be a reasonable reason to put ARM chips in desktops when all the advantages of the architecture only make sense in laptops?[/do]
The third argument then says that Apple would gain control over chip production. He attempted this journey in the 90s, and as we all know, it turned out infamously. Currently, the company designs its own ARM chipsets, although a third party (mostly Samsung at the moment) manufactures them for it. For Macs, Apple is dependent on Intel's offering and has virtually no advantage over other manufacturers, except that the latest processors are available to it before its competitors.
But Apple is already several steps ahead. Its main revenue comes not from the sale of MacBooks and iMacs, but from iPhones and iPads. Although is the most profitable among computer manufacturers, the desktop and notebook segment is stagnating in favor of mobile devices. Because of more control over the processors, the effort of changing the architecture would not be worth it.
However, what many overlook are the problems that would accompany a change in architecture. Apple has already changed architecture twice in the last 20 years (Motorola > PowerPC and PowerPC > Intel) and it certainly wasn't without difficulty and controversy. In order to take advantage of the performance that Intel chips offered, developers had to rewrite their applications from the ground up, and OS X had to include the Rosetta binary translator for backward compatibility. Porting OS X to ARM would be quite a challenge in itself (although Apple has already achieved some of this with iOS development), and the idea of all developers having to rewrite their apps to run on a less powerful ARM is quite scary.
Microsoft attempted the same move with Windows RT. And how did he do? There is minimal interest in RT, both from customers, hardware manufacturers, and developers. A great practical example of why a desktop system just doesn't belong on ARM. Another argument against is the new Mac Pro. Can you imagine Apple getting similar performance on an ARM architecture? And anyway, what good reason would there be to put ARM chips in desktops when all the advantages of the architecture only make sense in laptops?
Anyway, Apple has it clearly divided: Desktop computers and laptops have a desktop operating system based on the x86 architecture, while mobile devices have a mobile operating system based on ARM. As recent history has shown, finding compromises between these two worlds does not meet with success (Microsoft Surface). Therefore, let's bury once and for all the idea that Apple will switch from Intel to ARM in the near future.
Very nice article, I am of the same opinion. As an Air mid 2013 owner with 12,5 hours on 10.8 I see no reason to change the architecture if this works. :)
I wonder how long it will last with Mavericks :-)
the article is very good including valid reasons…. keep up the good work and more articles like this! :-)
I have an Air 2011 and noise? Sorry? Have you ever heard Tamchung and similar Vietnamese scraps? These are launch planes against the Air's superior cooling which is SUPER SILENT!!
I think the Air is the only thing that makes sense from Apple. Others are overpriced snobbery. Air is perfect in performance and design.
The fact that a person doesn't have something doesn't mean that it's an overpriced snobbery that doesn't have anything extra for the money. I had an Air and now I have a Retina and I'd say the Retina is a combination of the best of the Pro and the Air and yes it's quite expensive but I wouldn't consider it an overpriced snobbery because the Air can look like an overpriced snobbery to another group of regular laptop users also. However, it must be recognized that the Air is simply noisier than the MacBook Pro Retina for physical and design reasons. As I said, I had an Air and I heard the fan absolutely regularly at least 2-5 times a day, with the MBPR I no longer hear the fans (now 2) and that is mainly because the whole laptop cools down better at the same speed of the fans and the same method and type of work than it was at Air. If I'm not mistaken, your nickname is familiar to me, so my comment will probably be completely counterproductive, but I just had to write back ;)
You, sir, are annoyed that you bought a retina that is thick and, moreover, a new model has been released, so your retina has a 60% lower price. But it would also annoy me. Air is the right way - but only a decent, intelligent and knowledgeable person can admit that after buying a retina.
I don't know what the fan is on the Air, because I'm using WIN7 and it will probably be the buried DOG.
Fat? Well, it's not really that thick, and it's also significantly smaller in terms of the area it takes up. I'm not saying Air isn't the way to go. Yes, it is, especially for ultra-mobile use, it's a great machine, but I like the Retina display much more (the Air doesn't have it and probably won't for some time) and if there's anyone here who doesn't know the subject, it's you... Actually, why do you have an Air at all if you're running on it Windows :D??
I also had an Air and now I have a retina and I wouldn't change. I'm not saying that the Air is bad, it's definitely not, it's a powerhouse, but you can expect different performances from the retina.
Every Mac has something to it and has its customer.
Also about the thickness Horst, the Retina MBP is the same thickness as the Air at the thickest point i.e. at the hinge.
I'll have a look at the fat one here in Gottwaldov - we have such a stupid epl store here...
As I say – evolution is Air, classic is retina.
Retina probably won't be much of a classic yet, since it's barely been on the market for a year...
I downloaded the ORIGINAL WIN OFFICE on mac os, then opened my excel in it and lo and behold - it totally crashed. I'm not going to deal with whether Comrade Jobs or Comrade Gates is to blame, I need working Excel.
The mac OS is terrible - I don't want to be different at all costs. Believe me, if win went to my iPhone, I already have it there.
I need top design, top HW and top SW for my life, hence the combination.
THIS POST IS NOT DIRECTED AGAINST APPLE, IT JUST DESCRIBES THE FACTS (and that's why Kubín ALWAYS deletes it, because he just wants apple apple apple apple and I believe his shit is shaped like a bitten apple...)
You are a normal demented person, there is nothing else to write about it :D btw what is the top design on MSFT products?? If you need top design and SW, you should use OSX, iOS and Apple products, they have top design and SW. Anyway, there's no point in dealing with someone with such a limited outlook ;) thanks for the fun.
Cough it up Mr. Doubek... This person is limited...
And there we are. People like you just buy a car for 3 mega and in diesel (air with osx). They don't mind that it's lazy and that they won't save anything even if they steal diesel. I have a Jaguar in gasoline and with almost 400 horses I drive for the same money as a diesel incompetent Škoda. One must think and not be blinded by Comrade Jobs. But Czechs, a thrifty nation, buy junk because the neighbor said that the tdi octave is great. Do you not understand the context, sir, and if Excel will feed you and not go to the axis, will you go to the shovel?????
God, wake up!!!
I have a car with petrol ;), I use OSX, iWork (except for numbers) and the Mac version of MS Office, of which I use Excel the most, which works perfectly for me, I've already worked like this in a company where the others only had Windows and I only had a Mac and still it worked collaborate with colleagues without any problems. I don't know what problem you had with Excel, but it works perfectly for me, just like the rest of the Office package, which I don't use on a daily basis. In my opinion, you have not tried to use OSX for more than 1 month and you are letting go of wisdom. The only one who should wake up is you!
1. Apple products do not lose their price so quickly (like those with Windows), so the 60% price is a waste.
2. Apple hasn't introduced a new Pro version either, so that claim is even more nonsense
3. It's great to have Windows 7 on the Air. The battery life results are interesting, when it lasts less during tests with Windows. I understand, of course, that you need it for work. That many. But most also want a better SW at home and that's why they have OS X for home use. I switched to Mac mainly because of the SW.
4. The thickness is also nonsense, but others wrote that here. On the contrary, Pro with retina has a smaller frame and thus the overall size is smaller.
5. The Air is a beautiful device, but unfortunately it lacks retina and just won't get it
6. I have to agree with Martin that the fan can really be heard. When I work on it for a long time, which is not often, because I have an iMac at home and I do a lot of things on the Macbook. But also for this reason (and the retina) I will go to the Pro with the retina.
An ARM processor in a mac makes sense to me. Even on mac mini. Another reason is the price. Already in the basic mac mini for 600 USD there is a processor from Intel for 225 USD.
http://ark.intel.com/products/67355/Intel-Core-i5-3210M-Processor-3M-Cache-up-to-3_10-GHz-rPGA
The expensive mac mini has a processor for $378.
http://ark.intel.com/products/64899/Intel-Core-i7-3610QM-Processor-6M-Cache-up-to-3_30-GHz
The base macbook air has a processor for $342.
http://ark.intel.com/products/75028/Intel-Core-i5-4250U-Processor-3M-Cache-up-to-2_60-GHz
And it can be bought with a better processor for 454 USD.
http://ark.intel.com/products/75114/Intel-Core-i7-4650U-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_30-GHz
The price of the chipset must be added to the price of the processor, which can be 25-50 USD. So just get rid of the Intel processors in these products and Apple can reduce the price of the mac mini by 200 USD and the macbook air by 300 USD and still save enough money to produce its own Ax processor.
As for battery life, try to imagine that one day Apple will announce that all MacBooks will last at least 24 hours. With an ARM processor and IGZO display, it's completely realistic.
And as for running x86 or x64 applications on ARM processors, it is not necessary at all if Apple starts selling it as new products. Both iLife and iWorks can be delivered directly compiled for the ARM processor, and at the same time xCode can enable the compilation of applications for OS X on the ARM processor and at the same time it can enable those applications to be added to the AppStore. I basically have everything ready.
So, the main benefits can be a lower price, lower energy consumption and longer battery life.
Your reasoning is logical, but someone works in Aperture or Photoshop even on a MacBook Air, and I'm not sure if an ARM processor could handle that...
On the other hand, ARM MacBooks would probably have their buyers.
No, that processor is only worth so much to the end customer. This is the SUGGESTED SALE PRICE. And stores have their margin too, right? And even if the stores drop tens of dollars off, they still have a margin, right?
And Big retailers have volume discounts, right?
And Apple? It will be the first to get Haswell processors, so it can be the first to introduce Air with 12h endurance. And not only does Intel have such an advantage, mainly significantly lower prices. And those prices already include Intel's development in the billions of dollars, which Apple doesn't have to pay //because it's not the biggest customer, so it doesn't even finance that development much, it's more like Acer, HP, etc.
So no, the prices couldn't be lowered much anyway.
The great thing about the Mac is that anyone who needs Windows to work (fortunately I don't) can install it.
I agree with the article. It's nonsense
But no. Intel does not sell those processors to end customers. I can't even change myself on the board.
Recommended customer price… just because it doesn't sell doesn't mean it doesn't have the "recommended" price.
Is it necessary for Apple to completely switch to ARM? What if it switches to only machines aimed at home users and keeps pro machines (at least for a temporary period) on Intel? MB Air and MacMini on ARM, MB Retina, Mac Pro on Intel.
Apple and its own platform (PowerPC) - back then, however, Apple certainly did not design its own processors. Although he was part of the alliance, he was actually dependent on IBM or Motorola. Today it has a very decent ARM processor and a capable development team. It is no longer technically difficult to tweak your current ARM processors to have higher performance (at the cost of higher consumption). And the fact that their production is provided by another company? This applies to almost everyone (ARM is almost complete outside of Samsung, AMD (they sold their factories), ...) so I wouldn't see a problem here.
Rosette and backward compatibility - for machines aimed at home use, this is not really needed at all. iLife / iWork for ARM will be, it will be given on the Mac AppStore as a condition for including the application and will be resolved in a moment. After all, applications are no longer written in assembler, so transferring applications to a new processor is much easier today than it was in the past.
Leverage on Intel so that Apple has priority access to news and better prices are also appropriate.
So - I consider the transition to ARM rather unlikely, but I consider it almost certain that Apple is working on these options for Uncle Příhoda. And managed leaks to let Intel know about it are also quite likely :-)
Peter,
the article talks about control over chip manufacturing, not chip design.
The dollars saved on ARM chips would be absorbed by the simultaneous development of three operating systems (for Intel, ARM and iOS). OS X for ARM is seriously rubbish.
From my point of view, the transition to ARM is quite real, but not today. Nowadays, we are only at the beginning of the connection between OS X and iOS, which is slowly but surely coming due to innovations in OS X. Overall, x86 is a relatively outdated, albeit higher-performance variant. Unfortunately, the transition here is not as simple as with HDD-SSD, but we can slowly look forward to ARM in notebooks as well, in my opinion only in about 2025.
I'm coming from the future :-D So he was only 5 years old. It already happened in 2020.