NEWS 365: One More Thing

Beep boop - this is a robot. A new show has been posted to TWiT…

What are your thoughts about today’s show? We’d love to hear from you!

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gonna be a helluva ride!!

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I’m excited about the M1 chip, but I just noticed that the most RAM you can put in the MacMini is 16GB, way down from the 64GB available in the Intel model. Is there a reason to expect the M1 with 16GB to perform better than the Intel with 64? I’d love to go back to a MacPro tower, but I can’t go spending 6 grand on a computer, and I need something much beefier than a regular off-the-shelf MacMini. I really hope that rumor about a smaller / less costly MacPro comes through!

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Apple also conveniently left out that the devices will not support eGPUs even though they have Thunderbolt ports on them. That’s absolutely ridiculous - why would I spend that kind of money for that level of reduced functionality, especially given the RAM limitations and the minimal price decreases.

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Do you think it is “just” a lack of suitable drivers? Presuming they always used AMD because Nvidia is too closed and AMD doesn’t produce ARM drivers for their gear [yet]?

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The Unified Memory is on the SoC and it only supports a maximum of 16GB at the current time. You’ll have to wait for future generations if you are a Pro user.

The M1 won’t work better than an Intel with 64GB, if you actually need the 64GB. If you are on light loads that fit in 16GB and runs native M1, it will probably (i.e. according to Apple marketing, but not yet proven in the real world) be faster than the Intel equivalent.

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Given that they already have an AMD eGPU that they sell for the Intel-based Macs, I would have expected Apple to be able to scrounge up some drivers. This is, after all, the value proposition of having Apple control everything about the hardware and the software.

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I’m guessing it will have to wait for the “pro” chips.

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Apple noted faster SD speed in their presentation. I believe they said 2x faster. Also, Apple noted “For the first time, play back and edit multiple streams of full-quality, 4K ProRes video in Final Cut Pro without dropping a frame.” That implies there may be some advanced memory-mangement capabilities (both OS and hardware) to work around the previous limits for memory-intensive tasks.

I’m certain that bloggers have eval units now, but are probably embargoed until next Thursday or Friday. We should know then how much of an impediment the 16GB limit is. I’ve always been impressed with the performance of my fifth generation iPad (2017) – which has only 2GB of RAM.

You fears may be correct, but it’s too early to know for sure. We’ll just have to wait for those first reviewers.

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@MacPhyle: Discussion of the new M1 Macs on ATP was interesting. Marco is getting the 16GB MacBook Air to use because Apple will be asking for the 2020 WWDC Developer Kits to be returned. And Siracusa is getting an M1 MacBook Air, too. Discussion starts way into the show: https://overcast.fm/+R7DUUdhqE/2:31:40 . Full show description is at https://atp.fm/404 .

John is skeptical that SSD performance will be better on the M1 computers – Apple may have been comparing to one particular old MacBook Air that had a slower SSD. John is also skeptical that iOS memory frugality will magically apply to MacOS Big Sur.

These may not be the Macs you’re looking for.

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I’ll be interested to see if Alex Lindsay gets one and how it performs with the sort of professional video editing he does - my guess is that, although the processor is fast, the RAM and storage limitations will probably mean he will have to wait for the Pro versions to come out.

We currently have screaming fast consumer devices, but they seem to lack all professional features.

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Thank you! I’ll check out that episode.

There would need to be a complete re-write of macOS to get that sort of memory frugality. It is achieved by not having much in the way of real multi-tasking, background tasks are only “stubs”, the full app is “thrown away”, when it isn’t needed.

A “full-blown” operating system works very differently. I think desktop / laptop users would be very affronted if their applications suddenly stopped working in the background, because they were being slept or kicked out of memory.

I’m also sceptical about SSD speeds. M.2 has physical speed limits and most high end Intel devices (mac, Windows or Linux) can already push the M.2 SSDs to their limits, so any advantage there would be marginal. Given the same speed of SSD and interface, any speed difference should be rounding errors, therefore it is either a Y-series processor that is too slow to use the full speed of the M.2 SSD or the comparative device didn’t have a high speed M.2 SSD.

If it really is a major step forward, as Apple say, why not compare like-for-like, the truth will come out as soon as real users get their hands on them and run their own tests. If they have really compared the M1 with M.2 SSD against an older MacBook Air with Y processor or slower SSD, they risk a backlash, when what they have actually achieved is still remarkable…

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Sure. You may want to hit the jump point into the show – Overcast link above.

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So, since no one outside of Apple has used one of these machines yet, I would wait until they’re available and some reviewers have posted reviews! I suspect the M1 is going to be crazy good

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Since Apple has a liberal return policy, there’s no great reason to wait. Since Apple must deliver on those marketing promises, I expect the machines to be tremendously good.

If you look on Apple’s webpage, you’ll see that the 16GB RAM version of all 3 machines already have a lead time of ~30 days. MacStadium noted on a blog article that they placed an order for 600+ of the M1 Mac Mini machines for their rental fleet.

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I was referring to commenting on the new machines’ performance :grin:

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On the other hand, having been burnt by buying 1st generation Apple products in the past, I will wait for the second or third generation, to see whether I will jump ship back to Apple.

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