The rumors are true and Apple announced today at WWDC that the company will be moving to its own processors for future products. The company’s’ A-series chips have been used in iPhones, iPads, and its Apple TV boxes for years and the transition to the laptop/desktop is about to finally happen.
This should not come as a big surprise, the company has been touting how powerful their homegrown chips have been for years and they love to compare them to Intel’s offerings as well. By moving to use their own chips in their laptops/desktops, they are further consolidating the integration across software and hardware and reducing their reliance on third-parties for improving the performance of their devices. Further, by owning the chip process as well, they can release products on their own schedule, no longer when Intel/AMD says that they can update their hardware.
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This is a monumental shift for Apple but it’s not the first time they have done this either. Most will remember when Apple switched from IBM’s processors to Intel and there are even a few other changes further back than the IBM transition. Apple knows the hurdles ahead of them and has outlined a plan to help move users, developers (and hopefully apps), to the new architecture.
To help make the transition, Apple announced Rosetta 2 and a host of new frameworks, including the ability to run iPhone and iPad apps, on the new hardware. The company also showed Adobe and Microsoft Office running on Apple Silicon (A12Z bionic) too.
There is also a new dev kit but more importantly, a transition kit that uses a Mac Mini with the A-Series chip inside to start building apps, or transitioning your apps, to Apple Silicon. These kits will start shipping this week and you can sign up here.
The first Mac with Apple Silicon will ship this year and they expect the transition to take two years. Apple will continue to support MacOS on Intel chips for several more years.
The big question will be if consumers and developers follow Apple? Considering that the company has a loyal following, it will likely have an easier time making the move than Microsoft has experienced with its attempts to support an ARM ecosystem. But with all major changes, time will tell if this was the right move for Apple or if Intel/AMD was the better path forward.
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548024">In reply to jgraebner:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"The big question is whether or not this transition will attract more people to the Mac. A lot of the strategy seems to be kind of making the Mac into a professional version of the iPad (since iOS apps will now run natively), so it will be interesting to see how that transition works."</em></p><p><br></p><p>Yeah, I think the same: if macOS morphs UI-wise into more of an iPad clone, and the apps released for it just become the same iOS apps, is there much of a need in a lower-spec mac device, such as the mac Mini or MacBook Air, when you could couple an iPad with an external screen, mouse and keyboard?</p><p><br></p><p><em>"For professional ARM, I suppose the competition is probably mainly between Windows on ARM and Chrome OS. Will be interesting to see what happens there."</em></p><p><br></p><p>I think "Windows 10 on ARM" will eventually be a thing, but it needs 64-bit apps to run on it first, as many developers (such as Adobe and AutoCAD) have stopped releasing new versions of their software in 32-bit. Chrome OS I think is still too-limiting. Google would be better doing their own official version of "Android x86" and letting anyone install Android on any device: it would likely become the most-used Linux distro, given all the apps it has.</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#547975">In reply to suavegav:</a></em></blockquote><p>"Windows 10 on ARM" is a thing.</p><p><br></p><p>Or maybe these Apple CPUs are so-fast they could emulate x86-64?</p><p><br></p><p>Alternatively, VM software should still exist </p>
dftf
<p>It makes sense for Apple to do this, given the cost-savings and control by using their own custom chips, and it will likely lead to better battery-life on their laptop and desktop devices too (I'd assume the MacBook Air and Mac Mini lines will be first to transition).</p><p><br></p><p>But two things I wonder.</p><p><br></p><p>First: macOS 10.15 "Catalonia", released October 2019, dropped support for 32-bit apps, and even this transition saw some major recent-versions of apps be updated in-time (such as <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Adobe: PhotoShop 2018 or older; the latest Acrobat Pro and Reader at the time of its release; many anti-virus apps, also) but also some popular, older software, was 32-bit only (such as </span>Illustrator CS5 (2010) or older; InDesign CS6 (2012) or older; Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac; QuickBooks 2015; Parallels Desktop 7.0.15094 (2011); VMWare Fusion 3.1.4 (2012)). True, in all cases newer versions exist, but in some-cases it may be an upgrade someone can't afford, or has removed a feature they rely on, or has changed from a one-time purchase model to subscription-only. I wonder if some-people may be put-off getting a mac with a non-Intel chip fearing some apps they rely on won't work (such as people who have held-off upgrading to macOS 10.15 to retain 32-bit app support). They have said a "Rosetta 2" will be included (like in the PowerPC to Intel days) but performance of that wasn't said to be great. So they could face the same issues as Microsoft trying to get x86 apps to run on ARM.</p><p><br></p><p>Second: one would assume "Rosetta 2" will be a stop-gap, and only exist for a set-number of macOS releases. I guess in future Apple will change macOS from its current form into an iOS/iPad OS based OS. I wonder once this happens if the software will have all the same feature-sets as their old macOS counterparts, and will the interfaces change things like icon-sizes and add menus to accommodate when using a keyboard and mouse? Will gaming performance also be as-good, given you'll essentially be running the mobile-versions of games on your mac laptop or desktop. </p>
Stooks
<p>On one hand it is a gamble. Then again the market for Mac's is so small it does not matter really. You have two kinds of Mac users. </p><p><br></p><p>The very small group of professionals that use the few apps that are only on MacOS, basically Xcode and FinalCut are the only ones left worth mentioning and then you have the larger trendy anti-Windows crowd…look at me there is an Apple on my phone and computer!</p><p><br></p><p>The larger group will be able to move easily since they probably use a web browser on their Macbook for 98% of the Macbook use. The smaller pro group will have to stick with the Intel Mac's until they make ARM chips powerful enough to render 8K video in FinalCut. That is the true gamble, because if Apple does not get a powerful alternative for those users they will continue to walk away from Apple.</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548007">In reply to Stooks:</a></em></blockquote><p>Some people online are suggesting that Apple already have GPUs ready internally to rival AMD and NVIDIAs finest. I'll believe it when I see some benchmarks though.</p><p><br></p><p>It's also being said the lower-end machines, MacBook Air and Mac Mini, will all ship with only an Apple GPU. Only higher-end ranges will still offer a discreet NVIDIA card.</p>
Stooks
<blockquote><em><a href="#548018">In reply to dftf:</a></em></blockquote><p>Agreed on all of your points. </p><p><br></p><p>I have no doubt probably 80-95% of Mac usage could be done on a powerful ARM based Mac with the included GPU. Like I said the typical Mac user is browsing the internet/Google docs, photos app etc that a iPad can do just fine now.</p><p><br></p><p>As far as Apple having a GPU that can rival AMD and NVIDIA, I highly doubt that especially the high end NVIDIA stuff. The again they have mountains of money.</p><p><br></p><p>I think the real question is software vendors. How much does Adobe want to spend to migrate something like Premiere over to an ARM based Mac? </p><p><br></p><p>Mac market share is sitting at 9.4% according to Netmarketshare. Lets be nice and say 50% of those Mac users are using Adobe premiere or photoshop to do high end work. So 95% of high end premiere or photoshop users are NOT on Mac?…as in Windows users. Now they have to rewrite those apps to retain the 5% of users that are on a Mac???</p><p><br></p><p><br></p>
Stooks
<blockquote><em><a href="#548050">In reply to spullum:</a></em></blockquote><p>In my experience any emulation sucks in terms of performance. Rosetta was slow on the first Intel Mac's. VM's are slow on your average desktop/laptop computer. x86/64 apps are slow on Windows 10 for ARM via emulation.</p><p><br></p><p>Rosetta 1 was coming form a slower CPU (PowerPC) to a faster CPU Intel at the time. Not knowing any real details about these new Apple ARM chips for a Mac will they be faster than the current Intel CPU's or will the coming from a faster (intel) CPU and going to a slower (gen 1 Mac ARM) CPU and then trying to "emulate" X86??? Ugg not thanks.</p><p><br></p><p>We are missing so many details no one can really answer that question right now. One thing is for sure after many, many years of using Apple products……You DO NOT want to be the version 1 customers. If this takes off V2 or better yet V3 is where native software is plentiful and the the ARM chips are way better and finally the need for emulation is greatly decreased.</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548050">In reply to spullum:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"They demonstrated Photoshop, Office and Maya running natively on Apple Silicon …"</em></p><p><br></p><p>Given you can get Photoshop on iOS, and Microsoft Office on iOS, Android and Windows 8/10 ARM editions, work had already been done on porting both to ARM previously.</p><p><br></p><p>As for Maya, they mentioned the scene had "6 million polygons", which does make me wonder how-well high-end games will run on an Apple GPU, given that the PS2, released back in 2000, could do around 15-20 million fully-textured polygons a second at 30 FPS; so 6 million would be in Sega Dreamcast territory (3-7 million).</p><p><br></p><p>The lack of a discreet GPU on lower-end MacBook Air and Minis may well hurt gaming…</p>
Stooks
<blockquote><em><a href="#548051">In reply to Jeffsters:</a></em></blockquote><p>MacOS has 9.4% of the desktop/laptop OS market according to netmarketshare. Lets round up and call that 10% of the desktop/laptop OS market for simplicity. 90% of desktop/laptop users are NOT using MacOS. </p><p><br></p><p>If 50% of all MacOS users use Adobe CC….that would translate to 5% of the desktop/laptop OS market use Adobe CC on some kind of Mac. </p><p><br></p><p>The rest of the Adobe CC users are on something else….lets say Windows since it owns 89% of the OS market share and the last time I checked Adobe CC does not run on Linux or Chrome OS.</p><p><br></p><p>What is missing from my crazy math is the real number of Adobe CC users in total. Maybe 90% of Adobe CC users use a Mac….but I kind of doubt that, especially since Apple pretty much abandoned the Pro market for 5-6 years and lots of those Mac users moved over to Windows for the hardware power.</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548203">In reply to Daekar:</a></em></blockquote><p>Question-marks too around those who buy Apple MacBooks to run Windows on them what the future there will be… I'd guess "Windows 10 on ARM" will run-fine (assuming Boot Camp is still offered) but regular Windows 10 will only work if they have a hardware-level emulator for x86-64.</p><p><br></p><p>Let's hope Microsoft have been working hard on getting 64-bit apps to work in the ARM edition…</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548255">In reply to ghostrider:</a></em></blockquote><p>Even though I feel the same about macOS' UI becoming more like iOS, I do wonder if this really will-be to Apple's advantage.</p><p><br></p><p>They are predominantly a hardware company. If the CPUs and GPUs in iPads keep getting better, and given you can now use a bluetooth keyboard and mouse with them, people may start to wonder what the point in using a MacBook Air or Mac Mini is, when they all run the same apps (i.e. once more apps on macOS just become ports of the iOS versions).</p><p><br></p><p>Why not just plug an AV adaptor into the iPad to display it on a larger screen (or wireless link it), and use your external keyboard and mouse when you want a more computer-like experience, and use it as a tablet when you want a more-casual experience? I wonder how many will increasingly settle on iPhone and iPad only…</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548241">In reply to shameermulji:</a></em></blockquote><p>I'm not sure about "blown away", but I'm sure some impressive battery-life figures might be due.</p><p><br></p><p>I'd personally imagine the MacBook Air and Mac Mini lines will move to ARM; the MacBook Pro and Mac Pro lines will retain Intel for a couple of years at-least; possibly longer for the Mac Pro desktop line.</p><p><br></p><p>The interesting thing will be how good their GPU performance is — will high-end games run on an ARM MacBook Air or Mac Mini with only an integrated Apple GPU (and no separate NVIDIA or AMD option) as-well-as currently? There's a big-difference between games that run on iPad and iPhone and macOS in-terms-of visual-effects, max resolution, max framerates and so-on.</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548243">In reply to shameermulji:</a></em></blockquote><p>They will increasingly change the UI to replicate iPadOS, and any macOS-specific apps will disappear (old stuff like TextEdit) and they'll just be replaced by iOS versions (for example, System Preferences will start to look more-like Settings on iOS, and Finder may become more like the Files app).</p><p><br></p><p>Feels a lot like the old Android days, where apps would actually have a slightly-different layout on a bigger-screen device like a tablet, whereas nowadays it's the same-layout and just the text and graphics all become bigger.</p><p><br></p><p>The more they do converge though, the more I wonder if people will ask: "if I can present my iPad on an external monitor, and use an external mouse and keyboard… do I need a MacBook Air or Mac Mini"?</p>
dftf
<p>Okay, one question around iOS apps on macOS — how-come Microsoft doesn't do similar and let you run Android apps on Windows? Surely in the "Windows 10 on ARM" edition this should be fairly-simple, given the CPU is the native architecture of most Android phones. And even on regular Windows 10 editions, surely an emulator could be used — I seem to recall they did add one to Windows 10 Phone OS ("Project Astoria")?</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548047">In reply to MikeGalos:</a></em></blockquote><p>It remains to be seen if Boot Camp will still be offered; if so, only Windows 10 on ARM will work without emulation, yes.</p><p><br></p><p>If there is enough demand to run Windows on macOS, maybe someone like Parallels will create an emulator for x86-64?</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#548244">In reply to shameermulji:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"When Apple first started to grow the Mac market their initial strategy was try and attract Windows users (ie: I'm a Mac, I"m a PC ad campaign) but it seems like that strategy has tapered. Now by making macOS Big Sur similar to iPadOS / iOS, it's trying to grow that Mac market by going after iPhone / iPad users that don't own a Mac"</em></p><p><br></p><p>I'm still unsure though if it'll work. If they had never let their iPads connect to external monitors, and an external mouse and keyboard, then yes, people may wish to replicate the same experience on a mac desktop or laptop. But as you can do those things on an iPad thesedays, I'm not sure where the advantage comes to running the same apps on a different device.</p><p><br></p><p>The future is less devices, not more: look at how-many devices feature-phones and smart-phones replaced: PDAs; sat-navs; pagers; fax-machines (assuming you use a fax-to-e-mail solution); separate portable-media players; handheld games-consoles (Switch remains popular, but even that is both a handheld and, when docked, a console, so Nintendo reduced two lines into one); digital-camera; compass; physical notepad and so-on.</p><p><br></p><p>The more iPad-like macOS becomes I can't see why you'd need two devices that ultimately do the same thing and run the same apps… </p>
dftf
<p>@Paul: why do replies keep appearing at the top, not in the conversation thread?</p>