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Comment by nicoburns | Hacker News Reader

I'm really hoping apple puts these AMD mobile chips in their next MacBook Pro. At the moment I'm not seeing much reason to upgrade from my 2015 model, but if I could have 8 cores, that would a different matter...

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If apple ever switches CPU supplier for their macbooks, it'll probably be for their own.

I guess they could buy AMD. Not that it would make any sense. :-)

I think AMD will lose its x86 license then.

https://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilo...

The way I read it, Intel would lose it too. Neither Intel nor Apple could afford losing it for even one day. It would thoroughly damage their brand.

I wonder how feasible it would be to remove the internal instruction set translation, thus making it not an x86 CPU, and doing translation in software.

One of the key reasons we might not see this yet is Thunderbolt 3 support. Thunderbolt is noticeably missing from the new AMD laptops on the market - e.g. the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 (2020). Thunderbolt itself is an Intel technology.

The emergence of USB 4 (effectively TB3) as a standard will change that. Perhaps we'll see that become available in AMD's next generation of CPUs.

Is thunderbolt support tied to the CPU?? I thought it was just a slot that can be added in the mother board for any powerful CPU

Thunderbolt can be added to anything. There are Thunderbolt 3 AMD motherboards currently even, just only on desktop where it's borderline pointless.

The main thing is Intel's CPUs integrate a chunk of the thunderbolt 3 responsibility (which Ice Lake takes even further: https://www.anandtech.com/show/14514/examining-intels-ice-la... ). So it's an easy add-on for OEMs, which makes it more common & widespread as a result.

Also relevant being this is AMD's first time being in a premium laptop position in a long, long time. Just having AMD in a premium offering is itself a new scenario for OEMs.

> There are Thunderbolt 3 AMD motherboards currently even, just only on desktop where it's borderline pointless.

Here's a setup which takes advantage of TB3 on the desktop. I think this is a compelling setup, though not something I aspire to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQMCvQ01e80

I do like that setup but it doesn't actually need TB3, as a follow-up video from LTT showed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvzeZCZluJ0

Certainly not necessary. TB looks to be a bit more economical. The fiber setup is pricey in the second video.

I do love the idea of being distant from primary compute. I run a Threadripper desktop and my mobile option is an old, low-powered laptop from which I can remote into one of several environments hosted at home.

Oh I never knew this. Thanks for the link. I think AMD is catching up in every possible way and thats a good thing. I hope we get more cool stuff sooner from them!

I think Apple is already in the process of making their own chips. I'm thinking that they'll release an ARM chip for laptops. They are already blazing out on the mobile side.

I'm actually rooting/hoping for AMD. They seem to be top of the line atm. I haven't seen much of ARM

Yeah using AMD chips can instantly reduce the price and also offer more performance per dollar. Apple should try a single device at least

Yeah and we already know, it won't be in any way better but it will cost you a 5digit number but it will look sooo nice.

@downvotes: you know I'm right and your anger just shows how guilty you feel because of it.

It's not wrong in any way. People buy their devices by choice. Their products their prices

The i9 in a 16 inch MBP is 8 cores though?

Thermal throttling and energy saving when using all the cores on a laptop i9 means that the 4000 series 8 cores are on a league of their own.

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