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Comment by stefan_ | Hacker News Reader

This is a bit silly, it's like giving Apple credit for not even regularly bumping the CPUs in their lineup or getting locked into Intel.

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You’re close to restating why Apple Silicon exists in the first place: they didn’t want to delay upgrades but Intel couldn’t provide chips with decent specs on a dependable schedule. Back when Intel was shipping on time you’d see regular updates every year but then they stalled and that meant that there wasn’t a better part with the right thermal characteristics or other requirements. Remember when the MBPs had a lengthy delay before the maximum RAM limit went up? That was due to Intel not delivering CPUs using the next generation low-power DDR4 for, IIRC, multiple years. People would point to PCs which used DDR4 but miss that they were substantially larger and had much shorter battery life, massive batteries, or both.

> You’re close to restating why Apple Silicon exists in the first place: they didn’t want to delay upgrades but

Maybe. Apple was never very good at updating the chips in their laptops and desktops. Often way behind intels latest. Let’s hope theyve changed , but I doubt it.

The only time period I can recall where Apple was egregiously behind Intel's release schedule, it was because Intel was behaving in an egregiously anti-competitive way. Apple kept using Core 2 processors in their low-end models long after the first generation Core i3/i5/i7 parts were introduced, because Apple had standards for GPUs. Intel wouldn't let NVIDIA make chipsets with integrated graphics any more, so Apple mostly kept using older Intel CPUs paired with decent NVIDIA integrated graphics until Intel's integrated graphics was almost good enough.

(There have been other times where I've seen Apple widely accused of running behind on CPU updates, but only from people who aren't good at matching CPU models to the right product segment. Criticizing Apple for not using the latest generation yet in a product that uses 28W or 45W CPUs while the latest generation is only shipping 15W parts was never valid criticism.)

Again, look at Intel’s roadmap for the type of CPUs which Apple actually uses. When Intel shipped on-schedule, they updated regularly. Then Intel stopped hitting their targets by substantial periods, but not always the board – for example, the iMac uses lower TDP parts than high-end desktops so it didn’t matter that Intel had a high-heat chip out which gamers loved because they’d need a complete redesign to cool a part generating multiple times more heat.

Your critique is most accurate for the Mac Pro which had a big delay because the system design assumed the 2000s CPU/GPU relationship would continue and needed a complete redesign to hit the thermal and expansion characteristics which make sense for the target market.

Now, it would be nice if Apple had some different designs which weren’t so dependent on hitting very tight thermal limits – I’d particularly like a Mac non-Mini for those of us who don’t need it to be super thin and would prefer more ports and never throttling – but they’ve found another way to hit those targets with what appears to be no compromises on performance.

As wtallis said [0]:

> The chart compares M1 against an Ice Lake MacBook Pro and Comet Lake iMac. Comet Lake is current in Intel's desktop product line, and Ice Lake's successor started shipping last month. This isn't comparing against outdated Intel parts.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25106054

Where Apple has held back, there’s usually a reason. They were late on Skylake, say, but early Skylake machines were... problematic (notably the MS Surface Book).

In any case, the Intel chips being compared here are fairly current.

The guy just explained why Apple wasn’t good at updating and the reason is Intel

The chart compares M1 against an Ice Lake MacBook Pro and Comet Lake iMac. Comet Lake is current in Intel's desktop product line, and Ice Lake's successor started shipping last month. This isn't comparing against outdated Intel parts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_Pro#Technical_specific...

You can see how this is one of the things that changed yearly for the last 5 years. Exactly every year.

I wonder if the people bashing this M1 were bashing intel c2d when it came out.

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