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Comment by kokada | Hacker News Reader

I think this has no virtualisation instructions right? Since AFAIK, those are restricted to the Mx series.

Of course the 8GB of RAM is also limiting for running any kind of VM, but this notebooks are almost exactly what I was looking for, except for the 8GB of memory.

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The target user doesn't read hacker news. The target user is typing up papers for their history class. This absolutely kills the lower end of the market. I do not know why anyone who needs Safari and MS Office would buy anything else.

I think they very intentionally assume folks are not running VMs or doing much more than "every day" tasks. Given the pre-packaged E-Waste sold at most retailers for a similar price (or more) I think this is a really fantastic market move by Apple. This is doubly true as I read weirder and weirder things that Microsoft is doing with respect to Windows 12 and, well, in general.

I think this may well be what Apple is thinking! I've only ever purchased an Apple laptop, that was refurbished, because of the, what I consider, too high pricing for their lineup of really nice laptops. (I'm not bad mouthing Apple, I'm just cheap.) IMO, if Win 12 is as bad as what some are thinking, a lot of people will switch to Apple who may be afraid of Linux. (I'm referring to folks like me who normally use a computer for the normal stuff and some semi-lite gaming.)

The Neo pricing is usually my ceiling price for a Windows laptop, so I'll be watching the reviews and HN to see I if want to purchase one. Very exciting!

I agree with all your points. This was not me complaining, it was just an observation.

I am actually really excited for a Apple laptop for once, since it is kind the perfect replacement for my Chromebook Duet 3 that I was looking for.

It’s $599. The target audience for this won’t need more. Anyone who knows what a VM is is not the target audience.

I used an M1 Air with 8GB as my main software development machine for a year during Covid. It was fine.

To be clear, I am not complaining. I am well aware that the target demographic is students and casual users. It is just an observation.

However, the price argument doesn't make sense. I bought a EUR300 laptop for my wife 3 years ago that has a Intel Core i3 N305 CPU (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/231805/...), and that CPU, like any modern CPU from Intel, has virtualization instructions.

Heck, my Chromebook Duet with a Snapdragon 7c Gen 2, that compared to this A18 Pro chip is laughable underpowered, also has virtualization instructions (this is why Crostini, the Linux virtual environment for ChromeOS, works).

Are the instructions missing, or does iOS just not run the hypervisor?

I suppose we'll find out pretty soon, supporting virtualization would be important if they wanted to sell these to CS students that need eg. Docker.

So my observation comes from the fact that UTM webpage: https://getutm.app/faq/#what-are-the-limitations.

Now this webpage may be out-of-date, so take my claims with a grain of salt.

Can the Macbook Neo run Rosetta 2?

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