[AppleInsider] Apple may abandon Intel for its Macs starting with post-Broadwell

[ShintaiDK]

I think its also important to remember the loyalty, and by loyalty I mean what the company sells. Apple is exactly like Samsung on this point. Both have a CPU division, but none of them will allow that division to be in the way of a device sale.

 

[sm625]

Sorry, but I just don't see it. There needs to be a compelling reason for them to change architectures, and there just isn't one.

Lack of an SSD controller is a compelling reason. By not having one, they are forced to spend at least $30 more than they need to on storage. Dont forget that apple loves to squeeze vendors, and they can squeeze a single NAND supplier much harder than they can squeeze a vendor who has to acquire their own NAND as well as a discrete SSD controller. Apple might be able to squeeze $40 on 128GB, and as much as $70 per 256GB.

But still, intels margins at 65% means that they are making $200 off every $300 in parts they sell to apple. Why would apple willfully give away $200 per unit x 20 million units = $4 billion a year? It wouldnt cost half that much to totally switch over their entire mac software stack. Hell, they wouldnt even need to switch anything, they would just add support for both processor types. It isnt that hard to do, it just takes resources. And apple has plenty. In fact I would be shocked if most of apple's mac software in development doesnt already have ARM support programmed into it. I bet all they need to do is turn it on like a switch.

I doubt apple is paying full price for intel's chips. They probably are paying 60% of the list price. But still, jsut by having their own cpu with an integrated NAND controller would net them an easy $4billion a year in profits.

 

[Rakehellion]

Sorry, but I just don't see it. There needs to be a compelling reason for them to change architectures, and there just isn't one. They left IBM, and the PowerPC CPU's because IBM failed completely to deliver what was promised, and what Apple needed. While Intel does suffer some delivery issues, they are pretty minor compared to what came before it.

While Apple may be better than anyone else at changing architectures, it isn't something done lightly or on a whim.

Yeah, there's absolutely zero reason for them to switch.

 

[ShintaiDK]

But still, intels margins at 65% means that they are making $200 off every $300 in parts they sell to apple. Why would apple willfully give away $200 per unit x 20 million units = $4 billion a year? It wouldnt cost half that much to totally switch over their entire mac software stack.

You way oversimplify and forget half the story.

Apple is not paying Intel those amounts either. Not even close.

What you primary forgot to ask yourself is, how much will it cost Apple to make its own CPU. And how much to even make it somewhat competitive. Apples R&D is already in a fast spiral upwards without actually delivering its worth due to volume. And paying 10000-20000$ per wafer initially is rather painful as well.

Suddenly those Intel chips become very cheap. Not to mention better process node, faster and so on.

 

[witeken]

Lack of an SSD controller is a compelling reason. By not having one, they are forced to spend at least $30 more than they need to on storage. Dont forget that apple loves to squeeze vendors, and they can squeeze a single NAND supplier much harder than they can squeeze a vendor who has to acquire their own NAND as well as a discrete SSD controller. Apple might be able to squeeze $40 on 128GB, and as much as $70 per 256GB.

But still, intels margins at 65% means that they are making $200 off every $300 in parts they sell to apple. Why would apple willfully give away $200 per unit x 20 million units = $4 billion a year? It wouldnt cost half that much to totally switch over their entire mac software stack. Hell, they wouldnt even need to switch anything, they would just add support for both processor types. It isnt that hard to do, it just takes resources. And apple has plenty. In fact I would be shocked if most of apple's mac software in development doesnt already have ARM support programmed into it. I bet all they need to do is turn it on like a switch.

I doubt apple is paying full price for intel's chips. They probably are paying 60% of the list price. But still, jsut by having their own cpu with an integrated NAND controller would net them an easy $4billion a year in profits.

You are inventing numbers out of thin air. You should not do that unless you use it as an example. Also, you should stop thinking that Apple is holy and is justified to get all the parts they need to assemble their products for free. Apple-Intel is a mutual and long-term relation: Apple pays Intel money which helps Intel to maintain its long-term Moore's Law Tick-Tock roadmap, which is something no other company on this planet is able to do. Apple really gets the rewards in the long-term, and it doesn't cost them too much money. On the contrary, you should not be able to care less about Apple financials: they're the most healthy and wealthy company on earth.

 

[Sheep221]

Lack of an SSD controller is a compelling reason. By not having one, they are forced to spend at least $30 more than they need to on storage. Dont forget that apple loves to squeeze vendors, and they can squeeze a single NAND supplier much harder than they can squeeze a vendor who has to acquire their own NAND as well as a discrete SSD controller. Apple might be able to squeeze $40 on 128GB, and as much as $70 per 256GB.

But still, intels margins at 65% means that they are making $200 off every $300 in parts they sell to apple. Why would apple willfully give away $200 per unit x 20 million units = $4 billion a year? It wouldnt cost half that much to totally switch over their entire mac software stack. Hell, they wouldnt even need to switch anything, they would just add support for both processor types. It isnt that hard to do, it just takes resources. And apple has plenty. In fact I would be shocked if most of apple's mac software in development doesnt already have ARM support programmed into it. I bet all they need to do is turn it on like a switch.

I doubt apple is paying full price for intel's chips. They probably are paying 60% of the list price. But still, jsut by having their own cpu with an integrated NAND controller would net them an easy $4billion a year in profits.

Outsourcing was invented for a reason. The fact you don't have to buy components from someone else, but make them yourself, doesn't mean they are free(this is exactly what you said). In fact outsourcing is what made new technologies cheaper, faster and easily deployed to anyone.
And even then, Apple would still have to pay someone else to make them their chips, since Apple is only office building, every product is made by third parties, because they have no fabs and electronics factories. Which is excellent by the way since they can abuse chinese to make stuff faster and cheaper and ship it directly to the retailers = profit with almost zero effort. Quality is something apple is struggling for a long time now, if they gonna leave intel, that means their computers won't get even a quality CPUs anymore.

And I'm also not sure that there will ever be bridge between ARM and x86 for desktop computers, either ARM desktops would be power hungry as some early P4s or would be slow in everything beyond web browsing and playing movies in low res. That doesn't mean there can't be x86 replacement in the future, but it isn't gonna be ARM, it has to be something probably not even electronic, maybe quantum, organic etc.

 

[Qwertilot]

I dunno. They're doing the ipad/phone processors for a bunch of very good reasons, and they could clearly scale them up a good bit without enormous effort.

Not that much of the mac product stack uses hugely fast CPUs of course. Top end iGPU but they could do those.

The thing I can't work out would be what they're meant to be doing for the MacPro's/high end iMacs etc.

Building a whole, new, distinct, workstation class processor? They no doubt could do that but it really would be a rather eccentric use of their resources

 

[Phynaz]

The annual revival of this rumor

 

[TechFan1]

If Apple did switch over to their own processors, it would probably be with Apple chips made at Intel foundries, so both would win.

 

[SPBHM]

If Apple did switch over to their own processors, it would probably be with Apple chips made at Intel foundries, so both would win.

why? Apple seems to be doing well with TSMC, monopolizing their 20nm and all..



I think it would be crazy for Apple not to use their CPUs for laptops on the near future...

(high end)tablets and laptops are basically becoming the same thing, the A8X would be fine for a huge portion of the macbook users I think.

 

[elemein]

I don't understand how this would be even possible. Since when did Apple have a license to the x86_64 ISA? Would that mean they're switching all of their OSes to iOS or other ARM-compatible OSes?

If that's the proposed case, I don't see that happening.

 

[tviceman]

Yeah, there's absolutely zero reason for them to switch.

Just like there was zero reason for them to develop their own mobile chip? I can see it happening. The A8X is extremely powerful on the CPU side given it's power envelope. I'm not sure how hard their chips can be pushed, but given the better cooling capabilities of a laptop vs. tablet, the TDP (and thus performance) can be further increased from where it is now. The biggest hurdle would be the software migration, but if Apple were to go all in on ARM across their entire product stack, then I think developers would quickly adapt.

 

[jpiniero]

Would that mean they're switching all of their OSes to iOS

Presumably a future version of iOS. They could just extend it to have some sort of laptop-friendly interface. Objective-C is very portable, so any OSX apps could just be converted over.

The allure of saving the $200+ they spend on the Intel chips plus being able to release on their own terms is just too much.

 

[monstercameron]

Just want to clarify my post in a new post:

It's a huge risk, with little return, Apple isn't doing it. End of story.

its a small risk with large returns, how much is apple paying to intel to have those chips in their products when the lions share of their users only need a8x levels of performance and preferably its power usage/battery life.

maybe their pro line will stick to intel solutions but their is not reason for them to be paying the premium for intel parts when the have a pretty good in house solution.

 

[elemein]

Presumably a future version of iOS. They could just extend it to have some sort of laptop-friendly interface. Objective-C is very portable, so any OSX apps could just be converted over.

The allure of saving the $200+ they spend on the Intel chips plus being able to release on their own terms is just too much.

What about legacy applications or applications made with a certain arch in mind? Is the performance of Apple's A8x chips really comparable to Intel's ULV lineup? I just don't see that.

 

[cytg111]

Yea it is about as nuts as an APU in the PS4 let alone xbox1.
So alot of cons so far yet stated by the usual Intel Representatives Group so we might wanna take that with a grain of salt.
Any pros? What about convergence of ios and osx? Seems like it could be convenient to keep such a love child on a single platform.
Plus, as Intel is transforming into that monopolistic monolith it is, Apple is betting all it's chips that Intel will keep playing nice(which it wont given Apple would be out of choices) over the long run.
I cant see Apple NOT moving away from x86 (double negative for your pleasure). Apple is a mover not a follower.

 

[frozentundra123456]

There are good reasons both for and against this happening. Just because someone does not think it will happen does not make them some sort of fanboy. Everybody makes wrong predictions as well.

And BTW, what purpose do consoles have in this thread, except to subtly (or not so subtly really, because we all know who you are attacking) insult someone?

 

[RampantAndroid]

Didn't we have this rumor a couple years ago too? That by 2014 or 2015 they'd be using AMD CPUs? Now, maybe that means Apple has consistently looking at other options, but I'm going to say that I doubt Apple will dump all of their existing OSX app catalog in a flash.

 

[el etro]

Apple processor can do awesomely well on smaller form factors, but their chips can't scale well at enough clock speeds in order to serve in the bigger form factors. The use experience of their ARM chips in this form factors will be not good. Lets hope newer processors can make ARM chips clock as high as high-performance x86 chips, so ARM will be able to substitute x86 on PC market.

 

[cytg111]

There are good reasons both for and against this happening. Just because someone does not think it will happen does not make them some sort of fanboy. Everybody makes wrong predictions as well.

And BTW, what purpose do consoles have in this thread, except to subtly (or not so subtly really, because we all know who you are attacking) insult someone?

No attacks, simply a point of reference, source criticism, as certain parties willl always portray a situation from the same biased standpoint(say, for arguments sake, pro-intel). I read alot of these threads with good information and very often the pollution bias and propaganda starts and you have to shift and filter through all that information, replies to that information, spinoffs hereof and often the otherwise very interesting topic is grinded into the dust. by the same parties. every. single. time.
Public service, there be bias here, proceed with caution.

 

[TuxDave]

Sounds familiar.

http://semiaccurate.com/2011/05/05/apple-dumps-intel-from-laptop-lines/

In all honestly, if Apple could switch over to their own processors, they would. But they would need to first beat Intel at making processors for Macbooks.

 

[Eug]

1. I am 100% sure they have full OS X and their main apps on ARM OS X. Hell, they were one of the near-original ARM founders after all.

2. However, I don't see them considering ARM-on-the-desktop or even on the true laptop either just yet.

3. I do buy into the rumours that they will introduce a 12" iPad Pro, and I've been saying there is a possibility they will also release an Apple-branded keyboard cover along side it, like the Surface Pro. This thing would be a laptop-ified iPad - basically a hybrid - and is something I would actually consider buying, if it came with a nice trackpad. All of the current iPad + keyboard solutions are less than ideal, because the keyboard size is too small, and there is no trackpad. Plus iOS control with keyboards needs work. A 12" iPad Pro would provide enough room for a proper keyboard and trackpad, and iOS 8.3 could add in the needed OS tweaks. In addition, the already released A8X is a perfect SoC for this mythical iPad Pro hybrid, especially when paired to 2 GB RAM, something already present in the latest iPad Air 2. They would only need one speed bin for this. No need for multiple different speeds for an iPad Pro hybrid. Or at most, a bin for the iPad Air 2, and a faster bin for the iPad Pro hybrid.

4. However, they would continue to produce their Mac laptops on Intel. I have often wondered if the rumoured 12" MacBook Retina is in fact just an iPad Pro hybrid... but I don't think so. I think there will be a MacBook Retina, just because it's a logical product, and one a LOT of people want. People want to be able to continue to use their desktop apps on their laptops, and their laptop apps on their laptops, will full OS X flexibility. Some even want to dual boot Windows. In this context with a 12" MacBook Retina already in the works, the 12" iPad Pro hybrid is less convincing, but remains a possibility with some of the reasons for it mentioned in #3.

5. I'm sure Apple doesn't rule out this idea in back rooms when talking to their suppliers, because it's a leverage tool for getting good prices, including from Intel. They've done it once (IBM PowerPC --> Intel) so there's nothing philosophically stopping them from doing it again. Apple also has the option of using AMD as a last resort if things go south, but the argument for AMD as a backup was a lot stronger when AMD's chips didn't suck as bad as they do now compared to Intel's lineup.

tl;dr

I don't think Apple will go ARM in a true OS X laptop any time soon, but I do think they could release an iOS iPad Pro in laptop size (12"), possibly even with a proper hybrid keyboard attachment.

 

[erunion]

Comparing processors misses the point.

Mac is a legacy product. Apple is not going to switch the OS to ARM, even if their processors were way superior to intel's.

of course, Apple could replace MacOS with a future version of iOS that would support mobile and desktop( a la windows 8). In that case, it would use ARM even if Intel was faster. But Apple has made no indication they want to do that.

 

[scannall]

Just like there was zero reason for them to develop their own mobile chip? I can see it happening. The A8X is extremely powerful on the CPU side given it's power envelope. I'm not sure how hard their chips can be pushed, but given the better cooling capabilities of a laptop vs. tablet, the TDP (and thus performance) can be further increased from where it is now. The biggest hurdle would be the software migration, but if Apple were to go all in on ARM across their entire product stack, then I think developers would quickly adapt.

Lots of reasons to develop their own SOC. Other mobile OS's may be able to copy and clone iOS, but nobody gets the A8x. Great product differentiation that can't be copied easily. Plus they design their own cores with their own targets in mind. Qualcomm etc produce SOC's for marketing and spec sheets. 8 weak cores in a phone? It would be tough to come up with a dumber idea for a mobile SOC than that.

 

[IntelUser2000]

Ok, I think the important thing is knowing what the two companies think?

It's a noticeable loss to Intel if they lose being a CPU supplier to Apple. But if they don't have the technical competence to do it, and Apple decides to do it, how big of a loss for Apple is it?

The question for Apple is how possibility of practically abandoning "high-end" and Windows-installing Mac base is relevant to them. Do they have alternative apps coming? Maybe they figured out that the base needing that kind of performance is a small portion of their already small(relative to the company) PC group?

If they literally want "ARM Mac OS PCs" and start developing ARM compatible Mac OS high performance suites from there, then absolute performance, especially "x86-emulation" performance isn't important.