Apple Announces Event for November 10th: Arm-Based Macs Expected
by Ryan Smith on November 2, 2020 12:30 PM EST
We don’t normally publish news posts about Apple sending out RSVPs for product launch events, but this one should be especially interesting.
This morning Apple has sent notice that they’re holding an event next Tuesday dubbed “One more thing.” In traditional Apple fashion, the announcement doesn’t contain any detailed information about the content expected; but as Apple has already announced their updated iPads and iPhones, the only thing left on Apple’s list for the year is Macs. Specifically, their forthcoming Arm-powered Macs.
As previously announced by Apple back at their summer WWDC event, the company is transitioning its Mac lineup from x86 CPUs to Arm CPUs. With a two-year transition plan in mind, Apple is planning to start the Arm Mac transition this year, and wrapping things up in 2022.
For the new Arm Macs, Apple will of course be using their own in-house designed Arm processors, the A-series. As we’ve seen time and time again from the company, Apple’s CPU design team is on the cutting-edge of Arm CPU cores, producing the fastest Arm CPU cores for several years running now, and more recently even overtaking Intel’s x86 chips in real-world Instruction Per Clock (IPC) rates. Suffice it to say, Apple believes they can do better than Intel by designing their own CPUs, and especially with the benefits of vertical integration and total platform control, they might be right.
Apple has been shipping early Arm Macs to developers since the summer, using modified Mac Minis containing their A12Z silicon. We’re obviously expecting something newer, but whether it’s a variant of Apple’s A14 SoC, or perhaps something newer and more bespoke specifically for their Macs, remains to be seen.
In the meantime, because this is a phased transition, Apple will be selling Intel Macs – including new models – alongside the planned Arm Macs. So although Apple will no doubt focus on their new Arm Macs, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to see some new Intel Macs announced alongside them. Apple will be supporting Intel Macs for years to come, and in the meantime they need to avoid Osborning their x86 systems.
As always, we’ll have a live blog of the events next Tuesday, along with a breakdown of Apple’s announcements afterwards. So please be sure to drop in and check that out.
Source: Apple
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senjaz - Wednesday, November 4, 2020 - link
The OS X Server as an app doesn't even exist in its original sense any more. Some functions were moved in a limited way into System Preferences, many were just dropped all together. It really left us out to dry. The only reasons for using a Mac as a server these days is the Xcode server tool for continuous integration within teams and for mobile device management.Email – gone
Calendar – gone
Web server – gone
OpenDirectory – gone
DNS – gone
File Sharing – crippled and moved to System Preferences
Update Caching – moved to System Preferences
marees - Monday, November 2, 2020 - link
When did AnandTech start posting rumors 🤔 😉name99 - Monday, November 2, 2020 - link
So now we're calling official communication from Apple corporate rumors?https://www.apple.com/apple-events/
OK then.
marees - Saturday, November 7, 2020 - link
Where does Apple say that they are introducing a macbook with Arm chip?Mac User - Monday, November 2, 2020 - link
I have to say that Apple Silicon Mac will be a historical for the computer industry itself for several reasons. It's up to Apple to succeed or not. Technically, nobody cant do that since Apple can make both hardware and software by themselves. Microsoft seems failed with ARM based computer so far.alumine - Tuesday, November 3, 2020 - link
Inherently Windows on ARM *on its own* isn't bad - but the lack of a vibrant native software ecosystem is the major pain point at the moment.The killer feature for Windows has always been its massive software library and userbase (including virtually all devices having driver support on Windows) - sadly moving to Win10 on ARM basically nukes most of that....
flyingpants265 - Wednesday, November 4, 2020 - link
This has all been fixable with stuff like seamless VMs for a long while now.alumine - Tuesday, November 3, 2020 - link
I reckon Apple is probably in the best place to pull this off for a few reasons:1. iPad OS (based on Darwin, similar to IOS and MacOS - in the same way Windows 10 on ARM is based on a similar kernel to Windows 10).
2. Tbe app ecosystem - this is the killer. Apple has a huge software ecosystem with AAA titles thanks to the iPad - e.g. Adobe suite, MS Office, and the entire Apple first party libraries inc. Garage Band - I imagine porting these won't be a major issue.
That covers most of the low end market space.
Once the low end gets covered - then the more specialised / niche titles are more or less forced to make this transition.
M$ does not have anywhere near the rich ARM based software ecosystem around Win10 on ARM, but hopefully with MacOS on ARM the shift can finally start....
Quantumz0d - Tuesday, November 3, 2020 - link
Love the entertainment for the sudden ARM is masterrace content. As expected. Some are speculating Apple Servers, Others are saying some top class stuff like Apple is going to start a chain reaction.I wonder these people realize how much is marketshare of Mac OS and then how much revenue does Macbooks make. Well to educate the utopian citizens of Apple.
Mac accounts for 9.7% of their revenue share, shadowed by Services and iPhone is past 50%, and then the world wide distribution is also same, under 10%. So yep, Apple is going to transform the entire world.
Can't wait to see this Space Age technology beat Ryzen and Intel and also AWS juggernaut, Azure too.
Meteor2 - Monday, November 9, 2020 - link
Apple is the largest company in the world. If you think the world isn't going to notice their moving their desktop hardware to ARM, more fool you.