TheSage79

I am very suspicious the claim that the M1 Ultra can go toe to toe with an RTX 3080/3090 in GPU performance.

Long Story short, General Compute Chips really can't be benchmarked for every single common scenario with one benchmark. Things like Geek Bench or Cinebench do the best they can, but there is so many different scenarios out there that it is just not feasible for a benchmark to be accurate beyond a certain degree. Geekbench, in particular, is geared more for mobile devices than desktops. Thats why when LTT does videos on various processors, or GPUS, they don't just show Cinebench scores, but show its performance across a multitude of applications (usually games). The other thing to keep in mind is that the M1 series chips are SoC's which is unlike most of anything in the PC world; so typical PC benchmarking doesn't necessarily translate well. If you want to know real world performance, you need to go out there and well... see the real world performance. Personally, as someone who owns a 13" M1 MacBook Pro and has seen how well the M1 performs in real life, I can say the the M1 SoC is more than powerful enough for the vast majority of people. The M1 Pro, Max, or Ultra, are far more powerful than most people need and are much better suited for truly heavy hitting applications.

That's just it... I have yet to see anyone explain exactly how the consumers are being hurt by this. Developers? maybe. But consumers? not that I can see. Allowing a company to process its own payments doesn't increase consumer facing competition at all. If it doesn't increase consumer facing competition, It doesn't bring any sort of downward pricing pressure. If consumer facing competition doesn't increase then there is no increased pressure for the developers to improve their apps further. Where exactly is the benefit for the consumer in all of this? I can certainly see how it would benefit developers vs Apple - but I don't care about either of them if there is no benefit for me the consumer. This is why I am concerned about the anti-trust regulator stepping in. If consumers are not being hurt, then the only reason the regulator in the Netherlands is stepping in is to benefit one company over another. It doesn't help consumer at all and usually ends up hurting us.

Correct, which is why we should be concerned. Anti-trust exists because trusts hurt consumers. If consumers are benefitting from a business practice and not being hurt by it, then anti-trust regulators should have no reason to step in. If anti-trust regulators are stepping in when consumers are benefitting and not being hurt, then it follows that they are not stepping in for the benefit of the consumers. If anti-trust regulators are not stepping in for the benefit of consumers, then they are stepping in for the benefit of businesses instead. If anti-trust regulators are stepping in for the benefit of certain businesses, then it is likely consumers will be hurt for the benefit of businesses.

TLDR; 1) Apples 30% commission is for more than just Payment processing. 2) You can argue 30% is too high, but that is where market forces have set it. If you think it should be different then you need to have a solid argument for what it should be. 3) None of this actually matters to consumers because in the current system there has never been more choice or consumer focused competition in recent memory. 4) It is an argument between developers and Apple over who gets what percentage of revenue and who has control. As long as consumers are not affected, then who cares. A couple of thing to consider here... 1) Apple has stated on several occasions that the 30% commission is not just for payment processing, but it is also for the development of, maintenance of, and access to, the entire value of the iOS eco-system. Apple invests a ton of money into the iOS ecosystem, and they absolute DO deserve to profit off of it. Which brings up point 2... 2) People argue that the 30% commission is too high and not subject to market forces - but that just doesn't make sense. First let's tackle 30% commission. If you argue that the 30% commission is too high then that implies you believe there is some other commission figure that the commission "should" be. The problem with that is that is there has never been a consistent figure of what that commissions rate "should" be. I have seen everywhere from 5% to 20% with no real reasons given why any specific rate should be chosen. Normally, such rates are not arbitrarily chosen but driven by market forces - which brings me the second half to this point. Apple charges a 30% commissions because thats where the market tells them too. The closest analog to the iOS eco-system, a system where a sole company makes the HW and SW platform for a product, and allows third parties to participate in that platform, is a Game console. The XBOX platform charges a 30% commission the and Playstation charges 30%. commission (I could not find any info on Nintendo, but I have seen anywhere from 10% - 30%). If you include other S/W distribution platforms like Steam, you see the 30% figure show up over and over again. This is where the market equilibrium settled. Developers may not like that, but thats where the market stands. Which brings up my next point... 3) Do NOT fool yourself into thinking any of the complaints about iOS are consumer focused - they absolutely are not. This is about developer profits verses Apples profits - and nothing more. If you are a consumer, you are absolutely spoiled for choice when it comes to S/W on the iOS ecosystem. In fact, it can be argued that in the history of S/W, we have never had more choice. Don't believe me? Just go the the App Store and do a quick search for Weather apps. How many did you come up with? 20? 30? 100's? Heck, outside of S/W, just do a quick Google search for phone cases and see how many choices you get. Competition over consumers has never been more fierce and we as consumers are benefitting greatly because of it. We, as consumers, have never had it so good! Which brings up my final point... 4) Developers know that App revenue on iOS is consistently larger than App revenue on Android even though iOS only accounts for at best 25% market share world wide (most figures have them at 15%). This shows iOS, despite its 30% commission (and all of its restrictions), brings more value to developers than Android with its more open platform. Developers don't develope for iOS because of market share, they develop for iOS because that is where the money is - and they want more of it. Do you honestly think Epic, with its shady history, sued Apple for the people? Heck NO!. They want more money and nothing else. The have investors to pay and profits to make! If it makes business sense to sue, then they will sue. Do you think those App developers in the Netherlands filed a complaint for the people? Nope. Developers want more money and more control to do things like data collection (Its no coincidence that Facebook got a whole lot more critical of Apple's App Store once Apple started to crack down on privacy). They don't care about consumers... they care about their own profits. Don't fool yourself here. This is not to say Apple doesn't have shady practices of its own. It absolutely does - in spades (right to repair). But when it comes to the iOS eco-system, consumers are benefiting greatly from the current status quo. Why would we as consumers want to disturb that?

Budget (including currency): $1,000 Country: USA Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Other details (existing parts lists, whether any peripherals are needed, what you're upgrading from, when you're going to buy, what resolution and refresh rate you want to play at, etc): Due to various circumstances (mostly work), I plan to replace a 2017 iMac 5K with a Windows PC. I have pretty much selected all the internal components I want, but I am having a hard time trying to select a good replacement for the 27" 5K display. I honestly can't find an equivalent display out there (that isn't the LG Ultrafine 5K which only works with a Mac). I am fine using a 4K display, but finding a 4K display with the same color accuracy and brightness is... tough. To add to that, I plan to use it as a display for the both an M1 MacBook Pro and the Windows machine. Having some sort of variable refresh tech wouldn't hurt because if I have Windows PC, I might as well try some gaming. Does anyone have any suggestions? My current favorite is the LG32UL950 but its a bit pricey for my tastes. Any other suggestions out there I should be aware of?

Apple had me literally drooling over their new laptops right up until they announced the prices... YIKES! I will stick with my regular M1 MacBook Pro.

A lot of people seem to misunderstand what the purpose of vRAM really is. vRAM isn't some grand innovation to speed up graphics, its a stop gap measure because of the inefficiencies of a typical PC's memory structure. The whole reason it exists is because regular RAM had to be channeled through the CPU's memory controller and then to the GPU back through the CPU and then back to the RAM if the GPU wanted to use RAM - which is very inefficient. The PC's solution? Give the GPU its own RAM so it doesn't have to do that. Unified memory on the other hand basically bypasses this by letting the GPU have direct access to the systems RAM - much more efficient. This also means that the RAM itself can function as a communication channel between the CPU and GPU. The catch? Unified Memory (and the OS) has to coordinate the CPU's and GPU's calls to the RAM correctly to realize these gains meaning the RAM (currently) basically has to be built in to the system and can't be modified. The PC's architecture, on the other hand, can be customized however the user wants it. For the record, Apple didn't come up with the concept of unified memory. The concept is as old as the hills.

Sony would get absolutely crushed in (a US) court if they tried to sue over this. dBrand's products are aftermarket products pure and simple and dBrand is completely within its rights to produce aftermarket products for whatever products they want.

This one is really on Dell, not the state of California. Dell was literally IN the group who decided these standards - they have zero excuse for following the standards they helped create. They should stop buying cheap, proprietary, power supplies for their systems. As for California, I think it is a good standard. All it does is ensure that computer systems that are in their low power states are actually in a low power state that is meaningful. It doesn't limit what computers can do when they are active. If you want to run your system at 2000 watts while active, then California is fine with that. Its only when the computer is in a lower power state that California steps in and says, "That better actually be a low power state"

Just a thought... the only real reason why PC's dominate desktop gaming is because of the plethora of GPU's available. AMD is already working on their own ARM based chip and oh, they make GPU's as well. nVidia already has a working tech demo of its RTX GPU's working on ARM. Apple showed us that ARM based chips can match the performance of all but the highest end x86-64 desktops CPU's (though Apple still sucks at gaming). Honestly... there is not much left to stop the transition from x86-64 to ARM.

Thoughts on Apples new Products: Apple Card Family: (Legit forgot about this one until I looked at a roundup list) -Another way to go into debt... yay? (Seriously, don't give a 13 year old a credit card! How many us could handle on of those at age 13?) I'll give Apple credit for making a credit card far less predatory than they normally are, but debt is still debt. Podcast Subscriptions (Legit forgot about this one too until I saw a roundup list) -A way to show support to podcast producers (or at least 70% support). I am all for this. -A new interface for the podcast app. I need to see the App myself before I make any judgements, but Apple's track record isn't so good here. Purple iPhone: -Gimmicky... NEXT! Air Tags: -Outside of the controversy with tile, I personally see little use for airtags. I know they can help you find lost keys and whatnot, but looking at the size of those tags makes me think they are not that practical to actually put on something you would loose frequently. I am sure they are great location tags... but just not for me. -Only Apple could come up with designer locator tags. $299 for an Hermez branded tag? Nope! Apple TV: -If there is one area where Apple has leapfrogged the competition its in it Apple TV offering. The Apple TV was already heads above Roku and Google (with a price to match) in what it could do - but does it really matter? I think the Apple TV is one of those things where Apple over-designed something that will never be fully taken advantage of. Other than better gaming, what will that A12 processor actually bring to the table? And how many of us have actually played games on the Apple TV? The real feature here is Apples new remote. They combined the click wheel, touch surface, and physical buttons to create what appears to be a much better remote. I happen to own an Apple TV 4K and am very tempted to get this new one if just for the new remote. New iMac: -I love the physical design (except for the chin), but I HATE HATE HATE the color choices. Wow... these things are ugly (in my very subjective opinion). Yes, the bezels are smaller, but white bezels? yuck! -I am also disappointed that there is no M1X chip, but I think those are still coming. These iMacs seem to be geared towards replacing the 21.5 inch 4K iMacs which are part of what I like to call the "Casual Desktop" computer market. Don't get me wrong, owning an M1 MacBook Pro myself, I can vouch for the fact that the M1 SOC has been more than up to the task of handling anything I have thrown at it so far - the damn thing hasn't even broken a sweat yet. However, when it comes to desktops, energy efficiency takes a back seat to raw performance, and the AMD 5000 series is still a thing. Yes, the M1 SOC can almost match AMD's single core performance, but the 5950X has 16 of those things, while the M1 only really has 4 (the other four efficiency cores wont really help). Add to that either AMD's or nVidia's GPU, and the ability to configure more than 16GB of RAM and the M1 SOC gets completely outclassed on the desktop. So while I wont ding Apple for using the M1 on its 24" iMacs... I will ding them big time if they don't seriously upgrade for whatever is going to replace the 27" iMacs. New iPad Pro: -Apple isn't even playing fair at this point. I generally don't like to call any computer overpowered (Who doesn't like more power?)... but the new iPad Pro is overpowered. An M1 chip on a Tablet? MicroLed HDR 120 hz display? Thunderbolt port? Up to 2TB or storage? Ridiculous battery life? Whats not to lik... oh... they can cost upwards of $2,399.00 if you want all that. Now if you need it, you need it, but I just can't see myself ever buying a tablet over a laptop in that price range. I am sure there are people who will, but I am just not one of them. Overall, I am kind of disappointed in this Apple Event. It wasn't bad or anything... but it wasn't up to my expectations.

The three Macs lines they have already transitioned happen to be the three easiest for them to transition. All they really had to do is replace the Intel chips with their own SOC and have enough unified memory to run the apps. For the next tier of Macs, they are going to have to add more than just cores in order to compete with their current offerings. They will have to add more unified memory options, upwards of 64 gigs, more I/O options, and up their GPU to compete with the windows equivalent - some which have low/mid levels discrete GPUs. We are talking current 16" MacBook Pro and 21" iMac level systems and windows equivalent. For the next tier after that, now we are talking about having to compete with system thats have upwards of 128 Gigs of RAM, lots of I/O ports, and Mid to High level discrete GPU's. Think higher end iMac 27" and lower end iMac Pro's. They are going to have to greatly increase the I/O bandwidth of their SOC's and I don't expect Apple to be able to legitimately compete against the likes of RTX 3000 series or AMD 6000 Series without a discrete GPU of its own (unless they want to produce the worlds biggest SOC wafer). Just designing a discrete GPU with its associated I/O channels to the SOC will itself be quite a task. Then, if they want to compete with the likes of an Intel Xeon System or an AMD Epic system, they are really going to have to up their game with I/O bandwidth, Unified Memory (How does one even do 1.5T of Unified memory?) PCI Express Expansion, etc etc. Thats a lot of design work they need to do to get this rolling.

Now see... THIS... *THIS* is an actual example of potential a Anti-trust violation. Apple is using their position at the gatekeeper of the App store to prevent transparency to the end user (anti-trust is about what is fair to consumers, not what is fair to other businesses) about where the money is going on what any normal user would consider a charitable donation. Though, in reality, this is probably just Facebook being salty because Apple is about to essentially wreck Facebooks iOS business model with the new privacy features in iOS 14.

It was Epic who changed Fortnite and broke their contract with Apple, any damages to any customers because of that is entirely on Epic. There is no anti-trust law that allows epic to break a contract. And once again, thats just not how TRO's work. The T means temporary (30 days in this case IIRC) and the matter will be re-addressed at a later date. There has been no final decision one way or the other if the developer account can be banned or not. All that has happened is the judge put everything on hold. As a side note, Apple never said they were banning UE based games from the App store. They just said they were going to ban Epic from the developer program. Existing UE games would be unaffected.