iMac Pro to feature A10 Fusion coprocessor, possibly for low power tasks

[leadeater]

27 minutes ago, Nicholatian said:

Equifax hack, Target's data breach, all of the other CC data breaches on a list longer than my leg, and even a few government data breaches on top of everything else, and that's just honest business. Need I mention all of the nefarious types who are looking for security holes in things to do everything from jailbreaking to building botnets?

Those big data breaches are pretty unrelated to having a co-processor and embedded code for extended functionality. In fact most of the big business data breaches have directly been due to incompetence and not from a fundamental lack of security within the hardware being used. When you get advanced warning of a security flaw in a software component you are using, then the flaw becomes public, then details of how to exploit become public and yet you still haven't bothered to apply the security patch then that falls outside of any software or hardware security issues.

 

If a business has terrible security practices and bad governance no amount of hardware security features or protection is going to save them, just a matter of time.

 

Sure the more pieces of hardware in a device and the more different bits of firmware there are the more potential attack vectors there are, but doesn't mean they can't increase security either i.e. TPM.

[captain_to_fire]

Just now, ClientDigital said:

That would be the "perfect" laptop.

 

 

Inb4 comments saying "when will Apple make a touchscreen Mac"?

 

But for God's sake no ugly notch on the MacBook Pro 2018

[ClientDigital]

Just now, hey_yo_ said:

Inb4 comments saying "when will Apple make a touchscreen Mac"?

 

But for God's sake no ugly notch on the MacBook Pro 2018

But where would you put Face ID?

[79wjd]

3 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

Next... Face ID coming to the 2018 MacBook Pros and they include A11 Bionic SoC + 8th generation ULV Intel processors

 

Maybe if the browser uses more threads it will switch from ARM to x86. I'm guessing macOS will become a universal binary OS just like when Apple ditched the PowerPC in favor of Intel and developers who wrote their apps for PowerPC have to rewrite it to make it compatible to both PowerPC and Intel. Since iOS is just the forked version of macOS with touch support, I'm thinking it won't be so hard for them and developers have only to implement small changes to the code. For resource intensive apps like FCP X and Premiere CC, that will keep running with Intel processors.

For simple tasks like iMessage, FaceTime, Safari or Notes I'm guessing it will be using the ARM SoC but for more resource intensive applications like FCP X or Premiere, it will be using the Intel processor.

I'm not even talking about compatible apps. I'm taking about how switching processors would work on the fly. Eg let chrome run on the A10 while it can and then switch to the Intel CPU when more power is required. The switch would need to be seamless and instantaneous.

[captain_to_fire]

1 minute ago, D13H4RD2L1V3 said:

Yes, because let's face it.

 

FCPX puts Premiere Pro to utter shame in terms of performance.

That is because FCP X uses Intel's proprietary Quick Sync. That's also one of the reasons why Apple will not use AMD's Ryzen APUs anytime soon. If Adobe decides to implement Quick Sync as well, just imagine video editors who are using AMD Ryzen flocking back to Intel.

[79wjd]

3 minutes ago, D13H4RD2L1V3 said:

Yes, because let's face it.

 

FCPX puts Premiere Pro to utter shame in terms of performance.

Only because it uses quicksync, and unless things have changed, quicksync is still inferior in terms of quality (although for YouTube it should still be plenty).

[captain_to_fire]

2 minutes ago, ClientDigital said:

But where would you put Face ID?

The bezels of the current MacBook Pros are spacious enough to add a depth sensing Face ID camera. No need for a hideous and asymmetrical notch on a laptop.

 

3 minutes ago, djdwosk97 said:

I'm not even talking about compatible apps. I'm taking about how switching processors would work on the fly. Eg let chrome run on the A10 while it can and then switch to the Intel CPU when more power is required. The switch would need to be seamless and instantaneous.

WWDC is the typical time Apple refreshes their Mac line. Maybe that's the time they'll introduce a new macOS version that will do just that.

[ClientDigital]

1 minute ago, djdwosk97 said:

Only because it uses quicksync, and unless things have changed, quicksync is still inferior in terms of quality (although for YouTube it should still be plenty).

Final Cut Pro X isn't fast just because of quick sync, it also uses the Metal 2 API.

 

 

 

ALSO: Final Cut Pro X is still faster even on Macs that don't support quick sync

[ClientDigital]

9 minutes ago, ClientDigital said:

That would be the "perfect" laptop.

 

 

It would be great if the new MacBook Pro had a 6 core processor (probably i7-8920HQ) and a Vega mobile GPU as well as an A11X Bionic from the 3rd gen iPad Pro that is yet to be released 

[79wjd]

3 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

The bezels of the current MacBook Pros are spacious enough to add a depth sensing Face ID camera. No need for a hideous and asymmetrical notch on a laptop.

 

WWDC is the typical time Apple refreshes their Mac line. Maybe that's the time they'll introduce a new macOS version that will do just that.

I'll take the notch and smaller bezels anyday. Just make it default to the navigation bar or a solid black bar depending on the content on the screen.

[ClientDigital]

1 minute ago, djdwosk97 said:

I'll take the notch and smaller bezels anyday. Just make it default to the navigation bar or a solid black bar depending on the content on the screen.

I want oled laptops to make a comeback and this could be the start

[79wjd]

9 minutes ago, ClientDigital said:

I want oled laptops to make a comeback and this could be the start

Yeah..... No, I have no desire for an OLED screen on any computer until burn in gets better.

[captain_to_fire]

21 minutes ago, djdwosk97 said:

I'll take the notch and smaller bezels anyday. Just make it default to the navigation bar or a solid black bar depending on the content on the screen.

What will happen to the persistent menu bar with a cursed notch? 

 

12 minutes ago, ClientDigital said:

I want oled laptops to make a comeback and this could be the start

 I want a laptop that is color accurate, doesn’t suffer from burn ins and blue color shifting and whites becoming yellow because of an aging OLED panel. Remember that many people don’t replace their laptops as often as they replace their phones. 

 

[captain_to_fire]

42 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Sure the more pieces of hardware in a device and the more different bits of firmware there are the more potential attack vectors there are, but doesn't mean they can't increase security either i.e. TPM.

I wonder Intel processors are less secure than AMD. I don’t know where I read it (I think in this forum) that the design flaw of Skylake and above processors makes it easier to defeat the security feature ASLR implemented by both Windows 10 and macOS. I don’t know if there are findings with AMD’s Ryzen. 

[79wjd]

5 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

What will happen to the persistent menu bar with a cursed notch?

Exactly what I said? It will either always be a navigation bar or a solid black bar depending on content.

[leadeater]

8 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

I wonder Intel processors are less secure than AMD. I don’t know where I read it (I think in this forum) that the design flaw of Skylake and above processors makes it easier to defeat the security feature ASLR implemented by both Windows 10 and macOS. I don’t know if there are findings with AMD’s Ryzen. 

Yea that flaw is basically RIP everything lol.

[captain_to_fire]

Just now, leadeater said:

Yea that flaw is basically RIP everything lol.

So when it comes to security: 

AMD > Intel

[leadeater]

4 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

So when it comes to security: 

AMD > Intel

Ehhh... AMD has a similar feature in their CPUs, becoming more popular likely means a flaw with that will be found at some point.

[captain_to_fire]

2 minutes ago, VegetableStu said:

dodged a bullet there, LOL

Is this the one with ASLR bypass design flaw? I thought the vulnerability is ubiquitous to all Skylake and above processors. 

[leadeater]

9 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

Is this the one with ASLR bypass design flaw? I thought the vulnerability is ubiquitous to all Skylake and above processors. 

Only CPUs that feature AMT, which is a lot of them. Basically anything on the desktop/consumer socket/chipset line of products which includes the low end Xeons, the bigger chips that Intel makes don't feature AMT as they use IPMI instead which is on the motherboard and not in the CPU.

[leadeater]

7 minutes ago, VegetableStu said:

oh might be a different one. Not (even) 70% sure about the specifics of the more recent one (the skylake and above one, something about MINIX as well).

I'm not even sure if that's the bullet I dodged, LOL

I can't remember if the HEDT CPUs have the issue or not, what effects me and what I actually had to check was if E5 and above Xeons were effected and they are not .

 

Also personally I run a 4930k so yay for being outdated, don't even need to check.

[Matu20]

Any tweak to get more battery without compromising on perf out of the device is very welcome. 

[BachChain]

Because if there's anything that needs to be concerned about conserving power and always-on functionality, it's a desktop.

[AlTech]

24 minutes ago, BachChain said:

Because if there's anything that needs to be concerned about conserving power and always-on functionality, it's a desktop.

Well, the iMac Pro is not going to be a super high volume product. Apple knows this and is gonna take advantage of that to experiment with A series chips on Macs.

[Droidbot]

6 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

I really doubt that. If anything it makes the Mac much more secure.

Right, and Intel ME was meant to make PCs easier to control remotely for sysadmins. Now it's the #1 vector for attack to a physical machine. 

 

Black box POS chips get owned. 

It'll happen again post-ME/AMT. 

 

Also the OSX BL isn't known for being super duper secure anyhow. Some machines haven't even been updated against Thunderstrike and it's successor, which can infect from macOS into the EFI.