M4 MacBook Pro

(apple.com)

473 points | by tosh4 hours ago

68 comments

  • carlgreene3 hours ago
    What’s amazing is that in the past I’ve felt the need to upgrade within a few years.

    New video format or more demanding music software is released that slows the machine down, or battery life craters.

    Well, I haven’t had even a tinge of feeling that I need to upgrade after getting my M1 Pro MBP. I can’t remember it ever skipping a beat running a serious Ableton project, or editing in Resolve.

    Can stuff be faster? Technically of course. But this is the first machine that even after several years I’ve not caught myself once wishing that it was faster or had more RAM. Not once.

    Perhaps it’s my age, or perhaps it’s just the architecture of these new Mac chips are just so damn good.

    • jchw3 hours ago
      Laptops in general are just better than they used to be, with modern CPUs and NVMe disks. I feel exactly the same seeing new mobile AMD chips too, I'm pretty sure I'll be happy with my Ryzen 7040-based laptop for at least a few years.

      Apple's M1 came at a really interesting point. Intel was still dominating the laptop game for Windows laptops, but generational improvements felt pretty lame. A whole lot of money for mediocre performance gains, high heat output and not very impressive battery. The laptop ecosystem changed rapidly as not only the Apple M1 arrived, but also AMD started to gain real prominence in the laptop market after hitting pretty big in the desktop and data center CPU market. (Addendum: and FWIW, Intel has also gotten a fair bit better at mobile too in the meantime. Their recent mobile chipsets have shown good efficiency improvements.)

      If Qualcomm's Windows on ARM efforts live past the ARM lawsuit, I imagine a couple generations from now they could also have a fairly compelling product. In my eyes, there has never been a better time to buy a laptop.

      (Obligatory: I do have an M2 laptop in my possession from work. The hardware is very nice, it beats the battery life on my AMD laptop even if the AMD laptop chews through some compute a bit faster. That said, I love the AMD laptop because it runs Linux really well. I've tried Asahi on an M1 Mac Mini, it is very cool but not something I'd consider daily driving soon.)

      • dijit3 hours ago
        > Laptops in general are just better than they used to be, with modern CPUs and NVMe disks. I feel exactly the same seeing new mobile AMD chips too, I'm pretty sure I'll be happy with my Ryzen 7040-based laptop for at least a few years.

        You say that, but I get extremely frustrated at how slow my Surface Pro 10 is (with an Ultra 7 165U).

        It could be Windows of course, but this is a much more modern machine than my Macbook Air (M1) and feels like it's almost 10 years old at times in comparison. - despite being 3-4 years newer.

        • jchw3 hours ago
          It's true that Linux may be a bit better in some cases, if you have a system that has good Linux support, but I think in most cases it should never make a very substantial difference. On some of the newer Intel laptops, there are still missing power management features anyways, so it's hard to compare.

          That said, Intel still has yet to catch up to AMD on efficiency unfortunately, they've improved generationally but if you look at power efficiency benchmarks of Intel CPUs vs AMD you can see AMD comfortably owns the entire top of the chart. Also, as a many-time Microsoft Surface owner, I can also confirm that these devices are rarely good showcases for the chipsets inside of them: they tend to be constrained by both power and thermal limits. There are a lot of good laptops on the market, I wouldn't compare a MacBook, even a MacBook Air, a laptop, with a Surface Pro, a 2-in-1 device. Heck, even my Intel Surface Laptop 4, a device I kinda like, isn't the ideal showcase for its already mediocre 11th gen Intel processor...

          The Mac laptop market is pretty easy: you buy the laptops they make, and you get what you get. On one hand, that means no need to worry about looking at reviews or comparisons, except to pick a model. They all perform reasonably well, the touchpad will always be good, the keyboard is alright. On the other hand, you really do get what you get: no touchscreens, no repairability, no booting directly into Windows, etc.

          • thrw42A8N1 hour ago
            I boot Windows on my Mac M1 just fine. Just yesterday I played Age of Empires 3.
            • jchw1 hour ago
              I changed the wording to be "booting directly" to clarify that I'm not including VMs. If I have to explain why that matters I guess I can, but I am pretty sure you know.
              • thrw42A8N1 hour ago
                I am genuinely interested, why does it matter? The performance is more than good enough even to run a Visual Studio (not Code).
                • jchw59 minutes ago
                  If the roles were reversed would you still need an explanation? e.g. If I could run macOS inside of a VM on Windows and run things like Final Cut and XCode with sufficient performance, would you think there's no benefit to being able to boot macOS natively?
                  • thrw42A8N29 minutes ago
                    Booting natively means you need real drivers, which don't exist for Windows on Mac as well as for macOS on PC. It'd be useless. Just use the VM, it's good.

                    And it's not the same - running Windows natively on Mac would seriously degrade the Mac, while running macOS on a PC has no reason to make it worse than with Windows. Why not buy a PC laptop at that point? The close hardware/OS integration is the whole point of the product. Putting Windows into a VM lets you use best of both.

                    • jchw1 minute ago
                      The question was a hypothetical. What if the macOS VM was perfect? If it was perfect, would it then not matter if you couldn't just boot into macOS?

                      I'm pretty sure you would never use a Windows PC just to boot into a macOS VM, even if it was flawless. And there are people who would never boot a Mac, just to boot into a Windows VM, even if it was flawless. And no, it's not flawless. Being able to run a relatively old strategy game is not a great demonstration of the ability generally play any random Windows game. I have a Parallels and VMWware Fusion license (well... Had, anyway), and I'm a long time (20 years) Linux user, I promise that I am not talking out my ass when it comes to knowing all about the compromises of interoperability software.

                      To be clear, I am not trying to tell you that the interoperability software is useless, or that it doesn't work just fine for you. I'm trying to say that in a world where the marketshare of Windows is around 70%, a lot of people depend on software and workflows that only work on Windows. A lot of people buy PCs specifically to play video games, possibly even as a job (creating videos/streaming/competing in esports teams/developing video games and related software) and they don't want additional input latency, lower performance, and worse compatibility.

                      Even the imperfections of virtual machines aside, some people just don't like macOS. I don't like macOS or Windows at all. I think they are both irritating to use in a way that I find hard to stomach. That doesn't mean that I don't acknowledge the existence of many people who very much rely on their macOS and Windows systems, the software ecosystems of their respective systems, and the workflows that they execute on those systems.

                      So basically, aside from the imperfections of a virtual machine, the ability to choose to run Windows as your native operating system is really important for the obvious case where it's the operating system you would prefer to run.

      • acomjean3 hours ago
        I’ll agree the AMD laptops from the past couple of years are really impressive. They are fast enough that I’ve done some bioinformatics work on one.

        Battery life is decent.

        At this point I’m not switching from laptop Linux. The machines can even game (thanks proton/steam)

        • caycep3 hours ago
          the office Ryzen thinkpads we have are ok...but they're definitely no M1 MacBook Air or Pro...
          • jchw2 hours ago
            If we're mostly concerned about CPU grunt, it's really hard to question the Ryzen 7040, which like the M1, is also not the newest generation chip, though it is newer than the M1 by a couple of years. Still, comparing an M1 MacBook Pro with a Framework 16 on Geekbench:

            https://browser.geekbench.com/macs/macbook-pro-14-inch-2021-...

            https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/4260192

            Both of these CPUs perform well enough that most users will not need to be concerned at all about the compute power. Newer CPUs are doing better but it'd be hard to notice day-to-day.

            As for other laptop features... That'll obviously be vendor-dependent. The biggest advantage of the PC market is all of the choices you get to make, and the biggest disadvantage of the PC market is all of the choices you have to make. (Edit: Though if anyone wants a comparison point, just for sake of argument, I think generally the strongest options have been from ASUS. Right now, the Zephyrus G16 has been reviewing pretty good, with people mostly just complaining that it is too expensive. Certainly can't argue with that. Personally, I run Framework, but I don't really run the latest-and-greatest mobile chipsets most of the time, and I don't think Framework is ideal for people who want that.)

            • ikari_pl2 hours ago
              what about heat and noise?

              those are another two reasons why I can't ignore Apple Silicon

              • jchw2 hours ago
                Ultimately it'll be subjective, but the fans don't really spin up on my Framework 16 unless I push things. Running a game or compiling on all cores for a while will do the trick. The exact battery life, thermals and noise will be heavily dependent on the laptop; the TDP of modern laptop CPUs is probably mostly pretty comparable so a lot of it will come down to thermal design. Same for battery life and noise, depends a lot on things other than the CPU.
      • bjackman51 minutes ago
        I only do coding & browsing so maybe I'm a weak example but I find this even with my pretty old Intel laptops these days.

        My Skylake one (I think that would be 6 years old now?) is doing absolutely fine. My Broadwell one is starting to feel a little aged but perfectly usable, I wouldn't even _consider_ upgrading it if I was in the bottom 95% of global income.

        Compiling is very slow on these, but I think I'd avoid compilation on my laptop even if I had a cutting edge CPU?

        • jchw28 minutes ago
          Depends. I used to offload almost all compilation tasks, but now I only really do this if it's especially large. If I want to update my NixOS configuration I don't bother offloading it anymore. (NixOS isn't exactly Gentoo or anything, but I do have some overrides that necessitate a decent amount of compilation, mainly dogfooding my merge requests before they get merged/released.)

          YMMV.

      • wing-_-nuts1 hour ago
        >Laptops in general are just better than they used to be, with modern CPUs and NVMe disks.

        I've had my xps 13 since 2016. Really the only fault I have against it nowadays is that 8gb of ram is not sufficient to run intellij anymore (hell, sometimes it even bogs down my 16gb mbp).

        Now, I've also built an absolute beast of a workstation with a 7800x3d, 64gb ram, 24 gb vram and a fast ssd. Is it faster than both? Yeah. Is my old xps slow enough to annoy me? Not really. Youtube has been sluggish to load / render here lately but I think that's much more that google is making changes to make firefox / ublock a worse experience than any fault of the laptop.

        • xethos5 minutes ago
          Regarding Youtube, Google is also waging a silent war against Invidious. It's to the point that even running helper scripts to trick Youtube isn't enough (yet). I can't imagine battling active and clever adversaries speeds up Youtube page loads as it runs through its myriad checks that block Invidious.
      • sangnoir48 minutes ago
        > If Qualcomm's Windows on ARM efforts live past the ARM lawsuit

        FWIW, Qualcomm cancelled orders of its Windows devkit and issued refunds before the lawsuit. That is probably not a good sign

      • chx1 hour ago
        I am on Intel TGL currently and can't wait for Strix Halo next year. That is truly something else, it's nothing we have seen in notebooks before iGPU wise.
        • jchw1 hour ago
          I've had a couple of Tiger Lake laptops, a Thinkpad and I believe my Surface Laptop 4. Based on my experience with current AMD mobile chipsets, I can only imagine the Strix Halo will be quite a massive uplift for you even if the generational improvements aren't impressive.
    • extr3 hours ago
      I've owned an M1 MBP base model since 2021 and I just got an M3 Max for work. I was curious to see if it "felt" different and was contemplating an upgrade to M4. You know what? It doesn't really feel different. I think my browser opens about 1 second faster from a cold start. But other than that, no perceptible difference day to day.
      • stringsandchars2 hours ago
        > It doesn't really feel different.

        My work machine was upgraded from an M1 with 16GB of RAM to an M3 Max with 36GB and the difference in Xcode compile times is beyond belief: I went from something like 1-2 minutes to 15-20 seconds.

        Obviously if opening a browser is the most taxing thing your machine is doing the difference will be minimal. But video or music editing, application-compiling and other intensive tasks, then the upgrade is PHENOMENAL.

        • eropple1 hour ago
          FWIW I think that's more the core count than anything. I have a M1 Max as a personal machine and an M3 Max at work and while the M3 Max is definitely faster, it isn't world-beating.
        • jcgrillo27 minutes ago
          My current work machine is M1 Max 64Gb and it's the fastest computer I've ever used. Watching rust code compile makes me laugh out loud it's so quick. Really curious what the newer ones are like, but tbh I don't feel any pressure to upgrade (could just be blissfully ignorant).
        • Aeolun1 hour ago
          I very much enjoy being able to start compilation and just seeing results fly by.
        • fwip1 hour ago
          I think most of that difference is going to be the huge increase in performance core count between the base chip and the Max (from 4 to 12). The RAM certainly doesn't hurt though!
      • jcalabro20 minutes ago
        I've found compile times on large C++ code bases to be the only thing I really notice improving. I recently upgraded my work machine from a 2017 i7 to a shiny new Ryzen 9 9950x and my clean compile times went from 3.5 minutes to 15 seconds haha. When I compile with an M2 Max, it's about 30s, so decent for a laptop, but also it was 2x the price of my new desktop workstation.
      • charliebwrites3 hours ago
        This is how I feel about the last few iPhones as well

        I upgraded from a 13 pro to a 15 pro expecting zippier performance and it feels almost identical if not weirdly a bit slower in rendering and typing

        I wonder what it will take to make Mac/iOS feel faster

        • alwillis3 hours ago
          > I upgraded from a 13 pro to a 15 pro expecting zippier performance and it feels almost identical if not weirdly a bit slower in rendering and typing

          I went from an iPhone 13 mini to an iPhone 16 and it's a significant speed boost.

          • lawgimenez2 hours ago
            I went from 12 to 15 pro max, the difference is significant. I can listen to Spotify while shooting from the camera. On my old iPhone 12, this is not possible.
            • jonhohle1 hour ago
              I think that says more about Spotify than your phone.
              • stevenjgarner1 hour ago
                Test Spotify against YouTube Music (and others) - I personally see no reason for Spotify when I have YouTube Premium, which performs with less overhead.
                • lancesells9 minutes ago
                  Maybe they have friends and family on Spotify
            • pacifika39 minutes ago
              I’m sure you’re right but that’s pretty unreal.
        • andrei_says_2 hours ago
          16 pro has a specialized camera button which is a game changer for street / travel photography. I upgraded from 13 pro and use that. But no other noticeable improvements. Maybe Apple intelligence summarizing wordy emails.
        • danieldk2 hours ago
          I think the only upgrade now is from a non-Pro to Pro, since a 120Hz screen is noticeably better than a 60Hz screen (and a borderline scam that a 1000 Euro phone does not have 120Hz).

          The new camera button is kinda nice though.

          • matwood2 hours ago
            > The new camera button is kinda nice though.

            I was initially indifferent about the camera button, but now that I'm used to it it's actually very useful.

        • thenthenthen2 hours ago
          > I wonder what it will take to make Mac/iOS feel faster

          I know, disabling shadows and customisable animation times ;) On a jailbroken phone I once could disable all animation delays, it felt like a new machine (must add that the animations are very important and generally great ux design, but most are just a tad too slow)

        • tomjen32 hours ago
          I upgraded my iPhone 13 pro to the 16 pro and it was overall really nice - but it was the better use of hardware, the zoom camera, etc.

          The CPU? Ah, never really felt a difference.

        • doublerabbit2 hours ago
          XR to 13, as I don't want the latest and didn't want to loose my jailbreak.

          Infuriated by the 13.

          The 3.5mm audio thunder bolt adapters disconnect more often than usual. All I need to do is tap the adapter and it disconnects.

          And that Apple has now stopped selling them is even more infuriating, it's not a faulty adapter.

          • qubitcoder53 minutes ago
            I realize this isn't your particular use case. But with newer iPhones, you can use USB-C directly for audio. I've been using the Audio Technica ATH-M50xSTS for a while now. The audio quality is exceptional. For Slack/Team/Zoom calls, the sidetone feature plays your voice back inside the headphones, with the level being adjustable via a small toggle switch on the left side. That makes all the difference, similar to transparency/adaptive modes on the AirPod Pro 2s (or older cellphones and landlines).

            I use a small Anker USB-A to USB-C adapter [1]. They're rock solid.

            As great as the AirPod Pro 2s are, a wired connection is superior in terms of reliability and latency. Although greatly improved over the years, I still have occasional issues connecting or switching between devices.

            Out of curiosity, what's the advantage of a jailbroken iPhone nowadays? I'd typically unlock Android phones in the past, but I don't see a need on iOS today.

            Interestingly, the last time I used Android, I had to sideload Adguard (an adblocker). On the App Store, it's just another app alongside competing adblockers. No such apps existed in the Play Store to provide system-level blocking, proxying, etc. Yes, browser extensions can be used, but that doesn't cover Google's incessant quest to bypass adblockers (looking at you Google News).

            [0] https://www.audio-technica.com/en-us/ath-m50xsts [1] https://www.amazon.com/Adapter-Anker-High-Speed-Transfer-Not...

            • doublerabbit37 minutes ago
              > Out of curiosity, what's the advantage of a jailbroken iPhone nowadays? I'd typically unlock Android phones in the past, but I don't see a need on iOS today.

              I have custom scripts, Ad blocking without VPNs, Application firewalls.

              I enjoy having most-full control of my device.

          • HumblyTossed2 hours ago
            > The 3.5mm thunder bolt adapters

            The what? is this the adapter for 3.5mm headphones? If so, you don't have to get Apple made dongles. Third parties make them also.

            • Kirby6458 minutes ago
              Or just buy the actual Apple adapter from any number of other vendors. Best Buy still has plenty in stock, for instance.

              I'd guess the GPs actual problem is lint in the Lightning port though. Pretty common, relatively easy to clean out too, especially compared to USB-C.

              • doublerabbit41 minutes ago
                I'm in the EU. Third party ones cost the same as authentic Apple ones. If not more.

                Regardless of either, they both have the same fault.

                The connector between the phone and the adapter is poor. It could just be a fault with my phone but I have no way of proving this.

                • Kirby6433 minutes ago
                  Third party ones are almost certainly not as good as the actual Apple ones. The Apple one has remarkably good quality for its price.

                  I suspect this sounds like a problem with your specific phone. Never had a problem with any lightning accessories myself.

            • doublerabbit40 minutes ago
              Yes, which have the same fault as Apple authentic adapters which cost the same amount if not more.
          • internet20002 hours ago
            It’s probably because of the jailbreak.
      • ToucanLoucan3 hours ago
        Can confirm. I have an M2 Air from work and an M1 Pro for personal, and tbh, both absolutely fly. I haven't had a serious reason to upgrade. The only reason I do kind of want to swap out my M1 Pro is because the 13" screen is a wee small, but I also use the thing docked more often than not so it's very hard to justify spending the money.
    • crystal_revenge1 hour ago
      On the other side, as someone doing a lot of work in the GenAI space, I'm simultaneously amazed that I can run Flux [dev] on my laptop and use local LLMs for a variety of tasks, while also wishing that I had more RAM and more processing power, despite having a top of the line M3 max MBP.

      But it is wild that two years ago running any sort of useful genAI stuff on a MBP was more-or-less a theoretical curiosity, and already today you can easily run models that would have exceeded SotA 2 years ago.

      Somewhat ironically, I got into the "AI" space a complete skeptic, but thinking it would be fun to play with nonetheless. After 2 years of daily work with this models I'm starting to be increasingly convinced they are going to become increasingly disruptive. No AGI, but it will certainly reduce a lot of labor and enable things that we're really feasible before. Best of all, it's clear a lot of this work will be doable from a laptop!

      • tomcam33 minutes ago
        I would love to hear more about what exactly you think will be disruptive. I don’t know the LLM world very well.
    • nsxwolf53 minutes ago
      My 2019 i9 flagship MBP is just so, so terrible, and my wife's M1 MacBook Air is so, so great. I can't get over how much better her computer is than mine.
    • bhouston3 hours ago
      > I haven’t had even a tinge of feeling that I need to upgrade after getting my M1 Pro MBP.

      I upgraded my M1 MBP to a MacBook Air M3 15" and it was a major upgrade. It is the same weight but 40% faster and so much nicer to work on while on the sofa or traveling. The screen is also brighter.

      I think very few people actually do need the heavy MBPs, especially not the web/full-stack devs who populate Hacker News.

      EDIT: The screens are not different in terms of brightness.

      • tebbers2 hours ago
        Looked at it but ruled out the Air due to lack of ports and limited RAM upgrades.
      • 053 hours ago
        Pretty sure Air displays don't support HDR, are they really brighter?
        • bhouston3 hours ago
          I am not sure. I notice a difference. Maybe it is just screen age related?
          • 053 hours ago
            They supposedly have the same base brightness (500 nits), with Pro allowing up to 1000 in HDR mode (and up to 1600 peak).

            Air doesn't support 120Hz refresh either.

            There's an app that allows to unlock max brightness on Pros (Vivid)[0] even without HDR content (no affiliation).

            HDR support is most noticeable when viewing iPhone photos and videos, since iPhones shoots in HDR by default.

            [0] https://www.getvivid.app

            • bhouston2 hours ago
              I just looked at it again side by side and I think they are actually the same. Not sure why I earlier thought they were different.
            • nottorp2 hours ago
              On a tangent, if I have a M3 pro laptop how do I test HDR? Download a test movie from where, play it with what?

              I may or may have not seen HDR content accidentally, but I’m not sure.

      • rizzaxc3 hours ago
        the Air doesn't have ProMotion right? that feature is non-negotiable on any display for me nowadays
        • grujicd1 hour ago
          For me faster refresh rate is noticeable on phone or ipad where you scroll all the time. On a laptop you don't have that much smooth scrolling. For me it's a non issue on laptop, not even once I wished it had faster refresh. While I always notice when switching between Pro and non Pro iPad.
        • sroussey3 hours ago
          I have ProMotion on my MBP and iPhone but… it’s ok? Honestly, I use an older computer or iPhone temporarily and don’t notice a difference.

          I’m looking forward to the day I notice the difference so I can appreciate what I have.

          • danieldk2 hours ago
            I find 60Hz on the non-Pro iPhone obnoxious since switching to 120Hz screens. On the other hand, I do not care much about 60Hz when it comes to computer screens. I think touch interfaces make low refresh rates much more noticeable.
            • nottorp2 hours ago
              I wonder. Do you do a lot of doom scrolling?

              I can’t understand the people who notice the 120 hz adaptive refresh whatever and one guess is their use is a lot twitchier than mine.

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    • jcelerier8 minutes ago
      Interesting, I have a M2 Pro Mac Mini and I hit limits literally every day
    • rbanffy3 hours ago
      A lot of my work can be easily done with a Celeron - it's editing source, compiling very little, running tests on Python code, running small Docker containers and so on. Could it be faster? Of course! Do I need it to be faster? Not really.

      I am due to update my Mac mini because my current one can't run Sonoma, but, apart from that, it's a lovely little box with more than enough power for me.

      • mysteria23 minutes ago
        I still use Ivy Bridge and Haswell workstations (with Linux, SSD and discrete GPU) as my daily drivers and for the things I do they still feel fast. Honestly a new Celeron probably beats them performance wise.

        The modern AMD or Intel desktops I've tried obviously are much faster when performing large builds and such but for general computing, web browsing, and so forth I literally don't feel much of a difference. Now for mobile devices it's a different story due to the increased efficiency and hence battery life.

      • klooney3 hours ago
        How's the performance of Gmail on the Celeron? That's always my sticking point for older computers. The fancy web applications really drag.
        • rbanffy3 hours ago
          Not great. Works well with Thunderbird or Evolution though.

          And yes. Web apps are not really great on low-spec machines.

    • rconti3 hours ago
      It's so nice being able to advise a family member who is looking to upgrade their intel Mac to something new, and just tell them to buy whatever is out, not worry about release dates, not worry about things being out of date, and so on.

      The latest of whatever you have will be so much better than the intel one, and the next advances will be so marginal, that it's not even worth looking at a buyer's guide.

      • baq3 hours ago
        M3 Air with 16gb (base config as of today) is potentially a decade’s worth of computer. Amazing value.
        • chamomeal2 hours ago
          Base 16gb is absolutely wild. My base m2 air with 8gb is almost enough to handle anything I’d ever want it to without zero slowdown.

          A 16gb model for about a thousand bucks?? I can’t believe how far macbooks have come in the last few years

    • davidhariri1 hour ago
      I think this is confirmed by the fact software vendors are still not taking advantage of ARM chips maximum performance.

      Where this might shift is as we start using more applications that are powered by locally running LLMs.

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    • zitterbewegung1 hour ago
      I agree with you about not needing to upgrade but, it still stands that IMHO Apple is better off with upgrading or even having the need to upgrade with competition. (Also it's really good that Macs now have 16GB of ram by default). As I have had my M1 14.2 Max I believe that the only reason I would want to upgrade is that I can configure it with 128GB of ram which allows you to load newer AI models on device.

      The MacBook Pro seems like it does have some quality of life improvements such as Thunderbolt 5, the camera is now a center stage (follows you) 14 megapixel camera now all of them have three USB-C ports and the battery life claims of 22-24 hours. Regardless if you want a MacBook Pro and you don't have one there is now an argument on not just going to buy the previous model.

    • noman-land2 hours ago
      I would normally never upgrade so soon after getting an M1 but running local LLMs is extremely cool and useful to the point where I'd want the extra RAM and CPU to run larger models more quickly.
      • astrostl1 hour ago
        I'm bumping from a still-excellent M1 MAX / 64GB to M4 MAX / 128GB, mostly for local GenAI. It gives me some other uplift and also enables me to sell this system while it's still attractive. I'm able to exhaust local 7B models fairly easily on it.
      • yieldcrv2 hours ago
        I have a 64gb M1 Max and already do that

        but yes, I was looking at and anticipating the max RAM on the M4 as well as the max memory speed

        128gb and 546GB/s memory bandwidth

        I like it, I don't know yet on an upgrade. But I like it. Was hoping for more RAM actually, but this is nice.

    • madeofpalk2 hours ago
      Work just upgraded my M1 Pro to M3 Pro and I don't notice any difference except for now having two laptops.
    • nhumrich3 hours ago
      I dont think this has anything to do with the hardware. I think we have entered an age where users in general are not upgrading. As such, software can't demand more and more performance. The M1 came out at a time where mostly all hardware innovation had staggered. Default RAM in a laptop has been 16G for over 5 years. 2 years ago, you couldn't even get more than 16 in most laptops. As such, software hardware requirements havent changed. So any modern CPU is going to feel overpowered. This isn't unique to M1's.
      • vlovich1233 hours ago
        That’s because today’s hw is perfectly capable of running tomorrow’s software at reasonable speed. There aren’t huge drivers of new functionality that needs new software. Displays are fantastic, cellular speeds are amazing and can stream video, battery life is excellent, UIs are smooth with no jankiness, and cameras are good enough.

        Why would people feel the need to upgrade?

        And this applies already to phones. Laptops have been slowing for even longer.

        • slowmovintarget2 hours ago
          Until everything starts running local inference. A real Siri that can operate your phone for you, and actually do things like process cross-app conditions ("Hey Siri, if I get an email from my wife today, notify me, then block out my calendar for the afternoon.") would use those increased compute and memory resources easily.

          Apple has been shipping "neural" processors for a while now, and when software with local inference starts landing, Apple hardware will be a natural place for it. They'll get to say "Your data, on your device, working for you; no subscription or API key needed."

      • mixmastamyk2 hours ago
        I standardized on 16gb for my laptops over 10 years ago. I keep a late 2013 MBP with 16 for testing projects on, separate from my main Linux box.

        Getting an extra five years of longevity (after RAM became fixed) for an extra 10% was a no-brainer imho.

      • samatman1 hour ago
        I upgraded from the last 16" MBP Intel sold to the first 16" MBP M1 available.

        It is absolutely, 100%, no doubt in my mind: the hardware.

    • OskarS3 hours ago
      Yep, the same, M1 Pro from 2021. It's remarkable how snappy it still feels years later, and I still virtually never hear the fan. The M-series of chips is a really remarkable achievement in hardware.
    • matthoiland1 hour ago
      I feel the same way about my M1 Macbook Air ... it's such a silly small and powerful machine. I've got money to upgrade, I just have no need. It's more than enough for even demanding Logic sessions and Ollama for most 8b models. I love it.
    • pjmlp1 hour ago
      I have a 2009 and a 2018 Windows laptops.

      The only reason the 2009 one now gets little use, is its motherboard now has some electronic issues, otherwise it would serve me perfectly well.

    • 7ewis1 hour ago
      I have exactly the same experience, usually after 3 years I'm desperate for new Mac but right now I genuinely think I'd prefer not to change. I have absolutely no issues with my M1 Pro, battery and performance is still great.
    • erickhill1 hour ago
      I have an MBP M1 Max and the only time I really feel like I need more oomph is when I'm doing live previews and/or rendering in After Effects. I find myself having to clear the cache constantly.

      Other than that it cruises across all other applications. Hard to justify an upgrade purely for that one issue when everything else is so solid. But it does make the eyes wander...

    • gniv3 hours ago
      I've had Macs before, from work, but there is something about the M1 Pro that feels like a major step up.

      Only recently I noticed some slowness. I think Google Photos changed something and they show photos in HDR and it causes unsmooth scrolling. I wonder if it's something fixable on Google's side though.

    • jrochkind13 hours ago
      I bought my M1 Pro MBP in 2021. Gave it 16G of RAM and a 1TB HD. I plan to keep it until circa 2031.
    • danieldk2 hours ago
      Same. I used to upgrade every 1.5 years or so. But with every Apple Silicon generation so far I have felt that there are really no good reasons to upgrade. I have a MacBook M3 Pro for work, but there are no convincing differences compared to the M1 Pro.

      In fact, I bought a highly discounted Mac Studio with M1 Ultra because the M1 is still so good and it gives me 10Gbit ethernet, 20 cores and a lot of memory.

      The only thing I am thinking about is going back to the MacBook Air again since I like the lighter form factor. But the display, 24 GiB max RAM and only 2 Thunderbolt ports would be a significant downgrade.

    • dagw1 hour ago
      The only reason I'd want to upgrade my M1 Pro MBP is because I kind of need more RAM and storage. The fact that I'm even considering a new laptop just for things that before could have been a trivial upgrade is quite illuminating.
    • mark_l_watson2 hours ago
      I think regretting Mac upgrades is a real thing, at least for me. I got a 32G Mac mini in January to run local LLMs. While it does so beautifully, there are now smaller LLMs that run fine on my very old 8G M1 MacBook Pro, and these newer smaller models do almost all of what I want for NLP tasks, data transformation, RAG, etc. I feel like I wasted my money.
      • tarruda1 hour ago
        Small models retain much less of the knowledge they were trained on, especially when quantized.

        One good use case for 32gb Mac is being able to run 8b models at full precision, something that is not possible with 8-16gb macs

        • Eugr22 minutes ago
          Or better run quantized 14B or even 32B models...
      • fwip31 minutes ago
        You can sell it, get most of your money back.
      • xenospn1 hour ago
        Which ones in particular? I have an M2 air with 8GB, and doing some RAG development locally would be fantastic. I tried running Ollama with llama3.2 and it predictably bombed.
    • clairegraham1 hour ago
      Same. The upgrade from my Intel MBP to the M1 Pro 2011 was huge, but I haven't felt the need to upgrade at all.
    • HumblyTossed2 hours ago
      But this ad is specifically for you! (Well, and those pesky consumers clinging on to that i7!):

      > Up to 7x faster image processing in Affinity Photo when compared to the 13‑inch MacBook Pro with Core i7, and up to 1.8x faster when compared to the 13-inch MacBook Pro with M1.

    • kromokromo2 hours ago
      100% agree on this. Ive had this thing for 3 years and I still appreciate how good it is. Of course the M4 tingles my desire for new cool toys, but I honestly don´t think I would notice much difference with my current use.
    • 1R0533 hours ago
      probably the next update wave is coming from the need of AI features for more local memory and compute. The software is just not there yet in usual tasks but it's just a question of time I guess. Of course there will be the pressure to do that in the cloud as usual, but local compute will always remain a market.

      and probably it's good that at least one of the big players has a business model that supports driving that forward

    • frantathefranta3 hours ago
      Out of curiosity and also because I'm wondering which specification to potentially buy in the future, how much RAM does your MBP have?
    • prmoustache3 hours ago
      > Perhaps it’s my age, or perhaps it’s just the architecture of these new Mac chips are just so damn good.

      I feel the same of my laptop of 2011 so I guess it is partly age (not feeling the urge to always have the greatest) and partly it is non LLM and gaming related computing is not demanding enough to force us to upgrade.

      • data-ottawa3 hours ago
        I think the last decade had an explosion in the amount of resources browsers needed and used (partly workloads moving over, partly moving to more advanced web frameworks, partly electron apps proliferating).

        The last few years Chrome seems to have stepped up energy and memory use, which impacts most casual use these days. Safari has also become more efficient, but it never felt bloated the way Chrome used to.

    • jfoster1 hour ago
      I expect this trend to begin reversing as we start getting AI models that are intended to run locally.
    • sylens2 hours ago
      Agreed. Also rocking a M1 Pro MBP and can’t see myself replacing it until it dies
    • stouset3 hours ago
      I feel exactly the same. The one thing that would get me to pull the trigger on a newer one is if they start supporting SVE2 instructions, which would be super useful for a specific programming project I’ve been playing with.
    • andrei_says_2 hours ago
      I got 6+ years out of my last intel MacBook Pro and expect at least the same from my M1 Max. Both have MagSafe and hdmi output :)
    • matwood2 hours ago
      Same. I have an M1 Max 64GB. It has great battery life and I never feel myself waiting on anything. Such an amazing computer all around.
    • JyB3 hours ago
      Same feeling. The jump from all the previous laptops I owned to an M1 was an incredible jump. The thing is fast, has amazing battery life and stays cold. Never felt the need to upgrade.
    • dawnerd3 hours ago
      Guess that’s why most of their comparisons are with the older Intel Macs.
      • Cthulhu_3 hours ago
        And M1 from 4 years ago instead of M3 from last year; while a 2x speed improvement in the benchmarks they listed is good, it also shows that the M series CPUs see incremental improvements, not exponential or revolutionary. I get the feeling - but a CPU expert can correct me / say more - that their base design is mostly unchanged since M1, but the manufacturing process has improved (leading to less power consumption/heat), the amount of cores has increased, and they added specialized hardware for AI-related workloads.

        That said, they are in a very comfortable position right now, with neither Intel, AMD, or another competitor able to produce anything close to the bang-for-watt that Apple is managing. Little pressure from behind them to push for more performance.

        • Zafira39 minutes ago
          Their sales pitch when they released the M1 was that the architecture would scale linearly and so far this appears to be true.

          It seems like they bump the base frequency of the CPU cores with every revision to get some easy performance gains (the M1 was 3.2 GHz and the M3 is now 4.1 GHz for the performance cores), but it looks like this comes at the cost of it not being able to maintain the performance; some M3 reviews noted that the system starts throttling much earlier than an M1.

    • renewiltord3 hours ago
      The M1 series was too good. Blows Intel Macs out of the water. But I still have an M1 Max. It’s fantastic.
    • AISnakeOil2 hours ago
      This is how it feels to own a desktop computer.
    • mattgreenrocks3 hours ago
      My 2019 Intel MBP is getting long in the tooth. These M4 Pros look great to me.

      The base model is perfect. Now to decide between the M3/M4 Air and the M4 Pro.

      • charliebwrites3 hours ago
        I’m using the M3 Air 13 in (splurged for 24 GB of RAM, I’m sure 16 is fine) to make iOS apps in Xcode and produce music in Ableton and it’s been more than performant for those tasks

        Only downside is the screen. The brightness sort of has to be maxed out to be readable and viewing at a wrong angle makes even that imperfect

        That said it’s about the same size / weight as an iPad Pro which feels much more portable than a pro device

    • fstephany3 hours ago
      I have the same feeling performance-wise with the laptop I bought in 2020 with a Ryzen 7 4800H.

      But it's a heavy brick with a short battery life compared to the M1/2/3 Mac.

    • maxvisser3 hours ago
      Same for me. The only reason to replace it, is that my M1 pro’s SSD or battery will go bad or if I accidentally drop the machine and something breaks.
      • rbanffy3 hours ago
        I am replacing a Dell laptop because the case is cracking, not because it's too slow (it isn't lightning fast, of course, but it sure is fast enough for casual use).
      • fckgw3 hours ago
        I replaced my M1 Air battery last year and it's still going like a champ. $129 for another 3 years of life is a bargain.
    • crazygringo2 hours ago
      Yup, honestly the main reason I'd like to upgrade from my M1 MBA is the newer webcams are 1080p instead of 720p, and particularly much better in low light like in the evening.

      Has nothing whatsoever to do with CPU/memory/etc.

      • rafaelmn2 hours ago
        If you're in the ecosystem get an iphone mount - image quality is unreal compared to anything short of some fancy DSLR setup - it is some setup but not much with magnets in iphone.
    • fullspectrumdev3 hours ago
      Tbf, the only thing I miss with my M2 MacBook is the ability to run x86_64 VM’s with decent performance locally.

      I’ve tried a bunch of ways to do this - and frankly the translation overhead is absolute pants currently.

      Not a showstopper though, for the 20-30% of complete pain in the ass cases where I can’t easily offload the job onto a VPS or a NUC or something, I just have a ThinkPad.

    • JodieBenitez2 hours ago
      Ditto... will probably upgrade when the battery is dead !
    • digitalsushi3 hours ago
      when the hardware wait time is the same as the duration of my impulsive decisions i no longer have a hardware speed problem, i have a software suggestion problem
    • fellowniusmonk3 hours ago
      I got an MBP M1 with 32gb of RAM. It'll probably be another 2-3 years or longer before I feel the pressure to upgrade if not longer. I've even started gaming (something I dropped nearly 20 years ago when I switched to mac) again due to Geforce Now, I just don't see the reason.

      Frankly though, if the mac mini was a slightly lower price point I'd definitely create my own mac mini cluster for my AI home lab.

    • jart3 hours ago
      I hate to say it but that's like a boomer saying they never felt the need to buy a computer, because they've never wished their pen and paper goes faster. Or a UNIX greybeard saying they don't need a Mac since they don't think its GUI would make their terminal go any faster. If you've hit a point in your life where you're no longer keeping up with the latest technological developments like AI, then of course you don't need to upgrade. A Macbook M1 can't run half the stuff posted on Hugging Face these days. Even my 128gb Mac Studio isn't nearly enough.
      • dsv3099i11 minutes ago
        That’s interesting because I would’ve thought having strong local compute was the old way of thinking. I run huge jobs that consume very large amounts of compute. But the machines doing the work aren’t even in the same state I’m in. Then again maybe I’m even older as I’m basically on the terminal server / mainframe compute model. :)
      • mrweasel1 hour ago
        > If you've hit a point in your life where you're no longer keeping up with the latest technological developments like AI, then of course you don't need to upgrade.

        That's me, I don't give a shit about AI, video editing, modern gaming or Kubernetes. That newest and heaviest piece of software I care about is VSCode. So I think you're absolutely correct. Most things new since Docker and VSCode has not contributed massively to how I work and most of the things I do could be done just fine 8-10 years ago.

      • rconti3 hours ago
        I think the difference is that AI is a very narrow niche/hobby at the moment. Of course if you're in that niche having more horsepower is critical. But your boomer/greybeard comparisons fall flat because they're generally about age or being set in your ways. I don't think "not being into AI image generation" is (currently) about being stuck in your ways.

        To me it's more like 3d printing as a niche/hobby.

        • ach9l3 hours ago
          on ai being a niche/hobby at the moment... feels like something a unix greybeard would say about guis in the late 70s...
          • vundercind1 hour ago
            Playing with them locally? Yes, of course it's a niche hobby. The people doing stuff with them that's not either playing with them or developing not just an "AI" product, but a specific sort of AI product, are just using ChatGPT or some other prepackaged thing that either doesn't run locally, or does, but is sized to fit on ordinary hardware.

            < 1% of all engagement with a category thing is niche/hobby, yes.

          • nonameiguess6 minutes ago
            It's something a regular person would say to a Unix greybeard, which in and of itself was always and still is a very niche hobby.
          • alluro22 hours ago
            I get that you're probably joking, but - if I use Claude / ChatGPT o1 in my editor and browser, on an M1 Pro - what exactly am I missing by not running e.g. HF models locally? Am I still the greybeard without realising?
            • Eugr19 minutes ago
              Privacy? Lots of companies do not allow using public chatbots for anything proprietary.
            • jart1 hour ago
              It's like asking what you're missing by not using Linux if you're using Windows.
          • jart2 hours ago
            Or what a prokaryote would say about eukaryotes.
            • alluro22 hours ago
              Seems like we've reached the "AI bro" phase...
              • jart1 hour ago
                Using the term "bro" assumes that all AI supporters are men. This erases the fact that many women and nonbinary people are also passionate about AI technology and are contributing to its development. By using "AI bro" as an insult, you are essentially saying that women and nonbinary people are not welcome in the AI community and that our contributions don't matter. https://www.reddit.com/r/aiwars/comments/13zhpa7/the_misogyn...
                • wtallis49 minutes ago
                  Is there an alternative term you would prefer people to use when referring to a pattern of behavior perceived as a combination of being too excited about AI and being unaware (perhaps willfully) that other people can be reasonably be much less interested in the hype? Because that argument could definitely benefit from being immune to deflections based on accusations of sexism.
                • bilbo0s1 hour ago
                  Huh?

                  How old are you?

                  "Bro" has been gender neutral for over a decade. Males and females under the age of 25 call each other "bro" all the time.

      • gniv2 hours ago
        > A Macbook M1 can't run half the stuff posted on Hugging Face these days.

        Example?

        • jart2 hours ago
          LLaMA 3.1 405B
          • chrsw33 minutes ago
            I thought LLaMA 3.1 405B was a relatively huge model. Is the size of this model really typical of half the models you find on Hugging Face these days?
          • int_19h1 hour ago
            Given that models are only going to get larger, and the sheer amount of compute required, I think the endgame here is dedicated "inference boxes" that actual user-facing devices call into. There are already a couple of home appliances like these - NAS, home automation servers - which have some intersecting requirements (e.g. storage for NAS) - so maybe we just need to resurrect the "home server" category.
            • jart1 hour ago
              I agree, and if you want to have the opportunity to build such a product, then you need a personal computer whose specs today are what a home server would have in four years. If you want to build the future you have to live in the future. I'm proud to make stuff most people can't even run yet, because I know they'll be able to soon. That buys me time to polish their future and work out all the bugs too.
      • nonameiguess7 minutes ago
        So every user of a computer that doesn't create their own home-grown ML models is a boomer? This can't possibly be a generational thing. Just about everyone on the planet is at a place in their life where they don't make their own AIs.
      • ach9l3 hours ago
        you could not say this better than this.
    • AtlasBarfed1 hour ago
      I don't think there's any sort of processor for the last 10 years. It really makes me feel like I need to upgrade.

      What I do know is that Linux constantly breaks stuff. I don't even think it's treading water. These are interfaces are actively getting worse.

    • drcongo1 hour ago
      I also have an M1 Pro MBP and mostly feel the same. The most tempting thing about the new ones is the space black option. Prior to the M1, I was getting a new laptop every year or two and there was always something wrong with them - butterfly keyboard, Touch Bar etc. This thing is essentially perfect though, it still feels and performs like a brand new computer.
    • turnsout3 hours ago
      Same boat—I'm on a lowly M1 MacBook Air, and haven't felt any need to upgrade (SwiftUI development, video editing, you name it), which is wild for a nearly 4 year-old laptop.
    • kristofferR3 hours ago
      Yeah, I feel like Apple has done the opposite of planned obsolescence with the M chips.

      I have a Macbook Air M1 that I'd like to upgrade, but they're not making it easy. I promised myself a couple of years ago I'll never buy a new expensive computing device/phone unless it supports 120 hertz and Wi-Fi 7, a pretty reasonable request I think.

      I got the iPhone 16 Pro, guess I can wait another year for a new Macbook (hopefully the Air will have a decent display by then, I'm not too keen to downgrade the portability just to get a good display).

      • rbanffy3 hours ago
        Apple equipment always last a long time and retain value on the second-hand market.
        • spyckie23 hours ago
          Not true. Look at how little supercharged intel apples are going for in Facebook marketplace.

          The quality stuff retains value, not brand.

          • zinckiwi3 hours ago
            Comparing against the intel era is a bit apples (excuse me) to oranges. Technical generation gaps aside, Apple products hold value well.
            • spyckie22 hours ago
              So the intel era is not Apple products? Butterfly keyboard is not an Apple invention?

              They have the highest product quality of any laptop manufacturer, period. But to say that all Apple products hold value well is simply not true. All quality products hold value well, and most of Apples products are quality.

              I guarantee you that if Apple produced a trashy laptop it would have no resell value.

              Again, the quality holds the value not the brand.

              • rbanffy2 hours ago
                It's expected Intel-based Macs would lose value quickly considering how much better the M1 models were. This transition was bigger than when they moved from PowerPC to Intel.
              • microtherion2 hours ago
                One complicating factor in the case of the Intel Macs is that an architectural transition happened after they came out. So they will be able to run less and less new software over the next couple of years, and they lack most AI-enabling hardware acceleration.

                That said, they did suffer from some self inflicted hardware limitations, as you hint. One reason I like the MBP is the return of the SD card slot.

      • babblingdweeb3 hours ago
        Similar for me. MacBook Air M1 (8 cpu / 8 gpu; 16 GB RAM)...running in or out of clamshell with a 5k monitor, I rarely notice issues. Typically, if I'm working very inefficiently (obnoxious amount of tabs with Safari and Chrome; mostly web apps, Slack, Zoom, Postman, and vscode), I'll notice a minor lag during a video call while screen sharing...even then, it still keeps up.

        (Old Pentium Pro, PII, multi chip desktop days) -- When I did a different type of work, I would be in love with these new chips. I just don't throw as much at my computer anymore outside of things being RAM heavy.

        The M1 (with 16 GB ram) is really an amazing chip. I'm with you, outside of a repair/replacement? I'm happy to wait for 120hz refresh, faster wifi, and longer battery life.

      • JimDabell3 hours ago
        > Yeah, I feel like Apple has done the opposite of planned obsolescence with the M chips.

        They always have. If you want an objective measure of planned obsolescence, look at the resale value. Apple products hold their resale value better than pretty much every competitor because they stay useful for far longer.

      • 3 hours ago
        undefined
    • hughrj3 hours ago
      [dead]
  • opjjf4 hours ago
    It seems they also update the base memory on MacBook Air:

    > MacBook Air: The World’s Most Popular Laptop Now Starts at 16GB

    > MacBook Air is the world’s most popular laptop, and with Apple Intelligence, it’s even better. Now, models with M2 and M3 double the starting memory to 16GB, while keeping the starting price at just $999 — a terrific value for the world’s best-selling laptop.

    • electriclove3 hours ago
      Wow, I didn't expect them to update the older models to start at 16GB and no price increase. I guess that is why Amazon was blowing the 8GB models out at crazy low prices over the past few days.
      • bronco210163 hours ago
        Costco was selling MB Air M2 8 GB for $699! Incredible deal.

        I’ve been using the exact model for about a year and I rarely find limitations for my typical office type work. The only time I’ve managed to thermally throttle it has been with some super suboptimal Excel Macros.

        • porphyra2 hours ago
          I'm waiting for the 16 GB M2 Air to be super cheap to pick one up to use with Asahi Linux!
        • __rito__3 hours ago
          I was seeing $699 MB Air M1 8 GB on Amazon India a week ago.
    • bhouston3 hours ago
      But no update to a M4 for the MacBook Air yet unfortunately. I would love to get an M4 MacBook Air with 32GB.

      I believe the rumor is that the MacBook Air will get the update to M4 in early spring 2025, February/March timeline.

      • nsbk3 hours ago
        This is the machine I'm waiting for. Hopefully early 2025
        • brewmarche53 minutes ago
          Given that the Mini and iMac have received support for one more additional external display (at 60Hz 6K), I hope we’ll see the same on the MBA M4.
        • rbanffy3 hours ago
          There are still a couple days left this week.
          • 398968803 hours ago
            They said there would be three announcements this week and this is the third
            • sroussey3 hours ago
              They did? The tweet that announced stuff from the head of marketing did not mention 3 days.

              That said, I believe you. Some press gets a hands-on on Wednesday (today) so unless they plan to pre-announce something (unlikely) or announce software only stuff, I think today is it.

              • 398968802 hours ago
                "This is a huge week for the Mac, and this morning, we begin a series of three exciting new product announcements that will take place over the coming days," said Apple's hardware engineering chief John Ternus, in a video announcing the new iMac.
                • sroussey2 hours ago
                  Ah, thanks. I was referring to last weeks Tweet. I didn’t watch the iMac video.
              • rbanffy3 hours ago
                That's disappointing. I was expecting a new Apple TV because mine needs replacement and I don't really feel inclined to get one that's due for an upgrade very soon.

                Also, Studio and Pro are hanging there.

                • coder5431 hour ago
                  The current-gen Apple TV is already overpowered for what it does, and extremely nice to use. I can think of very few changes I would like to see, and most of them are purely software.
                  • int_19h1 hour ago
                    I really wish it had some way to connect USB storage directly.
                    • coder54352 minutes ago
                      Mine has 128GB of onboard storage... but Apple still bans apps from downloading video, which annoys me.

                      The streaming apps virtually all support downloading for offline viewing on iPhone, but the Apple TV just becomes a paperweight when the internet goes out, because I'm not allowed to use the 128GB of storage for anything.

                      If they're not going to let you use the onboard storage, then it seems unlikely for them to let you use USB storage. So, first, I would like them to change their app policies regarding internal storage, which is one of the purely software improvements I would like to see.

          • jq-r3 hours ago
            There really isn't a chance they'll update the same product twice in a week.
            • rbanffy3 hours ago
              They haven't officially updated it. They just discontinued the smaller model.
              • jq-r1 hour ago
                It would make more sense to discontinue the smaller model along with some other updates to the line. Or in other words, Air won't receive any other updates this week unfortunately.
      • ant6n1 hour ago
        The big question for me is whether they will have a matte option for the Air. I want a fanless machine with a matte screen.

        Unfortunately Apple won’t tell you until the day they sell the machines.

    • jsheard4 hours ago
      Every M-series device now comes with at least 16GB, except for the base iPad Pro, right?
      • fckgw3 hours ago
        Correct, every Mac computer starts at 16gb now. 256gb/512gb iPad Pro is 8gb, 1tb/2tb is 16gb.
      • MBCook3 hours ago
        At least all the M4 Macs. I’m not sure of every older M config has been updated, though at least some have been.
        • fckgw3 hours ago
          The only older configs that Apple sells are the M2 and M3 Airs, which were bumped. Everything else is now on M4, or didn't have an 8gb base config (Mac Studio, Mac Pro)
    • nsteel3 hours ago
      But still just 256GB SSD Storage. £200 for the upgrade to 512GB (plus a couple more GPU cores that I don't need. Urgh.
      • DrBenCarson3 hours ago
        It’s stationary. Just get a Thunderbolt NVMe drive and leave it plugged in
        • jq-r1 hour ago
          Why buy a laptop then if you're lugging all those external hard drives?
          • lancesells2 minutes ago
            Just invest in the model with more storage then?
    • modeless2 hours ago
      I've seen a lot of people complaining about 8GB but honestly my min spec M1 Air has continued to be great. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend a refurb M1 8GB Air for anyone price conscious.
    • hiatus2 hours ago
      If only they would bring back the 11" Air.
    • yurishimo3 hours ago
      It'll be interesting to see the reaction of tech commentators about this. So many people have been screaming at Apple to increase the base RAM and stop price gouging their customers on memory upgrades. If Apple Intelligence is the excuse the hardware team needed to get the bean counters on board, I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth!
      • sroussey3 hours ago
        So we can scream about the lousy base storage, which is the same as my phone. Yikes.
        • criddell1 hour ago
          It wouldn't surprise me if people typically use more storage on their phone than their computer. The phone should probably have a higher base storage than the base storage of their laptops.
    • alsetmusic4 hours ago
      Ohh, good catch. Sneaking that into the MBP announcement. I skimmed the page and missed that. So a fourth announcement couched within the biggest of the three days.
    • ActorNightly24 minutes ago
      Im sorry but any laptop that costs $1000 should come with 64 gigs minimum, or expandable slots.
      • georgeecollins16 minutes ago
        Tell me you are poor without telling me you are poor.

        Just kidding! As an Apple Shareholder I feel like you should take what Apple gives you and accept the price. ;)

    • abhinavk3 hours ago
      > while keeping the starting price at just $999 — a terrific value for the world’s best-selling laptop

      Only in US it seems. India got a price increase by $120.

    • alberth3 hours ago
      I guess that implies the MacBook Air won't be updated this week.

      Makes me wonder what else will be updated this week (Studio or Mac Pro)?

    • FireBeyond3 hours ago
      Well, the issue for me with memory on these new models is that for the Max, it ships with 36GB and NO expandable memory option. To get more memory that's gated behind a $300 CPU upgrade (plus the memory cost).
    • twilo3 hours ago
      Great news. The pro is kinda of heavy for my liking so the Air is the way to go
      • int_19h1 hour ago
        It's not just the weight - Air is also fanless (and still runs cold).

        And yes, with enough RAM, it is a surprisingly good dev laptop.

        • jq-r59 minutes ago
          Really too bad you cannot upgrade to 32GB RAM though =(
      • Analemma_3 hours ago
        I think spec-wise the Air is good enough for almost everyone who isn't doing video production or running local LLMs, I just wish it had the much nicer screen that the Pro has. But I suppose they have to segregate the product lines somehow.
    • Der_Einzige3 hours ago
      Apple deserves to be punished hard for not having done this back in 2018 when they should have. Would love to see regulators do to them what they did with USB-C here. Force them to bring back the audio jack on iphone as a response please regulators!

      6 years of insulting their customers with DOA useless hardware. The reality is that zero people will "not run into issues" with 8 gb of ram and a gimped 256gb SSD for caching.

  • throw0101a4 hours ago
    > All MacBook Pro models feature an HDMI port that supports up to 8K resolution, a SDXC card slot, a MagSafe 3 port for charging, and a headphone jack, along with support for Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3.

    No Wifi 7. So you get access to the 6 GHz band, but not some of the other features (preamble punching, OFDMA):

    * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi_7

    * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi_6E

    The iPhone 16s do have Wifi 7. Curious to know why they skipped it (and I wonder if the chipsets perhaps do support it, but it's a firmware/software-not-yet-ready thing).

    • cojo40 minutes ago
      I was quite surprised by this discrepancy as well (my new iPhone has 7, but the new MBP does not).

      I had just assumed that for sure this would be the year I upgrade my M1 Max MBP to an M4 Max. I will not be doing so knowing that it lacks WiFi 7; as one of the child comments notes, I count on getting a solid 3 years out of my machine, so future-proofing carries some value (and I already have WiFi7 access points), and I download terabytes of data in some weeks for the work I do, and not having to Ethernet in at a fixed desk to do so efficiently will be a big enough win that I will wait another year before shelling out $6k “off-cycle”.

      Big bummer for me. I was looking forward to performance gains next Friday.

    • canucker20162 hours ago
      Yeah, I thought that was weird. None of the Apple announcements this week had WiFi7 support, just 6E.

      https://www.tomsguide.com/face-off/wi-fi-6e-vs-wi-fi-7-whats...

      Laptops/desktops (with 16GB+ of memory) could make use of the faster speed/more bandwidth aspects of WiFi7 better than smartphones (with 8GB of memory).

    • ygouzerh2 hours ago
      It looks like few people only are using Wifi 7 for now. Maybe they are going to include it in the next generation when more people will use it.
      • throw0101a1 hour ago
        > It looks like few people only are using Wifi 7 for now.

        Machines can last and be used for years, and it would be a presumably very simple way to 'future proof' things.

        And though the IEEE spec hasn't officially been ratified as I type this, it is set to be by the end of 2024. Network vendors are also shipping APs with the functionality, so in coming years we'll see a larger and larger infrastructure footprint going forward.

    • 404mm1 hour ago
      The lack of Wifi7 is a real bummer for me. I was hoping to ditch the 2.5Gbe dongle and just use WiFi.
      • mort9653 minutes ago
        Hm why? Is 6E really so much worse than 7 in practice that 7 can replace wired for you but 6E can't? That's honestly really weird to me. What's the practical difference in latency, bandwidth or reliability you've experienced between 6E and 7?
        • 404mm46 minutes ago
          I don’t have any 6E device so I cannot really tell for sure but from what I read, 6E gets you to a bit over 1Gbit in real world scenario. 7 should be able to replace my 2.5Gbe dongle or at least get much closer to it. I already have routers WiFi 7 Eeros on a 2.5Gbe wired backbone.
          • mort9634 minutes ago
            I guess it makes sense if what you do is extremely throughput-focused... I always saw consistency/reliability and latency as the benefits of wired compared to wireless, the actual average throughput has felt fast enough for a while on WiFi but I guess other people may have different needs
    • sroussey2 hours ago
      Yeah, this threw me as well. When the iMac didn’t support WiFi 7, I got a bit worried. I have an M2, so not going to get this, but the spouse needs a new Air and I figure that everything would have WiFi 7 by then, and now I don’t think so.
      • carstenhag1 hour ago
        Faster is always nice, makes sense. But do you really need WiFi 7 features/speed? I don't know when I would notice a difference (on a laptop) between 600 or 1500 Mbit/s (just as an example). Can't download much anyhow as the storage will get full in minutes.
  • BrentOzar4 hours ago
    The M4 Max goes up to 128GB RAM, and "over half a terabyte per second of unified memory bandwidth" - LLM users rejoice.
    • manaskarekar4 hours ago
      The M3 Max was 400GBps, this is 540GBps. Truly an outstanding case for unified memory. DDR5 doesn't come anywhere near.
      • Rohansi3 hours ago
        Apple is using LPDDR5 for M3. The bandwidth doesn't come from unified memory - it comes from using many channels. You could get the same bandwidth or more with normal DDR5 modules if you could use 8 or more channels, but in the PC space you don't usually see more than 2 or 4 channels (only common for servers).

        Unrelated but unified memory is a strange buzzword being used by Apple. Their memory is no different than other computers. In fact, every computer without a discrete GPU uses a unified memory model these days!

        • rbanffy3 hours ago
          > (only common for servers).

          On PC desktops I always recommend getting a mid-range tower server precisely for that reason. My oldest one is about 8 years old and only now it's showing signs of age (as in not being faster than the average laptop).

        • throwaway484761 hour ago
          High end servers now have 12 ddr5 channels.
          • sliken56 minutes ago
            Yes, you could buy a brand new (announced weeks ago) AMD Turin. 12 channels of DDR5-6000, $11,048 and 320 watts (for the CPU) and get 576GB/sec peak.

            Or you could buy a M3 max laptop for $4k, get 10+ hour battery life, have it fit in a thin/light laptop, and still get 546GB/sec. However those are peak numbers. Apple uses longer cache lines (double), large page sizes (quadruple), and a looser memory model. Generally I'd expect nearly every memory bandwidth measure to win on Apple over AMD's turin.

        • binary1323 hours ago
          I read all that marketing stuff and my brain just sees APU. I guess at some level, that’s just marketing stuff too, but it’s not a new idea.
          • sliken2 hours ago
            The new idea is having 512 bit wide memory instead of PC limitation of 128 bit wide. Normal CPU cores running normal codes are not particularly bandwidth limited. However APUs/iGPUs are severely bandwidth limited, thus the huge number of slow iGPUs that are fine for browsing but terrible for anything more intensive.

            So apple manages decent GPU performance, a tiny package, and great battery life. It's much harder on the PC side because every laptop/desktop chip from Intel and AMD use a 128 bit memory bus. You have to take a huge step up in price, power, and size with something like a thread ripper, xeon, or epyc to get more than 128 bit wide memory, none of which are available in a laptop or mac mini size SFF.

            • reliabilityguy2 hours ago
              > instead of PC limitation of 128 bit wide

              Memory interface width of modern CPUs is 64-bit (DDR4) and 32+32 (DDR5).

              No CPU uses 128b memory bus as it results in overfetch of data, i.e., 128B per access, or two cache lines.

              AFAIK Apple uses 128B cache lines, so they can do much better design and customization of memory subsystem as they do not have to use DIMMs -- they simply solder DRAM to the motherboard, hence memory interface is whatever they want.

              • sliken1 hour ago
                > Memory interface width of modern CPUs is 64-bit (DDR4) and 32+32 (DDR5).

                Sure, per channel. PCs have 2x64 bit or 4x32 bit memory channels.

                Not sure I get your point, yes PCs have 64 bit cache lines and apple uses 128. I wouldn't expect any noticeable difference because of this. Generally cache miss is sent to a single memory channel and result in a wait of 50-100ns, then you get 4 or 8 bytes per cycle at whatever memory clock speed you have. So apple gets twice the bytes per cache line miss, but the value of those extra bytes is low in most cases.

                Other bigger differences is that apple has a larger page size (16KB vs 4KB) and arm supports a looser memory model, which makes it easier to reach a large fraction of peak memory bandwidth.

                However, I don't see any relationship between Apple and PCs as far as DIMMS. Both Apple and PCs can (and do) solder dram chips directly to the motherboard, normally on thin/light laptops. The big difference between Apple and PC is that apple supports 128, 256, and 512 bit wide memory on laptops and 1024 bit on the studio (a bit bigger than most SFFs). To get more than 128 bits with a PC that means no laptops, no SFFs, generally large workstations with Xeon, Threadrippers, or Epyc with substantial airflow and power requirements

                • Rohansi7 minutes ago
                  FYI cache lines are 64 bytes, not bits. So Apple is using 128 bytes.

                  Also important to consider that the RTX 4090 has a relatively tiny 384-bit memory bus. Smaller than the M1 Max's 512-bit bus. But the RTX 4090 has 1 TB/s bandwidth and significantly more compute power available to make use of that bandwidth.

            • jsheard1 hour ago
              > The new idea is having 512 bit wide memory instead of PC limitation of 128 bit wide.

              It's not really a new idea, just unusual in computers. The custom SOCs that AMD makes for Playstation and Xbox have wide (up to 384-bit) unified memory buses, very similar to what Apple is doing, with the main distinction being Apples use of low-power LPDDR instead of the faster but power hungrier GDDR used in the consoles.

          • sroussey2 hours ago
            [flagged]
        • Tepix3 hours ago
          For comparison, a Threadripper Pro 5000 workstation with 8x DDR4 3200 has 204.8GB/s of memory bandwidth. The Threadripper Pro 7000 with DDR5-5200 can achieve 325GB/s.

          And no, manaskarekar, the M4 Max does 546 GB/s not GBps (which would be 8x less!).

          • wtallis3 hours ago
            > And no, manaskarekar, the M4 Max does 546 GB/s not GBps (which would be 8x less!).

            GB/s and GBps mean the same thing, though GB/s is the more common way to express it. Gb/s and Gbps are the units that are 8x less: bits vs Bytes.

          • 2 hours ago
            undefined
          • hmottestad2 hours ago
            Thanks for the numbers. Someone here on hackernews got me convinced that a Threadripper would be a better investment for inference than a MacBook Pro with a M3 Max.
          • leptons1 hour ago
            B = Bytes, b = bits.

            GB/s is the same thing as GBps

            The "ps" means "per second"

        • manaskarekar3 hours ago
          Yes, it's just easier to call it that without having to sprinkle asterisks at each mention of it :)

          And yes, the impressive part is that this kind of bandwidth is hard to get on laptops. I suppose I should have been a bit more specific in my remark.

        • oDot3 hours ago
          Isn't unified memory* a crucial part in avoiding signal integrity problems?

          Servers do have many channels but they run relatively slower memory

          * Specifically, it being on-die

          • wtallis3 hours ago
            "Unified memory" doesn't really imply anything about the memory being located on-package, just that it's a shared pool that the CPU, GPU, etc. all have fast access to.

            Also, DRAM is never on-die. On-package, yes, for Apple's SoCs and various other products throughout the industry, but DRAM manufacturing happens in entirely different fabs than those used for logic chips.

            • kube-system1 hour ago
              System memory DRAM never is, but sometimes DRAM is technically included on CPU dies as a cache

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EDRAM

              • wtallis46 minutes ago
                It's mostly an IBM thing. In the consumer space, it's been in game consoles with IBM-fabbed chips. Intel's use of eDRAM was on a separate die (there was a lot that was odd about those parts).
      • metadat3 hours ago
        I was curious so I looked it up:

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDR5_SDRAM (info from the first section):

        > DDR5 is capable of 8GT/s which translates to 64 GB/s (8 gigatransfers/second * 64-bit width / 8 bits/byte = 64 GB/s) of bandwidth per DIMM.

        So for example if you have a server with 16 DDR5 DIMMs (sticks) it equates to 1,024 GB/s of total bandwidth.

        DDR4 clocks in at 3.2GT/s and the fastest DDR3 at 2.1GT/s.

        DDR5 is an impressive jump. HBM is totally bonkers at 128GB/s per DIMM (HBM is the memory used in the top end Nvidia datacenter cards).

        Cheers.

        • reliabilityguy2 hours ago
          > So for example if you have a server with 16 DDR5 DIMMs (sticks) it equates to 1,024 GB/s of total bandwidth.

          Not quite as it depends on number of channels and not on the number of DIMMs. An extreme example: put all 16 DIMMs on single channel, you will get performance of a single channel.

        • sroussey2 hours ago
          Yes, and wouldn’t it be bonkers if the M4 Max supported HBM on desktops?
      • jsheard3 hours ago
        It's not the memory being unified that makes it fast, it's the combination of the memory bus being extremely wide and the memory being extremely close to the processor. It's the same principle that discrete GPUs or server CPUs with onboard HBM memory use to make their non-unified memory go ultra fast.
        • smith70183 hours ago
          I thought “unified memory” was just a marketing term for the memory being extremely close to the processor?
          • jsheard3 hours ago
            No, unified memory usually means the CPU and GPU (and miscellaneous things like the NPU) all use the same physical pool of RAM and moving data between them is essentially zero-cost. That's in contrast to the usual PC setup where the CPU has its own pool of RAM, which is unified with the iGPU if it has one, but the discrete GPU has its own independent pool of VRAM and moving data between the two pools is a relatively slow operation.

            An RTX4090 or H100 has memory extremely close to the processor but I don't think you would call it unified memory.

            • refulgentis2 hours ago
              I don't quite understand one of the finer points of this, under caffeinated :) - if GPU memory is extremely close to the CPU memory, what sort of memory would not be extremely close to the CPU?
              • jsheard2 hours ago
                I think you misunderstood what I meant by "processor", the memory on a discrete GPU is very close to the GPUs processor die, but very far away from the CPU. The GPU may be able to read and write its own memory at 1TB/sec but the CPU trying to read or write that same memory will be limited by the PCIe bus, which is glacially slow by comparison, usually somewhere around 16-32GB/sec.

                A huge part of optimizing code for discrete GPUs is making sure that data is streamed into GPU memory before the GPU actually needs it, because pushing or pulling data over PCIe on-demand decimates performance.

                • refulgentis2 hours ago
                  I see, TL;DR == none; and processor switches from {CPU,GPU} to {GPU} in the 2nd paragraph. Thanks!
          • hollerith3 hours ago
            I thought it meant that both the GPU and the CPU can access it. In most systems, GPU memory cannot be accessed by the CPU (without going through the GPU); and vice versa.
            • layer81 hour ago
              CPUs access GPU memory via MMIO (though usually only a small portion), and GPUs can in principle access main memory via DMA. Meaning, both can share an address space and access each other’s memory. However, that wouldn’t be called Unified Memory, because it’s still mediated by an external bus (PCIe) and thus relatively slower.
      • vid4 hours ago
        It's not "DDR5" on its own, it's a few factors.

        Bandwidth (GB/s) = (Data Rate (MT/s) * Channel Width (bits) * Number of Channels) / 8 / 1000

        (8800 MT/s * 64 bits * 8 channels) / 8 / 1000 = 563.2 GB/s

        This is still half the speed of a consumer NVidia card, but the large amounts of memory is great, if you don't mind running things more slowly and with fewer libraries.

        • Y-bar1 hour ago
          > This is still half the speed of a consumer NVidia card, but the large amounts of memory is great, if you don't mind running things more slowly and with fewer libraries.

          But it has more than 2x longer battery life and a better keyboard than a GPU card ;)

        • wtallis3 hours ago
          > (8800 MT/s * 64 bits * 8 channels) / 8 / 1000 = 563.2 GB/s

          Was this example intended to describe any particular device? Because I'm not aware of anything that operates at 8800 MT/s, especially not with 64-bit channels.

          • sliken2 hours ago
            M4 max in the MBP (today) and in the Studio at some later date.
            • wtallis26 minutes ago
              That seems unlikely given the mismatched memory speed (see the parent comment) and the fact that Apple uses LPDDR which is typically 16 bits per channel. 8800MT/s seems to be a number pulled out of thin air or bad arithmetic.
        • sliken2 hours ago
          Fewer libraries? Any that a normal LLM user would care about? Pytorch, ollama, and others seem to have the normal use cases covered. Whenever I hear about a new LLM seems like the next post is some mac user reporting the token/sec. Often about 5 tokens/sec for 70B models which seems reasonable for a single user.
          • vid1 hour ago
            Is there a normal LLM user yet? Most people would want their options to be as wide as possible. The big ones usually get covered (eventually), and there are distinct good libraries emerging for Mac only (sigh), but last I checked the experience of running every kit (stable diffusion, server-class, etc) involved overhead for the Mac world.
        • manaskarekar3 hours ago
          Thanks, but just to put things into perspective, this calculation has counted 8 channels which is 4 DIMMs and that's mostly desktops (not dismissing desktops, just highlighting that it's a different beast).

          Most laptops will be 2 DIMMS (probably soldered).

          • wtallis3 hours ago
            Desktops are two channels of 64 bits, or with DDR5 now four (sub)channels of 32 bits; either way, mainstream desktop platforms have had a total bus width of 128 bits for decades. 8x64 bit channels is only available from server platforms. (Some high-end GPUs have used 512-bit bus widths, and Apple's Max level of processors, but those are with memory types where the individual channels are typically 16 bits.)
          • sliken2 hours ago
            I think you are confusing channels and dimms.

            The vast majority of any x86 laptop or desktops are 128 bits wide. Often 2x64 bit channels up till last year or so, now 4x32 bit DDR5 in the last year or so. There are some benefits to 4 channels over 2, but generally you are still limited by 128 bits unless you buy a Xeon, Epyc, or Threadripper (or Intel equiv) that are expensive, hot, and don't fit in SFFs or laptops.

            So basically the PC world is crazy behind the 256, 512, and 1024 bit wide memory busses apple has offered since the M1 arrived.

        • cjbprime4 hours ago
          Right, the nvidia card maxes out at 24GB.
      • mort963 hours ago
        This is a case for on-package memory, not for unified memory... Laptops have had unified memory forever

        EDIT: wtf what's so bad about this comment that it deserves being downvoted so much

    • garciasn4 hours ago
      We run our LLM workloads on a M2 Ultra because of this. 2x the VRAM; one-time cost at $5350 was the same as, at the time, 1 month of 80GB VRAM GPU in GCP. Works well for us.
      • alfonsodev4 hours ago
        Can you elaborate, are those workflows in queue or can they serve multiple users in parallel ?

        I think it’s super interesting to know real life workflows and performance of different LLMs and hardware, in case you can direct me to other resources. Thanks !

        • garciasn3 hours ago
          Our use case is atypical, based on what others seem to require. While we serve multiple requests in parallel, our workloads are not 'chat'.
      • manaskarekar4 hours ago
        If the 2x multiplier holds up, the Ultra update should bring it up to 1080GBps. Amazing.
        • SirMaster3 hours ago
          There isn't even an M3 Ultra. Will there be an M4 Ultra?
          • hmottestad1 hour ago
            At some point there should be an upgrade to the M2 Ultra. It might be an M4 Ultra, it might be this year or next year. It might even be after the M5 comes out. Or it could be skipped in favour of the M5 Ultra. If anyone here knows they are definitely under NDA.
          • tromp2 hours ago
            That would make the most sense for the next Mac Studio version.
            • int_19h1 hour ago
              There were rumors that the next Mac Studio will top out at 512Gb RAM, too.

              Good news for anyone who wants to run 405B LMs locally...

            • mpweiher2 hours ago
              And the week isn't over...
      • bushbaba4 hours ago
        About 10-20% of my companies gpu usage is inference dev. Yes horribly not efficient usage of resources. We could upgrade the 100ish devs who do this dev work to M4 mbp and free up gpu resources

        Smart move by Apple

      • Der_Einzige3 hours ago
        Right now, there are 0.90$ per hour H100 80gbs that you can rent.
      • sgt1014 hours ago
        You have another one with a network gateway to provide hot failover?

        Right?

        • ithkuil3 hours ago
          High availability story for AI workloads will be a problem for another decade. From what I can see the current pressing problem is to get stuff working quickly and iterate quickly.
    • Inviz4 hours ago
      I have M3 Max with 128GB of ram, it's really liberating.
      • sfn424 hours ago
        I have 32gb and I've never felt like I needed more.
        • umanwizard3 hours ago
          Having 128GB is really nice if you want to regularly run different full OSes as VMs simultaneously (and if those OSes might in turn have memory-intensive workloads running on them).

          Somewhat niche case, I know.

        • moffkalast3 hours ago
          Obviously you're not a golfer.
    • thimabi3 hours ago
      At least in the recent past, a hindrance was that MacOS limited how much of that unified memory could be assigned as VRAM. Those who wanted to exceed the limits had to tinker with kernel settings.

      I wonder if that has changed or is about to change as Apple pivots their devices to better serve AI workflows as well.

    • jjcm1 hour ago
      For context, the 4090 has 1,008 GB/s of bandwidth.
      • spacedcowboy22 minutes ago
        ... but only 1/4 of the actual memory, right ?

        The M4-Max I just ordered comes with 128GB of RAM.

    • doctoboggan4 hours ago
      This is definitely tempting me to upgrade my M1 macbook pro. I think I have 400GB/s of memory bandwidth. I am wondering what the specific number "over half a terabyte" means.
    • 4 hours ago
      undefined
    • segmondy3 hours ago
      Need more memory, 256GB will be nice. MistralLarge is 123B. Can't even give a quantized Llama405B a drive. LLM users rejoice. LLM power users, weep.
    • moffkalast3 hours ago
      Well it's more like pick your poison, cause all options have caveats:

      - Apple: all the capacity and bandwidth, but no compute to utilize it

      - AMD/Nvidia: all the compute and bandwidth, but no capacity to load anything

      - DDR5: all the capacity, but no compute or bandwidth (cheap tho)

  • jcmontx4 hours ago
    > "up to 1.8x faster when compared to the 16-inch MacBook Pro with M1 Pro"

    I insist my 2020 Macbook M1 was the best purchase I ever made

    • shade3 hours ago
      I have the OG 13" MBP M1, and it's been great; I only have two real reasons I'm considering jumping to the 14" MBP M4 Pro finally:

      - More RAM, primarily for local LLM usage through Ollama (a bit more overhead for bigger models would be nice)

      - A bit niche, but I often run multiple external displays. DisplayLink works fine for this, but I also use live captions heavily and Apple's live captions don't work when any form of screen sharing/recording is enabled... which is how Displaylink works. :(

      Not quite sold yet, but definitely thinking about it.

    • AdamJacobMuller1 hour ago
      Yep.

      I've never kept any laptop as long as I've kept the M1. I was more or less upgrading yearly in the past because the speed increases (both in the G4 and then Intel generations) were so significant. This M1 has exceeded my expectations in every category, it's faster quieter and cooler than any laptop i've ever owned.

      I've had this laptop since release in 2020 and I have nearly 0 complaints with it.

      I wouldn't upgrade except the increase in memory is great, I don't want to have to shut down apps to be able to load some huge LLMs, and, I ding'ed the top case a few months ago and now there's a shadow on the screen in that spot in some lighting conditions which is very annoying.

      I hope (and expect) the M4 to last just as long as my M1 did.

    • stetrain3 hours ago
      Yep. That's roughly 20% per generation improvement which ain't half-bad these days, but the really huge cliff was going from Intel to the M1 generation.

      M1 series machines are going to be fine for years to come.

    • drewbitt3 hours ago
      And my 2020 Intel Macbook Air was a bad purchase. Cruelly, the Intel and M1 Macbook Air released within 6 months of each other.
      • rconti3 hours ago
        In early 2020, I had an aging 2011 Air that was still struggling after a battery replacement. Even though I "knew" the Apple Silicon chips would be better, I figured a 2020 Intel Air would last me a long time anyway, since my computing needs from that device are light, and who knows how many years the Apple Silicon transition will take take anyway?

        Bought a reasonably well-specced Intel Air for $1700ish. The M1s came out a few months later. I briefly thought about the implication of taking a hit on my "investment", figured I might as well cry once rather than suffer endlessly. Sold my $1700 Intel Air for $1200ish on craigslist (if I recall correctly), picked up an M1 Air for about that same $1200 pricepoint, and I'm typing this on that machine now.

        That money was lost as soon as I made the wrong decision, I'm glad I just recognized the loss up front rather than stewing about it.

        • cantsingh3 hours ago
          Exact same boat here. A friend and I both bought the 2020 Intel MBA thinking that the M1 version was at least a year out. It dropped a few months later. I immediately resold my Intel MBA seeing the writing on the wall and bought a launch M1 (which I still use to this day). Ended up losing $200 on that mis-step, but no way the Intel version would still get me through the day.

          That said...scummy move by Apple. They tend to be a little more thoughtful in their refresh schedule, so I was caught off guard.

          • drewbitt2 hours ago
            When I saw the M1s come out, I thought that dev tooling would take a while to work for M1, which was correct. It probably took a year for most everything to be compiled for arm64. However I had too little faith in Rosetta and just the speed upgrade M1 really brought. So what I mean to say is, I still have that deadweight MBA that I only use for web browsing :)
      • chrizel3 hours ago
        Oh yes, my wife bought a new Intel MBA in summer 2020... I told her at the time Apple planned its own chip, but it couldn't be much better than the Intel one and surely Apple will increase prices too... I was so wrong.
      • ElCapitanMarkla2 hours ago
        Yeah I’m in the same boat. I had my old mid 2013 Air for 7 years before I pulled the trigger on that too. I’ll be grabbing myself an M4 Pro this time
    • d1str04 hours ago
      Same. My MBP and M1 Air are amazing machines. But I’m now also excited that any future M chip replacement will be faster and just as nice.

      The battery performance is incredible too.

    • BenFranklin1004 hours ago
      I got a refurbed M1 iPad Pro 12.9” for $900 a couple years ago and have been quite pleased. I still have a couple of years life in it I estimate.
  • RobinL3 hours ago
    Can anyone comment on the viability of using an external SSD rather than upgrading storage? Specifically for data analysis (e.g. storing/analysing parquet files using Python/duckdb, or video editing using divinci resolve).

    Also, any recommendations for suitable ssds, ideally not too expensive? Thank you!

    • pier252 hours ago
      It's totally fine.

      With a TB4 case with an NVME you can get something like 2300MB/s read speeds. You can also use a USB4 case which will give you over 3000MB/s (this is what I'm doing for storing video footage for Resolve).

      With a TB5 case you can go to like 6000MB/s. See this SSD by OWC:

      https://www.owc.com/solutions/envoy-ultra

    • trogdor2 hours ago
      > Also, any recommendations for suitable ssds, ideally not too expensive?

      I own a media production company. We use Sabrent Thunderbolt external NVMe TLC SSDs and are very happy with their price, quality, and performance.

      I suggest you avoid QLC SSDs.

    • joshvm1 hour ago
      Basically any good SSD manufacturer is fine, but I've found that the enclosure controller support is flaky with Sonoma. Drives that appear instantly in Linux sometimes take ages to enumerate in OSX, and only since upgrading to Sonoma. Stick with APFS if you're only using it for Mac stuff.

      I have 2-4TB drives from Samsung, WD and Kingston. All work fine and are ridiculously fast. My favourite enclosure is from DockCase for the diagnostic screen.

    • schainks1 hour ago
      With a thunderbolt SSD you'll think your external drive is an internal drive. I bought one of these (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BGYMHS8Y) for my partner so she has snappy photo editing workflows with Adobe CC apps. Copying her 1TB photo library over took under 5 min.
    • rbanffy3 hours ago
      The USB-C ports should be quite enough for that. If you are using a desktop Mac, such as an iMac, Mini, or the Studio and Pro that will be released later this week, this is a no-brainer - everything works perfectly.
    • thejazzman3 hours ago
      i go with the acasis thunderbolt enclosure and then pop in an nvme of your choice, but generic USB drives are pretty viable too ... thunderbolt can be booted from, while USB can't

      i tried another brand or 2 of enclosures and they were HUGE while the acasis was credit card sized (except thickness)

    • AlphaWeaver2 hours ago
      I've used a Samsung T5 SSD as my CacheClip location in Resolve and it works decently well! Resolve doesn't always tolerate disconnects very well, but when it's plugged in things are very smooth.
    • DrBenCarson1 hour ago
      Get something with Thunderbolt and you’ll likely never notice a difference
    • Tepix3 hours ago
      Run your current workload on internal storage and check how fast it is reading and writing.

      For video editing - even 8K RAW - you don't need insanely fast storage. A 10GBit/s external SSD will not slow you down.

  • tomrod4 hours ago
    This is the first compelling Mac to me. I've used Macs for a few clients and muscle memory is very deeply ingrained for linux desktops. But with local LLMs finally on the verge of usability along with sufficient memory... I might need to make the jump!

    Wish I could spin up a Linux OS on the hardware though. Not a bright spot for me.

    • aidenfoxivey4 hours ago
      You totally can after a little bit of time waiting for M4 bringup!

      https://asahilinux.org

      It won't have all the niceties / hardware support of MacOS, but it seamlessly coexists with MacOS, can handle the GPU/CPU/RAM with no issues, and can provide you a good GNU/Linux environment.

      • p_j_w3 hours ago
        Asahi doesn't work on M3 yet after a year. It's gonna be a bit before M4 support is here.
        • quux3 hours ago
          IIRC one of the major factors holding back M3 support was the lack of a M3 mini for use in their CI environment. Now that there's an M4 mini hopefully there aren't any obstacles to them adding M4 support
          • mmcnl3 hours ago
            Why would that matter? You can use a MacBook in CI too?
            • umanwizard2 hours ago
              How? What cloud providers offer it? MacStadium and AWS don't.

              I guess you could have a physical MBP in your house and connect it to some bring-your-own-infrastructure CI setup, but most people wouldn't want to do that.

      • umanwizard3 hours ago
        "a little bit of time" is a bit disingenuous given that they haven't even started working on the M3.

        (This isn't a dig on the Asahi project btw, I think it's great).

    • __MatrixMan__2 hours ago
      I miss Linux, it respected me in ways that MacOS doesn't. But maintaining a sane dev environment on linux when my co-workers on MacOS are committing bash scripts that call brew... I am glad that I gave up that fight. And yeah, the hardware sure is nice.
      • tomrod1 hour ago
        IIRC brew supports linux, but it isn't a package manager I pay attention to outside of some very basic needs. Way too much supply chain security domain to cover for it!
    • d1str04 hours ago
      Check out Asahi linux
    • BenFranklin1003 hours ago
      Off topic, but I’m very interested in local LLMs. Could you point me in the right direction, both hardware specs and models?
      • doctoboggan3 hours ago
        In general for local LLMs, the more memory the better. You will be able to fit larger models in RAM. The faster CPU will give you more tokens/second, but if you are just chatting with a human in the loop, most recent M series macs will be able to generate tokens faster than you can read them.
        • int_19h1 hour ago
          That also very much depends on model size. For 70B+ models, while the tok/s are still fast enough for realtime chat, it's not going to be generating faster than you can read it, even on Ultra with its insane memory bandwidth.
      • noman-land2 hours ago
        Get as much RAM as you can stomach paying for.
    • lowbloodsugar3 hours ago
      You can spin up a Unix OS. =) It’s even older than Linux.
      • tomrod1 hour ago
        BSD is fun (not counting MacOS in the set there), but no, my Unix experiences have been universally legacy hardware oversubscribed and undermaintained. Not my favorite place to spend any time.
      • umanwizard3 hours ago
        NextSTEP which macOS is ultimately based on is indeed older than Linux (first release was 1989). But why does that matter? The commenter presumably said "Linux" for a reason, i.e. they want to use Linux specifically, not any UNIX-like OS.
  • LeifCarrotson4 hours ago
    I'm pleased that the Pro's base memory starts at 16 GB, but surprised they top out at 32 GB:

    > ...the new MacBook Pro starts with 16GB of faster unified memory with support for up to 32GB, along with 120GB/s of memory bandwidth...

    I haven't been an Apple user since 2012 when I graduated from college and retired my first computer, a mid-2007 Core2 Duo Macbook Pro, which I'd upgraded with a 2.5" SSD and 6GB of RAM with DDR2 SODIMMs. I switched to Dell Precision and Lenovo P-series workstations with user-upgradeable storage and memory... but I've got 64GB of RAM in the old 2019 Thinkpad P53 I'm using right now. A unified memory space is neat, but is it worth sacrificing that much space? I typically have a VM or two running, and in the host OS and VMs, today's software is hungry for RAM and it's typically cheap and upgradeable outside of the Apple ecosystem.

    • jsheard4 hours ago
      > I'm pleased that the Pro's base memory starts at 16 GB, but surprised they top out at 32 GB:

      That's an architectural limitation of the base M4 chip, if you go up to the M4 Pro version you can get up to 48GB, and the M4 Max goes up to 128GB.

      • FireBeyond3 hours ago
        The "base level" Max is limited at 36GB. You have to get the bigger Max to get more.
    • redundantly3 hours ago
      The M4 tops off at 32 GB

      The M4 Pro goes up to 48 GB

      The M4 Max can have up to 128 GB

      • ldoughty3 hours ago
        It seems you need the M4 Max with the 40-core GPU to go over 36GB.

        The M4 Pro with 14‑core CPU & 20‑core GPU can do 48GB.

        If you're looking for ~>36-48GB memory, here's the options:

        $2,800 = 48GB, Apple M4 Pro chip with 14‑core CPU, 20‑core GPU

        $3,200 = 36GB, Apple M4 Max chip with 14‑core CPU, 32‑core GPU

        $3,600 = 48GB, Apple M4 Max chip with 16‑core CPU, 40‑core GPU

        So the M4 Pro could get you a lot of memory, but less GPU cores. Not sure how much those GPU cores factor in to performance, I only really hear complaints about the memory limits... Something to consider if looking to buy in this range of memory.

        Of course, a lot of people here probably consider it not a big deal to throw an extra 3 grand on hardware, but I'm a hobbyist in academia when it comes to AI, I don't big 6-figure salaries :-)

      • SparkyMcUnicorn3 hours ago
        It doesn't look this cut and dry.

        M4 Max 14 core has a single option of 36GB.

        M4 Max 16 core lets you go up to 128GB.

        So you can actually get more ram with the Pro than the base level Max.

    • fckgw3 hours ago
      On the standard M4 processor. If you move the M4 Pro it tops out at 48gb or moving to the M4 Max goes up to 128gb.
      • Tepix3 hours ago
        The 96GB RAM option of the M3 Max disappeared.
      • 419957013 hours ago
        Weird that the M4 Pro in the Mac mini can go up to 64GB. Maybe a size limitation on the MBP motherboard or SOC package?
        • _diyar3 hours ago
          Probably just Apple designing the pricing ladder.
    • post-it4 hours ago
      I haven't done measurements on this, but my Macbook Pro feels much faster at swapping than any Linux or Windows device I've used. I've never used an M.2 SSD so maybe that would be comparable, but swapping is pretty much seamless. There's also some kind of memory compression going on according to Activity Monitor, not sure if that's normal on other OSes.
      • thimabi3 hours ago
        Yes, other M.2 SSDs have comparable performance when swapping, and other operating systems compress memory, too — though I believe not as much as MacOS.

        Although machines with Apple Silicon swap flawlessly, I worry about degrading the SSD, which is non-replaceable. So ultimately I pay for more RAM and not need swapping at all.

        • post-it17 minutes ago
          Degrading the SSD is a good point. This is thankfully a work laptop so I don't care if it lives or dies, but it's something I'll have to consider when I eventually get my own Mac.
    • Octoth0rpe4 hours ago
      The max memory is dependent on which tier M4 chip you get. The M4 max chip will let you configure up to 128gb of ram
      • MaxDPS3 hours ago
        It looks like the 14 core M4 Max only allows 36GB of ram. The M4 Pro allows for up to 48GB. It's a bit confusing.
    • 3 hours ago
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  • wkyleg2 hours ago
    What's the consensus regarding best MacBooks for AI/ML?

    I've heard it's easier to just use cloud options, but I sill like the idea of being able to run actual models and train them on my laptop.

    I have a M1 MacBook now and I'm considering trading in to upgrade.

    I've seen somewhat conflicting things regarding what you get for the money. For instance, some reports recommending a M2 Pro for the money IIRC.

    • ZeroCool2u1 hour ago
      Training is not practical. For inference they're pretty great though, especially if you go up in the specs and add a bunch of memory.
  • unsupp0rted3 hours ago
    I have a 16" M1 Pro with 16 gigs of ram, and it regularly struggles under the "load" of Firebase emulator.

    You can tell not because the system temp rises, but because suddenly Spotify audio begins to pop, constantly and irregularly.

    It took me a year to figure out that the system audio popping wasn't hardware and indeed wasn't software, except in the sense that memory (or CPU?) pressure seems to be the culprit.

    • duped48 minutes ago
      This kind of sounds like someone is abusing perf cores and high priority threading in your stack. iirc, on MacOS audio workgroup threads are supposed to be scheduled with the highest (real time) priority on p cores, which shouldn't have issues under load, unless someone else is trying to compete at the same priority.
    • maxioatic2 hours ago
      I have a 14" M1 Max with 32gb of ram for work, and it does that popping noise every once it a while too! I've always wondered what was causing it.
      • SSLy2 hours ago
        Im relatively surprised modern Macs have same buffer underrun issue I had on intel laptops with pulseaudio 7+ years back.
    • zaptrem1 hour ago
      This happens whenever I load up one of our PyTorch models on my M1 MBP 16gb too. I also hate the part where if the model (or any other set of programs) uses too much RAM the whole system will sometimes straight up hang and then crash due to kernel watchdog timeout instead of just killing the offender.
    • silvr1 hour ago
      Whoa! I've been so annoyed by this for years, so interesting that you figured it out. It's the kind of inelegance in design that would have had Steve Jobs yelling at everyone to fix, just ruins immersion in music and had no obvious way to fix.
  • scrlk4 hours ago
    Nano-texture option for the display is nice. IIRC it's the first time since the 2012 15" MBP that a matte option has been offered?

    I hope that the response times have improved, because it has been quite poor for a 120 Hz panel.

    • lapcat4 hours ago
      > IIRC it's the first time since the 2012 15" MBP that a matte option has been offered?

      The so-called "antiglare" option wasn't true matte. You'd really have to go back to 2008.

    • jhickok3 hours ago
      My one concern is that nano-texture apple displays are a little more sensitive to damage, and even being super careful with my MBPs I get the little marks from the keyboard when you carry the laptop with your hand squeezing the lid and bottom (a natural carry motion).
    • Eric_WVGG4 hours ago
      Love the nano-texture on the Studio Display, but my MacBooks have always suffered from finger oil rubbing the screen from the keys. Fingerprint oil on nano-texture sounds like a recipe for disaster.

      For my current laptop, I finally broke down and bought a tempered glass screen protector. It adds a bit of glare, but wipes clean — and for the first time I have a one-year-old MacBook that still looks as good as new.

      • sroussey2 hours ago
        The iPad has nano texture and I find it does a much better job with oily fingerprints.
      • jonah3 hours ago
        I put a thin screen cleaner/glasses cleaner cloth on the keyboard whenever I close the lid. That keeps the oils off the screen as well as prevents any pressure or rubbing from damaging the glass.
        • Eric_WVGG1 hour ago
          I tried that, unfortunately didn't work for me at all.
    • 4 hours ago
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    • thom3 hours ago
      It's also on the iPad Pro. Only downside is you really do need the right cloth to be able to clean it.
      • umanwizard3 hours ago
        I believe the laptop ships with the cloth. That said, it is annoying to have to remember to always keep that one cloth with your laptop.
    • ant6n4 hours ago
      They brought back the matte screen! Omg. The question is, will they have that for the air.

      (I tend to feel if you want something specialized, you gotta pay for the expensive model)

    • pcdoodle4 hours ago
      Yes. It's finally back.
  • pw6hv18 minutes ago
    Just replaced for the first time battery on my Macbook Pro 2015 Retina. Feel so good using such an old piece of hardware.
    • zubiaur14 minutes ago
      I love mine, it has a fresh battery OEM battery as well. Runs the latest OS with OpenCore Legacy. But it's starting to get a bit annoying. Usable, but it is starting to feel slowish, the fan kicks up frequently.

      I might still keep it another year or so, which is a testament to how good it is and how relative little progress has happened in almost 10 years.

  • hartator2 hours ago
    I’m really excited about the nano-texture display option.

    It’s essentially a matte coating, but the execution on iPad displays is excellent. While it doesn’t match the e-ink experience of devices like the Kindle or ReMarkable, it’s about 20-30% easier on the eyes. The texture feels also great (even though it’s less relevant for a laptop), and the glare reduction is a welcome feature.

    I prefer working on the MacBook screen, but I nearly bought an Apple Studio Display XDR or an iPad as a secondary screen just for that nano-texture finish. It's super good news that this is coming to the MacBook Pro.

    • dkarbayev50 minutes ago
      Do you actually have to wipe the screen with the included special cloth? The screen on all of the macbooks that I've had usually get oily patches because of the contact with keycaps, so I have to wipe the screen regularly.
      • hartator33 minutes ago
        I wipe all my devices with regular paper towels with a tad of water. Including my $5k Apple XDR display.

        I am probably not the best example to emulate lol.

    • cedws1 hour ago
      Does it make much difference for looking at code?
      • hartator1 hour ago
        Yes, the main goal is to be easier on the eyes IMO.

        It's easier to read on it.

  • zja1 hour ago
    > MacBook Air is the world’s most popular laptop, and with Apple Intelligence, it’s even better. Now, models with M2 and M3 double the starting memory to 16GB, while keeping the starting price at just $999 — a terrific value for the world’s best-selling laptop.

    This is nice, and long overdue.

  • Vayu24 minutes ago
    As it goes for the section where they demoed the assistance from apple intelligence to the researcher creating an abstract and adding pictures to their paper. Is it better or worse to do this? People are already complaining so heavily about dead internet theory with the 'AI voice' being so prominent..
  • dr_kiszonka3 hours ago
    > "Up to 7x faster image processing in Affinity Photo"

    Great to see Affinity becoming so popular that it gets acknowledged by Apple.

  • twalla3 hours ago
    They're really burying the lede here - magic trackpad and magic keyboard finally have USB-C :)
    • DerekL19 minutes ago
      That was announced on Monday, with the new iMacs.
  • zurfer4 hours ago
    If I remember correctly, the claim was that M3 is 1.6x faster than M1. M4 is now 1.8x faster than M1.

    It sounds more exciting than M4 is 12.5% faster than M3.

    • spacedcowboy17 minutes ago
      There aren't that many people that upgrade something like an MBP every year, most of us keep them longer than that.

      I've just ordered an (almost) top-of-the-range MBP Max, my current machine is an MBP M1-max, so the comparisons are pretty much spot-on for me.

      Selling the M1 Ultra Studio to help pay for the M4 MBP Max, I don't think I need the Studio any more, with the M4 being so much faster.

    • dsv3099i1 hour ago
      If your goal is to sell more MBPs (and this is marketing presentation) then, judging by the number of comments that have the phrase "my M1" and the top comment, it seems like M1 vs M4 is the right comparison to make. Too many people are sticking with their M1 machines. Including me.

      It's actually interesting to think about. Is there a speed multiplier that would get me off this machine? I'm not sure there is. For my use case the machine performance is not my productivity bottleneck. HN on the otherhand... That one needs to be attenuated. :)

    • azinman23 hours ago
      Most people buying a new MacBook don’t have the previous version, they’re going much further back. That’s why you see both intel and m1 comparisons.
      • IshKebab36 minutes ago
        No it isn't. It's because 1.8x faster sounds better than 12% faster.

        Back when Moore's law was still working they didn't skip generations like this.

    • canucker20162 hours ago
      Looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_M4#Comparison_with_other...

      M4 is built with TSMC's 2nd Gen 3nm process. M3 is on the 1st gen 3nm.

      For the base M3 vs base M4:

      - the CPU (4P+4E) & GPU (8) core counts are the same

      - NPU perf is slightly better for M4, I think, (M4's 38TOPS @ INT8 vs M3's 18TOPS @ INT16)

      - Memory Bandwidth is higher for M4 (120 GB/s vs 102.4 GB/s)

      - M4 has a higher TDP (22W vs 20W)

      - M4 has higher transistor count (28B vs 25B)

    • nabakin3 hours ago
      It does and it gets even worse when you realize those stats are only true under very specific circumstances, not typical computer usage. If you benchmarked based on typical computer usage, I think you'd only see gains of 5% or less.
      • tigen1 hour ago
        Anyone know of articles that deep dive into "snappiness" or "feel" computer experiences?

        Everyone knows SSDs made a big difference in user experience. For the CPU, normally if you aren't gaming at high settings or "crunching" something (compiling or processing video etc.) then it's not obvious why CPU upgrades should be making much difference even vs. years-old Intel chips, in terms of that feel.

        There is the issue of running heavy JS sites in browsers but I can avoid those.

        The main issue seems to be how the OS itself is optimized for snappiness, and how well it's caching/preloading things. I've noticed Windows 10 file system caching seems to be not very sophisticated for example... it goes to disk too often for things I've accessed recently-but-not-immediately-prior.

        Similarly when it comes to generating heat, if laptops are getting hot even while doing undemanding office tasks with huge periods of idle time then basically it points to stupid software -- or let's say poorly balanced (likely aimed purely at benchmark numbers than user experience).

        https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare/apple-m1-vs-amd-ryzen-...

    • tonygiorgio4 hours ago
      So far I’m only reading comments here about people wow’d by a lot of things it seemed that M3 pretty much also had. Not seeing anything new besides “little bit better specs”
      • MBCook3 hours ago
        The M4 is architecturally better than the M3, especially on GPU features IIRC, but you’re right it’s not a total blow out.

        Not all products got the M3, so in some lines this week is the first update in quite a while. In others like MBP it’s just the yearly bump. A good performing one, but the yearly bump.

      • sliken2 hours ago
        Yes, upgrading from a m3 max to a m4 max would be a waste.
    • jumping_frog3 hours ago
      Maybe they are highlighting stats which will help people upgrade. Few will upgrade from M3 to M4. Many from M1 to M4. That's my guess.
  • mattfrommars3 hours ago
    Does anyone know if there is a way to use Mac without the Apple bloatware?

    I genuinely want to use it as primary machine but with this Intel MacBook Pro I have, I absolutely dislike FaceTime, IMessage, the need to use AppStore, Apple always asking me have a Apple user name password (which I don't and have zero intention), block Siri, and all telemetry stuff Apple has backed in, stop the machine calling home, etc.

    This is to mirror tools available in Windows to disable and remove Microsoft bloatware and ad tracing built in.

    • wpm2 minutes ago
      There is zero iCloud account requirement. You do not need to use the App Store. Gatekeeper can be disabled with a configuration profile key. Telemetry (what little there is) can be disabled with a configuration profile key. Siri can be disabled, all of the generative AI crap can be disabled, yadda yadda yadda, with a configuration profile key. Every background service can be listed and disabled if you disable authenticated-root. Hell, you could disable `apsd` and disable all push notifications too, which require a phone home to Apple.
    • alanwreath2 hours ago
      IIRC Apple is a lot less heavy handed wrt service login requirements when compared to Microsoft’s most recent Windows endeavors. And depending on the developer you can get around having to use the App Store at all. Being you’re on an Intel Mac have you considered just using Linux ?
    • derr13 hours ago
      You don't need to use AppStore, unless of course you want to use apple software.

      Pretty much all the software I use is from brew.

    • dvno421 hour ago
      You can use OSX without an Apple account and paired with a 3rd party host based firewall (Little Snitch), the OS usually stays out of your way (imo). Bundled apps can be removed after disabling SIP (file integrity) but there are downsides/maintenance to that route.
    • sliken47 minutes ago
      At a linux conference I saw many macbooks. Talked to a few, they just ran linux in a VM full screen for programming and related. Then used OSX for everything else (office, outlook, teams, work enforced apps, etc). They seemed very happy and this encouraged them to not task switch as often.
    • alberth3 hours ago
      Do you mean you want to use Apple Silicon without macOS?

      If that's your question, yes - various options exist like https://asahilinux.org

    • WesolyKubeczek3 hours ago
      You can totally use it without ever signing in to Apple account. You cannot delete Siri etc, but you can disable parts of it and not use the rest.
      • philistine2 hours ago
        There used to be this whole contingent of people who were adamant that Apple's software was too opinionated, bloated, that you couldn't adapt its OS to your needs, and that Apple was far too ingrained in your relationship with your device. That Linux was true freedom, but at least that Windows respected its users

        Then Windows 11 came out.

        • int_19h1 hour ago
          I belong to that contingent, and I still stand by the assertion that Apple's software is too opinionated, configurability is unreasonably low, and you have to stick to the Apple ecosystem for many thing to get the most out of it.

          My primary desktop & laptop are now both Macs because of all the malarkey in Win11. Reappearance of ads in Start and Windows Recall were the last straws. It's clear that Microsoft is actively trying to monetize Windows in ways that are inherently detrimental to UX.

          I do have to say, though, that Win11 is still more customizable overall, even though it - amazingly! - regressed below macOS level in some respects (e.g. no vertical taskbar option anymore). Gaming is another major sticking point - the situation with non-casual games on macOS is dismal.

        • mixmastamyk1 hour ago
          Happened a lot earlier than 11.
    • philistine2 hours ago
      You need to embrace Apple's vision, or use something else. Clearly your goals and Apple's are misaligned, so you will only feel pain when using a Mac.

      Get a PC.

    • mixmastamyk1 hour ago
      I gave up on macos when they started making the OS partition read-only. A good security feature in general, but their implementation meant that changing anything became a big set of difficulties and trade-offs.

      That, combined with the icloud and telemetry BS, I'd had enough.

  • thimabi3 hours ago
    Nice to see they increased the number of performance cores in the M4 Pro, compared to the M3 Pro. Though I am worried about the impact of this change on battery life on the MBPs.

    Another positive development was bumping up baseline amounts of RAM. They kept selling machines with just 8 gigabytes of RAM for way longer than they should have. It might be fine for many workflows, but feels weird on “pro” machines at their price points.

    I’m sure Apple has been coerced to up its game because of AI. Yet we can rejoice in seeing their laptop hardware, which already surpassed the competition, become even better.

    • snjnlsn3 hours ago
      I'm curious why they decided to go this route, but glad to see it. Perhaps ~4 efficiency cores is simply just enough for the average MBP user's standard compute?

      In January, after researching, I bought an apple restored MBP with an M2 Max over an M3 Pro/Max machine because of the performance/efficiency core ratio. I do a lot of music production in DAWs, and many, even Apple's Logic Pro don't really make use of efficiency cores. I'm curious about what restraints have led to this.. but perhaps this also factors into Apple's choice to increase the ratio of performance/efficiency cores.

      • thimabi3 hours ago
        > Perhaps ~4 efficiency cores is simply just enough for the average MBP user's standard compute?

        I believe that’s the case. Most times, the performance cores on my M3 Pro laptop remain idle.

        What I don’t understand is why battery life isn’t more like that of the MacBook Airs when not using the full power of the SOC. Maybe that’s the downside of having a better display.

        • umanwizard2 hours ago
          > Most times, the performance cores on my M3 Pro laptop remain idle.

          Curious how you're measuring this. Can you see it in Activity Monitor?

          > Maybe that’s the downside of having a better display.

          Yes I think so. Display is a huge fraction of power consumption in typical light (browsing/word processing/email) desktop workloads.

          • thimabi2 hours ago
            > Curious how you're measuring this. Can you see it in Activity Monitor?

            I use an open source app called Stats [1]. It provides a really good overview of the system on the menu bar, and it comes with many customization options.

            [1]: https://github.com/exelban/stats

          • netruk441 hour ago
            > Curious how you're measuring this. Can you see it in Activity Monitor?

            Yes, processor history in the activity monitor marks out specific cores as Performance and Efficiency.

            Example: https://i.redd.it/f87yv7eoqyh91.jpg

            • umanwizard1 hour ago
              Wow, I didn't even realize you could double-click the CPU graph on the main screen to open that view.
  • cebert1 hour ago
    I wish Apple would let me max out the RAM on a lower performance chip. That’s more valuable to me than more compute.
    • dcchambers54 minutes ago
      I think it's just one of the tradeoffs of having everything on one SOC. They can only realistically and efficiently make so many versions.
  • TIPSIO3 hours ago
    These chips are incredible. Even my M1 MBP from 2020 still feels so ridiculously fast for everyday basic use and coding.

    Is an upgrade really worth it?

    • jitl3 hours ago
      I don’t think it will “feel” much faster like the Intel -> M1 where overall system latency especially around swap & memory pressure got much much better.

      If you do any amount of 100% CPU work that blocks your workflow, like waiting for a compiler or typechecker, I think M1 -> M4 is going to be worth it. A few of my peers at the office went M1->M3 and like the faster compile times.

      Like, a 20 minute build on M1 becoming a 10 minute build on M4, or a 2 minute build on M1 becoming a 1 minute build on M4, is nothing to scoff at.

    • thimabi3 hours ago
      I guess it’s only worth it for people who would really benefit from the speed bump — those who push their machines to the limit and work under tight schedules.

      I myself don’t need so much performance, so I tend to keep my devices for many, many years.

  • abnry4 hours ago
    How viable is Asani Linux these days? MacBook hardware looks amazing.
    • dcchambers4 hours ago
      No support for M3 or M4 powered machines currently.

      > All Apple Silicon Macs are in scope, as well as future generations as development time permits. We currently have support for most machines of the M1 and M2 generations.[^1][^2]

      [^1]: https://asahilinux.org/about/

      [^2]: https://asahilinux.org/fedora/#device-support

    • drhodes4 hours ago
      btw, there is a recent interview with an Asani dev focusing on GPUs, worth a listen for those interested in linux on apple silicon. The reverse engineering effort required to pin down the GPU hardware was one of the main topics.

      https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/2024/10/15/linux-apple-...

    • jitl3 hours ago
      For many years I treated Windows or macOS as a hypervisor - if you love Linux but want the Mac hardware, instant sleep & wake, etc, putting a full screen VM in Parallels or similar is imo better than running Linux in terms of productivity, although it falls short on “freedom”.
      • umanwizard2 hours ago
        I do the same thing, but there are two big caveats:

        1. Nested virtualization doesn't work in most virtualization software, so if your workflow involves running stuff in VMs it is not going to work from within another VM. The exception is apparently now the beta version of UTM with the Apple Virtualization backend, but that's highly experimental.

        2. Trackpad scrolling is emulated as discrete mouse wheel clicks, which is really annoying for anyone used to the smooth scrolling on macOS. So what I do is use macOS for most browsing and other non-technical stuff but do all my coding in the Linux VM.

    • kristofferR4 hours ago
      Have anyone tried it recently, specifically the trackpad? I tried the Fedora variant a few months ago on my M1 Macbook and it was horrible to use the trackpad, it felt totally foreign and wrong.
      • philistine2 hours ago
        I feel you, but Apple's trackpad prowess is not an easy thing to copy. It's one of those things I never expect anyone else to be able to replicate the level of deep integration between the hardware and software.

        It's 2024, and I still see most Windows users carrying a mouse to use with their laptop.

  • mrcwinn2 hours ago
    Question without judgement: why would I want to run LLM locally? Say I'm building a SaaS app and connecting to Anthropic using the `ai` package. Would I want to cut over to ollama+something for local dev?
    • andrewmunsell2 hours ago
      Data privacy-- some stuff, like all my personal notes I use with a RAG system, just don't need to be sent to some cloud provider to be data mined and/or have AI trained on them
    • jwitthuhn1 hour ago
      For me it is consistency. I control the model and the software so I know a local LLM will remain exactly the same until I want to change it.

      It also avoids the trouble of using a hosted LLM that decides to double their price overnight, costs are very predictable.

  • rTX5CMRXIfFG27 minutes ago
    That ad reveal at the end. Someone in the marketing team must have started doing CrossFit
  • mcculley3 hours ago
    Still, no matter how much you are willing to spend, you cannot buy a MacBook Pro with an LTE modem, like the ones in the iPhone, iPad, and Watch.
    • jitl1 hour ago
      Tethering to an iPhone is so easy though - just select it in the Wifi menu. I'm not sure if I'd ever pay for an LTE modem option. I'm sure it would be better efficiency and performance to have it built-in, but I wouldn't think many people care enough about that small difference to offer it as an option.
      • mcculley1 hour ago
        I use the tethering quite often. I have for years. It is flaky and burns two batteries instead of one. I agree that many people do not care. Some of us who are traveling a lot are willing to pay for more options.
      • Detrytus1 hour ago
        It's not about efficiency or performance, it's about not having to own the iPhone in the first place. Just put a SIM card inside the laptop and forget about it. Windows laptops can even seamlessly switch between wifi and LTE depending on which one is available. But of course Apple would never allow that because they want to force you to own the full set of Apple devices. Laptop being self-sufficient would be against their policy.

        Not to mention that in the US the cell phone carriers artificially limit tethering speed or put data caps on it when you tether from your phone. You have to buy a dedicated data-only plan and modem.

    • trogdor1 hour ago
      I wonder if one of the obstacles is the amount of data that would likely be used.

      Most cellular carriers offer unlimited on-device data plans, but they cap data for tethering. Integrating an LTE modem into a laptop essentially requires a mobile data plan with unlimited tethering - which, AFAIK, doesn’t exist at the moment. I’m not sure why.

      • mcculley1 hour ago
        I think the biggest obstacle is the Qualcomm patents. There is no good reason why a MacBook Pro cannot have a feature that Dells have.
  • philodeon20 minutes ago
    To sum up the HN wisdom on Apple Silicon Macs:

    Before the M4 models: omg, Apple only gives you 8GB RAM in the base model? Garbage!

    After the M4 models: the previous laptops were so good, why would you upgrade?

  • daco1 hour ago
    Upgraded to a M1 Pro 14 in December 2021, and I still rock it everyday for dev purpose. Apple does great laptop.

    The only downsides is that I see a kind of "burnt?" transparent spot on my screen. When connecting to an HDMI cable, the sound does not ouput properly to the TV screen, and makes the video I plat laggy. Wondering if I go to the Apple Store, would fix it?

    • david_allison1 hour ago
      If you're still under AppleCare+, definitely give it a try before it expires.

      Personal anecdote: don't get your hopes up. I've had my issues rejected as 'no fault found', but it's definitely worth spending a bit of time on.

  • thesurlydev2 hours ago
    My wallet is trembling.

    On a side note, anyone know what database software was shown during the announcement?

  • e63f67dd-065b1 hour ago
    > MacBook Air with M2 and M3 comes standard with 16GB of unified memory, and is available in midnight, starlight, silver, and space gray, starting at $999 (U.S.) and $899 (U.S.) for education.

    At long last, I can safely recommend the base model macbook air to my friends and family again. At $1000 ($900 with edu pricing on the m2 model) it really is an amazing package overall.

  • doctoboggan3 hours ago
    Does anyone know of any good deals on the older models of apple laptops? Now is usually a great time to purchase (a still very capable) older model.
    • bigtex3 hours ago
      Watch SlickDeals. I think it was this time last year where lots of refurbs/2 generation old machines were going for massive discounts. Granted they were M1 machines, but some had 64GB RAM and 4TB drives for like $2700. Microcenter and B&H are good ones to watch as well.
    • fckgw3 hours ago
      Most retailers have had the older models on closeout for a few weeks now. Best Buy, Amazon and Costco have had the M3 models for a few hundred off depending on models.
    • tencentshill3 hours ago
      The M-series macbooks depreciate in value far slower than any of the Intel models. M1 base models can still sell for nearly $1k. It's difficult to find a really good deal.
    • 2wrist3 hours ago
      The refurbished store is always a good place to have a look through.
  • vishnugupta3 hours ago
    Can someone please help me out with this? I'm torn between Mac mini and and MacBook Pro, specifically the CPU spec difference.

    MBP: Apple M4 Max chip with 16‑core CPU, 40‑core GPU and 16‑core Neural Engine

    Mac mini: Apple M4 Pro chip with 14‑core CPU, 20‑core GPU, 16-core Neural Engine

    What kind of workload would make me regret not having bought MBP over Mac mini given the above. Thanks!

    • subarctic1 hour ago
      Doesn't it make a bigger difference that one of them is a laptop and one of them is a mini computer that you have to leave plugged in?
    • alberth3 hours ago
      Since the only real difference is number of GPUs, it'd be:

      - photo/video editing

      - games, or

      - AI (training / inference)

      that would benefit from the extra GPUs.

      • mixmastamyk1 hour ago
        ^3D work - Maya, Blender, etc. Probably would be best on a Studio or workstation if/when those are available again.
    • bhouston3 hours ago
      For normal web dev, any M4 CPU is good as it is mostly dependent on single core speed. If you need to compile Unreal Engine (C++ with lots of threads), video processing or 3D rendering, more cores is important.

      I think you need to pick the form factor that you need combined with the use case:

      - Mobility and fast single core speeds: MacBook Air

      - Mobility and multi-core: MacBook Pro with M4 Max

      - Desktop with lots of cores: Mac Studio

      - Desktop for single core: Mac mini

      I really enjoy my MacBook Air M3 24GB for desktop + mobile use for webdev: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41988340

  • bloopernova3 hours ago
    Trying to find how many external displays the base model supports. Because corps almost always buy the base model #firstworldproblems

    The base model doesn't support thunderbolt 5.

    And the base model still doesn't support more than 2 external displays without the DisplaySync (not DisplayPort!) hardware+software.

    • fckgw3 hours ago
      https://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/specs/

      "M4 and M4 Pro

      Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display at 1 billion colors and:

      Up to two external displays with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt, or one external display with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and one external display with up to 4K resolution at 144Hz over HDMI

      One external display supported at 8K resolution at 60Hz or one external display at 4K resolution at 240Hz over HDMI"

    • mmcnl3 hours ago
      Two displays with the lid open.

      "The display engine of the M4 family is enhanced to support two external displays in addition to a built-in display."

      https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/10/apple-introduces-m4-p...

  • lightoverhead1 hour ago
    The machine is great! How is its performance for AI model training? A lot of library and tools are not built for M series chip
  • david_allison4 hours ago
    > MacBook Pro with M4 Max enables:

    > Up to 4.6x faster build performance when compiling code in Xcode when compared to the 16‑inch MacBook Pro with Intel Core i9, and up to 2.2x faster when compared to the 16‑inch MacBook Pro with M1 Max.

    OK, that's finally a reason to upgrade from my M1.

  • azinman23 hours ago
    No wifi 7? Are others shipping it?
    • electriclove3 hours ago
      Strange because their latest iPhones do have Wifi 7
    • kristofferR3 hours ago
      Yup, Wi-Fi 7 devices have been shipping for over a year. My Odin 2 portable game console has Wi-Fi 7.
  • 3 hours ago
    undefined
  • daveisfera2 hours ago
    Once they get a MacBook Air with an M4, it will become a viable option for developers and other users that want/need 2 external monitors. Definitely looking forward to that happening.
    • uriah52 minutes ago
      The M3 Air does support 2 but only with the lid closed
  • commandersaki3 hours ago
    Hm, the M3 MacBook Pro had a 96GB of ram model (which is what I have). I wonder why it's not an option with the M4.
    • sliken2 hours ago
      M2 pro has 256 bit wide memory, mostly benefiting the GPU perf.

      M3 pro has 192 bit wide memory, GPU improvements mostly offset the decrease in memory bandwidth. This leads to memory options like 96GB.

      M4 pro has 256 bit wide memory, thus the factor of 2 memory options.

    • maxioatic2 hours ago
      It is interesting they only support 64gb and then jump to 128gb. It seems like a money play since it's $1,000 to upgrade for 128, and if you're running something that needs more than 64 (like LLMs?) you kind of have no choice.
  • smokey_the_bear3 hours ago
    I have an M2 Max now, and it's incredible. But it still can't handle running xcode's Instruments. I'd upgrade if the M4s could run the leaks tool seamlessly, but I doubt any computer could.
  • lenerdenator2 hours ago
    I'm just some dude, looking at a press release, wondering when Tim Apple is gonna be a cool dude and release the MBP in all of the colors that they make the iMac in.

    APPARENTLY NOT TODAY.

    C'mon mannnnn. The 90s/y2k are back in! People want the colorful consumer electronics! It doesn't have to be translucent plastic like it was back then but give us at least something that doesn't make me wonder if I live in the novel The Giver every time I walk into a meetup filled with MacBook Pros.

    I'm sure the specs are great.

  • brailsafe2 hours ago
    The base M4 Max only has an option for 36gb of ram!? They're doing some sus things with that pricing ladder again. No more 96gb option, and then to go beyond 48gb I'd have to spend another $1250 CAD on a processor upgrade first, and in doing so lose the option to have the now baseline 512gb ssd
    • brailsafe1 minute ago
      [delayed]
    • 1 hour ago
      undefined
  • dagmx4 hours ago
  • commandersaki4 hours ago
    New 12MP Center Stage Camera. Will it support 4k?
    • musictubes2 hours ago
      4k for videoconferencing is nuts. The new camera should be an improvement over the old. Plus, being able to show your actual, physical desktop can be Andy too. Using your iPhone as the webcam will still probably give you the best quality especially if you are in a lower light situation.
    • Almondsetat3 hours ago
      The 12MP will be used for better framing, there is still almost no use case for 4k quality video conferencing
      • bearjaws3 hours ago
        It is truly sad how bad Zoom / Google Meet / Teams are when it comes to video quality.

        I look at my local source vs the recording, and I am baffled.

        After a decade of online meeting software, we still stream 480p quality it seems.

        • Almondsetat1 hour ago
          When I have a full team of people with 1080p webcams and a solid connection I can notice the quality. Most of the time not everyone fulfills those requirements and the orchestrator system has to make do
        • sroussey2 hours ago
          FaceTime has great quality. Unfortunately, as you age you start to hate the quality.
        • fellowniusmonk2 hours ago
          I mean you can easily create your own fully meshed P2P group video chat in your browser just using a little bit of JS that would support everyone running 4k, but it will fail the moment you get more than 3-8 people as each persons video stream is eating 25mbps for every side of a peer connection (or 2x per edge in the graph.)

          A huge part of group video chat is still "hacks" like downsampling non-speaking participants so the bandwidth doesn't kill the connection.

          As we get fatter pipes and faster GPUs streaming will become better.

          edit: I mean... I could see a future where realtime video feeds never get super high resolution and everything effectively becomes a relatively seemless AI recreation where only facial movement data is transmitted similar to how game engines work now.

    • perfect-blue3 hours ago
      I don't think so. They would have made that a huge deal.
    • minimaxir2 hours ago
      Tech specs confirm only 1080p recording.
  • matsz4 hours ago
    Wonder how good are those for LLMs (compared to M3 Pro/Max)... They talk about the Neural Engine a lot in the press release.
    • Lalabadie3 hours ago
      I'm not sure we can leverage the neural cores for now, but they're already rather good for LLMs, depending on what metrics you value most.

      A specced out Mac Studio (M2 being the latest model as of today) isn't cheap, but it can run 180B models, run them fast for the price, and use <300W of power doing it. It idles below 10W as well.

  • bhouston3 hours ago
    Does anyone have benchmarks for the M4 Pro or M4 Max CPUs yet? Would love to see Geekbench scores for those.
  • sroussey3 hours ago
    No WiFi 7!

    :/

  • 4 hours ago
    undefined
  • wcski1 hour ago
    but does it have touch screen -_-
  • TIPSIO3 hours ago
    The keyboard touch button (top right) is objectively hideous and looks cheap. My current TouchBar may be useless but at least looks nice.
  • wslh3 hours ago
    I really like these new devices, but I’ve found that the latest MacBook Air (M3) is sufficient for my needs as a manager and casual developer. My MacBook Pro M1 Max has essentially become a desktop due to its support for multiple monitors, but since the Mac Mini M4 Pro can also support up to three external displays, I’m considering selling the MacBook Pro and switching to the Mini. I’ve also noticed that the MacBook Pro’s battery, as a portable device, is less efficient in terms of performance/battery (for my usage) compared to the MacBook Air.

    Regarding LLMs, the hottest topic here nowadays, I plan to either use the cloud or return to a bare-metal PC.

  • jerojero4 hours ago
    Finally they're doing starting memory at 16gb.

    Looking at how long the 8gb lasted it's a pretty sure bet that now you won't need to upgrade for a good few years.

    I mean, I have a MacBook air with 16gb of ram and it's honestly working pretty well to this day. I don't do "much" on it though but not many people do.

    I'd say the one incentive a MacBook Pro has over the air is the better a screens and better speakers. Not sure if it's worth the money.

    • efields4 hours ago
      My hypothesis is Apple is mostly right about their base model offerings.

      > I mean, I have a MacBook air with 16gb of ram and it's honestly working pretty well to this day. I don't do "much" on it though but not many people do.

      If an HN user can get along with 16gb on their MacBook Air for the last X years, most users were able to get by with 8gb.

      • skellington3 hours ago
        It's just a tactic to get a higher average price while being able to advertise a lower price. What makes it infuriating is memory is dirt cheap. That extra 8GB probably costs them $10 at most, but would add to utility and longevity of their hardware quite a bit.

        They are supposed to be "green" but they encourage obsolescence.

        • Spooky233 hours ago
          They align need with more CPU and margin. Apple wants as few SKUs as possible and as much margin as possible.

          8GB is fine for most use cases. Part of my gig is managing a huge global enterprise with six figures of devices. Metrics demonstrate that the lower quartile is ok with 8GB, even now. Those devices are being retired as part of the normal lifecycle with 16GB, which is better.

          Laptops are 2-6 year devices. Higher end devices always get replaced sooner - you buy a high end device because the productivity is worth spending $. Low end tend to live longer.

        • carlosjobim3 hours ago
          People looking for low prices buy PC, they don't even consider Mac. Then they can have a computer with all the "higher numbers", which is more important than getting stuff done.
    • axelthegerman4 hours ago
      > pretty sure bet that now you won't need to upgrade for a good few years.

      Or you could get a framework and you could actually upgrade parts that are worth upgrading - instead of upgrade as in buying a new one

      • ativzzz3 hours ago
        I bought a framework back in 2020 or so and really wish I just waited a little longer and spent a few hundred bucks more on the M1.

        It's fine, but the issue is linux sleep/hibernate - battery drain. To use the laptop after a few days, I have to plug it in and wait for it to charge a little bit because the battery dies. I have to shut it down (not just close the screen) before flying or my backpack becomes a heater and the laptop dies. To use a macbook that's been closed for months I just open it and it works. I'll pay double for that experience. If I want a computer that needs to be plugged in to work I have a desktop for that already. The battery life is not good either.

        Maybe it's better now if I take the time to research what to upgrade, but I don't have the time to tinker with hardware/linux config like I did a few years ago.

      • jerojero2 hours ago
        I don't mind spending a thousand bucks every 7 years to upgrade my laptop. I've had this macbook air since 2020 and besides the speakers don't being the best... I have no complaints.

        I don't really see a world where this machine doesn't last me a few more years. If there's anything i'd service would be the battery, but eh. It lasts more than a few hours and I don't go out much.

  • aquir2 hours ago
    Would it make sense to upgrade from M2 Pro 16 to M4 Pro 16? (both base models) I mean it terms of numbers, more cores, more RAM but everything else is pretty much the same. I am looking forward to see some benchmarks!
    • umanwizard2 hours ago
      Completely depends on what your workflow is.
    • sliken2 hours ago
      No.
  • gjvc2 hours ago
    As a proud user of an ARM3 in 1992, I'm pleased to be able to see and say that ARM won in the end.
  • alexnewman2 hours ago
    I recently switched back to using homemade desktops for most of my work. I’ve been running Debian on them . Still have my Mac laptop for working on the go
  • 2 hours ago
    undefined
  • alexashka1 hour ago
    The software stack has gotten so bad that no amount of hardware can make up for it.

    The compile times for Swift, the gigabytes of RAM everything seems to eat up.

    I closed all my apps and I'm at 10gb of RAM being used - I have nothing open.

    Does this mean the Macbook Air 8gb model I had 10 years ago would basically be unable to just run the operating system alone?

    It's disconcerting. Ozempic for terrible food and car-centric infrastructure we've created, cloud super-computing and 'AI' for coping with this frankenstein software stack.

    The year of the Linux desktop is just around the corner to save the day, right? Right? :)

    • carstenhag59 minutes ago
      Memory doesn't need to be freed until a different software needs it.
      • alexashka10 minutes ago
        I'm referring to what Activity Monitor app tells me in its memory tab - not the underlying malloc/whatever implementation being used.

        It tells me my computer is using 8gb of RAM after a restart and I haven't begun to open or close anything.

        When I open Xcode and tell it to run a macOS app I have made no changes to - I just timed it - it takes 30 seconds.

        I take a print statement and add ONE CHARACTER to the print statement and press Run - it takes 30 seconds again.

        No amount of hand waving can excuse this sort of nonsense in my mind.

  • jfoster4 hours ago
    Have they published this ahead of other pages or is it just me?

    The linked Apple Store page says "MacBook Pro blasts forward with the M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max chips" so it seems like the old version of the page still?

    • jasongill4 hours ago
      yes, it's not anywhere but the press release at this time
      • jfoster4 hours ago
        Looks like it's updated now.
        • jasongill4 hours ago
          yep, just updated a second ago
    • Hamuko4 hours ago
      I noticed the same, but it looks like the pre-order link now gives me M4 chips instead of M3.
  • fsflover4 hours ago
    > while protecting their privacy

    This is misleading:

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25074959

    "macOS sends hashes of every opened executable to some server of theirs"

    • ilikepi4 hours ago
      > This is misleading: ...

      To be fair, the link in this story is to a press release. Arguably there are probably many things in it that can be considered "misleading" in certain contexts.

    • moffkalast3 hours ago
      What's the deal with running Linux on these anyway? Could one conceivably set up an M4 mini as headless server? I presume Metal would be impossible to get working if MacOS uses proprietary drivers for it...
      • wmf2 hours ago
        Metal doesn't exist under Linux but OpenGL and Vulkan work.
    • whynotminot4 hours ago
      [flagged]
  • nightski4 hours ago
    I find it very odd that the new iMac has WiFi 7 but this does not... Also it is so aggravating they compare to 3 generations ago and not the previous generation in the marketing stats. It makes the entire post nearly useless.
    • parsimo20104 hours ago
      It is very aggravating, but if they advertised a comparison to last year's model and showed you small performance gains you might not want to buy it.

      A more charitable interpretation is that Apple only thinks that people with computers a few years old need to upgrade, and they aren't advertising to people with a <1 year old MacBook Pro.

    • klausa3 hours ago
      The iMac doesn’t have WiFi 7.
  • shrubble4 hours ago
    Disingenuous to mention the x86 based MacBooks as a basis for comparison in their benchmarks; they are trying to conflate current-gen Intel with what they shipped more than 4 years ago.

    Are they going to claim that 16GB RAM is equivalent to 32GB on Intel laptops? (/sarc)

    • alsetmusic4 hours ago
      Lot's of people don't upgrade on the cadence that users on this forum do. Someone was mentioning yesterday that they are trying to sell their Intel Mac {edit: on this forum] and asking advice on getting the best price. Someone else replied that they still had a 2017 model. I spoke to someone at my job (I'm IT) who told me they'd just ordered a new iMac to replace one that is 11 years old. There's no smoke and mirrors in letting such users know what they're in for.
      • michaelmueller3 hours ago
        Yup, I'm a developer who still primarily works on a 2018 Intel Mac. Apple's messaging felt very targeted towards me. Looking forward to getting the M4 Max as soon as possible!
        • trogdor1 hour ago
          Oh, wow. You are in for a treat.

          The only downside is that your computer will no longer double as a space heater :p

          • orangecat37 minutes ago
            Indeed. The one positive feature of the 2019 MBP I briefly had to use was that my cat loved taking naps on it.
      • postexitus3 hours ago
        I have a 2013 Macbook Air as a casual browsing machine that's still going strong (by some definition of it) after a battery replacement.
      • izacus4 hours ago
        Right, it's obviously that, not a marketing trick to make numbers look much bigger while comparing to old CPUs and laptops :)
        • alsetmusic1 hour ago
          Given that they also compare it to an M1 in the same aside, I'd say you're wrong.

          > Up to 23.8x faster basecalling for DNA sequencing in Oxford Nanopore MinKNOW when compared to the 16-inch MacBook Pro with Core i9, and up to 1.8x faster when compared to the 16-inch MacBook Pro with M1 Pro.

    • musictubes2 hours ago
      Ben Bejarin said that around 50% of the installed base is still using Macs with Intel chips. You’ll keep hearing that comparison until that number goes down.
    • hu34 hours ago
      They are going to milk these horrendous crazy hot x86 thermally throttled macs performance comparisons for a decade.
    • wiremine4 hours ago
      It could see it as disingenuous, or a targeted message to those users still on those older x86 machines.
      • Yabood3 hours ago
        Exactly how I read it. I have an intel model, and the press release felt like a targeted ad.
  • dcchambers4 hours ago
    > Now available in space black and silver finishes.

    No space grey?!

    • billti4 hours ago
      I don't think they had Space Grey on the M3 models either. That was initially my preference, but I went with the Black and quite like it.
  • adgxh4 hours ago
    [flagged]
  • vid4 hours ago
    [flagged]
    • Shekelphile2 hours ago
      If you’re willing to buy from a retailer you can usually get two or three year financing terms. sell it at the end of the payment term for half (or more) of what you paid in total and get a new one on a similar plan if you want.

      don’t think it’s wise though, i bought a base m1 pro mbp when it launched and don’t feel a need to upgrade at all yet. i’m holding off for a few more years to grab whenever the next major increase in local llm capability and battery life comes.

    • Ancapistani2 hours ago
      They have a business lease program - it's super easy to sign up for, and it's not like you have to have an LLC or something.
    • acyou4 hours ago
      If you're willing to play, here are plenty of lenders who will finance this purchase.

      If it affects your earning power to that extent, you should probably pony up and save in the long run, probably just a few years until you see returns.

      Caste system usually can't be bypassed by paying a monthly subscription fee.

      I will note that making it a subscription will tend to increase the overall costs, not decrease. In an environment with ready access to credit, I think offering on a subscription basis is worse for consumers?

    • mjlee3 hours ago
      I'm not sure about the caste system enforcement idea you have, but plenty of places (including Apple) lease MacBook Pros to businesses.
    • infecto3 hours ago
      Huh? My m1 is still kicking strong with little to no reason to upgrade.

      If it matters that much to you just sell the old one and buy the new. That's your subscription.

  • prmoustache3 hours ago
    Am I allowed to work on my laptop if I don't have a PRO cpu?
    • mathfailure2 hours ago
      Only if you work on your hobbies.
  • smallstepforman4 hours ago
    The adjectives in the linked article are nausiating. Apple’s marketing team fail as decent humans writting such drivel.

    Give us data, tell us whats new, and skip the nonsense buzz filling adjectives.

    To quote Russell Brand, just say he sat down, not that he placed his luscious ass in silk covered trousers on a velvetly smooth chair, experiencing pleasure as the strained thigh muscles received respite after gruelling on their feet watching a lush sunset in a cool summers evening breeze.

    • kps2 hours ago
      While we're bashing Apple marketing: `:prefers-color-scheme` is a11y. Take your fucking fashion statements elsewhere.
    • Veen3 hours ago
      I'm not sure Russel Brand is the best ambassador for plain English.
    • fckgw3 hours ago
      I don't think you understand what a press release is.
    • empath753 hours ago
      Most people buying macs don't care about specs, they care about _what they can do_.
  • gigatexal2 hours ago
    Lolz the M4 max doesn’t get anything more than 128GB ram in the MacBook? Weird
  • iluvcommunism3 hours ago
    I have an m3 ultra. I don’t think I need to upgrade. I also find it amusing they’re comparing the m4 to the m1 and i7 processors.
    • roopepal24 minutes ago
      I find it amusing how you answer your own "question" before asking it. Why would they target the marketing material at people who already know they aren't going to need to upgrade?
    • sroussey2 hours ago
      There is no M3 Ultra.