Hey, Apple Silicon Macs are coming. By the end of the year they will be here and
my iPad is scared ….
Hey, Im Jerry and to the possible detriment of my iPad Pro with Magic Keyboard, new Macs with
Apple Silicon are coming. It is possible that the features an Apple Silicon MacBook could offer will
make it more compelling to use on the couch or when mobile, reducing the appeal of my iPad. EEK….
I love my 12.9” iPad Pro and the iPad magic keyboard.
Together they provide me with what I need 95% of the time when I am using a device.
It is my go-to couch and quick trip device because it does so many things so well.
Because the iPad is a tablet and touch-first device,
it doubles as a 2-in-one where you can just remove the iPad from the keyboard to play a game,
surf the web, or flick through twitter. And when I need to work on a video script,
or do my real day job work, I just slap this onto the magic keyboard and I am all
setup with a trackpad and keyboard that I can use to remote into my corporate servers and
thst is tjust a hest tjsjysd d,tiosdhfiusd fsoifu selapekjsd workstations, or crank out some emails.
The Apple A12x processor that is in this thing is almost 2 years old
and still blows away the performance of similarly priced laptops.
Heck, the single core performance is the same as my new 2020 mid-range iMac, but the iPad
is in such a compact package, rarely gets warm to the touch, and doesn’t have a fan.
There are so many great things about the iPad Pro with Magic Keyboard
that makes it functional AND fun to use;
however, there are a few instances where I need to move to a full Mac or PC desktop experience.
Safari on iPadOS 14 was upgraded to a “Full desktop browser”, but that’s not exactly accurate.
It does display webpages by default in the desktop mode but because it is still a “mobile” browser
underneath there are still times where a webpage just does not work correctly.
Some examples would be things like some government websites or forms that have not been upgraded for
modern devices. Things like google docs have been improved but if you go to a website that
incorporates maps you cant use the mouse and keyboard to zoom in. Things like that.
As I get more into the YouTube thing the way I create thumbnails keeps evolving. When I
first started, I used Canva to help design my thumbs and as I get better
at this I have moved to Photoshop, which now has an iPad App. Not all of the tools
have been ported yet to the iPad App and things works a bit differently so for now
my muscle memory pushes me towards my iMac to try and knock them out faster.
I love video editing on the ipad using lumafusion because it is fast and intuitive,
and I just just go though and create jump cuts with ease. Some of my videos are shot with
multiple cameras at the same time and to splice them together so I can quicky cut from camera A
to Camera B I need a desktop editor. Final Cut Pro X and Premiere Pro make it very simple to
synchronize multiple clips and just use the keyboard as it is playing to jump between cameras.
And whether I am editing a video or remoted into a work server sometimes I just need more
screen real-estate. Although you can connect an ipad to an external display it just mirrors
it and does not give you any more space to work with or extend beyond a single display.
I can think of a few more reasons when I actually need a desktop OS,
as limited in number as they are, but that is why my iPad should be scared.
When Apple Announced that Apple Silicon macs were coming, they talked about reaching the power of a
desktop with the power consumption of a laptop. Like I said earlier the iPad Pro from 2018 is as
fast in single core performance as my mid-range 2020 iMac. If you took the same A12x Chip and put
it in a bigger base with better thermal capacity I am certain the performance would be even better.
And just think, Apple is not going to throw an A12x in the new laptops. If you watch Luke Miani’s
video with his predictions of the A14X processor, he does a great job of breaking down the history
of Apple A series processor. Luke goes over the performance differences between the A and the AX
chips and decerns based on the averages that the A14X could be faster than the i9 in the latest
16” macbook pro, and just shy of the i9 iMac. Which if somewhat accurate, would be amazing.
And depending on which product you are talking about Apple could have
much bigger chips with more cores, more room for thermal limits, and maybe even multiple chips.
….A guy can dream….
Back to the Macbooks that could compete with my iPad Pro…
So, in the context of an A14X type processor in a Macbook or MacBook Air size laptop,
one could expect that the laptop may not get hot like the current Air does. The
current Air, with either an i5 or i7 can get uncomfortably hot just doing basic things.
Then god forbid, if you want to play an Apple Arcade game, or Minecraft,
you almost cant hear the game from the speakers over the super loud
fans. ………………………………..so, Its possible we could get killer performance without the need for a fan.
So a super high performance chip that is very power conservative, and doesn’t require a fan,
with a larger chassis, could lead to battery life that is beyond what anyone thought.
iPads, since the first generation, have been given battery estimates of around 10 hours of use.
Macbooks get what Apple calls “all day battery life” that with actual use ends
up somewhere around 4-6 hours. ………so, with low power needs and bigger chassis
I could see a situation where these new laptops can get 12-18 hours of battery life.
I don’t want to go into graphics chips too much, because I am not
a gamer and don’t really pay attention to them too much, but Apple did show off the A12X
running Final Cut Pro with graphics intensive changes on the fly. We also know how good many
of the games are on ipad and iPhone so it can be assumed that the graphics performance on these
new Apple Silicon chips will be above average and there are even rumors of Apple developing their
own discrete graphics cards which could really push the boundaries.
One advantage that the iPad has over a Mac is a touchscreen. We have all heard Apple’s
argument against touch screens on the Mac for the last 10 years, but, times are a changing.
So many Windows laptops have included touchscreens and so many kids are growing up in a touch first
world that I think Apple is looking at adding touchscreens to the mac in the future.
Im not saying that touchscreens are always good or good for everything,
but sometimes, just based on what you are doing, it is simpler to just reach up and
swipe on the screen instead of using a mouse or trackpad. …………………..and if you want to see
potential evidence of touch ability coming to the Mac, look at the demos of MacOS Big Sur.
The control center has horizontal sliders for changing things like volume and brightness
which look very much like they are built for touch. Add in apple pencil support and……………hmmm
I think that some people want it, in some cases touch on the Mac would be useful,
and it is almost inevitable at this point. The only question is when.
And the last thing I think is coming to the Mac with Apple Silicon………Cellular connectivity.
Finally, we will be able to buy a mac, slap a sim card in it, and have internet connectivity
anywhere and any time. ……………I use the cellular data in my iPad all the time.
I love it. I like the convenience of it always being on and not having to find
and connect to a wifi network. I think they are more secure than any public wifi and I don’t need
to agree to any BS terms or restrictions compared to say a Hotel wifi connection.
SO, If you take a Mac that can run all the desktop software you need
without restrictions, add in all the benefits of an iPad
like performance, low heat, battery life, touch-screen, and cellular connectivity,
what you are left with is almost a no compromise portable computing experience……..sure,
you may not be able to remove the screen from the keyboard but that is such a limited use for me.
If half of what we talked about today is accurate, then My ipad should be shaking in
its boots because I am not sure that I can resist such a full featured device with so many benefits.
If you love the iPad for what it is and are just looking to find ways to
make it a little more like a laptop, you should check out this video over here.
If you liked this video hit the thumbs up button and subscribe for videos on all the
cool new things coming out soon. Thanks for watching and Ill see you next time.