Apple keynote 20205/1/2023 ![]() ![]() “Performance is enough of a reason to change, but it’s just part of the story,” Srouji said. Of course, Apple has been headed in this direction for a while now. While many developers will test their apps this summer on a Mac mini running the same A12Z Bionic processor that’s in the 2020 iPad Pro, Apple’s shipping ARM Macs will contain processors that are not left over from an iPad, but made specifically for them. Srouji also made it clear that Apple is designing a series of processors that are purpose built for the Mac, just as it has built custom processors for the iPhone, the iPad, and the Apple Watch. I appreciated his line about how the 2018 iPad Pro’s status as a device that was more powerful than most PC laptops “foreshadows how well this architecture scales to the Mac.” Of course, Srouji doesn’t want to steal the thunder of future Mac product announcements, but he does want to impress upon all of us that there are good reasons. In a lengthy presentation, Apple’s chip czar Johny Srouji offered a few tantalizing suggestions about why Apple was making this move. I would imagine that, eventually, there will be a way to run Windows on ARM Macs-but it may take a while and it may be a slow, frustrating experience when it does arrive. Apple made a point of highlighting virtualization features that are built into macOS Big Sur running on Apple Silicon, but these seem to be for virtualizing operating systems built for Apple’s processors, not for emulating an operating system built for a different processor. People who rely on running Windows apps on their Macs, however, will not find a comforting story. Apple has also indicated that these new Macs will follow the same general software policies as current Macs do, so they won’t be restricted to only Mac App Store apps or anything like that. ![]() For those that won’t, there’s Rosetta 2, a code-translation system that builds a version of your apps translated in advance for the new chips and using native system features whenever possible-so even your old, not-yet-native apps will run, and probably run at decent speeds. That means that many apps will run natively on Apple’s chips from the start. Mac development almost entirely occurs with Apple’s development tools and compilers, so the path will be fairly straightforward for developers. This transition is likely to be the smoothest of the three. The Mac begins the third processor transition of its life with a move from Intel processors to Apple-designed ARM processors that Apple’s referring to, generically, as “Apple silicon.” (My guess is that this is a necessary placeholder until Apple unveils the specific name for this series of processors when the first ARM Macs ship later this year.) Bye Intel, hello Apple silicon Apple senior vice president of Hardware Technologies Johny Srouji. ![]() I’m still getting my bearings, and it’s important to pace one’s self for the week to come, but here are a few of my quick observations about the opening day of Apple’s first-ever virtual WWDC. And the carefully orchestrated keynote video was of an even higher density than Apple’s presentations usually are. But I’ve been going to WWDC since the late 90s, so today was… strange. Most people attend WWDC remotely every year, watching video sessions in the comfort of their homes and offices. Note: This story has not been updated since 2020. ![]()
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