Every once in a while, usually once per decade or so, there is one big change that happens in tech that affects everything. Not just that, but it also affects our everyday lives.

A good example would be the introduction of the first iPhone back in 2007, which literally changed how future Phones looked and functioned to this very day. Samsung’s Flexible Display Technology from 2011 allowed us to have the Foldable Smartphones that we have today, with many more to come in the future. Tesla’s Autopilot has redefined, and will continue to redefine, the car industry. Now…there is another big change just around the corner and this time, it’s all about the Processor.

So, get ready for a bit more of a technical video and have those snacks ready and enjoy!

Up until 2006, Apple Macs were using PowerPC Processors. PowerPC were a type of Reduced Instruction Set Architecture Processors, which were created in 1991 by, ironically, Apple, IBM and Motorola. This was also known as the AIM Alliance.

The whole idea behind PowerPC Processors was for them to be affordable to the average consumer, rather than for high-end business computers. Additionally, they were intended to not just be very powerful for the average user, but also allow Programmers to very quickly and easily write Code for them. This was all good. From 1994 up until 2006, Apple had only been using PowerPC Processors. But at WWDC 2005, Steve Jobs went on stage to make a big announcement. He announced that Apple will be moving from PowerPC Processors, to Intel Processors.

The main reason for this was ‘Performance per Watt. He said that PowerPC Processors gave Macs around 15 Units of Performance per Watt, whereas Intel was giving them 70 Units, almost five times as much. This is why Apple switched from PowerPC, to Intel Processors. Intel’s Chips were more powerful and also consumed less energy, meaning that their machines could be thinner and more portable, which was very important back then. Devices back then were not as thin and portable as they are now.

Apple’s Processors haven’t always come from Intel

Now, switching to a new Processor, especially when it has a different Architecture, is extremely difficult and PowerPC and Intel were both based on a completely different Architectures. PowerPC CPU’s were based on the POWER Instruction Set Architecture, whereas Intel CPU’s were based on the x86-64 Architecture. What this means was that they were speaking completely different languages.

This also meant that every single new program had to be re-written from scratch, but macOS in itself was not capable of running on Intel Processors unless of course, they had a Translator. That Translator was called Rosetta, named after the stone that helped us translate Ancient Egyptian, as the top half of it was written in ancient Egyptian, whilst the bottom half was written in ancient Greek. Anyway, Rosetta translated PowerPC instructions into x86-64 instructions, which meant that most, but not all programs that were developed for the PowerPC era, could actually run on Intel based Macs without the need for a full re-write.

It wasn’t perfect, just like when you’re translating between two different languages, some expressions just won’t translate that well. So, while PowerPC Apps could run on Intel Macs, Native Apps that were designed for Intel Macs first would always run better. That transition actually went very smoothly and fast forward 14 years and up until this point, Apple has kept on using Intel Processors in all of their Macs.

However, Apple is now switching from Intel, to their own Apple Series of Processors and this change will be even bigger than the last one.

Why?

Why switch? Isn’t Intel the market leader when it comes to CPU’s? They are in terms of sales, but they’ve been having some serious issues in the last few years.

You see, the way a CPU works is that they have these tiny Transistors that can pass electrical current through them, which the CPU then reads as one’s and zero’s. Modern CPU’s have billions of Transistors and the smaller and thinner these are, the faster they can pass the current through and therefore, the faster the CPU. It’s like driving a car from NY to LA to deliver a package, compared to driving from your house to your neighbour’s house, to deliver the same package. Obviously, the package will get to your neighbour’s house much faster as the distance is smaller, CPU’s work in the same way.

Apple will soon be making Processors with Transistors that are only twice as thick as Human DNA.

The size at which the Transistors inside a Processor are measured at is just in a few Nano-Metres. Intel has been using a 14nm manufacturing process and just to give you an idea of how thin those Transistors are, a human hair is around 90,000nm in thickness. A single strand of human DNA is 2.5nm. Intel’s has been manufacturing transistors at 14nm, which is pretty incredible. But, Intel has been releasing 14nm CPU’s since 2014 and they’ve been trying to switch to 10nm, the next step in the manufacturing process, since. They’ve only been able to do it in 2019.

Apple, on the other hand, switched to 10nm in 2017, two years ahead of Intel. Not only that, but Apple has since switched to 7nm in 2018 and will switch to 5nm in 2020, with the upcoming Apple A14 Processors. Apple is already three generations ahead of Intel when it comes to the manufacturing process. To be more accurate, TSMC is, they are the actual manufacturers for Apple’s CPU’s. Additionally, AMD is also manufacturing on a 7nm process now, being two generations ahead of Intel.

Intel launched 10nm in 2019, but even now in 2020, only ‘Y’ & ‘U’ Series Mobile CPU’s come with it. Desktop and high-end Laptop Processors, such as the H-Series that you would find on a 16” MacBook Pro for example, those are still based on a 14nm process.

Even if you take a look at the 10nm ‘Y’ & ‘U’ Series Processors, not even all of the models are based on the 10nm process, some are still 14nm CPU’s. It’s so horribly confusing. The whole point of Intel’s 10th Generation Processors was to finally switch to 10nm, but they’ve only done that on around 20% of their 10th Generation CPU’s, the rest are still 14nm. AMD Processors now out-perform Intel quite substantially and they even do it at a lower price.

Not only that, but Apple has improved their own Processors so much, that even the 2018 iPad Pro now out-performs most Laptop Processors from Intel. The iPad Pro has significantly better performance than a 2020 baseline 13” MacBook Pro, it’s even better than the higher-end model. The iPad Pro is also significantly thinner than a Laptop and it does not even have a Fan in it, it is all passively cooled, whereas Laptops need to have gigantic Cooling Systems.

The new iPad Pro is a great example of what Apple can achieve with their own technology.

These are the two main reasons why Apple wants to move away from Intel. They want better Performance and they want that Performance at a lower power consumption than at what Intel offers, which means that they can make way more portable devices with a significantly better Battery Life. Imagine having an iMac that’s as thin as an iPad Pro, or a MacBook Pro that lasts for 20 hours, or more, on a single charge.

But, there is one more reason why Apple wants to switch now. Unlike 2005, when they were just looking for better performance at a lower power consumption, Apple now has the iPhone and the iPad, none of which they had back in 2005. Those devices also run on Apple’s own Processors, which means that Apple can now unify their entire line of devices and have any APPS run on the iPhone, the iPad and on the Mac natively, with no changes in the code required. This means that you’ll be able to run any iPhone App directly on your Mac including Instagram, Facebook Messenger or basically anything.

Moreover, Mac Apps such as Final Cut Pro X and Logic Pro X will also able to run on iPhone and iPad. In fact, Apple even showed FCP X running on a Mac Mini with an Apple A12Z Processor, the same Processor as in the iPad Pro 2020. While it did have 16GB of RAM, compared to the 6GB on the iPad, and the CPU was likely cooled too, it could actually play three streams of 4K ProRes with effects at the same time, without dropping any frames at all. A 16” MacBook Pro can run around 11 streams of 4K ProRes, which is quite a bit more, this would also be ProRes RAW. But, keep in mind that the A12Z is just a Tablet Processor. Apple already mentioned that they’re working on multiple variants of their own CPU’s to be used in Macs, which Apple hasn’t really showed yet.

However, they did show us this graph that compared their Processors to the current devices that Apple is offering. Whilst Apple’s range is quite big, we can indeed tell that they are developing Laptop Processors that are just on par with Intel’s lowest-end Desktop Processors, while also having less power consumption than Intel’s current Laptop Processors .That equates to a 12” MacBook or a MacBook Air with a 20 hour Battery Life, having more performance than the regular iMac. Now, if we take a look at the upper part of this graph, we can see that Apple’s even aiming to make Processors better than any Desktop Processors that Intel has now, with just a bit more power consumption than a current Laptop.

These are very bold claims but I do believe that they can pull this off, especially if we take a look at what they’ve already achieved with the iPad alone.

Ok, so now that we’ve covered the ‘Why’, what about the ‘How’?

How?

To help this transition, Apple is bringing back Rosetta. Credit: Apple

MacOS Big Sur, which is coming out later this year, will be the first macOS that has been developed for both x86-64 Intel Processors and ARM Processors (ARM being the Architecture that Apple’s using for their own Chips). Apple will be using the same Rosetta tool that they used back in 2006 to switch from PowerPC to Intel, which is now called Rosetta 2 and will translate x86-x64 Code, into ARM code. This means that you’ll still be able to run all of your Intel software on future ARM Macs.

Native apps will still run much better, FCP X was a good example and Apple has also shown Photoshop as well as Lightroom, which were both running extremely smooth. Lightroom was able to open up a massive library of RAW photos without any lag or slowdown whatsoever. On the Mac, I always get the beachball and some lag here and there whenever I do that, so that’s crazy.

When?

You’re probably wondering, when is this transition going to happen and how would you be impacted?

We could soon be looking at one unified system for the Mac line-up.

Well, Apple has said that this transition would take two years. Meaning that by the end of 2022, we should have an Apple Processor in every single Mac that Apple sells, from the MacBook Air, all the way up to the Mac Pro, which is nuts. ARM CPU’s have never been designed for sustained workloads but it seems that this concept has been proven wrong, ‘The Verge’ reports that Japan has developed a supercomputer using ARM Processors and it turns out that this is now the fastest computer in the entire world, with it also being 2.8 times faster than the previous most powerful supercomputer in the world. So, ARM is definitely looking very promising.

Now, Intel based Macs will still be supported for a number of years, but if you do plan on getting a Mac now, I would highly highly advise you to wait until the end of the year when Apple would be releasing their first Mac with an Apple Processor. Ming-Chi Kuo says that it will be a new 13” MacBook Pro. I’m fine with that, so I can’t wait!

MacOS big Sur

I just want to touch a bit on macOS Big Sur. This is really the biggest software update since macOS Yosemite, which changed up the design significantly from the previous design language that macOS Mavricks used. ‘Big Sur’ is an even bigger change as it adds a ton of elements from the iPhone and the iPad, to macOS. We even get things such as Control Centre and the same iOS-style Toggles.

While I do really like this design a lot, it kind of looks like it was made for Touch Input first because, well, it was. The iOS UI was made for Touch Input rather than Mouse Input. So, the fact that Apple’s adding the exact same design language and the same UI style makes me think that maybe we will see a TouchScreen Mac in the not too distant future. That would be pretty amazing.

I wouldn’t exactly call this a ‘Unified Design’. Credit: Apple

The start-up sound is back, which is quite interesting to see, alongside a ton of design elements from iOS. These include the Notification Panel and the indicator that shows amount of battery you have left in hours, is now back. They’ve also just cleaned up the entire UI a lot.

I do have two main concerns regarding Big Sur’s design. Firstly, the UI elements and how they just don’t feel right, they were designed for Touch Input. My second concern is the Icons. Apple is calling this a unified design, but they don’t look the same. They all have this weird shadow that is on the inside, very strange. We don’t have this on iOS and it just looks as if different Icons were designed by different people. The ‘Reminders’ Icon has no shadow at all, whereas the ‘Messages’ Icon does. Hopefully Apple fixes this by October, when macOS Big Sur is said to be released to the public.

Anyway, I’m definitely looking forward to the future of the Mac and this transition will shape the entire tech industry. It will end up forcing more companies to innovate into the Mobile CPU space and of course, forcing Intel to do something about their CPU offering because at this point, AMD is ahead and it seems like Apple is now ahead as well.