Monday, June 22nd 2020
Apple announces Mac transition to Apple silicon
In a historic day for the Mac, Apple today announced it will transition the Mac to its world-class custom silicon to deliver industry-leading performance and powerful new technologies. Developers can now get started updating their apps to take advantage of the advanced capabilities of Apple silicon in the Mac. This transition will also establish a common architecture across all Apple products, making it far easier for developers to write and optimize their apps for the entire ecosystem.
Apple today also introduced macOS Big Sur, the next major release of macOS, which delivers its biggest update in more than a decade and includes technologies that will ensure a smooth and seamless transition to Apple silicon. Developers can easily convert their existing apps to run on Apple silicon, taking advantage of its powerful technologies and performance. And for the first time, developers can make their iOS and iPadOS apps available on the Mac without any modifications.
To help developers get started with Apple silicon, Apple is also launching the Universal App Quick Start Program, which provides access to documentation, forums support, beta versions of macOS Big Sur and Xcode 12, and the limited use of a Developer Transition Kit (DTK), a Mac development system based on Apple's A12Z Bionic System on a Chip (SoC).
Apple plans to ship the first Mac with Apple silicon by the end of the year and complete the transition in about two years. Apple will continue to support and release new versions of macOS for Intel-based Macs for years to come, and has exciting new Intel-based Macs in development. The transition to Apple silicon represents the biggest leap ever for the Mac.
"From the beginning, the Mac has always embraced big changes to stay at the forefront of personal computing. Today we're announcing our transition to Apple silicon, making this a historic day for the Mac," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "With its powerful features and industry-leading performance, Apple silicon will make the Mac stronger and more capable than ever. I've never been more excited about the future of the Mac."
Family of Mac SoCs to Deliver Powerful New Features and Best-in-Class Performance
For over a decade, Apple's world-class silicon design team has been building and refining Apple SoCs. The result is a scalable architecture custom designed for iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch that leads the industry in unique features and performance per watt, and makes each of them best in class. Building upon this architecture, Apple is designing a family of SoCs for the Mac. This will give the Mac industry-leading performance per watt and higher performance GPUs—enabling app developers to write even more powerful pro apps and high-end games. And access to technologies such as the Neural Engine will make the Mac an amazing platform for developers to use machine learning. This will also create a common architecture across all Apple products, making it far easier for developers to write and optimize software for the entire Apple ecosystem.
macOS Big Sur Enables Transition to Apple Silicon
In macOS Big Sur, Apple is offering a range of technologies to make the transition to Apple silicon smooth and seamless. With everything built into Xcode 12, such as native compilers, editors, and debugging tools, most developers will be able to get their apps running in a matter of days. Using Universal 2 application binaries, developers will be able to easily create a single app that taps into the native power and performance of the new Macs with Apple silicon, while still supporting Intel-based Macs. With the translation technology of Rosetta 2, users will be able to run existing Mac apps that have not yet been updated, including those with plug-ins. Virtualization technology allows users to run Linux. Developers can also make their iOS and iPadOS apps available on the Mac without any modifications.
Quick Start Program Lets Developers Get Started Today
Apple Developer Program members can start moving their apps to Apple silicon today by applying for the Universal App Quick Start Program. The program provides access to documentation, forums support, beta versions of macOS Big Sur and Xcode 12, and includes the limited use of a DTK, which will enable developers to build and test their Universal 2 apps. The DTK, which must be returned to Apple at the end of the program, consists of a Mac mini with Apple's A12Z Bionic SoC inside and desktop specs, including 16 GB of memory, a 512 GB SSD, and a variety of Mac I/O ports. Developers can apply to the program at developer.apple.com, and the total cost of the program is $500.
Apple today also introduced macOS Big Sur, the next major release of macOS, which delivers its biggest update in more than a decade and includes technologies that will ensure a smooth and seamless transition to Apple silicon. Developers can easily convert their existing apps to run on Apple silicon, taking advantage of its powerful technologies and performance. And for the first time, developers can make their iOS and iPadOS apps available on the Mac without any modifications.
Apple plans to ship the first Mac with Apple silicon by the end of the year and complete the transition in about two years. Apple will continue to support and release new versions of macOS for Intel-based Macs for years to come, and has exciting new Intel-based Macs in development. The transition to Apple silicon represents the biggest leap ever for the Mac.
"From the beginning, the Mac has always embraced big changes to stay at the forefront of personal computing. Today we're announcing our transition to Apple silicon, making this a historic day for the Mac," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "With its powerful features and industry-leading performance, Apple silicon will make the Mac stronger and more capable than ever. I've never been more excited about the future of the Mac."
Family of Mac SoCs to Deliver Powerful New Features and Best-in-Class Performance
For over a decade, Apple's world-class silicon design team has been building and refining Apple SoCs. The result is a scalable architecture custom designed for iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch that leads the industry in unique features and performance per watt, and makes each of them best in class. Building upon this architecture, Apple is designing a family of SoCs for the Mac. This will give the Mac industry-leading performance per watt and higher performance GPUs—enabling app developers to write even more powerful pro apps and high-end games. And access to technologies such as the Neural Engine will make the Mac an amazing platform for developers to use machine learning. This will also create a common architecture across all Apple products, making it far easier for developers to write and optimize software for the entire Apple ecosystem.
macOS Big Sur Enables Transition to Apple Silicon
In macOS Big Sur, Apple is offering a range of technologies to make the transition to Apple silicon smooth and seamless. With everything built into Xcode 12, such as native compilers, editors, and debugging tools, most developers will be able to get their apps running in a matter of days. Using Universal 2 application binaries, developers will be able to easily create a single app that taps into the native power and performance of the new Macs with Apple silicon, while still supporting Intel-based Macs. With the translation technology of Rosetta 2, users will be able to run existing Mac apps that have not yet been updated, including those with plug-ins. Virtualization technology allows users to run Linux. Developers can also make their iOS and iPadOS apps available on the Mac without any modifications.
Quick Start Program Lets Developers Get Started Today
Apple Developer Program members can start moving their apps to Apple silicon today by applying for the Universal App Quick Start Program. The program provides access to documentation, forums support, beta versions of macOS Big Sur and Xcode 12, and includes the limited use of a DTK, which will enable developers to build and test their Universal 2 apps. The DTK, which must be returned to Apple at the end of the program, consists of a Mac mini with Apple's A12Z Bionic SoC inside and desktop specs, including 16 GB of memory, a 512 GB SSD, and a variety of Mac I/O ports. Developers can apply to the program at developer.apple.com, and the total cost of the program is $500.
61 Comments on Apple announces Mac transition to Apple silicon
Some notes:
Dual boot? No everyone wants to program in a vm.
Will I be able to compile xcode programs at will or there is a dev edition for the mac os arm?
No thanks I'm on android and linux/windows for a reason.
I'm satisfied in Apple providing updates to their smartphones like no other. 7 years seems low for a laptop/desktop though. Let's be honest, at this point a good 10 y/o machine still does just fine for general websurfing/youtube/et alii home use.
It would be a shame to me if Apple doesn't make use of Ryzen to at least some extent e.g. iMac Pro and Mac Pro.
Anandtech will start hyping it up with their useless garbage SPEC scores, which shows A series are from space but in reality of Application perfomrance of finishing the task on an Android Qualcomm based phone vs A series no difference. I just hope this even pushes more innovation on x86, thank you AMD for doing that with ZEN and I hope Intel innovates so that we can still keep our machines build by ourselves and used like what we wish.
Also this should put the CISC vs RISC debate to rest for a while, at least here ~
New #1 Supercomputer: Fujitsu’s Fugaku and A64FX take Arm to the Top with 415 PetaFLOPs
The ISA doesn't matter, never did. It's all about performance, optimizations & of course the ecosystem.
Unless I'm missing something, Apple have just condemned the Mac lineup to the same "mobile-first" software plague that severely harmed the desktop PC a decade ago.
Developers aren't going to write full-fat software Just for MacOS, for free, no. The Mac lineup is going to get the lowest-common-denominator treatment where porting an iOS version to desktop is the path of least resistance.
If Apple throws billions in the direction of the software giants that cover the majority of the market, they may get somewhere.
Incoming US supercomputers
Frontier project, Cray's AMD fusion solution has 1.5 ExaFLOPS (2021) with PCIe 4.0 lanes.
Aurora project, Intel's fusion solution has 1 ExaFLOPS (2021).
Fujitsu’s Fugaku ARM SoC has PCIe 3.0 lanes. A64FX has 512 bit SIMD support.
Sometime in 2020, AMD's CDNA Radeon Instinct includes Tensor cores.
I think this is actually the best thing they can do to differentiale themselves even more, to be in control of literally every design decision, from software to hardware in one laptop or computer. This has already always been the big thing about apple products for years, not they are just making the last logical step. Literally nothing points to locking anything for professional users, and I believe there's absolutely no way Apple would be this dumb and do anything to scare this huge group of users away. That would literally make no sense for their Mac product lineup, especially for the use case of something like a MacBook Pro compared to a an IPad. Those are literally two different worlds of users for Apple.
Out of the box, MacOS platform has inferior hardware raytracing.
I watched the KeyNote and they were using the full Final Cut Pro and even that was running at full speed working with full 4K HDR video footage without skipping a beat.
I hate to sound like an Apple fanboy here, but I think they nailed it.
Yawn.
Oh, and "Metal Only".
While I don't disagree that Apple's ecosystem is a high walled garden, it is also this walled garden that allows them to pull this sort of transition a lot easier than their competitors. With developers onboard with Apple's transition because its lucrative with a user base that tend to spend on apps/ games, this will also aid the transition.
I don't think the impact will be too massive.