Apple Previews macOS 11.0 Big Sur - Available Fall 2020

[Azimuth1]

Yours’ (and my 2012 one’s) only hope will rely on dosdude1...

Thanks very much... I haven't even known of its existence !!! Very helpful... especially now ... because it's not the right moment to buy a MBP 13" ... even if I really would like to...

 

[K0be]

Apple estimates 4 years for macOS devices.

Environment - Answers

More answers to your questions about Apple and the environment.

www.apple.com

Apple estimates the life of the product to be 4 years, but not the support ends after 4 years.
And we're supposing that this 10th gen MBP is the last intel mac.
So for least 6 years we'll be supported.

Spoiler: apple website quote

1. To model customer use, we measure the power consumed by a product while it is running in a simulated scenario. Daily usage patterns are specific to each product and are a mixture of actual and modeled customer use data. For the purposes of our assessment, years of use, which are based on first owners, are modeled to be four years for macOS and tvOS devices and three years for iOS, iPad OS and watchOS devices. Most Apple products last longer and are often passed along, resold, or returned to Apple by the first owner for others to use. More information on our product energy use is provided in our Product Environmental Reports.

 

[Luka-s]

That is if you don't mind not having WIFI on your MacBook.

 

[mm2margaret]

For me, it just means that there's no real incentive to buying Intel based Macs anymore and paying such a high premium to do so. Sure, I would consider buying an Intel based Mac at a significant discount, but not at the current pricing.

I know of some Mac Pro users who've kept their original Mac Pros (pre-2011) for ten or twelve years, but can you really do that when they've been EOL'd now?

I was considering buying a Mac Pro, but no, not now, not at the current pricing. They've essentially been discontinued (the long slow way, of course). No reason I can see to pay a premium for that kind of system.

There are a lot of compromises in buying a Mac (particularly in graphics cards), and I'm glad I've kept my Windows up to date. I'll keep my hacks running (until they don't) and will switch to Windows when I have to, but I won't be buying Intel based Macs any time soon at the prices Apple currently charges. Soon, can't tell you exactly when, many buyers, particularly corporate and agency buyers, soon they will realize that buying a Intel based Mac will be a bad investment and they won't pull the trigger on a purchase.

 

[Bustycat]

Apple estimates the life of the product to be 4 years, but not the support ends after 4 years.
And we're supposing that this 10th gen MBP is the last intel mac.
So for least 6 years we'll be supported.

Spoiler: apple website quote

1. To model customer use, we measure the power consumed by a product while it is running in a simulated scenario. Daily usage patterns are specific to each product and are a mixture of actual and modeled customer use data. For the purposes of our assessment, years of use, which are based on first owners, are modeled to be four years for macOS and tvOS devices and three years for iOS, iPad OS and watchOS devices. Most Apple products last longer and are often passed along, resold, or returned to Apple by the first owner for others to use. More information on our product energy use is provided in our Product Environmental Reports.

Lasting longer doesn't mean being supported longer.

 

[beelzebozo]

The last time Apple switched architecture.

 

[K0be]

Lasting longer doesn't mean being supported longer.

It's insane to suppose a 2020 PRO machine not being supported for at least 6 years IMHO.
I would like to emphasize that macOS 11 will be compatible with 2013 Mac Pros and MacBooks.

 

[Bustycat]

It's insane to suppose a 2020 PRO machine not being supported for at least 6 years IMHO.
I would like to emphasize that macOS 11 will be compatible with 2013 Mac Pros and MacBooks.

Yeah but that is now. How would it be if Apple wants to accelerate the completion of Apple Silicon transition?

 

[K0be]

Yeah but that is now. How would it be if Apple wants to accelerate the completion of Apple Silicon transition?

Maybe won't be 6 years, but I bet not less than 4 years.
Apple can't screw up it's own machines. Maybe even from 2021 we'll no more see new intel macs, but current ones will be supported.

 

[randall.svancara]

I think it will take Apple a while to kill off Intel systems
1. It is more than just a CPU, you also need a graphics card and for high-end performance a lot of processing is offloaded to the graphics card. SOC architecture is great, but I don't see them embedding an AMD Radeon 580 into an ARM SOC. Also consider if this was the case, they would still need to write ARM-compatible drivers.
2. They just released the new cheese grater! It is based on an Intel Xeon platform. While there are ARM "servers" that do have many cores, there are things that you have to consider with multi-core architectures like interconnects which facilitate communication between CPUs which both Intel and AMD have figured out.

So in my opinion, Apple will attempt to build ARM SoC systems which will initially debut in their lower-end systems and probably hit a performance wall when they attempt to ramp up to higher-end systems which will take them a few more years of R&D, and company acquisitions to get it right. I think what you are seeing is a company announcing a strategic direction but the journey is long, a lot longer than simply migrating away from PowerPC. They had to do that, PowerPC was going nowhere. Intel-based systems are still going strong and the impetus to migrate is not there, especially if Intel concedes and gives Apple a bit more flexibility, which will probably happen or lose an incredible amount of the market.