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Good morning! āļø *Tim Cook voice*
Today, weāre discussing the new Macs coming out next week,Ā Appleās controversial earnings, the latest software, and more!
Estimated reading time: 3.4 minutes
šĀ Poll
In the last poll, I asked: When do you plan to buy your next Mac?
Here were some of my favorite replies:
Not anytime soon - āI have been using Apple computers since 1984 when they introduced the Macintosh 128k and had all the various iterations up until my last purchase of an iMac 27inch, which I occasionally still use. But at the age of 77 I will not be buying another but have just purchased an iPhone 15 Pro which will suffice.ā
This Year - āThis year or early 2024 with the M3. I'm starting my graduate studies in January 2024 in Computer Science and an M3 Mac would really be nice with maxed-out specs, I currently have the 2020 Intel MacBook Pro and have been missing out on Apple silicon and now I have a reason to upgrade.ā
Next 3-4 years - āWith ļ£æ silicon Macs being so good, the need or desire to upgrade is lessened all the more. Redesigned versions will be far more tempting than the actual chip upgrades. ļ£æ silicon Macs have tremendous performance and longevity IMHO.ā
This week: If Apple made an 18-inch MacBook, would you want one?
Would you buy an 18" MacBook if Apple made one? |
š» M3: Not as Good as it Seems
Earlier this week, Apple announced new MacBook Proās and a new 24ā iMac with the all-new M3 chips. They were available to pre-order after the Scary Fast event and will be releasing next week.
Btw, that entire Scary Fast event was shot on an iPhone 15 Pro Max. How insane is that!? You can watch Appleās behind-the-scenes footage from the event here.
Anyways, hereās a brief recap of what is being released next week:
24ā iMac with M3 chip
14-inch MacBook Pro with M3 chip
14 & 16-inch MacBook Pro with M3 Pro & M3 Max chips
So yes, the 13-inch MacBook Pro with the Touch Bar is officially dead!
But the new entry level MBP thatās replacing it isā¦ not as good as it seems.
The base 14-inch MacBook Pro is $1599 and while that might seem like a good price for a MacBook Pro, you might want to look closer at the other options. Here are my thoughts:
The M3 MacBook Pro only has 2 Thunderbolt ports, the M3 Pro/Max models have 3
M3 can only output to 1 external display, M3 Pro supports 2, and M3 Max supports 4 external displays.
M3 comes with 8GB of RAM, so once you upgrade to 16GB, youāre at $1799 - only $200 away from the M3 Pro machine that comes with more CPU cores, GPU cores, and 18GB of RAM. Easy decision!
And that was my exact thought process when trying to determine which MacBook Pro I was going to order as my new main laptop.
So, if you need more than 8GB of RAM, which I believe most professionals do, skip the M3 MBP and go for the base M3 Pro MBP this year. Minimum.
And if you canāt justify an extra $200, you likely arenāt the target market for a MacBook Pro, so you might benefit more from the 15-inch M2 MacBook Air.
On the other hand, the 24ā iMac with M3 will be a decent upgrade over the previous M1 version, but unfortunately it comes in the same colors and Apple did not give it the M3 Pro chip like I was hoping for.
Meanwhile, the M3 Max is insane. Leaked GeekBench scores show it performs similar to the M2 Ultra chip! If you can afford it, the M3 Max MacBook Pro seems like a solid upgrade no matter which Mac youāre coming from.
Anyways, I will have all of the new Macs in the studio next week and compare them in real-world scenarios, so stay tuned!
š° Apple Earnings - Are They Dying?
Apple YoY revenue growth after Q4 results
Apple announced their Q4 2023 earnings on Thursday and man, there was a lot of doom & gloom headlines floating around. Weāll address that in a moment, but first, here are the results:
Revenue: $89.5B vs $89.35B (expected)
EPS $1.46 vs $1.39 (expected)
iPhone revenue: $43.8B vs $43.73B (expected)
Services revenue: $22.3B vs $21.36B (expected)
Mac revenue: $7.6B vs $8.76B (expected)
iPad revenue: $6.4B vs $6.33B (expected)
Wearables revenue: $9.3B vs $9.41B (expected)
Now the reason there were a lot of āApple is dyingā headlines plastered all over X after this report, is being Appleās sales decline for the 4th straight quarter. That hasnāt been done since 2001!
But hereās why that statistic is essentially irrelevant:
Net income increased 10.8% YoY
New all-time revenue record for Services
New Q4 record for iPhone revenue
New all-time high for active devices
So, yeah, Apple is not dying. Donāt believe everything you read on X/the news.
Per Appleās press release:
āToday Apple is pleased to report a September quarter revenue record for iPhone and an all-time revenue record in Services,ā said Tim Cook, Appleās CEO. āWe now have our strongest lineup of products ever heading into the holiday season, including the iPhone 15 lineup and our first carbon neutral Apple Watch models, a major milestone in our efforts to make all Apple products carbon neutral by 2030.ā
āOur active installed base of devices has again reached a new all-time high across all products and all geographic segments, thanks to the strength of our ecosystem and unparalleled customer loyalty,ā said Luca Maestri, Appleās CFO. āDuring the September quarter, our business performance drove double digit EPS growth and we returned nearly $25 billion to our shareholders, while continuing to invest in our long-term growth plans.ā
Let's Talk Software
Apple skipped the week for software updates, but things will pick back up next week. Hereās what to expect:
iOS 17.2 Beta 2
watchOS 10.2 Beta 2
macOS Sonoma 14.2 Beta 2
tvOS 17.2 Beta 2
We could also see a double point update (iOSĀ 17.1.1) in the coming weeks before the final release of iOS 17.2, which Iām expecting in December.
Other iOS-related tidbits:
Resident Evil Village is now available on iPhone 15 Pro & M1/M2 iPads. It plays very well and still shocks me that these graphics/scenes are possible on a smartphone
A new AirTag firmware update dropped this week. Build number is 2A61
8 new games will be added to Apple Arcade in November and December, following the first ever price increase
šØ New Wallpaper Collection
Last week, I soft launched my largest wallpaper collection yet, OPULENT. Since last week, Iāve added a few extra wallpapers & increased the quality even further!
So, if you want to support me directly and also get 100+ dark-themed wallpapers, hereās an awesome opportunity to do so!
You can grab the wallpapers here and feel free to share your favorite Home Screen setups with me over on Instagram or X!
š°Ā Quick News Bites
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