A $100,000 touchscreen MacBook, Apple wants to overthrow Steve Jobs

IDC analysts believe that continued supply constraints and inventory backlogs at the beginning of the year as manufacturers and distributors rushed to stock up in response to rising memory prices have made market demand weak in the third quarter. Moreover, prices will not be close to the same period last year, but will remain high. From the perspective of market share, the top three Lenovo, HP and Dell all experienced year-on-year declines of more than 20% in shipments, and Apple also fell by 11.3%.

Another organization, Omdia, recently reported that on the supply side, manufacturers and their ODM partners have begun to reduce production in the third quarter. Its chief analyst Ye Maosheng said that although PC manufacturers have raised prices many times in the past few quarters, it is not enough to completely offset the impact of memory price increases. “The current decline may be just the beginning of a new downward cycle.” The PC market in the fourth quarter is expected to decline by 24% year-on-year.

In fact, Apple explicitly refused to launch a touch Mac for a long time, and the company’s co-founder Steve Jobs (Steve Jobs) worked on the 2010 “Back to the Mac (Return to Mac)” press conference, publicly criticized using a touch screen upright on a laptop as an “ergonomic disaster.”

In contrast, in 1983, Hewlett-Packard launched the first business computer with a touch screen. In 2012, with Microsoft releasing the touch-optimized Windows 8 operating system and Intel vigorously promoting ultrabooks (Ultrabook) concept, PC manufacturers such as ASUS, Acer, Lenovo and Dell began to mass-produce cost-effective traditional touch-screen laptops with modern forms.

However, this time Apple emphasized that its touch sensor is not covered on the surface of the display panel, but directly embedded in it, thereby significantly reducing latency. This technology is called in-cell touch technology, and it is fundamentally different from the plug-in or plug-in technology used in most Windows touch notebooks, including the Microsoft Surface series.

Judging from the live experience video, in addition to the basic operations of the touch screen, you can even use music software on the screen to complete the “playing piano” experience by tapping the screen. Apple also emphasized in its official press release that “musicians can play software instruments directly on the screen.” However, when operating this experience, since the screen cannot be laid flat at 180 degrees, the screen will shake with touch during the “playing” process.

Professional software has begun to adapt. The question is, do I need a pen?

For Apple, upgrades other than touch may be more important. Apple Chief Hardware Officer Johnny SroujiJohny Srouji) said that the PROLED XDR display combines dual-layer series OLED technology with the advanced algorithm of the display engine to achieve the ultimate visual fidelity that professionals yearn for. The new MacBook Pro represents a deep integration of Apple chips, hardware and software.

Compared with the touch screen, the screen itself deserves more attention. It uses Tandem OLED (Double-layer tandem OLED) technology, replacing the previous Mini-LED LCD solution, achieving a peak brightness of 2,000 nits, surpassing the previous generation Liquid Retina XDR screen in terms of thinness and low-latency experience, which was first launched on laptops in 2021.

Apple offers two options: standard glass and nano-textured glass for MacBook. The latter is precision etched into the glass panel to further reduce reflections and glare, but requires an additional price of 1,125 yuan.

This display is the same as the iPhone and iPad. This MacBook Pro is also equipped with Smart Island for quick access to background running programs. At the same time, Apple emphasizes that its applications have been optimized for it, because macOS will automatically convert touch input into clicks, so many existing applications can directly support touch operations. At the same time, through open APIs, a large number of third-party applications have also been updated.

However, Apple did not mention Apple Pencil in the announcement. But in 2012, when Microsoft released the first-generation Surface Pro, it announced that it came with a stylus. Following subsequent model policy adjustments, Microsoft will sell stylus pens as separate optional accessories in multiple product lines. Other PC manufacturers do not make it standard for all employees, but stylus is generally one of the configurations of high-end products.

Therefore, Apple’s official announcement mentioned that professional software such as Blender, Maxon Cinema 4D, Maxon ZBrush and Shapr3D have been adapted or will be launched to support touch. It remains to be seen how this will change the user’s usage habits, because it is generally believed that these software have a strong demand for stylus pens.

From a chip perspective, MacBook Pro is not equipped with M6, but still offers two options: M5 Pro and M5 Max. The M5 Pro is officially recommended to scientists, engineers, software developers and professional creatives, while the M5 Max is recommended to 3D visual effects artists, AI developers and film composers. The latter can run large language models with hundreds of billions of parameters directly on the device.

In addition, compared with the previous model, the 14-inch model is lighter and lighter by 220 grams, and the 16-inch model is lighter by 320 grams. At the same time, thanks to the OLED display stack, the thickness of the model is reduced by 0.5 mm and 1 mm respectively.

It’s hard to be disappointed with iPad mini’s high refresh rate, and what’s even more difficult is not comparing it to Duo

In addition to this product, John Ternus also appeared in pictures of the new iPad mini from the pictures posted on the scene. One or two days before the event, Apple directly released this iPad mini update product online through multiple press releases, as well as the new iMac and 14-inch MacBook Pro equipped with M6 chips.

Among them, after two years, Apple has upgraded the screen of the iPad mini and equipped it with a larger 8.5-inch OLED display. This will change the complaints of users that the LCD screen is “jelly screen” and gray in dark light. The overall thickness of the fuselage is reduced to 5.4 mm, and it uses the A20 Pro flagship chip made with a 2-nanometer process.

Moreover, this generation of iPad supports IP67 waterproofing for the first time, cancels the traditional physical speaker opening, and uses a special screen acoustic sound system. This means you can safely take it to the bathroom and watch a show while taking a shower. These changes were announced by Apple Vice President of Hardware Engineering Dave Pakula.Dave Pakula) appears to be “a huge leap forward” for users who want to have the complete experience in one hand.

Of course, in terms of price, compared to the previous generation, the starting price of the wireless LAN version of iPad mini has increased by 1,500 yuan to 5,499 yuan, and the starting price of the version with cellular network has increased by 1,800 yuan to 6,799 yuan. It is worth noting that if you choose the complete top-end version and the nano-texture glass panel, the price also breaks through the 10,000 yuan mark.

With such a price and configuration, it’s hard not to compare the iPhone Duo. Comparing only from the paper parameters, the iPad mini display exceeds the 7.6-inch Duo internal screen, so the overall size is larger, but the weight is only 1 gram more than the iPhone Duo; only the 512GB version of the chip uses the same full-blood version of the A20, while the 128GB and 256GB versions have one less CPU; the iPad mini only has a single rear camera, and the Center Stage camera is moved to the long side of the fuselage.

Regarding comparing the two, Omdia chief analyst Li Zegang told Huxiu that iPhone Duo represents Apple’s new definition of a product form in high-end smartphones. Although both iPhone Duo and iPad mini can support cellular networks, the two categories meet different market needs.

At the same time, Apple did not increase the screen refresh rate and still maintained 60Hz. It may be a pity for some users that there is no upgrade to “high brush”.

Li Zegang said that “high refresh rate” is an interest point for domestic tablet manufacturers when considering gaming scenarios, but it is not strictly necessary for Apple users. Therefore, it still depends on how Apple defines the position of iPad mini in the product layout, and Apple has always not been too aggressive in its hardware strategy. The absence of “high refresh rate” does not affect the core experience.

In addition, Apple has not introduced the Apple smart part on its official website in mainland China. According to the English press release, because it is equipped with iPadOS27, mini users can complete more tasks through Siri AI, including helping users quickly find the information they need through understanding of personal situations, while using the screen awareness function to perform corresponding operations based on the content on the user’s screen, and answer questions on almost any topic.

The low-key updated mainland China version doesn’t mention much about AI.

As for the 14-inch MacBook Pro and new iMac equipped with M6 chips released on the second day, the starting prices are 15,999 yuan and 12,499 yuan respectively. Since Apple has already experienced a round of official price increases due to global supply chain and memory chip shortages, there are not many waves in such prices.

Looking at the product itself, Apple called the 14-inch MacBook Pro “the first choice for most users” when it introduced it. It is worth noting that M6 provides it with end-side AI capabilities. When processing workloads such as large language model prompt words, the performance is improved by up to 25% compared to the M5 chip, and the memory bandwidth is increased to up to 170GB/s, speeding up multi-tasking, running high-load applications and large-scale projects.

Among them, the 12-core central processor has 2 more cores than the previous generation, which improves task processing speed and supports multi-tasking across applications, compiling codes, and operating complex creative workflows. The 12-core graphics processor also adds 2 cores, and the graphics performance is improved by up to 30% compared to the M5. The dual 16-core neural network engine performance is also up to 1.9 times faster than the M5.

The new iMac also emphasizes AI capabilities. After being equipped with the M6 ​​chip, Apple claims that the AI ​​performance can be improved by up to 5 times compared to the M4 chip model. However, little else has changed.

Compared with a series of hardware updates, update news from Apple Creator Studio is easy to ignore. Similarly, regarding Apple smart phones, the AI ​​update part of the deep AI assistant function in conjunction with OpenAI, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro and the “three-piece office set” did not appear on the official website of mainland China.

The latter only mentioned “the launch of multiple new AI function betas” and that relying on new MCP support, external AI agents and tools can directly read content, perform editing and automation operations in Keynote reports, Pages documents and Numbers tables.

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