The Pro Display XDR: A Beast of a Machine

Oh, speaking of the pro display XDR, make sure you get subscribed, because we're finally pitting our fully complete hack pro head to head against the new Mac Pro and you won't want to miss it. Moving on, I doubt Apple will run their shiny new Apple Silicon at the same kind of red line that they've been forced to with Intel machines, like our 2020 iMac here.

Now they have employed some clever tricks to improve the experience somewhat, like factory under vaulting with direct control over VRMs, custom fan and performance curves, and more. But at the end of the day, this machine still spikes up to 99 degrees when you fire up an intensive CPU-bound application, a state that it can only maintain for a short while before it drops down to base clock, where it mercifully runs at a mere 90 ish degrees.

This differs from past behavior though, which an optimist might say shows that Apple is finally taking the thermals and longevity of their machine seriously or a cynic might say is probably more about quietly kneecapping the Intel Macs to make the upcoming arm-based ones look better. For my part, I wouldn't be surprised if it's all a little bit of both.

While we don't have any firm data on what performance or thermals will look like on Apple Silicon, we need look no further than the iPad Pro to get some hints. That's a tablet with no active cooling whatsoever that can pull off laptop-like performance and crucially sustain it for long periods of time. Finally, I doubt that Apple is gonna settle for performance that's just as good. Our iMac's 10-core CPU does manage some decent numbers, but it's been clear for a while now that Apple's been desperately trying to squeeze more performance out of Intel's aging 14 nanometer+ processors, wherever they can.

So we can see it here, where they allow the thermals to spike in the hope that the load will be a short one and that the CPU will race back down to idle. This actually works out for them in some scenarios, like Photoshop and Final Cut, but it absolutely kills performance in longer running benchmarks like Blender, where the core clocks drop way down to base clock.

The GPU for its part is still good or as good as a mid-range consumer card with pro slapped onto its name can be. But between Apple's experience with building mobile GPUs in developing the low-level metal and Metal to APIs, and in building the afterburner accelerator card for the Mac Pro, they may have all the tools they need to be self-sufficient here.

This one's actually a bit of a wild card, but that's still in the future as of this video. We still can't say exactly what an Apple Silicon iMac will look like, which is why buying any Intel-based Mac today is going to be a bit of a crapshoot.

Now I am hoping that Apple's ongoing support for these devices stands out from the rest of the industry, kind of like their iPhone support does. The issue is that so far, they've only made vague commitments, like for years to come. How many years? Remember back when Apple transitioned away from Power PC? MacOS 10.6's first universal binary format only lasted from 2006 until Apple killed non-Intel support at the OS level with Snow Leopard in 2009.

If I was buying a shiny new Mac today, I'd want something, a little firmer. With that said, if I needed to buy a desktop today and it had to be a Mac for whatever reason, this one actually looks pretty good, ignoring the moon logic pricing for some of the upgrades. You know what's not moon logic though, switching to FreshBooks.

FreshBooks is a small business cloud accounting solution built for owners. You can work anywhere with the FreshBooks mobile app. You can create professional-looking invoices in seconds on the go. You can snap pictures of your receipts so you don't lose them. And this is new, you can automatically track your mileage on the iOS app as you drive. So you can be organized and ready to maximize your deductions at tax time.

Never miss an update with FreshBooks. You can see when a client has viewed their invoice or when an invoice has become overdue, and you can get 50% off your first three months of freshbooks when you sign up for a paid plan @freshbooks.com/techtips.

We're gonna have that linked below. Thanks for watching guys. Go check out our video on Apple Silicon for more info on this whole debacle, if you, well, want to hear more? I'll see you over there. Do I have a beard in that one? - You do. - Oh, okay. I was gonna promise clean-shaven Linus but apparently not.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: en- To create somethingthat's genuinely new,you have to start again.And that's very hard to do.So hard in fact that Appleis still working on it.So until then, they'd like you to please,please buy the new iMac anyway.Even if its future usefulnessis going to depend onthird party app developers.Besides, why would that bother you?If you think about it,you're not really paying for a computer.You're paying for an experience.One unlike any other experience,the experience of buyinga brand new machine,that's dead on arrival.And I think that's really special.Just like I think oursponsor, Ridge, is special.Ridge Wallet wants to redefine the walletwith its compact frameand RFID blocking plates.Check out how they cankeep your wallet bulge downand use our offer code Linusto save 10% and getfree worldwide shipping.(upbeat music)Okay, but wait,this year's iMac sportsa surprising numberof true meaningful improvementsover previous models.We get an obligatory spec thump,allowing it to be equippedwith up to Intel's latest10th gen 10 core consumer CPU.That's going to make theiMac pro sweat a little bit,given that even if you kitthat thing out with 18 cores,they're gonna be older, slower ones,making the decision to go iMacover iMac pro even more appealing,10 gigabit ethernet is now availablefor a reasonable $100 extra,making almost the entire Mac lineupcapable of high-speed backupsand working with heavy media projectsover a network connection.Great job, Apple, butlike, no really, for real.And it's still stuck with eight gigsof DDR4 2666 memory out of the box,but it's user upgradableand we get optionsfor up to eight terabytes of storage.And, oh yeah, there'sBluetooth 5.0 support,which is a nice to have,even if it's unlikely you'llnotice much of a difference,given that AirPods Pros already workwith Macs running Catalina and 2019 iMacsreportedly already had the hardware for itwithout most people noticing.Anyway.Now it's certainly not themost exciting looking machine.And I honestly don't think that Applewill have any incentive to make onethat is exciting until theycan launch an all new modelrunning Apple Silicon,but ignoring the hey bezelsare still sexy, right,aesthetic, the improvements over last genkind of just keep rolling here.It has a nano texture glass option,which is pricey at $500.But in my experience with it,provides a surprisinglyeffective anti-glare effectwithout causing major sparklinglike LCD coatings tend to,and finally the webcam andmicrophone have been upgraded.How much better does this look and sound?And not a moment too soon.The timing for this reallycouldn't have been better,given the way that telecommutinghas increasingly become the norm.Now it's worth noting that if you optfor nano textured glass,it is gonna stand out a little,but not nearly as much as a notchor a whole punch camera on a smartphone.So I'm gonna give Apple a pass here.So great machine then, right?Go buy it today, right?Well maybe, but before you do,there's some stuff you should know.Over the next two years,Apple is going to transition its hardwareaway from Intel X86,which means that all Apple softwarewill run on their own arm based chips,creatively dubbed, Apple Silicon.This means many things,but the most important fornow is that app compatibilityis going to be a huge focus going forward,so much so that Apple has createdtwo compatibility layersto address it Rosetta 2and Universal Binary 2.The first of those allows thenew arm chips that are comingto run existing X86 software.The latter allows a developer to bundlean arm and X86 version of their appsin a single package thatshould be natively compatiblewith systems running either architecture,kind of like how our water bottlesare natively compatiblewith your face hole,LTT store.com.Now you'll notice thatRosetta 2 only goes one way,and that could be a major problem.While Apple could supportuniversal binary twofor as long as Intel basedMacs have official support,likely to the end of 2025 or so,based on past trends,it's actually up toindividual app developers,whether or not they wantto provide support for it,which if you're old enoughto remember the transitionaway from power PC towards Intel X86,you'll know means thatyou're almost definitelygoing to get inconsistent levelsof support from one app to another.And this time around it hasthe potential to be even worse.Because our Macs can runiDevice apps directly,developers may be incentivized to developfor that platform firstwith your legacy IntelMac, as an afterthought.All of this is to saythat if what you loveabout the Apple ecosystem in generaland Mac in particularis that it just works,the 2020 iMac, and I mean,really any Intel Mac from here on outis practically speaking, dead on arrival.You're definitely gonnaget about two yearsof the experience thatyou expect out of them,give or take a year.But beyond that, it is agigantic question mark.So instead of just a normal review,let's look at this machinefrom the perspectiveof a potential Mac buyerand see if we can make some predictionsfor how the truly nextgeneration iMacs will look,and whether they're worth waiting for.First, I don't see these massive bezelsor the Apple chin barsticking around for much longer.While Apple might not adoptall of the industrial designof its pro display XDR,if I was a betting man,I'd put my money on Apple's next iMacto look a little something like this,all business on the front,machined aluminum on the back,but with a more traditionaliMac style stand.While the pro display XDRis rather flat on the back,I would also expectApple to adopt the lookmore akin to the MacBook,flattened chamfered edgeswith a subtler curvethan the current iMacsrather bulbous shape.Oh, speaking of the pro display XDR,make sure you get subscribed,because we're finally pittingour fully complete hack prohead to head against the new Mac Proand you won't want to miss it.Moving on, I doubt Apple will runtheir shiny new Apple Siliconat the same kind of red linethat they've been forcedto with Intel machines,like our 2020 iMac here.Now they have employed some clever tricksto improve the experience somewhat,like factory under vaultingwith direct controlover VRMs, custom fan andperformance curves, and more.But at the end of the day,this machine still spikes up to 99 degreeswhen you fire up an intensiveCPU bound application,a state that it can onlymaintain for a short whilebefore it drops down to base clock,where it mercifully runsat a mere 90 ish degrees.This differs from past behavior though,which an optimist mightsay shows that Appleis finally taking the thermalsand longevity of their machine seriouslyor a cynic might say is probably moreabout quietly kneecapping the Intel Macsto make the upcoming armbased ones look better.For my part, I wouldn't be surprisedif it's all a little bit of both.While we don't have any firm dataon what performance or thermalswill look like on Apple Silicon,we need look no further thanthe iPad pro to get some hints.That's a tablet with noactive cooling whatsoeverthat can pull off laptop like performanceand crucially sustain itfor long periods of time.Finally, I doubt thatApple is gonna settlefor performance that's just as good.Our iMac's 10 core CPU doesmanage some decent numbers,but it's been clear for a while nowthat Apple's been desperately tryingto squeeze more performanceout of Intel's aging 14 nanometerplus plus plus plus plus plus processors,wherever they can.So we can see it here,where they allow the thermals to spikein the hope that theload will be a short oneand that the CPU willrace back down to idle.This actually works outfor them in some scenarios,like Photoshop and Final Cut,but it absolutely kills performancein longer running benchmarks like Blender,where the core clocks dropway down to base clock.The GPU for its part is still goodor as good as a mid range consumer cardwith pro slapped onto its name can be.But between Apple's experiencewith building mobile GPUsin developing the low levelmetal and metal to APIs,and in building theafterburner accelerator cardfor the Mac Pro, theymay have all the toolsthey need to be self sufficient here.This one's actually a bit of a wild card,but that's still in thefuture as of this video.We still can't say exactlywhat an Apple Silicon iMac will look like,which is why buying anyIntel based Mac todayis going to be a bit of a crapshoot.Now I am hoping thatApple's ongoing supportfor these devices stands outfrom the rest of the industry,kind of like their iPhone support does.The issue is that so far,they've only made vague commitments,like for years to come.How many years?Remember back when Apple transitionedaway from power PC?MacOS 10's first universal binary formatonly lasted from 2006 untilApple killed non-Intel supportat the OS level with Snow Leopard in 2009.If I was buying a shiny new Mac today,I'd want something, a little firmer.With that said, if I neededto buy a desktop todayand it had to be a Macfor whatever reason,this one actually looks pretty good,ignoring the, well, moon logic pricingfor some of the upgrades.You know what's not moon logic though,switching to FreshBooks.FreshBooks is a small businesscloud accounting solutionthat's built for owners.You can work anywhere withthe FreshBooks mobile app.You can create professionallooking invoicesin seconds on the go.You can snap pictures of your receiptsso you don't lose them.And this is new, you can automaticallytrack your mileage onthe iOS app as you drive.So you can be organized and readyto maximize your deductions at tax time.Never miss an update with FreshBooks.You can see when a clienthas viewed their invoiceor when an invoice has become overdue,and you can get 50% offyour first three months of fresh books,when you sign up for a paidplan @freshbooks.com/techtips.We're gonna have that linked below.Thanks for watching guys.Go check out our video on Apple Siliconfor more info on this whole debacle,if you, well, want to hear more?I'll see you over there.Do I have a beard in that one?- You do.- Oh, okay.I was gonna promise clean shaven Linus,but apparently not.\n"