The First Apple Silicon Mac Could be a “Super Lightweight” 12-Inch MacBook
Last updated September 23, 2021
- Sources coming from China report that a new (12-inch) MacBook will be the first Mac notebook powered by an ARM processor.
- The notebook will have a battery life of 15 to 20 hours.
- Next year, an all-new iMac should arrive – but with Apple’s own GPU.
During this year’s WWDC, Apple unveiled its plans to switch to Apple Silicon chips – across all of its products (with Macs included, for the very first time). However, we weren’t given any strict timelines of when this transition will start, with a hint that we’ll see the first Apple Silicon computer by the year’s end.
As reported by The China Times (citing insider sources), Apple is preparing a 12-inch MacBook that’s going to "super lightweight" and will come with a battery life of between 15 and 20 hours. As you can guess, this MacBook will be powered by Apple Silicon chip. More precisely, this will be an A14X processor, codenamed "Tonga" and manufactured by TSMC. And most importantly, this notebook should arrive in 2020.
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No other information about this MacBook model is known as of right now, except that it’ll come with a USB Type-C interface. Also, it should weigh less than one kilogram.
By all means, it looks like Apple's A14 chip will be a groundbreaking one. It will certainly power this year's iPhone 12 models. And even though no leaks are pointing to this, we'll also see it across iPad Pro models (with other iPads to follow the lead). Of course, we're talking about two chips here – A14 and A14X, with the latter one being used in notebooks.
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The China Times also shares its insider knowledge of Apple's plans for 2021. More precisely, it's said that Apple is developing a completely redesigned iMac. What comes as a surprise here is Apple's plans for the computer's GPU. Reportedly, Apple has decided to use its own GPU, produced using TMSC's 5nm process. This new GPU should provide better performance per watt (compared to what AMD and Nvidia offer), allowing developers to write graphics-intensive pro-level applications and games.
We do have to note that we've heard contradicting reports about Apple's plans for its CPU. Last month, a highly reputable analyst predicted that select MacBook Pro and MacBook Air models would be the first to come with Apple Silicon chips. However, these two reports agree on Apple's intention to produce radically overhauled computers in 2021.
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Lastly, we’d like to note that we’ve already seen the first Apple Silicon Geekbench results. Those came from Apple’s (hardware) development kit, so they don’t provide an exact prediction. However, they tell us that Apple Silicon will most definitely usher Mac computers into an entirely new digital era – and we can’t wait to see that happen.
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