Anyone else picked up an M1 Mac?

Got a MBP 16/256 - I'm reasonable and don't expect everything I use on day 1 to work, but damn is this thing fast, and so far just about everything I use has a native binary or one is in beta.

My biggest complaint so far is that it takes about 15-20 minutes of doing something before it heats up enough to just sit it on my lap (in my case running javascript/typescript unit tests in VS Code). Otherwise it's an ice cold slab of aluminum, lol. My other Mac gets warm just by turning it on.

 

I've got a MBP 16/512 ordered. It's supposed to get here around Christmas. A pretty nice present to myself.

My current PC laptop is roughly equivalent to the MBP 16" with an upgraded CPU and graphics card. The thing sounds like a 747 getting ready for takeoff just surfing the web. I had an Intel i7 13 MBP" a while back and I didn't remember it making a lot of fan noise. So, back in September I had another one all set to go, but decided to wait to see what the new Apple silicon was about. Boy, I'm glad I did.

Just waiting on that slow boat from China.

 

Watching them for sure. If they have decent keyboards and eventually can run Linux, I might be interested.

 

This is going to be fun to watch. Apple vs Intel/PC. I don't remember the last time a new CPU was this much faster than its predecessor. Maybe back in the ancient history of the 286, 386, 486 days Recently, Intel has brought out many generations that were just incrementally better, but nothing game changing.

From a cost vs performance view Apple is, shockingly, ahead. My personal 2 year old PC laptop was around $1,500 and is on par with a $2,300 16" MBP. My new MBP is $1,700 and for the money I don't think there is a PC based system that can touch it.

On the other hand Apple sucks big time in the enterprise environment. My shop is 60% PC, 40% Apple and we literally have an Apple team and Microsoft team. IMO, the Apple guys have the harder job. Since we let our employees choose their OS these new M1 Macs aren't going to cause us any more trouble that anything else Apple. (which is to say they cause a lot of trouble) Windows only shops like my previous gig might have a harder time telling the users, no Macs. I used to be able to mollify the Mac fanboy crowd by giving them a PC with better specs and performance.

 

Bought the same config for my son but saving it for his birthday. But all accounts are very good. By Apple standards a pretty good deal as well.

 

Yep, that is definitely what is interesting. From what I can tell the transfer to ARM is going better than the PPC-> intel switch, so at least there's that. I'm really curious how this is going to change the whole market in the long run.

 

I was around when Apple pulled support for the PPC. It was a train wreck from many of my users' perspective. They had their favorite PPC applications and they weren't going to give them up until Apple pried them from their cold - dead - fingers. I wonder what the fate of Intel apps on the ARM platform will be? If PPC history is any clue there will be a LOT of apps that never get updated. At some point Apple is going to say no more support, and the very same users will be crying that their precious Intel apps no longer work. It's too early yet, but in about a year I'll become the Pied Piper of getting the users to move to ARM compatible apps. Most will listen and move, but some will never learn.

 

We'll see. emulation is light years ahead of where it as last time, architecture might not be what kills the old apps.

My roomie bought a g5 mac pro right before the switch. whoops. I miss that case though

 

YUP! Ordered the 16/512 Macbook Pro as well and have been checking my order status multiple times everyday since placing my order LOL! Hopefully it gets here before the projected 24th date.

 

I ordered mine 11/23. At first it said delivery 12/14 - 12/21. Then it changed to 12/21 - 12/29. Then two days ago I got a notice that it shipped and the scheduled delivery is 12/11. At this point I'm kind of over the 747 fan noise from my current laptop, can't wait for it to get here.

 

Wow that is pretty awesome! I ordered mine Dec. 1st. Ive heard similar shipping experiences with new M1's and the delivery date fluctuating, getting delayed, and then end up arriving earlier than the first dates they gave you. I'm hoping the same happens for mine cause i cant wait. Good on Apple to under-promise, and over-deliver.

 

So did it come??? Mine still hasnt changed from from "Processing" status but they did charge my card about 1am two nights ago.

 

Yes, it came last Thursday, a day earlier than they said it would. At the risk of sounding like a fan boy, wow. It's pretty much what all the reviewers said it would be. The fan noise, when it does run, is almost silent. Battery life is crazy good. I'm starting to think in terms of days of use rather than hours. Comparing speed, the M1 blows my 2 year old, 6 core i7 out of the water. I launched Adobe Illustrator on both machines at the same time. The M1 was ready to go to work when the PC had just brought up the splash screen.

The biggest bug I've found so far is a keyboard remapping app, Karabiner, causes kernel panics. I'm not sure if that's a Big Sur or M1 problem. Adobe Illustrator "works", I've only done one small project and there was a hard crash. I was able to get it done, and the machine was silent doing it.

Bottom line, so far no regrets

 

Nice!!! My order just changed to preparing to ship I can’t wait! Lol I been feeling like a 10yr old who picked out his new bike but can’t use it until his actual birthday.

 

For those that have, how are you still liking them? My 2017 MBP 15” battery just nuked itself a week before my Zoom-based degree starts again, which is great.

Was quoted $700 to repair (because the battery and keyboard are the same unit), which seems unreasonable when the new M1 laptops are much north of that.

 

$700 is Way too much when for $300 more you could have an M1 MacBook Air that will run circles around your old Mac. I've had a couple of minor problems with niche software that doesn't work, but 99% of what I do works great on my M1.

 

The only thing I’ll miss is dual booting into Windows for a few apps I’ve used for engineering, but I’m done with that for now / I have a 2012 rMBP I can still use if required, even if she is showing her age.

Probably be making my way to BestBuy tomorrow.. and getting a bottle of bourbon next door while I’m there.

edit

I’m most upset that this couldn’t have happened later in the year when the revision comes out with MagSafe (again). I absolutely loathe USB C power.

 

to a new MBP M1 and a bottle of bourbon.

rant
I absolutely loathe Apple's USB C only mentality. When they announced they were removing the magsafe, SSD slot, and USB A I pushed the update cycle and purchased my team the last MBP that included those ports. Since then we've had to upgdate again, but we missed the butterfly keyboard debacle. (Well for my techs, the poor, poor users and my repair guy are still suffering.) But, while I loathe what Apple and Microsoft do sometimes, it does provide good paying steady work for a lot of people. Imagine a world where they weren't such idiots. I'd have to find a productive job. lol /rant

 

I have a 2012 rMBP that's got some pretty gnarly ghosting and runs like a brick, but it's got all the ports thank goodness. The 2017 MBP has the butterfly, but I didn't mind it (or have issues, even). That said, the old / new again style is way better.

Super bummed my laptop died before the 2021 refresh that is bringing ports and MagSafe back, bu oh well. I got a bottle of Makers Cask Strength to sooth the pain.

 

I think that if there was a time for people to upgrade from the older generation this would be the time. Having double the battery life is amazing. And as we all know replacing the battery on the MB is just costly and doesn’t seem to worth it IMO.