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Apple Could Use ARM Coprocessors for Three Updated Mac Models (techcrunch.com)
According to a Bloomberg report, Apple could be working on three new Mac models for this year. From a report: All three of them could feature an ARM coprocessor to improve security. Apple isn't switching to ARM chipsets altogether. There will still be an Intel CPU in every Mac, but with a second ARM processor. Currently, the MacBook Pro features a T1 chip while the iMac Pro features a T2 chip. On the MacBook Pro, the ARM coprocessor handles the Touch ID sensor and the Touch Bar. This way, your fingerprint is never stored on your laptop's SSD drive -- it remains on the T1 secure enclave. The Intel CPU only gets a positive response when a fingerprint is validated. The iMac Pro goes one step further and uses the T2 to replace many discrete controllers. The T2 controls your stereo speakers, your internal microphone, the fans, the camera and internal storage.
PC manufacturers have been using these for a long time. They started out as 8-bit MCUs with a builtin ROM and have been getting more and more powerful with time.
In terms of security centralized devices are the bane of security. Decentralized components that do one thing and does them well helps security, by making each process easy to code and manage without conflicting with other actions. If your fingerprint scan will need to be handled by the main CPU. that means your fingerprint data is going down the main CPU Bus, which is possibly visible by other applications and hacks. Vs. in essence its own little computer in the computer to do the work and send back a good or bad bit. Outside what the rest of the computer is dealing with. All the extra data in the processing is not accessible from the rest of the computer. This in general makes things much safer.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
I highly suspect that this change will render hardware compatibility with off the shelf components a thing of the past for Apple (again).
This means no more Hackintosh should a future OSX require this chip be in place.
(slow clap)
"Oh good, my slowclap processor made it into this thing." - GLaDOS
#DeleteFacebook
Of course none of that info is secure any longer due to spectre and meltdown on the Intel side. Everyone is going to need to replace their CPU's. There's going to be a huge class action lawsuit (or several of them.)
Apple released their OWN Spectre and Meltdown patches for the past 3 macOS versions. I haven't heard that their versions of the patches have the same issues as the Intel ones that everyone is rushing to un-install...
Interesting way to make hackintosh machines more difficult to build, but an arm core can be emulated with qemu.
Nice try.
macOS will still have to install on the dozens of Mac models WITHOUT an ARM coprocessor; so, for the next foreseeable while, that paranoid fantasy will remain just that.
Every PC has dozens of microprocessors, so adding an ARM chip into a computer is no big paradigm shift. A typical PC has a SATA controller, USB controller, video card, etc. One of the big things that Intel has been good at over the years is integrated more features onto a single die. Around 2000 is when they started adding wireless directly onto the die ("Centrino") followed by integrated video. I forget when the memory controller got integrated.
Watch for a forthcoming OS that will run macOS apps and iOS apps simultaneously, with a touchscreen for at least the laptop models. At first such a machine will primarily for developers, replacing the iOS simulator that is now part of Xcode, but we may then see the long-awaited convergence of laptops and tablets.
Personally, I never asked my computer and cell phone to be the same. I am very comfortable with them being different tools for different jobs. I am fine with them being optomized differently so that they can do their job in as an effective way possible.
I think of all the non-sense that has hit Mac Os in recent years, in an effort to make it more IOS like. I do not like how they removed management controls away from iTunes. I LIKED having more robust photo options. Almost everything they have added in to merge the two operating systems has made my MacBook pro's interface worse.
To me, it is culmination of the split between Jobs and Cook. Jobs wanted to make technology insanely great. Cook wants to make it insanely the same.
"Liberalism is a very noble idea, currently controlled by some very bad people. Be sure you do not get the two confused.
Reasonably intelligent person: Hey, this fingerprint stuff is sensitive. Let's isolate it in separate hardware!
Non-stupid detail person: ... and since it's specialized hardware and has information we want to control let's lock it down and have it only run code we've signed!
Well-meaning idiot: ... and since it only runs our code, let's make it More Secure by having zero transparency!
Fucking worthless moron: ... and since it's More Secure, let's put it in control of more stuff! And add more software! And funnel everything through it! Let's have it run the keyboard! And the camera! And the disk!
(Intel): ... and let's give it direct network access, too!
Hacker: Pwnt!
This pattern happens over and over again at company after company. People build these "secure" enclaves to isolate things, and then as soon as they have them they blow that isolation by shoveling in every damned thing they can think of so everything can be "more secure". And since it's in charge of everything, it has to have control of everything. And then it gets cracked.
THAT'S NOT HOW IT'S SUPPOSED TO FUCKING WORK!. If you have a sensitive function, you put it in its OWN FUCKING COMPARTMENT. And you give it no more privilege than it needs to do that one thing. You don't dump in a shit-ton of unrelated software into a coprocessor that's trusted for everything (and, by the way, is usually pretty much invisible to the OS).
Morons.
Interesting way to make hackintosh machines more difficult to build, but an arm core can be emulated with qemu.
Nice try.
macOS will still have to install on the dozens of Mac models WITHOUT an ARM coprocessor; so, for the next foreseeable while, that paranoid fantasy will remain just that.
Are Hackintoshes even still a thing?
Honestly, that's the first time I've heard that term in what must have been 5 or 6 years... I don't think many have bothered on a serious level because Windows 7 was good enough and Apple made it too hard. I imagine the only people doing it now are doing it just for the LoLs.
However welcome to the beginning of the end. The Mac User is now just an Ipad user with a bigger bill, its only a matter of time before the Intel processor is dropped and MacOS and IOS become one. No-one does serious work on a Mac, despite your forthcoming protestations.
Hackintoshes are most CERTAINLY still "a thing", especially with the long-time since the Mac Pro refresh, and the fact that some have been pining for the "return of the tower" since the Cylindrical Mac Pro came out in 2013. Plus, some people are just "cheap"...
Apple will not be dropping Intel (buy they may switch to AMD, if they can get their power consumption down to a reasonable level); because they know they sell a LOT of MacBook Pros (and some iMacs) to people running primarily Windows or Linux, and those aren't switching to primarily ARM any time soon. There is just TOO MUCH software out there that is still x86, and Apple is WELL AWARE of that!
As far as "no one does serious work on a Mac", you're simply full of shit. Period.