Laptop Vendors Are Left Sitting On the Sidelines Waiting For the Next Waltz To Start (pcper.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: Intel's delayed release of a new processor is going to have a noticeable effect on the laptop market this year. As there is little chance of seeing anything new until towards the end of this year, laptop designers will not be able to offer new models for the holidays and will instead have to rework existing products. DigiTimes suggests we will see trimmed down models with lower price tags to try to entice consumers into purchasing something, as they expect lower demand than we saw last year. Hopefully some gaming machines may become more affordable, or we will start to see models incorporating AMD's new chips become more common.

Comments

Re: Can't we find some way to blame Apple for this

[Anonymous Coward]

Apples 2 year behind in processors. They don't matter.

One wish list

[Anonymous Coward]

My wish list would be:

1) Ryzen processor.
2) long battery life
3) AMD graphics (plays nice with free software)
4) sweet price point

Other stuff like SSD and generously expandable memory go without saying.

I have Intel fatigue. I'm tick-tocked out.

Re:One wish list

[Tough Love]

My wish list would be:

1) Ryzen processor.
2) long battery life
3) AMD graphics (plays nice with free software)
4) sweet price point

Other stuff like SSD and generously expandable memory go without saying

So, like this then.

Re:One wish list

[squiggleslash]

I ran it past our marketing department, and great news, we can give you a Mobile Celeron with a 16Gb SSD (awesome battery life, more than six hours!), with a 14" 1366x768 screen, and Intel graphics for $500. Sounds awesome right? Well, get this: we'll install a one month FREE TRIAL of Norton Antivirus for NO ADDITIONAL COST.

Re:One wish list

[Anne Thwacks]

how about a keyboard as good as a T61?

Re:One wish list

[Locke2005]

Yes, SSD is a given. But how much memory do you really need in a laptop, given that more memory means shorter battery life?

AMD's gaming laptops have been disappointing

[rsilvergun]

They're priced too high for the performance. I'm seeing them in the $600-$800 range, which puts them in competition with mobile GTA 1050s (albeit not the TI); but even then they get trounced by a 1050 unless you're talking the Vega/Intel hybrid floating around, and that one's only showing up on machines in the $1200 range, which gets you into 1060 mobile territory if you shop around.

They do have really nice TDP, but only if you're gaming on a battery and I don't know a lot of folks who do that. Most laptop gamers I know want them for lan parties or because their main machine is a laptop.

Re:AMD's gaming laptops have been disappointing

[Highdude702]

https://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/...

Someone above linked that. for the price its a decent computer. I love my Ryzen. I have a binned(by myself) chip though.

Intel should do an Nvidia

[rahvin112]

Intel should pull a card from Nvidia's playbook and simply rebrand last years processors with a new number.

Re:Intel should do an Nvidia

[Anonymous Coward]

They've been doing that since sandy bridge.

Re:Intel should do an Nvidia

[Anonymous Coward]

Intel should pull a card from Nvidia's playbook and simply rebrand last years processors with a new number.

They already are. See the i7-8086K for one such example.

Re:Intel should do an Nvidia

[Locke2005]

A "Limited Edition" CPU? That is INSANE!!!

My old laptop is just fine

[sinij]

My i7 Haswell based laptop is within 95% performance of a comparably priced brand new machine. Only one still works, after keyboard was replaced under extended warranty. It is now on third battery. Why would I bother upgrading?

Re:My old laptop is just fine

[thegarbz]

Good question, why would you? In the mean time most people don't have an i7 Haswell based laptop.

Speaking of quoting magical numbers, I have an i5 Haswell based laptop. It's slow as heck. The performance of the device hasn't been related to the processor in it for a long time for many designs. Your processor is 95% as fast as a modern one? Congradulations. Mine is too, for about 15 seconds, and then it sits there alternating between thermal throttling and TPD throttling states which the entire Haswell series is well known for due to the large difference between the turbo boost frequency and the sustained TPD in most designs.

But maybe that's all irrelevant. Maybe tomorrow you'll knock it off your desk and break the screen. Will you upgrade it then? Will forking out money for year old tech then have a meaning for you?

Re:My old laptop is just fine

[sinij]

Obviously, if I am forced to upgrade I would.

However, I really don't like laptops that are being offered today. Most of them went for miniaturization, it is hard to get something like what I have. For some reason underlying assumption by laptop manufacturers that people want smaller laptops. I personally don't.

Re:My old laptop is just fine

[thegarbz]

Obviously, if I am forced to upgrade I would.

However, I really don't like laptops that are being offered today.

I think that is the point of the entire article. .... Not necessarily design point of view, but from a technology point of view. Personally I would be pissed if I were forced to upgrade to something old.

Also I get your sentiment. We really need more variety in laptops. Personally for me the thinner and lighter the better (hence I'm stuck with a thermally throttling thing). But where there is a market for something beefier that should really be filled. The problem is lots of people do want small, light, thin, and with margins as crap as they are it's harder to go after the niche markets.

Re:Can't we find some way to blame Apple for this?

[Actually, I do RTFA]

If Apple hadn't decided to move away from Intel chips, they would have found the bug in their rigorous testing, thus the fixes would have already happened.

Does that work for you?

Re: Can't we find some way to blame Apple for this

[blackomegax]

Intel hasn't really released a new processor since sandy bridge. They just kept shrinking it and adding video decoder ASICs, but it's still the same CPU. Intel doesn't matter anymore.

Would anyone notice?

[thunderclees]

With very few exceptions Intel has been basically selling the same performance for years.

Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[ctilsie242]

Laptop vendors can do more than new CPUs to bring some usefulness and features. Being able to have an OS in ROM would be handy, if only to have a way to restore an OS without having to worry about recovery media. If a Tandy MS-DOS clone back in the 1980s can do this, so can a PC vendor. Other things come to mind as well, be it the ability to charge (albeit slowly) on USB-C for beefier laptops, allowing for multiple USB chargers to charge a battery at the same time, built in vitualization and encryption so one can have their gaming stuff, their work stuff, personal stuff, and stuff nobody should see, all on one laptop, perhaps using something like PhonebookFS to further hide the presence of other VMs.

Another idea would be to have better support for external GPU breakout boxes. That way, one can go from running command line stuff to Crysis fairly easily, as well as providing fast access to additional storage.

CPUs are nice, but there are still many things that can be done to differentiate one's product from everyone else.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[Sique]

How do you patch an OS in ROM, after someone found a way to remotely activate your ROM OS and has free reign over your computer?

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you patch an OS in ROM, after someone found a way to remotely activate your ROM OS and has free reign over your computer?

Make it a socketed PROM so you can swap it out with a new one.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[tlhIngan]

be it the ability to charge (albeit slowly) on USB-C for beefier laptops, allowing for multiple USB chargers to charge a battery at the same time

A number of laptops already support charging by USB-C - some in fact don't have an AC adapter port anymore - they change exclusively by USB-C using USB-PD. And by many, I'm not saying Apple - but Lenovos and Dells too. Also, not slower - USB-PD supports up to 100W, and most adapters easily do 60W which is more than sufficient to charge and run the laptop.

Another idea would be to have better support for external GPU breakout boxes. That way, one can go from running command line stuff to Crysis fairly easily, as well as providing fast access to additional storage.

Already done. It's called Thunderbolt and many laptops have a Thunderbolt 3 port with the USB-C port. And yes, external GPUs (eGPU) are supported as well. If you're talking about gaming, you'd be running Windows 10 which has great support for this sort of thing. In fact, they make nice Thunderbolt docking stations too with USB-PD, so a single port docking system is available for laptops.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[Sique]

How many ROM changes will the socket survive? And how many people will void the warranty by opening the case and switch the ROM?

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[Voyager529]

Laptop vendors can do more than new CPUs to bring some usefulness and features.

I agree with your point. I disagree with most of your examples.

Being able to have an OS in ROM would be handy, if only to have a way to restore an OS without having to worry about recovery media.

You'd need MS to agree to what basically amounts to shipping whatever the current slipstream build at the time of manufacture onto an internal MicroSD card. I mean, okay, but with them turning Windows into an OS Reinstall every six months, I see a ROM-based solution as being difficult to solve in practice.

If a Tandy MS-DOS clone back in the 1980s can do this, so can a PC vendor.

Tandy's MS-DOS clone was about 200kbytes that basically didn't change and used very rudimentary commands to interface with hardware. Literally none of those things apply to laptops today. What might make a bit more sense to put in ROM, however, is something like what Apple does - enough OS to download the real OS from the internet.

Other things come to mind as well, be it the ability to charge (albeit slowly) on USB-C for beefier laptops

With USB-C not quite in common parlance yet, this function would be lost on most users. Additionally, USB-C still hasn't been adequately commoditized such that I'd trust lower end chargers. For users who need that sort of charging capability, spare laptop chargers can easily be had for $20 on eBay.

allowing for multiple USB chargers to charge a battery at the same time

to then use multiple outlets? That seems far less convenient than a spare DC charger.

built in vitualization and encryption so one can have their gaming stuff, their work stuff, personal stuff, and stuff nobody should see, all on one laptop

There's a few issues here. First off, that's purely a software thing and has nothing to do with hardware. Laptop manufacturers seldom put that sort of first party software on their computers upon shipping because a lot of people wouldn't use it; software like Veracrypt has existed long enough that people who value their privacy to any level are already using it. Of those that do, a lot would be calling support because they forgot their password or put something in X container instead of Y container, making it an utter nightmare for phone support. Finally, even if Samsung or whoever *did* do this *and* managed to sort out the support aspects *and* it gained any sort of traction, you'd see alternatives pop up the next day and remove the advantage. If nothing else, QubesOS already makes all of this possible.

perhaps using something like PhonebookFS to further hide the presence of other VMs.

The new Blackberry phones have similar functionality. I'm not holding my breath for them to sell in droves. I just don't think that sort of isolation is truly valuable to anyone who isn't already using an existing solution.

Another idea would be to have better support for external GPU breakout boxes. That way, one can go from running command line stuff to Crysis fairly easily, as well as providing fast access to additional storage.

I do think there's something to be said for standardizing on an external GPU connector, but I feel like it's going to be tough for eGPUs to leave a niche. Gaming laptops don't need them, mainstream laptops probably don't have enough of a system bus to leverage them, small-but-i7 laptops would need a monitor as well, and the eGPUs would have to be inexpensive enough to not make a gaming rig a better investment.

As for storage, NAS is the way to go in most cases. From a DIY FreeNAS to an inexpensive-but-quick QNAP to a beautiful and simple Synology, there are no shortage of ways to get terabytes of data at you fingertips using garden variety ethernet. If that's not doing it for you, USB-C external drives are alrea

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[CohibaVancouver]

Being able to have an OS in ROM would be handy, if only to have a way to restore an OS without having to worry about recovery media.

Not sure what you're getting at here. In my MS Surface, the Windows 10 "restore" is in a partition on an SSD that's soldered to the motherboard. If I do a factory reset it comes back to the base image. No recovery disk. I hear you on the OS in ROM - That goes back to my TRS-80 Model 1 (although if you had a "floppy drive" then the TRS-DOS OS loaded from that), but I'm unclear what the benefit to that would be on modern hardware, other than perhaps "instant" on, but my Win 10 Surface already has "instant on?"

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[rogoshen1]

thunderbolt 3 is pretty standard at this point in time for eGPU's.

And, I might sound like a bit of a fanboy, but it's nice having a relatively light laptop I can lug around while traveling or whatnot, but when gaming I can hook it up to an eGPU and get pretty good performance. (roughly 80% of the desktop performance for a given card)

Granted it's cheaper to just go with a desktop; but in my case I already had a spare 970gtx and a laptop with TB3 -- so an extra 250ish for the eGPU box wasn't that big of a stretch.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[Narcocide]

How many ROM changes will the socket survive?

More if they don't use a shitty one.

And how many people will void the warranty by opening the case and switch the ROM?

Irrelevant. People void their warranties anyway.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[AHuxley]

The new ROM on a chip could be sent out with the mail and replaced as a chip in the computer. It was just a chip.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[thegarbz]

Laptop vendors can do more than new CPUs to bring some usefulness and features.

Yes, they can stop thermally throttling the previous generation by making the laptop 1mm thicker doubling the size of the heatsink for a huge speed boost.

Being able to have an OS in ROM would be handy, if only to have a way to restore an OS without having to worry about recovery media.

This confuses me. How often do you do this? Personally I don't want them wasting R&D money on something that is only a minor inconvenience every few years. Seriously a USB stick works fine for a recovery media.

built in vitualization and encryption so one can have their gaming stuff, their work stuff, personal stuff, and stuff nobody should see

This sounds good but I don't see this as the job of the hardware vendor. The last thing I want is those idiots shipping more bloated piece of crap poorly written buggy software. The idea is good, but it should be left to software companies to impliment.

Another idea would be to have better support for external GPU breakout boxes.

That should be as trivial as providing a thunderbolt port these days.

CPUs are nice, but there are still many things that can be done to differentiate one's product from everyone else.

I agree, but my personal list would look slightly different:
- Provide more port choice.
- Provide improved pen / touch interfaces because other than the Surface Pro / iPad Pro the majority are garbage.
- Sound. It seems like every laptop that partners with some sound company (e.g. HP and Harman Kardon) produces rubbish speakers that can't even sustain a skype conversation.
- Cameras that don't suck
- Drivers that aren't horrible piece of crap.
- And honestly I may get flak for saying so, but Connected Standby in Windows is fantastic. Much faster than wake on RAM and other such junk. Being able to sleep and wake my computer in less than a second is a huge deal for me now.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[mjwx]

Laptop vendors can do more than new CPUs to bring some usefulness and features. Being able to have an OS in ROM would be handy, if only to have a way to restore an OS without having to worry about recovery media. If a Tandy MS-DOS clone back in the 1980s can do this, so can a PC vendor. Other things come to mind as well, be it the ability to charge (albeit slowly) on USB-C for beefier laptops, allowing for multiple USB chargers to charge a battery at the same time, built in vitualization and encryption so one can have their gaming stuff, their work stuff, personal stuff, and stuff nobody should see, all on one laptop, perhaps using something like PhonebookFS to further hide the presence of other VMs.

Another idea would be to have better support for external GPU breakout boxes. That way, one can go from running command line stuff to Crysis fairly easily, as well as providing fast access to additional storage.

CPUs are nice, but there are still many things that can be done to differentiate one's product from everyone else.

The issue is that adding all of that adds weight. Now You may be thinking that this race to make things thinner and lighter is a bad idea but if that is the case you never had a laptop in 2005 when they were huge bulky monstrosities that weighted 5KG. This isn't an exaggeration. The reason most people had desktops back then is that laptops weren't much smaller or lighter.

I've got a 8 yr old 30L backpack I use as carry on luggage. When I bought it I had a 14" Lenovo that would barely fit inside, my current 15" Asus K501 slips in quite easily and I've never had so much spare space in that bag.

The only thing I miss is an optical drive, but I've got a USB one and still have a lot of space in my bag so I cant really complain.

Another idea would be to have better support for external GPU breakout boxes. That way, one can go from running command line stuff to Crysis fairly easily, as well as providing fast access to additional storage.

The NVidia Optimus thing is pretty good for this. Sitting in a hotel room watching videos in bed, it uses the Intel GPU for low power draw, when playing games it uses the GeForce GPU for max graphics. The battery life using the Nvidia GPU is about 3-4 hours compared to the 9-10 it gets on the Intel GPU so when playing games at an airport, it's good to have it plugged in.

The problem with external boxes is that you need access to the PCI-E bus using a PCI-E x4 port at the very least for graphics, PCI-E x16 for proper eye-melting goodness and we don't have a small enough standard adaptor for that one. Using non-standard adaptors means we'll have 15+ different standards.

Re:Laptop vendors are can do more than new CPUs...

[Agripa]

How do you patch an OS in ROM, after someone found a way to remotely activate your ROM OS and has free reign over your computer?

There are many ways ROMs were patched in the past but the common way now is to patch after copying into shadow RAM which is normally done anyway for performance.

Still running a decade old C2D laptop...

[ewhenn]

I'm still running a Core 2 Duo Laptop from 2006. It had a T5500 (1.67 GHz 2MB Cache) which I upgraded to a T7400 (2.17 GHz, 4MB cache) a few years back as the chip was $4.00 used.

I basically only browse, watch Netflix/YT, or do light office style work on that machine. If I'm doing any "real" work I'm using my desktop with a much more powerful CPU, 32 GB RAM, and triple monitor setup.

Laptops are only useful for light tasks, why replace it if it still does what's asked of it?

An OS in ROM needs support

[rsilvergun]

you get calls on it. Even if they're simple calls they're still calls. External GPUs are still in their infancy so they only show up on really expensive laptops where support costs can be baked into the cost of the laptop. A CPU upgrade doesn't add call volume to your help desk, making it a cheap and easy way to sell new laptops.

Re:Can't we find some way to blame Apple for this?

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> blame Apple

Actually, I'll blame other laptop makers. Build me something like Apple's MacBook only more upgradable and you can have my MacBook money. (For the same reason, Apple feels no pressure to upgrade its aging set.)

No reason to upgrade

[Locke2005]

Intel seems to assume customers want MORE CORES at a lower clock rate. No, I want a faster clock rate using less power!

Re:No reason to upgrade

[thegarbz]

No what you want is a unicorn. Intel just know that they don't exist.

You can offer more cores to increase multithreadding performance without an associated hit in battery life. You can't do the same by ramping up clock speed.

As a matter of interest, what are you doing these days that doesn't benefit from multi-threadding?

Re:No reason to upgrade

[PixetaledPikachu]

Intel seems to assume customers want MORE CORES at a lower clock rate. No, I want a faster clock rate using less power!

That is actually what Intel has been doing up until a year ago. They capped highest number of cores for their consumer level CPU to 4. To get more cores, you need to shell out more to get Xeon workstation CPUs. They only recently give you more cores when AMD introduces Ryzen.

Re:No reason to upgrade

[AmiMoJo]

Unfortunately the laws of physics won't allow Intel to give you faster clock speeds at lower power until they really sort out their next generation fabrication process, and even then the improvement won't be dramatic.

More cores are the way to go for low power performance. It's just taking software a while to catch up.

Re:No reason to upgrade

[Agripa]

Intel seems to assume customers want MORE CORES at a lower clock rate. No, I want a faster clock rate using less power!

Unfortunately that is incompatible with power density limited designs which are scaled to smaller feature sizes. Intel would have to use a *larger* die to achieve a lower thermal resistance which directly increases cost.

Where the F is my Power9 laptop?!?!

[Anonymous Coward]

I am getting really sick of all this closed hardware designed for toys being used in my professional tools!

Re:Wut?

[alvinrod]

Presumably it's Cannon Lake / Whiskey Lake. Cannon Lake was the line using the 10 nm process that's been delayed and Whiskey Lake is the codename for the new generation that will be made on the (further) refined 14 nm process. I don't expect much deviation from the 8000-series (Coffee Lake) in terms of what Intel will offer.

The reason that TFA can't state which processor is being delayed is because Intel has announced any models for Whiskey Lake yet. Cannon Lake has one measly i3 that's being dumped on the Chinese market, and I wouldn't be surprised if Cannon Lake ends up getting scrapped entirely at some point and that they move right on to Ice Lake (the next 10 nm architecture) or whatever comes after that if the 10 nm is really screwed.

Fucking Intel Monopoly

[brxndxn]

While AMD is absolutely kicking ass - especially when you consider its market cap compared to Intel or Nvidia - I see an industry that is plagued with implied 'tit for tat' arrangements unwilling to piss off Intel.

We're seeing all sorts of 'bargain-bin' consumer laptops with AMD processors - but we're really not seeing business-grade laptops available at all using AMD. The industry knows Intel is basically stuck in the mud and AMD has it beat for a while. Meanwhile, no one dares build a laptop with such business essential items like a docking station, durable build, and customization.

In any other industry, we'd see tons of new high-end models if the competition got better. In this industry, we see laptops limited by the unwillingness of the industry to build what everyone wants. Remember when Steve Jobs was so damn disruptive with the Ipod? He basically just built what everyone wanted at the time while the music industry (and players like Sony) refused to build anything with mp3 for an embarrassingly long time. I wonder how long it will take until someone is disruptive in this space.

I can't wait to upgrade my 3 year old Macbook Pro.. but there is nothing available right now that beats it across the board. I don't want to 'upgrade' to a bigger heavier laptop. Nor do I want it to have less resolution or battery life. I want what everyone upgrading a laptop wants - more processing power, more cores, more memory, hard drive space, speed, etc..

You cannot blame Apple

[Anonymous Coward]

They tried everything to drive their customers away. Outdated hardware. High price tag. Soldering components in to prevent customers from upgrading or replacing them. No enough ports. That shitty Island keyboard.

Apple fanboys couldn't take the hint: "Oh Hello my name is Sebastian and I'd like a Frappe Grande and don't you think "Island" sounds so exotic!? '.

Even when Apple released an iPhone without a headphone jack, Apple fanboys still shot their load.

Apple has tried everything to drive their fanboys to PCs. It just doesn't work. So sorry PC vendors: You are on your own!

Re:You cannot blame Apple

[Chaset]

Crude language aside, I do see a point there. My last few computers were Apple branded, but they haven't made anything I want to upgrade to in 3~4 years. Even the last one I got was a bit of a compromise, but I was willing to make it to buy myself time to transition to something else. They certainly are driving me away. Unless they fix those issues you mentioned (soldered in components, lack of ports), my next machine will likely not be an Apple. System76 is looking pretty good lately.

I also read something about them deprecating OpenGL? There's probably no one left there who remembers QuickDraw3D and what success that was.

They're doing everything they can to drive away high end users. Oh well.

Re:You cannot blame Apple

[TheFakeTimCook]

Yes, and in my opinion, they are doing it for one purpose and one purpose only... profit!

I am not trying to ditch Apple here, I am trying to be fair and realistic.

This is what I think:

* They are moving fast towards ARM.

* They need to shun power users, since ARM will not be sufficiently powerfull for that user segment.

* They already have had a reputation for being something that only stupid or ignorant people use (dating back all the way to the one button mouse), so they might aswell boost that image.

* They want to use ARM in everything and by everything I mean laptops, phones, "smart speakers" and tablets

* They do not wish to continue making Macs, unless they can sell them as ARM netbooks, no more stationary workstations

* OSX, MacOS etc.. have changed platform before, "just like that" because they have been very cunning about seperation of layers and they use many genius tricks to do this very smoothly, something they should be proud of.. it is very impressive how they handle that

* When everything they sell is ARM, then they control everything, own CPU's, own OS's, own everything... brilliant for Apple, not so much for consumers (they go from a technical prison cell to a complete technical isolation), because it would most like mean less options for users... once again... for example.. an ARM Apple netbook will not run Windows 10, unless MS decides to go all in on Windows 10 ARM...

I don't know why I am indulging an AC; but here I go:

Considering Intel's complete lack of a game-plan, I think that anyone NOT considering alternative CPUs at this point is headed for deep disappointment.

You haven't seen what Apple can do with a 16-core ARM of their own design. I think that compute-power isn't going to be an issue. And for the price they are likely paying for that Intel detritus, they could likely afford to have a 1 sq. ft. piece of silicon, with 100 cores of their own design!

If Apple was interested in "Shedding Pro Customers", you wouldn't have seen an 18-core Xeon iMac Pro, eGPU support in macOS, a promise of a new Mac Pro (yes, I realize it's still vaporware), continuous improvements in Final Cut Pro X and Logic Pro X, etc.

If they are so stupid in their ARM developments, how come they have the hands-down most powerful ARM-based SoCs in the mobile space? You do realize, of course, that they have more ARM hardware and software development experience than nearly anyone on the planet, right?

They ARE very cunning in their ability to painlessly switch platforms, on that we wholeheartedly agree.

MS is going all-out on their ARM port of Windows 10. In fact, I think they actually released it in May:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-...

Oh, and since they already HAVE x86 Emulation (actually, JIT cross-compiling, which is exactly how Apple did their seamless 68k emulation on PPC) baked-in, it's now a no-brainer for Apple to build ARM-based laptops and desktops, and still provide Windows compatibility.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-...

So, this really isn't as hare-brained an idea as it would first seem, given Apple's mastery of all things ARM.

Re: Can't we find some way to blame Apple for this

[DRJlaw]

The CPUs in the 2017 MacBook Pro and iMac were about a month old when Apple announced their use in those models.

2017 MacBook Pro released June 2017.

Kaby Lake mobile "U" series processors launched January 2017.

Your reality has oddly long months, and appears to omit February, March, April, and May.

Now kindly FOAD.

Now kindly remind yourself that it is now the end of June 2018, and that 1.5 years is far closer to 2 years than one, however oddly long, month. Plan to see a 6 core Macbook Pro anytime soon? Thought not.

Moore's Law

[speedplane]

Moore's Law is already dead. We're now just seeing the effect it has on the market. Sure, things are made cheaper with more mass production, but without any real advancement, we may be stuck in a technological plateau.

Re: Can't we find some way to blame Apple for this

[TheFakeTimCook]

The CPUs in the 2017 MacBook Pro and iMac were about a month old when Apple announced their use in those models.

2017 MacBook Pro released June 2017.

Kaby Lake mobile "U" series processors launched January 2017.

Your reality has oddly long months, and appears to omit February, March, April, and May.

Now kindly FOAD.

Now kindly remind yourself that it is now the end of June 2018, and that 1.5 years is far closer to 2 years than one, however oddly long, month. Plan to see a 6 core Macbook Pro anytime soon? Thought not.

1 month or 5, it was STILL the most-current CPU when the MBPs and iMacs were shipped. So, what's your point, Mr. Pedantic?

As far as the 6 core MBPs go, probably October-November. Qualifying the new component and setting up CM logistics takes a little time. Plus you've gotta admit that Intel has been getting pretty spastic as to their "Roadmap" these days. That makes OEMs kind of nervous.

Re:No more chopped liver keyboards

[toddestan]

You can get a clicky keyboard on some of those ridiculous gamer laptops. I'd even consider buying one, but it they look about what you expect a gamer laptop to look like.

I think that must be low end vega

[rsilvergun]

because I looked up a review and they were running Street Fighter V in 720p/low spec mode and not getting a consistent 60. I'm not even sure if Capcom will let you play online with that. A mobile 1050 will run it in 1080p normal mode (SFV only has to 2 modes, low spec and regular). The 1050 based laptop will usually cost more but if you shop around I've seen them for less (Costco had one for $600 not to long ago, but I think they were clearing them out).