this post was submitted on 27 Aug 2024
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[–] [email protected] 211 points 2 months ago (4 children)
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[–] [email protected] 146 points 2 months ago (5 children)

Considering that RAM is shared with the GPU, it's still not enough.

[–] [email protected] 148 points 2 months ago (2 children)

It's OK - for an extra $400 they'll sell you one with an extra $50 worth of RAM.

[–] [email protected] 43 points 2 months ago (7 children)

It doesn't even cost that for them.

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 months ago

$800 for $30 of ram

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago

"yeah but that's like having 32GB on a lame PC"

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[–] [email protected] 86 points 2 months ago (2 children)

It's really sad that this needs to be an actual headline.

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[–] [email protected] 76 points 2 months ago (5 children)

I know it's not a like for like comparison, but the Pixel 9 Pro that launched this month has 16gb of RAM.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Yup, while the current iPhone 15 Pro is the only model which has 8 GB of RAM, with the regular iPhone 15 having 6 GB. All iPhone 16 models (launching next month) will still only have 8 GB according to rumors, which happens to be the bare minimum required to run Apple Intelligence.

Giving the new models only 8 GB seems a bit shortsighted and will likely mean that more complex AI models in future iOS versions won't run on these devices. It could also mean that these devices won't be able to keep a lot of apps ready in the background if running an AI model in-between.

16 GB is proper future-proofing on Google's part (unless they lock new software features behind newer models anyway down the road), and Apple will likely only gradually increase memory on their devices.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Pretty much what NVIDIA is doing with their GPUs. Refusing to provide adequate future proof amount of VRAM on their cards. That's planned obsolescence in action.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

And like Apple, Nvidia has no shortage of fanboys that insist the pitiful amounts of (V)RAM is enough. The marketing sway those two companies have is incredible.

It's a complete joke that Sapphire had an 8GB version of the R9 290X, what, 11 years ago or something? And yet Nvidia is still selling 8GB cards now, for exorbitant prices, and people lap it up.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago

The current GPU situation actually has me curious about AMDs upcoming Halo APU chips. They're likely going to be pretty expensive relative to their potential GPU equivelent performance but if they work out similar to the combined price of a CPU and GPU then it might be worthwhile as they use onboard RAM as their VRAM. Probably a crazy idea but one I look forward to theory-building in spring when they release.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (8 children)

If you were being cynical, you could say it was planned obsolescence and that when the new ai feature set rolls out that you have to get the new phone for them.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It's a good comparison actually because Apple keeps saying that their ram is faster because it's soldered (Which is true but only if you squint). I don't really think it makes a difference because if you run out of space you still run out of space, the fact that you can access the limited space more quickly doesn't really help.

Well phone RAM also tends to be solded onto the board too so it's a pretty good comparison.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Some phones have 24gb since 2 years ago already

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[–] [email protected] 75 points 2 months ago

for the same price other laptops sell for 64GB

what a bargain

[–] [email protected] 50 points 2 months ago

Oooo a whole 16 gigs! It can run Firefox with more than four tabs open!

[–] [email protected] 41 points 2 months ago (1 children)

...is this actually 16Gb or 8Gb feeling like 16Gb, as per previous statements?

[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

I think perhaps they realize the Apple magic has worn off and people have shockingly realized that 8 GB is in fact 8 GB.

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 2 months ago

...in 2030.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 2 months ago (5 children)

And it probably won't be able to be upgraded by the user, which should be the bare minimum.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago (3 children)

And it ~~probably~~ absolutely guaran-fucking-teed won't be able to be upgraded by the user, which should be the bare minimum.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Linux requirements: CPU (optional)

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 2 months ago

Golly, thanks Apple. It's not like I can go buy a 256GB DIMM right now. 16GB what a joke.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 months ago (19 children)

Whoa, that's like 32GB of Windows RAM. Seems excessive to me tbh

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (9 children)

The annoying thing is I have had people claim that 8GB and 16GB is fine on Apple and works better than on PC laptops. To the point one redditor point blank refused to believe I owned an Apple laptop. I literally had to take a photograph of said laptop and show it to them before they would believe me about the RAM capacity.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago (8 children)

You should have said "sure buddy" and ignored them.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (1 children)

My Linux machine has 64 GiB of RAM, which is like 128 GiB of Mac RAM. It's still not enough

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (11 children)

Serious question what are you using all that RAM for? I am having a hard time justifying upgrading one of my laptops to 32 GiB, nevermind 64 GiB.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 months ago (2 children)

My sister just bought a MacBook Air for college, and I had to beg her to spend the extra money on 16gb of memory. It feels like a scam that it appears cheap with the starting at price, but nobody should actually go with those "starting at" specs.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (16 children)

Let me know how many multiple thousands of dollars it's going to cost for a MAX variant of the chip that can run three external monitors like it's 2008.

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I don't really care unless it has the same price point as the 8gb one.

But we all know it won't be.

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

and maximum since you probably won't be able to upgrade it since silicon doesn't allow upgrades

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago (9 children)

Yeh can upgrade them at purchase. From 256gb storage to 512gb will only cost you one kidney.

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Naturally the price for the cheapest model will also be going to up several orders of magnitude more than the cost of materials, labor, and healthy profit margin to account for that as well I'm sure.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Why are apple products always so anemic on memory?

[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

Because there are two types of mac users:

  • People that are buying them with their own money because they're trendy and just using them as glorified Internet browsers. 16gb is plenty.
  • People using them professionally so their company is paying and Apple can over charge for the necessary memory upgrade
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[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Greed, it lowers the advertised price, but once you spec it decently you've added a grand in extras

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

“640k ought to be enough for anyone.”

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago

Good, 8 is unusable for my workloads and 12 feels like they're just fucking with us

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