"In a recent call with Intel's Ryan Shrout about the performance of its 11th Generation H-series laptop processors, he took some time out to throw some serious shade Apple's way. "
Of course they did. And not just the new M1 Macs but the Intel MacBooks as well. Because it’s not like Intel has anything better to spend their brain-space on right now, do they?
Oh… Wait...
Previously on Intel Apple drive-bys
So, after pretty much everyone in the industry, including Windows -stans, dunked on Intel like a donut over the last couple ill-conceived, ill-advised, ill-executed anti-Apple marketing mess-ups, Intel has to have been learned, right? No way could some fragile ego micro… peon in Marcomms or the exec team screw this up again… or worse, could they?
According to Intel, it's the poor gaming experience of a Mac that makes its own devices superior.
The poor gaming experience. Gotcha. Not the poor computing or creating experience? If you want that, for sure get a Mac. It’s just the poor gaming experience that should drive you too…
Well, not Intel, I guess, because both Xbox and PlayStation went AMD…
This wasn't an idle boast either, Intel has thrown some research behind its feeling.
Now I’m not going to pretend that money wasted on attack marketing would be better spent on getting Intel’s chipset business turned around, because those are totally different departments and staff… but honestly at this point would it really hurt to have everyone in the company aligned and focused on making Intel better? Getting out and helping to push?
And don’t say you can do both at the same time because the current product clearly, clearly shows absolutely otherwise.
Not only are Apple Macs rubbish because they run Apple's own M1 silicon, which is obviously inferior to what Intel used to make,
The M1, which is an ultra-low-power part, has some of the best single-core pure performance in the industry, and the absolute best performance efficiency in the industry, but it’s rubbish and obviously inferior to Intel’s aggressively hot, egregiously power hungry chips, that were so delayed they had to invent a tic-toc-toc-toc-optimize-optimize-optimize-optimize cycle while Apple was pushing out new silicon architecture generations and gains year-over-year? Does Websters really need to subtweet the definition of rubbish here? Or is that abundantly, hilariously obvious by now?
but over half of the most popular games don't even run on the platform.
That’s totally fair. Apple has never focused on high-end gaming on the Mac, and even when they included higher-end AMD graphics cards, they never optimized them for gaming, like at all. Maybe that’ll change with a higher-end Apple TV or VR headset product, maybe not. But for now, totally fair.
What of emulators, I hear you ask? Yeah, they had that covered too. By showing off Valheim running appallingly through Parallels: trees popping in out of existence, textures appearing and disappearing. It was not pretty.
Now, normally I wouldn’t be all in-before cliche toxic pedant comment guy, but Parallels is virtualization not emulation. And I point that out only because you can’t virtualize x86 Windows on M1, only Windows for ARM, which has nothing to really do with Intel. Unless we’re, River-Song-Spoilers talking about Intel Macs, in which case you can boot camp into Windows on an Intel Mac for Native performance.
Which just… Aiya. Just Uncle Roger level Aiya.… once again has Intel own-goaling themselves not as a significant differentiator in the PC space, but as a commodity part where everything significant or differentiated comes from running Windows on top of them.
The red in this graph is actually an Intel-powered MacBook Pro, using a Core i9 9980HK alongside an AMD Radeon Pro 5600M to be exact, compared to the Core i5 11400H alongside a GeForce RTX 3060. Proof, if it were needed, that PCs are just better.
So… 11th generation Intel with latest generation Nvidia runs faster than 9th generation Intel with nearly 2 year old AMD…
Wait, I take it all back. This is actually 5D 9000IQ level marcomms… If what Intel wants to do is show why Apple had no choice but to yote them for custom M-series silicon.
And so the fact that you can't game properly on a Mac means that Apple should probably give up and go home.
Yup, shut it down, return the money to shareholders and Michael Dell. Fun and trillions of dollars while it lasted… If only there was a reality where a small percentage of PC customers — so small that it would be incomprehensibly weird for Apple to be living so rent free, for so long, in Intel’s brain stem, if Intel wasn’t either no-wrath-like-a-supplier-scorn or worried the mindshare of M1 all by itself is an existential threat to their stalled silicon business — if only there was a reality where people who preferred the overall experience of the Mac but also wanted higher-end gaming couldn’t also get dedicated gaming consoles or rigs… yes, running AMD.
I mean, it’s what a crapton of PC laptop owners have done. And with the price-to performance ratio of the M1 MacBook Air… That might even be the killer… est combo in the business right now.
To be fair, gaming on a Mac absolutely is rubbish, and it's not something I'd want to do. But I'm still surprised that Intel is so angry about it all. I even asked if Intel was burning its bridges with Apple? The answer was that Apple has been very public about moving to its own silicon and that it is now a competitor. All's fair in love and war I guess.
It is. It totally is. And it’s not like Apple hasn’t taken more than their fair share of pot shots at Android and Windows over the years. They even came close to an Intel slap-back during the M1 iMac intro in April.
Other than that, though, Apple’s been surprisingly… polite about Intel over the years. Bitten their tongue nearly completely off. As Intel’s constant delays pushed back the release date of new Mac models by months or more, and their failure to meet process shrink roadmaps had MacBooks running like TDP max space heaters for nearly half a decade. Even after direct questions during press briefings, hell, between them, Apple marcomms would just smile and keep Intel completely un-thrown from under any busses. For years. And now they pretty much don’t talk about Intel at all.
And… Maybe that’s what’s gotten Intel so pissy? Not that Apple walked away, but that Apple never looked back? Never answered their late night thirst texts? Never reacted at all to their constant self-owning beyond cringe-embarrassing attention seeking. That’s like watching the death-throws of a once-apex predator, Dinosaured down not by an M1 meteor from the heavens but a shame comet of their own complancency? Maybe that’s what’s got Intel so you mad?
And about the only thing I can think of that could help them now is if the entire exec and marcomms team sign up for Brilliant. Stat.
It’s this awesome website and app that teaches algorithms and neural networks, math, science, and computer science, critically — critically! — logic and deduction, but also physics, quantum mechanics, game theory, cryptocurrency, and so much more.
And it’s built on learning while doing and solving real challenges in real-time. With no memorizing long messy formulas or fact sheets, no tests or grades. Just instant feedback that coaches you bit by bit so you can rapidly improve and learn fundamental concepts… literally before you even realize it.