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Desktops (Apple) Apple

Several macOS Monterey Features Unavailable on Intel-Based Macs (macrumors.com) 141

Several of macOS Monterey's features won't be available to users with an Intel-powered Macs. On the macOS Monterey features page, fine print indicates that the following features require a Mac with the M1 chip, including any MacBook Air, 13-inch MacBook Pro, Mac mini, and iMac model released since November 2020: 1. Portrait Mode blurred backgrounds in FaceTime videos
2. Live Text for copying and pasting, looking up, or translating text within photos
3. An interactive 3D globe of Earth in the Maps app
4. More detailed maps in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, and London in the Maps app
5. Text-to-speech in more languages, including Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and Finnish
6. On-device keyboard dictation that performs all processing completely offline
7. Unlimited keyboard dictation (previously limited to 60 seconds per instance)

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Several macOS Monterey Features Unavailable on Intel-Based Macs

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  • by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @03:08PM (#61470872)

    There - you have Apples policies right there - buy a new mac or fuck you.

    Map detail and 3d maps tied to ARM instead of Intel as well? There's absolutely no reason for that - get lost apple.

    • There - you have Apples policies right there - buy a new mac or fuck you.

      Map detail and 3d maps tied to ARM instead of Intel as well? There's absolutely no reason for that - get lost apple.

      Does Apple owe you or anyone additional features for free? Honestly, this is silly. It's as if you bought a gasoline car and then the next year the auto-maker came out with the same car model as an electric self-driving car. The automaker agrees to upgrade the software in your old model car to enable self driving for free, but cannot upgrade the powertrain to electric. You have to buy a new car for that. Should you complain? I honestly don't think so.

    • It's buy a new Mac or continue to do what you are doing now plus some (not all) new whizzy things all for the upgrade price of exactly Zero Dollars. Exactly the same situation as my Raspberry Pi OS and core software.

    • This type of comment is why /. Is still great.

      Ars and Reddit are simply bending over to apple heavy handed tactics.

      These artificial limitations are simply that, to force the rabid cult members to buy a new mac.

      By the way, do you want to see how far gone Ars is into apples ass?
      Don't write the words âoerabid cult members âoe since that is apparently a good reason to ban people.

      • These artificial limitations are simply that, to force the rabid cult members to buy a new mac.
        And how exactly does it force you to buy a new Mc?

        I'm sitting here on my 2014 MacBook Air, and no ne is holding me a gun on my had and is forcing me to buy anything ...

        • These artificial limitations are simply that, to force the rabid cult members to buy a new mac.
          And how exactly does it force you to buy a new Mc?

          I'm sitting here on my 2014 MacBook Air, and no ne is holding me a gun on my had and is forcing me to buy anything ...

          Thats the problem with people.

          You need to differentiate between the rabid followers that will defend apple actions and go out and buy a new Mac because "reasons" and then are the ones that have one, realize is a bullshit money grab action on Apples part, call them out and continue using their current devices.

          So up to you to decide were you fall on those descriptions.

  • by BishopBerkeley ( 734647 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @03:09PM (#61470882) Journal

    Apple went down this path because Intel wouldn't make the processors Apple wanted. So, here we are.

    I have an Intel Mac. No skin off my hide. Those are not exactly make or break features.

    • by _xeno_ ( 155264 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @03:22PM (#61470952) Homepage Journal

      But none of them are features that should require the M1 chip. Well, maybe. They're also all iOS features, so it's possible that Apple is literally taking the iOS code and running it on macOS and that's why you can't use them on Intel Macs.

      1. Portrait Mode blurred backgrounds in FaceTime videos

      OK, I suppose it's possible that Intel's GPU isn't up for this, and they don't want to force the main GPU on for such a task because it wastes power. So maybe justified.

      2. Live Text for copying and pasting, looking up, or translating text within photos

      Probably uses the AI co-processor features that Apple has for their custom chips, since it was originally intended for use on iOS.

      3. An interactive 3D globe of Earth in the Maps app

      Um, nope, no way to justify this.

      4. More detailed maps in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, and London in the Maps app

      Or this.

      5. Text-to-speech in more languages, including Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and Finnish

      Or this.

      6. On-device keyboard dictation that performs all processing completely offline

      Well, again, this may require the AI co-processor stuff, so I'll give them a pass on just this, I suppose.

      7. Unlimited keyboard dictation (previously limited to 60 seconds per instance)

      And again, no way to justify this. At least on technical grounds.

      All of these things can certainly be done on Intel Macs. I'll grant them not doing background blurring as a "power consumption thing" but the items that may require the AI co-processor can definitely be done in software on an Intel Mac. They just don't want to.

      • by dfghjk ( 711126 )

        "1. Portrait Mode blurred backgrounds in FaceTime videos

        OK, I suppose it's possible that Intel's GPU isn't up for this, and they don't want to force the main GPU on for such a task because it wastes power. So maybe justified."

        Unlikely. More likely is that Apple uses a library for which there is no Intel version and they don't want to create one. Intel's GPU not up to the job but the M1's is? Haha. Who says it even needs the GPU?

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion
          • by jythie ( 914043 )
            Well, yeah. Under all those libraries that do stuff for you, there is often a bit of C or Assembly handling some of the low level tasks. Even if it is only a small part of the library, it is still a dependency.
            • Not in this case.

              There are phone apps which can do frame rate background segmentation on midrange Android devices on the CPU. All you need is a decent SGEMM which apple already provide for Intel and have for years. As CNNs go, it's an easy task. And there are plenty of BSD licensed libraries which will use GPUs for acceleration.

              This is just Apple being dicks.

          • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

            More likely is that Apple uses a library for which there is no Intel version and they don't want to create one

            There are people out there writing complicated image processing libraries in assembler?

            More like it requires the Apple ISP (image signal processor) in the M1 chip (and in iOS). Intel chip of course does not have the ISP.

            It's likely a feature of the camera itself which on the M1 is a standard smartphone like camera, but on the Intel Mac is a USB camera.

            • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

              More likely is that Apple uses a library for which there is no Intel version and they don't want to create one

              There are people out there writing complicated image processing libraries in assembler?

              More like it requires the Apple ISP (image signal processor) in the M1 chip (and in iOS). Intel chip of course does not have the ISP.

              It's likely a feature of the camera itself which on the M1 is a standard smartphone like camera, but on the Intel Mac is a USB camera.

              If that were the case, I'd expect it to be supported on T2-based Intel Macs, too, given that the T2 chip also contains image processing hardware and was likely designed at the same time as the CPU in the iPhone X, which supports FaceTime effects. The Neural Engine seems like a more likely guess to me. But who knows.

              Either way, it really doesn't make sense to me that they'd implement something that trivial so close to the hardware. That's about like implementing a modern word processor in assembly languag

        • If Intel chip is not up for this then perhaps they should go ask MS how to do it?
      • 1. Portrait Mode blurred backgrounds in FaceTime videos

        OK, I suppose it's possible that Intel's GPU isn't up for this, and they don't want to force the main GPU on for such a task because it wastes power. So maybe justified.

        Come on, Zoom does this just fine on an Intel mac.

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • by EvilSS ( 557649 )
        #1 is probably built around the M1 neural engine, so that makes sense. #7 is most likely dependent on #6 (on-device vs across network) so that one also makes sense. The only ones that jump out as arbitrary are 3, 4, and 5. 3 and 5 might be more that they don't want to put effort into developing them on two systems (3 utilizing some custom M1 GPU feature vs Intel, 5 being tied to the new on-device Siri. Just guesses though). 4, I just can't figure out a reason for other than they just don't want to do it.
      • by Strider- ( 39683 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @05:07PM (#61471430)

        5. Text-to-speech in more languages, including Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and Finnish

        Or this.

        Have You ever tried speaking Finnish? I’m surprised it doesn’t take a beowulf cluster to do that...

        • On the cööntrrääry, with ällmööst eevery öther leetter wriitten wtiice, I woulld sääy Suomi hääs a lööt öf reeduundanccy buiillt-iin. Yoou cään drrööp häällf the leetterrs and stiill määkke seensse öf iit.

      • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

        But none of them are features that should require the M1 chip. Well, maybe. They're also all iOS features, so it's possible that Apple is literally taking the iOS code and running it on macOS and that's why you can't use them on Intel Macs.

        1. Portrait Mode blurred backgrounds in FaceTime videos

        OK, I suppose it's possible that Intel's GPU isn't up for this, and they don't want to force the main GPU on for such a task because it wastes power. So maybe justified.

        This is the least justified of all of them. If you search the web, you'll find implementations of this feature running in TensorFlow.js. In a browser. No GPU needed, much less a separate tensor processor. In the worst case, you might have to train a smaller model and get slightly worse results, but realistically, this is a piece of cake.

      • by tsm_sf ( 545316 )
        "Does anyone at our modern and fast moving company want to work on old software for an old platform for the old company we used to be?"

        "No?"
      • by vlad30 ( 44644 )
        Actually Most if not all these features are available in 3rd party apps currently on intel Macs e.g. Blurred background on zoom i.e. portrait mode. This could be more of a olive branch to developers for features apple is incorporating and let them keep the older market while they come up new features. Keeping developers happy is important however even developers understand some features will need to be incorporated by apple eventually
      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        Google has been doing on-device speech to text / dictation for a few years on normal ARM CPUs.

        Intel's GPUs are more than up to the task. Other apps like Zoom do it without issue. Also the way it works is similar to one stage of video encoding (motion estimation) which again Intel GPUs are more than adequate for.

      • by jeremyp ( 130771 )

        Background blurring is certainly possible on an Intel Mac. Both Teams and Zoom have this feature. Zoom even manages to do it without melting the circuit board into a pile of slag.

    • I have an Intel Mac. No skin off my hide. Those are not exactly make or break features.

      Yet ...

    • by MrLint ( 519792 )

      Just like when IBM didnt make the CPUs apple wanted.

    • by Jerrry ( 43027 )

      Apple to Intel Mac owners: Fuck You!

    • > I have an Intel Mac. No skin off my hide. Those are not exactly make or break features.

      They'll get there

      • Iâ(TM)ll be sure for an upgrade by then. :)

      • I have a similar view. The great obsolescence has begun in earnest. Of course, if you think Apple's buiness model is to make money by selling you the widget, it makes sense that they would want you to migrate. I think in general they support their HW for a good long period... but these arch changes are exceptions. You can still buy an Intel-based mac today, and the features available are already wasting away. Not the best look.
    • I have an Intel Mac.

      No. According to Apple you have a festering sore that needs to be treated. Sooner than you think.

      No skin off my hide. Those are not exactly make or break features.

      Not broken enough to convince you? Give it another update or two.

      Death By 1,000 Cuts, is pleasing to them. Like Calligraphy. Guessing that was a Jobs thing.

    • No, Apple went down this path because, like the rest of the PC market, they just had an amazing year selling computers to anyone/everyone who would have bought a Mac for the next few years. (Working at home and all)
      Now Apple is in a bind to it's shareholders and the image of the M1 processors.
      Anyone who was holding out on buying a Mac most likely bought a shiny new Mac in the last year so they aren't in any hurry to go buy yet another new computer in less then a year. This means most potential buyers of a n
      • by jeremyp ( 130771 )

        In my case the feature they need to get me to buy an Apple silicon based Mac is 64Gb RAM. I'm hoping they delay it for a year because my current MBP is still pretty new and it's hard to justify replacing it right now.

    • No skin off my hide. Those are not exactly make or break features.

      Don't worry, Apple will keep trying until they find something you care about.

  • And fanboys (Score:3, Insightful)

    by fred6666 ( 4718031 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @03:10PM (#61470884)

    are going to defend the move in 3... 2... 1...

    • by Shemmie ( 909181 )

      Actually happened, as you were typing this message.

      That's legitimately impressive.

    • Re:And fanboys (Score:5, Insightful)

      by DontBeAMoran ( 4843879 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @04:12PM (#61471174)

      No matter what people write, they're always shoved into "Apple fanboy" or "Apple hater" boxes, it doesn't even matter if they use Apple gear or not.

      "This is amazing" says someone with a Linux PC and an Android phone - labelled as an Apple fanboy.

      "This is so freaking stupid" says someone with an iMac, MacBook Pro, iPad and iPhone - labelled as an Apple hater.

      • by jythie ( 914043 )
        Yeah.. over the years it has gotten really cringy. People get REALLY invested in their tribal relationship with Apple.
      • I reserve the term 'fan boy' for people who believe Steve Jobs really was against DRM in iTunes.
        • I believe he really was against DRM. After all, it was just a lot of pointless work and liabilities for Apple. Dropping DRM meant more profits.

          The funniest part of it all is when he got the labels to agree to drop the DRM and increase the quality from 128kbps to 256kbps at the same time. I have no idea how he was able to get the labels to ever agree to that. For Apple though, it meant all the iPods were now basically half the capacity, pushing people to buy the biggest capacity models and more incentives fo

      • I don't care what architecture people like, but I do care about accurate information.

        When people say it's impossible/unrealistic for certain features to exist on certain hardware for totally bullshit marketing reasons, that's reason to get upset.

  • Oops too late. Time to pay up on your Apple tax.
  • The (intel based) Mac I bought last year won't allow it.

    Who cares?

    It does the job

  • Dear Apple,

    I see you've allowed Corrupt Greed to take over the sales meetings again. Fuck You Very Much for that. I hope you feel this pain in the most unexpected ways, because you have no justified reason to pull this kind of shit as a way to guilt consumers into buying your overpriced hardware.

    Sincerely,

    - Apple customer, 1984 - today.

    • by hjf ( 703092 )

      It took you 37 years to realize? Jeez.

      • It took you 37 years to realize? Jeez.

        The last hardware I purchased was a 2012 Mac Mini that I upgraded myself with an SSD and RAM. Those upgrade days, are long gone.

        I received a much newer MBP as a gift, but you're right. They actually lost me as a customer when they removed all DIY upgrade paths and started financially raping people for said soldered upgrades. No thanks. I can't justify that kind of premium for CandyBSD.

        I hope between this and their (now) infamous 30% developer tax, that they get burned hard.

  • by leonbev ( 111395 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @04:32PM (#61471276) Journal

    It's not really worth bothering to upgrade to Monterey if you have an Intel Mac. Gotcha.

    Honestly, I wish that I would have stuck with Mojave (10.14). I lost access to a ton of older 32 bit Mac apps and games when I "upgraded" to Catalina.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Apple somehow manages to provide years of support, while actually pushing people to abandon perfectly fine devices at the same time.

    (Okay, sure bring the mod hammer...) One thing Microsoft does well is supporting their sh-t forever. And, they also get to *reduce* resource usage of their OS over time. Yes, sure running ads in the start menu is not forgivable, I am just focusing on the back compat aspect.

    However Apple abandons everything in about two OS iterations. Even if the device is *technically* supporte

  • by couchslug ( 175151 ) on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @06:01PM (#61471690)

    One only NEEDS a specific PC to run software to make a profit. Other use is toy use (like gaming on Windows boxes).

    Considered as a tool for work Macs are cheap compared to what a tradesman invests in their typical kit but this idea is a hard sell to buyers too invested in one model instead of planning for OS diversity from the start. If a grand or two hurts in the first world then it's not a tool but an option no matter how much affection you have for it.

    The market rewards Apple therefore its choices are correct for Apple. If they're less correct for you, buy another machine or run an OS that doesn't shit all over your freedoms. You knew what you signed up for (if this is still a tech site).

    "Freedom of choice means you have some work to do."
                         

    • If they're less correct for you, buy another machine or run an OS that doesn't shit all over your freedoms.

      That is exactly what I did. From 2005 until 2013, I had a decent amount of Apple kit. The pressure to buy the new stuff was stronger than my need to buy the new stuff, so I exited the Apple ecosystem. My money is not theirs, it is mine and I chose to keep it.

  • According to Apple's own website https://www.apple.com/macos/monterey-preview/ [apple.com], only the Portrait mode is restricted to M1 Macs.

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