Devindra has been writing about the way technology intersects with our lives for nearly 20 years. He started the Amherst Student's first technology column, worked in IT support for many (many) years, and eventually moved to Brooklyn to cover New York's tech scene in 2009.
It's been a Mac-heavy week! In this episode, Devindra and producer Ben Ellman dive into all of Apple 's new M4 hardware: the new iMac, Mac mini and refreshed Macbook Pros. The Mac mini, in particular, looks like it'll be a huge hit for anyone who needs a simple desktop system. Also, we dive into why Apple is pushing for every Mac to get 16GB of RAM at a minimum. That will benefit all users, even if they don't care about Apple Intelligence.
So, yeah, tune in for that. Ben, you are somebody who I know is fully in the Mac ecosystem, and I also know you're very conscientious. Well, unfortunately, or for what you do, you're kind of there, but you're also very conscientious about how you upgrade, right? Because we're dragging you into a modern iPhone and things like that.
a series of Mac news announcements, but we didn't, we didn't know if it would just be a live stream. We didn't know if it would just be video recordings and news drops. And that's what it ended up being. They lovedance. I mean, I feel it, you know, I'm sure even Apple is tired of hosting these song and dances or media events.
Because their grumpiness about having to do that, when it's getting toward the end of the year and they've got so much else on their plate, might bleed into man, why did they fly us out for this? Yes, there are improvements, but I think it's even unbearable. I thinkIt's a lot of work. And I feel like even the people at Apple are like, you know, we don't need to go this hard. Like they produced a couple of videos. They got the press releases out there.
on the back, right? There's no real colors on the real. No, you get the front colors to you have the like little chin on the iMac, but is the design that thinner design they launched with the M one chips now in slightly brighter colors? Like whatever the last one I reviewed, like I was just so impressed at being able to to move that thing around to just And I remember portabilityYeah, like you could bring it from your den to your, you know, dining room or something and do something with your kids and then bring it back.
So because it's running large models, large language models and different things, and it's no wonder that. Microsoft's Copilot Plus PCs, those AI PCs also require at least 16 gigabytes of RAM. I think what we're seeing is like that is the cost of running these AI models because what they're doing is basically chewing up large amounts of data or processing it against your current data and that takes memory.
And now I'm introducing a new standard folks. If you're listening to this show, if you like to play games. If you like to edit the occasional video or something, or just put something up on Instagram or or TikTok, 32 gigabytes of RAM. Let's go, let's go all in on 32 gigabytes of RAM. How much RAM do you have in your MacBook, Ben?that too. But 32 gigabytes really gives you room to breathe.
around 2005. That original Mac Mini was kind of a slow little box, but it was an interesting idea that not many people were doing. I honestly think you can, you can like really trace the small PC trend back to the Mac Mini because Intel's NUCs and other things people did kind of followed with what that was.Amazing. Like you can, and that was like years ago, right? That was like before the M series Mac. Oh yeah,yeah, no.
That was like one of the big reasons to do it. And it almost seemed it seems like Apple saw that criticism and directly addressed that. So there were two USB C ports up front. There's also the headphone jack up front. Around the back the base M4 model gets you Thunderbolt 4 support, which is, which is pretty good.
And that M4 pro. Mac mini starts at 13. 99. That's what you'd pay for a decently powerful desktop, you know? So if you are somebody working in audio or video and you don't need the full capabilities of the Mac studio, which is especiallyThat's probably going to be video. That's probably going to be like really complicated, like 3d rendering or something like that's andata. That's a ton of data. That's the main thing.
You can see some fins there. So it is bringing in air and it's doing great. It's like dealing with heat in some ways, but how big can the fans actually be on a thing like this? I don't know. I think Apple had the video or had the thing in the actual let me see in their launch video.I'm looking forward to seeing a teardown of this to see what the actual diameter of the fan is going to be.Yeah. I mean, it's probably just one big fan, I believe.
Like slightly updated version of the case for the old Mac mini on the Mac studio. And they can say okay, now this is you're slightly bigger, but way more powerful entertainment production workstation.I don't, I don't think they need to do that at all. Like the Mac mini exists to be powerhouse where you don't have to worry about heat.
I certainly don't need it, but I am tempted to get one and make it my Plex server or something just make it a little headless system that sits somewhere that I can tap into.But also think about it a tech guy like you probably has a lot of pretty decent monitors just lying around, and so if you're talking about the possibility of getting a iMac to set up in some public place for Sophia or, you know, both of your kids to use as they grow up.
That was my life back then. We have come so far. The only downside is like nothing is upgradable anymore. You can't upgrade the Ram. You can't swap out you know, your wifi card if something goes wrong. So that is theprice we pay for all that. And I think the last thing that came out during this Mac week was that the AirPods Pro 2 hearing features were finally released.Yeah. The AirPods Pro 2 hearing features the hearing tests and all that stuff is up there.
Oh, yeah, MacBook Pro. The last thing that I wanted to say about the hearing features is that I'm still reticent to use it. even if I could, even if I had all the equipment that I needed, just because getting that assessment, and then just having to sit with it, might be a little bit scary. That is human psychology.
Let me see here. There's also this and the iMac also have a nano texture option for their screens. And that could be useful for anybody doing work in really bright environments or direct sunlight. So if you're like, if you're working in the desert and MacBook out there, you Even with a great high quality screen, there will be glare, it'll be hard to make things out.
It's like a thing. I'm not going to say, go, go take out a loan on a computer, but you know, if you break up a more expensive device into smaller monthly payments, It hurts a lot less. That's how I freelanced and got decent computers while I was freelancing.
Oh, most definitely. Chromebooks, I mean, that's the thing, but we are, I'm at least trying to encourage people at least get a Windows laptop, at least get something that is a little more flexible and functional.
The compute stick, which was just stick that plugged into your HD HDMI port. It. And that's it. That's it. Or no, it was a stick that you plug in. So it's like abasically. It was a cool thing that they could do, but they gave up on it because it was expensive and nobody was really using it.I'm looking it up. It's like HP Elite Mini 800 G9 desktop PC. Yes. That looks pretty small. HP G2 Mini G9. So, this one, the Elite Mini. 800 G9 is 699. That's almost 700.
Yeah, whatever. Whatever makes the shift more bearable. Oh, yeah, go ahead. But, it can also be a sneaky way of being like, Hey, you know what? I blew out my ears listening to like crazy dubstep music or something and now I have hearing loss. Earlierthan I would think. There's totally that. I've been actually thinking Man, my life, my high school life would have been so different if I had like wireless earbuds like walk around and have stuff.
But I kind of understand why Apple is just not too bothered to fix it. The power button on the bottom of the Mac mini. I saw people talking about that too. It's like on the bottom rear corner, instead of like on a port on the back or something, or even directly a print. I know Apple wants to make that thing look clean.
Cause you probably want it accessible for the USB port. So it's, it is a choice. Apple is building their systems for people who have Apple accessories. And I think that's mainly what they're thinking about here.So if you want to also contribute to our live stream, I'm I say at the end of every live stream it gets cut off from the audio version that the live stream makes us smarter.
Like you would buying a house. That's a, just an investment for you basically. So it's I've hated what these companies have all done. Like I was, I don't know if you remember this, Ben, you remember the era before Uber and Lifter and everything New York used to have Halo. Which I think was a London based startup.
You get really bad drivers on Uber and Lyft because normal people just driving around in their cars. Not fun. Not great. Anyway, that's a good thing. That's a good thing. You also want to bring up this thing about OpenAI, Ben. I know you were interested in this. OpenAI's Whisper.I just let my otter subscription lapse because. I was using it for another client. I was using it, you know, five or six times a week. So I figured, okay, yeah, I can take this off of my taxes.
And the problem is that people are using this in hospitals. That's a situation where you really can't have something just go off all crazy, especially because if it goes off all crazy and it sounds a little scary or something, like I saw some examples in the Associated Press, not Reuters, Reuters would get mad at me for that.
It's also, I don't, I don't think I don't think AOC has seen Crazy Taxi before. So it's also introducing a new person into this world and the That's surprising to me. Just like the, the insanity of crazy taxi. I love this game. I love the dreamcast. I've talked about how much I love the dreamcast, but Tim Tim was just has yeah, pure, pure love for it.
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