Upgrade - 285: Mac Pros for Mac Pros

Episode Date: February 17, 2020

Myke met the people for whom the Mac Pro was made, and reports back with details. Jason tries to combat confusion about whether the Mac is really being attacked by malware and explains what Apple is doing to stop it. And we address some five-year-old follow-up regarding text input on the Apple Watch.

from relay fm this is upgrade episode 285 today's show is brought to you by direct mail bombas and door dash my name is mike hurley and i am joined on assignment by mr jason snell hello jason snell well wait assignment means that i'm not here, but I am here. So I'm just from a remote location. I don't know. No one knows where I am. It's a hotel room. But I'm here. I'm here and I'm present. Usually, Jason, when you're in hotel rooms, we have new Apple hardware to talk about. But that's not happening today. This is merely a vacation that you are on.

Yeah, I'm just on my way from one place to another. But as we all well know, as is told by the upgrade law, Jason will never miss an episode. So here he is. That's right. And also, nobody wants to talk about this, Mike, because we should do our Snell Talk question. Thomas wants to know for the hashtag Snell Talk question. Jason, how is your phone oriented in your pocket? Is the screen facing you, away from you?

Is it upside down or right side up? Do you think about this or does it just go in any way it happens to be i feel like we really every couple of years we have one of these things where we talk about doc orientation and where you put your phone and and and all of these other things that are just personal preference and they all come out and everybody gets to share their opinion but to please thomas i will say i put my phone in my pocket with the screen facing inward because then if something hits me in the thigh it is less likely to break the screen and um with the top of the phone going in first yep so that if i pull the phone out

it's in my hand in the right orientation there is absolutely no other way to put your phone in your pocket this is the way to do it there are three other ways plus like i guess sideways if you have very large pockets but don't do those they're all wrong you put you put like like top of the phone facing down screen towards you because you could very rightly said you do not want to break the screen, right? So like bumping into something, you might break the screen. And the other, with the phone is facing down,

as you say, when you take it out of your pocket, you don't have to do anything, right? Your phone, when you look at it, it's in the correct orientation. Like I cannot imagine, although I'm sure I'm going to find out, why anybody would want to do it any other way. It is the only way.

Also, there's a legacy issue from when there was a headphone jack. It was on the bottom. And if you're Alex Cox and you have a battery, you plug it in to the lightning port. And so, again, you would need it that way. But it is true that it used to be that the headphone jack was on the top. The first one and and it was recessed in such a way that not all headphones would go as you would fit so you needed an adapter if you were using some sort of headphones but it was only on the

first iphone that they did that uh it was a bad idea yes thank you so much to thomas for that wonderful snow talk question you can uh nearly it Hell Talk, which is like a different, that's a different thing. Maybe we could do that for Halloween. Summer of fun. Send in your Hell Talk question for that. Hashtag Snell Talk to get your question in to help us start a future episode. Jason, would you permit me to do some follow out to a new project that I'm working on? Plug away, Mike.

Plug away. Thank. Plug away. Thank you so much. I have a brand new show here at RelayFM. It's called The Test Drivers, and it's myself and the amazing tech YouTuber, Austin Evans. And on The Test Drivers, we dive in deep to tech of all kinds. We put it through its paces. New stuff, old stuff, weird stuff, good stuff. We want to help you decide what your next daily driver should be. That's the whole idea of the show is we want to take products, we want to use them, we want to understand them across all technology, no matter who makes the product, whether it's Google or Apple or Microsoft,

Samsung, the whole tech landscape. We want to go software, hardware. It doesn't matter if it's interesting. We want to talk about it. We released episode one so far, which focuses on Samsung's new phones, like the new S20, S20 Plus and S20 Ultra, because Austin got to spend some time with them. So we talk about those. And on episode two, we're going to be doing something that I'm really excited to talk about, which is to basically, how to try and understand how are you supposed to choose what Android phone you want to buy,

if you want to buy an Android phone, like's so much choice they change so often how are you supposed to choose so that's going to be our second episode along with some other stuff as well I also want to talk about whether folding phones really can be daily drivers right now so we'll talk about that on episode two which is going to be out probably next week and record in every couple of weeks there'll be an episode every couple of weeks. This is basically because I've wanted to do a show like this for a long time, and Austin is the perfect person to collaborate with on a project like this because I care about all of technology, and I don't get to talk about all of technology everywhere, right?

Because most of the shows that I do, we're mostly focused on Apple and talking about the latest Android phones doesn't fit. Plus, Jason doesn't want to talk about folding phones, so I had to find something that would. I don't want to talk about folding phones. I don't. So, go to relay.fm slash thetestdrivers, or you can search for the

testdrivers in Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Pocketcast, everywhere. We have tons of awesome stuff in the works for this show. We have lots of grand ideas and big thoughts. So, it would mean a lot to me if you checked it out um i think me and austin have a great chemistry together so i think you may enjoy it so go to relay.fm slash test drivers or the test drivers whichever one you prefer they both work because it's impossible to remember urls sometimes so go check it out

i have some long-term follow-up very long-term follow-up This follow-up was so long-term that I read it and was like, that's interesting, and then Jason sent me an email demanding we put it in the show. So this follow-up comes from ATDL. That was the name on the email, so that's the name that we will go with. Would you like, I'm just going to read it. I'm going to read it out, and then we'll talk about it.

This is follow-up from episode 35 of Upgrade. At 14 minutes and 26 seconds, you addressed my question as to whether you could imagine T9 input on the Apple Watch. T9 input, we're breaking away from email for a moment. T9 input is if you've ever used a phone like this or maybe you're just not aware of it,

where you would have a number pad, right right one to nine when phones have physical buttons but characters two to zero or two to nine could be used for letters so but they would be assigned in like a weird order so for example if you wanted to type the letter c you would have to press the number two three times a b c and they had little printing on them i remember this letter that's that's one of my reasons for wanting this in is i i really do remember this question because it took me aback it seemed like such a strange request right because it's kind of old school text input but anyway continue continue the letter you know the reason you would maybe want to do it is because it allows you to put a somewhat functional keyboard into a very small space right so you exactly you can imagine this this episode which is a great title is called where the fluoro

elastomer meets the road i don't know what that was about but that was a good title for episode 35 yeah i guess we were talking about some kind of rubber the um apple watch bands are fluoro elastomer that's what apple wants to call them instead of rubber bands where the rubber meets the road is uh it's not rubber anymore it's fluoroelastomer good times episode 35 classic classic clearly uh so we're still talking about it and 250 episodes to literally 250 episodes later this is yes it's the great it's the grand episode 35, 250th anniversary episode today. That's what we're going with. So anyway, this is also a follow-out to Connected 280 at 1 hour, 22 minutes, and 40 seconds, where Stephen Hackett mentioned he used the scribble function on the Apple Watch a fair amount, which is where you can scribble with your fingers to type, to put in characters,

you can scribble with your fingers to type to to put in characters and connected 281 at 1 minute and 33 seconds where federico discussed a popular i like keeping those in because i love that they put them in there where federico discussed a popular new watch app called flick type which is essentially a swipe keyboard on the apple watch on episode 35 of upgrade jason gave some good-natured ribbing about whether t9 made sense i get it it's almost like asking if apple should release a slide rule app in addition to its calculator app but now that the apple watch has been around for almost exactly five years i'm wondering if you changed your mind do siri and scribble really work well enough for apple to cut the watch's tether to the iphone how often do you actually use the watch to compose messages and how much more often

would you use it if there was some other key entry option available? Stephen seems to share Jason's view in 2015 that Apple is probably committed to Siri and Scribble and is unlikely to offer another option. Mike seems to think that Apple should offer a native swipe keyboard. That is true. Mike does think that. I personally find Siri and Scribble to be quite cumbersome to compose messages, and I don't know how independent the watch can be about some other kind of text entry. When I asked you about T9 in 2015, I thought I was being pretty modest. I didn't dare to dream for a full-size swipe keyboard on that tiny, tiny screen. So Jason, do you still stand by T9 being ludicrous for the apple watch how do you type or put enter text into the apple watch and do you think there could be a better way i think the t9 stuff is ludicrous

only and i'm glad that uh that this letter writer thinks it was good natured um only because apple from apple's perspective it's like why would we provide compatibility with muscle memory from really old phones even if it was effective but i think asking the question is how do i do better text input and that's an important question was scribble there at the beginning i thought apple added scribble that's new like in 2015 that wasn't a thing maybe in the last couple of years yeah so that's part of it is it was just so scribble is better and in that uh in that connected episode steven points out a really great thing that you may not have noticed which is if you start writing something in scribble these little arrows come up and you can actually either tap on that or you can use

the crown and it's it's guessing what you're typing so there is autocomplete it's just super subtle that blew my mind i had no idea right as a feature they should make a bigger point of that because that yeah it makes it even more useful yeah me too me too so uh i think i don't love scribble it is frustrating to write something so slowly with your fingertip. I found, and it's not really, you know, we call it Siri. It's dictation. I think dictation, when it works on the Apple Watch, is pretty good. There are still moments where I tap it and start to talk and it just doesn't register. I don't know what that is and why that happens. That sometimes whatever I do, whether happens that sometimes whatever I do whether it's a

Siri input or whether it's just dictation it just can't talk to the server and it fails and that's frustrating but when it works it actually works really well once you get the hang of saying you know great exclamation point wait a second comma let me think about it question mark right like once you learn to talk like that you can do pretty well but uh i would say this flick type thing um it's a great idea and i agree with steven that it's less likely that apple will put it on there because apple is maybe too proud to do something like that on the apple watch and be ridiculed for it. But I think it should be an option. I think that app proves that it's doable and that for some people, they would rather kind of have a keyboard analog. And it is doing exactly what the original iPhone keyboard did, which is making a lot of

guesses about what word you're actually trying to type because your finger is big and the keyboard is small and you're going to miss letters. So i think it would be great if they would do it because this app is a great proof of concept that they could um but i like steve and i am skeptical that they actually will um but you know i i think it's a good point like you're not gonna your watch is not a phone, but a text input needs to happen from time to time. I just think, you know, I think the dictation is the right thing to do. It's just that it is still not as reliable as it should be. And Scribble is too slow for me anyway, which is why if I had the choice between Scribble and FlickType, I would choose FlickType for sure. It is a nicer way to input text. I mean, plus we're getting, you know, a lot of people are now starting to get used to it because Apple

implemented this method of typing into the iPhone keyboard. So that's why I think they will do it because they have already worked on a system and they've got it on one platform. And I actually think it makes even more sense to have something like this in the Apple Watch and the iPhone because it's a much more in my opinion forgiving typing uh system provided it works correctly i think actually when i talk about apple's pride i think you've got the exact line in there which is um it's not about putting a keyboard on the apple watch it's about putting swiping to type on the apple watch and then they can say look that we did this on the iphone it worked really well, so now we're adding it to the Apple Watch.

And it's not a commentary on scribble or dictation failing. It's more an exciting new feature. And honestly, Apple wants to do it that way. A full-size keyboard does not work in the idea of you meaning to hunt and peck. That's ridiculous on the Apple Watch screen.

It's too small. But having a keyboard as a way to allow you to do swipe typing that makes a lot more sense but 8tdl thank you for this wonderful uh follow-up i personally enjoyed the detail of it i really loved that you put timestamps in there that was just so wonderful and we'll check back with you in 250 episodes for what for i don't know i don't know whether the brainwave interface into the apple watch is good enough okay who can say what the future brings mike but i'm sure there'll be something jason we also received another anonymous uh email from an apple employee stating that and i quote dongle town is a real place at apple park we have a room where

any employee can go to get whatever dongle they need. This person sent us photographic evidence of these dongles wearing a Dongletown t-shirt. This was too good to not include in today's episode. It was incredible. Obviously, we can't share the image, but you can rest assured that me and Jason can attest to its realness. I have heard from many, multiple, I should say, multiple Apple employees that the Dongletown t-shirt is a very popular t-shirt at Apple Park. Heaven is a place on earth and Dongletown is a place in Cupertino. This episode is brought to you

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Our thanks to Bombas for their support of Upgrade and all of RelayFM. It's a wonderful thing when we have a sock sponsor, Mike. I know you love sock sponsors, Jason. I do. They're my favorite. They're your very favorite socks. a wonderful thing when we have a sock sponsor mike i know you love sock sponsors jason i i do they're my favorite they're your very favorite socks ever when i was back on the sock wise podcast i love them there too special that's where we talked about socks for 30 minutes jason i want to talk to you about mac pros used by mac pros today okay is this the mac power users now um sure kind of actually

it's a little crossover here so i want to talk about the mac pro specifically used by macintosh professionals because recently apple brought me into contact with a number of creative professionals to demonstrate how the mac pro and the Pro Display XDR especially are helping them evolve and like expand their workflows into ways that they couldn't before so I have a bunch of stuff that I want to talk about but overall what I actually really enjoyed about this experience is seeing how these products are being used by the people that really need them and also the people that I think it's clear to see Apple are targeting with the Mac Pro, like real creative professionals.

To give you an idea of what I'm talking about here, I got to speak to Thomas Carter of Trim Editing, who was actually previously on Mac Power Users when the Mac Pro came out. He'd had one for a bit. Luna Animation Company, an animation company who did some work on the recently released Jumanji film. Jason Hawks, who is an aerial photographer who straps a MacBook Pro into a helicopter

and hangs out the side of it and takes pictures. One of the coolest people I've met in my entire life. And also music producer Estelle Rubio, who uses a MacBook Pro to record and master music. And Estelle was doing something which was really surprising that I'll talk about in a little bit. But I want to talk about the Mac pro first because that was like i think the whole reason that they wanted ideally to have people talking to people like me to talk about why the mac pro is great for them right this is the this actually answers i think one of the underlying questions that we've had about the mac pro since it was announced which is who exactly is the Mac Pro for? I feel like I know now.

Who did Apple design this product for? Because it's probably not me and probably not you. No, it's not. But you met them. I genuinely feel like, I mean, I have a lot to say on this now, but I genuinely feel like I have now met the people that this product was made for. So obviously we had like two people working in the video field and then they were really the ones who were making the most of the Mac Pro So obviously we had like two people working in the video field, and then they were really the ones who were making the most of the Mac Pro itself.

Estelle and Jonathan, the photographer and the music producer, they were mostly focused on the Pro Display XDR and how that helps them, but also the MacBook Pro. But the Mac Pro was clearly very focused around what you can do with it when looking at video, whether it's editing or animation. Obviously, we know this, right, that the Mac Pro helps these people get their stuff done faster, right? So everybody was talking about significant performance gains, whether it's exporting and rendering or seeing more video feeds on the screen at once, right?

The more power you pack into a system, the more you're going to get out of it. And that's what's going on, right? Like, we've heard people talk about this already, like using being able to use the actual 8k files rather than reference files, right? Like you can use this stuff in Final Cut, because the machine can handle it. And the time stuff is really good. Because if you imagine a render time being taken down, it means that people can deliver their projects faster because it can handle more. There's less back and forth. So I watched this one demo from Luna Animation and they were showing this video

that they'd made for an iPhone game. It was an animated video. And they were showing me the animation app Maya, right? M-A-Y-A. And what they were showing me the animation app Maya, right? M-A-Y-A. And what they were doing, so like they had this final footage of like these skeletons coming out of the ground, right? And they had like five skeletons coming out of the ground

and running towards the screen. Now, when they were working on an iMac Pro on this, they couldn't in real time watch and animate and adapt all five skeletons. They'd have to do like two at a time. So you would animate two of them. Then you'd go in and animate another two. Then the last one.

Then you would have to render it down to a video file and make sure that they're not accidentally colliding with each other, right? Because you can't see all of them at the same time because the iMac Pro just couldn't handle it, right? But with the Mac Pro, they can do all of them at the same time because the iMac Pro just couldn't handle it, right? But with the Mac Pro, they can do all of them at the same time. So what you were seeing, what was happening before is an animator would be animating part of a scene, rendering it out, watching the video playback, taking notes, being like, oh, okay, so this timestamp, one of them crosses over the other one. I don't want that. Then having to go back, make those adjustments, watch it again, make sure you see what I mean.

So there's like, it's not just you're saving time because it's faster and it can render more at the end. You're also having more capability during the work time. So you're saving people's time by meaning they don't have to go back around and around and around. Sure. And what I liked about this demo specifically is Maya is not an application made by Apple, right? So it is not as well optimized for the Mac Pro. Like apparently they have been doing some optimizations, but it's not like final cut, right? So even applications that are not made by Apple and tuned specifically to work

well with the hardware, you can see benefits from it. So I thought that was like a very interesting thing to see that dropping this machine into already existing setups will make substantial differences, right? Which is what you would want, because having to wait for the software to all just be updated, I mean, it's not gonna, it's's not it's not gonna get you what you want right because then it's like that whole idea of buying hardware in the hope that software will someday become better for it which is like a terrible thing to do but yeah don't do that no you don't do that but because this machine can handle it you're good so i really got a sense for why looking at stuff like this that the mac pro can exist they were also showing how they could have multiple applications rendering things in

the background and they were using like multiple screens you know like the what is it windows homes the desktops multiple desktops they have like different apps running at a time so they'd have like this animation app rendering this thing this animation app rendering this thing and they were saying they just couldn't you can't do that on an iMac pro it would just slow down and sputter and they had a kind of um I don't remember the exact specs but they had like a what they were showing all of this on was like one of the middle of the road ones when it looks like 13 or 15 grand this Mac pro so expensive but they weren't showing me this on like the highest end machine, right? It was like kind of the, what people seem to say is like, oh, this is the kind of amount of money you'd want to

spend on one of these things, right? In the kind of 13 to 15,000 level to get that machine that's like the best of everything that can be given without going into crazy territory. So I really got the sense from all of this as to why the Mac Pro exists. It feels like Apple are making machines, like this machine specifically. I feel like in general, Apple's computers now, the Mac especially, they are made with the capability to serve people's needs at different levels, right? So for most work, an iMac and a MacBook Air is what you need, right? Because you're answering email, you're doing web browsing, right? The consumer laptops can and do work for even people in working scenarios. But then you have the MacBook Pro and the iMac Pro for more

heavy tasks. It's super sufficient, right? So for me and you editing our shows, the iMac Pro can do it, right? For app developers, MacBook Pro, iMac Pro, they can do it. They can deal with it, right? Like the app will kind of have that world covered now. And I think it's become more clear to me having seen these very different, much more demanding workflows and creative people

that I can see that the Mac pro it was made for that type of work. It's a type of work that could not be delivered well enough on what Apple was offering. Right. Like, and I feel like we can see that now, like people in these types of creative fields, which we can clearly see that Apple was positioned this, this, this line of products towards, which we can clearly see that Apple was positioned this line of products towards, they needed this more than anybody else because they couldn't get their needs serviced by Apple because the raw power or the expandability was just not there. And I understand, like, trust me, I understand that there are people that want that hardware, like the Mac Pro. The more time I've spent looking at a thing the more i want one because i think it's super futuristic and cool looking but i know it's not

for me it is out of my budget range to get it configured the way that i want and i'm cool with that because the hardware was not made for me like i feel like i now have a better sense of why they designed it the way that they did and have positioned it the way that they have because the type of people that needed a machine like this apple just wasn't making it right um lunar animation we're also kind of talking about how when they worked on the credit scene for jumanji like the end credit scene They worked on the credit scene for Jumanji, like the end credit scene.

And they got very, very short timelines. This project came to them super soon before it needed to be finished, effectively, which was an interesting thing to me. I don't know why. I didn't really ask. It's like, I don't want to wonder why exactly the movie studios do things the way that they do. But they were saying that because they had the Mac Pro

and the Pro Display, they could accept this this job if they didn't have it they probably couldn't have accepted the job because they wouldn't have had enough time to get like a reference monitor in the studio like having the pro display but they didn't need to get that type of monitor they don't have one because we all know now they're really expensive and also there was this like large set of assets there's like this big uh wonderfully textured map which goes in the background of the credits thing you've seen these kind of credit scenes right like it's the one where all the big stars are at the end and they've got all this animation it's referring back to things you've seen in the movie um and the iMac pro would have

taken too long for it to render and they wouldn't have been able to see everything in real time but the Mac pro let them do that um oh the cost so this is super fascinating to me cost is not a factor for some of these companies when the hardware is so powerful because so like this is like a thing like how can you know how can x company afford for these fifteen thousand dollar mac pros well they lease them over multiple years so they're just paying an amount of money and then at the end of the lease they'll decide whether they want to pay the rest or they'll get a new machine right that's how they've been doing it for years so they're still just leasing maybe the lease is a little more expensive but they don't need to plop down 45 000 to buy three of them right they're just maybe making their lease a bit more expensive but they're saying like at

the end of the lease now, if they buy that machine, the expandability of the Mac Pro means they probably don't need to get a new computer next year, just new parts. So on the long term, these could be way better for them, right? But the thing that opened my eyes the most was so a company like Lunar Animation,

who are making animation, they make stuff for iPhonehone games they make stuff for movie studios right the software licenses they need per animator is sixteen thousand dollars a year a year right so they showed me this chart of hardware it's like three there's like three graphs like hardware software animator and the lowest portion even when buying these mac pros it's like hardware is the least expensive software is the middle and the animator is the most expensive part so they you know like if you're paying that much for software you want it to run on the best hardware you can get it on and also animators are so expensive

that if you can make their time more productive by having them wait around for less stuff, you're making money back, right? That's the calculation that I think is the most important for a lot of this pro stuff is you've got a hopefully highly paid professional person using that as their tool. And if you pay money to make them more productive, you're saving money. it's that it's

actually a fairly simple math calculation that if you can make them more productive because they're no longer waiting around for some period of time then it's worth spending the money to do it just because in the end you're paying them to not work when they're waiting because your tech isn't good enough and like i feel like I knew that before, but I always just thought like, oh, they'll save a few minutes here and there because the render's faster. But the thing that really opened my eyes

was to this idea of multiple applications can be worked on in the same time. So while you're waiting for one thing to render, you can go to the other. And previous machines just couldn't cope with the load of a lot of different types of applications being run at the same time but also that idea of like being able to see more assets in real time on a screen because because it can be powered it's like a big it's like a big difference right because that means

that you're not having to go back over the same thing multiple times so like that's where the time savings are, where before my expectation was like, yeah, but if it's faster rendering, yeah, maybe you can do it in a third of the time, but really how much is that? But it's way more than that. It's throughout the entire production process,

the time it's being saved. And for a small company, that is massively important because they're probably paying a lot of their animators by the hour and so you know right like it helps um pro display xdr like that was something that everyone was talking about like stuff we already knew right that oh i got to see the nano texture it's beautiful oh my god jason i've seen it seen it. Oh my God. Oh my God, I love it. I absolutely love it. That is a beautiful screen. And I was seeing some HDR stuff. So Thomas was showing me a commercial that he'd been working on.

And it was like a dark room, but there were some lights in it. And the lights were so bright in this dark room, it kind of looked like someone just cut a hole in the monitor and the light was coming through it it was bananas like super super awesome um i want one of those displays so bad but have nothing to use for that right like i did but you know obviously the reference mode they're a big deal for cinematic work right because if you're working on something that's meant to be seen in a specific way, you can see it.

And this is what I was saying earlier about how this Jumanji project could be taken on. Because the client, the studio, needed it to be seen in a certain way, in a certain reference mode that is built into the Pro Display XDR. So they can just do the work in the modes that they like and then flick over and see how it looks in this cinematic mode and they're good. And I mentioned earlier the music producer, Estelle. She was using the 16-inch MacBook Pro to do things I didn't even, never even thought could be done in Logic, right? Like these hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of tracks.

Like I use like four tracks in Logic. But the thing that was wild to me is she had used the new microphone system to record an acoustic guitar just and she was just like oh what can it do and she was so happy with the result and i heard it it sounded fantastic when it overlaid with a bunch of other stuff in a track she's releasing music that has been she has used the microphone in the 16 inch macbook pro to record so like she loves the way that sounds so much and it did

sound great that she can now just record in a hotel room or whatever and can just put that into a track that she's releasing and it was just like all right like i you know we know from this show we tested it right like in spoken word in podcasting it's okay but i wouldn't want to use it right like in a pinch i could but when used in a situation like music where you've got like a bunch of things happening at once the downsides of it are taken away like because it's it's over overall smoothed out by everything else that's happening around um so i just thought it sounded super cool but so yeah that was some stuff that i just wanted to share because i feel like having spoken to these people that work in these fields my mindset has been shifted a little bit on

what these who the who these products have been made for in a way that i think apple wanted to communicate um so i wanted to share it for sure it's interesting because like i mean this is really just sort of explaining like why why did they make the choice they made in terms of who they're targeting with uh with the mac pro and the pro display and this is this is the people that that they're trying to reach with this which is you know it doesn't i think really address the other part of this which is is there a is there a hole in the market that's not really being served by apple that this product doesn't fill and that's why people are unhappy with the choices they made but it does point to these people and say this is you know this is why we

built this product is these people had a need that was not being fulfilled by any existing mac yeah like i think the hole is like there there are people that want a machine like this right but don't need a lot of the power that apple built into it but i think it's up to them if they want to make that like i i don't think the need is there in the same way that it was for these types of people right where like the need is otherwise i can't use a Macintosh anymore, right? Which is like a very different thing. And I don't know how much of Apple's priority is in the idea of like people want a specific type of computer because it's the type of computer they

want. I don't know. I don't, I can't tell how much they would care about that, right? Maybe they would a lot. Maybe they wouldn't. Maybe they kind of would. I don't know. I know that I personally think that it would be super cool to own a machine like that, right? That like if the Mac Pro was a thing that started at much cheaper prices, right?

Like if it started at $2,500 and you could get something like the iMac Pro for like $6,000 or $7,000, $5,000 maybe that's a machine that I would own, right? Because I like the aesthetics of it and I like the I really genuinely do like the idea of being able to upgrade that machine

myself. Having seen I've been watching just lots of YouTube videos about, because I like watching the iMac Pro the Mac Pro being taken apart, I can't explain why, I just been watching just lots of YouTube videos about, because I like watching the Mac Pro being taken apart. I can't explain why. I just think it's beautiful inside. Like, I would be able to update that on my own.

And that is like a super appealing thing. And I know why people would want to do that. But I just don't know if like that is a machine that Apple particularly wants to make. And we're kind of referring to this idea of like a budget tower. The X-Mac, as it's been called for so many years right um i think i think john syracuse coined that phrase right i don't know it's been around a long time i'm just gonna say john claimed it in case he did and then would be upset at me

and provide follow-up i think it's way better to have the follow-up be no it wasn't me then it was me and how dare you disrespect me so i'm just to say that John Syracuse came up with the term XMAC. But this idea of like a smaller tower, right? Like, and I know why people would want it. But now I feel like I understand why much more the Mac Pro exists. Good. All right, should we take a break and talk about malware? Everyone's favorite subject?

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Our thanks to Direct Mail for their support of this show and RelayFM. So Jason, you wrote a post on Six Colors about malware and the Macintosh. Can you explain to me why we're talking about this? So there's this company called Malwarebytes that is a maker of anti-malware software, cross-platform. And they do a report every year that's sort of like the state of malware as they see it because they've obviously got to do malware software. You have to have basically researchers who are seeing what stuff is spreading

and how it works and updating your system to fight it. But it's also a marketing exercise. That's the truth of it is they are trying to promote themselves as experts and they sell product that stops malware and those go together. So they released their report for the state of malware in 2019. And one of the things, because of the way that they define their terms one of the things that got picked up by a lot of tech news outlets and spread around was that they made this kind of extraordinary claim that essentially there was more malware on the mac

than on windows and that there was a huge growth in mac malware which is funny because as a mac user you're probably sitting there thinking, well, wait a second, I thought there wasn't any malware on the Mac. And the truth is, they are using some pretty shaky definitions. They have defined malware to include apps that don't do anything or are misleading in what they do and sort of adware stuff that hijacks your browser um to put up like pop-ups and things so you know the mac keeper kind of stuff where somebody gets a you know you speed up your mac if you download this and then it kind of infests your mac and it's hard to remove it all and it keeps coming back and stuff like that

it's not quite the same as leaking your you know scanning your hard drive and leaking your personal information or destroying your computer or encrypting your hard drive and demanding ransom those are like traditional malware versus this other category of where making your machine and you turning it into something for something else right yeah a botnet that you're now a bitcoin farmer and you don't even know exactly exactly so i think i i i think that the coverage was um the coverage that some outlets had was kind of misguided because it was oh my god mac malware which is exactly i think whattes wants, because they want people to buy their software. So just, you know, I think there is... So I'm balancing that, saying that I think that they went too far and that they made this a little too alarmist, with the real bit of, I think, interesting information in this report which is it's definitely the case that um these sort of sleazy groups that

have these apps that they want to convince you to download with a link on a website somewhere and you download it thinking you have a problem and then they install and again they're not they're not really malware but they are going to redirect your you know your web pages and your ad requests on web pages and they're going to do all this know your web pages and your ad requests on web pages and they're going to do all this other kind of gross stuff and and they're going to make it hard to for you to remove it that that is on the rise that stuff is on the rise there are more of those there were new ones and there was a lot more of it than there used to be and that seems to be accurate that in 2019 there were many more attempts to get this stuff out there on on the mac um so

i think that's interesting the other point that didn't come across in a lot of stories about this report that i think is interesting is that in november apple kind of quietly clarified their rules for being on the platform. And this is not... There's a tech note. I linked to it in my story. We can link to it in the show notes. There's a tech note that basically says, here's what we don't allow on the platform.

And this is not allowing the Mac App Store. Like, this stuff's not allowed in the Mac App Store. So you basically, unless there's a horrible mistake that they have to correct, which I guess happens occasionally. But basically, this is not stuff you get in the Mac App Store. So you basically, unless there's a horrible mistake that they have to correct, which I guess happens occasionally, but basically, this is not stuff you get in the Mac App Store. This is stuff that you download from somewhere on the internet. But Apple's control of the Mac as a platform is not limited to the Mac App Store, right? They have these other mechanisms, and by redefining their rules or clarifying their rules they're also you know they're they're pointing out that they have a couple of big hammers that

they can use to smash things on the mac if they want like every new version of mac software after i think june of last year has to be notarized, which means you have to upload it. Every piece of software, you have to upload it to an Apple server, and then they scan it, and then they wrap it in a cryptographic signature and send it back to you. So every Mac app that is by default kind of runnable, you can get around it if you really want to, but by default that is runnable, has to have this signature it means it won't be tampered with it also means that it's passed some tests and it also means that apple has that id and if they find that you're in violation that your app does something sleazy they can kill it

they just kill it and it and it stops working so is this they can only do this for apps that have been notarized no they can i mean they can so there are different kinds they they have a they have a an antivirus and malware protection scheme where they can basically target anything but they also have this other option which is targeting the signature of an app prevents it from being launchable right so if i remember rightly this is what they did to that um bit torrent app transmission right that got yeah that got uh kind of man in the middle attack right yeah so so there are um and my point here is that even if you're not in the mac app store apple has ways of killing your software if they really want to and by clarifying their rules what they did is

their rules always said kind of like yes we mean malware we mean things that affect your computer or send your personal information in ways you aren't aware of like those those are there but also it's things like making it hard to remove it uh changing its name so that you can't find it um trying to get you to pay to remove it redirecting requests doing like there's a whole list of things that that fall into this category and my understanding is that when malwarebytes came up with this list of all of these adware things making it seem like the mac is infested with all of this adware stuff that um you can probably make a pretty good link there that the rise of the adware is why

Apple probably clarified its rules. And I think most of that stuff has been smashed, has been whacked by Apple, like they got the hammer. So it was worth having that conversation that it looks like there is something that went on where the Mac is a higher profile target for some of this garbage software than it used to be, but that Apple then has seemingly responded to that rise with a clarification of its own policies. And it's got a bunch of levers it can pull to have that stuff just die if they feel like it crosses the line. Now, there are some exceptions to this like we've we've talked about there there are apps that we look at and say i don't know why that app exists

where it's like oh it'll clean up your logs and remove files and make your mac work faster and you look at it you say i don't think that's necessary or right can i just take a quick very just a quick thing because like people get these types of applications confused right like mac keeper is this i don't know just not great but there are applications that help you like look at what's on your hard drive and delete stuff and i think and i have used those right so uh applications like clean my mac and daisy disk this is my point is i can provide some skepticism about some of those apps you know know, and whether that category needs to exist. What I like them for and what I've used those apps for is like, I just don't know where the, if I need, if I'm running low on storage space,

sometimes I just need to see where are the large files. And those applications have always helped me find things that I wouldn't have known. And some Mac users will know for example where to go to remove the old backup files of old iphones but i right don't and it helps me for that so this is my point which is apple is not they're making this a light touch right like? Like you really need to be doing something misleading to get in trouble. It's not saying we've decided that this kind of app, you shouldn't use it and so we're going to kill it.

That's not what they're doing. And I likened it in my story to how the Food and Drug Administration in the US doesn't evaluate um herbal supplements for whether they work or not right they're like look some people like them some people don't think they're worth it we're not making a judgment it's a little like that which is right we want apple to take a light touch it's not harmful then don't do anything about it if people are happy with it yeah so the and we don't want an Apple that's an activist Apple that's coming in and shutting down apps

that people feel are legitimate just because Apple doesn't like them or that Apple has an alternative that they built that they want you to use, right? That's no good. But that's not what they're doing here. So anyway, it's kind of a fascinating issue. The thing that kind of got me mad

was reading a Recode story that quoted the guy who is basically the mac guy at malware bites and he made the statement that's like you know mac users say that mac macs don't need anti-malware software and it's just an illusion because you can see all the bad stuff that's out there. And that's why my story ends with me saying, no, you don't need anti-malware software. Because I think it is a quote that shows that he's trying to scare people because it benefits his company. But I think there is also some truth in it that is worth discussing, which is I think it's possible that some Mac users make bad decisions because they think they're invulnerable and they're not the there are bad things that can happen to you on the mac if you download random software from random places that you don't know who did it and it asks you for

permission to install a bunch of things and then your Mac starts acting really weird. Like that can happen and Apple may not save you from that or they may not save you for a while from that. So I do think that the perception that Macs can't get malware is potentially culturally bad in that it makes Mac users not behave kind of carefully on the internet

when they're running software. But that said, I don't run malware software. I never have. And as John Syracuse mentioned on ATP last week, in many ways, it is just as bad as some bad software in terms of kind of wrecking your Mac experience and slowing everything down. So, yeah. I think that it's like, it is an often said thing, right? Macs don't get viruses. It's completely accurate,

but there is a big difference between people's mindset of the way that Windows devices would get viruses. And that's gotten way better on Windows now. But back in the day, just going to some websites was a problem right and sure that that was like a thing and that didn't happen to the mac like that's true

but like it is possible to see that if you are a irresponsible uh or oblivious mac user just clicking on anything and doing whatever you want yeah you can get malware and there is as you mentioned earlier like companies not companies bad actors who make this stuff right are now targeting the mac more than they have before there's a reason why i mean most of the bad malware that we've seen on the mac is actually stuff that's come from pirated software where it's in a shady place of the internet. And then they put, they take real software and they've kind of put it up as a pirate download,

but they've actually altered it to be, you know, a malware installer. And like there are, yes, you can do specifically, you know, dumb things to endanger your Mac.

And so I think it's always good to be wary. And I think what Apple always says is download from the Mac App Store or other trusted sources. Like, yes, if you download that from Microsoft or Adobe or, you know, bare bones or whoever, like, okay, you can do that. And this is why Apple has, you know, changed the defaults about what apps can run, and built Gatekeeper, which originally looked at your app the first time it launched and now looks at your app not just the first time it launches, but thereafter to make sure that it passes some tests. And it's why they've got their anti-malware software

that isn't totally invisible, but runs in the background and auto-updates and will kill anything that Apple has flagged as being bad. So Apple has continued to step up their game. This is why they asked for permission so that as annoying as it is in Catalina, the motivation there is that if some app that you downloaded that's supposed to be a calendar asks to read your entire hard drive, that you were able to look at that and go, well, wait a second. Why would I let it do that? Why is it doing that? Like that is an alert to say this app may be doing things you are

not aware of, or why is it reading? What does it want to read my address book? If it's not address book related, it's not contacts list related. That's why they put all of those in. It does give me pause. There's a line in the Malwarebytes story or a report about how a lot of the vectors that are on the Mac now are based on shell scripts, you know, command line terminal stuff. And I use that stuff all the time, but it makes me think that if that's the latest vector for this stuff, probably in future versions of Mac OS, we're going to see Apple lock that stuff down even more. we're going to see Apple lock that stuff down even more. And another thing that Dan Morin brought up last week when I was talking to him on the podcast I did with him for Six Colors members is, I think one of the great danger points on the Mac to this day is installers that ask you for your password

when they install stuff because they have to install special components. And most apps don't do that. But every now and then there's an app that's like, I need you to put in your password so I can put some stuff in some various places. And that's an invisible process, right? And I feel like if I were doing a to-do list of security at Apple, I'd actually put that on my list as any app that wants to ask you for your

password in order to install stuff has to go through a system where they list everything that they're putting everywhere and why, and then let you, you know, let you undo it later with a couple of clicks, because that's, that's where I get kind of creeped out of like, well,

what are you putting where and why? And it's kind of invisible. So, you know, there's more Apple's going to do. And I think we need to have that conversation and had it when Catalina came out that sometimes Apple is getting in the way of user desire in places that it shouldn't. And I think like demanding approval for access

to the desktop and documents folders is a great example of that. I think it's really silly and annoying, and that's not how apps should work. But at the same time, they are trying to protect us from stuff like this and try to anticipate the next vector of people doing bad stuff to your Mac. It's a super difficult line to have to walk, right? Right. walk right right because people like me and you get frustrated by the security dialogues and some of the things that get locked down but they're not necessarily doing it for me or you but then there is this question of like how much is too much and how much ends up just

making your experience so much worse that you accept a lot of dialogues anyway right like it's a real it's a real line to walk but it is helpful for a lot of people i guess i guess if it's stopping them from their machines being taken over or get or slowed down or worse yeah i think the danger is if you um you think you act with confidence but you don't actually know, like you think, oh, well I can just say yes, because everything's fine. And that's what I was saying sort of about cultural issues. Like if you believe you can just agree to anything because it's the Mac and your Mac is impervious, that's not great. You know, a lot of, uh, advanced users are going to install all sorts of wacky stuff and do all sorts of things that are probably not safe, but they are better equipped to determine sort of like what a trusted

resource is. But an average user who is not really equipped to determine what a trusted resource is. And in fact, doesn't even care because they just think that the Mac is impervious. That's where you get into a danger zone. And I know that that's why Apple wants to kind of intercept that stuff, which is why Apple has said in public that they're not going to make it

impossible for you to run software. You want to run on your Mac. What they're going to do is they're going to get in your way and say, you sure you want to do this or go turn that setting off if you want to do this because they want to stop the people who don't understand what it is they're about to agree to. And they've been talked into doing it by some webpage somewhere. And that's what they're trying to intercept.

I want to talk about the iPad in 2020, because there are some reports that are interesting, somewhat conflicting. And I just want to see what you think. So DigiTimes is reporting that Apple will be releasing its first 5G products in the second half of 2020. This will be for at least some models of the iPhone and also the iPad Pro with the A14 and A14X chips respectively for those products. But there are also many rumors suggesting Apple will upgrade the iPad Pro line in March to include the triple lens camera system with a time of flight sensor for AR. So the question posed by these two things is, could we see two iPad Pro refreshes in 2020?

Or at some point in 2020, there will be like an additional model of the iPad Pro, which has 5G as well as its other features. What do you think about this? Well, when I look at the first wave of 5G products from other phone makers, it looks like what everybody did is just take their product and then do a 5G variant. So if Apple's going to come out with new ipads in the spring

and they want to do a 5g capable ipad my guess is that it's just going to be we'll get the whatever it is fourth generation ipad pro in the spring and then there'll be a fourth generation ipad pro with 5g option in the fall yeah and that it might even be as simple as it's literally the same ipad but now there is a 5g option you can buy for an extra however many dollars it is and that's that's my guess is i i don't think apple you know wants to delay the ipad out of its 18 month cycle and put it in when the phones are coming out just to delay for 5g and 5g you know again it's nice to have it i i wouldn't be surprised if apple just doesn't do it like just it's like no the ipad doesn't even need 5g but if they really feel like they want their entire product line to inherit that has cellular to

inherit 5g at some point i could just see them sliding that out at some point in the fall and saying oh by the way the ipad pro now does 5G too, whether it's a, you know, additional fee or whether they just sort of slipstream it and the old cellular iPad Pro is replaced by a new one that is a 5G instead. But because that's a real question, right? It's like the cost of a 5G modem, the cost of that 5g being integrated do they do they charge extra money for that or is it just sort of like well we've now changed the cellular version to be 5g i don't know the answer to that but that's my guess it's just it's going to be that simple of like oh yeah it does 5g now we we drop that in it's not a new product it's the same product but now there's a 5g variant and that's it yeah i i think that's kind of where i'm

leaning to where like we do still get some new ipad pros in the spring because i think that there's a lot of smoke around that right we're just talking about it last week right like these new hardware keyboard things right like it's just stuff happening which doesn't make any other sense as to why it would maybe happen now like except for new hardware. Plus, it's time for the iPad Pro to be refreshed. I think leaving it until September would be two years, which feels like too long. They might want to have more power in the iPad Pro before WWDC.

We'll see. Who knows? But then they could... I do think if the iPhone goes 5G this year, which I think it will, I think that they would also want to have the iPad Pro go 5G. And if I was going to put money on the table, I would say that they would say, oh, you know the LTE iPad?

You can't get that anymore. It's now a 5G iPad. And they just slot that in in its place for both sizes. That's what I think they'll do. And then, you know, make a big thing about Apple going all in on 5G. So there was also some reports that I saw that Apple might use their own antennas for 5G. They will not use the Qualcomm ones in the 2020 phones, which is surprising and kind of counter to what we thought. But that kind of seems like that's that they're where they're going with it or at least they will do um you know how for years apple would used different companies for

the antennas right like some phones would be intel's do you mean the modems so what the antennas yeah modem sorry the modem but you know how it's mike versus the modems again there you go there there are very it's a very specific antenna band. There was a report from Fast Company indicating that Apple would look to limit its reliance on Qualcomm, which is a quote from The Verge, but the iPhone maker said to be exploring designing its own 5G, they say antenna in the article. Well, I mean, you could design an antenna for your hardware and then have the modem attached to it

but it's i mean clearly they don't want to ultimately rely on qualcomm for anything but my impression is that they're going to for now i don't know i don't know enough about that report to say sorry jason i actually think it is an antenna thing right like there are antennas as well as modems and that apple is looking to develop its own antennas because it's unhappy with qualcomm's i'm not okay i mean that that's a really weird specific inside baseball story but are we surprised that apple would choose to take control of some part of the hardware design that they don't need to rely on qualcomm for i'm not surprising no uh so yeah i i would expect it i mean i do think i mean i've i've made picks on this unconnected i do think this is the year that apple goes in on 5g um just because yeah i agree i think it would be it would be the thing

if they didn't do it right that would be the thing of this iphone that everyone will write their articles about right like oh apple being left behind right like that's i'm not saying that's why they're doing it there's good reason to do it right like 5g rollout is becoming a thing right like in in the in europe and america like it's becoming a thing and they would be being left behind because you know you mentioned about like phone makers last year had like in a more expensive 5g variant of their phones but this year you know like samsung's devices and devices coming out from other manufacturers they just come with 5g antennas in them like yeah it's not an additional thing anymore antennas and

modems and modems my word i one day i'll get those right but yeah they're coming with 5g support just there you go there you go yes to the phone completely and my guess is i think i'm with you i think apple's just going to release phones that have 5g oh i don't think there will be like the the only the mac supports it or whatever like that seems wild or or a 5g variant right like they skipped that era that year they're like no we're not going to do that and then this year when everything it's much more of a mainstream just like all the phones have it which is why i actually kind of lead to lean to the idea that if they're going to do a 5 in the fall, they could have the A14X instead of an A13X.

If you look at the speed of the current iPad Pro, it's still kind of spectacular. Does the iPad Pro really need to go to the 14... Because the A13X, they'll call it that, but it's really an iPad Pro

variant of that processor.'s really a you know an ipad pro variant of that processor it's made it's a new processor made for the ipad pro for 2020 and they only need to do that once right right that they might not have to bump it to a14x like it's just not not necessary my my guess would be that if they're not planning to release new ipads in the fall that that's you know this is part of the roadmap, is that this is going to be the most advanced chip that they can make now. And is it an A14 or an A13? Well, they'll probably call it an A13X.

But does it have technology that is more advanced than the regular A13? Probably, right? Probably. And so there's some reality there and there's some marketing there. All right, let's finish up today's episode with some hashtag ask upgrade questions. But before we do,

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Let me tell you, that is a common thing that happens at this event that I'm going to at this convention, is that you end up with the, maybe we should get somebody to bring us Thai food from that Thai restaurant that's a mile away. And we do that, and it's great. Because they're like, oh, the room service is really expensive, and the

options are really limited but we can just order for you know for 10 people we just put it into DoorDash put it in the app and then you get your everybody gets their food and is not hungry anymore Jason I know what we're going to do for WWDC lunch next year

we're going to DoorDash it every time when Jason's making his way over to me and I'm taking notes after the WWDC keynote before we record our episode I say Mike I need a sandwich I need a taco

we both need lunch what are we going to do and we never know what to do because the place is always so busy next time we're just going to door dash it we'll order it in advance right

we'll get it all ready and have it delivered to us great idea right now our listeners can get $5 off their first order or $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app and enter the promo code UPGRADE. That is $5 off your first order.

You just go to the App Store, download the DoorDash app, use the promo code UPGRADE. Download it right now. Start planning your dinner. That is $5 off your first order with the promo code UPGRADE in the DoorDash app. Our thanks to DoorDash for their support of this show and RelayFM and Jason. order with the promo code upgrade in the door dash app thanks to door dash for their support of this show and relay fm and jason now is time for some hashtag ask upgrade questions to round

out episode 285 of this here program when we start with andrew and andrew says could it be that the apple tv is just hanging around as the lowest price home kit hub yeah i mean it does it right but anything doesn't be a home kit hub well an ipad can be a home kit hub yeah i mean it does it right but anything doesn't be a home kit hub well an ipad can be a home kit hub is it just ipads and and uh and home pod and home pod so i feel like i don't i mean so here's the thing andrew like technically yeah like it does do that but i don't think that's why apple are keeping it like that i think the reason the ipad and the home and the home pod can be used as a home kit hub is because they know they need to spread that out unlike the apple tv isn't because it used to be the apple tv was the only thing

right as a hub for your home kits like something that could control your home kit devices when you're outside of the home right but now there's multiple products that can do that it's a fine reason to have one if you've already got one i don't think it's a reason to buy one right i mean and i've heard from some people who are like oh well you you guys didn't mention that apple tv is important from a privacy standpoint because i don't trust Amazon or Roku to watch what I'm doing and sell my information and all that. It's like, fair enough. My understanding, though, is that, like,

your TV can just tell what's on the screen sometimes. And you can turn that stuff off, too, but is it working and keep your TV off the network and all that? My point is we're really not saying why does Apple make the Apple TV as much as we're saying why is the Apple TV the way that it is and what role does it serve when the competition has, you know, I bought a 4K Amazon Fire Stick for 25 bucks and that Apple TV costs seven times that and that seems a bit much.

So like what role does it serve? and as a premium streamer that has better privacy and all that that makes sense to me i still feel like the price is just way out of whack with the rest of the the world but um we'll see what they do isaac wants to know how many times a day do you accidentally take a screenshot on your iphone isaac's about two a day i would say at least once a week i go to my photo roll and find a screenshot of my morning alarm I do it on my iPad all the time actually because I'm grabbing the edge of my iPad to pick it up and it takes

a screenshot because it's the buttons are right on the corner there so if you have your fingers just right you'll take a screenshot of your iPad as you're picking it up for me like because I have my iPhone in one of the studio neat material docs up it's great for me like because i have my iphone in one of the studio neat material docs and it's like on my night table and so i'll just reach out to like

press the side of my phone to stop the alarm and a lot of the times i'm doing that i'm like grabbing the whole side of the phone taking the taking the screenshot so that's why that happens to me i've never really gotten used to that press all the buttons take the screenshot thing you know what i'd really like um is that the floating window has a shortcut to delete the screenshot but it doesn't oh right just like so as soon as it's there if i flick it across the screen or if i take it all the way up to the top or something like that i can be like no just go away and have like a little trash icon or something up here and i can drag it in there i'd like that because sometimes i do take them like a little whatever you know like a little trash icon or something up here and i can drag it in there i'd like that because sometimes i do take them like a little whatever you know like a little sf icon next to the yeah that'd be there's a share sheet that comes out if you tap and hold but um even that doesn't really

satisfy me so like i think i'd like that to be better tim asks what do you think they'll call this year's iphones my favorite question will they really make us say the iPhone 11S Pro Max or just go to 12 or something crazy like iPhone 5G? I don't think they're going to 12, personally. I think it's going to be 12. Okay, just a quick question. Lots of phone makers this year are making big jumps, like

Samsung just went to 20, because like 2020. Apple wouldn't do that, would they? They should go to 12? I don't know like i i feel like i've been saying for years that apple doesn't want to end up in a situation where it's like ladies and gentlemen the iphone 24 right like do you think they could call it the iphone 5g i mean they called it the iphone 3g so here's the thing so so i keep thinking how do they get out away from the increments and i'm not sure that they have found a way to do that.

But this would be an opportunity for them to brand, if they truly have their whole line as 5G, to brand it that way. It's just to call it the iPhone 5G and ride on the fact that everybody is talking about 5G this year. And then next year, they could still make the iPhone 12 or 13 or make it something else. But if I had to put money down on one thing, it would be 12, not 11S. Because I agree that with this new wide array of different variant names, like Pro Max, 11S Pro Max is a mouthful. It's not like there wasn't a 10S Pro Max, so they might do it.

But if I had to guess one, but I do think that 5 max is a mouthful it's not like there wasn't a 10s pro max so they might do it but um but if i had to guess one but i do think that 5g is a possibility don't forget there's still those rumors of like more and more phones this year so like naming could get bananas like we could end up with iphone 12 iphone 12 max iphone 12 pro iphone 12 pro max max iphone 12 pro iphone 12 pro max with 5g i i actually kind of like iphone 5g and iphone 5g pro i don't know that just that that feels good to me rather than the number and i agree with you like you have the ability to do it this year for a good reason so why not give it a go and then next then next year just do something completely different rather than saying oh it's the 12 or the 13 now sounds Sounds great to me. Jonathan asks, when Apple switches the Mac to ARM,

what upgrades do you think you'll be able to make in the configurator? Do you, like, Jonathan says, I guess there'll just be one processor choice. Will we still be able to choose RAM? What do you think? Do you think it's going to be, so if and when Apple switches the Mac to the ARM processors, do you think it will be like an iPhone and an iPad

where you basically don't get any configuration options? Or do you think Apple will still allow you to make choices? I wrote a Macworld column about this a while ago because when I was looking at the MacBook Air and the fact that it basically has no options for um processor um i had this moment where i thought oh it's gonna be like this isn't it i i do think that there will still be options on max some but i think it's going to be less. It would not surprise me if we really end up in a world where there's an ARM, let's say MacBook Air and an ARM MacBook Pro 13 and an ARM MacBook Pro 16,

which there might not be. It's possible ARM will only come to consumer and not to pro laptops. It's also possible that it will come to all laptops but my point is in that scenario it would not surprise me if computer a came with processor type a and computer b came with processor type b and computer c came with processor type c and that's it and then maybe you can maybe you would adjust the storage and and maybe maybe the ram maybe not but that i think apple wants to make ideally apple would like to live in a world like the ipad and the iphone where your choices are very limited like you don't buy an ipad and choose what processor goes in it you don't buy an iphone and choose what processor goes in it you can choose your storage you don't

even choose your ram although the ipad you can choose the most expensive one that has a little more ram but apple doesn't talk about it so that's i think that's that's what apple wants to do whether they'll be able to get away with it in all the details of what it's like to move a platform to arm and have a pc platform on arm we'll see but i think if given their druthers, that would be what they would choose. And Stephen asks, if you could make one third-party device or an iPad or iOS feature exist to make podcasting from those devices better, what would it be? Oh, this is easy. I want iOS, iPadOS to support apps being able to capture audio in the background. Essentially, I want audio hijack for iOS.

I want to be able, on my Mac, I can say, record my microphone to a file. Record the sound coming out of Skype to a different file. Even like route the audio to different places for different tasks. And that's all that, I mean, to me, that's the last piece that's missing is what I should be able to do is plug any USB microphone or audio interface into an iOS device or iPad OS device and press record and do what I do on my Mac. And instead I have like a second recorder that's external that I'm using right now to do this. So for me,

it's, it's essentially that is I want the OS to provide that additional recording thing so that I can have, um, you know, audio hijack essentially on my iPad. All right. If you,

I agree actually, by the way, like that's what I want. Just multiple streams of audio in software that can be controlled sent and recorded just like you do on the Mac then we can do it

that's the last part that's it that's the last thing that's it alright if you would like to send in a question for a future episode of the show

just send out a tweet with the hashtag askupgrade please send those in we'd love to get those questions and try and provide you with the answers

or the opinions that you're looking for thanks so much to our sponsors for this episode Bombas, Direct Mail and DoorDash you with the answers or the opinions that you're looking for. Thanks so much to our sponsors for this episode, Bombas, Direct Mail, and DoorDash. You can find Jason online at sixcolors.com and theincomparable.com, as well as here at RelayFM where Jason hosts many shows. He is at Jason, or J-S-N-E-L-L, on social media.

I am at iMike, I-M-Y-K-E. Please go check out The Test Drivers. That's my new show with Austin Evans where we talk about all things technology and try and work out what the best products are for you we'll be back next week and Jason will be who knows where probably back in Six Colors land

yeah until then thank you so much for listening say goodbye Jason Snell goodbye from Los Angeles dude Hollywood Jason Snell. Goodbye from Los Angeles, dude. Hollywood Jason Snell over there.