Apple has confirmed that it's switching Macs to its own silicon, transitioning away from Intel processors, and now we know when we'll actually be able to buy a Mac running on Apple chips. Though the first hardware will be a custom version of the Mac mini, that will be focused on developers to begin getting them up to speed. The rest of us will need to wait - though not for long.
Today Apple announced that they'd be moving toward their own silicon - effectively removing Intel from the equation. This was a "huge leap forward for the Mac," said Apple CEO Tim Cook. "Today is the day we're announcing the Mac is transitioning to our own Apple silicon." This move is major for every key player involved - not just Intel and Apple, but the users of future Mac computers as well.
Apple has named its new version of Mac software, with macOS Big Sur being announced at WWDC 2020. It's being described as the biggest design change undertaken by Apple since iOS 10, with the company's unified symbols - along with depth and translucency - brought over from iOS and iPadOS to the desktop now.
It seems that CPU giant Intel's empire is once again besieged. From critical hardware flaws to Apple's upcoming ARM-based Macs, Intel is slowly but surely being forced to come to terms with a future where it will be forced to rub shoulders with its rivals from all fronts. Even long-time partner Microsoft is cozying up with long-time rival AMD for the former's Surface line of laptops. It's probably not that surprising considering how popular the AMD Surface Laptop 3 apparently was.
The first few months of the year were rough for companies and organizations that regularly hold large events year in and year out. Most have canceled while others have put their events on hold, albeit indefinitely. Google did cancel its annual I/O developers conference but Apple is pushing ahead with an online version of its yearly WWDC. And it's a good thing, too, because it's now expected to make one of the biggest announcements in the company's history since the late Steve Jobs announced it would be abandoning the PowerPC platform for Intel.
There has been a sudden rise in the popularity of video conferencing and remote meetings in the past months. There has also been a rise in work from home arrangements, many of which involve keeping a laptop stationary on a desktop with multiple peripherals connected to it. Dell thought it smart to capitalize on both use cases and hit two birds with one stone with the rather unusual concept of creating a multi-port adapter that also functions as a speakerphone.
Zoom is that kind of product that everyone loves to hate but still remains one of the most widely-used in its field. Time and again, the company that is close to officially becoming a verb has been involved in one privacy or security scandal or another, including one that is being linked to the Chinese government. One of the most recent issues that has earned it no small amount of criticism is withholding its end-to-end encryption or E2EE from its free users. Zoom has now backtracked on that stance but it comes with a small catch.
Lenovo has launched the new generation of its ThinkPad P-Series laptops, as well as the third-generation ThinkPad X1 Extreme. These laptops are designed for professionals, offering a variety of features, sizes, and hardware configurations to meet a variety of needs. The lineup packs 10th-generation Intel H series mobile processors, an exclusive Ultra Performance Mode, and more.
The global situation has proven that some of the work your bosses insisted couldn't be done at home can, when circumstances force it, actually be done at home. That doesn't mean, however, that your home, especially your home computer and network, are ideal places to do some professional activity, especially those that require some data security and privacy. As a tool that was designed for remote collaboration, Dropbox is now launching new products to address the growing number of people working from the comfort of their couches or even their beds.
It seems that Microsoft will be adopting a "tick-tock" release cycle when it comes to major Windows 10 updates. Although two don't exactly make a pattern yet, it could very well be the start of one. Considering how Microsoft has taken a lot of flak for botching its Windows releases, it definitely needs some time out every year to make sure PCs around the world don't break for yet another six or so months. At least that seems to be the implied goal with the limited scope of the next major Windows 10 version that's coming in the second half of the year.
It may not be Google's OS but Chrome OS is truly shaping up to be the one OS to rule them all. It can already run software from Android and Linux in addition to its own native web-based Chrome apps and soon it will add what may be the most important set of apps for users. Full Windows applications are coming to some Chromebooks but those will be running via a third-party solution and only to a very select few Chrome OS users.
AMD today announced that it's expanding its lineup of 3rd-generation Ryzen desktop CPUs with the introduction of the Ryzen 5 3600XT, Ryzen 7 3800XT, and the Ryzen 9 3900XT. The new CPUs won't be here until next month, but AMD is revealing some of the specifications for them today. In addition to that, AMD also announced the A520 chipset today, but details on that are still very slim.