Apple’s March ‘22 Event Afterglow
For a few years now, we have always tuned in to Apple events when they introduce new hardware and sometimes new software. It’s perhaps fair to say that we are massive fans of the company and their products and for personal uses we always would go for Apple products although admittedly due to office equipment we have also started to see the benefits of the Windows ecosystem (not used Windows for more than 10 years!). This post will be public some time after the event but at the time of writing (11 March 2022) is still quite fresh in our minds!
Always look forward to guessing what each Apple event invite hints!
Anyway, the first Apple event this year took place a few days ago on March 8th, 2022 and it was actually pretty exciting and a bit sad in some ways; we’ll explain more below. But the headlines of the event, which we’ll go through one by one with our thoughts, is: 1) New iPhone 13 colour, 2) New iPhone SE, 3) New iPad Air, 4) New M1 Processor, and 5 New Mac. It was a pretty jam packed hour and so overwhelming to take in especially when we watched it live, it was at 2am SGT and some of us had meetings at 7am the same morning! Alright so let’s talk about our impressions on the 5 main topics presented at March event.
Alpine Green iPhone 13
This was made quite quick and swift off the bat: essentially introducing a new dark green color to the iPhone 13 line up which we think look super sexy! Seems like the last time they had this color options was in the 2019 iPhone 11 lineup which was very cool to see when you hold it yourself. What is a bit curious is the decision to release this color at a supposedly mid-term period for the iPhone 13 (as the next iteration, iPhone 14, would probably come in September 2022) as adding product sub-variants supposedly adds more strain to supply chains making us think if this is a strategy to boost iPhone 13 sales? Who knows. What is clear is that this is a very cool option to have making the choice of color if you’re thinking of getting an iPhone 13 even more difficult. Hope to see it in person when it hits Apple stores in Singapore!
iPhone SE 3
In the build up of the event a newer iteration of Apple’s low end iPhones, the SE, was heavily anticipated. What’s interesting about this 3rd make is that it shares a lot of the bells and whistles of the upper categories without you needing to break the bank. Starting at USD$429, the updated SE gets the A15 bionic which is the same base setup processor of the upper end iPhone 13 lineup, a retina HD display (at 4.7” the resolution should be 1334x750), 5G connectivity, smart HDR, better battery life, and a lot of the photography software features present in higher tier iPhones! Who is this phone for? We think there’s a few possible consumer demographics targeted for this particular product:
People interested in the iOS ecosystem for the first time but don’t really want to break the bank
Younger users wanting this as option for first-time phones, and
Generally people wanting a quality Apple product but does not need the features and the price tag of the upper tiered phones.
We think this price is super competitive and allows Apple to cut a few corners but also become a solid choice in the sub US$500 phone category which is probably the highest saturated market.
iPad Air 5
This is probably the second most exciting announcement for us, mainly as we are fans of the iPad Air (we have mark I and II at home!) and the versatility of it as an everyday tablet (we have the much larger 12.9” M1 iPad Pro which is a LOT more powerful but less versatile — maybe a review on that later?). And this update is very cool. If the iPad Air 4’s main headlines (for us) includes compatibility with Pencil 2nd generation, the list for iPad Air 5 includes:
M1 — this has got to be the biggest addition, where Apple silicon is usually a flagship feature, the iPad Air 5 is now embedded with one of the most powerful processors out there, performing around 60% better than iPad Air 4. This would allow you to do complex rendering and animation on a device that starts at US$599! Apple also claims that the GPU is 2x faster than the last iPad.
5G — we never get the cellular iPads but if you feel that this is a need, you’ll be happy to know that it features 5G connectivity hence you can upload your videos, animations, drawings and other so much faster!
Colors — there seems like a few new pastel colors which we’ve always like from the iPad Air 4.
One thing that we thought when looking at the iPad Air 5 is that “this will definitely give the iPad Pro 11” M1 a run for its money” — and wouldn’t it? From a normal user perspective like us, there doesn’t seem to be too many things on the surface that the Pro version would have above this Air version. Maybe we can later write a head to head review between M1 Pro 11 vs M1 Air 5 because the price gap is noticeable (starts at US$799 for the former, and US$599 for the latter). This would actually be important for us personally too as Adit’s first gen (!!) iPad Air is 9 years old now and would want to refresh it — but which to get? Stay tuned for our take on the matter!
M1 Ultra
It feels now with every Apple event they seem to be announcing their new expanded versions of the M1 processor; slowly and gradually like when you’re pouring tomato ketchup from its bottle. Its both exciting and nerve-racking. Why? Okay its obvious why its exciting but aren’t you worried that the gazillion dollar machine you invested in 6 months ago might now be rendered “weaker” by its own maker? If you bought that super powerful M1 Max Macbook Pro 16” last year, are you not a bit annoyed that there’s a much more powerful core in such a short time and wondered if you should have held back?
On a bit of a geeky side (we’re not technical people tho), here is why the Ultra is crazy:
Apple has essentially taken TWO of their M1 Max chips and combined them through a connector. It has an onboard GPU that in theory is on par with the RTX 3080 — which is a dedicated GPU!! Some articles also note that it could perhaps reach higher levers of performance than RTX 3090 with i9-12900K!!!! Now all they need is to get all those video games to be compatible :p
The CPU itself is composed of 20 cores (Intel’s i9 is 18 cores), and they’ve grown that from the base M1 launched in 2020 that “only” had 8 cores — which powered the M1 Macbook Pro and Macbook Airs launched then
At top tier configuration, the Ultra chip can support up to 128GB of RAM! Which is impressive, given that our existing Macbook Pro (from 2018, mind you) still runs on 8GB of RAM.
Of course this comes at a hefty price tag (which we’ll discuss later in the Mac Studio section) but actually we sort of have a feeling that this time around, Apple pricing strategy for this caliber product is really not that bad considering this is the same company that sells Mac Pro wheels for US$999. For normal users like us, the Ultra is nothing but a technological hanging gardens of Babylon — it is a marvel of mankind and what prowess R&D can achieve despite all shortcomings of the world. We would never get the Ultra (unless given — our parents told us to be appreciative of blessings) because we are not world class animators, or 3D artists, or heavy video editors, etc. We assume many of you are like us.
Mac Studio and Display
We’ve deliberately not separated the two products although they were technically introduced as two standalone products and technically you can use the Studio Display with other things than a Mac Studio. But why would you? We’ll get into this.
The most exciting part of the event, the cream of the crop if you will, is the announcement of what product will take the crown as the first devices rocking that M1 Ultra. But before going on a slurry of appreciations for this new setup, let us side track you for a moment because for us there is a bit of sadness here. We actually came into the event hoping that if the 27” iMac was not announced now, then it will come some time later. But it seems that with the release of Mac Studio and Studio Display; Apple has decided to discontinue the 27” iMac. OH WOE.
Why is this sad? We actually wanted to get the 27” back in 2021 but it didn’t make sense because we were moving houses (AND COUNTRIES) at the end of the year and that we knew there has to be an M1 update as the 27” iMac (if not mistaken the latest 27” retina iteration came out from way back in 2014) so we decided to wait. It was pretty sad to know that there might not be an update to the 27” iMac (at least in the near future) because we wanted a big screen iMac and the M1 that came out in 2021 was 24” only (and in colors we did not like).
As you can see above, the “all-in-one” computer has always been an iconic lineup in Apple’s computing history including the memorable G3 and G4 designs and we’ve always thought that the iMac, with the 27” Retina model sitting as flagship (i.e. the actual king because Mac Pro is sort of like Thanos level) did the lineage proud. To be honest this announcement made us a bit sad because now it almost feels like the iMac, in its true form, is a bit sidelined inside the embodiment of the M1 24” iMac. So there it is, our side track rant. Moving on.
What do we think of the Mac Studio? First of all, and this is something they have done in ages: but that single aluminum enclosure is EVER SO GORGEOUS! There is always something so stupidly plain and simple yet minimalistic and ultra industrial about Apple’s designs. It almost looks like something that comes from the mysterious world of Kamino (Star Wars fan might relate). It doesn’t look fast, it’s not at all flashy, but you’re sort of intrigued. There are many plant vases bigger than that and that thing has the computing power that might match an i9 with an RTX 3030? Madness!
So yes. We like. A lot. Between the Mac Studio and the Studio Display it almost looks like what they’ve done here is like what many of those modern restaurants are doing: taking a beloved recipe then deconstructing it. So in many ways, yes this to us is like Apple taking a hearty egg fried rice and serving us egg and rice separately but at once — at a higher price because of course the egg is Omega-100 and the rice is Kinmemai Premium. Only time will tell if we would like this new form factor. Its not new obviously; but it isn’t exactly like the CPU and Monitor set up. More on that below.
We do like the connectivity built into the Mac Studio: 2 USB-C ports in front and SD card reader and at the back: 4 USB-C Thunderports, 1 LAN port, 2 USB-A ports, 1 HDMI port, and a 3.5mm audio jack. That’s pretty rich! If you have the resources, the Mac Studio with M1 Ultra can power 4 (FOUR) Studio Displays AND 1 4K TV. Holy moly God knows what profession would need that but the option to do that is pure awesomeness. Our understanding is that the Studio Display also allows power pass through so you can hook up the Display into the power outlet and only use one cable to the Mac Studio to both display the screen and source of power. This is maybe not new but Adit recently got a similar setup from his office (Dell laptop powered by Dell Ultrasharp monitor which houses electricity, external webcam, mouse usb receiver, and others keeping things clean). So what about the Display?
The design from the front is really nothing special; we have seen much thinner bezels but then again most monitors don’t actually house a webcam integrated into it. Why didn’t they do the notch design like the new Macbook Pro 16”? Wouldn’t that allow more screen real estate? But beyond that the design is similar to the Mac Studio: its just the necessity, no frills, but gets the job done. And arguably that’s what it needs to be.
Inside the bonnet is another story. We’re not sure, besides high-performing 4K TVs, that there are computer monitors that have computing chips embedded into them. The Verge did a good job breaking down the reason to this but in essence: to make sure that the webcam and speakers embedded inside the monitor works to its full potential. In a world where we do a lot of work and business over virtual platforms and video calls; having a good webcam really does make one quite happy. We have a Dell 4K webcam (which we can review another time) and that performs amazingly during video calls and its so good that it might be super cool for streaming and stuff — but the thing is its external so it is versatile but rather cumbersome as well because its so visible above the monitor.
Another thing Apple is pretty good at is embedding good sounding speakers (for internal level speakers) — we’re still blown away by how good the M1 iPad Pro 12.9” and the iPhone 13 Pro Max sounds. Okay, not as good if you have external speakers but that is apples and oranges. We’re keen on getting to hear how good the embedded speaker are when we test the real thing.
Alright alright so we’ve spent the past 5 minutes of your reading time swooning over the Mac Studio and Studio Display. What about the pricing? The actual pre-order website at Apple SG is not up yet at the time of writing but this is what we know in terms of pricing from the event:
Mac Studio with M1 Max starts at US$1.999
Mac Studio with M1 Ultra starts at US$3.999
Studio Display starts at US$1.599
Yes its pretty steep even if you compare at how much the top of the line 27” Retina iMac was going for at full price but this new rendition is a lot more powerful even beating out the Mac Pro in some aspects for a fraction of the price. We can maybe get into the economics in a later post but if you compare it to building a PC rig with i9 and RTX 3080 (which we’ve read above that they are quite on par) the whole package will not be so different.
Our key takeaways?
As we both just upgraded to 13 Pro Max a couple months ago, then the new colour and the iPhone SE 3 will definitely not move a needle for us. We think the Alpine Green is gorgeous for you still out to get a new iPhone 13, and the SE 3 is a great low-end phone that’s competitive at that price bracket.
The iPad Air 5 is definitely an important announcement for us, which blurred the conviction of what we should get to replace Adit’s first gen iPad Air that is practical and versatile. The obvious choice used to be the 11” version of the M1 iPad Pro, but now that isn’t so clear any more. Maybe we’ll do a bit more digging before decided as that is not a priority purchase anyway.
We’ve been thinking about it for a couple days now and quite convinced that we might be very interested to take up a Mac Studio + Studio Display setup. But which specific one (definitely not M1 Ultra!) will need to be decided. We’re still in the middle of building up our “office” space at home and need to consider what is best for a shared setup. What about you? Hope this short article gave a pretty succinct round up of the March event, look forward to hearing what you’ll get next!
