After the M1, these intriguing Apple silicon mysteries still remain

The launch of the Mac Studio was a big moment for Apple. After years of preparation, that launch marked an important milestone in the Mac’s journey. Apple exec John Ternus’s declaration that the M1 chip family is complete marks the end of the first Apple silicon product cycle.

But the wheel keeps turning. The first cycle answered numerous questions we were wondering about less than two years ago–but many more questions remain. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, this is only the end of the beginning.

Mysteries revealed

Before the Apple silicon transition was announced in June 2020, there were so many questions about how it might work. Many of us had concerns that Apple’s processors, designed for the iPhone and then beefed up for the iPad, would not be able to handle the needs of Mac users, or at least pro-level Mac users.

In early 2020, my podcasting partner Myke Hurley predicted that Apple would transition its consumer Macs to Apple-built processors by now but couldn’t quite bring himself to predict the same for pro Macs. And yet here we sit, with Apple having rolled out the M1 Pro, M1 Max, and M1 Ultra chips–to the applause and delight of Mac fans everywhere. Only the Mac Pro lurks off in the distance, yet to be assimilated.

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This, to me, is the most breathtaking aspect of this first cycle of Apple silicon on the Mac: All those concerns about Apple’s ability to get professional-level Mac performance out of its chip architecture have vanished. When the M1 Macs arrived in the fall of 2020, they were so impressive that doubt about higher-end chips began to melt away. The arrival of the MacBook Pro in the fall of 2021 just clinched the deal. The M1 era has exceeded all expectations.

So what’s next?

Waiting in the wings

While we have a much better idea of Apple’s Mac processor strategy now than we did two years ago, it’s very hard to predict trends from a single data point. We can assume a lot of the M2 generation will look similar to the M1… but there will also be differences.

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