Apple Finishes Dumping Intel Entirely, Touts Results

Apple
(Image credit: Apple)

The launch of Apple's Mac Pro based on its M2 Ultra processor formally marked the completion of the company's transition from Intel's CPUs to its own system-on-chips, which took about three years. The transition spurred users of Macs to upgrade and encouraged users of Windows to switch to Macs. Roughly half of Apple's PCs bought in Q2 were purchased by new users.

"This past quarter, we were pleased to complete the transition to Apple Silicon for the entire lineup," said Tim Cook, Apple's chief executive, at the company's conference call with analysts and investors (via SeekingAlpha). "This transition has driven both strong upgrade activity and a high number of new customers. In fact, almost half of Mac buyers during the quarter were new to the product. We also saw reported customer satisfaction of 96% for Mac in the U.S."

Indeed, the transition to Apple Silicon helped Apple to boost sales of its Mac computers and gain market share. The company controlled 6.3% of the PC market, with 4.077 million Macs sold in Q2 2019. During Q2 2023, the company commanded 8.6% of the PC market, with 5.3 million units sold. Meanwhile, in Q1 2022, the firm owned 9.3% of the desktop and laptop market as it supplied 7.342 million PCs during the quarter, many of which were sold to first-time users, and many were upgrades.

Controlling the hardware and software enables Apple to integrate various special-purpose accelerators into its SoCs and maximize performance in select applications. In addition, it allows it to precisely tailor its software for these SoCs, which promises to reduce the number of glitches and offer decent performance. Finally, it allows the company to maximize its profit margins now that it does not have to pay for CPUs to Intel. Unfortunately, with the transition to its Apple Silicon, Apple no longer supports third-party GPUs with its Mac Pro PCs, which will frustrate users who need high-performance GPUs.

Since the PC market in Q2 2023 was down 13.4% year-over-year in terms of unit shipments, it is not surprising that Macs generated $6.8 billion in revenue for Apple during the quarter, down 7% year-over-year. It is also noteworthy that Apple sold more PC units than it did in Q2 2022, according to IDC. A reason why Apple's Mac revenue was down amid unit sales growth was probably because many first-time users bought inexpensive PCs. In contrast, in Q2 2022, the company finally ramped up sales of its premium M2 Pro and M2 Max-based MacBook Pros.

Also, it is evident that in Q2 2023, Apple's PC business performed better than the PC businesses of Lenovo, Dell, and Acer, at least regarding unit sales growth. Meanwhile, the company expects Mac and iPad revenue to decline in the ongoing quarter.

"We expect the revenue for both Mac and iPad to decline by double digits year-over-year due to difficult compares, particularly on the Mac," said Cook. "For both products, we experienced supply disruptions from factory shutdowns in the June quarter a year ago and were able to fulfill significant pent-up demand in the year-ago September quarter."

Anton Shilov
Contributing Writer

Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends.

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  • rluker5
    That is indeed a correlational relationship.
    Reply
  • jkflipflop98
    Yes, because those highly technical Mac users know and/or care what silicon is inside the case with the fruit on it.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    jkflipflop98 said:
    Yes, because those highly technical Mac users know and/or care what silicon is inside the case with the fruit on it.
    I've heard Mac laptops are popular among software developers. I know one research scientist (PhD, EE) who was provided one by his employer, for work, and quite likes it. You can no longer claim that Macs are strictly for non-technical users, these days.

    I would never buy one, because I'm too cheap and I dislike Apple as a company. By itself, that's reason enough. However, they also have zero user-upgradable parts (not even storage!). Finally, I'd want to run Linux, which only works with caveats or in a VM (no thanks).
    Reply
  • Laetitian
    jkflipflop98 said:
    Yes, because those highly technical Mac users know and/or care what silicon is inside the case with the fruit on it.
    It's the other way around. Not more Mac fans who buy it because they are impressed by the hardware. More non-Mac users who jump the fence because the performance of Apple processors is what it took to make the price-to-performance ratio more justifiable.
    The difference between a Mac with an Intel processor and a Mac with an M1 or M2 is palpable the moment you open the laptop, and certainly when you check its battery life by the time you are done. Both technically inclined people and average Mac users can appreciate that.

    Agree with the other guy about not wanting one for myself, but still.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    Laetitian said:
    The difference between a Mac with an Intel processor and a Mac with an M1 or M2 is palpable the moment you open the laptop, and certainly when you check its battery life by the time you are done. Both technically inclined people and average Mac users can appreciate that.
    Indeed. Check the Battery Life tests, here:
    https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple-MacBook-Air-15-2023-M2-review-The-everyday-MacBook-now-in-15-inches.726811.0.html
    Reply
  • waltc3
    Admin said:
    While sales of Macs slump, adoption of the platform by new users is growing.

    Apple Finishes Dumping Intel Entirely, Touts Results : Read more
    It's always been that way with Apple. Every time Steve Jobs decided to "transition" the Mac to a new CPU, requiring emulation for the current Mac software at the time, Apple would lose between a quarter and half its Mac business, and would have to depend on new suckers coming in...;) Actually, people needing/wanting laptops aren't really into hardware or making hardware choices, so MacBooks have always sold well--or as well as Apple cares about. For their sakes, I hope that the next Mac CPU isn't incompatible with the current ones. I can't believe Apple would be foolish enough to do that, but I've said exactly that before and been surprised. Back when Jobs was pushing Intel Macs like there was no tomorrow, he constantly talked up how much better the Intel CPUs were versus PowerPC, and the different PPC CPUs jobs moved the platform to. When Jobs was using PPC he talked up how much better PPC was than Intel, rinse and repeat, with each CPU transition. I was always thankful I never had to endure those transitions!
    Had Jobs not created a Blackberry with a touch screen, Apple would now be an historical footnote. Years ago people begged Apple to go head-to-head with Windows in the global markets, as Mac was then x86, but Apple steadfastly refused. Apple is like Intel to a bizarre extent--neither company does well in the face of vigorous competition. Apple cloners, when forced by contract to buy 80% of their components from Apple, provided better Macs than Apple at lower prices! So of course Apple shut the Mac clone business down forever. Apple is a cellphone company that sells computers on the side, imo. Jobs removing the word "Computer" from the company Logo was a giant hint as to where he was taking the company. Cook peddles ordinary junk at premium prices just like Jobs, but unlike Jobs, Cook does a lot less of that. Cook's $1k monitor stands out in my memory...;)
    Reply
  • bit_user
    waltc3 said:
    It's always been that way with Apple. Every time Steve Jobs decided to "transition" the Mac to a new CPU, requiring emulation for the current Mac software at the time, Apple would lose between a quarter and half its Mac business, and would have to depend on new suckers coming in...;)
    And where's the evidence that Apple has lost any existing customers, in any of this transition? The fact that they're down year-over-year was explained in the article and not attributed to loss of customers.

    waltc3 said:
    For their sakes, I hope that the next Mac CPU isn't incompatible with the current ones. I can't believe Apple would be foolish enough to do that, but I've said exactly that before and been surprised.
    Given that Apple spent about the past 1.5 decades building up their ARM CPUs to this point, with rumors of ARM-power laptops going back at least 5 years, you can be quite certain no further ISA transition is going to happen any time soon. This seems like FUD, to me.

    waltc3 said:
    had Jobs not created a Blackberry with a touch screen, Apple would now be an historical footnote.
    Apple's resurgence goes back well before the iPhone. First, he fixed the OS by bringing most of the tech from NeXT. Then, he revolutionized the music industry with the iPod and iTunes. The iPhone was the final feather in his cap, but I think Apple would still be a player in the tech scene without it. Don't forget that the music industry was in free-fall, with rampant online piracy of their content, until Steve Jobs entered the picture and proved that commercial online music sales could be profitable for them.

    I'm not a Steve Jobs groupie, BTW. I could say a lot of negative things about him, too. However, I believe in credit where it's due. And speaking of which, he had the vision and the nous to acquire PA Semi (2008) and Intrinsity (2010), in order to build their CPUs powering their phones, tablets, and now these machines.

    waltc3 said:
    Apple cloners, when forced by contract to buy 80% of their components from Apple, provided better Macs than Apple at lower prices!
    You're going back 25 years, now. Do you really think that's in any way relevant to the company Apple is today? I don't. They were on the verge of bankruptcy, back in the 1990's.

    waltc3 said:
    Apple is a cellphone company that sells computers on the side, imo.
    Probably true 10 years ago, but now their presence in cloud services (including video & music streaming) is growing quite a lot. Including original content for Apple TV.

    waltc3 said:
    Cook peddles ordinary junk at premium prices just like Jobs, but unlike Jobs, Cook does a lot less of that. Cook's $1k monitor stands out in my memory...;)
    $1k is actually unremarkable for a professional-grade display.
    Reply
  • waltc3
    bit_user said:
    And where's the evidence that Apple has lost any existing customers, in any of this transition? The fact that they're down year-over-year was explained in the article and not attributed to loss of customers.

    Where's the evidence? I lived through the period, and it was always more than obvious that every time Apple transitioned--a painful experience, btw, they lost existing customers. Maybe it suits you to believe that Mac customers are masochists...;) But I really don't think so. Think about how exciting it was for Mac owners to have to throw away all of their expensive software because it either wouldn't run at all or else wouldn't run well through Rosetta and other Mac emulation. Microsoft got where it is today by maintaining backwards compatibility even with new SoA hardware. That is a huge advantage. As well, while Apple OS's support only a very limited number hardware devices, Windows supports practically anything available on the market.
    bit_user said:


    Given that Apple spent about the past 1.5 decades building up their ARM CPUs to this point, with rumors of ARM-power laptops going back at least 5 years, you can be quite certain no further ISA transition is going to happen any time soon. This seems like FUD, to me.
    Why does it sound like FUD? I didn't state there would be another incompatible CPU transition in Apple's future. Above, you maintained that fundamental CPU/OS transitions didn't bother anyone, now you say me mentioning it is FUD...;) Truth--nobody ever got advance notice before Jobs transitioned. Apple is not a CPU manufacturer, btw. It does not compete with AMD or even Intel in that regard. As usual, Apple hardware is chained to Apple products and goes nowhere else. By design.

    bit_user said:


    Apple's resurgence goes back well before the iPhone. First, he fixed the OS by bringing most of the tech from NeXT. Then, he revolutionized the music industry with the iPod and iTunes. The iPhone was the final feather in his cap, but I think Apple would still be a player in the tech scene without it. Don't forget that the music industry was in free-fall, with rampant online piracy of their content, until Steve Jobs entered the picture and proved that commercial online music sales could be profitable for them.
    NeXT was a total failure. NeXT was monochrome, only. (Remember when Macs had tiny little monochorme monitors when other companies were using color? I was surprised at that Jobs could understand color television but not color computer monitors.) BTW, When Jobs came back to Apple, he talked the "board" into paying off the unpaid NeXT debt--which was more than half-a-billion dollars by then! Apple did so. BTW, the Music industry was being pilfered by the RIAA, IIRC. And Jobs copied the Beatles music and wound up in court with them and had to pay them another $50M to settle--as they sued him for infringement. Then Jobs said that he stole their music out of "homage" to the Beatles...;) The Beatles didn't care about the "homage," and took the $50M, instead. I repeat, if not for the iPhone, Apple would be gone, today--I have no doubt about that.

    bit_user said:

    I'm not a Steve Jobs groupie, BTW. I could say a lot of negative things about him, too. However, I believe in credit where it's due. And speaking of which, he had the vision and the nous to acquire PA Semi (2008) and Intrinsity (2010), in order to build their CPUs powering their phones, tablets, and now these machines.

    All I'm saying about Jobs is true--not "negative." He was like a cult leader, really, and I'm happy to see those days have finally ended. Jobs had a reputation for carrying around the RDF (Reality Distortion Field) when he would publicly lie about Apple's competitors, as well as Apple's own products...It was absolutely and 100% true, and a running joke while he was alive.
    bit_user said:


    You're going back 25 years, now. Do you really think that's in any way relevant to the company Apple is today? I don't. They were on the verge of bankruptcy, back in the 1990's.
    Tim Cook was under Job's wing for decades. Of course, he was influenced by Jobs...;) Cook was Job's handpicked successor.
    bit_user said:


    Probably true 10 years ago, but now their presence in cloud services (including video & music streaming) is growing quite a lot. Including original content for Apple TV.
    Flashes in the pan..check out their real income/profits--almost all of it comes from their iPhone business. Without that, Apple is toast. Not a criticism, just a fact.
    bit_user said:


    $1k is actually unremarkable for a professional-grade display.
    I said nothing about a monitor--it was the *monitor stand* he promoted for $1K! Just the stand...;) You should remember that...Cook got booed loudly at MacWorld thing presentation IIRC. Ridiculous. Cook even called down the crowd of the rabidly Mac faithful who booed him...;) That's Apple for you...I'll pass, however. Monitors can be costly--mine ATM was ~1k, for instance. But it was only the monitor stand that I was speaking of.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    waltc3 said:
    Where's the evidence? I lived through the period,
    You made a claim that Apple has just lost users due to its ARM transition. Provide evidence or drop the claim. You can't make up in words what you lack in data.

    waltc3 said:
    Why does it sound like FUD? I didn't state there would be another incompatible CPU transition in Apple's future.
    No, you merely made a very pointed suggestion. That's the very definition of FUD, and it flies in the face of overwhelming facts.

    waltc3 said:
    nobody ever got advance notice before Jobs transitioned.
    That's not true. Apple announced it was switching to Intel well in advance of when any Intel-based Macs reached the market. This transition period was needed in order for software vendors to port their software, among other things. Intel's addition of AVX was even rumored to be granted as a concession to win Apple's business, since SSE was inferior to PowerPC's Altivec.

    Furthermore, in the case of the Intel transition, you're talking about Apple sourcing 3rd party CPUs, whereas their current generation of IP is 100% designed in-house. That's part of the reason it took them a 12-year buildup to reach the point where they could begin to transition their laptops to their ARM-based CPUs. That also makes it a very different proposition for them to transition to anything else.

    waltc3 said:
    Apple is not a CPU manufacturer, btw.
    Not in the sense of fabrication, but it's misleading to suggest they don't design their own CPUs.

    waltc3 said:
    NeXT was a total failure.
    They came out with yet-another-workstation during a time when the market and economy wasn't hungry for them (i.e. early 1990's). However, what set them apart was their software technology. This technology and expertise is what Jobs successfully leveraged to make the transformational change that was OS X.

    Anyway, the monochrome monitor thing was quickly remedied by the Nextstation Color. However, it's not as if the whole monochrome thing came out of nowhere. I once had an old Sun 360 workstation with a 1280x1024 19" monochrome monitor and the text on that thing was absolutely beautiful. If you were doing print work (layout, copy editing, etc.), at the time, it truly was the state of the art, as shadow masks were fairly coarse and obscured fine detail.

    Heck, I'd argue that even for writing code, monochrome would let you comfortably use smaller fonts, to squeeze more on the screen. Since text editors had only just begun to do things like syntax highlighting, around that time, you weren't really losing much by doing so.

    I can understand why it might seem odd to you, as an outsider.

    waltc3 said:
    I repeat, if not for the iPhone, Apple would be gone, today--I have no doubt about that.
    Apple's stock price increased by over 28x between the point just before it acquired NeXT and just before the iPhone launched. Say what you want, but you're sorely lacking in any kind of credible evidence supporting this claim.

    waltc3 said:
    Tim Cook was under Job's wing for decades. Of course, he was influenced by Jobs...;) Cook was Job's handpicked successor.
    You lost the plot, here. You had been complaining about their execution during the "clones" era. That pre-dated Jobs' return to Apple, so it's wrong to put that on Jobs or suggest it has anything to do with Cook.

    waltc3 said:
    Flashes in the pan..check out their real income/profits--almost all of it comes from their iPhone business. Without that, Apple is toast. Not a criticism, just a fact.
    You need to look at trends and separate where they've been from where they're going.

    waltc3 said:
    I said nothing about a monitor--it was the *monitor stand*
    What you said was "Cook's $1k monitor stands out in my memory...", which the average person would interpret to mean that you're talking about a $1k monitor which stands out in your memory.

    Anyway, I definitely do remember the overpriced "wheels" upgrade for the old Mac Pro, and I'll agree that they do indeed have some ridiculously-priced accessories. As a matter of fact, I already stated above that Apple's pricing practices are just one of the things that turns me off on the company.

    I think the main difference between us is that just because I don't like Apple or a lot of its users, it doesn't mean I feel moved to spread FUD about them. Honestly, don't you have better things to do?
    Reply
  • ex_bubblehead
    Alright. Let's drop the off topic bickering here. Get back on the posted topic or do not post at all. Any more of it beyond this point will incur sanctions for the offending member/s.
    Reply