New apple M1 chips - who's buying?

[NDA]

The latest MacBooks have a 1080p camera - is the iPhone camera going to offer an improvement on that on FaceTime or whatever?

[JiggyJaggy]

What does everyone think of the new stage manager on the Macs?

[nebpor]

[quote=NDA]The latest MacBooks have a 1080p camera - is the iPhone camera going to offer an improvement on that on FaceTime or whatever?[/quote

Massively - if you have a recent phone, it has different lenses and optical zoom. Much better than the front camera on the MacBook, albeit the MacBook will still look lovely and is less faf

[NDA]

nebpor said:

NDA said:

The latest MacBooks have a 1080p camera - is the iPhone camera going to offer an improvement on that on FaceTime or whatever?

Massively - if you have a recent phone, it has different lenses and optical zoom. Much better than the front camera on the MacBook, albeit the MacBook will still look lovely and is less faf

OK, thanks... I have a 14Pro, but am not very knowledgeable about optics/lenses etc. I assumed 1080 was about as good as it gets.

[nebpor]

Your 14Pro will capture better depth of field I bet and have a bigger aperture, so get more light

You are correct 1080p is the top in terms of resolution (forgetting 4K, which your phone can do but will be a bugger in terms of bandwidth), but even at 1080p the actual camera capturing the video still makes a huge difference

But as I said, I’m being niggly - the mac on its own will still look brilliant compared to a normal webcam. Apple always does a great job of it

[Blown2CV]

JiggyJaggy said:

What does everyone think of the new stage manager on the Macs?

Utterly pointless personally

[mikef]

ArsE82 said:

I need to find a monitor-top mount for my phone!

I use a cheap suction-cup mount for an action camera stuck to the back of a monitor and a phone mount (this one - Manfrotto - MCPIXI Universal Smartphone Clamp)

[ArsE82]

nebpor said:

ArsE82 said:

Exciting!

Looking forward to Stage Manager, and the Continuity Camera will be great as I use my M1 Air 'docked'. I need to find a monitor-top mount for my phone!

I already do this using Camo Studio on my Mac/iPhone - it makes you look like a Hollywood superstar on video calls. Could never go back to the usual webcam

I used to use EpocCam on Windows during lock-down, when it was almost impossible to get a webcam. Unfortunately it doesn't work with Teams on Mac.

Looks like Camo does, by using an application that runs on the Mac as well as running on the phone?

[NDA]

Blown2CV said:

JiggyJaggy said:

What does everyone think of the new stage manager on the Macs?

Utterly pointless personally

I use it and quite like it. I know what's open - which I didn't before - and can easily switch to another open application.

Like many 'features', it's not exactly earth shattering, but it's handy for me.

[ArsE82]

NDA said:

Blown2CV said:

JiggyJaggy said:

What does everyone think of the new stage manager on the Macs?

Utterly pointless personally

I use it and quite like it. I know what's open - which I didn't before - and can easily switch to another open application.

Like many 'features', it's not exactly earth shattering, but it's handy for me.

Pretty handy for me too.

I use an ultra-wide monitor at home, so tend to have Outlook snapped to the left and Chrome snapped to the right on one 'Desktop'.

With Stage Manager I have a few other apps that I use for a short time on another 'Desktop', and it's handy to be able to switch between them quickly.

I'm fairly new to Mac though so might be using the wrong function completely!

I used the Continuity Camera with my iPhone 13 Mini the other day and it was great.

[eeLee]

NDA said:

I use it and quite like it. I know what's open - which I didn't before - and can easily switch to another open application.

Like many 'features', it's not exactly earth shattering, but it's handy for me.

do you know about Mission Control? For me this is far better, I use that on my MBA rather than Stage Fright.

[Blown2CV]

eeLee said:

NDA said:

I use it and quite like it. I know what's open - which I didn't before - and can easily switch to another open application.

Like many 'features', it's not exactly earth shattering, but it's handy for me.

do you know about Mission Control? For me this is far better, I use that on my MBA rather than Stage Fright.

i guess it's about different options to do similar things. Different people prefer different ways of app switching. I tend to just click the icons in the dock, personally, but my machine isn't for work use. I did think the animation of the app switching in stage manager was a bit crap too but i am one of the social underclass of people who dare to have a pre apple silicon machine.

[Leithen]

I use a lot of the trackpad gestures to access Mission Control etc. Mrs L's MacBook doesn't have any of these switched on and it drives me nuts!

[ajprice]

New stuff today. M2 Pro and Max chips, M2 MBP 14" and 16", and M2 Mac Mini.
https://www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2023/01/apple-un...

[thebraketester]

ajprice said:

New stuff today. M2 Pro and Max chips, M2 MBP 14" and 16", and M2 Mac Mini.
https://www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2023/01/apple-un...

New base Mac mini is stingingly good value for money

[Durzel]

M2 MBPs are egregiously expensive, even by Apple standards.

Like-for-like M2 Max is a good £450 more expensive than the M1 Max was earlier on today. ~£4500 for the one I want (with edu discount), I can’t rationalise that for a refresh.

[untakenname]

I'm impressed by how well Apple keep their upcoming lineup a secret.

I bought an M1 Mac mini for Christmas as it was rumoured to be updated in October then they said March, if I'd known I'd probably have waited, will be watching the benchmarks between the old and new with interest.

thebraketester said:

New base Mac mini is stingingly good value for money

Only the base model though, of you want 16GB of ram it's double the price.
Edit: just went on apple's site rather than read the third party news and it's £200 more for 16GB which isn't too bad.

Edited by untakenname on Tuesday 17th January 21:09

[ajprice]

untakenname said:

thebraketester said:

New base Mac mini is stingingly good value for money

Only the base model though, of you want 16GB of ram it's double the price.

16GB option is £200.

[OMITN]

untakenname said:

I'm impressed by how well Apple keep their upcoming lineup a secret.

In my experience of working with them several years ago, everyone buys into this. Never mind joking it’s like a cult on the outside, it struck me as being like that on the inside.

[768]

I've spent a fortune on Apple kit, but even I think £200 for an extra 8GB of RAM is eye wateringly expensive.