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ATP

428: A Series of Rectangles

 

00:00:00 ◼   ► (laughs) I'm not feeling great right now. (laughs)

00:00:02 ◼   ► - Save it for the show. - Okay, okay.

00:00:04 ◼   ► - Save it for the show, save it for the show.

00:00:06 ◼   ► Yeah, so we have a lot of things to,

00:00:09 ◼   ► this is not really the show, but I'm trying to ease into it

00:00:11 ◼   ► since I have to cut Marco off.

00:00:13 ◼   ► We have a lot of stuff to cover.

00:00:15 ◼   ► It's going to be John Siracusa's favorite kind of episode,

00:00:17 ◼   ► an episode where it's probably nothing but follow up.

00:00:20 ◼   ► So brace yourselves, everybody.

00:00:22 ◼   ► (electronic music)

00:00:23 ◼   ► It is everyone's favorite time of year.

00:00:27 ◼   ► It is approaching WWDC time.

00:00:30 ◼   ► So what does that mean?

00:00:32 ◼   ► It means the ATP store is back and no snark.

00:00:37 ◼   ► I really mean this.

00:00:40 ◼   ► I've been really excited for this one.

00:00:41 ◼   ► I feel like we have a really good lineup this year.

00:00:43 ◼   ► Not that they've been bad in other years,

00:00:44 ◼   ► but I feel like this year, really good lineup.

00:00:47 ◼   ► And so here's what we've got.

00:00:49 ◼   ► If you are listening to this now, recorded or live,

00:00:52 ◼   ► you can go to ATP.fm/store.

00:00:56 ◼   ► And we have several different offerings.

00:00:59 ◼   ► Let me briefly try to go through them all

00:01:02 ◼   ► without John or Marco, probably John, interrupting me.

00:01:04 ◼   ► And then we will spend a little more time on each of them.

00:01:07 ◼   ► We've got--

00:01:07 ◼   ► - Hey, I'm good at interrupting you too.

00:01:09 ◼   ► - Well, yes, but I thought John

00:01:10 ◼   ► would have more thoughts on this one.

00:01:12 ◼   ► So anyway, so we've got, actually you succeeded

00:01:14 ◼   ► in making the point, well done.

00:01:15 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:01:18 ◼   ► All right, so we've got several different shirts.

00:01:20 ◼   ► We've got the M1 shirt.

00:01:22 ◼   ► The front is our favorite six colors, slash, slash, slash,

00:01:27 ◼   ► with M1 on the front.

00:01:28 ◼   ► The back, a certain John Siracusa spent an inordinate

00:01:33 ◼   ► amount of time recreating the ChIP diagram of the M1.

00:01:35 ◼   ► It looks excellent.

00:01:36 ◼   ► We have that in color on the front,

00:01:39 ◼   ► and then it's monochrome on the back.

00:01:40 ◼   ► We also have that in monochrome on the front.

00:01:43 ◼   ► So it's just white ink on the front,

00:01:44 ◼   ► but several different kind of colors of shirts.

00:01:47 ◼   ► We've got an ATP Performance shirt.

00:01:48 ◼   ► So this is kind of in the spirit of Under Armour,

00:01:51 ◼   ► although it is not exactly Under Armour.

00:01:52 ◼   ► So if you were wearing this while you are sweating,

00:01:55 ◼   ► it doesn't stick to you,

00:01:56 ◼   ► and you don't have to like scissor it off.

00:01:58 ◼   ► It actually slides right off.

00:02:00 ◼   ► Then we also have the classic logo shirt,

00:02:03 ◼   ► the one that we've known and loved for several years now.

00:02:05 ◼   ► We've got the pins that have been around forever,

00:02:06 ◼   ► and we'll eventually run out of them,

00:02:07 ◼   ► but that day is not today.

00:02:09 ◼   ► And then my personal favorite,

00:02:11 ◼   ► because this was my contribution,

00:02:12 ◼   ► we have an ATP pint glass, an etched ATP pint glass,

00:02:17 ◼   ► which I'm very excited about.

00:02:19 ◼   ► So that's the quick overview.

00:02:21 ◼   ► This will all be available.

00:02:22 ◼   ► The sale will end Friday, May 14.

00:02:25 ◼   ► This is where I do the same thing I do every year.

00:02:27 ◼   ► For those of you who are good about this,

00:02:29 ◼   ► I'm sorry for wasting a moment of your time.

00:02:31 ◼   ► I'm sorry, but I gotta do it.

00:02:33 ◼   ► Every year, every time, without fail,

00:02:36 ◼   ► within hours of the sale ending, I get tweets.

00:02:40 ◼   ► (gasps)

00:02:41 ◼   ► Is it over?

00:02:42 ◼   ► Oh, I forgot, is it over?

00:02:43 ◼   ► Is it over?

00:02:44 ◼   ► Oh no, I forgot, is it over?

00:02:45 ◼   ► Yes, it's over.

00:02:46 ◼   ► So please, if you're listening to this,

00:02:49 ◼   ► and you are at all interested in any of these fantastic

00:02:51 ◼   ► shirts or glasses or pins, now's the time.

00:02:54 ◼   ► Pull your car over if you're in the car.

00:02:56 ◼   ► Pull over to the side of the walkway that you're on

00:02:58 ◼   ► if you're walking.

00:02:59 ◼   ► Or, in all likelihood, you're at home,

00:03:01 ◼   ► which is where you probably should be.

00:03:02 ◼   ► So stop what you're doing at home.

00:03:04 ◼   ► ATP.fm/store, now's the time.

00:03:07 ◼   ► All right, let's go through this with a little more detail.

00:03:08 ◼   ► Jon, the M1 shirt was, I think, 100% your work.

00:03:12 ◼   ► So would you like to dive in a little more

00:03:14 ◼   ► and tell us a little more about it?

00:03:15 ◼   ► - Yeah, for the people who don't listen to the car segments,

00:03:17 ◼   ► who don't care about them,

00:03:18 ◼   ► who don't understand what it is with our logo,

00:03:19 ◼   ► like the joke of our ATP logo is that since this,

00:03:23 ◼   ► you know, since Accidental Tech podcast

00:03:25 ◼   ► came out of us doing a car podcast,

00:03:27 ◼   ► it looks a lot like the M logo, the BMW M logo,

00:03:31 ◼   ► which has some colored stripes leaning to the right,

00:03:33 ◼   ► and then an M, and so our show was a bunch of,

00:03:36 ◼   ► you know, colored stripes, but it was the apple colors,

00:03:38 ◼   ► and then a leaning A for ATP, right?

00:03:42 ◼   ► This year, of course, we know the M1 is in all the max,

00:03:44 ◼   ► and the M1 is awesome, so it gave us a chance

00:03:46 ◼   ► to make a shirt that actually has a bunch of colored stripes

00:03:49 ◼   ► and a slanty M.

00:03:51 ◼   ► Looks just like the BMW M logo.

00:03:52 ◼   ► Please, BMW, don't sue us, it's a parody.

00:03:55 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:03:56 ◼   ► And so now, finally, we have an actual M shirt.

00:04:00 ◼   ► Now, BMW, the M1 was a supercar,

00:04:02 ◼   ► and it was not, it didn't have a logo or anything like this.

00:04:05 ◼   ► Actually, BMW makes their 1s a little bit different,

00:04:07 ◼   ► but we took some artistic license,

00:04:09 ◼   ► so that's the idea behind the M1 shirt.

00:04:12 ◼   ► So we've got the colored one,

00:04:16 ◼   ► which I think is the most expensive

00:04:17 ◼   ► to manufacture shirt we've ever made,

00:04:20 ◼   ► because every single one of those colors in the front,

00:04:22 ◼   ► I think, is a separate printing pass,

00:04:24 ◼   ► plus we printed on the back,

00:04:26 ◼   ► so I think for the first time, we had to do calculations

00:04:28 ◼   ► to make sure we literally wouldn't lose money

00:04:30 ◼   ► in each shirt that we sold.

00:04:32 ◼   ► So we apologize for the price,

00:04:35 ◼   ► and speaking of the price of these shirts,

00:04:37 ◼   ► and forget about shipping and VAT,

00:04:38 ◼   ► I know they're insanely expensive,

00:04:40 ◼   ► just wanna remind everybody,

00:04:41 ◼   ► if you don't care about shirts,

00:04:42 ◼   ► you don't care about pint glasses,

00:04:43 ◼   ► you don't want any of this junk in your life,

00:04:45 ◼   ► but you just wanna give us money,

00:04:46 ◼   ► we have a way for you to do that.

00:04:49 ◼   ► You can become an ATP member at ATP.fm/join,

00:04:53 ◼   ► and believe me, if you want a shirt, get a shirt,

00:04:56 ◼   ► but if you just wanna give us money,

00:04:58 ◼   ► we get way, way, way more money if you join as a member

00:05:01 ◼   ► than if you buy a shirt.

00:05:02 ◼   ► I know it seems ridiculous,

00:05:03 ◼   ► like how can you not be making a ton of money

00:05:05 ◼   ► off these shirts?

00:05:05 ◼   ► The shirts are here for people who want shirts.

00:05:08 ◼   ► I want shirts, my kids want shirts,

00:05:10 ◼   ► people want shirts, people want pint glasses.

00:05:12 ◼   ► Get them if you want them, they're awesome,

00:05:14 ◼   ► they're really cool, but if you don't care

00:05:15 ◼   ► about any of this merch and you just wanna give us money,

00:05:17 ◼   ► ATP.fm/join, and the synergy here is,

00:05:20 ◼   ► if you do want a shirt,

00:05:21 ◼   ► but you don't wanna pay full price for that shirt,

00:05:23 ◼   ► if you're an ATP member,

00:05:25 ◼   ► you get 15% off every single thing in the store.

00:05:28 ◼   ► So you can become a member today, become a member,

00:05:31 ◼   ► pay for one month of membership, get the 50% discount,

00:05:34 ◼   ► save more money than you spent on the membership,

00:05:36 ◼   ► buy a bunch of stuff, cancel next month.

00:05:38 ◼   ► It's really easy to do.

00:05:39 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:05:40 ◼   ► - Oh, and I guess the colored M1 shirt.

00:05:42 ◼   ► So the monochrome one is our attempt to let people

00:05:44 ◼   ► have this shirt for less money,

00:05:45 ◼   ► 'cause the monochrome is just one color of ink,

00:05:47 ◼   ► so you don't have to do umpteen printing passes on it.

00:05:50 ◼   ► But the cool thing about the M1 monochrome shirt

00:05:52 ◼   ► is it comes in a ton of colors.

00:05:54 ◼   ► Let me look at how many different colors

00:05:55 ◼   ► we have with this thing.

00:05:56 ◼   ► We have blue, red, purple, teal, green, pink,

00:06:01 ◼   ► like a lighter purple, like tri-blend versions of all those.

00:06:05 ◼   ► So just because we show a blue shirt

00:06:07 ◼   ► and you're like, ah, I don't want a blue shirt,

00:06:08 ◼   ► look at all the colors.

00:06:09 ◼   ► A lot of them are really cool looking.

00:06:11 ◼   ► Lots of different styles, different materials.

00:06:13 ◼   ► When possible, we give every color

00:06:15 ◼   ► and every possible material.

00:06:16 ◼   ► It's not always possible.

00:06:17 ◼   ► Some colors are only available in cotton,

00:06:18 ◼   ► some only available in tri-blend,

00:06:20 ◼   ► but just check out all the colors.

00:06:21 ◼   ► Same thing with the performance shirt.

00:06:23 ◼   ► It comes in a bunch of different colors and styles,

00:06:25 ◼   ► so check it out.

00:06:26 ◼   ► And as for the pint glass, it is not printed, it is etched.

00:06:30 ◼   ► We already had someone ask whether that's dishwasher safe.

00:06:32 ◼   ► I assume so.

00:06:33 ◼   ► We will follow up next week to confirm one or the other,

00:06:35 ◼   ► but that's part of the reason we didn't choose printing.

00:06:38 ◼   ► Etching is actually scratching of the glass,

00:06:40 ◼   ► so I think that'll hold up well.

00:06:42 ◼   ► - Yep, yep, I am super excited about this.

00:06:44 ◼   ► All of this, and I can't stress enough.

00:06:46 ◼   ► John, can you tell the story of recreating the M1

00:06:51 ◼   ► for the back of the M1 shirt?

00:06:52 ◼   ► Because you went through a preposterous amount of work

00:06:56 ◼   ► to get this to look right.

00:06:57 ◼   ► - Eh, it's not that much work.

00:06:58 ◼   ► I mean, so if you look at it, you'll say,

00:07:00 ◼   ► hey, I recognize that kind of from Apple's presentations

00:07:03 ◼   ► where they show this stylized, not really realistic version

00:07:05 ◼   ► of the M1 that shows the four high-performance cores

00:07:09 ◼   ► and the four efficiency cores and the GPU cores,

00:07:11 ◼   ► and it's not a reflection of the physical chip,

00:07:13 ◼   ► but it is kind of an abstract diagram that Apple uses.

00:07:16 ◼   ► But of course, we can't use Apple's graphics

00:07:18 ◼   ► because they belong to Apple's.

00:07:19 ◼   ► But I can, in fact, sit there for hours and hours

00:07:22 ◼   ► in a vector design program and make a series of rectangles

00:07:27 ◼   ► that more or less approximates exactly what Apple had.

00:07:29 ◼   ► So thank you, Apple, for the inspiration

00:07:32 ◼   ► for this chip design, even though it doesn't reflect reality

00:07:35 ◼   ► and yes, I did draw every single line of that chip myself.

00:07:38 ◼   ► - And I think a series of rectangles might be

00:07:40 ◼   ► underestimating how many lines there are in this drawing.

00:07:43 ◼   ► - I mean, they really are all rectangles.

00:07:45 ◼   ► Like, it's just, it's a lot of rectangles.

00:07:47 ◼   ► And the other thing that I discovered when drawing it

00:07:49 ◼   ► is that Apple's drawings are not symmetrical.

00:07:52 ◼   ► Like, when you see a bunch of lines

00:07:54 ◼   ► that you think are evenly spaced,

00:07:55 ◼   ► they're not actually evenly spaced.

00:07:57 ◼   ► Because I was trying to do it on a grid with, like,

00:07:59 ◼   ► grid snap, and I realized when I did the same number

00:08:01 ◼   ► of lines as Apple, it would be like,

00:08:03 ◼   ► they wouldn't line up correctly.

00:08:04 ◼   ► Anyway, it's artisanally hand-created.

00:08:07 ◼   ► It's very interesting.

00:08:08 ◼   ► (both laughing)

00:08:09 ◼   ► - Yeah, I'm really, really excited for this.

00:08:12 ◼   ► Way back when, it was one of our earlier shirt sales,

00:08:14 ◼   ► when we had done the, how would you describe this?

00:08:17 ◼   ► I think this was Marco's idea,

00:08:19 ◼   ► but it was a rounded rect outline

00:08:22 ◼   ► that was approximately the proportions

00:08:24 ◼   ► of the then-new Apple Watch,

00:08:26 ◼   ► and it said Accidental Tech Podcast on it,

00:08:27 ◼   ► and we did this years and years and years ago.

00:08:29 ◼   ► And I think this was the same shirt

00:08:31 ◼   ► that we did the edition, the very first edition,

00:08:33 ◼   ► if I'm not mistaken.

00:08:34 ◼   ► - Yes.

00:08:35 ◼   ► - And if you weren't around for that,

00:08:36 ◼   ► we basically printed one, or had one printed in

00:08:39 ◼   ► with gold foil or something like that,

00:08:40 ◼   ► which I don't think it was actual literal gold,

00:08:42 ◼   ► but nevertheless.

00:08:43 ◼   ► - No, we actually tried to make it literal gold,

00:08:45 ◼   ► but they, and there are people who print in gold leaf,

00:08:48 ◼   ► but it wasn't gonna work out.

00:08:50 ◼   ► There was some practical reason why

00:08:53 ◼   ► you kinda can't really do it.

00:08:55 ◼   ► It's technically possible, but it's a bad idea.

00:08:57 ◼   ► - Right, so we attempted to do that,

00:08:59 ◼   ► and it didn't work out, but one of the shirts we did

00:09:01 ◼   ► was the sport shirt, and we did that in this,

00:09:04 ◼   ► again, it's not literally Under Armour,

00:09:05 ◼   ► but Under Armour style, I don't know how to describe it

00:09:08 ◼   ► that doesn't, in a flattering way,

00:09:10 ◼   ► 'cause I would say almost like a plasticky,

00:09:12 ◼   ► but that sounds terrible, it's not plasticky,

00:09:14 ◼   ► but nevertheless, we did that,

00:09:15 ◼   ► and that is my designated workout shirt,

00:09:17 ◼   ► and I only bought one of them, so I use it a lot,

00:09:20 ◼   ► and it needs brothers and sisters.

00:09:24 ◼   ► So, hence the ATP Performance shirt,

00:09:26 ◼   ► which I'm really excited about,

00:09:27 ◼   ► and again, that comes, like John said,

00:09:28 ◼   ► in several different colors,

00:09:30 ◼   ► and I cannot tell you enough how excited I am

00:09:32 ◼   ► for the ATP Pint Glass.

00:09:33 ◼   ► Years ago, Plex sent me a bunch of swag,

00:09:36 ◼   ► just to be nice, because Plex is awesome,

00:09:38 ◼   ► and one of them was a pint glass

00:09:39 ◼   ► with a printed Plex logo on it,

00:09:41 ◼   ► and it is my favorite pint glass,

00:09:43 ◼   ► and even though I'm not a beer drinker,

00:09:44 ◼   ► a pint is a perfect size for all sorts of beverages,

00:09:47 ◼   ► for water, for soda, for any number of things,

00:09:51 ◼   ► for mixed drinks if you're aggressive.

00:09:53 ◼   ► So, I am really excited to get this pint glass in the house

00:09:57 ◼   ► and have some friends for my Plex pint glass as well.

00:10:00 ◼   ► I am super stoked.

00:10:01 ◼   ► This is all, again, until Friday, May 14th.

00:10:04 ◼   ► I won't belabor the point,

00:10:05 ◼   ► but please, if you're even thinking about it,

00:10:06 ◼   ► now's the time.

00:10:07 ◼   ► Pull over, stop what you're doing,

00:10:09 ◼   ► atp.fm/store, atp.fm/join,

00:10:11 ◼   ► and again, please go to your membership page

00:10:14 ◼   ► or your member page and see what your discount code is,

00:10:17 ◼   ► and find your discount code,

00:10:18 ◼   ► and use that when you check out, save yourself 15%.

00:10:21 ◼   ► So, thank you for entertaining us.

00:10:24 ◼   ► I appreciate it, and we'll move right along,

00:10:27 ◼   ► and continue celebrating.

00:10:29 ◼   ► - Before we continue, I wanted to thank Casey

00:10:31 ◼   ► and reiterate that, 'cause I totally forgot.

00:10:33 ◼   ► If you're an ATP member, you get 15% off.

00:10:36 ◼   ► If you go to your member page and get your discount code,

00:10:38 ◼   ► you actually have to go,

00:10:40 ◼   ► we have a link to the member page on atp.fm/store.

00:10:42 ◼   ► So, you log in as your member, you go to your member page,

00:10:44 ◼   ► there you see your private feeds and all the other stuff,

00:10:46 ◼   ► and you will also see your discount code.

00:10:48 ◼   ► Copy and paste that discount code into the promo code field

00:10:51 ◼   ► when you check out from the Cotton Bureau page,

00:10:53 ◼   ► and that's how you get your discount.

00:10:55 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:10:56 ◼   ► Moving right along, we have other things

00:10:57 ◼   ► that we need to celebrate.

00:10:59 ◼   ► Two-thirds of ATP have completed asterisk, asterisk,

00:11:03 ◼   ► their journey on the vaccination train,

00:11:04 ◼   ► which we'll talk about that in a second.

00:11:05 ◼   ► But Marco, how you feeling, buddy?

00:11:07 ◼   ► - Not great, Bob.

00:11:10 ◼   ► (both laughing)

00:11:11 ◼   ► - What is that from?

00:11:12 ◼   ► I know the line, but what is that from?

00:11:14 ◼   ► - Mad Men. - Okay.

00:11:16 ◼   ► So, you got yours yesterday, your second shot yesterday?

00:11:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah.

00:11:19 ◼   ► I've had friends who have had worse days after,

00:11:24 ◼   ► but I'm not having the nothing reaction

00:11:26 ◼   ► that I think many people have, for sure.

00:11:28 ◼   ► - I had a mostly nothing reaction.

00:11:31 ◼   ► Erin also got her second yesterday,

00:11:32 ◼   ► and she, I think, is on the same path that you are.

00:11:35 ◼   ► She's not bad, but she's not feeling good.

00:11:38 ◼   ► - On my desk in front of me are two Benadryl pills

00:11:42 ◼   ► that I will be taking near the end of the show,

00:11:45 ◼   ► (both laughing)

00:11:46 ◼   ► which will start a timeline after this, so I won't.

00:11:49 ◼   ► But yeah, I, look, let me start by saying

00:11:53 ◼   ► I might have committed a crime.

00:11:57 ◼   ► - Oh, wonderful.

00:11:58 ◼   ► - I gave false statements.

00:12:00 ◼   ► They asked if I had had any of the symptoms recently,

00:12:05 ◼   ► and I said no, but that wasn't entirely true.

00:12:09 ◼   ► You see, my kid had a cold about a week ago.

00:12:14 ◼   ► Basically, it was going around like the whole school,

00:12:15 ◼   ► the whole town, everybody has this cold,

00:12:17 ◼   ► and it's not COVID, people have been tested, it's fine.

00:12:19 ◼   ► We know it's not that.

00:12:20 ◼   ► So, this cold has hit me.

00:12:25 ◼   ► One of the weird symptoms of this cold is that every night,

00:12:29 ◼   ► or most nights for the last three or four nights,

00:12:33 ◼   ► I've gotten hives on my arms and legs

00:12:36 ◼   ► that just itch for a while. - What?

00:12:37 ◼   ► - I've never gotten hives in my life.

00:12:39 ◼   ► I have mild allergies here and there.

00:12:40 ◼   ► Never had hives for anything.

00:12:42 ◼   ► So, that's interesting.

00:12:43 ◼   ► And it seems to completely unrelated,

00:12:48 ◼   ► believe me, I've done the debugging of like,

00:12:50 ◼   ► all right, what are the factors that have changed?

00:12:52 ◼   ► What could this possibly be?

00:12:53 ◼   ► Could it be food?

00:12:54 ◼   ► Could it be laundry detergent?

00:12:55 ◼   ► Like all that, everything.

00:12:57 ◼   ► It's not, it's none of those things.

00:12:58 ◼   ► Like nothing correlates in a direct way to this.

00:13:02 ◼   ► Except, I did some research, and apparently,

00:13:06 ◼   ► hives are often apparently the result of certain viruses.

00:13:10 ◼   ► Like sometimes you just get a cold,

00:13:11 ◼   ► and one of the things it does to you

00:13:13 ◼   ► is give you hives for the duration of the cold.

00:13:15 ◼   ► I had never heard of this, but when you research hives,

00:13:18 ◼   ► that's what turns up from the more reputable sources.

00:13:21 ◼   ► Which by the way, are hard to find.

00:13:23 ◼   ► But anyway, so, I decided, you know,

00:13:27 ◼   ► we had this appointment that was set

00:13:29 ◼   ► from when we got the first shot.

00:13:30 ◼   ► They automatically set you the second appointment

00:13:32 ◼   ► three weeks later.

00:13:33 ◼   ► And I thought, you know, I can not get my second shot.

00:13:38 ◼   ► But there's a risk in that, that like,

00:13:42 ◼   ► all the testing that's been done on the vaccines,

00:13:44 ◼   ► and the massive amount of data that we have

00:13:47 ◼   ► that this thing is ridiculously overwhelmingly safe.

00:13:50 ◼   ► Like, I'm pretty sure you're more likely

00:13:52 ◼   ► to die on the way to the vaccine site

00:13:54 ◼   ► in a car accident than you are to die from the vaccine.

00:13:57 ◼   ► I know that we've tested this very widely,

00:13:59 ◼   ► but we've tested it with people getting a shot,

00:14:02 ◼   ► you know, once, and then getting a second one

00:14:04 ◼   ► three weeks later.

00:14:06 ◼   ► If I get my second one six weeks later,

00:14:09 ◼   ► then that's gonna be a lot less tested of a situation.

00:14:13 ◼   ► - You'll be fine, like the three weeks

00:14:15 ◼   ► is the soonest you can possibly give it

00:14:17 ◼   ► because they're rushing to get the vaccine.

00:14:18 ◼   ► Most vaccines, they wait six months to a year.

00:14:20 ◼   ► So just FYI, I know it's too late now,

00:14:22 ◼   ► but you could've waited a year and it would be fine.

00:14:24 ◼   ► - Well, and I know, logically, I know, like,

00:14:27 ◼   ► and I mean, again, like the way mRNA vaccines work

00:14:30 ◼   ► is so remarkably amazing and remarkably safe

00:14:33 ◼   ► compared to most of the things.

00:14:35 ◼   ► Like, I wasn't too concerned, I'm like,

00:14:38 ◼   ► okay, that would be like an unknown.

00:14:40 ◼   ► Or I could just go get it now,

00:14:42 ◼   ► even though I kinda have a weird cold,

00:14:44 ◼   ► and roll the dice on that risk.

00:14:47 ◼   ► And I decided to do that instead

00:14:51 ◼   ► because I wanted to get this done.

00:14:52 ◼   ► - Your reasoning about health decisions

00:14:54 ◼   ► is suspect on many levels.

00:14:55 ◼   ► I mean, you're talking about the thing that's tested.

00:14:57 ◼   ► They're asking those questions for a reason,

00:14:59 ◼   ► presumably because they don't want you to take it

00:15:01 ◼   ► when you have a cold, but you're okay doing that.

00:15:04 ◼   ► Anyway, I'm sure everything is fine, I'm sure it's fine.

00:15:06 ◼   ► I'm just saying, I feel like your reasoning,

00:15:09 ◼   ► your reasoning is not sound for any of this.

00:15:12 ◼   ► - Well, regardless, maybe people don't always

00:15:14 ◼   ► make the right decisions, but regardless, that's what I did.

00:15:17 ◼   ► So I still have the weird nighttime hives

00:15:22 ◼   ► on my arms and legs, but otherwise, like from the vaccine,

00:15:26 ◼   ► I seem to only have worsened my cold

00:15:28 ◼   ► by making myself extremely tired all day today.

00:15:32 ◼   ► Just like really, just like knocked out tired.

00:15:35 ◼   ► But I don't have like the fever

00:15:37 ◼   ► that everyone says they get and everything,

00:15:38 ◼   ► so I think I'm doing okay.

00:15:40 ◼   ► And ultimately, I mean, geez,

00:15:42 ◼   ► I did two episodes of the show with COVID.

00:15:44 ◼   ► - I was gonna say, like you're really on the COVID tour

00:15:47 ◼   ► this year, you get the actual COVID, you get the vaccine,

00:15:49 ◼   ► now you're getting the second shot

00:15:51 ◼   ► while you have some other cold.

00:15:52 ◼   ► Like you just, you're rounding all the bases here.

00:15:54 ◼   ► So I think you're, you know, maybe you'll get a fourth

00:15:57 ◼   ► or a third COVID shot in six months, who knows?

00:16:00 ◼   ► - Oh my word. - Thanks, yeah.

00:16:02 ◼   ► Maybe I see this, I got the Pfizer,

00:16:03 ◼   ► maybe I get the Moderna one also, just for--

00:16:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, why not, just double up.

00:16:07 ◼   ► All right, so we should start with some follow-up

00:16:09 ◼   ► and this relates actually to what we were just talking about

00:16:11 ◼   ► So I, this is one of those moments where I swear

00:16:14 ◼   ► at some point I said something,

00:16:16 ◼   ► but either it got cut or-- - You totally said it,

00:16:19 ◼   ► it got cut in the edit.

00:16:20 ◼   ► - Okay, so I was gonna say either it got cut in the edit

00:16:22 ◼   ► or there was enough like distance between the thing

00:16:25 ◼   ► that I said wrong in my in-show correction,

00:16:28 ◼   ► which does happen sometimes, you know,

00:16:29 ◼   ► I'll say something five minutes into the show

00:16:31 ◼   ► and then I'll correct it 10 minutes into the show.

00:16:32 ◼   ► And we've already gotten inundated with emails

00:16:34 ◼   ► after the five minute mark about how wrong I am,

00:16:36 ◼   ► which, you know, at that moment I was wrong, so that's fine.

00:16:39 ◼   ► - And that's why it got edited out

00:16:40 ◼   ► because your correction was distant from it

00:16:42 ◼   ► and Marco was trimming the fat, so anyway, go on.

00:16:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, so last week I was making reference

00:16:48 ◼   ► to being quote unquote fully vaccinated,

00:16:51 ◼   ► which I don't know if that necessarily

00:16:54 ◼   ► is the wrong nomenclature,

00:16:55 ◼   ► but it certainly presented the wrong implication.

00:16:57 ◼   ► And I would just like to state clearly that yes,

00:16:59 ◼   ► even last week I knew that it's not until two weeks

00:17:02 ◼   ► after your second shot, if you're on the two shot system,

00:17:06 ◼   ► that you are considered completely and utterly vaccinated.

00:17:09 ◼   ► All I was trying to say at the time, which again,

00:17:11 ◼   ► I probably should have chosen better words,

00:17:13 ◼   ► is I have received the mandatory two shots that I need.

00:17:17 ◼   ► And this was, at some point or another,

00:17:19 ◼   ► this related to the Gruber term, vaccinated,

00:17:22 ◼   ► which I think is quite funny and I have embraced.

00:17:25 ◼   ► And Gruber defined vaccinated as two weeks

00:17:27 ◼   ► after your final shot.

00:17:28 ◼   ► And so I am not yet vaccinated, I am halfway to vaccinated

00:17:31 ◼   ► in the sense that I got my first, excuse me,

00:17:34 ◼   ► I got my second shot about a week ago.

00:17:36 ◼   ► So yes, you are not fully vaccinated

00:17:38 ◼   ► until two weeks after your second shot.

00:17:40 ◼   ► I am well aware of that, I am sorry that that got cut

00:17:43 ◼   ► in the last episode.

00:17:44 ◼   ► - As am I, because it was probably my fault.

00:17:46 ◼   ► - Well, you know, like I said, I think I clarified,

00:17:48 ◼   ► we went off on like a tangent if I recall correctly,

00:17:50 ◼   ► and then by the time I got the clarification.

00:17:52 ◼   ► - Us? - Yeah, if you listen

00:17:53 ◼   ► to the tangent, you see why it was cut,

00:17:54 ◼   ► but that's where you put your correction.

00:17:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, exactly. - Got it.

00:17:58 ◼   ► - Yeah, us and a tangent, no.

00:17:59 ◼   ► - Yeah, right, that never happens.

00:18:01 ◼   ► - So moving right along, sometime, what was it,

00:18:04 ◼   ► just a day or two ago, who is this, Joanna Stern

00:18:07 ◼   ► had an interview with Hair Force One,

00:18:09 ◼   ► otherwise known as Craig Federighi,

00:18:11 ◼   ► and it was a pretty good interview,

00:18:12 ◼   ► it was only eight minutes long, you can find it on YouTube,

00:18:14 ◼   ► and interestingly, at seven and a quarter minutes,

00:18:18 ◼   ► Joanna asks him, "Hey, Tim has said

00:18:21 ◼   ► "that he's gonna be out in 10 years,

00:18:23 ◼   ► "are you gonna be the next CEO?"

00:18:25 ◼   ► And John, what did he say?

00:18:26 ◼   ► - Also, here's the thing, yeah,

00:18:28 ◼   ► I would encourage everyone to watch his interview

00:18:29 ◼   ► 'cause it's really short, and also 'cause his hair

00:18:31 ◼   ► seems to be at half mast. (laughing)

00:18:34 ◼   ► This is like the first bad CFED hair day I've ever seen.

00:18:37 ◼   ► - Maybe it was like really humid there?

00:18:39 ◼   ► - Yeah, it looked kinda like that.

00:18:40 ◼   ► Or maybe you just got out of bed, I don't know.

00:18:42 ◼   ► But that was the question, it's like,

00:18:43 ◼   ► "Oh, your name's been floated as the next CEO,"

00:18:45 ◼   ► which is a topic that we discussed in the show

00:18:47 ◼   ► a couple episodes ago, who are the possible people

00:18:50 ◼   ► who could be in line for next CEO?

00:18:51 ◼   ► And when we discussed it, my attitude towards Federighi

00:18:56 ◼   ► being the next CEO was like, "Ah, it doesn't seem

00:18:57 ◼   ► "like something he's interested in,"

00:19:00 ◼   ► 'cause he just seems like he's more interested in tech stuff,

00:19:02 ◼   ► and I'm sure he knows how hard Tim's job is,

00:19:04 ◼   ► I'm not sure he has any, it was all about like,

00:19:06 ◼   ► whoever was gonna be CEO was gonna really have

00:19:08 ◼   ► to want that job, and it's a difficult job,

00:19:10 ◼   ► and it's in many ways not as much fun

00:19:12 ◼   ► as being the more technical level.

00:19:14 ◼   ► So he got asked the question, and his answer was,

00:19:17 ◼   ► "Get outta here, no," I think he said--

00:19:19 ◼   ► - Irresponsible.

00:19:20 ◼   ► - Yeah, that would be irresponsible, that's insanity,

00:19:22 ◼   ► forget it, right?

00:19:23 ◼   ► But watch the video, that's why we have a timestamp link

00:19:26 ◼   ► in the show notes that brings you directly to that question,

00:19:29 ◼   ► you can see his answer.

00:19:31 ◼   ► What he says, the words, the transcript is,

00:19:33 ◼   ► "Oh, that's silly," you know, whatever.

00:19:36 ◼   ► But the way he says it, said, "Oh, CFED wants to be CEO."

00:19:40 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:19:41 ◼   ► That was my read on it anyway, my read on it was,

00:19:44 ◼   ► "Yes, it was a silly," oh, forget it,

00:19:45 ◼   ► that's so ridiculous, right?

00:19:47 ◼   ► But the way he said it makes me think,

00:19:49 ◼   ► he's open to the idea, so I'm starting

00:19:52 ◼   ► to come around on that.

00:19:53 ◼   ► - I still don't think that A, he would want it,

00:19:56 ◼   ► or B, he should be the CEO, because we know him

00:20:00 ◼   ► to some degree, the three of us have all met him

00:20:02 ◼   ► at some point, right?

00:20:04 ◼   ► Like, I've had a couple of conversations with him,

00:20:06 ◼   ► like WBCs and stuff, you can tell through and through,

00:20:10 ◼   ► he's a nerd like us, and a nerd like us should not be

00:20:15 ◼   ► in the CEO of Apple in 2021 position.

00:20:19 ◼   ► Because as I was saying, at this point,

00:20:21 ◼   ► it's more of like a, it's almost like a political

00:20:25 ◼   ► and diplomatic kind of job on a lot of levels,

00:20:27 ◼   ► and that's not a job for a nerd, that's a job

00:20:30 ◼   ► for basically a tech-savvy politician.

00:20:34 ◼   ► - Well, I was saying that because he's a nerd,

00:20:35 ◼   ► he wouldn't want it, because that's not what he's into,

00:20:38 ◼   ► but in terms of could a nerd do that job well,

00:20:41 ◼   ► here's the thing, yes, he's the nerd,

00:20:42 ◼   ► but he's so high up on the org chart

00:20:44 ◼   ► that surely his last two or three jobs have been

00:20:47 ◼   ► like 98% political, managerial, you know, BS,

00:20:51 ◼   ► it just so happens that he's also still super tactical

00:20:53 ◼   ► and super into that, but I think as Steve Jobs

00:20:57 ◼   ► at least has shown, whatever it is that you're super into,

00:21:00 ◼   ► you can still dig down on even when you're CEO,

00:21:03 ◼   ► like you can just kind of choose which things you delegate,

00:21:05 ◼   ► you know what I mean?

00:21:06 ◼   ► So that, I mean, I'm basing it off like the way he said

00:21:09 ◼   ► like a three-word answer, so this is obviously silly, right?

00:21:12 ◼   ► But I no longer think it's ridiculous

00:21:16 ◼   ► that he might be interested in it,

00:21:17 ◼   ► and I don't think it's ridiculous

00:21:19 ◼   ► that he might do an okay job at it.

00:21:21 ◼   ► Just because his strengths are completely different

00:21:23 ◼   ► than Tim Cook's, and Tim Cook's were completely different

00:21:26 ◼   ► than Steve's, I think they're all inhabiting

00:21:29 ◼   ► such a high level in the org chart

00:21:31 ◼   ► that they all could do a reasonable job as CEO,

00:21:35 ◼   ► they would just be very different kinds of CEOs.

00:21:38 ◼   ► - I think that's true, and the rumblings I've heard

00:21:40 ◼   ► from friends at Apple is that, you know,

00:21:43 ◼   ► I think some of them like C-Fed and some of them don't,

00:21:45 ◼   ► but I've never heard anyone even think about breathing

00:21:49 ◼   ► that he's not an incredibly smart man.

00:21:53 ◼   ► Like, you know, everyone universally,

00:21:55 ◼   ► the friends of mine who like him,

00:21:56 ◼   ► the friends of mine that don't,

00:21:57 ◼   ► all say that he's extremely bright.

00:21:59 ◼   ► And if you look at this interview,

00:22:00 ◼   ► now granted I'm sure it was heavily edited,

00:22:02 ◼   ► but it seems like not only is he smart,

00:22:04 ◼   ► but he's a very cool customer in a very Tim Cook sort of way.

00:22:08 ◼   ► And I don't know that he would get the nod,

00:22:10 ◼   ► and I'm not 100% convinced he would want it,

00:22:13 ◼   ► but I do think, if I were a betting man,

00:22:15 ◼   ► I'd say he would definitely take a stab at it.

00:22:18 ◼   ► And the other interesting thing is, you know,

00:22:19 ◼   ► he is extremely technical.

00:22:21 ◼   ► I think it was Marco a second ago that said

00:22:22 ◼   ► he's, you know, a nerd's nerd.

00:22:23 ◼   ► - He really, really is.

00:22:25 ◼   ► - Right, he's still at least looking at code

00:22:28 ◼   ► from time to time, and I think there have been times

00:22:30 ◼   ► that rank and file engineers have had to be like,

00:22:33 ◼   ► Craig, stop, please don't make commits.

00:22:36 ◼   ► No, no, no, no, no, please stop.

00:22:38 ◼   ► You have much more important things.

00:22:39 ◼   ► That may be BS, I might be making that up,

00:22:41 ◼   ► but I'm pretty sure that I have heard stories about that,

00:22:44 ◼   ► you know, not too many years ago,

00:22:46 ◼   ► that this is still a thing that happens from time to time.

00:22:48 ◼   ► And he seems to really get it.

00:22:51 ◼   ► So I only met him once, it was when Marco,

00:22:54 ◼   ► if I recall correctly, you had spotted him

00:22:56 ◼   ► across the field at the bash

00:22:58 ◼   ► when it was still in San Francisco,

00:23:00 ◼   ► and all of a sudden you basically grabbed my arm

00:23:02 ◼   ► and said, follow me, let's go.

00:23:04 ◼   ► What is going on?

00:23:04 ◼   ► And next thing I know, I'm posing with Federighi

00:23:07 ◼   ► and shaking his hand, and he was an extremely kind fellow.

00:23:09 ◼   ► And so anyways, yeah, I would be surprised

00:23:13 ◼   ► if he was the one to get the nod,

00:23:14 ◼   ► but I wouldn't be surprised if he was interested in it.

00:23:18 ◼   ► - I did pick up, there was a little bit of oddity

00:23:20 ◼   ► to his tone of reaction, but I attributed that

00:23:23 ◼   ► to discomfort with the question,

00:23:25 ◼   ► as opposed to actually wanting the job.

00:23:28 ◼   ► 'Cause again, I've heard similar things, Casey,

00:23:31 ◼   ► of how he really is very involved with the tech.

00:23:35 ◼   ► I can't imagine that he has any interest

00:23:38 ◼   ► in doing all the other crap that the CEO has to do.

00:23:41 ◼   ► He's really into the software and the tech.

00:23:44 ◼   ► And he doesn't even seem to be that into

00:23:46 ◼   ► a lot of the product design and product decisions,

00:23:49 ◼   ► let alone the massive amount of operational

00:23:53 ◼   ► and political stuff that CEOs have to deal with.

00:23:55 ◼   ► Financial stuff, I mean, there's so much stuff

00:23:57 ◼   ► that CEOs have to do these days,

00:23:58 ◼   ► especially the CEO of Apple in 2021,

00:24:01 ◼   ► or 2031, or whatever it is.

00:24:03 ◼   ► It's not a job that somebody who is very, very technical

00:24:08 ◼   ► would probably really want to do.

00:24:10 ◼   ► Because honestly, he's probably really happy where he is,

00:24:14 ◼   ► 'cause where he is is about as high up as you can go

00:24:17 ◼   ► without having a lot more of that other stuff

00:24:20 ◼   ► come into your job description

00:24:21 ◼   ► that he probably doesn't want.

00:24:23 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think people always have aspirations,

00:24:27 ◼   ► people are always enthusiastic

00:24:29 ◼   ► and trying to get to the next big thing.

00:24:31 ◼   ► But I totally hear what you're saying.

00:24:33 ◼   ► I could go on with this conversation for another hour.

00:24:35 ◼   ► We got a lot to go through, so let's just move right along.

00:24:37 ◼   ► Apple TV, so calibration.

00:24:39 ◼   ► I thought we had said this or implied this last episode,

00:24:42 ◼   ► but I guess not.

00:24:44 ◼   ► The whole thing where you calibrate the TV,

00:24:47 ◼   ► which is I guess how we phrased it,

00:24:48 ◼   ► you're not actually calibrating the TV itself.

00:24:50 ◼   ► You're calibrating the Apple TV's output

00:24:53 ◼   ► for your specific TV.

00:24:55 ◼   ► The idea being that when your TV is tuned to the Apple TV,

00:24:59 ◼   ► when you're using the Apple TV as your input,

00:25:01 ◼   ► then it will look incredible

00:25:02 ◼   ► because you've used your iPhone and the Apple TV in concert

00:25:05 ◼   ► in order to tune the output for your specific TV.

00:25:08 ◼   ► Is that a better way of describing it?

00:25:10 ◼   ► - I mean, we did say that it adjusts the TV's outputs,

00:25:13 ◼   ► but I didn't delve into what the implications of that are.

00:25:16 ◼   ► I mean, the obvious first implication is that means

00:25:19 ◼   ► that if you calibrate the Apple TV's output

00:25:22 ◼   ► to look better on your TV, that only affects the Apple TV

00:25:25 ◼   ► because when you're not looking at the Apple TV,

00:25:28 ◼   ► that was the only thing whose output you calibrated.

00:25:30 ◼   ► Like you're not calibrating the display device,

00:25:33 ◼   ► you're calibrating the signal that comes over the HDMI cable

00:25:36 ◼   ► into your display device and adjusting that signal

00:25:38 ◼   ► to account for whatever weirdness there is

00:25:40 ◼   ► in your display device.

00:25:41 ◼   ► But when you use another display device

00:25:43 ◼   ► like your game console or your cable box

00:25:45 ◼   ► or whatever it is that you have,

00:25:46 ◼   ► anything you did with the Apple TV is totally irrelevant

00:25:49 ◼   ► because you were only basically telling the Apple TV

00:25:52 ◼   ► to output different signals.

00:25:53 ◼   ► Second thing is, perhaps less obvious,

00:25:56 ◼   ► television sets, especially modern ones,

00:25:57 ◼   ► have tons of adjustments that the Apple TV has no access to.

00:26:02 ◼   ► There are tons of image processing things

00:26:05 ◼   ► that happen on the TV itself,

00:26:07 ◼   ► and there's nothing you can do to the output

00:26:09 ◼   ► from the Apple TV to enable, disable,

00:26:11 ◼   ► or adjust those features at all.

00:26:13 ◼   ► And if your TV is super duper off,

00:26:15 ◼   ► there's nothing the output of your HDMI signal can do

00:26:17 ◼   ► to account for that.

00:26:18 ◼   ► Or if it could account for it,

00:26:19 ◼   ► it could just make it much worse

00:26:20 ◼   ► because if you're red and you're green, you're super low,

00:26:23 ◼   ► the only way it can get it in balance

00:26:24 ◼   ► is bringing your blue super low

00:26:25 ◼   ► and now your whole image level is down.

00:26:27 ◼   ► It's very, very complicated.

00:26:28 ◼   ► All this is to say that you should actually calibrate

00:26:31 ◼   ► your television and not calibrate the output

00:26:35 ◼   ► of one of your HDMI devices to account

00:26:38 ◼   ► for the idiosyncrasies of your television sets.

00:26:40 ◼   ► So please calibrate your TV if you want to do this.

00:26:43 ◼   ► Now, all that said,

00:26:45 ◼   ► this Apple thing is probably better than nothing.

00:26:47 ◼   ► And if you watch most of your TV through the Apple TV,

00:26:50 ◼   ► it might help some, but yeah.

00:26:53 ◼   ► Quinn Nelson, Snazzy Labs, Snazzy YouTube channel,

00:27:00 ◼   ► has an upcoming video about the Apple calibration

00:27:02 ◼   ► versus a real calibration.

00:27:04 ◼   ► I'm really curious to see what he finds,

00:27:05 ◼   ► but my assessment of this Apple calibration thing right now

00:27:10 ◼   ► is pretty low.

00:27:10 ◼   ► So unless it's, this is some very surprising results,

00:27:13 ◼   ► I would say, please calibrate your television

00:27:14 ◼   ► and not just your Apple TV.

00:27:17 ◼   ► - Sounds good.

00:27:17 ◼   ► All right, the remote has a slightly rounded back,

00:27:20 ◼   ► which I think I had seen before we recorded,

00:27:23 ◼   ► but I don't believe we brought up last time.

00:27:25 ◼   ► So that should be nice to at least be able to pick up

00:27:28 ◼   ► the correct side facing upwards,

00:27:30 ◼   ► which is definitely an improvement.

00:27:32 ◼   ► How do you feel about that, Jon?

00:27:34 ◼   ► - Yeah, and even last time I said

00:27:35 ◼   ► it had no acknowledgement of human hands,

00:27:37 ◼   ► here's a minor acknowledgement.

00:27:38 ◼   ► Now, the Siri remote also had slightly curved sides,

00:27:42 ◼   ► so you could pick it up with your fingernails off the table.

00:27:44 ◼   ► This one is a more of a uniform sort of U shape

00:27:48 ◼   ► along the entire bottom.

00:27:50 ◼   ► It's not sloped enough,

00:27:51 ◼   ► and it's not like it's still not gonna be,

00:27:52 ◼   ► you're gonna pick it up

00:27:53 ◼   ► or you're gonna feel like you're a giant

00:27:54 ◼   ► and this is something for a toddler,

00:27:56 ◼   ► because that's how small the remote is,

00:27:57 ◼   ► but credit where credit is due,

00:27:58 ◼   ► they slightly curved the bottom.

00:28:01 ◼   ► - Indeed, and then Eric Weber writes

00:28:03 ◼   ► that the original Siri remote was $80,

00:28:05 ◼   ► but it was dropped to 60 with the refreshed white ring

00:28:09 ◼   ► when the original Apple TV 4K was introduced in 2017.

00:28:13 ◼   ► - So this remote is not cheaper than the Siri remote.

00:28:16 ◼   ► It's only cheaper than the original Siri remote,

00:28:18 ◼   ► so that's a shame.

00:28:19 ◼   ► - There was a big brouhaha over the last several days

00:28:22 ◼   ► that the new Siri remote does not have an accelerometer

00:28:26 ◼   ► or gyroscope for gaming on the Apple TV, which is a bummer.

00:28:30 ◼   ► - Yeah, especially since it costs the same amount

00:28:32 ◼   ► and it doesn't have a U1 in it as we discussed last week,

00:28:34 ◼   ► so I'm not sure where the extra money went.

00:28:38 ◼   ► It's got a smaller touchpad, a similar number of buttons.

00:28:42 ◼   ► It's made of aluminum instead of being aluminum,

00:28:45 ◼   ► glass, and metal or whatever the other one was.

00:28:48 ◼   ► I don't know, anyway, I don't quite understand

00:28:50 ◼   ► why this lacks those features,

00:28:52 ◼   ► other than the touchpad's not big enough

00:28:53 ◼   ► to play games with anyway, so why should they bother?

00:28:56 ◼   ► But really, if you're gonna play games on the Apple TV,

00:28:58 ◼   ► you should buy a controller.

00:28:59 ◼   ► You shouldn't use the Siri remote,

00:29:01 ◼   ► and apparently you can't use this remote

00:29:02 ◼   ► if the games require an accelerometer or gyroscope.

00:29:05 ◼   ► - Is anybody playing games on Apple TV?

00:29:08 ◼   ► - I hope they're not playing them with the remote

00:29:10 ◼   ► if they are.

00:29:11 ◼   ► - I guess you can play Crossy Road with the remote.

00:29:13 ◼   ► Any game that has one button?

00:29:14 ◼   ► - We did.

00:29:15 ◼   ► When it first came out, we played a lot of Crossy Road,

00:29:17 ◼   ► we played Badland, but ultimately,

00:29:20 ◼   ► we just fell out of favor with the Apple TV

00:29:22 ◼   ► as a gaming platform because we tried a bunch of games.

00:29:24 ◼   ► I even bought two of the controllers,

00:29:26 ◼   ► like two different branded Apple TV MFI controllers,

00:29:31 ◼   ► and the gaming scene is just so,

00:29:33 ◼   ► it feels like back in the '90s

00:29:35 ◼   ► when you bought the wrong system.

00:29:37 ◼   ► It feels like you had the 3DO,

00:29:39 ◼   ► and you're waiting for good games to come out,

00:29:40 ◼   ► and you're like, well, there's not a lot here.

00:29:43 ◼   ► - Well, you're used to that being a Genesis person.

00:29:45 ◼   ► - Oh, no way, come on.

00:29:46 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:29:49 ◼   ► - It was too easy, I couldn't resist.

00:29:50 ◼   ► - No, it's more like a 32X.

00:29:51 ◼   ► It's like you bought 32X thinking,

00:29:53 ◼   ► oh, there's gonna be a lot of games for this,

00:29:54 ◼   ► and then just nothing happens.

00:29:57 ◼   ► - Well, if you subscribe to Apple One,

00:29:58 ◼   ► you should at least check out Apple Arcade

00:30:00 ◼   ► 'cause they just added a whole infusion of games,

00:30:02 ◼   ► including a bunch of known good games

00:30:05 ◼   ► from the pre-Apple Arcade days,

00:30:06 ◼   ► only without ads in an app purchase.

00:30:08 ◼   ► So, you know, if you're getting it for free anyway,

00:30:10 ◼   ► you might as well check it out.

00:30:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, so anyway, to come back

00:30:13 ◼   ► to this lack of gyroscope and accelerometer,

00:30:15 ◼   ► apparently if you try to play a game that requires it

00:30:18 ◼   ► and you don't have a proper game controller hooked up,

00:30:22 ◼   ► the app will say, to play this game on your Apple TV,

00:30:25 ◼   ► you need to connect the Apple TV remote,

00:30:26 ◼   ► parenthesis, first generation, parenthesis,

00:30:28 ◼   ► or a compatible PlayStation, Xbox, or MFI controller.

00:30:31 ◼   ► If I were to read that as a regular person,

00:30:34 ◼   ► I wouldn't have a clue what MFI meant.

00:30:36 ◼   ► - I wouldn't have a clue what Apple TV remote,

00:30:38 ◼   ► parenthesis, first generation means.

00:30:39 ◼   ► - That's true too, yeah, absolutely.

00:30:40 ◼   ► - And there's a note about this,

00:30:41 ◼   ► that Apple TV remote is what it's called in countries

00:30:45 ◼   ► where Siri is not available on the Apple TV,

00:30:47 ◼   ► but otherwise it's called the Siri remote.

00:30:49 ◼   ► - Fair enough.

00:30:50 ◼   ► - But no one knows what Siri remote first generation is,

00:30:53 ◼   ► and no one knows what Apple remote first generation is,

00:30:55 ◼   ► but people do know what PlayStation, Xbox controllers are,

00:30:57 ◼   ► so at least they have a fighting chance.

00:30:59 ◼   ► - Somebody, Odin, wrote in with an interesting point

00:31:03 ◼   ► about Apple TV pricing.

00:31:04 ◼   ► So as everyone else has been,

00:31:06 ◼   ► we've been lamenting the fact that it is a very expensive

00:31:09 ◼   ► box to do the sorts of things that it does.

00:31:11 ◼   ► And Odin writes, with regard to the pricing,

00:31:14 ◼   ► neither comes, neither, the Apple TV doesn't come

00:31:17 ◼   ► with an HDMI cable, so you can't even connect it

00:31:20 ◼   ► to your TV right out of the box.

00:31:22 ◼   ► Meanwhile, Google and Amazon's $30 streaming device

00:31:25 ◼   ► is plugged directly into an HDMI port.

00:31:27 ◼   ► - Neither meaning like the 4K or the HD.

00:31:29 ◼   ► Like it makes sense if you think about it for a second

00:31:31 ◼   ► and you know how big the box is.

00:31:32 ◼   ► Of course there's not an HDMI cable in there,

00:31:34 ◼   ► it's this tiny little box.

00:31:35 ◼   ► It's just got enough room for the little puck

00:31:36 ◼   ► and the remote, but it's another, you'll get it,

00:31:40 ◼   ► you'll say like, yay, here's this new Apple TV,

00:31:41 ◼   ► let me hook it up, and you realize,

00:31:42 ◼   ► unless you already have a spare HDMI cable,

00:31:44 ◼   ► unless you disconnect another input

00:31:46 ◼   ► and put this one in its place,

00:31:48 ◼   ► there's something else you have to buy.

00:31:49 ◼   ► Because it's just not expensive enough

00:31:51 ◼   ► to support the price of that cable.

00:31:53 ◼   ► - It's pretty crummy.

00:31:55 ◼   ► Did the Apple TV ever come with an HDMI cable?

00:31:58 ◼   ► I don't remember.

00:31:58 ◼   ► - No. - I don't think so.

00:31:59 ◼   ► I think it's always, maybe the one that was

00:32:01 ◼   ► basically a Mac Mini, do you remember that one?

00:32:03 ◼   ► - I don't think that had HDMI output,

00:32:05 ◼   ► I think that was component.

00:32:06 ◼   ► - Maybe.

00:32:07 ◼   ► I never had one, I don't remember.

00:32:07 ◼   ► - But no, they never came with HDMI,

00:32:09 ◼   ► I had one of those, they never came with HDMI cables.

00:32:11 ◼   ► - And yes, the chatter of mass,

00:32:12 ◼   ► the PS5 does come with an HDMI cable.

00:32:14 ◼   ► And it's good that it does because PS5 supports HDMI 2.1

00:32:18 ◼   ► and most people don't have an HDMI 2.1 compatible cable

00:32:21 ◼   ► just laying around if they haven't bought

00:32:23 ◼   ► AV equipment in a while.

00:32:24 ◼   ► - Correction, it did have HDMI out.

00:32:26 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:32:28 ◼   ► - We regret the--

00:32:29 ◼   ► - It also had component, in my defense.

00:32:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was the one that ran Mac OS 10.4 or something.

00:32:35 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was basically,

00:32:36 ◼   ► it was like a little Celeron in there.

00:32:38 ◼   ► It was a whole little low powered,

00:32:40 ◼   ► like 400 megahertz Celeron computer or something like that.

00:32:43 ◼   ► - And a hard drive, right?

00:32:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, I believe so.

00:32:45 ◼   ► - It was a little Mac, it ran Mac OS.

00:32:47 ◼   ► - I do not remember this at all.

00:32:49 ◼   ► - It was the one that, it basically acted like an iPod.

00:32:51 ◼   ► You had to sync things to it from your Mac.

00:32:54 ◼   ► And it was a whole thing.

00:32:56 ◼   ► - I think it was introduced at the iPhone event in 2007,

00:32:58 ◼   ► wasn't it?

00:32:59 ◼   ► - Yes, yes it was.

00:33:00 ◼   ► - It was like ITV, right?

00:33:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, originally it was,

00:33:03 ◼   ► well I think it was announced as ITV earlier that year,

00:33:05 ◼   ► but I think they introduced it then as Apple TV.

00:33:07 ◼   ► It was introduced at one event,

00:33:09 ◼   ► or it was like previewed at one event,

00:33:10 ◼   ► and then it was, I think it was shown off

00:33:12 ◼   ► at the iPhone event.

00:33:13 ◼   ► - As bad as the current crop of Apple TVs are,

00:33:16 ◼   ► this one was worse, so just be glad things have improved.

00:33:18 ◼   ► - For the time, it was really interesting.

00:33:21 ◼   ► - For the time, TiVo embarrassed it, so I'm not sure.

00:33:24 ◼   ► - Oh, here we go.

00:33:25 ◼   ► We need a different sound effect

00:33:27 ◼   ► other than a ding for the TiVo.

00:33:29 ◼   ► Like a whomp.

00:33:30 ◼   ► - I don't know about TiVo much, I'm just saying.

00:33:31 ◼   ► Back when the first Apple TV came out,

00:33:34 ◼   ► TiVo was just a thousand times better.

00:33:36 ◼   ► - Moving right along.

00:33:37 ◼   ► John, tell me, what is the deal with high frame rate HDR,

00:33:41 ◼   ► anyway, like what is the story there?

00:33:44 ◼   ► - We talked about that as a possible reason

00:33:45 ◼   ► that Marco should get the fancy new Apple TV,

00:33:47 ◼   ► oh don't you wanna see high frame rate HDR video,

00:33:50 ◼   ► meaning higher than like 30 frames per second or whatever.

00:33:53 ◼   ► And Chris Jennings tells us that apparently,

00:33:59 ◼   ► according to his conversations with Apple support,

00:34:01 ◼   ► which isn't always exactly correct,

00:34:03 ◼   ► but according to these conversations

00:34:04 ◼   ► from a theoretically knowledgeable Apple source

00:34:07 ◼   ► in Apple support, you can get the high frame rate HDR

00:34:12 ◼   ► features on the older Apple TV 4K too,

00:34:15 ◼   ► that it's basically a software feature,

00:34:16 ◼   ► not a hardware feature.

00:34:17 ◼   ► Now initially I thought, well, that can't be the case,

00:34:19 ◼   ► because only the new Apple TV 4K supports HDMI 2.1,

00:34:22 ◼   ► and I know you need HDMI 2.1 to support

00:34:25 ◼   ► 120 frames per second and stuff like that,

00:34:27 ◼   ► but it turns out that even though the new Apple TV

00:34:29 ◼   ► has HDMI 2.1, it only supports up to 4K

00:34:33 ◼   ► at 60 frames per second.

00:34:35 ◼   ► Even though HDMI 2.1, the standard,

00:34:37 ◼   ► can do 4K at 120 frames per second,

00:34:40 ◼   ► the fancy new Apple TV doesn't go higher than 60.

00:34:44 ◼   ► And the old Apple TV 4K supported HDMI 2.0A,

00:34:47 ◼   ► which stops at 4K 60, but I don't know

00:34:51 ◼   ► if the old Apple TV 4K before the software

00:34:53 ◼   ► did do 4K 60, so anyway, it's still an open question,

00:34:56 ◼   ► but it seems clear that if you're looking for 4K

00:34:58 ◼   ► at 120 frames per second from your new Apple TV,

00:35:01 ◼   ► it can't currently do that, even though technically

00:35:03 ◼   ► the wire coming out of it can support that.

00:35:06 ◼   ► I guess we'll just wait to have to get these things

00:35:08 ◼   ► in our houses and see if we can play back

00:35:11 ◼   ► 4K 60 frame per second HDR video on an old Apple TV 4K

00:35:16 ◼   ► with the new tvOS update, but according to Apple support,

00:35:19 ◼   ► that is a thing that can happen.

00:35:21 ◼   ► The other theory I have is that maybe high frame rate HDR

00:35:23 ◼   ► via AirPlay requires the new Apple TV,

00:35:25 ◼   ► and it only works wired or downloaded to the thing

00:35:29 ◼   ► with the old one, I don't know, it's very confusing.

00:35:33 ◼   ► - Better get that 64 gig model

00:35:35 ◼   ► in case it's only downloaded.

00:35:36 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:35:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, right?

00:35:39 ◼   ► - Aye yai yai, all right, and AppleCare+ is available

00:35:41 ◼   ► for the first time for Apple TV, providing three years

00:35:44 ◼   ► of technical support and additional hardware coverage,

00:35:46 ◼   ► including up to two incidents of accidental damage

00:35:49 ◼   ► protection every 12 months.

00:35:51 ◼   ► It's $30 for all of that.

00:35:54 ◼   ► And I first thought, why would one want this?

00:35:57 ◼   ► But then it occurred to me when I was still

00:36:00 ◼   ► with a true jobby job, there were Apple TVs

00:36:02 ◼   ► in like every conference room, and I would assume

00:36:04 ◼   ► that this is a corporate thing.

00:36:05 ◼   ► - No, no, you forget, or maybe you've been lucky enough

00:36:08 ◼   ► not to know this.

00:36:09 ◼   ► It's a stupid remote, the Siri remote was covered in glass.

00:36:12 ◼   ► People were shattering them all the time.

00:36:13 ◼   ► It's not like your Apple TV puck is gonna get damaged,

00:36:18 ◼   ► I hope, like it's usually just sitting with the TV

00:36:19 ◼   ► or whatever, it's this stupid remote.

00:36:21 ◼   ► Now, I think the new remote looks much, much sturdier

00:36:23 ◼   ► 'cause it's just aluminum and plastic buttons

00:36:25 ◼   ► and there's no big glass thing, but I've seen so many

00:36:27 ◼   ► pictures of completely shattered, like the glass diving

00:36:31 ◼   ► board on the Siri remotes.

00:36:33 ◼   ► So I just wanted to bring those up just because

00:36:35 ◼   ► if you're afraid of that happening or if for some reason

00:36:38 ◼   ► you're buying the one that still has the glass remote,

00:36:41 ◼   ► you can actually get AppleCare for it.

00:36:42 ◼   ► And I think the only reason this exists is because of all

00:36:45 ◼   ► of the people breaking their Siri remote and then being

00:36:47 ◼   ► super angry that it costs 60 bucks or in the past 80 bucks

00:36:50 ◼   ► to replace the stupid remote that they just broke.

00:36:52 ◼   ► That's a good point, I hadn't considered that.

00:36:54 ◼   ► - The chatroom says that the Apple TV remote is not covered

00:36:56 ◼   ► by AppleCare or was not covered by AppleCare.

00:36:58 ◼   ► I'm assuming this new AppleCare for the Apple TV

00:37:01 ◼   ► covers everything.

00:37:02 ◼   ► And when they say accidental damage, I'm assuming

00:37:04 ◼   ► they include accidental damage to the remote.

00:37:07 ◼   ► But if you have any questions, ask Apple to make sure

00:37:09 ◼   ► before you buy it, but it is only 30 bucks.

00:37:11 ◼   ► - Is it very likely that you would accidentally

00:37:14 ◼   ► damage the box?

00:37:16 ◼   ► - I mean, I guess if it's in a conference room or being

00:37:19 ◼   ► wheeled around on a card and you drop it and it cracks,

00:37:21 ◼   ► I don't know, maybe yank out the cable and it breaks

00:37:24 ◼   ► the connector.

00:37:25 ◼   ► - I don't know, man.

00:37:26 ◼   ► But all I know is it's this coming Friday, which as we

00:37:29 ◼   ► record is like a day and a half away that I can finally

00:37:32 ◼   ► order a new one and I am super excited.

00:37:34 ◼   ► - It is pretty funny though, like there was, I think

00:37:37 ◼   ► somebody wrote in to point this out, but like the new one

00:37:40 ◼   ► isn't that much better than the outgoing one.

00:37:44 ◼   ► Like it's actually most of the newness of it is the new

00:37:48 ◼   ► remote, which you can now get for all of them, or you will

00:37:51 ◼   ► be able to get for all of them once the orders go up.

00:37:54 ◼   ► And it's an A12 versus an A10X, but like the A10X and A12

00:37:58 ◼   ► are actually not as far apart as you would think.

00:38:01 ◼   ► - And I did read that the A10X has a better GPU than the

00:38:04 ◼   ► A12, which I'm not sure that I buy, but I mean the A12

00:38:08 ◼   ► certainly will be lower power for doing the same amount

00:38:12 ◼   ► of work, I suppose.

00:38:13 ◼   ► - Yeah, it seems like this was an update mostly to the

00:38:16 ◼   ► remote, and Apple basically speed bumped barely the box.

00:38:21 ◼   ► And I'm okay with that, because the remote was the biggest

00:38:24 ◼   ► problem, I'm still amused at how bad the pricing is,

00:38:29 ◼   ► and that they still offer two capacities.

00:38:32 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:38:34 ◼   ► But you know, I'm hoping that the remote will be good,

00:38:36 ◼   ► and we will find out.

00:38:37 ◼   ► Honestly though, I don't think I'm even gonna buy the new

00:38:41 ◼   ► box, I think I'm only gonna buy the remotes.

00:38:43 ◼   ► Because I look at the box and I'm like, well what am I

00:38:46 ◼   ► spending the extra $120 for the box for?

00:38:49 ◼   ► I'm not really getting a lot for that, I don't think.

00:38:53 ◼   ► - I can understand that.

00:38:54 ◼   ► - Real time follow up, they were looking at the

00:38:56 ◼   ► apple.com/support/products/appletv, and it says the

00:39:00 ◼   ► AppleCare+ does cover your Apple TV, included Siri remote

00:39:04 ◼   ► and power cord, it's not called Siri remote anymore,

00:39:06 ◼   ► Apple, update your page.

00:39:07 ◼   ► And up to two incidents of accidental damage.

00:39:09 ◼   ► It looks like the remote is covered under the new AppleCare.

00:39:12 ◼   ► And one more AppleCare thing here that I snuck in,

00:39:15 ◼   ► this is not Apple TV related, but apparently now AppleCare+

00:39:18 ◼   ► coverage for the Mac can be extended beyond three years,

00:39:21 ◼   ► you just keep paying for it.

00:39:22 ◼   ► So they always have the thing where you can pay like

00:39:24 ◼   ► per month, but then you could also pay one lump sum

00:39:27 ◼   ► and get the three years, now at the end of the three years

00:39:29 ◼   ► you can just keep paying, I presume on a yearly or monthly

00:39:32 ◼   ► or whatever plan.

00:39:33 ◼   ► We'll put a link in the show notes for more details on this.

00:39:35 ◼   ► So if you have a Mac and you're always annoyed that even

00:39:37 ◼   ► with the fancy AppleCare+, you know, three year bulk

00:39:41 ◼   ► purchase thing, it just ends after three years, now you

00:39:43 ◼   ► can keep paying and keep getting that AppleCare

00:39:45 ◼   ► if you want to.

00:39:46 ◼   ► That's actually really nice, you know, like I would have

00:39:49 ◼   ► definitely used that on my iMac Pro, I think people who buy

00:39:53 ◼   ► like really expensive Macs and use them for more than

00:39:56 ◼   ► three years, that's a really nice feature.

00:39:58 ◼   ► I wonder like how long will it go though?

00:40:00 ◼   ► Like there has to be some limit, right?

00:40:02 ◼   ► Because otherwise they would be, like Apple would therefore

00:40:04 ◼   ► be on the hook to replace your like seven year old Mac

00:40:07 ◼   ► or something, like there's probably some limit.

00:40:10 ◼   ► - They have that time horizon where like the products

00:40:11 ◼   ► become like obsolete or something and Apple parlance

00:40:15 ◼   ► and they're like, I'm sure there is a limit on it,

00:40:17 ◼   ► but just going past three years is useful and you know,

00:40:20 ◼   ► the longer you go, the more likely it is you're gonna need

00:40:23 ◼   ► that coverage, so if, and if the price doesn't increase,

00:40:25 ◼   ► which I don't think it does, I don't think it increases

00:40:27 ◼   ► with time, other than just like the normal sort of

00:40:30 ◼   ► inflationary increases of AppleCare and all their products,

00:40:34 ◼   ► yeah, it might be a good deal for people if they keep

00:40:35 ◼   ► you the Macs for a long time.

00:40:37 ◼   ► - Hey, going back to the Apple TV for a second,

00:40:39 ◼   ► I am going to be placing an order Friday morning.

00:40:41 ◼   ► Do I, why would I spend the extra $20 for the 64 gig

00:40:44 ◼   ► one, I'm never gonna play games on it, I almost never,

00:40:47 ◼   ► I can't remember a time I've ever downloaded anything

00:40:49 ◼   ► to this.

00:40:50 ◼   ► - You gotta hold all those screensaver video.

00:40:51 ◼   ► - You know, you joke, but that actually is a reasonable

00:40:54 ◼   ► answer 'cause those screensavers are so good, but like,

00:40:56 ◼   ► I don't think it's worth 20 bucks to do that, is it?

00:40:58 ◼   ► Like why would I get the big one?

00:40:59 ◼   ► - I think $20 is so little for doubling the storage,

00:41:03 ◼   ► I just might get it anyway, just for the hell of it,

00:41:05 ◼   ► but yeah, I have the aerial screensaver on my Mac

00:41:07 ◼   ► and I looked at how big the folder of downloads is

00:41:09 ◼   ► and it's 54 gigs.

00:41:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's big, it is not small, especially for a computer

00:41:14 ◼   ► with the monitor you have.

00:41:16 ◼   ► - So, you know, if you get the 32 gig Apple TV,

00:41:18 ◼   ► you certainly won't have all of the screensaver video cache

00:41:21 ◼   ► locally and I know that's gonna really pain you.

00:41:23 ◼   ► - That's interesting actually.

00:41:24 ◼   ► - With your gigabit internet connection,

00:41:25 ◼   ► you never notice this. - Exactly, exactly.

00:41:27 ◼   ► Yep, all right, well, we'll see how I feel,

00:41:29 ◼   ► but sitting here now, I think I'm just gonna get the 32.

00:41:32 ◼   ► All right, moving on to the iMac.

00:41:34 ◼   ► The power brick slash cable, this was brought up,

00:41:38 ◼   ► I think I first saw this with Jason Snell,

00:41:40 ◼   ► he apparently cut a, I think it was a two meter string

00:41:44 ◼   ► and hung it off the back of a standing desk

00:41:45 ◼   ► while it was in standing mode and he said

00:41:47 ◼   ► that the power brick would probably be dangling in the air

00:41:50 ◼   ► because the two meters isn't quite enough

00:41:52 ◼   ► for his particular standing desk, which is kind of a bummer.

00:41:54 ◼   ► - What is this meters business?

00:41:55 ◼   ► Analog is affecting you.

00:41:56 ◼   ► We're talking about feet here, okay?

00:41:58 ◼   ► - Sorry, John.

00:41:59 ◼   ► - Two meters is not the same thing as six feet.

00:42:02 ◼   ► Yeah, so Jason did bring this up

00:42:04 ◼   ► when he was trying to see, you know, in my standing desk,

00:42:07 ◼   ► if I had a six foot cord coming out of the back of my iMac,

00:42:10 ◼   ► would the brick reach the ground

00:42:12 ◼   ► or would the brick be dangling in midair

00:42:14 ◼   ► and his measurements indicated that the power brick

00:42:16 ◼   ► would kind of be dangling in midair, which is not ideal.

00:42:19 ◼   ► He did an interview on upgrade with the Apple folks

00:42:23 ◼   ► and brought this exact issue up and said,

00:42:24 ◼   ► "Hey, six foot cord, I just measured

00:42:27 ◼   ► "that won't be quite long enough for my setup.

00:42:29 ◼   ► "How did you come up with six feet?"

00:42:30 ◼   ► And the Apple people said, "Well, we looked

00:42:32 ◼   ► "at all different setups and we came up

00:42:33 ◼   ► "and we thought this was the blah, blah, blah."

00:42:35 ◼   ► But like, Jason had just got done telling them,

00:42:37 ◼   ► it's like, well, this may fit, like the AirPods,

00:42:40 ◼   ► fit the average ear but not fitting Marco's ear.

00:42:42 ◼   ► This may be sort of the sweet spot

00:42:44 ◼   ► for satisfying the most people,

00:42:46 ◼   ► but it doesn't work in Jason's setup

00:42:48 ◼   ► and I don't think Jason's, you know,

00:42:50 ◼   ► because Apple acknowledged standing desks,

00:42:52 ◼   ► it's not like they didn't think about standing desks,

00:42:53 ◼   ► they did, but Jason's not that tall

00:42:55 ◼   ► and his desk is not that high,

00:42:57 ◼   ► so I feel like they made, you know,

00:42:59 ◼   ► put an extra six inches to a foot on this cord

00:43:02 ◼   ► would probably be beneficial

00:43:03 ◼   ► for people who use standing desks.

00:43:05 ◼   ► - You know what would be a lot more beneficial

00:43:07 ◼   ► for people who use standing desks?

00:43:09 ◼   ► Why are you running more than one cable off the desk?

00:43:12 ◼   ► - Oh, you'll have to Velcro things

00:43:14 ◼   ► at the bottom of your desk, here we go.

00:43:16 ◼   ► - Yes, somehow zip tie or otherwise attach a surge strip

00:43:20 ◼   ► under your desk to the underside of your desk,

00:43:23 ◼   ► plug everything on your desk into that,

00:43:25 ◼   ► tie up all the loose, you know, cable excess

00:43:27 ◼   ► so it's nice and tidy somewhere,

00:43:28 ◼   ► and then run one cable or maybe two if you include ethernet

00:43:32 ◼   ► from that area of your desk down one of the lifting legs

00:43:36 ◼   ► or whatever you can have it run down cleanly to the outlet.

00:43:39 ◼   ► And then you can have a huge amount of slack

00:43:42 ◼   ► in that second, you know, cable grouping of, you know,

00:43:44 ◼   ► just the ethernet and power coming out of the desk

00:43:46 ◼   ► and all the stupid little short cables

00:43:47 ◼   ► you can plug into the underside of your desk

00:43:49 ◼   ► and have everything nice and tidy.

00:43:51 ◼   ► - So this is a setup for people who have more than just

00:43:53 ◼   ► the iMac on their desk, but part of the beauty

00:43:55 ◼   ► of having the single cable coming out of your iMac,

00:43:57 ◼   ► like you don't even need ethernet back there and everything,

00:44:00 ◼   ► like that's, I think if you just have an iMac

00:44:02 ◼   ► in a lone scenario like that,

00:44:05 ◼   ► you don't need the whole power strip underneath the desk,

00:44:07 ◼   ► maybe you just have the one cord.

00:44:08 ◼   ► And maybe those people don't use standing desks,

00:44:10 ◼   ► I don't know, I'm just saying like it's,

00:44:11 ◼   ► the fact that it's so close to working with a standing desk,

00:44:13 ◼   ► but just needs a few more inches seems like they could

00:44:16 ◼   ► fix that in a subsequent revision.

00:44:18 ◼   ► The second thing to know about the power brick is

00:44:20 ◼   ► we were speculating about, hey, they could have used USB-C

00:44:22 ◼   ► because USB-C can, USB-C power delivery can do 100 watts.

00:44:27 ◼   ► Apparently the power brick is rated for 143 watts.

00:44:30 ◼   ► Now that doesn't mean the iMac or any of the iMacs

00:44:32 ◼   ► they introduced, you know, in the Apple event

00:44:35 ◼   ► will actually ever consume 143 watts,

00:44:38 ◼   ► but that's what the brick is rated for.

00:44:40 ◼   ► So maybe Apple knows something we don't,

00:44:42 ◼   ► maybe they're just trying to have one brick and reuse it.

00:44:45 ◼   ► You know, maybe they're thinking ahead,

00:44:47 ◼   ► is the next version might use more power than this one did.

00:44:49 ◼   ► I don't know, but either way,

00:44:51 ◼   ► the bricks makes me think that Apple thinks that 100 watts

00:44:54 ◼   ► is not sufficient for the system,

00:44:56 ◼   ► either in the present or the future.

00:44:58 ◼   ► - That's interesting.

00:44:59 ◼   ► Tell me about Visa mounts,

00:45:01 ◼   ► 'cause apparently you can flip flop sort of, kind of.

00:45:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, we didn't, I don't know if you mentioned

00:45:05 ◼   ► Visa mounts at all, but just FYI, like the old style iMacs,

00:45:09 ◼   ► these new colored ones,

00:45:11 ◼   ► you can also get them with a Visa mount.

00:45:13 ◼   ► If you don't like the non-adjustable little foot,

00:45:15 ◼   ► you can get a Visa mount on the back

00:45:16 ◼   ► and then put it on whatever arm or stand

00:45:18 ◼   ► or anything else you have that supports Visa.

00:45:20 ◼   ► And apparently, according to Jason Snell,

00:45:22 ◼   ► you can call AppleCare and if you buy a Visa mount iMac

00:45:26 ◼   ► and say, I don't want the Visa mount anymore,

00:45:28 ◼   ► can you swap it for the foot version?

00:45:31 ◼   ► Now, no idea how much that would cost.

00:45:33 ◼   ► Obviously it would cost you some money.

00:45:35 ◼   ► I assume they just replaced the entire back of the computer,

00:45:38 ◼   ► but the good thing is the computer

00:45:39 ◼   ► is basically a giant iPad anyway,

00:45:41 ◼   ► and so the back is just like the entire big back shell

00:45:43 ◼   ► and maybe it's an easy repair, I don't know.

00:45:46 ◼   ► But it's nice to know that you're not stuck

00:45:48 ◼   ► with the Visa mount permanently if you buy one

00:45:51 ◼   ► and then change your mind later.

00:45:53 ◼   ► - Indeed.

00:45:54 ◼   ► And then someone wrote in to ask,

00:45:56 ◼   ► hey, does anyone else wish that they would add

00:45:59 ◼   ► the ethernet port to all Mac-powered adapters?

00:46:02 ◼   ► For example, the notebooks would be nicer than a dongle.

00:46:04 ◼   ► Don't we all want that?

00:46:05 ◼   ► Or is it just me?

00:46:07 ◼   ► I guess not literally just me, but.

00:46:08 ◼   ► - I mean, it depends on your setup.

00:46:09 ◼   ► I can see the appeal because we don't like dongles, right?

00:46:12 ◼   ► And you have to have the power brick with you anyway,

00:46:13 ◼   ► and there's plenty of room on the power brick

00:46:15 ◼   ► for the ethernet connector.

00:46:16 ◼   ► But on the other hand,

00:46:18 ◼   ► people tend not to like to crawl around under their desk

00:46:20 ◼   ► and plug things in, and with an iMac, it's not a big deal.

00:46:22 ◼   ► You do it once, it's a desktop,

00:46:23 ◼   ► you set it up and you're done.

00:46:24 ◼   ► But with a notebook, you're bringing it from place to place.

00:46:27 ◼   ► Maybe if you had multiple power adapters in the house

00:46:29 ◼   ► and you could set up the ethernet at once

00:46:30 ◼   ► and just have the power cord

00:46:31 ◼   ► kind of stick it up on your desk, it would be cool.

00:46:33 ◼   ► I can see the appeal and maybe that is Apple's plan.

00:46:36 ◼   ► Again, they made 143 watt adapter.

00:46:38 ◼   ► Maybe this adapter will also come

00:46:41 ◼   ► with some other future computer.

00:46:42 ◼   ► But the tricky bit is you need to route ethernet

00:46:46 ◼   ► to the power brick and all of Apple's current power bricks

00:46:50 ◼   ► don't do that in terms,

00:46:51 ◼   ► I don't think they even have the right number of conductors.

00:46:53 ◼   ► I think they're just power from the power brick.

00:46:55 ◼   ► I'm not entirely sure,

00:46:56 ◼   ► but my impression is that from the power brick.

00:46:58 ◼   ► - That's not entirely true.

00:47:00 ◼   ► They support only USB two transfer speeds though.

00:47:03 ◼   ► So like whatever Apple labels as a charge cable for USB-C,

00:47:06 ◼   ► it can be used as data, but not for USB three speeds.

00:47:10 ◼   ► - Yeah, and of course,

00:47:12 ◼   ► they could put out an adapter that would support this.

00:47:14 ◼   ► The other wrinkle in this

00:47:15 ◼   ► and we're not gonna talk about this week,

00:47:17 ◼   ► but there's a bunch of leaks from some ransomware attack

00:47:20 ◼   ► on a manufacturer that shows,

00:47:22 ◼   ► supposedly show the rumored MacBook Pros

00:47:25 ◼   ► with all the things that we talked about in past shows,

00:47:27 ◼   ► SD card slot and MagSafe.

00:47:29 ◼   ► - And HDMI.

00:47:30 ◼   ► - Yeah, and HDMI, right?

00:47:31 ◼   ► If those things end up having MagSafe,

00:47:35 ◼   ► of course Apple can do whatever it wants

00:47:36 ◼   ► with this, whatever this new MagSafe is,

00:47:38 ◼   ► but that would mean that they would need to route ethernet

00:47:41 ◼   ► through the MagSafe adapter,

00:47:42 ◼   ► along with power down the power cable to the power brick

00:47:45 ◼   ► where the supposed ethernet port is.

00:47:47 ◼   ► So I think there's some merit to this idea,

00:47:50 ◼   ► but it seems complicated enough

00:47:52 ◼   ► that unless Apple is really married to it,

00:47:54 ◼   ► that they're, especially if they're going to MagSafe,

00:47:57 ◼   ► it's just seems simpler for them to just bring back MagSafe

00:47:59 ◼   ► as just a power thing.

00:48:00 ◼   ► And then continue to rely on dongles for everything else.

00:48:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, and if you actually want a single cable solution,

00:48:07 ◼   ► I would assume and hope that if this new MagSafe

00:48:11 ◼   ► based MacBook Pro thing is real,

00:48:13 ◼   ► or even if it isn't,

00:48:14 ◼   ► assuming future MacBook Pros might have MagSafe,

00:48:17 ◼   ► I would hope that they would also still be able to charge

00:48:20 ◼   ► via USB-C PD.

00:48:21 ◼   ► And if that's the case,

00:48:22 ◼   ► then people who want a single cable solution,

00:48:25 ◼   ► but some kind of port expansion

00:48:28 ◼   ► can continue to use like Thunderbolt docs and stuff.

00:48:30 ◼   ► And still have just one cable running to the computer

00:48:32 ◼   ► that also charges it.

00:48:33 ◼   ► - Yeah, I will be,

00:48:35 ◼   ► even though I think MagSafe would be great

00:48:37 ◼   ► to bring back for notebooks,

00:48:39 ◼   ► it will bum me out ever so slightly

00:48:41 ◼   ► if USB-C power delivery goes away.

00:48:43 ◼   ► You know, if it's one or the other, not both.

00:48:46 ◼   ► And especially since we're all approaching this

00:48:50 ◼   ► like USB-C lifestyle where everything is USB-C.

00:48:54 ◼   ► I mean, there's so much of my life other than my iPhone

00:48:57 ◼   ► that is USB-C.

00:48:58 ◼   ► And just having a USB-C dongle sitting around

00:49:02 ◼   ► can power my iPad, my computer, my drone, et cetera,

00:49:07 ◼   ► my Switch.

00:49:08 ◼   ► And man, it would really stink

00:49:11 ◼   ► if MagSafe got reintroduced, which would be excellent.

00:49:14 ◼   ► And then they said,

00:49:15 ◼   ► "Well, that's the only way you can charge now."

00:49:17 ◼   ► Tough nuggies.

00:49:18 ◼   ► That would really bum me out.

00:49:19 ◼   ► - Yeah, agreed.

00:49:20 ◼   ► And I hope and I bet they would probably keep both.

00:49:24 ◼   ► - One would hope and one would think.

00:49:26 ◼   ► All right, and then finally, Eric Berlin writes,

00:49:28 ◼   ► "What's the benefit of having four high efficiency cores

00:49:30 ◼   ► "in a system without a battery like the iMac or Mac mini?

00:49:33 ◼   ► "Aside from economies of scale,

00:49:34 ◼   ► "do you expect there to be a split

00:49:35 ◼   ► "between desktop and laptop versions

00:49:36 ◼   ► "and of future Apple M series systems on a chip?"

00:49:40 ◼   ► I mean, one silly answer is it's just more efficient.

00:49:43 ◼   ► Like as silly as that sounds,

00:49:44 ◼   ► but why run a higher wattage core

00:49:48 ◼   ► and why expend all that energy if you don't have to?

00:49:51 ◼   ► I mean, I know that's kind of silly,

00:49:53 ◼   ► but it does add up over time, doesn't it?

00:49:56 ◼   ► - I mean, it makes sense for more

00:49:57 ◼   ► than just an electric bill perspective.

00:49:59 ◼   ► It's, you know me, it's all about fan noise, right?

00:50:02 ◼   ► If you can use, most of the time, your Mac is not doing much

00:50:06 ◼   ► if you're not running some big, you know,

00:50:08 ◼   ► hard task in the background that's using lots of cores.

00:50:10 ◼   ► So from moment to moment,

00:50:12 ◼   ► those efficiency cores are getting a ton of use

00:50:14 ◼   ► because especially when you're just sitting there

00:50:16 ◼   ► reading text on a webpage, there's probably,

00:50:18 ◼   ► hopefully, unless you're running Chrome

00:50:19 ◼   ► with a bunch of terrible tabs in the background,

00:50:21 ◼   ► no need for the high efficiency cores to be enabled at all.

00:50:24 ◼   ► And if you can just use the efficiency cores

00:50:26 ◼   ► or one or two of the efficiency cores,

00:50:28 ◼   ► it uses less power, yes, and that means less heat

00:50:30 ◼   ► and that means less fan noise.

00:50:32 ◼   ► Now, Eric is right that like the reason they're using this

00:50:35 ◼   ► 'cause like this is the architecture they have

00:50:37 ◼   ► and you know, they're not gonna, you know,

00:50:40 ◼   ► it's not, apparently, we now know the answer.

00:50:42 ◼   ► Is it worth it for them to make for the low-end iMac

00:50:45 ◼   ► an entirely different chip,

00:50:46 ◼   ► even though the current M1 fits fine?

00:50:48 ◼   ► No, not worth it to them.

00:50:49 ◼   ► They could have made a chip without efficiency cores

00:50:52 ◼   ► and with like six, you know,

00:50:54 ◼   ► high performance cores or something, right?

00:50:56 ◼   ► And that would be extra expense

00:50:57 ◼   ► and maybe they'd get a little bit of benefit,

00:50:59 ◼   ► but for the low-end iMac, it was not worth it.

00:51:01 ◼   ► So yes, economies of scale,

00:51:03 ◼   ► there are many different computers you can wrap around the M1

00:51:05 ◼   ► and the iMac is one of them

00:51:06 ◼   ► and it's perfectly fine for that.

00:51:07 ◼   ► And as a bonus, less fan noise, less heat, less electricity.

00:51:11 ◼   ► Probably less electricity is non-measurable,

00:51:14 ◼   ► but I imagine the less heat and less fan noise

00:51:16 ◼   ► is something that they could actually measure.

00:51:17 ◼   ► So I'm glad that efficiency cores exist

00:51:20 ◼   ► and I think there's a place for efficiency cores

00:51:22 ◼   ► on every single one of their desktop computers,

00:51:24 ◼   ► even the big giant Mac Pro that they eventually make

00:51:27 ◼   ► with umpteen cores or whatever,

00:51:29 ◼   ► it's okay to have some efficiency cores in there

00:51:30 ◼   ► 'cause sometimes the Mac Pro

00:51:31 ◼   ► is not doing anything that big either.

00:51:33 ◼   ► - And that brings us to another computer that has an M1

00:51:37 ◼   ► and it's, as its core, and that is the iPad.

00:51:41 ◼   ► And so there's some follow-up we need to talk about

00:51:43 ◼   ► with regard to the iPad,

00:51:44 ◼   ► starting with the front-facing camera.

00:51:45 ◼   ► Tell me about that.

00:51:47 ◼   ► - I think we missed this entirely in the event show.

00:51:49 ◼   ► There was so much stuff,

00:51:50 ◼   ► but Apple talked about center stage,

00:51:52 ◼   ► which is their way to use the new 12 megapixel

00:51:55 ◼   ► front-facing wide camera on the new iPads

00:51:59 ◼   ► to take a very wide view of what's in front of them,

00:52:03 ◼   ► but then crop it to show the area of interest

00:52:06 ◼   ► when doing like video conference type things.

00:52:08 ◼   ► And they showed it with like,

00:52:09 ◼   ► with one person in the picture, it will center on them.

00:52:12 ◼   ► And then when more people come, it will expand the image.

00:52:14 ◼   ► Now the camera doesn't move.

00:52:16 ◼   ► It's not like it's actually zooming optically.

00:52:18 ◼   ► It's not pivoting from side to side.

00:52:20 ◼   ► It is merely taking different crops

00:52:21 ◼   ► and doing image processing, you know,

00:52:22 ◼   ► using the software to do some smarts.

00:52:25 ◼   ► And obviously the crops are gonna be lower resolution

00:52:26 ◼   ► than the full 12 megapixels,

00:52:28 ◼   ► but apparently there's enough pixels to go around

00:52:29 ◼   ► to make this work, especially for like a FaceTime thing.

00:52:31 ◼   ► So it looks like a very cool feature.

00:52:34 ◼   ► And the other thing to know about it is that

00:52:36 ◼   ► this feature is actually available

00:52:38 ◼   ► to other people through an API.

00:52:40 ◼   ► So if you have any kind of third-party app

00:52:42 ◼   ► and you want to start taking video

00:52:43 ◼   ► from the front-facing camera,

00:52:45 ◼   ► apparently there's an API that you can just tell it,

00:52:47 ◼   ► please do that center stage thing

00:52:48 ◼   ► where you look for people's faces

00:52:49 ◼   ► and try to include them,

00:52:50 ◼   ► which is very nice of them to include.

00:52:52 ◼   ► Although, honestly, I'm not sure what other apps

00:52:54 ◼   ► people use for doing video conferencing on the iPad

00:52:57 ◼   ► besides FaceTime and I guess Zoom maybe,

00:53:00 ◼   ► but do people use Zoom on the iPad?

00:53:02 ◼   ► I guess so.

00:53:02 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:53:03 ◼   ► - Well, Declan spends several hours a day

00:53:05 ◼   ► in Teams on the iPad.

00:53:07 ◼   ► - In Teams, seriously?

00:53:08 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:53:09 ◼   ► - Oh my God, I didn't even think about that.

00:53:10 ◼   ► Children shouldn't be subjected to Teams.

00:53:12 ◼   ► - No, it is bad.

00:53:14 ◼   ► It is real bad on the iPad.

00:53:16 ◼   ► - I hope those apps do use those features though,

00:53:18 ◼   ► because that is a problem,

00:53:19 ◼   ► especially with an iPad where you're trying to like

00:53:21 ◼   ► prop it up at the right angle

00:53:22 ◼   ► and make sure you get everyone in the picture,

00:53:24 ◼   ► like doing, well, mostly for me

00:53:26 ◼   ► is doing family FaceTime calls,

00:53:27 ◼   ► but I suppose for other things that are not family

00:53:29 ◼   ► and maybe you're using Teams or what do you call it?

00:53:33 ◼   ► WebEx or Zoom or whatever.

00:53:36 ◼   ► So that's cool and worth mentioning.

00:53:39 ◼   ► - Indeed.

00:53:39 ◼   ► Hey John, how much RAM do you have in your iPad?

00:53:42 ◼   ► - We noted this on the event show,

00:53:44 ◼   ► but we didn't really emphasize, right?

00:53:46 ◼   ► So yes, the iPad comes with two different amounts

00:53:49 ◼   ► of RAM, but the most important thing is

00:53:51 ◼   ► Apple lists those two different amounts of RAM

00:53:54 ◼   ► on their web pages and in their promotional material

00:53:56 ◼   ► for the first time, the amount of RAM in an iPad

00:53:59 ◼   ► is not a secret that Apple won't tell you,

00:54:01 ◼   ► even though everybody knows what it is.

00:54:03 ◼   ► They actually use it in their advertising material.

00:54:05 ◼   ► It's on their slides, up to 16 gigabytes of memory.

00:54:09 ◼   ► We should all, if we were there live,

00:54:10 ◼   ► we all should have gasped and said,

00:54:12 ◼   ► the iPad has memory?

00:54:14 ◼   ► I thought it just had storage all these years.

00:54:16 ◼   ► If you've just been buying iPads based on storage,

00:54:17 ◼   ► now you're gonna tell me there's memory?

00:54:20 ◼   ► It's like when they change from iOS firmware,

00:54:22 ◼   ► from iPhone firmware to iOS.

00:54:25 ◼   ► It's like, the iPhone has an operating system?

00:54:27 ◼   ► I thought it just had firmware.

00:54:29 ◼   ► You know, a secret.

00:54:31 ◼   ► So I like this.

00:54:32 ◼   ► Obviously this is just in the pro models

00:54:33 ◼   ► that I think they still don't talk about RAM

00:54:35 ◼   ► on the lesser iPad models, but see Apple,

00:54:38 ◼   ► nothing bad happens if you talk about RAM.

00:54:39 ◼   ► We all know it's in there and we have to figure out

00:54:42 ◼   ► what it is anyway eventually.

00:54:43 ◼   ► It's just annoying that it's not on your product pages

00:54:45 ◼   ► and now it finally is, at least for the pros.

00:54:48 ◼   ► - So speaking of iPad pros,

00:54:50 ◼   ► apparently the new 12.9 inch iPad pro,

00:54:54 ◼   ► specifically the 12.9, won't work

00:54:56 ◼   ► with the original $350 Magic Keyboard.

00:55:00 ◼   ► So it's just a bit thicker than the last one was

00:55:03 ◼   ► and because of that, officially speaking,

00:55:05 ◼   ► it is not compatible with the Magic Keyboard

00:55:08 ◼   ► that came out before this new one existed.

00:55:10 ◼   ► However, if you were to buy a Magic Keyboard today,

00:55:13 ◼   ► it is compatible with every iPad

00:55:15 ◼   ► that has ever been compatible with the Magic Keyboard.

00:55:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's a shame,

00:55:20 ◼   ► but I still think they made the right move.

00:55:22 ◼   ► Some people were saying, oh, didn't you know how thick

00:55:24 ◼   ► the new 12.9 inch iPad would be

00:55:26 ◼   ► when you made the original Magic Keyboard?

00:55:28 ◼   ► I think it's conceivable that no, they didn't.

00:55:30 ◼   ► Maybe they were shooting for, oh, it'll be the same width.

00:55:32 ◼   ► But you know, we talked about the screen tech

00:55:34 ◼   ► in this new 12.9 inch iPad with the, you know,

00:55:37 ◼   ► 2,500 different zones and 10,000 LEDs.

00:55:41 ◼   ► That screen is amazing and it's worth

00:55:42 ◼   ► putting on the highest of the high-end iPad.

00:55:44 ◼   ► And if they had to make it 0.5 millimeters thicker

00:55:48 ◼   ► to pull that off at the cost of breaking compatibility

00:55:51 ◼   ► with their very expensive Magic Keyboard,

00:55:52 ◼   ► I still think that's the right move

00:55:54 ◼   ► because this is the most expensive iPad

00:55:57 ◼   ► with the highest end, you know,

00:55:59 ◼   ► you can get it 16 gigs of RAM and two terabytes of storage

00:56:01 ◼   ► and all that stuff.

00:56:03 ◼   ► Obviously not ideal.

00:56:04 ◼   ► I don't think Apple planned this.

00:56:05 ◼   ► I think they probably tried to make it

00:56:07 ◼   ► exactly the same size and they just couldn't quite get it.

00:56:10 ◼   ► And if the choice was between this screen

00:56:12 ◼   ► and being compatible with the Magic Keyboard,

00:56:15 ◼   ► they'd take the screen any day.

00:56:16 ◼   ► So it's a bummer, but I think the right move.

00:56:19 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, honestly, I'm surprised and happy

00:56:23 ◼   ► that they haven't changed the keyboard size

00:56:26 ◼   ► for the 11 inch.

00:56:27 ◼   ► I mean, this is like, this is the longest they've ever gone.

00:56:30 ◼   ► If you're an 11 inch customer,

00:56:31 ◼   ► this is the longest you've ever been able

00:56:32 ◼   ► to carry any peripherals forward.

00:56:35 ◼   ► You know, like normally, if you were buying a new iPad Pro,

00:56:39 ◼   ► or you would have to buy a new keyboard,

00:56:42 ◼   ► possibly even a new pencil depending on when you bought it,

00:56:44 ◼   ► if you use the pencil or not.

00:56:46 ◼   ► And those things are so expensive.

00:56:48 ◼   ► They add up pretty quickly.

00:56:50 ◼   ► So this is actually a nice, you know, constant period here

00:56:55 ◼   ► where like, if I bought a new iPad,

00:56:57 ◼   ► which honestly I'm not going to,

00:56:58 ◼   ► but if I bought a new iPad,

00:56:59 ◼   ► I would still be able to use my same keyboard

00:57:01 ◼   ► from two years ago.

00:57:03 ◼   ► - Yeah, and people who are second guessing this,

00:57:05 ◼   ► like it was helpful to think about the other scenarios

00:57:07 ◼   ► that could have happened,

00:57:08 ◼   ► just let's say they're targeting

00:57:09 ◼   ► to make it exactly the same width.

00:57:10 ◼   ► And they build one and they say,

00:57:12 ◼   ► here it is with the new screen and the, you know,

00:57:15 ◼   ► the new guts and it's exactly the same dimensions

00:57:17 ◼   ► as the old one.

00:57:18 ◼   ► And they have some kind of problem.

00:57:19 ◼   ► Oh, it's like overheating in this area,

00:57:22 ◼   ► or this thing is very close to shorting out,

00:57:24 ◼   ► or there's some other problem.

00:57:25 ◼   ► And they say, well, you know,

00:57:26 ◼   ► the only way we can solve this is to make the thing

00:57:29 ◼   ► half a millimeter thicker

00:57:30 ◼   ► to give a little bit more breathing room.

00:57:31 ◼   ► And everyone's like, oh,

00:57:32 ◼   ► that's going to break compatibility with the thing.

00:57:34 ◼   ► You would much rather have them make the thing thicker

00:57:37 ◼   ► than to say, well, let's just shove it in there

00:57:39 ◼   ► and just hope for the best

00:57:40 ◼   ► because whatever the problem may be with overheating

00:57:42 ◼   ► or shorting or compressing or bulging

00:57:45 ◼   ► or causing discoloration on the screen because of stress,

00:57:47 ◼   ► you don't want any of those problems.

00:57:49 ◼   ► And if that was the reality and they said,

00:57:51 ◼   ► well, they did that because if they didn't do that,

00:57:52 ◼   ► the keyboard wouldn't work,

00:57:53 ◼   ► you'd be saying what a ridiculous notion,

00:57:55 ◼   ► who cares that the keyboard works?

00:57:56 ◼   ► I don't, I just want my iPad to work.

00:57:58 ◼   ► I don't even have that keyboard.

00:57:59 ◼   ► This is absolutely the right move.

00:58:01 ◼   ► It's a bummer, but sometimes that happens

00:58:02 ◼   ► when you're pushing the envelope,

00:58:04 ◼   ► which I feel like Apple is with this,

00:58:06 ◼   ► with this don't call it a tablet iPad

00:58:09 ◼   ► that is just tremendously fast

00:58:11 ◼   ► and has an amazing screen on it.

00:58:12 ◼   ► - Indeed.

00:58:13 ◼   ► Last week, we were talking about potential uses for AirTags,

00:58:17 ◼   ► which actually speaking of, before we get to this followup,

00:58:20 ◼   ► Marco, did you order any AirTags?

00:58:22 ◼   ► - You can order them?

00:58:23 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:58:24 ◼   ► - Oh, yes, that's right.

00:58:25 ◼   ► I did.

00:58:26 ◼   ► - Wow. - Sorry.

00:58:27 ◼   ► - Are you feeling well, bud?

00:58:28 ◼   ► - Beaver's setting in.

00:58:29 ◼   ► - Little warm.

00:58:30 ◼   ► No, I forgot.

00:58:34 ◼   ► Yes, I did order a four-pack.

00:58:37 ◼   ► It's coming on whatever day one is,

00:58:38 ◼   ► which I think is, is it this Friday?

00:58:40 ◼   ► - It's either this or next, I think.

00:58:41 ◼   ► I don't recall, to be honest with you.

00:58:43 ◼   ► So the reason--

00:58:43 ◼   ► - Yeah, so I'll have it next Monday.

00:58:45 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:58:46 ◼   ► - The reason I don't recall is because I ordered a one-pack,

00:58:48 ◼   ► which at the time was delivering in like mid-May,

00:58:51 ◼   ► and I thought about getting a four-pack,

00:58:52 ◼   ► but I don't even know what I'm using one for,

00:58:54 ◼   ► so it seems silly to buy four just on a lark,

00:58:58 ◼   ► but I did order one, and it'll be here

00:59:01 ◼   ► several weeks after your four-pack is.

00:59:03 ◼   ► John, what about you?

00:59:04 ◼   ► What did you order, if any?

00:59:05 ◼   ► - Didn't order any, 'cause I still can't think of

00:59:07 ◼   ► what I'm gonna use it for, you know.

00:59:10 ◼   ► So I'll listen to your reports

00:59:12 ◼   ► and what it's like to have a little plastic puck.

00:59:14 ◼   ► - It is kind of, you know, I would've been very surprised

00:59:17 ◼   ► if you would've told me before the Apple event

00:59:20 ◼   ► that the only things I would buy as a result

00:59:22 ◼   ► of this Apple event were AirTags and a new Apple TV remote.

00:59:25 ◼   ► But that's honestly, like, that's what I'm in.

00:59:29 ◼   ► I'm in this for those things.

00:59:30 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, that's a fair point.

00:59:32 ◼   ► So anyway, so we were asking, you know,

00:59:34 ◼   ► what would we use these for?

00:59:35 ◼   ► And something that I had thought of,

00:59:37 ◼   ► but I didn't say on the show,

00:59:38 ◼   ► this was not Marco's fault this time,

00:59:40 ◼   ► I definitely did not say it out loud.

00:59:42 ◼   ► And this was also provided to us by Jameson on Twitter.

00:59:45 ◼   ► A use case for AirTags, watching your luggage

00:59:48 ◼   ► work its way back to you at the carousel at the airport.

00:59:51 ◼   ► Now, I vaguely remember where airports are,

00:59:53 ◼   ► and I vaguely remember what luggage is, but nevertheless,

00:59:56 ◼   ► that is a very good use case for it.

00:59:57 ◼   ► Another thing that a few people have suggested,

00:59:58 ◼   ► including just now in the chat,

01:00:00 ◼   ► is placing it in or around a favorite stuffed animal

01:00:04 ◼   ► from a child, because if you're a parent,

01:00:06 ◼   ► you know, especially when they're young,

01:00:08 ◼   ► they have that special stuffed animal

01:00:10 ◼   ► that if they lose that stuffed animal,

01:00:13 ◼   ► oh, your next week, two months is going to be terrible.

01:00:17 ◼   ► So a lot of people are saying they're thinking

01:00:20 ◼   ► about sewing one in the animal or putting it

01:00:22 ◼   ► around the animal or whatever the case may be.

01:00:24 ◼   ► And again, I'm talking about a stuffed animal.

01:00:25 ◼   ► - If you put it inside the animal, though,

01:00:26 ◼   ► your kids will just tear it open and pull out the stuffing

01:00:29 ◼   ► and get that thing out and then just destroy it.

01:00:30 ◼   ► - Probably, probably, but nevertheless,

01:00:32 ◼   ► that's another idea.

01:00:33 ◼   ► - If your kids are dogs.

01:00:34 ◼   ► - I would say also, like, on the following your luggage

01:00:37 ◼   ► through the airport thing, I'm not, we don't know yet

01:00:41 ◼   ► how frequently the location is updated

01:00:43 ◼   ► and what kind of range they have in practice yet.

01:00:46 ◼   ► I would wait, if that's the kind of use case

01:00:48 ◼   ► you have in mind, I would maybe wait and see

01:00:52 ◼   ► how these things actually perform in reality.

01:00:54 ◼   ► - I mean, I'm assuming people are expecting that

01:00:55 ◼   ► to be in U1 range by that point, like,

01:00:57 ◼   ► you're not looking to say, like,

01:01:00 ◼   ► which baggage carousel is it?

01:01:01 ◼   ► You just wanted to know, like,

01:01:03 ◼   ► is it coming off the thing now or whatever?

01:01:05 ◼   ► Again, yeah, you're right, someone would have to test it,

01:01:07 ◼   ► but I'm guessing that this use case is only useful

01:01:10 ◼   ► when you're within U1 range, and I don't know

01:01:12 ◼   ► what U1 range is, but certainly it's less than

01:01:15 ◼   ► the passerby had Bluetooth on range.

01:01:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, I would expect it to be something like 30 feet,

01:01:20 ◼   ► you know, because it's Bluetooth-based and, yeah, so,

01:01:23 ◼   ► I'm guessing it's something like that,

01:01:24 ◼   ► but I wouldn't expect it to be, like--

01:01:26 ◼   ► - And you don't need this for Boston's Logan Airport,

01:01:30 ◼   ► you don't need this AirTek thing at all,

01:01:31 ◼   ► because I can just tell you, just get a chair,

01:01:33 ◼   ► your luggage is not coming out for an hour.

01:01:35 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:01:38 ◼   ► - Well, that's what you get for living in Boston.

01:01:39 ◼   ► Hey-o, all right, moving right along.

01:01:41 ◼   ► Something that I think all of us knew, but again,

01:01:43 ◼   ► did not say actually on the show is one of the problems

01:01:47 ◼   ► with Apple's premium podcast offering is

01:01:50 ◼   ► what if you don't have an iPhone?

01:01:51 ◼   ► Tough nuggies?

01:01:52 ◼   ► - Yeah, we were talking about who are you excluding

01:01:54 ◼   ► by using this Apple premium podcast,

01:01:57 ◼   ► and we talked mostly about, hey, if any of your listeners

01:02:00 ◼   ► don't use the Apple podcast app,

01:02:01 ◼   ► they have to start using it,

01:02:02 ◼   ► because that's the only way to listen to your show

01:02:04 ◼   ► if it's an Apple premium podcast.

01:02:07 ◼   ► But many people were going to say, and yeah,

01:02:09 ◼   ► what about all the people who don't even have iPhones?

01:02:12 ◼   ► Of course they can't use Apple podcasts,

01:02:14 ◼   ► and they can't listen to your show at all,

01:02:15 ◼   ► and there's tons of those people.

01:02:17 ◼   ► One of the reasons I didn't mention this,

01:02:18 ◼   ► it was something that I should have mentioned

01:02:20 ◼   ► when we talked about the premium podcast is,

01:02:22 ◼   ► I'm basing this on nothing, but my impression and hunch is

01:02:27 ◼   ► that Apple is at least considering the notion

01:02:32 ◼   ► of making Apple premium podcasts available on Android.

01:02:36 ◼   ► I know this seems weird to you, but I mean,

01:02:39 ◼   ► I just assumed that they would eventually make it available

01:02:41 ◼   ► on Android, and then I saw everyone else thinking

01:02:43 ◼   ► that they never would.

01:02:45 ◼   ► It just seems like Apple music,

01:02:46 ◼   ► like an audio service type thing.

01:02:51 ◼   ► I know Apple doesn't do a lot of things on other platforms.

01:02:53 ◼   ► They made Safari for Windows and then gave up on it

01:02:55 ◼   ► or whatever, but Apple premium podcast for Android

01:02:59 ◼   ► does not seem like a ridiculous thing to me.

01:03:00 ◼   ► Now obviously they don't have that now,

01:03:02 ◼   ► so don't assume it is going to exist,

01:03:05 ◼   ► but I don't know if you two feel the same way.

01:03:06 ◼   ► It just seems to me that it's not such a ridiculous notion.

01:03:10 ◼   ► - No, I don't think it's a ridiculous notion.

01:03:12 ◼   ► It would take a lot of motivation though.

01:03:15 ◼   ► The reason why Apple brought Apple Music to Android,

01:03:18 ◼   ► they did, right?

01:03:19 ◼   ► That's something they actually did?

01:03:20 ◼   ► - Yep, I believe so.

01:03:22 ◼   ► - We've never talked about it after they did it,

01:03:24 ◼   ► so I kind of forgot.

01:03:25 ◼   ► - I mean, it's like Safari on Windows.

01:03:27 ◼   ► When it went away, it probably took a while for me

01:03:28 ◼   ► to realize it went away because we use Safari on Windows.

01:03:31 ◼   ► - Right, so I don't know how well Apple Music on Android

01:03:34 ◼   ► would be doing, but the reason they did that

01:03:37 ◼   ► is because Apple Music is a massive service

01:03:40 ◼   ► that brings in significant revenue

01:03:42 ◼   ► into their services division and everything.

01:03:44 ◼   ► Premium podcasts, I don't think, I mean, I could be wrong,

01:03:49 ◼   ► but the way they've launched at least,

01:03:50 ◼   ► their version of premium podcasts,

01:03:52 ◼   ► I don't see that becoming anywhere near the size

01:03:55 ◼   ► of Apple Music as a business.

01:03:57 ◼   ► And therefore, I think there would be a lot less

01:04:00 ◼   ► financial motivation for them to invest

01:04:02 ◼   ► into the engineering of that.

01:04:04 ◼   ► The Apple Music, or the Apple Podcasts app

01:04:07 ◼   ► is not just a big web view.

01:04:09 ◼   ► It's a whole bunch of native code in there.

01:04:11 ◼   ► And so it would be substantial work for them

01:04:14 ◼   ► to bring over that app as its own thing.

01:04:17 ◼   ► So I just, I don't see it happening, honestly.

01:04:21 ◼   ► - I mean, it really, it kind of depends

01:04:23 ◼   ► a little bit on the competitive landscape.

01:04:24 ◼   ► Not that, we're probably not gonna have time

01:04:25 ◼   ► to talk about it this episode,

01:04:26 ◼   ► but Spotify's new premium podcast move

01:04:30 ◼   ► is an interesting counter to what Apple has done

01:04:32 ◼   ► and is different in all sorts of ways.

01:04:33 ◼   ► And you're right, it's mostly small potatoes,

01:04:35 ◼   ► and the safe bet is that they're not gonna do it,

01:04:37 ◼   ► but they might eventually see it as a strategic thing

01:04:40 ◼   ► that they have to do just to keep Spotify at bay.

01:04:42 ◼   ► It also depends on how all of the antitrust stuff

01:04:44 ◼   ► related to Spotify and other stuff turns out.

01:04:47 ◼   ► So all I'm saying is that this is right,

01:04:50 ◼   ► that you are excluding people who have Android,

01:04:52 ◼   ► but that I don't think it's completely ridiculous

01:04:56 ◼   ► that Apple might someday put their premium podcast

01:04:59 ◼   ► on Android.

01:05:00 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, I think it depends a lot on like,

01:05:02 ◼   ► how well is Apple Music doing on Android?

01:05:05 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:05:06 ◼   ► I've never heard of anybody using it.

01:05:08 ◼   ► I'm sure there are some people who do,

01:05:10 ◼   ► but I would bet it's not a substantial market for them.

01:05:13 ◼   ► - I mean, and I think one of the big reasons

01:05:15 ◼   ► that Apple Music exists on Android is, interestingly,

01:05:18 ◼   ► as a counter to Spotify, not in the podcast space,

01:05:20 ◼   ► obviously, just in the plain old music space.

01:05:22 ◼   ► And I think you're probably right

01:05:23 ◼   ► that it's maybe not doing that well on Android.

01:05:26 ◼   ► But like, why does it exist at all?

01:05:27 ◼   ► You said it's because Apple Music is a big business.

01:05:29 ◼   ► I think a big part of it is also

01:05:31 ◼   ► because Spotify is there,

01:05:33 ◼   ► and if we're gonna compete with Spotify,

01:05:34 ◼   ► kind of like the Apple TV thing,

01:05:35 ◼   ► if we're gonna compete at all,

01:05:37 ◼   ► we can't be stingy and say,

01:05:39 ◼   ► "Oh, it's only on Apple platforms."

01:05:40 ◼   ► It's like, if you're gonna be some kind of service

01:05:43 ◼   ► type thing, you've gotta be everywhere.

01:05:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, maybe, and part of it also,

01:05:45 ◼   ► it might just be as simple as,

01:05:47 ◼   ► like Apple Music was born out of Beats Music,

01:05:49 ◼   ► and Beats Music was available on Android,

01:05:51 ◼   ► so maybe they had an easier path to get there.

01:05:54 ◼   ► Maybe they didn't have to build as much

01:05:55 ◼   ► as we think they had to build from scratch for that.

01:05:57 ◼   ► - They should give Android the old podcast app

01:05:59 ◼   ► with the reel-to-reel tape.

01:06:00 ◼   ► - Yeah, that'd be great!

01:06:02 ◼   ► Yeah, from iOS 5.

01:06:03 ◼   ► - Oh man, that would be funny.

01:06:06 ◼   ► All right, John, do you wanna tell me

01:06:08 ◼   ► about your Eero and smart outlet situation, please?

01:06:11 ◼   ► - This is so long ago, I don't know

01:06:12 ◼   ► if people still remember.

01:06:13 ◼   ► I did a whole big RecDefs episode about it,

01:06:15 ◼   ► so I'm not gonna go into too much detail,

01:06:16 ◼   ► but to catch everyone up, I had filled around

01:06:20 ◼   ► with my network and made my Eero my router

01:06:22 ◼   ► and got rid of an airport extreme,

01:06:24 ◼   ► and everything worked except for my smart outlet,

01:06:26 ◼   ► which was completely invisible,

01:06:27 ◼   ► and I was trying to debug it,

01:06:28 ◼   ► I couldn't figure what the deal was.

01:06:30 ◼   ► Here's what eventually worked.

01:06:32 ◼   ► Why did it work?

01:06:34 ◼   ► Unknown, but here's what eventually worked.

01:06:36 ◼   ► It was a suggestion I got from two different places.

01:06:38 ◼   ► Merlin suggested that I do this,

01:06:39 ◼   ► and I didn't follow his suggestion,

01:06:42 ◼   ► and then I got the same suggestion

01:06:44 ◼   ► from a person at the smart outlet company,

01:06:47 ◼   ► and the reason I did it when the person

01:06:48 ◼   ► in the smart outlet company said it was not because,

01:06:51 ◼   ► like, oh, I trust that person more than Merlin,

01:06:52 ◼   ► but it was simply because I needed

01:06:53 ◼   ► to respond to their email,

01:06:55 ◼   ► and when I respond to any kind of email

01:06:57 ◼   ► where people give debugging suggestions,

01:06:58 ◼   ► I have to tell them, I tried your suggestions

01:07:00 ◼   ► and here were the results, like truthfully,

01:07:03 ◼   ► and one of their suggestions was hardware reset the outlet,

01:07:07 ◼   ► which I had done many, many times before,

01:07:09 ◼   ► but I had not, you know, this is two different ways

01:07:12 ◼   ► to reset, it's like a soft reset and a factory reset,

01:07:14 ◼   ► depending on how long you hold down

01:07:15 ◼   ► the little buttons or whatever,

01:07:17 ◼   ► I had not factory reset the new outlet,

01:07:20 ◼   ► the new one that I bought that just came out of the box,

01:07:23 ◼   ► and you may be thinking, why would you need

01:07:25 ◼   ► to factory reset an outlet that you just brand new

01:07:28 ◼   ► took out of a box that's never been on your network,

01:07:31 ◼   ► like that's never even been seen by anything

01:07:33 ◼   ► on your network that is invisible,

01:07:34 ◼   ► like, you know, I haven't even been able

01:07:36 ◼   ► to attempt to connect it, because every time I do it,

01:07:38 ◼   ► it says, looking for devices, can't find anything, right?

01:07:41 ◼   ► But that's what I did, I factory reset the new outlet,

01:07:45 ◼   ► and it just joined right up and worked perfectly.

01:07:47 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:07:48 ◼   ► - Oh my goodness.

01:07:49 ◼   ► - Now, here are the theories we've got behind this.

01:07:51 ◼   ► One theory is that there is, apparently for this brand

01:07:55 ◼   ► of smart outlet, there is a server-side component

01:07:58 ◼   ► associated with your account, 'cause I think you have

01:08:01 ◼   ► to sign into your account to use their iOS app,

01:08:04 ◼   ► and the person at the smart outlet company says

01:08:06 ◼   ► that we deleted all your data on our server side.

01:08:08 ◼   ► - Oh.

01:08:09 ◼   ► - Yeah, we've all, like, maybe that was a factor, right?

01:08:12 ◼   ► The second thing is, and this is something I didn't know,

01:08:14 ◼   ► and I just don't know the details of it,

01:08:15 ◼   ► that apparently home kit devices can only be

01:08:19 ◼   ► in provisioning mode, like where they're ready

01:08:22 ◼   ► to be added to your network or whatever,

01:08:24 ◼   ► for a limited amount of time, and I think it's like

01:08:27 ◼   ► a security thing, like you don't want to allow them

01:08:29 ◼   ► to be in provisioning mode indefinitely,

01:08:30 ◼   ► 'cause you could like put something in provisioning mode

01:08:33 ◼   ► and like your neighbors accidentally pick it up

01:08:35 ◼   ► a week after you tried to connect it,

01:08:36 ◼   ► and they connect it to their thing, right?

01:08:38 ◼   ► So there's some kind of time limit as part

01:08:39 ◼   ► of the home kit spec, if you want to be

01:08:41 ◼   ► a home kit compliant device, you can only be

01:08:43 ◼   ► in provisioning mode for a limited amount of time,

01:08:46 ◼   ► after which you need to do some kind of reset

01:08:48 ◼   ► to get them out of that, and maybe this particular

01:08:50 ◼   ► smart outlet needs a factory reset after it has reached

01:08:53 ◼   ► its provisioning mode time limit, and I can tell you

01:08:54 ◼   ► that if there is a time limit, I'm surely past it,

01:08:56 ◼   ► because I've been trying to add these things to my network

01:08:59 ◼   ► for, you know, days and days, just constantly having them

01:09:02 ◼   ► and like ready to be added to your network,

01:09:03 ◼   ► make sure this light is blinking, right?

01:09:05 ◼   ► So those are the theories.

01:09:06 ◼   ► Server side, or it was stuck in provisioning mode

01:09:09 ◼   ► too long and timed out, but whatever it is,

01:09:11 ◼   ► a factory reset of the brand new thing made it work,

01:09:13 ◼   ► and now I have the old one, which I have no use for,

01:09:16 ◼   ► it's just sitting here, I'm not sure what I'm gonna do

01:09:18 ◼   ► with it, I haven't even tried to connect it,

01:09:19 ◼   ► but now I'm just not touching anything,

01:09:20 ◼   ► because my network, everything's on my network,

01:09:23 ◼   ► just like I want it to be, I haven't had any

01:09:25 ◼   ► of that Teams problem in all my Teams meeting at work,

01:09:28 ◼   ► I have yet to, you know, have the problem recur,

01:09:30 ◼   ► although it hasn't been a month yet, but so far so good,

01:09:33 ◼   ► my networking house is in order.

01:09:35 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:09:37 ◼   ► - That's good, I'm very glad for you.

01:09:38 ◼   ► - Don't touch it.

01:09:39 ◼   ► - Yeah, definitely don't touch it.

01:09:41 ◼   ► I'd actually like to make a brief request for help.

01:09:45 ◼   ► I, in the process of doing this screened in porch,

01:09:48 ◼   ► selected, I don't remember talking about this on the show,

01:09:50 ◼   ► but I selected two not cheap ceiling fans

01:09:53 ◼   ► in order to put in the screened in porch,

01:09:55 ◼   ► and there was a little bit of a disagreement

01:09:59 ◼   ► as to whether or not these not cheap ceiling fans

01:10:01 ◼   ► were worth the money that we spent,

01:10:02 ◼   ► and one of the things I wanted to do

01:10:04 ◼   ► with these ceiling fans was use them

01:10:06 ◼   ► with Lutron Caseta switches,

01:10:08 ◼   ► and I thought I was buying the appropriate kind of fan

01:10:11 ◼   ► in order to use them with Lutron Caseta switches,

01:10:13 ◼   ► and it turns out I did not,

01:10:14 ◼   ► and many, many hours of investigation

01:10:17 ◼   ► and fiddling about later,

01:10:19 ◼   ► what I've realized is these particular fans

01:10:21 ◼   ► use some sort of proprietary radio frequency controller,

01:10:24 ◼   ► so there is something in the wall,

01:10:26 ◼   ► and it is connected to the fan,

01:10:29 ◼   ► but the actual commands to go on or off

01:10:31 ◼   ► for different speeds or whatever are radio frequency,

01:10:33 ◼   ► and what I'd like to do is figure out a way

01:10:34 ◼   ► to get that on HomeKit.

01:10:35 ◼   ► These fans are Kickler fans, K-I-C-H-L-E-R.

01:10:39 ◼   ► Kickler doesn't seem to believe that HomeKit exists

01:10:42 ◼   ► or even Alexa or anything like it,

01:10:44 ◼   ► so if you have a way that you are aware of

01:10:48 ◼   ► that you can make a RF device talk HomeKit,

01:10:52 ◼   ► please let me know, Casey lists on Twitter,

01:10:53 ◼   ► or you can find my contact information on my website.

01:10:56 ◼   ► I'd love to know, 'cause I've been looking

01:10:57 ◼   ► at this broad link RM4 IR and RF universal remote,

01:11:02 ◼   ► which I guess is basically it's supposed to just emit IR

01:11:06 ◼   ► or RF in order to control things

01:11:09 ◼   ► that really you're not supposed to be able to control,

01:11:11 ◼   ► and I'm looking at this, but I don't know

01:11:13 ◼   ► if it's gonna work with the appropriate frequencies,

01:11:14 ◼   ► blah, blah, blah, so I will stop here,

01:11:16 ◼   ► but just if you've experienced anything like this,

01:11:18 ◼   ► please let me know.

01:11:19 ◼   ► I would love to know about it.

01:11:20 ◼   ► Our, I think, final bit of follow-up?

01:11:22 ◼   ► No, yeah, our final section of follow-up

01:11:24 ◼   ► is with regard to Marco's refusal to believe

01:11:27 ◼   ► that there's anything other than Tesla Superchargers

01:11:29 ◼   ► in the world, and friend of the show,

01:11:32 ◼   ► Sam, well-submitted of the Wheel Bearings podcast,

01:11:34 ◼   ► wrote in to say that Tesla accounted

01:11:36 ◼   ► for about two-thirds of EV sales in the US in the last year,

01:11:40 ◼   ► but according to Sam, whose job is to know

01:11:42 ◼   ► these sorts of things, that share is likely

01:11:44 ◼   ► to shrink significantly in 2021 and beyond.

01:11:46 ◼   ► There's lots of new competitors arriving this year next

01:11:49 ◼   ► from all the legacy brands.

01:11:50 ◼   ► And then moving on, Sam writes,

01:11:54 ◼   ► for distribution, there are currently 3,440 CCS,

01:11:58 ◼   ► which I believe is the connector type,

01:11:59 ◼   ► DC fast charger locations with 6,534 actual outlets,

01:12:04 ◼   ► so about 3,500 locations with about 6,500 outlets

01:12:09 ◼   ► across the United States.

01:12:10 ◼   ► There are 1,000 Supercharger locations,

01:12:13 ◼   ► so about a third as many locations,

01:12:15 ◼   ► however, they have about 10,000 outlets,

01:12:18 ◼   ► so about twice as many outlets.

01:12:20 ◼   ► So Tesla has fewer locations,

01:12:22 ◼   ► but more chargers per station.

01:12:24 ◼   ► Something I don't think we've mentioned on the show

01:12:26 ◼   ► is that Electrify America was done in part

01:12:30 ◼   ► because Volkswagen was compelled to fund it

01:12:32 ◼   ► as a result of Dieselgate.

01:12:35 ◼   ► And Electrify America was the first network

01:12:37 ◼   ► to implement the plug-in charge standard,

01:12:39 ◼   ► which allows drivers to set up one account

01:12:40 ◼   ► for their compatible vehicles.

01:12:42 ◼   ► So Ford, Volkswagen, Mercedes, Lewis, and Rivian

01:12:45 ◼   ► have all announced support and more coming,

01:12:46 ◼   ► and then they let you just plug it in,

01:12:48 ◼   ► and then it authenticates and starts charging,

01:12:49 ◼   ► just like a Supercharger.

01:12:50 ◼   ► And we'll put a link in the show notes

01:12:51 ◼   ► to a list of all the chargers and networks

01:12:54 ◼   ► and whatnot at the Department of Energy website

01:12:58 ◼   ► for the United States.

01:13:00 ◼   ► Do you wanna jump in here, Marco,

01:13:01 ◼   ► 'cause I know you have some feedback

01:13:02 ◼   ► or you wanna plow forward?

01:13:03 ◼   ► - Yeah, just a quick little thing on this point.

01:13:05 ◼   ► So my car is still in the body shop, still,

01:13:10 ◼   ► and they haven't even been able to start to work on it

01:13:13 ◼   ► because insurance companies are apparently terrible.

01:13:17 ◼   ► But-- - Neat.

01:13:18 ◼   ► - So it's been almost a month,

01:13:19 ◼   ► and they haven't actually started working on it yet

01:13:21 ◼   ► because of my insurance company, so that's okay.

01:13:23 ◼   ► I mean, I guess it was my fault for going with the

01:13:26 ◼   ► totally fly-by-night insurance company Allstate.

01:13:29 ◼   ► - Ah, I also use Allstate, and they are--

01:13:30 ◼   ► - But you don't get to be a big insurance company

01:13:32 ◼   ► by just giving out money for free.

01:13:35 ◼   ► Insurance company does not wanna pay a lot for the Smuffler.

01:13:38 ◼   ► - Yeah, nice.

01:13:39 ◼   ► - Anyway, so we're still driving around the i3,

01:13:44 ◼   ► and we had an opportunity to stop and supercharge,

01:13:48 ◼   ► and I specifically sought out an Electrify America location

01:13:53 ◼   ► 'cause there was one kinda near where we were going.

01:13:55 ◼   ► And so we were down to about 30-something percent on the i3.

01:14:00 ◼   ► We stopped off.

01:14:02 ◼   ► It looked almost like a supercharger.

01:14:04 ◼   ► They had these big, glowing white bays across the back

01:14:08 ◼   ► of this mall parking lot.

01:14:09 ◼   ► There were eight plugs in this location,

01:14:12 ◼   ► so it looked pretty nice,

01:14:14 ◼   ► and it was a pretty good experience.

01:14:17 ◼   ► It was significantly nicer than the ChargePoint one

01:14:21 ◼   ► that I'd used before.

01:14:22 ◼   ► And it was super easy.

01:14:25 ◼   ► I walked up to the thing, and I plugged it into the car,

01:14:28 ◼   ► and they had a little credit card contactless/chip reader

01:14:32 ◼   ► on the front, so I just did Apple Pay on the front of it.

01:14:34 ◼   ► I didn't have to make an account.

01:14:35 ◼   ► I didn't have to do anything.

01:14:36 ◼   ► All I had to do was Apple Pay with my credit card,

01:14:39 ◼   ► Apple Pay with my phone, rather,

01:14:41 ◼   ► wave it in front of their little reader,

01:14:43 ◼   ► beep, it started up, and then I was able to watch

01:14:47 ◼   ► both in my car and also on their screen.

01:14:49 ◼   ► They had a giant, glowing screen

01:14:50 ◼   ► to show my car's charge level.

01:14:52 ◼   ► I guess the car communicates its charge level

01:14:54 ◼   ► back through the CCS connector to the charger.

01:14:57 ◼   ► So it was able to give me a time estimate.

01:15:00 ◼   ► It was able to give me a percentage readout and everything.

01:15:03 ◼   ► It allowed you to type in a phone number,

01:15:05 ◼   ► and it would text you updates.

01:15:06 ◼   ► That way, like, if you wanted to leave

01:15:08 ◼   ► and go inside the mall or whatever,

01:15:10 ◼   ► you could do that and see when it's done.

01:15:12 ◼   ► And overall, it cost me about 10 bucks to charge

01:15:15 ◼   ► from something like 30% to about 90%.

01:15:21 ◼   ► I mean, this is not a large-range car.

01:15:22 ◼   ► That's something like 100 miles of range.

01:15:26 ◼   ► But it was about a half hour.

01:15:29 ◼   ► Really not bad at all.

01:15:31 ◼   ► It was a surprisingly nice

01:15:33 ◼   ► supercharger competitive experience.

01:15:38 ◼   ► And if every DC fast charger was as nice

01:15:42 ◼   ► as the Electrify America ones,

01:15:44 ◼   ► then I think that would be a really nice world to get to.

01:15:47 ◼   ► I don't think we're there yet,

01:15:48 ◼   ► and I think it's gonna be a while before we get there.

01:15:50 ◼   ► But when and if that kind of world arrives

01:15:54 ◼   ► for the non-Tesla charging needs,

01:15:57 ◼   ► that will be very nice and very compelling.

01:15:59 ◼   ► So I really enjoyed it.

01:16:00 ◼   ► It was very nice to use,

01:16:02 ◼   ► and I would gladly use it again.

01:16:04 ◼   ► However, again, when I look for things like this

01:16:07 ◼   ► in the areas I travel,

01:16:09 ◼   ► the Tesla superchargers are still,

01:16:11 ◼   ► they're still better coverage of the areas I go,

01:16:15 ◼   ► and they're in more convenient locations.

01:16:19 ◼   ► Kind of an underappreciated part

01:16:21 ◼   ► of charger location selection is,

01:16:24 ◼   ► well, what can you do during the half hour

01:16:26 ◼   ► that you're waiting there?

01:16:27 ◼   ► If it's in a travel plaza or something,

01:16:29 ◼   ► like off the highway, that's great.

01:16:30 ◼   ► Because then you can park your car,

01:16:33 ◼   ► and the thing is, you're only gonna be charging there

01:16:35 ◼   ► for maybe a half hour to 40 minutes.

01:16:38 ◼   ► You can't do something that's gonna take you two hours.

01:16:40 ◼   ► You can't watch a movie or anything in a movie theater.

01:16:43 ◼   ► But you also don't want it to just be

01:16:45 ◼   ► in the back of an empty parking lot

01:16:48 ◼   ► where there's nowhere even within walking distance

01:16:50 ◼   ► that you could really meaningfully go.

01:16:53 ◼   ► So you want something to do,

01:16:55 ◼   ► and I like the travel plaza kind of situation

01:16:57 ◼   ► because then you can go in, use the bathroom,

01:17:00 ◼   ► order food, have a quick snack,

01:17:03 ◼   ► get a crappy coffee at Starbucks,

01:17:05 ◼   ► go out to your car, and it's pretty much time.

01:17:07 ◼   ► Tesla seems to be significantly better,

01:17:10 ◼   ► at least with the more recent round of superchargers,

01:17:13 ◼   ► significantly better at choosing good locations

01:17:16 ◼   ► that actually give you some reasonable way

01:17:18 ◼   ► to use your 40 minutes that you're gonna have

01:17:20 ◼   ► while sitting there.

01:17:21 ◼   ► So that's one thing that so far

01:17:24 ◼   ► the non-Tesla fast chargers around here

01:17:27 ◼   ► are not super great at.

01:17:30 ◼   ► But I mean, that could just be a regional difference.

01:17:31 ◼   ► But anyway, it's something to look at.

01:17:33 ◼   ► Like when you're comparing,

01:17:34 ◼   ► if you're looking at electric cars,

01:17:35 ◼   ► if you're comparing the charging networks,

01:17:37 ◼   ► you definitely have to, I think,

01:17:39 ◼   ► look at which ones you're likely to use

01:17:41 ◼   ► and where they actually are,

01:17:43 ◼   ► what kind of environment they're actually in.

01:17:45 ◼   ► 'Cause that matters a lot.

01:17:47 ◼   ► - Like Sam said, though, this is changing rapidly

01:17:49 ◼   ► because all the EVs from all the car companies

01:17:52 ◼   ► are coming out pretty fast and furious now.

01:17:54 ◼   ► And most of them, granted, are not actual cars,

01:17:56 ◼   ► they're stupid SUV things, but there's a ton of them.

01:17:59 ◼   ► And Electrify America and all the other sort of

01:18:02 ◼   ► car brand charging networks

01:18:03 ◼   ► are just going to be expanding extremely rapidly.

01:18:06 ◼   ► And it's not just one company doing it,

01:18:08 ◼   ► it's multiple companies doing it.

01:18:09 ◼   ► So I expect this to be a very dynamic situation.

01:18:11 ◼   ► In fact, I was surprised to see

01:18:12 ◼   ► there was three times as many CCS DC fast chargers,

01:18:16 ◼   ► 'cause this is trying to compare like to like

01:18:17 ◼   ► and not just say like any old thing,

01:18:19 ◼   ► but the DC fast chargers.

01:18:21 ◼   ► And I'm also surprised to see that a bunch of car brands,

01:18:24 ◼   ► we talked about this one,

01:18:25 ◼   ► let me get the pronunciation right 'cause I saw a video.

01:18:27 ◼   ► Tycon.

01:18:30 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:18:31 ◼   ► - Nice, nice.

01:18:31 ◼   ► - They have two syllables in their word

01:18:33 ◼   ► and neither one of them is pronounced the way

01:18:34 ◼   ► that an English speaker would expect them to say.

01:18:35 ◼   ► But Porsche has a YouTube video that says,

01:18:37 ◼   ► Ty like a necktie and then Con like the opposite of Pro.

01:18:41 ◼   ► Tycon, which has this 800 volt system

01:18:44 ◼   ► that allows it to charge faster and stuff.

01:18:46 ◼   ► I recently saw a review of the new Hyundai IONIQ 5,

01:18:51 ◼   ► which is another SUV type thing or whatever.

01:18:55 ◼   ► I think it has an 800 volt system too.

01:18:58 ◼   ► And it's not a fancy car.

01:19:00 ◼   ► Like it's competing with like,

01:19:02 ◼   ► it's competing with the mainstream SUVs, right?

01:19:05 ◼   ► It's more expensive than a gas SUV,

01:19:07 ◼   ► but still it's not $100,000 car.

01:19:09 ◼   ► And those 800 volt systems can charge a lot faster.

01:19:13 ◼   ► So the amount of time that you spend at the chargers

01:19:15 ◼   ► may actually be decreasing,

01:19:17 ◼   ► assuming we can get these 800 volt,

01:19:19 ◼   ► like whatever it is, 250 kilowatt or whatever.

01:19:22 ◼   ► I get confused with battery specs for laptops.

01:19:25 ◼   ► If those start to proliferate.

01:19:27 ◼   ► And the other thing I'll say about your charging experience

01:19:29 ◼   ► is your car doesn't even have the plug and charge thing

01:19:31 ◼   ► that we were talking about here,

01:19:32 ◼   ► which is just like, you don't have to do any of that stuff.

01:19:34 ◼   ► You just plug the thing in.

01:19:35 ◼   ► I mean, that's what this feedback says

01:19:37 ◼   ► is that you just plug it in

01:19:38 ◼   ► and somehow it knows who you are

01:19:39 ◼   ► based on the fact that you plug the car into it.

01:19:41 ◼   ► Because you had set up an account

01:19:42 ◼   ► with Electrify America beforehand.

01:19:44 ◼   ► And that's the best experience

01:19:45 ◼   ► because when you fill up your car with gas,

01:19:47 ◼   ► I mean, I guess you have to pay with your phone or whatever,

01:19:50 ◼   ► but like just be able to pull up to one of those things,

01:19:52 ◼   ► take the plug out, shove it into your car and walk away

01:19:54 ◼   ► and get all those features that you described

01:19:56 ◼   ► without even having to activate Apple Pay or tap it.

01:19:59 ◼   ► That's pretty cool.

01:20:00 ◼   ► Although I do wonder,

01:20:01 ◼   ► like I've been watching a lot of videos about electric cars

01:20:04 ◼   ► 'cause there are so many of them coming out.

01:20:05 ◼   ► Most of them don't appeal to me at all,

01:20:06 ◼   ► but a lot of them have,

01:20:08 ◼   ► I mean, I guess we'll get to this in the next feedback.

01:20:10 ◼   ► Interesting integrations

01:20:11 ◼   ► with their various power supply things.

01:20:15 ◼   ► Like, you know, their sort of charging network,

01:20:18 ◼   ► integrations in the car, integrations outside the car,

01:20:21 ◼   ► like you said, the thing where it texts you

01:20:22 ◼   ► to see how filled up your thing is or whatever.

01:20:24 ◼   ► So I wonder if those features

01:20:26 ◼   ► will end up being differentiators

01:20:28 ◼   ► or if we will kind of settle on one feature set,

01:20:31 ◼   ► kind of like gas pumps.

01:20:32 ◼   ► There's a million gas companies around here,

01:20:33 ◼   ► but the feature set of gas pumps in the US

01:20:36 ◼   ► has always kind of like coalesced

01:20:38 ◼   ► around a standard feature set.

01:20:40 ◼   ► If there was any moment where like, you know,

01:20:42 ◼   ► mobile speed pass came out and for a little while,

01:20:44 ◼   ► they didn't want to have it.

01:20:45 ◼   ► Eventually, stuff like that spreads everywhere.

01:20:47 ◼   ► So it'll be interesting to see that play out

01:20:48 ◼   ► with electric charging stations as well.

01:20:51 ◼   ► - And speaking of very expensive cars,

01:20:53 ◼   ► a friend of the show, Dave Nenian writes,

01:20:54 ◼   ► "With regard to charging station integrations,

01:20:57 ◼   ► "you know, each car vendor either owns a charging network

01:20:59 ◼   ► "or partners with one,

01:21:00 ◼   ► "and at least with Volkswagen, Audi, and Porsche,

01:21:03 ◼   ► "the charger location, routing, availability, et cetera,

01:21:05 ◼   ► "is fully integrated into the nav system."

01:21:07 ◼   ► I'm assuming much like Tesla.

01:21:09 ◼   ► In the, hold on, let me see if I can do this.

01:21:10 ◼   ► In the Taycan, and I'm sure this is true of others,

01:21:14 ◼   ► writes Dave Nenian, "If I plan a trip,

01:21:16 ◼   ► "it automatically routes me through chargers,

01:21:18 ◼   ► "not just in network ones,

01:21:20 ◼   ► "and it tells me how long to charge for

01:21:21 ◼   ► "and adjust during the trip if conditions change.

01:21:23 ◼   ► "It's just like the Tesla, basically,

01:21:24 ◼   ► "except the DC fast chargers, while fewer in number,

01:21:27 ◼   ► "can go up to 350 kilowatts,

01:21:29 ◼   ► "and I can charge from five to 80% in 22 minutes."

01:21:32 ◼   ► Dave admits that that's sometimes in a Walmart parking lot,

01:21:35 ◼   ► which is kind of crummy, but nevertheless,

01:21:37 ◼   ► it's fast, which is great.

01:21:39 ◼   ► - Another cool thing about the 800 watt system

01:21:41 ◼   ► and the new Hyundai, one of the features they're advertising

01:21:43 ◼   ► is you can use it to charge another electric car.

01:21:46 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:21:47 ◼   ► So you can drive over to them and just plug your thing,

01:21:49 ◼   ► like if they run out of charge somewhere,

01:21:51 ◼   ► you can go there and charge them up on it.

01:21:54 ◼   ► - That's interesting.

01:21:55 ◼   ► That would actually be really nice for

01:21:57 ◼   ► like a towing company to have some of those in their fleet.

01:22:01 ◼   ► So if you have an EV that gets totally dead

01:22:04 ◼   ► and is stranded on the side of the road,

01:22:05 ◼   ► you could drive this to them.

01:22:06 ◼   ► - 'Cause you can't bring a gas can.

01:22:08 ◼   ► - Right, yeah, exactly.

01:22:10 ◼   ► That actually is a really good feature.

01:22:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, and what you can do then is

01:22:13 ◼   ► if you take a car back from that car

01:22:15 ◼   ► and put it into your car, you can drive forever.

01:22:17 ◼   ► - Right, exactly.

01:22:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's how it works.

01:22:19 ◼   ► - You just have a loop.

01:22:20 ◼   ► - Right.

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01:24:34 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

01:24:37 ◼   ► - All right, let's do some Ask ATP.

01:24:39 ◼   ► Brian Ash writes, "This one is for Jon.

01:24:41 ◼   ► "If Apple were to announce a new mini Mac Pro

01:24:43 ◼   ► "in April or May, can you imagine a configuration

01:24:46 ◼   ► "that would make you switch away

01:24:47 ◼   ► "from your Intel Mac Pro this soon?

01:24:49 ◼   ► "How much performance would you need

01:24:51 ◼   ► "and at what price would that need to be to make the jump?"

01:24:54 ◼   ► - I've actually talked about this before,

01:24:56 ◼   ► but it's worth revisiting now that we know more

01:24:57 ◼   ► about the ARM Macs.

01:24:59 ◼   ► I am totally open to a smaller version of the Mac Pro.

01:25:03 ◼   ► Like all I want is some internal storage and a big GPU

01:25:07 ◼   ► and that's what I've got in my current Mac Pro,

01:25:09 ◼   ► but if you open it up,

01:25:09 ◼   ► there's a lot of empty space in there, right?

01:25:12 ◼   ► So if they make a miniature version,

01:25:13 ◼   ► they can fit the stuff that I want

01:25:15 ◼   ► and doesn't have room for all the stuff that I don't use,

01:25:17 ◼   ► that's fine.

01:25:18 ◼   ► Like this thing has so many slots in it.

01:25:19 ◼   ► Like I have a second GPU in there that I'm not even using

01:25:22 ◼   ► just because there are so many open slots

01:25:24 ◼   ► that's the best place in the house to store it, right?

01:25:27 ◼   ► So I, and I think maybe something will use it

01:25:31 ◼   ► for compute someday, but like I do not need

01:25:33 ◼   ► the massive amount of spaces in this thing,

01:25:35 ◼   ► but I do actually enjoy the fact that I have, you know,

01:25:38 ◼   ► a bunch of internal storage in there

01:25:40 ◼   ► and my big double height video card and all that stuff.

01:25:42 ◼   ► So we'll see, I'm totally open to a miniature one.

01:25:44 ◼   ► And as for when I would upgrade, you know,

01:25:47 ◼   ► I'm still assuming that the Mac Pro will be like,

01:25:50 ◼   ► if not the very last,

01:25:51 ◼   ► then at least one of the last machines to port over to ARM.

01:25:54 ◼   ► So I've got a while yet to see

01:25:56 ◼   ► what they're gonna come out with.

01:25:58 ◼   ► And if the new ARM based Mac Pro equivalent

01:26:03 ◼   ► comes out like by the end of this year,

01:26:04 ◼   ► I don't think I'm gonna upgrade that soon.

01:26:06 ◼   ► It's mostly a monetary issue

01:26:08 ◼   ► because I'm not going to sell this one.

01:26:10 ◼   ► Like, you know, I don't sell my Macs.

01:26:11 ◼   ► I keep them, I keep the Macs that are meaningful to me.

01:26:13 ◼   ► This is, this Mac is always going to be meaningful to me,

01:26:16 ◼   ► but I don't need to use this thing for 10 years.

01:26:19 ◼   ► Like, you know, we always knew the ARM transition was coming

01:26:21 ◼   ► and I said, when I bought this,

01:26:22 ◼   ► if it turns out that the ARM Macs come out

01:26:23 ◼   ► right after I buy this, oh, well,

01:26:25 ◼   ► I've gotta be okay with that.

01:26:26 ◼   ► And look what happened.

01:26:27 ◼   ► Here it is, and I'm more or less okay with it.

01:26:29 ◼   ► I'll use this Mac until I've saved up

01:26:32 ◼   ► enough discretionary income to replace it

01:26:34 ◼   ► or until it becomes so obsolete that I have to replace it.

01:26:37 ◼   ► So maybe not the end of this year,

01:26:39 ◼   ► but you know, in two, three years, yeah,

01:26:41 ◼   ► I'll be ready to replace it.

01:26:43 ◼   ► - Fair enough.

01:26:45 ◼   ► All right, Lingxiu Zhang writes,

01:26:46 ◼   ► do you use FileVault on your personal Macs,

01:26:48 ◼   ► and if so, why?

01:26:49 ◼   ► I just got a new M1 MacBook Air

01:26:51 ◼   ► and came across the setting during setup,

01:26:53 ◼   ► which was on by default.

01:26:54 ◼   ► I'm hesitant to turn it on because of the possible

01:26:56 ◼   ► computational overload, but is that even still relevant?

01:26:59 ◼   ► You know, I honestly don't even know if I'm using FileVault.

01:27:02 ◼   ► I think I am on my laptop.

01:27:04 ◼   ► Where is that?

01:27:05 ◼   ► Is that in security and privacy?

01:27:06 ◼   ► - I think you've hit on the main thing

01:27:08 ◼   ► that I was gonna say, which is most people don't even know

01:27:11 ◼   ► whether they're using FileVault,

01:27:12 ◼   ► which really speaks to how transparent it is,

01:27:15 ◼   ► both from a user's perspective

01:27:17 ◼   ► and I think also from a computational perspective.

01:27:19 ◼   ► There is computational overhead to it,

01:27:21 ◼   ► and I think it can still actually be measured,

01:27:23 ◼   ► although that might be harder with the ARM Macs

01:27:25 ◼   ► because all the decompression stuff

01:27:28 ◼   ► probably has some dedicated hardware units

01:27:30 ◼   ► somewhere inside there.

01:27:31 ◼   ► - Well, the T2 did accelerate that.

01:27:33 ◼   ► In the last generation of Intel Macs, they used the T2.

01:27:36 ◼   ► The T2 did that, which made the computational overhead part

01:27:40 ◼   ► basically free.

01:27:41 ◼   ► - Free, like at the cost of some additional power

01:27:43 ◼   ► than your battery, you know, whatever.

01:27:44 ◼   ► But yeah, it's the type of thing where,

01:27:48 ◼   ► don't worry about the performance, is what we're saying.

01:27:51 ◼   ► - Yeah, so it turns out I was looking,

01:27:53 ◼   ► so in System Preferences, Security and Privacy,

01:27:56 ◼   ► and then there's a tab for FileVault.

01:27:58 ◼   ► Both of my computers are using it,

01:27:59 ◼   ► and I would have expected that my MacBook Pro

01:28:02 ◼   ► definitely was, and I wasn't sure about my iMac Pro,

01:28:05 ◼   ► but yes, both of them are.

01:28:07 ◼   ► And yeah, I don't think even having,

01:28:09 ◼   ► I've used FileVault, especially on laptops, for years.

01:28:12 ◼   ► I don't remember ever having noticed

01:28:14 ◼   ► a computational difference.

01:28:15 ◼   ► You know, I don't remember ever having noticed a slowdown.

01:28:19 ◼   ► Even, there have been once or twice I've either turned it on

01:28:22 ◼   ► after I've had the operating system installed and so on,

01:28:26 ◼   ► or perhaps even turned it off.

01:28:27 ◼   ► But yeah, I don't see any reason not to at this point,

01:28:31 ◼   ► to be completely honest with you.

01:28:33 ◼   ► - Margo, do you have it enabled on your Macs?

01:28:35 ◼   ► Do you even know?

01:28:36 ◼   ► - I didn't know.

01:28:38 ◼   ► I thought I had it enabled.

01:28:39 ◼   ► I just checked on my Mac Mini that I'm using now,

01:28:41 ◼   ► and it's not on on the Mac Mini.

01:28:43 ◼   ► I figure I probably shouldn't turn it on

01:28:46 ◼   ► during the recording.

01:28:47 ◼   ► - I would recommend not, Casey.

01:28:49 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:28:50 ◼   ► - But I, yeah, I'm pretty sure it's on my laptop.

01:28:53 ◼   ► But yeah, I recommend leaving it on,

01:28:56 ◼   ► because at this point, this day and age,

01:28:58 ◼   ► the computational overhead of that,

01:29:00 ◼   ► I don't think is relevant.

01:29:02 ◼   ► - So my policy is I tend to put it on for laptops,

01:29:06 ◼   ► just because they might be lost somewhere,

01:29:08 ◼   ► and whatever modicum of security it is

01:29:10 ◼   ► to have this stuff encrypted at rest,

01:29:12 ◼   ► I will take that, right?

01:29:14 ◼   ► On my desktops, I personally choose not to enable it,

01:29:18 ◼   ► but it has nothing to do with performance,

01:29:20 ◼   ► and everything to do with me being afraid

01:29:21 ◼   ► of hosing myself somehow,

01:29:23 ◼   ► by either forgetting the encryption password,

01:29:25 ◼   ► or it's somehow getting corrupted in some way.

01:29:27 ◼   ► I'm just paranoid in that way that I have enough problems.

01:29:31 ◼   ► I'm always doing weird stuff with my computer,

01:29:32 ◼   ► like trying to somehow get bootcamp installed

01:29:34 ◼   ► and bootable on an external disk,

01:29:35 ◼   ► which was a saga that I just reflected on this

01:29:38 ◼   ► the other day, that I've long since forgotten

01:29:40 ◼   ► what I did to make that happen,

01:29:41 ◼   ► so if I ever had to do it again,

01:29:42 ◼   ► I'd be starting from zero.

01:29:44 ◼   ► But it was really hard, and it was scary,

01:29:46 ◼   ► and it involved a lot of my machine

01:29:47 ◼   ► being in a almost unbootable state,

01:29:50 ◼   ► and that's before we even get to the ARM Macs,

01:29:52 ◼   ► which are way harder to deal with booting

01:29:54 ◼   ► and external booting, right?

01:29:55 ◼   ► So the reason I don't enable it in my desktops

01:29:57 ◼   ► is like, well, they're in my house,

01:29:59 ◼   ► they're much less likely to be stolen or lost,

01:30:03 ◼   ► and I'm kind of afraid that I'll accidentally

01:30:05 ◼   ► lock myself out.

01:30:06 ◼   ► Those are probably not good reasons.

01:30:08 ◼   ► You should probably just enable encryption everywhere,

01:30:10 ◼   ► but it seems like, based on Marco's experience,

01:30:12 ◼   ► that Apple still doesn't default it to on

01:30:14 ◼   ► for its desktop Macs, otherwise,

01:30:16 ◼   ► if Marco doesn't remember explicitly choosing not to do it,

01:30:18 ◼   ► it was probably just the default.

01:30:19 ◼   ► I'm assuming it defaults to on all their laptops,

01:30:21 ◼   ► but maybe not on their desktop, so.

01:30:23 ◼   ► - I mean, this is also an installation

01:30:25 ◼   ► that I brought forward from old desktops,

01:30:27 ◼   ► so I just checked, my laptop does indeed have it on,

01:30:30 ◼   ► and I'm kind of with you,

01:30:31 ◼   ► like I tend to make my laptops more secure.

01:30:35 ◼   ► Like, for instance, I always leave

01:30:38 ◼   ► find my Mac on on my laptops,

01:30:41 ◼   ► but I don't leave it on on my desktops,

01:30:43 ◼   ► because remember back when Matt Honan was hacked

01:30:45 ◼   ► and they used find my Mac to remote wipe all of his Macs?

01:30:49 ◼   ► That scared me enough that like,

01:30:51 ◼   ► I like the ability to remote wipe my laptop

01:30:54 ◼   ► if it ever gets stolen,

01:30:55 ◼   ► but I don't want anybody to have the ability

01:30:57 ◼   ► to remote wipe my desktop.

01:30:59 ◼   ► So, that's just one of those things,

01:31:00 ◼   ► I always turn that off on the desktop.

01:31:03 ◼   ► But yeah, FileVault is on on the laptop,

01:31:05 ◼   ► and I leave all the high security stuff there.

01:31:07 ◼   ► And I think I'll turn it on on my desktop too,

01:31:08 ◼   ► 'cause why not?

01:31:09 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, like I said,

01:31:11 ◼   ► I see no reason not to, to be completely honest.

01:31:13 ◼   ► All right, and then finally from Johan Neubert,

01:31:16 ◼   ► what do you think about the longevity of the M1?

01:31:18 ◼   ► How long do you think they'll last?

01:31:20 ◼   ► Usually buying a quote unquote first generation

01:31:22 ◼   ► Mac computer can be bad in the long run.

01:31:25 ◼   ► Do you think that they'll last as long as iPhones

01:31:27 ◼   ► or even as long as John's old Mac Pro?

01:31:30 ◼   ► I mean, I don't know, look at,

01:31:32 ◼   ► I guess look at iPhones, right?

01:31:34 ◼   ► Because this is, or iPads perhaps,

01:31:36 ◼   ► especially early on, like in the iPhone 4 era,

01:31:39 ◼   ► you were seeing dramatic speed increases

01:31:41 ◼   ► with each new year's phone.

01:31:43 ◼   ► But I feel like the last couple of phones I've gotten,

01:31:46 ◼   ► they're snappier, sure,

01:31:48 ◼   ► but I wouldn't say it's a dramatic increase

01:31:50 ◼   ► like it was in years past.

01:31:51 ◼   ► So I would expect it's probably a three to four

01:31:55 ◼   ► to five year chip without feeling too terrible about it.

01:31:58 ◼   ► I mean, and also look at the iMac Pro,

01:32:00 ◼   ► or excuse me, my iPad Pro from 2018.

01:32:03 ◼   ► I don't feel like I'm CPU bound

01:32:06 ◼   ► or CPU limited very often on that thing.

01:32:08 ◼   ► And that's three years old now.

01:32:09 ◼   ► So I think you'll get some time out of it.

01:32:11 ◼   ► What do you think, Marco?

01:32:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, I don't, I think if anything,

01:32:14 ◼   ► you might get more time than you expect

01:32:16 ◼   ► because it's the first of the new architecture.

01:32:19 ◼   ► So far, like in, you know,

01:32:21 ◼   ► the reason why you're not really supposed

01:32:23 ◼   ► to buy the first version of things if you can help it

01:32:25 ◼   ► is that usually the first version has problems,

01:32:27 ◼   ► just weird bugs or shortcomings

01:32:30 ◼   ► or weird things that they fix in later versions.

01:32:33 ◼   ► We've had the M1 stuff now since November,

01:32:36 ◼   ► so, or October, whenever it was, well, it's delivered

01:32:38 ◼   ► in November, so we've had them now for a good half a year,

01:32:42 ◼   ► and there don't seem to be many issues,

01:32:46 ◼   ► and possibly even any major ones.

01:32:49 ◼   ► - There's some software issues.

01:32:51 ◼   ► - Agreed.

01:32:52 ◼   ► - I poll my kids about the reliability of Mac OS

01:32:55 ◼   ► on the M1s, but those aren't,

01:32:56 ◼   ► they're not anything to do with the hardware.

01:32:58 ◼   ► It's just like, okay, well, Mac OS has some shortcomings

01:33:00 ◼   ► in terms of drivers or whatever, you know, like, yeah.

01:33:04 ◼   ► There's more weird pink screens are not unlocking

01:33:07 ◼   ► or stuff like that, but that software,

01:33:09 ◼   ► the software will continue to get updated,

01:33:10 ◼   ► and the software will eventually come to accommodate these,

01:33:13 ◼   ► but there's nothing weird about this hardware

01:33:17 ◼   ► from a hardware perspective, simply because it is

01:33:19 ◼   ► so much like, and now is identical to,

01:33:21 ◼   ► the iPad hardware from which it's derived, right?

01:33:24 ◼   ► So it's not like this is the very first system on a chip

01:33:27 ◼   ► that Apple has made, right?

01:33:28 ◼   ► So I think the hardware is very solid,

01:33:31 ◼   ► and Casey was talking about, like,

01:33:33 ◼   ► projecting forward, like, how much faster

01:33:35 ◼   ► a chip's going to be, like, well,

01:33:36 ◼   ► is the next year's chip gonna be so fast

01:33:38 ◼   ► that you'll feel bad about having this one?

01:33:40 ◼   ► The more important direction is to look as backwards,

01:33:42 ◼   ► because backwards behind this thing are the Intel chips,

01:33:45 ◼   ► and they're way down there in the mud,

01:33:47 ◼   ► in terms of performance, right?

01:33:49 ◼   ► So as these machines get older,

01:33:51 ◼   ► the Intel machines will rapidly become,

01:33:53 ◼   ► oh, so slow, I can't even imagine using those,

01:33:55 ◼   ► but these things will hang on, because this is the big leap,

01:33:58 ◼   ► this is the big discontinuity.

01:33:59 ◼   ► It was like slow and steady, one or 2% or 5% increase,

01:34:03 ◼   ► in Intel chips, and then this huge leap to the M1,

01:34:06 ◼   ► and it's gonna take a long time before the performance

01:34:09 ◼   ► that's available in the M1 becomes so slow

01:34:12 ◼   ► that you can't even imagine using it, right?

01:34:14 ◼   ► So I think these M1s, assuming there's no catastrophic

01:34:17 ◼   ► hardware problem, are going to be usable, useful computers

01:34:21 ◼   ► for a really long time.

01:34:22 ◼   ► Like, think about that fanless $999 MacBook Air.

01:34:25 ◼   ► What an amazing performance bargain.

01:34:27 ◼   ► I think that computer will last longer

01:34:30 ◼   ► than any $1,000 Apple computer has, perhaps, ever.

01:34:33 ◼   ► So I am very optimistic about how long these will be,

01:34:37 ◼   ► especially since that M1 MacBook Air

01:34:40 ◼   ► doesn't have any moving parts, even.

01:34:41 ◼   ► Like, it's so much, it's like an electric car,

01:34:43 ◼   ► so much simpler, so much fewer parts inside it,

01:34:46 ◼   ► fewer things to go wrong, and the performance is great.

01:34:49 ◼   ► So thumbs up on the M1.

01:34:51 ◼   ► I made a shirt about it.

01:34:53 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:34:54 ◼   ► - The only thing I will note about

01:34:55 ◼   ► the performance characteristics of the M1,

01:34:57 ◼   ► now having used them full-time for however many months,

01:35:00 ◼   ► the reason it feels so ridiculously fast,

01:35:03 ◼   ► and the reason why certain tasks are so incredibly

01:35:06 ◼   ► much faster than they were on Intel,

01:35:07 ◼   ► or smoother, or better responding,

01:35:09 ◼   ► the ceiling of performance, when you have very,

01:35:14 ◼   ► like, efficient, parallelized, vectorized code,

01:35:18 ◼   ► is not that much higher than what we had before.

01:35:20 ◼   ► In some cases, it isn't higher at all.

01:35:21 ◼   ► What they did was they raised the floor a lot.

01:35:25 ◼   ► So a lot of common things on the M1,

01:35:28 ◼   ► common CPU tasks and everything, those are faster,

01:35:33 ◼   ► sometimes by a lot.

01:35:34 ◼   ► And so it seems like performance all across the board,

01:35:38 ◼   ► everything is just snappier and more responsive,

01:35:40 ◼   ► but where the M1 is limited is when you wanna

01:35:44 ◼   ► push it really hard, when you're maxing out all the cores,

01:35:47 ◼   ► and doing something really CPU intensive,

01:35:49 ◼   ► it's not slow, but it's not as much faster

01:35:53 ◼   ► than the Intel stuff, as you would expect,

01:35:55 ◼   ► based on how much faster it is

01:35:56 ◼   ► with kind of more pedestrian tasks.

01:35:58 ◼   ► - Well, it depends on what you're comparing it to.

01:35:59 ◼   ► If you compare it to the Intel $999 MacBook Air,

01:36:02 ◼   ► it crushes it, and even in the parallel stuff,

01:36:05 ◼   ► but as you get to the higher end, yeah,

01:36:06 ◼   ► 'cause they're using this chip everywhere.

01:36:07 ◼   ► Again, we've just seen the low-end computers here.

01:36:11 ◼   ► But let's say the MacBook Pro, 13-inch MacBook Pro,

01:36:13 ◼   ► that's an area where I can imagine

01:36:14 ◼   ► the previous best 13-inch MacBook Pro Intel model

01:36:18 ◼   ► would match it in multi-core, maybe.

01:36:20 ◼   ► But as you get to the lower-end machines,

01:36:24 ◼   ► you're thinking of multi-core as compared to,

01:36:26 ◼   ► what about my 10-core iMac Pro?

01:36:27 ◼   ► But that's not what these machines are competing with.

01:36:30 ◼   ► - Right, exactly, and so if you are someone

01:36:33 ◼   ► who tends to buy the high-core machines,

01:36:37 ◼   ► the 15 or 16-inch MacBook Pro, the iMac Pro, the Mac Pro,

01:36:41 ◼   ► if you're buying the highest-core accounts

01:36:42 ◼   ► and you're matching those things out,

01:36:45 ◼   ► first of all, you're gonna want probably more GPU power

01:36:47 ◼   ► than this can offer if you're using that for video stuff.

01:36:51 ◼   ► But I can see a good case for waiting until,

01:36:57 ◼   ► whatever it's called, the M1X or maybe the M2,

01:36:59 ◼   ► whatever the beefier version of this

01:37:01 ◼   ► for the bigger computers ends up being called,

01:37:04 ◼   ► waiting for that, but otherwise,

01:37:07 ◼   ► and that's, by the way, that's why my computer

01:37:11 ◼   ► never feels slow to me anymore unless I am doing something

01:37:15 ◼   ► like an Xcode archive build, (laughs)

01:37:18 ◼   ► or a lot of Xcode builds, honestly,

01:37:20 ◼   ► where my project is big enough now

01:37:22 ◼   ► that when I do a lot of builds in Xcode,

01:37:25 ◼   ► and I'm using it on Swift now, thanks a lot, Swift,

01:37:27 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:37:28 ◼   ► whenever I do a build in Xcode, it maxes out

01:37:30 ◼   ► all of the cores for maybe 10 to 60 seconds

01:37:35 ◼   ► depending on what exactly it's doing.

01:37:36 ◼   ► And you definitely feel that, and there are areas

01:37:39 ◼   ► where I would love to have more high-performance cores

01:37:42 ◼   ► just so I can shorten those builds.

01:37:45 ◼   ► And when that, whatever the next little Mac Pro ends up being

01:37:50 ◼   ► whenever that comes out, I will probably buy it

01:37:52 ◼   ► for that reason because I don't need any GPU power

01:37:56 ◼   ► more than I already have, but I really would love

01:37:58 ◼   ► way more high-performance cores,

01:38:00 ◼   ► as many as they will give me, I'll take them.

01:38:02 ◼   ► 'Cause right now I have four, that's great.

01:38:04 ◼   ► Give me 12, give me 16, great, that would be even better.

01:38:07 ◼   ► And so I don't know what they're gonna do,

01:38:08 ◼   ► but if you are that, if you have that kind of performance

01:38:11 ◼   ► need where you're doing a lot of high-end parallel stuff,

01:38:14 ◼   ► you may wanna wait and see what else comes out after this

01:38:17 ◼   ► if you're looking to use it for a very long time.

01:38:19 ◼   ► That being said, right now, I am incredibly satisfied

01:38:23 ◼   ► with this, it just, the only time I notice it being

01:38:26 ◼   ► a little bit slow is that.

01:38:27 ◼   ► But I also look and say like, well this is a MacBook Air,

01:38:31 ◼   ► or a Mac Mini, depending on which computer I'm using.

01:38:34 ◼   ► And like, these are, for what they are,

01:38:37 ◼   ► and for what I paid for them, it's fantastic.

01:38:40 ◼   ► All right, thank you to our sponsor this week, Backblaze,

01:38:42 ◼   ► and thank you to our members who support us directly.

01:38:45 ◼   ► You can become a member and get a discount

01:38:48 ◼   ► on our new merch by going to ATP.FM/JOIN.

01:38:52 ◼   ► If you just wanna buy a shirt and not become a member,

01:38:54 ◼   ► no problem, that's cool, go to ATP.FM/STORE.

01:38:57 ◼   ► Thank you everybody, and we will talk to you next week.

01:39:00 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

01:39:03 ◼   ► ♪ Now the show is over ♪

01:39:05 ◼   ► ♪ They didn't even mean to begin ♪

01:39:08 ◼   ► ♪ 'Cause it was accidental ♪

01:39:10 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:10 ◼   ► ♪ Oh it was accidental ♪

01:39:12 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:13 ◼   ► ♪ John didn't do any research ♪

01:39:15 ◼   ► ♪ And Marco and Casey wouldn't let him ♪

01:39:18 ◼   ► ♪ 'Cause it was accidental ♪

01:39:20 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:21 ◼   ► ♪ Oh it was accidental ♪

01:39:23 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:24 ◼   ► ♪ And you can find the show notes at ATP.FM ♪

01:39:29 ◼   ► ♪ And if you're into Twitter ♪

01:39:32 ◼   ► ♪ You can follow them at C-A-S-E-Y-L-I-S-S ♪

01:39:37 ◼   ► ♪ So that's Casey Liss M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M ♪

01:39:43 ◼   ► ♪ N-T Marco R. Menn ♪

01:39:45 ◼   ► ♪ S-I-R-A-C ♪

01:39:48 ◼   ► ♪ U-S-A-C-R-A-C-U-S-A ♪

01:39:50 ◼   ► ♪ It's accidental ♪

01:39:52 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:53 ◼   ► ♪ They didn't mean to ♪

01:39:55 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:57 ◼   ► ♪ Accidental ♪

01:39:58 ◼   ► ♪ Tech podcast ♪

01:40:00 ◼   ► ♪ So long ♪

01:40:02 ◼   ► - Oh my god, my arms are on fire.

01:40:05 ◼   ► - Your arms?

01:40:06 ◼   ► Oh, because-- - The hives, the hives.

01:40:08 ◼   ► - I've never had hives before this week.

01:40:09 ◼   ► It's terrible.

01:40:10 ◼   ► - It does not sound particularly fun.

01:40:12 ◼   ► - And these aren't even severe hives.

01:40:14 ◼   ► I don't have to be scratching them all the time.

01:40:16 ◼   ► I'm trying not to scratch them at all.

01:40:18 ◼   ► And they go away sometime in the middle of the night.

01:40:20 ◼   ► So I go to bed.

01:40:21 ◼   ► They start around like seven or eight p.m.

01:40:24 ◼   ► I go to bed, and then I wake up in the morning,

01:40:26 ◼   ► and they're gone.

01:40:27 ◼   ► So I don't know what's going on.

01:40:29 ◼   ► - People get me talking about my toes on rectus.

01:40:31 ◼   ► I think this is worse.

01:40:32 ◼   ► I don't wanna hear about hives.

01:40:34 ◼   ► - I don't wanna have them, believe me.

01:40:35 ◼   ► This is not a fun thing, but--

01:40:39 ◼   ► - Well, how do you think all that 5G

01:40:40 ◼   ► is getting out of you, man?

01:40:41 ◼   ► - I know.

01:40:43 ◼   ► I'm glad that they started before the shot

01:40:46 ◼   ► so I know that that's not it.

01:40:47 ◼   ► - That's true, actually.

01:40:48 ◼   ► That's a good point.

01:40:49 ◼   ► Your body's a petri dish.

01:40:52 ◼   ► Some people's body are a wonderland.

01:40:53 ◼   ► Marco's body is a petri dish.

01:40:55 ◼   ► - I always get the weird medical issues in the family.

01:40:57 ◼   ► I don't have anything normal that's wrong with me.

01:41:00 ◼   ► I only have occasional really weird stuff like this happen,

01:41:03 ◼   ► and then it goes away.

01:41:03 ◼   ► Like, okay, well.

01:41:04 ◼   ► So anyway, hopefully by next week,

01:41:08 ◼   ► I won't be having hives every night for unknown reasons.

01:41:11 ◼   ► - Actually, next week's show, I will be vaccinated.

01:41:14 ◼   ► - And next week's show, I will be where Marco is

01:41:17 ◼   ► because that's the day my second shot was scheduled for.

01:41:20 ◼   ► - Oh, nice.

01:41:21 ◼   ► - I don't recall.

01:41:22 ◼   ► Are you Pfizer or Moderna?

01:41:23 ◼   ► - Pfizer.

01:41:24 ◼   ► - Okay, so I'm the lone Moderna man.

01:41:26 ◼   ► - My wife got her second shot today, too.

01:41:27 ◼   ► She went to bed early complaining of a headache, so.

01:41:30 ◼   ► - Lots of hydration is what I've heard.

01:41:33 ◼   ► I'm not sure.

01:41:34 ◼   ► I think it's placebo, but it's always a good idea anyway.

01:41:37 ◼   ► - It is probably a placebo,

01:41:38 ◼   ► but I was drinking water and Powerade, Pedialyte,

01:41:42 ◼   ► literally Pedialyte, like whatever,

01:41:44 ◼   ► nonstop the day before and the day of,

01:41:46 ◼   ► and I really did not have a bad go of it at all.

01:41:51 ◼   ► Like I said, I think earlier in the show,

01:41:52 ◼   ► there was a couple hours where I was like really chilly

01:41:55 ◼   ► during the day and felt a little rundown.

01:41:57 ◼   ► I had a lot of like, I don't know if you guys get this,

01:42:00 ◼   ► but when I take NyQuil, which I don't do often,

01:42:02 ◼   ► the following day I'll wake up and I'll feel like my head

01:42:04 ◼   ► is like two or three floors above my body.

01:42:08 ◼   ► That's the only way I can describe it.

01:42:09 ◼   ► Like it's the most odd, like very light,

01:42:11 ◼   ► not lightheaded, but like fuzzy feeling.

01:42:14 ◼   ► And I had, and I would like would waffle between,

01:42:17 ◼   ► oh, my head is not several stories above my body

01:42:20 ◼   ► like it is after NyQuil,

01:42:21 ◼   ► but it's like the next story above my body.

01:42:24 ◼   ► And then it would go into like a light headache

01:42:25 ◼   ► and then back to this like floating head, like brain fog,

01:42:28 ◼   ► as a roll call says in the chat,

01:42:30 ◼   ► that's a good way of looking at it.

01:42:32 ◼   ► And I kept going back and forth with that.

01:42:33 ◼   ► And I was freezing at night for two nights,

01:42:36 ◼   ► but that was it, like I tweeted about all this

01:42:40 ◼   ► and some people were like, wow, that sounds really bad.

01:42:41 ◼   ► And I was like, no, actually it really was nothing.

01:42:44 ◼   ► Like it really wasn't bad at all.

01:42:46 ◼   ► So yeah, it seems to be just the luck of the draw.

01:42:49 ◼   ► I don't know what to make of it.

01:42:50 ◼   ► - I can tell you from experience though,

01:42:52 ◼   ► this is all better than actual COVID.

01:42:54 ◼   ► - Yeah, I was gonna say like from my experience,

01:42:56 ◼   ► not having had it, it's like,

01:42:57 ◼   ► certainly even what Aaron's going through,

01:42:59 ◼   ► you know, super, super tired and feeling not the greatest.

01:43:03 ◼   ► Like I'll take that over COVID any day of the week.

01:43:05 ◼   ► And you actually are in the,

01:43:06 ◼   ► you're uniquely positioned to say with authority

01:43:10 ◼   ► that it is indeed better.

01:43:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, imagine having that brain fog for a month.

01:43:14 ◼   ► - Yeah, no.

01:43:15 ◼   ► - In addition to like the horrible fever and aches

01:43:16 ◼   ► and everything that you had for two weeks.

01:43:18 ◼   ► Like that's, it's just, it's no contest.

01:43:22 ◼   ► This is better.

01:43:23 ◼   ► - Indeed.

01:43:24 ◼   ► And I've probably said this live.

01:43:26 ◼   ► And the thing of it is, is that like,

01:43:28 ◼   ► if I knew that COVID was just a bad flu,

01:43:31 ◼   ► like hear me out, hear me out.

01:43:32 ◼   ► If I knew it was like just a bad flu

01:43:34 ◼   ► where you feel like crap for a week, like fine, whatever.

01:43:36 ◼   ► I probably would have just gone on living my life.

01:43:37 ◼   ► But because there's such a variance between like,

01:43:41 ◼   ► oh, you get it and nothing really happens.

01:43:42 ◼   ► And oh, you get it and literally die.

01:43:46 ◼   ► That's why I've been locked in my house for a year

01:43:49 ◼   ► because you don't know what's gonna happen.

01:43:51 ◼   ► And yeah, like Aaron and I both were,

01:43:55 ◼   ► not that we were dreading getting our second shot,

01:43:57 ◼   ► but we're both like, oh God, what's gonna come of this?

01:43:59 ◼   ► Are we gonna feel like death for a day?

01:44:00 ◼   ► But you know what?

01:44:01 ◼   ► I'll take it.

01:44:02 ◼   ► That is absolutely worth it.

01:44:05 ◼   ► I will absolutely do it.

01:44:06 ◼   ► And I wasn't planning on getting preachy in the after show,

01:44:09 ◼   ► but here we are.

01:44:10 ◼   ► If you have the opportunity to get a vaccination,

01:44:12 ◼   ► please, please do so.

01:44:13 ◼   ► Please do so.

01:44:15 ◼   ► - This is really like,

01:44:16 ◼   ► this is all of our duty to society.

01:44:19 ◼   ► If you can get vaccinated, get vaccinated.

01:44:23 ◼   ► - Yep.

01:44:25 ◼   ► Couldn't agree more.

01:44:26 ◼   ► I think that's fine for an after show,

01:44:28 ◼   ► to be honest with you.

01:44:29 ◼   ► - I don't know how long I have in this Benadryl.

01:44:30 ◼   ► So we're gonna keep it moving.

01:44:33 ◼   ► - I gotta get you on the phone in like an hour

01:44:35 ◼   ► and start asking for something

01:44:37 ◼   ► that you really don't wanna give me.

01:44:38 ◼   ► Like, hey man, you wanna buy me a Ticon?

01:44:40 ◼   ► - Store's down, Marker, you gotta fix it.

01:44:41 ◼   ► What, what?

01:44:42 ◼   ► You won't be able to, I'll be in DND mode, auto DND.

01:44:45 ◼   ► 10 p.m. is when it starts.

01:44:46 ◼   ► - Hey man, I can call you twice in a row.

01:44:49 ◼   ► That'll bust right through.

01:44:50 ◼   ► - Will it?

01:44:51 ◼   ► I think it's only if I like tell you to, right?

01:44:52 ◼   ► Like don't I have to whitelist you for that?

01:44:54 ◼   ► Or is that everybody?

01:44:55 ◼   ► - I think it might be like people in your address book

01:44:58 ◼   ► can double call through, I don't remember.

01:44:59 ◼   ► - Oh crap, you're in my address book.

01:45:01 ◼   ► - He's gonna actually do it, don't worry.

01:45:03 ◼   ► - I'm not gonna.

01:45:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, he's gonna be asleep by then.

01:45:05 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, I'm absolutely going to sleep.

01:45:08 ◼   ► - He's gonna have a sleepy shirt.

01:45:09 ◼   ► - I am in my sleepy shirt, you are correct.

01:45:12 ◼   ► That is a fact.

01:45:13 ◼   ► - I'm in my sleepy hives, so I'm ready to go.

01:45:15 ◼   ► - Oh no, yeah, you're in your own sleepy shirt.

01:45:18 ◼   ► - Yes, red and blotchy on my arms.

01:45:20 ◼   ► Kinda itchy, kinda hot.

01:45:23 ◼   ► - Okay, I did think the toe thing was much worse,

01:45:26 ◼   ► but we're starting to even out, no longer you go on.

01:45:30 ◼   ► - I mean the toe wasn't like infectious

01:45:32 ◼   ► or you know what I mean?

01:45:33 ◼   ► Like it's not spreading across my body,

01:45:35 ◼   ► or as Marcos is gonna be.

01:45:36 ◼   ► - Hives aren't infectious.

01:45:37 ◼   ► - You're just gonna be one big hive soon.

01:45:39 ◼   ► - Yeah, but it's not infectious,

01:45:40 ◼   ► it doesn't spread to other people.

01:45:42 ◼   ► - I don't know, I don't know how the hives work,

01:45:44 ◼   ► it's spreading to yourself.

01:45:45 ◼   ► - Now granted, I only learned this like 48 hours ago

01:45:48 ◼   ► when I looked it all up.

01:45:49 ◼   ► Oh God, this is terrible.

01:45:52 ◼   ► I don't know how people do this.

01:45:55 ◼   ► Like a lot of allergy people have hives

01:45:56 ◼   ► on a more regular basis.

01:45:57 ◼   ► I, God I hope this is not my new life.

01:46:00 ◼   ► This is not, I hope this has been my new normal.

01:46:02 ◼   ► - Time for some more allergy shots.

01:46:04 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, I haven't got,

01:46:05 ◼   ► I actually haven't gotten them in a few months

01:46:06 ◼   ► because it's difficult where I live to get that done.

01:46:10 ◼   ► - Well before you die, let's take it by the live listeners.

01:46:15 ◼   ► Thank you if you're listening live,

01:46:16 ◼   ► if you've joined because at least a couple of you did,

01:46:19 ◼   ► if you've bought merch, which I haven't looked,

01:46:21 ◼   ► but I'm assuming at least a couple of you did.

01:46:23 ◼   ► Thank you, thank you for just listening to us,

01:46:24 ◼   ► shill for all these things, that's very kind of you,

01:46:26 ◼   ► and thank you for being live listeners,

01:46:28 ◼   ► hopefully not covered in hives.

01:46:29 ◼   ► Live listeners, not hive listeners.

01:46:31 ◼   ► - And you all can rest assured,

01:46:32 ◼   ► when Casey said a few of you joined,

01:46:35 ◼   ► Casey watches the membership number.

01:46:37 ◼   ► - Oh, like a hawk, like a hawk.

01:46:41 ◼   ► You don't even know.

01:46:42 ◼   ► - There was one time when there was a wave

01:46:44 ◼   ► of payment failures, just 'cause it was the interval

01:46:49 ◼   ► that they were new on, and Casey posted in our chat,

01:46:52 ◼   ► we've had a, what was it, disastrous,

01:46:54 ◼   ► what was the word you used?

01:46:55 ◼   ► - I know what you're thinking of,

01:46:56 ◼   ► but I don't remember how I phrased it.

01:46:57 ◼   ► - Had a disastrous drop in members,

01:46:58 ◼   ► and it was like .01% or something,

01:47:01 ◼   ► but it was like some number of people,

01:47:04 ◼   ► like five people or something.

01:47:05 ◼   ► - It was more than five, you big jerk, but yes.

01:47:07 ◼   ► - It was some small number of people,

01:47:09 ◼   ► and you were like, it's a disaster.

01:47:11 ◼   ► - Excuse me, it was like 20 or 30 people, sir,

01:47:15 ◼   ► and I will concede that I was definitely

01:47:18 ◼   ► having a chicken little moment.

01:47:19 ◼   ► It was more than you were making it out to be,

01:47:21 ◼   ► but it was still not as much as my reaction justified.

01:47:24 ◼   ► - Yeah, and regardless, so if you're out there thinking,

01:47:28 ◼   ► should I become a member, would they even notice?

01:47:31 ◼   ► Rest assured, Casey will notice.

01:47:34 ◼   ► - I will notice.

01:47:35 ◼   ► - I look at the numbers too,

01:47:36 ◼   ► and I actually keep track of them.

01:47:37 ◼   ► I mean, I don't keep track of them over time,

01:47:39 ◼   ► but I do have a little solver sheet that I updated in.

01:47:43 ◼   ► Let's put it this way, perspective members.

01:47:45 ◼   ► We do not have enough members

01:47:47 ◼   ► that you are one of an anonymous few.

01:47:48 ◼   ► You are a precious gem, a unique ingot of whatever.

01:47:54 ◼   ► There's not so many members, so come and join,

01:47:56 ◼   ► so there'll be more.

01:47:57 ◼   ► - And rest assured, at least Casey

01:47:59 ◼   ► and probably John will notice.

01:48:01 ◼   ► I won't notice, but I will appreciate it.

01:48:03 ◼   ► - Marco doesn't give a shit.

01:48:05 ◼   ► - I care about like--

01:48:07 ◼   ► - I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

01:48:08 ◼   ► - He cares in the aggregate.

01:48:10 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's it, that's it.

01:48:11 ◼   ► - I care like, what's the ballpark of how we're doing,

01:48:14 ◼   ► and is the average either going up or staying the same?

01:48:16 ◼   ► That's what I care about.

01:48:17 ◼   ► If it starts, like if the average starts going down,

01:48:20 ◼   ► then I'll start caring in a bad way, you know,

01:48:22 ◼   ► but like as long as things are flat or going up,

01:48:26 ◼   ► like trend-wise, I'm fine with that.

01:48:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, I would agree with that.

01:48:29 ◼   ► I pay closer attention than I know I should,

01:48:32 ◼   ► and is probably healthy, but it's important to me.

01:48:34 ◼   ► So, and that implies it's not important to you too,

01:48:37 ◼   ► you know what I mean.

01:48:38 ◼   ► It's just, there are things that I choose to worry about.

01:48:42 ◼   ► - Casey also needs his garage door status

01:48:44 ◼   ► and his menu bar and his Mac, so there you go.

01:48:47 ◼   ► - Hey, both of these things,

01:48:47 ◼   ► they're literally next to each other.

01:48:49 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, did you see, this was,

01:48:52 ◼   ► I think this was the best email of the week,

01:48:54 ◼   ► from Russ Newcomer.

01:48:55 ◼   ► Subject line, "Casey, AirTag is used.

01:48:58 ◼   ► "I am surely not the first person to suggest

01:49:01 ◼   ► "that you put one on the top half of your garage door

01:49:03 ◼   ► "to determine if it's open or not."

01:49:05 ◼   ► - See, I read that, I'm like, how is that supposed to work?

01:49:07 ◼   ► Like the U1 can like point an arrow

01:49:09 ◼   ► to say if it's open or closed.

01:49:10 ◼   ► Like I don't feel like the resolution

01:49:11 ◼   ► would be enough to make that useful.

01:49:13 ◼   ► - Well, it depends on how close the bedroom is to the garage.

01:49:15 ◼   ► It's pretty close, right? - That's true, actually.

01:49:16 ◼   ► - Isn't it right on top of it?

01:49:18 ◼   ► - That's right, our master bedroom

01:49:19 ◼   ► is directly above the garage.

01:49:20 ◼   ► - Then we had to like launch the Find My app,

01:49:22 ◼   ► which always takes a long time,

01:49:23 ◼   ► and wait for it to find and register,

01:49:25 ◼   ► and show the letter arrow,

01:49:26 ◼   ► and then show the number of feet.

01:49:27 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:49:28 ◼   ► - I was slightly miffed by it,

01:49:31 ◼   ► but also it was a very, very good email.

01:49:34 ◼   ► And so I did laugh.

01:49:35 ◼   ► - That was my favorite email of the week.

01:49:37 ◼   ► Russ gets an award, a gold star,

01:49:40 ◼   ► for the best email of the week.

01:49:41 ◼   ► - I've put in our super secret text,

01:49:43 ◼   ► this is my menu bar as it stands right this very moment.

01:49:46 ◼   ► So you'll see that there's a padlock that is locked,

01:49:49 ◼   ► so the garage is indeed closed,

01:49:51 ◼   ► and then there's a one to seven digit number

01:49:54 ◼   ► that indicates subscriber count.

01:49:56 ◼   ► - You have that in your menu bar?

01:49:58 ◼   ► - You're damn right I do.

01:49:59 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:50:00 ◼   ► You're damn right I do.

01:50:01 ◼   ► - He's got too much stuff in that menu bar.

01:50:03 ◼   ► Like do you need backblaze there?

01:50:05 ◼   ► Like the whole point of backblaze

01:50:06 ◼   ► is it just runs without you worrying about it.

01:50:08 ◼   ► - No, I don't want backblaze there.

01:50:10 ◼   ► Can I remove it?

01:50:10 ◼   ► - Yes, go to the-- - Oh really?

01:50:12 ◼   ► - Go to the prep range and uncheck the checkbox, yeah.

01:50:14 ◼   ► - Where?

01:50:15 ◼   ► I don't see any such checkbox.

01:50:16 ◼   ► - I'll find it for you.

01:50:17 ◼   ► - I don't even know what half the stuff in my menu bar is.

01:50:20 ◼   ► - Backblaze.

01:50:21 ◼   ► - Oh my god, there it is.

01:50:21 ◼   ► - Settings, yeah.

01:50:22 ◼   ► - Oh John, I love you.

01:50:23 ◼   ► - It's not new, it's always been there.

01:50:25 ◼   ► - I don't doubt it, I've just never noticed.

01:50:26 ◼   ► I love you John, that's trans.

01:50:27 ◼   ► - All right, so I saved you some space.

01:50:29 ◼   ► What else can we get rid of?

01:50:30 ◼   ► You can't get rid of Skype

01:50:31 ◼   ► 'cause it puts that up here whenever it's running.

01:50:32 ◼   ► - That'll go away.

01:50:33 ◼   ► Do is there.

01:50:34 ◼   ► - Bluetooth, do you actually use that menu bar?

01:50:36 ◼   ► - I used to more often than I do now,

01:50:40 ◼   ► so I could probably remove that.

01:50:41 ◼   ► - Yeah, control center now makes that a lot less necessary

01:50:43 ◼   ► for a lot of people.

01:50:44 ◼   ► - Do you ever disable Wi-Fi or pick a different network?

01:50:47 ◼   ► - No.

01:50:48 ◼   ► - So get that out of there.

01:50:49 ◼   ► - Can you remove the Wi-Fi?

01:50:50 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, good idea.

01:50:51 ◼   ► - We're really cleaning house here.

01:50:52 ◼   ► - Oh okay, I'm liking this.

01:50:54 ◼   ► All right, can I get rid of the Wi-Fi?

01:50:55 ◼   ► This is, oh yeah I can.

01:50:58 ◼   ► - Command drag.

01:50:58 ◼   ► - You were performing.

01:50:59 ◼   ► - Command drag, and it's still available

01:51:00 ◼   ► under control center if you ever actually want to do it,

01:51:02 ◼   ► so it's technically still in your menu bar.

01:51:03 ◼   ► - Oh you were performing a wonderful service John.

01:51:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, and then get rid of Fuzzy Clock 'cause it's dumb.

01:51:09 ◼   ► - I like Fuzzy Clock.

01:51:10 ◼   ► For those who don't know, Fuzzy Clock is,

01:51:13 ◼   ► right now it says five, literally the words five space two.

01:51:17 ◼   ► - F-I-V-E space T-O space T-E-N because it's five to 10.

01:51:22 ◼   ► - I like Fuzzy Clock.

01:51:23 ◼   ► - And it's like how can we make time

01:51:25 ◼   ► really hard to read quickly?

01:51:27 ◼   ► Like I know time is easy to tell at a glance

01:51:28 ◼   ► 'cause people are used to looking at both analog clocks

01:51:30 ◼   ► and digital clocks, but can we make it,

01:51:32 ◼   ► can we slow them down?

01:51:33 ◼   ► Can we add cognitive load?

01:51:34 ◼   ► Someone said yes we can.

01:51:36 ◼   ► - All right, I'm also taking away day one.

01:51:37 ◼   ► I used to be religious about taking a note

01:51:39 ◼   ► as to what I work on today.

01:51:40 ◼   ► - That's the little bookmark shape thing.

01:51:41 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's the bookmark.

01:51:42 ◼   ► And I don't need to do that anymore.

01:51:44 ◼   ► So I'm just taking that away.

01:51:45 ◼   ► Dropler I use enough that I want it in the menu bar

01:51:48 ◼   ► even though I probably should just remove it.

01:51:50 ◼   ► - What's the lock icon on the far left?

01:51:52 ◼   ► - That's my garage door, man, it's closed.

01:51:53 ◼   ► - Oh, that's right, okay.

01:51:55 ◼   ► But you need a custom icon for the garage door.

01:51:57 ◼   ► Now that we've made all this space for the glory item

01:51:59 ◼   ► which is the garage door, you need a custom template image

01:52:03 ◼   ► for garage door open and garage door closed.

01:52:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:52:07 ◼   ► Everything else though, I have iStep menus

01:52:08 ◼   ► which I know is your favorite app of all time.

01:52:11 ◼   ► Let's see, can I get rid of time machine up there?

01:52:14 ◼   ► - You can get rid of Siri, I would recommend it.

01:52:16 ◼   ► - Can I? - Yeah.

01:52:17 ◼   ► - God bless you, how do I not know all these things?

01:52:19 ◼   ► God, I'm an amateur.

01:52:20 ◼   ► - 'Cause you don't use a Mac, I don't know.

01:52:22 ◼   ► - Seriously, good grief.

01:52:24 ◼   ► Oh, this is looking so much better, John.

01:52:26 ◼   ► I would get rid of the clock

01:52:27 ◼   ► but now that's the fricking notification center

01:52:30 ◼   ► so I can't get rid of that.

01:52:30 ◼   ► I can't get rid of spotlight either.

01:52:32 ◼   ► - You got fuzzy clock and you've got the analog clock.

01:52:35 ◼   ► - I know, I know, I know.

01:52:36 ◼   ► Then Synology Drive, yeah, let's see.

01:52:41 ◼   ► This is looking much better.

01:52:42 ◼   ► - I'm basically making your screen bigger.

01:52:44 ◼   ► Pretty soon it'll feel like you have an XDR.

01:52:46 ◼   ► [beeping]

01:52:48 ◼   ► [BLANK_AUDIO]