The all-new MacBook Neo has been such a hit that Apple is facing a "massive dilemma," according to Taiwan-based tech columnist and former Bloomberg reporter Tim Culpan. In the iPhone 16 Pro models, the A18 Pro chip has a 6-core GPU. During the chip manufacturing process, however, sometimes a CPU or GPU core can turn out to be faulty.

In the iPhone 16 Pro models, the A18 Pro chip has a 6-core GPU. During the chip manufacturing process, however, sometimes a CPU or GPU core can turn out to be faulty. Rather than discarding the leftover A18 Pro chips with only a 5-core GPU, Apple opted to use them in the MacBook Neo, as a way of optimizing its supply chain and costs.

These so-called “binned” chips with a 5-core GPU are effectively “free” to Apple, given that they otherwise would have been discarded.

Herein lies the dilemma.

In the latest edition of his Culpium newsletter today, Culpan said the MacBook Neo is selling so well that Apple’s supply of the binned A18 Pro chips with a 5-core GPU will “run out” before the company is able to fully satisfy demand for the laptop.

  • Arcane2077@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    17·
    5 days ago

    It’s called suffering from success, and Apple, more than most companies, has a lot of experience with it.

    The usual path (something every chipmaker does) is to just disable the ‘extra’ cores.

    They could also sell higher spec’d Neos, but that would never happen before the midrange macbooks are refreshed because it would mess up Apple’s very carefully formulated pricing strategy