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Now that Apple has finished announcing its slate of new M4-equipped Mac computers, we’ve finally been able to see them in person. The Verge’s Vjeran Pavic got some hands-on time with the new products and took some gorgeous photos that you can peruse below.
I’m blown away by how small the new Mac Mini is; the old Mac Mini, which was already small, seems giant in comparison. Vjeran tells me that, in person, the smaller Mac Mini is cute but that it’s “more like a mini Mac Studio than a mini Mac Mini.” He also says that there’s no way to reach the power button, which is on the underside of the computer, without lifting it up.
As for the other computers, the new colors on the iMac really pop when they’re lined up together in these photos, if you ask me. And while the space black color for the MacBook Pros isn’t totally new, seeing it in these photos makes me really wish that Apple would bring it to the MacBook Air.
The new Macs are all available to preorder now ahead of their official release next week.
Mac Mini

iMac

MacBook Pro

Accessories

There it is: the charging port, still on the bottom.

The Magic Trackpad and its USB-C port.

Why does Apple still have the bad arrow keys on this keyboard?

Now that Apple has finished announcing its slate of new M4-equipped Mac computers, we’ve finally been able to see them in person. The Verge’s Vjeran Pavic got some hands-on time with the new products and took some gorgeous photos that you can peruse below.

I’m blown away by how small the new Mac Mini is; the old Mac Mini, which was already small, seems giant in comparison. Vjeran tells me that, in person, the smaller Mac Mini is cute but that it’s “more like a mini Mac Studio than a mini Mac Mini.” He also says that there’s no way to reach the power button, which is on the underside of the computer, without lifting it up.

As for the other computers, the new colors on the iMac really pop when they’re lined up together in these photos, if you ask me. And while the space black color for the MacBook Pros isn’t totally new, seeing it in these photos makes me really wish that Apple would bring it to the MacBook Air.

The new Macs are all available to preorder now ahead of their official release next week.

Mac Mini

iMac

MacBook Pro

Accessories

There it is: the charging port, still on the bottom.

The Magic Trackpad and its USB-C port.

Why does Apple still have the bad arrow keys on this keyboard?

Read More 

Image: Activision

Comcast is boasting about what it’s calling its “biggest week in internet history,” which it pegs on Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 downloads and Thursday Night Football streams. The company says the Call of Duty game, which it released on October 25th, was responsible for a whopping 19 percent of its overall traffic last week.
It’s not really possible to quantify that further, given Comcast didn’t provide any specific numbers — either about how many customers were downloading the game or how big their downloads were. Ranging between 84.4GB for the PlayStation version and 102GB for the PC edition Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is, in the grand tradition of Call of Duty games, a hefty download. It can be as much as 300GB if players choose to go ahead and download Modern Warfare II and III and all the associated content packs and languages, as Activision explained in June.

Comcast bragging about its gigantic network traffic weekend in this way really underscores, if you scratch the surface a tad, just how restrictive its 1.2TB data cap can be in 2024. The company lifted that cap during the covid pandemic and even delayed reinstating it multiple times, but nevertheless brought it back in most US states.
The FCC, which says providers have the “technical ability” to operate without such limits, is currently investigating how they affect consumers. Whether the FCC can actually do anything about that is in question.
For any players who did download the whole massive 300GB package, they’ll have wiped out a huge chunk of their 1.2TB Xfinity data cap in one fell swoop. If they used their internet as normal otherwise, that could put them right up against or even blow past that cap. Given that my family used nearly 800GB last month without any notably large game downloads, it wouldn’t be that hard at all.

Image: Activision

Comcast is boasting about what it’s calling its “biggest week in internet history,” which it pegs on Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 downloads and Thursday Night Football streams. The company says the Call of Duty game, which it released on October 25th, was responsible for a whopping 19 percent of its overall traffic last week.

It’s not really possible to quantify that further, given Comcast didn’t provide any specific numbers — either about how many customers were downloading the game or how big their downloads were. Ranging between 84.4GB for the PlayStation version and 102GB for the PC edition Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is, in the grand tradition of Call of Duty games, a hefty download. It can be as much as 300GB if players choose to go ahead and download Modern Warfare II and III and all the associated content packs and languages, as Activision explained in June.

Comcast bragging about its gigantic network traffic weekend in this way really underscores, if you scratch the surface a tad, just how restrictive its 1.2TB data cap can be in 2024. The company lifted that cap during the covid pandemic and even delayed reinstating it multiple times, but nevertheless brought it back in most US states.

The FCC, which says providers have the “technical ability” to operate without such limits, is currently investigating how they affect consumers. Whether the FCC can actually do anything about that is in question.

For any players who did download the whole massive 300GB package, they’ll have wiped out a huge chunk of their 1.2TB Xfinity data cap in one fell swoop. If they used their internet as normal otherwise, that could put them right up against or even blow past that cap. Given that my family used nearly 800GB last month without any notably large game downloads, it wouldn’t be that hard at all.

Read More 

Image: OnLeaks via Android Headlines

Google appears to be planning to put a bigger display on its entry-level Pixel 9A, according to a report from Android Headlines. The forthcoming phone will reportedly get a 6.3-inch display to match the Pixel 9 and 9 Pro.
The 6.3-inch size would make it larger than the past few generations of A-series Pixel phones, including the 8A, 7A, and 6A — all of which came with a 6.1-inch display. Along with a screen size increase, the Pixel 9A is also rumored to come with a top refresh rate of 120Hz, Google’s Tensor G4 chipset, 8GB of RAM, and up to 256GB of storage.
Renders of what appears to be the Pixel 9A suggest that Google is making some big design changes to the phone as well. The Pixel’s prominent camera bar is absent from the rear of the phone, while the two camera sensors are placed in pill-shaped housing instead. According to Android Headlines, the Pixel 9A could feature a 48-megapixel (MP) primary camera, a 13 MP ultrawide camera, and a 13 MP front-facing lens. It’s also rumored to have a 5,000mAh battery — slightly larger than the 4,492mAh battery in the Pixel 8A.
We still don’t know when Google will reveal the Pixel 9A, but Android Headlines reports that its launch will be held in March. The phone will also reportedly retain the same $499 price as the Pixel 8A.

Image: OnLeaks via Android Headlines

Google appears to be planning to put a bigger display on its entry-level Pixel 9A, according to a report from Android Headlines. The forthcoming phone will reportedly get a 6.3-inch display to match the Pixel 9 and 9 Pro.

The 6.3-inch size would make it larger than the past few generations of A-series Pixel phones, including the 8A, 7A, and 6A — all of which came with a 6.1-inch display. Along with a screen size increase, the Pixel 9A is also rumored to come with a top refresh rate of 120Hz, Google’s Tensor G4 chipset, 8GB of RAM, and up to 256GB of storage.

Renders of what appears to be the Pixel 9A suggest that Google is making some big design changes to the phone as well. The Pixel’s prominent camera bar is absent from the rear of the phone, while the two camera sensors are placed in pill-shaped housing instead. According to Android Headlines, the Pixel 9A could feature a 48-megapixel (MP) primary camera, a 13 MP ultrawide camera, and a 13 MP front-facing lens. It’s also rumored to have a 5,000mAh battery — slightly larger than the 4,492mAh battery in the Pixel 8A.

We still don’t know when Google will reveal the Pixel 9A, but Android Headlines reports that its launch will be held in March. The phone will also reportedly retain the same $499 price as the Pixel 8A.

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Image: Dropbox

Dropbox is cutting its workforce by 20 percent today — laying off 528 people — amid slowing growth for its core cloud storage business. The latest round of cuts comes after Dropbox laid off around 500 people in early 2023 to redirect efforts to its AI division.
“We’re making more significant cuts in areas where we’re over-invested or underperforming while designing a flatter, more efficient team structure overall,” writes Dropbox CEO Drew Houston in a blog post titled An update from Drew. At the same time, Houston mentions that the market is moving towards where the company placed its “biggest bets,” which includes Dropbox’s Dash AI search product.
For its second-quarter earnings this year in August, Dropbox reported an increase of 63,000 paid users quarter over quarter, which is light compared to its total 18 million-plus user base. As reported by TechCrunch, Q2 was Dropbox’s slowest growth in company history, and its shares lost more than 20 percent of their value year to date in August.
Houston says Dropbox will say more about its 2025 strategy to grow its core business and speed up new products in the coming days. Affected employees will get sixteen weeks of severance pay, equity, bonus plan lump sums, payouts of approved leave, and immigration consultation for those on work visas. Dropbox says most of the payouts will take place in fiscal Q4 2024.

Image: Dropbox

Dropbox is cutting its workforce by 20 percent today — laying off 528 people — amid slowing growth for its core cloud storage business. The latest round of cuts comes after Dropbox laid off around 500 people in early 2023 to redirect efforts to its AI division.

“We’re making more significant cuts in areas where we’re over-invested or underperforming while designing a flatter, more efficient team structure overall,” writes Dropbox CEO Drew Houston in a blog post titled An update from Drew. At the same time, Houston mentions that the market is moving towards where the company placed its “biggest bets,” which includes Dropbox’s Dash AI search product.

For its second-quarter earnings this year in August, Dropbox reported an increase of 63,000 paid users quarter over quarter, which is light compared to its total 18 million-plus user base. As reported by TechCrunch, Q2 was Dropbox’s slowest growth in company history, and its shares lost more than 20 percent of their value year to date in August.

Houston says Dropbox will say more about its 2025 strategy to grow its core business and speed up new products in the coming days. Affected employees will get sixteen weeks of severance pay, equity, bonus plan lump sums, payouts of approved leave, and immigration consultation for those on work visas. Dropbox says most of the payouts will take place in fiscal Q4 2024.

Read More 

It has been a while since the MCU really felt like a cohesive place, but Marvel’s new slate of upcoming Disney Plus shows makes it seem like the studio is ready to tighten things up.
Ahead of Agatha All Along’s season 1 finale tonight, Marvel shared a new sizzle reel highlighting all of its upcoming projects that will carry the MCU into its Sixth Phase. After Agatha All Along and Deadpool & Wolverine (which starts streaming on November 12th), the third and final season of What If…? is set to premiere on December 22nd. Jeff Trammell’s animated Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man series will debut the following month on January 29th, and introduce a new take on Peter Parker (Hudson Thames). On March 4th, Daredevil Born Again begins with a new story in the MCU centered around Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox), Vincent Fisk / Kingpin (Vincent D’Onofrio), and Frank Castle / Punisher (Jon Bernthal).
Later that summer, Ironheart starring Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams (who appeared in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever) will debut on June 24th. And the Black Panther spinoff miniseries Eyes of Wakanda premieres on August 6th. Marvel Zombies, another Marvel Animation-produced spinoff, hits Disney Plus some time in October. But in December, Marvel’s closing out the year with its live-action Wonder Man project starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Simon Williams and Ben Kingsley as Trevor Slattery.
Curiously absent from the sizzle reel is any mention of X-Men ‘97’s second season, but that probably means we can expect to see it some time in 2026 along with the new Vision-centric show.

It has been a while since the MCU really felt like a cohesive place, but Marvel’s new slate of upcoming Disney Plus shows makes it seem like the studio is ready to tighten things up.

Ahead of Agatha All Along’s season 1 finale tonight, Marvel shared a new sizzle reel highlighting all of its upcoming projects that will carry the MCU into its Sixth Phase. After Agatha All Along and Deadpool & Wolverine (which starts streaming on November 12th), the third and final season of What If…? is set to premiere on December 22nd. Jeff Trammell’s animated Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man series will debut the following month on January 29th, and introduce a new take on Peter Parker (Hudson Thames). On March 4th, Daredevil Born Again begins with a new story in the MCU centered around Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox), Vincent Fisk / Kingpin (Vincent D’Onofrio), and Frank Castle / Punisher (Jon Bernthal).

Later that summer, Ironheart starring Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams (who appeared in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever) will debut on June 24th. And the Black Panther spinoff miniseries Eyes of Wakanda premieres on August 6th. Marvel Zombies, another Marvel Animation-produced spinoff, hits Disney Plus some time in October. But in December, Marvel’s closing out the year with its live-action Wonder Man project starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Simon Williams and Ben Kingsley as Trevor Slattery.

Curiously absent from the sizzle reel is any mention of X-Men ‘97’s second season, but that probably means we can expect to see it some time in 2026 along with the new Vision-centric show.

Read More 

Impossibly small, incredibly convenient. Space internet is the reason I’ve been able to work from some very remote locations over the last two years, ever since I subscribed to what was then called Starlink RV. Now, SpaceX has launched the diminutive Starlink Mini. It changes the game for portable connectivity.
The $599 Starlink Mini combines the terminal and Wi-Fi router into a single dish that’s so efficient, it can be powered by a portable battery, despite needing to lock onto a constellation of Starlink satellites traveling at speeds of 17,000mph about 350 miles above the Earth.
Hell, the whole thing fits into a small backpack with room left over for a laptop, folding solar panel, and a pocket-size USB-C power bank, offering hours of connectivity. That makes the Starlink Mini ideal for anyone like me looking to combine remote work with off-grid adventures by foot, bike, boat, or van — either for an extended weekend trip or as a lifestyle.
I recently bought the Starlink Mini, which I’ve been testing when hiking, vanlifing, and at home in the city. It’s not quite as fast as my large and unwieldy residential dish, with its motorized stand and separate Wi-Fi router. But the Starlink Mini is more than capable of supporting connectivity speeds required for both work and play.
After more than a month of regular use in five European countries with up to 10 active devices on the same connection, I can say that if you’re looking for fast internet with low (enough) latency that you can deploy quickly in places where 4G and 5G don’t reach, then the Starlink Mini is for you.

The Mini is an angular, rectangular dish with a removable kickstand. It’s about the size of a stack of printer paper and weighs just 2.56 pounds (1.16kg). In my testing, the Starlink Mini consumes less than half the energy of my much larger Standard Actuated dish with its separate Gen 2 router — a huge savings for a device that might be running on battery power 24/7 when mounted on an RV, boat, or off-grid cabin.
For maximum portability, you’ll need the right USB-C cable and a properly specced USB-PD battery. But once you have that figured out, the performance is rather remarkable.

The Starlink Mini must be manually positioned, while the Standard Actuated dish has a motorized mount.

Speeds and trees
I tested the Starlink Mini’s connectivity in several scenarios: head-to-head with my Standard Actuated dish and router placed on the roof of my house; placed inside a backpack on a hike through a forest; and mounted in several locations in and around my Sprinter van to test performance when driving and parked.
Running a speed test on a Starlink system can produce a wide range of results as the dish’s antenna switches between satellites every few minutes. You can see that reflected in the max and min speeds I grabbed for each scenario in the table below:

Just look at those backpack numbers! I didn’t think the Starlink Mini’s 110-degree field of view would be wide enough for the phased array antenna to maintain a satellite connection when carried vertically in a backpack. But once I got a satellite lock by holding the pack horizontal in my hands, I was able to maintain it during a 40-minute loop through the forest, with regular drops due to tree coverage. But the connection always returned in the clearings, allowing me to stream Netflix video.
The other big takeaway is how well the Mini (and its integrated Wi-Fi router) performed on the roof of my van when parked. Sure, the Standard Actuated dish would have been faster, but that would have required me to set up that giant terminal, motorized stand, and separate Wi-Fi router for maybe a 20 percent gain in performance, based on my previous experience. Not worth the trouble.

This gap between my solar panels and windshield was the best location for speed and stability.

The Starlink Mini works well when placed on my dashboard beneath the Sprinter’s huge windshield. Trees, as always, are the enemy.

The Starlink Mini’s integrated Wi-Fi router did mean I had to be more thoughtful about placement compared to the standard array with its separate router. When parked, I found that placing the Mini outside on the roof of my van in the gap between my rigid solar panels and windshield was best. Placing it on top of the solar panels cut performance in half; SpaceX’s support page notes that “Wi-Fi performance is best underneath and behind the Mini.”
Setting the Mini on my van’s giant dashboard worked surprisingly well when parked, but I experienced mixed results when driving. At a standstill, it worked almost as well as putting the dish on the Sprinter’s roof. In fact, the connection was usually faster due to the uninterrupted Wi-Fi signal, but I did experience a few seconds of dropped connections every hour or so. Driving with it on the dashboard even on long, straight stretches of treeless roads in central France was frustrating, as it could only hold onto the connection about 50 percent of the time. But it did far better in Belgium and the Netherlands, where it suffered just a few seconds of lost connection during any 15-minute sample.
I also discovered that the Mini’s orientation doesn’t matter too much. The excellent Starlink app offers to help you find the ideal placement with a superimposed target box placed over the dish that updates in real time as you rotate it — something my Standard Actuated dish does automatically. It’s neat but also not often necessary, according to my testing. As you can see in the table, the download speeds for the Mini placed on a table maximally misaligned (on the horizontal plane) were faster than when it was perfectly aligned! I tested this repeatedly and found that orientation didn’t significantly impact performance so long as the dish was relatively flat.
Overall, upload speeds on the Starlink Mini (like all Starlinks) are pretty slow across the board. Uploading a 4K video often means finding a Wi-Fi connection at a cafe or hunting down a 4G / 5G signal. Otherwise, you can always start an upload at night and hope that it finishes by the morning.
Cables and batteries
Unfortunately, the Mini kit only ships with an AC wall adapter and a 49.2-foot (15m) cable with weather-resistant 5221 barrel jacks on each end. To really take advantage of its portability, you’ll need a properly specced USB-C cable and battery.
The Starlink Mini requires a battery that supports 100W (20V/5A) USB-C power delivery (PD) — something you’ll only find on pricier power banks sold over the last few years. SpaceX explicitly states that the “Starlink Mini will not work with USB PD ratings of 65W or lower.”
I’ve been testing the Mini with a variety of batteries, including a random 140W USB-C PD 3.1 power bank I found on Amazon with a 27,600mAh (99.36Wh) capacity — the legal limit for airplane carry-ons. It powers my Starlink Mini for three hours when mounted on the roof of my home, or about two hours when the dish is in a backpack during a hike.

Hank’s not as impressed as I am with the Starlink Mini in the new Peak Design backpack.

In practice, the Mini requires very little power. I’ve yet to see it pull more than 50W at peak times like startup or when streaming 4K content. During a normal workday in the center of Amsterdam, the Mini consumed an average of about 30W (usually floating between 22–38W) when plugged into a battery. In rural locations, I average between 15–20W, according to the StarLink app. That’s consistent with what the USB-C port on my solar generator was showing, as the Mini pulled between 12–25W while transitioning between satellite connections and dealing with incoming and outgoing data requests.
That’s an energy savings of up to 64 percent
The Starlink Mini is therefore much more efficient than my Standard Actuated Starlink system, which consumes an average of about 42W, in my testing. That’s an energy savings of up to 64 percent — exactly what I want to hear as a budding vanlifer and bikepacker.
But you still need the right cable: one that supports 100W USB-C power delivery and can bung into the Starlink Mini’s 5521 port. SpaceX recently started selling a 16.4-foot (5m) USB-C-to-5521 cable for $31 / €31. After testing a few cables and adapters from Amazon with mixed results, I highly recommend buying the official cable.

This cable and power bank worked but didn’t form a watertight connection to the Starlink Mini. Here, on my roof in Amsterdam, I’m consuming 27W.

The SpaceX USB-C-to-5521 cable must be purchased separately. I wish it were longer.

The SpaceX USB-C cable has two advantages. First, it ensures the Mini maintains its IP67 protection against water and dust ingress. I found some shorter USB-C-to-5521 cables rated for 100W that successfully powered the Starlink Mini, but they left a gap for rain and dust to enter the unit. You’ll need the Mini to be watertight, especially if you’re mounting the dish on the outside of your vehicle for in-motion use.
The other advantage of the SpaceX cable is the small LED on the USB-C end that glows red if the connected battery can’t produce the required 100W. That can be super useful if your family has a stack of random power banks laying about at home (like I do).
I do wish that SpaceX’s USB-C cable were at least as long as the 5521-to-5521 power cable that ships with the Starlink Mini. I could have used that extra 33 feet (10m) when parking too close to a tree because the Mini — like all Starlink terminals — requires a clear view of the sky for optimum performance.
I did try using a 5521 barrel adapter to convert that longer cable to USB-C. It worked for a while, but the Starlink Mini would inevitably reboot after losing power under intense load — probably because the added resistance of the long cable was too much for the power bank to overcome.

Other worthwhile observations:

I can connect to the Starlink Mini and stream video at a distance of over 200 feet so long as the space between me and the Mini is free of obstructions.
If Wi-Fi range is an issue, there’s an RJ45 port on the Mini to hardwire a router into the dish to create a mesh or standalone network. I don’t think I’ll ever need this, and I definitely don’t want to carry the extra gear when traveling, but it does make my Mini a good backup option for my network at home.
Many high-end power stations include 5521 barrel jacks for a direct DC connection to the Starlink Mini. Just make sure it can produce enough power; many can’t.
The Mini dish emits a variable whine that can be annoying when sitting within about five feet of the unit in a silent environment.
Starlink latency is a problem for playing competitive shooters, but it’s fine for casual gameplay. I’ve seen latency hover between 24–32ms, with spikes up to 100ms.
The dish is so small and lightweight that I do worry it’ll blow off the van in a storm (or be stolen at night), but so far, it’s weathered a few squalls (and weirdos) just fine. When I’m feeling cautious, I just move it inside to the dashboard.
My Mini unexpectedly entered into Snow Melt (heating) mode twice: once on top of my van during a rainy and windy storm when it was still 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius) outside; and a second time on the dashboard when it was 64F (18C) inside the van. Power draw hit 50W during the heating cycle, with an average draw of 34W. I turned off automatic heating to save power.

Just as SpaceX warns, you can’t power other USB-C devices by plugging the 5521 end of the SpaceX USB-C cable into the Starlink Mini’s AC adapter. I tried and failed to charge my MacBook Pro, iPhone 15 Pro, and multiple power banks that way, causing the red LED on the cable to flash.

Starlink made this remote work location possible, as it lacked even one bar of 4G.

Pricing for the Starlink Mini varies widely by region. SpaceX sells the kits for less in underserved locations and more “in high-usage areas like the US, where Starlink Mini places additional demand on the satellite network.” Currently, that means the kit costs $599 in the US, but it’s priced closer to $200 in Guatemala. In the Netherlands, I paid €399 (about $438) for the Starlink Mini kit.
You also have to pay for service, which — importantly — can be paused for the months you’re not using it. In the US, the Starlink Mini is available with either the Roam 50GB ($50 / month) plan or Roam Unlimited ($165 / month). Both allow for use anywhere within the country of purchase, internationally “for up to two months per trip,” and on a vehicle moving at speeds of up to 100mph / 160kph on land or up to 12 nautical miles off the coast. I pay €72 / month (about $79 / month) for my Roam Unlimited plan.
For me, the cost of the Starlink Mini kit and subscription are a bargain for the lifestyle it enables. I had considered paying several hundred dollars for a Star Mount just to have my old Standard Actuated dish converted into a 12V system that could be easily powered by a large power station without any of that inefficient AC/DC conversion mess. Now, SpaceX has done all the hard work for me and I get to keep my warranty.
As someone who likes to occasionally live and work as far off the grid as possible, the Starlink Mini is the dish I’ve been waiting for. It’s the most energy-efficient Starlink terminal SpaceX offers, and its most portable by a mile, with only a modest drop in performance. That makes it an absolute game-changer for anyone who wants to stay fully connected in areas too remote for broadband providers to care about. I humbly submit that those are the best places to be.
Photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge

Impossibly small, incredibly convenient.

Space internet is the reason I’ve been able to work from some very remote locations over the last two years, ever since I subscribed to what was then called Starlink RV. Now, SpaceX has launched the diminutive Starlink Mini. It changes the game for portable connectivity.

The $599 Starlink Mini combines the terminal and Wi-Fi router into a single dish that’s so efficient, it can be powered by a portable battery, despite needing to lock onto a constellation of Starlink satellites traveling at speeds of 17,000mph about 350 miles above the Earth.

Hell, the whole thing fits into a small backpack with room left over for a laptop, folding solar panel, and a pocket-size USB-C power bank, offering hours of connectivity. That makes the Starlink Mini ideal for anyone like me looking to combine remote work with off-grid adventures by foot, bike, boat, or van — either for an extended weekend trip or as a lifestyle.

I recently bought the Starlink Mini, which I’ve been testing when hiking, vanlifing, and at home in the city. It’s not quite as fast as my large and unwieldy residential dish, with its motorized stand and separate Wi-Fi router. But the Starlink Mini is more than capable of supporting connectivity speeds required for both work and play.

After more than a month of regular use in five European countries with up to 10 active devices on the same connection, I can say that if you’re looking for fast internet with low (enough) latency that you can deploy quickly in places where 4G and 5G don’t reach, then the Starlink Mini is for you.

The Mini is an angular, rectangular dish with a removable kickstand. It’s about the size of a stack of printer paper and weighs just 2.56 pounds (1.16kg). In my testing, the Starlink Mini consumes less than half the energy of my much larger Standard Actuated dish with its separate Gen 2 router — a huge savings for a device that might be running on battery power 24/7 when mounted on an RV, boat, or off-grid cabin.

For maximum portability, you’ll need the right USB-C cable and a properly specced USB-PD battery. But once you have that figured out, the performance is rather remarkable.

Speeds and trees

I tested the Starlink Mini’s connectivity in several scenarios: head-to-head with my Standard Actuated dish and router placed on the roof of my house; placed inside a backpack on a hike through a forest; and mounted in several locations in and around my Sprinter van to test performance when driving and parked.

Running a speed test on a Starlink system can produce a wide range of results as the dish’s antenna switches between satellites every few minutes. You can see that reflected in the max and min speeds I grabbed for each scenario in the table below:

Just look at those backpack numbers! I didn’t think the Starlink Mini’s 110-degree field of view would be wide enough for the phased array antenna to maintain a satellite connection when carried vertically in a backpack. But once I got a satellite lock by holding the pack horizontal in my hands, I was able to maintain it during a 40-minute loop through the forest, with regular drops due to tree coverage. But the connection always returned in the clearings, allowing me to stream Netflix video.

The other big takeaway is how well the Mini (and its integrated Wi-Fi router) performed on the roof of my van when parked. Sure, the Standard Actuated dish would have been faster, but that would have required me to set up that giant terminal, motorized stand, and separate Wi-Fi router for maybe a 20 percent gain in performance, based on my previous experience. Not worth the trouble.

The Starlink Mini’s integrated Wi-Fi router did mean I had to be more thoughtful about placement compared to the standard array with its separate router. When parked, I found that placing the Mini outside on the roof of my van in the gap between my rigid solar panels and windshield was best. Placing it on top of the solar panels cut performance in half; SpaceX’s support page notes that “Wi-Fi performance is best underneath and behind the Mini.”

Setting the Mini on my van’s giant dashboard worked surprisingly well when parked, but I experienced mixed results when driving. At a standstill, it worked almost as well as putting the dish on the Sprinter’s roof. In fact, the connection was usually faster due to the uninterrupted Wi-Fi signal, but I did experience a few seconds of dropped connections every hour or so. Driving with it on the dashboard even on long, straight stretches of treeless roads in central France was frustrating, as it could only hold onto the connection about 50 percent of the time. But it did far better in Belgium and the Netherlands, where it suffered just a few seconds of lost connection during any 15-minute sample.

I also discovered that the Mini’s orientation doesn’t matter too much. The excellent Starlink app offers to help you find the ideal placement with a superimposed target box placed over the dish that updates in real time as you rotate it — something my Standard Actuated dish does automatically. It’s neat but also not often necessary, according to my testing. As you can see in the table, the download speeds for the Mini placed on a table maximally misaligned (on the horizontal plane) were faster than when it was perfectly aligned! I tested this repeatedly and found that orientation didn’t significantly impact performance so long as the dish was relatively flat.

Overall, upload speeds on the Starlink Mini (like all Starlinks) are pretty slow across the board. Uploading a 4K video often means finding a Wi-Fi connection at a cafe or hunting down a 4G / 5G signal. Otherwise, you can always start an upload at night and hope that it finishes by the morning.

Cables and batteries

Unfortunately, the Mini kit only ships with an AC wall adapter and a 49.2-foot (15m) cable with weather-resistant 5221 barrel jacks on each end. To really take advantage of its portability, you’ll need a properly specced USB-C cable and battery.

The Starlink Mini requires a battery that supports 100W (20V/5A) USB-C power delivery (PD) — something you’ll only find on pricier power banks sold over the last few years. SpaceX explicitly states that the “Starlink Mini will not work with USB PD ratings of 65W or lower.”

I’ve been testing the Mini with a variety of batteries, including a random 140W USB-C PD 3.1 power bank I found on Amazon with a 27,600mAh (99.36Wh) capacity — the legal limit for airplane carry-ons. It powers my Starlink Mini for three hours when mounted on the roof of my home, or about two hours when the dish is in a backpack during a hike.

Hank’s not as impressed as I am with the Starlink Mini in the new Peak Design backpack.

In practice, the Mini requires very little power. I’ve yet to see it pull more than 50W at peak times like startup or when streaming 4K content. During a normal workday in the center of Amsterdam, the Mini consumed an average of about 30W (usually floating between 22–38W) when plugged into a battery. In rural locations, I average between 15–20W, according to the StarLink app. That’s consistent with what the USB-C port on my solar generator was showing, as the Mini pulled between 12–25W while transitioning between satellite connections and dealing with incoming and outgoing data requests.

The Starlink Mini is therefore much more efficient than my Standard Actuated Starlink system, which consumes an average of about 42W, in my testing. That’s an energy savings of up to 64 percent — exactly what I want to hear as a budding vanlifer and bikepacker.

But you still need the right cable: one that supports 100W USB-C power delivery and can bung into the Starlink Mini’s 5521 port. SpaceX recently started selling a 16.4-foot (5m) USB-C-to-5521 cable for $31 / €31. After testing a few cables and adapters from Amazon with mixed results, I highly recommend buying the official cable.

The SpaceX USB-C cable has two advantages. First, it ensures the Mini maintains its IP67 protection against water and dust ingress. I found some shorter USB-C-to-5521 cables rated for 100W that successfully powered the Starlink Mini, but they left a gap for rain and dust to enter the unit. You’ll need the Mini to be watertight, especially if you’re mounting the dish on the outside of your vehicle for in-motion use.

The other advantage of the SpaceX cable is the small LED on the USB-C end that glows red if the connected battery can’t produce the required 100W. That can be super useful if your family has a stack of random power banks laying about at home (like I do).

I do wish that SpaceX’s USB-C cable were at least as long as the 5521-to-5521 power cable that ships with the Starlink Mini. I could have used that extra 33 feet (10m) when parking too close to a tree because the Mini — like all Starlink terminals — requires a clear view of the sky for optimum performance.

I did try using a 5521 barrel adapter to convert that longer cable to USB-C. It worked for a while, but the Starlink Mini would inevitably reboot after losing power under intense load — probably because the added resistance of the long cable was too much for the power bank to overcome.

Other worthwhile observations:

I can connect to the Starlink Mini and stream video at a distance of over 200 feet so long as the space between me and the Mini is free of obstructions.
If Wi-Fi range is an issue, there’s an RJ45 port on the Mini to hardwire a router into the dish to create a mesh or standalone network. I don’t think I’ll ever need this, and I definitely don’t want to carry the extra gear when traveling, but it does make my Mini a good backup option for my network at home.
Many high-end power stations include 5521 barrel jacks for a direct DC connection to the Starlink Mini. Just make sure it can produce enough power; many can’t.
The Mini dish emits a variable whine that can be annoying when sitting within about five feet of the unit in a silent environment.
Starlink latency is a problem for playing competitive shooters, but it’s fine for casual gameplay. I’ve seen latency hover between 24–32ms, with spikes up to 100ms.
The dish is so small and lightweight that I do worry it’ll blow off the van in a storm (or be stolen at night), but so far, it’s weathered a few squalls (and weirdos) just fine. When I’m feeling cautious, I just move it inside to the dashboard.
My Mini unexpectedly entered into Snow Melt (heating) mode twice: once on top of my van during a rainy and windy storm when it was still 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius) outside; and a second time on the dashboard when it was 64F (18C) inside the van. Power draw hit 50W during the heating cycle, with an average draw of 34W. I turned off automatic heating to save power.

Just as SpaceX warns, you can’t power other USB-C devices by plugging the 5521 end of the SpaceX USB-C cable into the Starlink Mini’s AC adapter. I tried and failed to charge my MacBook Pro, iPhone 15 Pro, and multiple power banks that way, causing the red LED on the cable to flash.

Pricing for the Starlink Mini varies widely by region. SpaceX sells the kits for less in underserved locations and more “in high-usage areas like the US, where Starlink Mini places additional demand on the satellite network.” Currently, that means the kit costs $599 in the US, but it’s priced closer to $200 in Guatemala. In the Netherlands, I paid €399 (about $438) for the Starlink Mini kit.

You also have to pay for service, which — importantly — can be paused for the months you’re not using it. In the US, the Starlink Mini is available with either the Roam 50GB ($50 / month) plan or Roam Unlimited ($165 / month). Both allow for use anywhere within the country of purchase, internationally “for up to two months per trip,” and on a vehicle moving at speeds of up to 100mph / 160kph on land or up to 12 nautical miles off the coast. I pay €72 / month (about $79 / month) for my Roam Unlimited plan.

For me, the cost of the Starlink Mini kit and subscription are a bargain for the lifestyle it enables. I had considered paying several hundred dollars for a Star Mount just to have my old Standard Actuated dish converted into a 12V system that could be easily powered by a large power station without any of that inefficient AC/DC conversion mess. Now, SpaceX has done all the hard work for me and I get to keep my warranty.

As someone who likes to occasionally live and work as far off the grid as possible, the Starlink Mini is the dish I’ve been waiting for. It’s the most energy-efficient Starlink terminal SpaceX offers, and its most portable by a mile, with only a modest drop in performance. That makes it an absolute game-changer for anyone who wants to stay fully connected in areas too remote for broadband providers to care about. I humbly submit that those are the best places to be.

Photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge

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Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo from Getty Images

Waymo has long touted its ties to Google’s DeepMind and its decades of AI research as a strategic advantage over its rivals in the autonomous driving space. Now, the Alphabet-owned company is taking it a step further by developing a new training model for its robotaxis built on Google’s multimodal large language model (MLLM) Gemini.
Waymo released a new research paper today that introduces an “End-to-End Multimodal Model for Autonomous Driving,” also known as EMMA. This new end-to-end training model processes sensor data to generate “future trajectories for autonomous vehicles,” helping Waymo’s driverless vehicles make decisions about where to go and how to avoid obstacles.
But more importantly, this is one of the first indications that the leader in autonomous driving has designs to use MLLMs in its operations. And it’s a sign that these LLMs could break free of their current use as chatbots, email organizers, and image generators and find application in an entirely new environment on the road. In its research paper, Waymo is proposing “to develop an autonomous driving system in which the MLLM is a first class citizen.”
End-to-End Multimodal Model for Autonomous Driving, also known as EMMA
The paper outlines how, historically, autonomous driving systems have developed specific “modules” for the various functions, including perception, mapping, prediction, and planning. This approach has proven useful for many years but has problems scaling “due to the accumulated errors among modules and limited inter-module communication.” Moreover, these modules could struggle to respond to “novel environments” because, by nature, they are “pre-defined,” which can make it hard to adapt.
Waymo says that MLLMs like Gemini present an interesting solution to some of these challenges for two reasons: the chat is a “generalist” trained on vast sets of scraped data from the internet “that provide rich ‘world knowledge’ beyond what is contained in common driving logs”; and they demonstrate “superior” reasoning capabilities through techniques like “chain-of-thought reasoning,” which mimics human reasoning by breaking down complex tasks into a series of logical steps.

Screenshot: Waymo
Waymo’s EMMA model.

Waymo developed EMMA as a tool to help its robotaxis navigate complex environments. The company identified several situations in which the model helped its driverless cars find the right route, including encountering various animals or construction in the road.
Other companies, like Tesla, have spoken extensively about developing end-to-end models for their autonomous cars. Elon Musk claims that the latest version of its Full Self-Driving system (12.5.5) uses an “end-to-end neural nets” AI system that translates camera images into driving decisions.

This is a clear indication that Waymo, which has a lead on Tesla in deploying real driverless vehicles on the road, is also interested in pursuing an end-to-end system. The company said that its EMMA model excelled at trajectory prediction, object detection, and road graph understanding.
“This suggests a promising avenue of future research, where even more core autonomous driving tasks could be combined in a similar, scaled-up setup,” the company said in a blog post today.
But EMMA also has its limitations, and Waymo acknowledges that there will need to be future research before the model is put into practice. For example, EMMA couldn’t incorporate 3D sensor inputs from lidar or radar, which Waymo said was “computationally expensive.” And it could only process a small amount of image frames at a time.
There are also risks to using MLLMs to train robotaxis that go unmentioned in the research paper. Chatbots like Gemini often hallucinate or fail at simple tasks like reading clocks or counting objects. Waymo has very little margin for error when its autonomous vehicles are traveling 40mph down a busy road. More research will be needed before these models can be deployed at scale — and Waymo is clear about that.
“We hope that our results will inspire further research to mitigate these issues,” the company’s research team writes, “and to further evolve the state of the art in autonomous driving model architectures.”

Emma Paper by ahawkins8223 on Scribd

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo from Getty Images

Waymo has long touted its ties to Google’s DeepMind and its decades of AI research as a strategic advantage over its rivals in the autonomous driving space. Now, the Alphabet-owned company is taking it a step further by developing a new training model for its robotaxis built on Google’s multimodal large language model (MLLM) Gemini.

Waymo released a new research paper today that introduces an “End-to-End Multimodal Model for Autonomous Driving,” also known as EMMA. This new end-to-end training model processes sensor data to generate “future trajectories for autonomous vehicles,” helping Waymo’s driverless vehicles make decisions about where to go and how to avoid obstacles.

But more importantly, this is one of the first indications that the leader in autonomous driving has designs to use MLLMs in its operations. And it’s a sign that these LLMs could break free of their current use as chatbots, email organizers, and image generators and find application in an entirely new environment on the road. In its research paper, Waymo is proposing “to develop an autonomous driving system in which the MLLM is a first class citizen.”

The paper outlines how, historically, autonomous driving systems have developed specific “modules” for the various functions, including perception, mapping, prediction, and planning. This approach has proven useful for many years but has problems scaling “due to the accumulated errors among modules and limited inter-module communication.” Moreover, these modules could struggle to respond to “novel environments” because, by nature, they are “pre-defined,” which can make it hard to adapt.

Waymo says that MLLMs like Gemini present an interesting solution to some of these challenges for two reasons: the chat is a “generalist” trained on vast sets of scraped data from the internet “that provide rich ‘world knowledge’ beyond what is contained in common driving logs”; and they demonstrate “superior” reasoning capabilities through techniques like “chain-of-thought reasoning,” which mimics human reasoning by breaking down complex tasks into a series of logical steps.

Screenshot: Waymo
Waymo’s EMMA model.

Waymo developed EMMA as a tool to help its robotaxis navigate complex environments. The company identified several situations in which the model helped its driverless cars find the right route, including encountering various animals or construction in the road.

Other companies, like Tesla, have spoken extensively about developing end-to-end models for their autonomous cars. Elon Musk claims that the latest version of its Full Self-Driving system (12.5.5) uses an “end-to-end neural nets” AI system that translates camera images into driving decisions.

This is a clear indication that Waymo, which has a lead on Tesla in deploying real driverless vehicles on the road, is also interested in pursuing an end-to-end system. The company said that its EMMA model excelled at trajectory prediction, object detection, and road graph understanding.

“This suggests a promising avenue of future research, where even more core autonomous driving tasks could be combined in a similar, scaled-up setup,” the company said in a blog post today.

But EMMA also has its limitations, and Waymo acknowledges that there will need to be future research before the model is put into practice. For example, EMMA couldn’t incorporate 3D sensor inputs from lidar or radar, which Waymo said was “computationally expensive.” And it could only process a small amount of image frames at a time.

There are also risks to using MLLMs to train robotaxis that go unmentioned in the research paper. Chatbots like Gemini often hallucinate or fail at simple tasks like reading clocks or counting objects. Waymo has very little margin for error when its autonomous vehicles are traveling 40mph down a busy road. More research will be needed before these models can be deployed at scale — and Waymo is clear about that.

“We hope that our results will inspire further research to mitigate these issues,” the company’s research team writes, “and to further evolve the state of the art in autonomous driving model architectures.”

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The latest video shared by Boston Dynamics demonstrates the new Atlas robot’s autonomous navigation and handling capabilities. | Screenshot: YouTube

Boston Dynamics has shared another look at the latest version of its humanoid robot, Atlas. Earlier videos of the all-electric robot demonstrated its unique range of motions, but this time Atlas is shown using machine learning and its upgraded sensors to perform sorting tasks in a simulated factory environment.
The task of moving engine covers “between supplier containers and a mobile sequencing dolly” isn’t especially exciting, but it demonstrates several of the new robot’s capabilities working together. After being provided with only a “list of bin locations to move parts between,” Atlas uses various sensors and machine learning models to determine the location of bins and how it needs to manipulate its body, arms, and three-fingered hands to grasp and relocate the parts inside them.

The new Atlas is capable of completing the assigned task and reacting to environmental feedback in real time. At one point in the video a part is positioned a little too high to easily slide into one one of the sequencing dolly’s compartments. When the robot meets resistance, it removes the part and then re-evaluates its orientation and position before making an adjustment and trying again successfully.
As is also evident by the “Fully Autonomous” watermark on the video the entire time, Boston Dynamics is trying to emphasize that its latest humanoid robot can perform complex tasks with minimal human intervention. A few weeks ago it was revealed that Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robots that were mingling with guests and serving drinks during the company’s Cybercab reveal were mostly being controlled remotely by human operators.
As with its other robots like the four-legged Spot and the one-armed Stretch, the new Atlas may one day be more than just a platform for Boston Dynamics to demonstrate its latest and greatest technology. But that’s assuming its advanced capabilities don’t come with an outrageous price tag.

The latest video shared by Boston Dynamics demonstrates the new Atlas robot’s autonomous navigation and handling capabilities. | Screenshot: YouTube

Boston Dynamics has shared another look at the latest version of its humanoid robot, Atlas. Earlier videos of the all-electric robot demonstrated its unique range of motions, but this time Atlas is shown using machine learning and its upgraded sensors to perform sorting tasks in a simulated factory environment.

The task of moving engine covers “between supplier containers and a mobile sequencing dolly” isn’t especially exciting, but it demonstrates several of the new robot’s capabilities working together. After being provided with only a “list of bin locations to move parts between,” Atlas uses various sensors and machine learning models to determine the location of bins and how it needs to manipulate its body, arms, and three-fingered hands to grasp and relocate the parts inside them.

The new Atlas is capable of completing the assigned task and reacting to environmental feedback in real time. At one point in the video a part is positioned a little too high to easily slide into one one of the sequencing dolly’s compartments. When the robot meets resistance, it removes the part and then re-evaluates its orientation and position before making an adjustment and trying again successfully.

As is also evident by the “Fully Autonomous” watermark on the video the entire time, Boston Dynamics is trying to emphasize that its latest humanoid robot can perform complex tasks with minimal human intervention. A few weeks ago it was revealed that Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robots that were mingling with guests and serving drinks during the company’s Cybercab reveal were mostly being controlled remotely by human operators.

As with its other robots like the four-legged Spot and the one-armed Stretch, the new Atlas may one day be more than just a platform for Boston Dynamics to demonstrate its latest and greatest technology. But that’s assuming its advanced capabilities don’t come with an outrageous price tag.

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Image: CD Projekt Red

Cyberpunk 2077 is making the jump to Macs. According to Apple’s announcement video for the new, M4-equipped MacBook Pros, CD Projekt Red’s sci-fi RPG will be available on Macs “early next year.”
“Taking full advantage of Apple silicon and advanced technologies of Metal, the world of the dark future is available to Mac gamers for the very first time,” CD Projekt Red says in an announcement. “Players can enjoy advanced features like path tracing, frame generation, and built-in Spatial Audio for even more immersive gameplay and stunning visuals.

The game will be available on the Mac App Store and on Steam when it launches next year. The version that’s launching on Mac is the Ultimate Edition that includes the very good Phantom Liberty expansion, and CD Projekt Red says that “existing PC Steam purchases of the game” will carry over to the Mac. You’ll need to have a Mac with Apple Silicon to play it.
Cyberpunk 2077 first launched in 2020, and while it had an infamously rocky release, the game is in great shape now.

Image: CD Projekt Red

Cyberpunk 2077 is making the jump to Macs. According to Apple’s announcement video for the new, M4-equipped MacBook Pros, CD Projekt Red’s sci-fi RPG will be available on Macs “early next year.”

“Taking full advantage of Apple silicon and advanced technologies of Metal, the world of the dark future is available to Mac gamers for the very first time,” CD Projekt Red says in an announcement. “Players can enjoy advanced features like path tracing, frame generation, and built-in Spatial Audio for even more immersive gameplay and stunning visuals.

The game will be available on the Mac App Store and on Steam when it launches next year. The version that’s launching on Mac is the Ultimate Edition that includes the very good Phantom Liberty expansion, and CD Projekt Red says that “existing PC Steam purchases of the game” will carry over to the Mac. You’ll need to have a Mac with Apple Silicon to play it.

Cyberpunk 2077 first launched in 2020, and while it had an infamously rocky release, the game is in great shape now.

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Image: Apple

Apple’s week of episodic hardware releases continues today with a new video announcing the updated MacBook Pros with M4, M4 Pro, and M4 Max chips. Their announcement follows the updated M4 iMac on Monday and the redesigned M4 Mac Mini on Tuesday.
Like the iMac and Mac Mini videos, the new MacBook Pro video is available to watch on Apple’s website by clicking the “watch the announcement” link on the product page or over on the company’s YouTube channel. This video yet again starts with Apple’s SVP of engineering, John Ternus, doing the hardware reveal honors. He says it’s “packed with pro features, Apple Intelligence, and Apple silicon that’s more powerful than ever before.” Then he opens the new notebook and a gust of wind blows his hair back.

Image: Apple

Next comes senior engineering program manager for Mac systems Trevor McLeod who reveals that the new entry M4 MacBook Pro, still starting at $1,599, now comes in space black color, which was previously reserved for the higher-end specs. McLeod says the new 14-inch M4 is up to 1.8 times faster than the M1 for tasks like editing photos and has a neural engine that’s “up to 3 times more powerful than in M1,” which helps make Apple Intelligence features perform better. Like the iMac and Mac Mini, the MacBook Pro line has also shed the anemic 8GB RAM base option and now starts with 16GB for the entry-level model with the M4 chip.
Meanwhile, the M4 Pro version of the MacBook Pro now starts with 24GB of RAM instead of 18GB from the M3 Pro version. According to Apple’s VP of platform architecture, Tim Millet, the higher-end M4 Max chip option has 16 CPU cores and 40 GPU cores. Plus, it has more than half a terabyte per second of unified memory bandwidth that has “four times the bandwidth of the latest AI PC chip.” Apple also flashed a CPU performance chart that promises the M4 Max is 1.2 times faster than the M3 Max.
Apple has also announced an updated MacBook Air with its minimum RAM bumped to 16GB.

Image: Apple

Apple’s week of episodic hardware releases continues today with a new video announcing the updated MacBook Pros with M4, M4 Pro, and M4 Max chips. Their announcement follows the updated M4 iMac on Monday and the redesigned M4 Mac Mini on Tuesday.

Like the iMac and Mac Mini videos, the new MacBook Pro video is available to watch on Apple’s website by clicking the “watch the announcement” link on the product page or over on the company’s YouTube channel. This video yet again starts with Apple’s SVP of engineering, John Ternus, doing the hardware reveal honors. He says it’s “packed with pro features, Apple Intelligence, and Apple silicon that’s more powerful than ever before.” Then he opens the new notebook and a gust of wind blows his hair back.

Image: Apple

Next comes senior engineering program manager for Mac systems Trevor McLeod who reveals that the new entry M4 MacBook Pro, still starting at $1,599, now comes in space black color, which was previously reserved for the higher-end specs. McLeod says the new 14-inch M4 is up to 1.8 times faster than the M1 for tasks like editing photos and has a neural engine that’s “up to 3 times more powerful than in M1,” which helps make Apple Intelligence features perform better. Like the iMac and Mac Mini, the MacBook Pro line has also shed the anemic 8GB RAM base option and now starts with 16GB for the entry-level model with the M4 chip.

Meanwhile, the M4 Pro version of the MacBook Pro now starts with 24GB of RAM instead of 18GB from the M3 Pro version. According to Apple’s VP of platform architecture, Tim Millet, the higher-end M4 Max chip option has 16 CPU cores and 40 GPU cores. Plus, it has more than half a terabyte per second of unified memory bandwidth that has “four times the bandwidth of the latest AI PC chip.” Apple also flashed a CPU performance chart that promises the M4 Max is 1.2 times faster than the M3 Max.

Apple has also announced an updated MacBook Air with its minimum RAM bumped to 16GB.

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