Accidental Tech Podcast

685: The Ability to Be Hotter

April 1, 2026 02:15:38 • Download (131 MB)

Farewell, Mac Pro.

Pre-show:
- Happy independence day, John!
- The Great Saunter
  - Pedometer++
- The AI Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist
🗣️ New ATP Member Special: ATP Tier List: Home Screen Icons
- More about the flag
Follow-up:
- Overcast transcripts
  - Missed Apex
- MacBook Neo
  - Tim Cook on the MacBook Neo launch
  - New Ice Book? (via Adrian Bengtson)
    - iBook “Snow”
  - Teardown by Framework founder Nirav Patel
    - Framework
  - MacBook Neo vs. Chromebooks
    - “NFW”, says Henry
    - “This could be a breath of fresh air”, says Ari
- “Medium” Core and M5 Pro/Max information from Apple
  - Chance Miller at 9to5 Mac
    - Original article 🇩🇪
  - PCI Express
- Ubiquiti
  - What about site-to-site VPN for Marco?
    - UniFi Travel Router
  - “Not so fast, my friend” re: Wi-Fi 7 MLO
    - YouTube announcement
    - Blog post
  - Some shadiness from January
🪦 RIP, Mac Pro 🪦
- Thoroughly Considered #123: The Last Detail with John Siracusa
- CUDA
Ask ATP:
- Are we running any iOS apps in macOS? (via Alex Kent)
- How would we balance new shiny vs. familiarity? (via Michael Brescher Jr.)
Post-show: John and Marco bicker about islands
- Merriam-Webster’s definition of “mainland”
Members-only ATP Overtime: 🥚 Update
- 10 February: Delayed to 2027
- 20 February: Smart speaker with a camera?
  - The Information

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ATP Tier List: Home Screen Icons

March 27, 2026

Ranking the app icons on our iPhone home screens, including built-in Apple apps, third-party apps, and — somewhat awkwardly — even our own.

This episode is exclusive to our members. Join now to listen!

684: It’s Not What Young People Do

March 26, 2026 01:55:14 • Download (111 MB)

WWDC 2026 hopes, the state of passkeys, more on podcast transcripts, and how businesses manage fleets of Macs.

Follow-up:
- Overcast & Transcriptions
  - Marco had never seen inside a datacenter
  - What about podcasts that include their own transcripts (via Matt King)
  - What is Marco using for a job queue? Perhaps Faktory? (via Drew Stephenson)
    - beanstalkd
    - Ansible
  - Monitoring & control interface
  - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of the minis… (via Aaron Dippner)
    - System X
    - RDMA over Thunderbolt was added in macOS 26.2
    - I Ran a Trillion Parameter AI on a Mac
    - Apple Didn’t Have to Go This Hard
    - Apple Insider
  - Mac fleet management advice
    - Apple Business
- AirPods Max popularity in New York
WWDC 2026 Announced
Ask ATP
- What’s the deal with passkeys, anyway? (via Phillip Miller)
  - XKCD
- Does having an 8 GB RAM computer keep macOS lean? (via Jon Fabritius)
- Will we get an iPhone or iPad Pro that will use macOS when connected to a display? (via Keith Heaton)
  - Michael Cook’s contrary opinion
Post-show: Casey is continuing to quiet quit his Synology
Members-only ATP Overtime: How Apple will add touch support to macOS

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683: I Didn’t Want to Melt My Rug

March 19, 2026 02:21:48 • Download (140 MB)

MacBook Neo hands-on, Studio Display XDR eyes-on, and how Overcast is transcribing podcasts at scale.

Follow-up:
- You’re welcome, world
- Formula 1
  - A brief, renewed pitch to watch this season
  - Cameras
    - Are not a large portion of the coverage (via Matt Rigby)
    - Failures don’t [usually] matter (via The Racing Line)
      - Great camera overview video
  - The other perk of in-car footage (via Eric Fox)
  - On getting Sky Sports replays (via Brendan Webb)
- Rosetta
  - A deep dive from Colin McKellar
  - Instant Final Cut Pro deprecation warning (via Tom Obarski)
- iPhone 17e teardown
- MacBook Neo
  - Gruber on the camera & mic on-screen indicators
    - Apple Platform Security Guide
    - On Apple Exclaves (Medium link)
  - CPU benchmark correction (via Philipp Sommer)
  - SSD benchmarks (via Vito Traino)
  - John’s and Marco’s hands-on impressions
  - Teardowns
    - Tech Re-Nu
    - iFixIt
      - Video
      - Blog post
AirPods Max 2
- Newsroom
- John wins the bet (Overcast timestamp link)
- Apple’s compare page
Overcast beta now has transcripts!
Post-show Neutral: BMW i3 Revealed
- The Verge
- Ars Technica
Members-only ATP Overtime: Apple’s 27 OSes and Liquid Glass
- Gurman on 15 February
- Gurman on 15 March

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682: Medium Core

March 12, 2026 02:16:48 • Download (132 MB)

MacBook Neo details, Studio Display XDR tech and impressions, Marco tries a Garmin, and Casey tries to watch F1.

Pre-show: Casey brings us back to Anniversary Corner
- Related episode of ATP
Follow-up:
- An explanation for John’s post that broke containment (via Thomas Dickson)
- MacBook Neo
  - John’s theory about color & clamshells
  - The M1 MacBook Air was American Walmarts only. (via Pierre-Luc Gagné)
    - Aside also via P-L: does the Neo run Rosetta 2?
  - MacBook Neo inputs 🤝 iPad Air inputs (via Andrew Larson)
  - SSD speeds (via The Verge)
  - The  logo
    - iPhone 5 intro video is what John was thinking of (via Peter Puleio)
    - Jason’s review
  - Dave2D’s review
  - Teardown
  - Tyler Stalman on the Neo running “pro” apps
- Performance Cores vs. Super Cores
  - New in Xcode 24.6β3: CPUFAMILY_ARM_SOTRA (H17S) (via Brendan Shanks)
    - H17S is the missing M5 Pro identifier from iOS 26.3 RC
  - Quinn’s review
    - M5 Pro & Max are on N3P; M5 is N3E
    - Baidu leakers
      - Super cores (“P-Core”)
        
        4.61 GHz
        
        10-wide decoding
      - Performance cores (“M-Core”)
        
        4.38 GHz
        
        7-wide decoding
        
        ~70% the performance of a Super Core
        
        Dual operating mode from efficiency cores
      - Efficiency cores (“E-Core”)
        
        3.05 GHz
        
        6-wide decoding
  - Andrew Cunningham at Ars
    - L2 cache
      - Super: 16 MB
      - Performance: 8 MB
      - Efficiency: 6MB
    - Minimum clock speed:
      - Super: 1,308 MHz
      - Performance: 1,344 MHz
      - Efficiency: 972 MHz
  - Fusion architecture (via Frederic_Orange)
- MacBook Pro Storage pricing (via Richard Allen)
- MacBook keyboard glyphs (via Dan Moren)
- Environmental progress (via Andrew Leahey)
  - TOSTracker
  - Example individual comparison
- Third-party displays (via Dan Boyle)
- Pro Display XDR or Studio Display XDR? (asked by Imthaz)
- Studio Display XDR
  - UFO Test
  - MKBHD’s review states it has 12 GB RAM 🤭
  - Studio Display XDR white paper (PDF) (via Kevin Sliech)
    - Superwide viewing angle
    - Timing controller (TCON)
    - Calibration
    - Display optimization modes
Formula 1 news
- Drive to Survive (Apple TV link)
- Dad jokey-est promo video (Also on YouTube)
- 2026 season preview
- F1TV vs. Apple TV
  - Link accounts
- Romain Grosjean’s
Samsung Galaxy S26 Privacy Display
- MKBHD
- The Verge
Post-show: Marco’s Garmin adventures
Members-only ATP Overtime: The future of x86_64 on macOS
- Tahoe 26.4 warnings
- Slightly more detail from Ars Technica

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