Review: The Mac Studio shows us exactly why Apple left Intel behind

Enlarge / Apple's Mac Studio desktop. (credit: Andrew Cunningham)

Apple Silicon Macs have gotten more interesting the deeper into the transition we've gotten. The MacBook Air, 13-inch MacBook Pro, and Mac mini all looked and felt exactly like the Macs they replaced, just with better performance and much better battery life. The 24-inch iMac and 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros were throwbacks to the colorful G3 iMacs and titanium PowerBooks from two decades ago. And now we've gotten to the Mac Studio, the first totally new Apple Silicon Mac.

The Studio reminds me of a few Macs we've seen before-it's sort of a trashcan Mac Pro by way of the PowerMac G4 Cube. It borrows elements of the Mac Pro and the Mac mini, but it replaces neither. It's both a glimpse at what is possible now that Apple is leaving the Intel era behind, and yet another recommitment to the Mac as a powerful and flexible platform for getting work done.

It's not quite the mythical midrange xMac" workstation of yore, but it's as close as we've ever gotten. That's an exciting place to be.

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