Clever branding, Apple.
Well, the new update that rolled out alongside the rather uneventful iMac announcement is like upgrading from OS X Leopard to Snow Leopard, but without all the fanfare Jobs liked to do. I'm not complaining. It is still macOS Sequoia, after all. That's not my problem. My issue is, well, what we promised versus what we got.
While Apple Intelligence is technically a new feature under the hood, it is still Siri we are presented with. 15.1 provides, to quote the late Jobs, "0 new features." It involves refinements and improvements to existing software without providing anything new. Normally, this would be okay if that was advertised at WWDC, but it wasn't. I was really looking forward to Genmoji. That is my biggest criticism.
However, what we got is still welcome. The biggest improvement is how you use Siri. You now have a third option to activate it: double tap a button or key, or, if you're a touch device, bottom of the screen. Then you can begin chatting to it. This is soo much better than awkwardly yelling at the computer just to know the weather or turn on the lights. For as long as Siri has been out, I've never used it because of how infamously inconsistent it used to be. Now it's just a double tap or press away, and I can just ask it whatever without feeling like I'm talking to a brick wall. Will it still be as janky as before? I have no idea. This is just my impression of a beta.
As for other features, that I can't say for sure. I was handed a lower-end M1 Mac Mini from a close friend. It means that memory and space are tight. Despite that, I love it. For a low-end Mac, it is the best experience I've had. But while macOS is incredibly efficient (though still nothing like Haiku OS on even the most shittiest desktops), when Apple Intelligence attempts to rewrite content, it consumes resources like you wouldn't believe! Not just RAM but storage space, too.
Despite my mixed review, it is welcome to have these features on first-generation hardware. They let you know they're there without being intrusive. Can't say the same for Microsoft's can of worms. With this new Siri, I can easily access utilities without having to fight it.
