The so - called "5G laptop" that Apple may launch doesn't face difficulties in technology at all.

Recently, there have been reports indicating that Apple may be considering introducing 5G cellular network connectivity to its MacBook series of laptops. The relevant products could potentially enter mass production and hit the market as early as 2026.

Interestingly, Apple seems to have developed a prototype with 3G network connectivity as early as 2007. At that time, they even designed an elegant retractable antenna on the outside edge of the screen for that prototype. However, for some unknown reason, this model was never launched, and Apple didn't engage in the planning of "cellular network-enabled" MacBooks for a long time afterwards.

Recent rumors suggest that Apple's renewed confidence in the cellular network connectivity function of the MacBook models is largely because they may have finalized their second-generation self-developed 5G baseband, the rumored C2 chip.

It is reported that the C2 not only supports the Sub-6GHz frequency band but also adds support for millimeter-wave 5G networks. Friends who have been following various 5G network-related news in the past two years may know that millimeter-wave networks indeed perform better than Sub-6GHz networks in terms of peak rate and performance in densely populated areas.

From this perspective, Apple's choice to wait for the maturity of its self-developed 5G baseband before developing the "MacBook 5G" may not only be for better market promotion but also to avoid a poor user experience of the device in scenarios such as office buildings, exhibitions, and sports venues. In fact, this is in line with Apple's consistent style of not being the first to try new things and waiting for the technology to be fully mature before implementation.

But are laptops with 5G connectivity, or those with built-in cellular network connectivity, really something new? Or was the previous technology really "immature"?

In fact, as early as 2020, just over a year after the commercialization of 5G in China, some manufacturers had already launched foldable laptops with 5G connectivity. It used a rather early "hybrid architecture" x86 processor (i5-L16G7) at that time and provided 5G network connectivity through an externally attached 5G baseband.

It should be noted that don't think that "externally attached 5G basebands" are unreliable. At present, whether it's Intel, AMD, or Qualcomm, they all rely on externally attached basebands to achieve 5G connectivity on laptops and haven't integrated it directly into the main chip.

There are several reasons for this. On the one hand, the 5G function is still relatively niche in laptops. Designing an integrated chip specifically for it would result in high costs that outweigh the benefits. Moreover, from previous reports, the "externally attached baseband" solutions of each company are jointly developed. Their compatibility and performance have been repeatedly verified and are not like Wi-Fi network cards, which can be used by simply plugging one in (there may be strange bugs).

On the other hand, although externally attached basebands have a slight disadvantage in terms of power consumption, this difference is mainly noticeable in devices like smartphones where power consumption is a major concern. For a device the size of a laptop, the slight power consumption difference caused by an internally or externally attached baseband may not even be as obvious as the power saved by turning down the volume. Moreover, the large surface area of a laptop makes it much easier to arrange 5G antennas. It can accommodate a large number of antennas without worrying about blockage during use.

In conclusion, for laptops, the technology of "built-in 5G connectivity" can be considered quite mature. Not only is power consumption not a problem at all, but according to feedback from relevant users, the network speed and signal performance of "5G laptops" are actually often better than those of 5G mobile phones and far superior to 5G portable Wi-Fi devices.

So, the question arises. If there is no technical threshold for "built-in 5G" in laptops, why are there not many relevant devices on the market until now? Why does the "MacBook 5G" attract attention and may even stimulate competitors to "follow the trend" again?

On the one hand, this is of course related to the way people use laptops. As is well known, compared with desktop computers, the advantage of laptops is their portability. They can be put in a bag, carried around, and used at any time.

However, this doesn't mean that most people use laptops while on the move. In fact, many users' daily usage scenarios are quite "fixed." For example, some office workers are used to bringing their laptops to work and using them at their desks, perhaps only valuing the data confidentiality advantage brought by the portability. Another example is on college campuses. Many students prefer to use laptops rather than desktop PCs, and their reason may even be simply that laptops consume less power and are less likely to cause the dormitory circuit breaker to trip.

In contrast, users like us who often need to take out laptops for work during business trips, on transportation, at airports, or in conference venues are actually in the minority. And from our actual experience, it would of course be more convenient if laptops could connect to 5G networks on their own. But even without this function, we can still get the job done with a mobile phone hotspot or portable Wi-Fi.

On the other hand, if you pay attention to the information about some laptops with built-in cellular network functions (not limited to 5G) on the market, you will find that these devices often "give away" data packages in various ways. And the data package allowances are often quite large, much larger than the common "data cards" on mobile phones.

What does this mean? In fact, it means that relevant manufacturers are well aware that although laptops with built-in cellular networks may be a bit more "convenient" than using a mobile phone hotspot or portable Wi-Fi, this "convenience" alone is not enough to convince users to buy. So, only by adding a large data package that users can't get elsewhere can the advantages of such devices be truly reflected and form sufficient market competitiveness.

However, on the one hand, there may not be many users with a strong demand. On the other hand, the service of providing a large (or even unlimited) data package itself also brings considerable cost pressure. Under the combination of these two factors, even though the technology of built-in cellular networks and built-in 5G connectivity in laptops is actually not difficult, there are still very few products that choose this as a selling point.

[The pictures in this article are from the Internet] 

This article is from the WeChat official account “3eLife” (ID: IT - 3eLife). The author is 3eLife. It is published by 36Kr with authorization.