Max Weinbach
As seen in:
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LinkedIn,
XDA Developers,
9to5Mac,
Flipboard,
Android Police,
Tinh Te,
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Creative Strategies,
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Covers:
Phones, computers, software, wearables, 5G, foldables
Doesn't Cover:
Not much
Analyst @creativestrat | Analyst and Market Research Firm | Typo ignorer
Email: max@creativestrategies.com
Articles by Max Weinbach
The Asus Zenbook A16 is the first premium Snapdragon laptop, if you buy the right one
Normally I don’t talk about specs in a review. The spec sheet is not the product. The overall experience is the product, and the overall experience on this laptop is good. Not my favorite in the world, but good. I’m breaking my rule this time because the person considering this laptop is the most spec-driven, value-driven buyer in the market. This is a MacBook Air style machine, and MacBook Air cross-shoppers do math, but focused on performance over all else. So let’s talk about the Zenbook A16.
Boring is Best: The Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x is My Default Snapdragon Laptop
I’m now on day three of product reviewing, and today I’m looking at the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x with the Snapdragon X2 Elite. This is a laptop that gets almost everything right. Good products tend to be boring, and that’s exactly what makes this machine so impressive.
iPhone Duo Review: Apple Nailed This iPhone
The funny part of writing reviews/reports/talking about hardware is you never really know what you want to talk about until you sit down to write about it. When doing this for the iPhone Duo, I've spent the past week (technically 6 days, but close enough) using it and thinking about what I wanted to talk about and felt was important to understand the device.
RTX Spark: Entering the Age of Preference
By Max Weinbach We're in the age of preference. RTX Spark gets Windows close enough to the performance I've liked so much in the M5 Macs that the computer I want to use becomes a much more interesting question. The operating system, the design, and the configuration I prefer can carry a lot more weight now. Apple has been building chips with this approach for about five years: a powerful CPU and GPU sharing a large pool of memory in a laptop.
The Agentic CPU Guidebook
Go deeper with this research in CS Atlas:Subscribers with access can use Atlas to explore the technical companion, compare CPU architectures, and work through the assumptions behind our forecast.
M5 Ultra Mac Studio: Frankly, It’s Overpowered
The M5 Ultra Mac Studio is insanely good. For how I work, it is the most compelling local AI machine I’ve used, and frankly it feels overpowered. I can have a capable model loaded, agents doing real work, Xcode open, and still use the computer normally. I keep trying to find the point where I have to choose between pushing the GPU and getting on with everything else, and so far I haven’t found it. My configuration has 256GB of unified memory, but memory alone only gets a model onto the machine.
Apple’s AI Strategy Starts With the iPhone
One of the more important ideas Apple put forward at its event was also one of the most familiar. The iPhone is becoming your personal intelligence hub. Think about what that product needs: your personal context, a screen, cameras, microphones, connectivity, and other devices connected to it. A product that is with you throughout the day and already helps you navigate your life. That sounds like a pretty good AI product to me. There has been a lot of discussion about what comes after the smartphone.
Google's new event strategy is great
This may sound weird to those who aren't in the media/influencer/analyst/tech event scene, which is likely the vast majority of people reading this, but I want to talk about something that I found very interesting over the past two Made by Google Pixel events. Google has a new strategy around this, where the news embargo and videos from tech creators come out a few hours before the actual event. The last year it was around 2 hours before, this year it's 8 hours before.
Intel’s New G3 Extreme Shows Why PC Handhelds Will Keep Growing
I have a habit when I review gaming hardware: I use the review as an excuse to finally play something I have been putting off. The RTX 5090 was my excuse to play Alan Wake 2, and I loved that game. The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ became my excuse to restart Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, a game I bought a PlayStation 5 to play and then never finished. I am not much of a controller person, and gaming handhelds have never fit into my life.
GPT-5.6, the Diligence Stack Agent Bench, and Why Practical Agent Benchmarks Need to Get Real
Most AI benchmarks still do a mediocre job of explaining how useful models are in the kinds of agentic workflows businesses actually care about. That is not because benchmarks are useless. They are useful. But many of them are still optimized around narrow tasks, coding-heavy environments, academic-style reasoning problems, or synthetic prompts that do not look much like how knowledge workers actually use AI systems.
State of Models, August 2026: What the Major Models Do Well and What They Cost
Editor’s note: This report is based on our daily use of the models and the testing behind CS Bench. We identify which findings come from the benchmark and which reflect our judgment. The rankings are current as of August 2026. Exhibit 1 groups the models into five classes based on the work they can complete reliably inside an agent system. The Diligence Stack has covered the AI market broadly. This is our first full assessment of the models themselves.
M5 Apple Silicon: It’s All About the Cache And Tensors
Today is a big day, M5 Day! I say this because I believe M5 is a bigger deal than the products it’s in. That’s not to say these products are bad, quite the opposite: they are so good and have been so good for so many years that it’s hard to think of anything meaningful to say. The iPad Pro is the best tablet on the market. The MacBook Pro is the best all around $1600+ laptop on the market. For the iPad Pro, that’s been true since 2018 and for the MacBook Pro that’s been true since 2021.
Max Weinbach
About Notable technology analyst and journalist known for his insights into consumer technology. He has earned a considerable following on his X account and has built a reputation for his expertise and writing style, making him a notable voice in the tech community. Before Fame He attended Fairfield University. Trivia He has worked as an analyst at Creative Strategies, Inc. and as a part-time contributor for 9to5Google, where he pens reviews, editorials, and other content related to technology.
Pro Optional: The Year the iPhone Was About Feel
Yesterday was the iPhone launch, and it was actually a refreshing one. It was one of the first years that I think I had decently low expectations going in, but was incredibly surprised (and delighted) coming out. This is partly because for the first time in years, quite a few of the leaks, rumors, and reports leading up to the event were pretty wrong. The other part is just how drastic the change to the iPhones was after seeing them in person. Specs and images really do not do these devices justice.
What’s up with ChatGPT & GPT-5?
OpenAI finally released GPT-5 last week, and there has been quite a lot of discourse on the internet about its quality. Some users have a great impression, others not so much. Some are mourning the loss of a friend, others are just happy to have a more intelligent model with free access. There is a lot of confusion, a lot of questions, and a lot of varying opinions. To be clear, there are a few models in the GPT-5 series. There’s GPT-5, GPT-5 Mini, GPT-5 Nano, and GPT-5 Chat.
The SoC Revolution: Apple Proves High-End Gaming and All-Day Battery Life Can Coexist
Last October Apple announced Cyberpunk 2077 was coming to macOS with full optimization for Metal and Apple Silicon. The second I heard that, I got excited because that meant Cyberpunk 2077 was the first AAA game to get proper care and optimization to make sure it ran well on macOS and Apple Silicon.
Unpacked 2025: Samsung’s foldables are so back
Last week was Samsung Unpacked, specifically Unpacked focusing on the Galaxy Z Fold 7, Z Flip 7, and Galaxy Watch 8 series. These launches mark a pivotal moment for the broader smartphone market, signaling Samsung’s drive to make foldables mainstream by marrying a familiar phone feel with flagship‑grade capabilities. The Fold 7 is probably the best foldable on the global market, and finally hits an important milestone for foldables: it feels like a completely normal phone while closed.
Generative‑AI Study: Usage & Attitudes
At the end of last year we ran a study with 900‑respondent online survey, fielded December 1 – 15, 2024 among U.S. adults 18+. All percentages are of the total sample unless otherwise stated. After diving into the data, thanks in no small part to ChatGPT (shoutout to o3-pro!), some fascinating patterns have emerged across both consumer and enterprise behaviors.
Apple WWDC 2025: A more helpful Apple
I hate to steal Google’s tagline for this I really don’t but this year felt like Apple trying to make platforms more helpful. There’s this general consensus that Apple is behind in AI, missing out on chatbots and ignoring what most consider to be the next generation of experiences. The common saying is chat is the new UI, and everything will be conversational. Apple isn’t there yet, nor do they want to be. Apple made that very very very clear in interviews after the event.
Google I/O 2025: Gemini, AI Search, and the Evolving Business Model
AI-Centric I/O: Google I/O 2025 heavily focused on Gemini AI and its integration across Google’s ecosystem, particularly Search, signaling a major strategic shift towards an AI-driven future. Android-specific news was largely separated. Gemini Model Advancements: Continued evolution of the Gemini family (2.5 Pro, Flash) including a new “Deep Think” reasoning mode, alongside powerful multimodal features (seeing, understanding, talking, creating via tools like Imagen 4 and Veo 3).
Beyond Tracking: Whoop MG Review - A Deep Dive into Healthspan and Preventative Health
There’s been a pretty big trend recently in healthy living and health/wellness. Alcohol consumption is trending down, gym memberships are trending upwards with utilization also trending upwards, mostly because of GenZ. The interest in health and wellness is at all time highs. Wearables like Oura Ring and Whoop are also becoming even more popular, with people just wanting to know more about their health and wellness, and everything that has to do with it like sleep, stress, and exercise.
We Do Not Have Enough Compute
We are in a huge AI compute shortage right now. At this very moment! When you hear most people talk about this, it’s generally in regards to model scaling and compute scaling for training. Not enough compute so labs can’t scale up the scaling laws.
A weekend with Apple’s Mac Studio with M3 Ultra: The only real AI workstation today
Executive Summary: The Apple Mac Studio featuring the M3 Ultra represents the most powerful AI workstation currently available, tailored specifically toward AI developers’ demanding workflows. With its unprecedented unified memory (up to 512GB) and robust GPU performance, the M3 Ultra Mac Studio excels at running large language models (LLMs) efficiently, surpassing even high-end PCs in practical AI workloads.
AI Generated Post Earnings Report: Intel
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REPORT: Copilot+ PCs and a New Category of AI PC
CoPilot+ PCs and a New Category of AI PC Personal computing is at a unique inflection point with generative AI. Perhaps one we have not seen since the introduction of the graphical user interface. With a tremendous amount of excitement for AI enhanced software running on our computers, the NPU provides such an increase in local AI performance that a new era of Windows is enabling a new category of computers powered by AI.
REPORT: TOPS of the Morning to You
Given there is a new standard in measuring NPU performance capabilities, it is critical we have a better understanding of the relationship between NPU TOPS and the relationship of TOPS as a metric and AI performance. While we completely agree, TOPS is a difficult metric to measure real-world AI performance, we think of it in terms of CPU GHz measurements in terms of knowing potential raw performance of the NPU.
REPORT: Developer Spotlight - Cephable
Developer Spotlight: Cephable Cephable is an accessibility software platform that allows users to control technology using various input methods beyond the traditional keyboard and mouse. Cephable’s software enables users to control computers, applications, and digital devices using alternative inputs like voice commands, facial expressions, head motions, body gestures, and virtual buttons.
REPORT: What Makes the NPU Unique
What Makes the NPU Unique Now that AI is front and center, the NPU has become more important than ever for computing devices. But what differentiates the NPU and why is it better suited than CPUs and GPUs for many AI workloads? When looking specifically at the NPU’s role, it is its dedicated role on AI workloads we think can’t be overstated. While the CPU and GPU have capabilities to run AI workloads, they also have a myriad of other jobs and functions.
Review: Honor Magic V2 RSR is a pricier version of the most impressive foldable
Foldables have come a long way over the past few years. Last September, I had the opportunity to play with the Honor Magic V2. At the time, it was the thinnest, coolest, and most technically advanced foldable I had ever felt, and it arguably still is. It was nearly as thin as any normal candy bar phone, had a massive battery, support for a stylus on both displays, and impressive camera specs.
Honor doubles down on silicon battery tech for better energy storage with 5,600 mAh in Magic 6 Pro
Silicon-carbon batteries may be the future of mobile batteries, offering better energy density and saftey in a more sustainable battery. In its upcoming Magic 6 Pro, Honor is showing off the extreme testing that the new battery can survive in. This technology has been around for a while, but, until last year, it really wasn’t used in any consumer products. That changed with the Honor Magic 5 Pro in China, which had the first consumer Silicon-carbon battery.
Honor Magic V2 RSR and Magic 6 series set to launch globally at MWC
It’s becoming a busy time for tech with CES and Galaxy Unpacked just a few weeks ago, and now MWC is coming up at the end of the month. That means new phones, and Honor is coming to the MWC stage with a global launch on February 25th for its latest foldable and the Magic 6 series. At this event, Honor is going to announce global pricing and availability for the recently teased Porsche Design Honor Magic V2 RSR as well as global availability of the Honor Magic 6 series.
These are 9to5Google's favorite phones of 2023 – what's yours? [Poll]
Smartphones have, in big ways, become more and more of the same. Just about everything has a good camera, good battery life, and a good screen. So, really, everything comes down to personal preference. As the year 2023 comes to a close, the 9to5Google team has picked out our favorite phones of the year and, to my own personal surprise, that’s coming with a huge level of variety. Alright, so, let’s reveal our favorites.
Review: JBL Authentics 300 is a Google Assistant speaker that hits all the right notes Original
Smart speakers were a craze for a while, but the hype has very much died down in recent years. With the JBL Authentics 300, though, it’s clear that there’s finally a Google Assistant speaker worth your time, and it has great sound, design, and cross-compatibility with Amazon Alexa. The JBL Authentics 300 speaker caught my eye right away with its retro design. The leather-like enclosure and vintage-inspired grille pay homage to JBL’s iconic speakers of the past.
I've used Whoop's new AI coach for 2 weeks, and it's a game-changer
“Game-changer” is a term that’s become overused, but after two weeks using Whoop’s new AI Coach on the health-focused fitness wearable, I’m serious when I say it’s game-changing. Today Whoop announced the new Whoop AI coach. It’s an AI-based chatbot powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4 model with access to all of your personal Whoop data and metrics.
Honor teases launch of two new foldables coming at IFA 2023 Original
Late 2023 is becoming the time for foldables. Samsung just launched the Z Flip 5 and Z Fold 5, Google’s Pixel Fold is now widely available, OnePlus has a foldable on the schedule for the end of the year, and now Honor has just announced that it will be showing off not one, but two foldables at its IFA 2023 launch event. The company has confirmed that it will be announcing two foldable smartphones at the event.
Hands-on: Honor 90 is a midrange phone with a flagship display, and it’s glorious
Most midrange phones try to find the middle ground of hardware, with every aspect taking a little hit, so the overall device is equally good. OK cameras, OK build, OK battery, OK performance, etc. Every once in a while, manufacturers try to put the part it finds most important at the forefront, which is exactly what Honor did with the Honor 90, which has one of the best displays I’ve seen on any mobile phone, but it costs just $430.
Answering your Nothing Phone (2) questions: Haptics, hardware, Verizon support, and more
The Nothing Phone (2) just launched this week. It’s a great phone but with every new launch, there are plenty of questions. Below are a few of the best questions I’ve found from the 9to5Google comments on the Phone (2) with answers after two weeks of use. Feel free to post more questions in the comments, and we’ll do our best to answer them as we see them! Yeah, it feels significantly better in hand. The frame is thinner now, and the slight curve to the back glass makes it feel better.
dbrand’s Something (dark) skins bring the Nothing look to Pixel, iPhone, Mac, and more Original
Last year, dbrand released their Something skins, which took the Nothing Phone (1) design language, and customized it to devices like the Pixel 6 Pro, Galaxy S22 Ultra, and iPhone 13 Pro to mimic the design language on those devices. To celebrate the launch of the Nothing Phone (2), dbrand is at it again with Something(dark), a black colorway of their Something skins. These skins, just like the white colorway, were each modeled individually for the device they’re designed for.
Why users are switching from Windows PC to Mac
Apple’s Mac sales are at all time highs with pretty major growth, while there may be some post-pandemic correction in play for the whole PC market, the overall trajectory of Mac sales is looking great. Apple is doing something right with the Mac to convince PC users to switch from Windows PC to Mac. Based on some of our own data, we have a good idea of what Apple is doing that resonates with buyers, to the point at which they are switching at record numbers.
Motorola Razr+ lets you use front display as a camera preview in any app [Gallery]
Today Motorola announced the new Motorola Razr+ with the massive new front display. You can run full apps on it, watch movies in HDR, and even use it as a viewfinder preview for Instagram, TikTok, and others while recording from the rear cameras. The Razr+ software allows the phone to mirror the rear cameras to the front display in any app that uses it. It was enabled by default for Instagram and TikTok, and likely will be other apps, but can manually be toggled in any app of your choosing.
Honor's Magic Vs folding is coming to the UK for £1,399
Honor is gearing up to launch its highly anticipated foldable smartphone, the Honor Magic Vs, in the UK, just a few months after it’s MWC announcement. Honor is new to the global foldable market. It’s first foldable, Honor Magic V, was announced in early 2022 in China only. It was a slimmer, lighter, and nearly flat folding version of the Galaxy Z Fold3. With the Magic Vs, it’s not only going global starting with the UK, but it’s getting it’s own footing with a simplified hinge and no gap design.
HTC teases new U-series smartphone joining its ‘Viverse’
HTC hasn’t been serious about the phone game for years. It even sold part of its mobile business to Google for the Pixel product line five years ago. With a niche phone here and there, like last year’s HTC Desire 22 Pro metaverse phone, they’re not totally out of it, and now, the company is teasing another new entry for 2023. HTC’s last U series flagship phone launched in June 2018 with the HTC U12+.
Pixel Fold leak details full specs, free Pixel Watch perk, more
There have been quite a few leaks for the Pixel Fold over the past week. Thanks to Jon Prosser of Front Page Tech, we now have all of the detailed specs for the Pixel Fold. Jon starts out by confirming the $1,799 price for the Pixel Fold. It will come in Chalk and Obsidian 256GB at that $1,799 price, while the 512GB will be available for $1919 in Obsidian only. To alleviate some of the pain of the price, Google will be offering a free Pixel Watch for everyone who pre-orders the foldable.
Source: Pixel 7a to start at $499, available in stores May 11
Google’s Pixel 7a is just a few weeks away, rumored to launch at Google I/O 2023 on May 10. This phone is set to be the successor to Google’s Pixel 6a, arguably the best-value phone of 2022. Thanks to a retail source, we now have the price for Pixel 7a. Sources: Pixel Tablet will have 8GB of RAM, four colors, and this included dock 9to5Google can confirm that the price of Pixel 7a will be $499, a $50 increase over last year’s model.
Xiaomi 13 Ultra will be announced on April 18th
Xiaomi just announced its launch event for the Xiaomi 13 Ultra which will take place on April 18. The event, titled “A shot above” is being used to announce the Xiaomi 13 Ultra, the true flagship of the Xiaomi 13 series. Xiaomi announced the Xiaomi 13 and 13 Pro at MWC a few months ago. The Ultra promises to be more improved and more impressive versions of those devices, which pack Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2.
Honor Magic 5 Pro Review: Magic is in the eye of the beholder
For years, Honor was known as the Huawei sub-brand focused on budget devices, but after the Huawei-US issues, Honor split off from Huawei and became its own company. This has allowed Honor to really show what its mobile technology can do. Last year’s Honor Magic 4 Pro had some of the best hardware but was hampered by poor camera software. Now, the Honor Magic 5 Pro fixes that, while providing one of the best all-around devices with interesting software choices.
Messaging is no longer Android’s mess, it’s an iPhone problem: Talking RCS with Hiroshi Lockheimer Original
A few weeks ago, at MWC 2023, I had an opportunity to sit down with Hiroshi Lockheimer, senior vice president of Platforms and Ecosystems at Google, to talk about RCS messaging. While there was not a lot into the future of what Google is planning with Google Messages and RCS as a protocol, I did get a good look into how RCS came to be and how Google sees it. 9to5Google has a rebooted newsletter that highlights the biggest Google stories with added commentary and other tidbits.
Honor launches Honor Magic Vs foldable globally alongside Honor Magic 5 Pro
Today at Honor’s “Unleash the Power of Magic” event at MWC, it announced the global launch of two new phones: Honor Magic Vs and Honor Magic 5 Pro. Honor Magic Vs is Honor’s first foldable phone to launch outside of China. The Honor Magic Vs has a similar design to the Galaxy Z Fold 4 but with a thinner body and no gap between the two halves of the device. Honor Magic Vs is running a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1, which is slightly outdated compared to the current 2023 flagship Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip.
Exclusive: iPhone 15 CADs reveal larger 6.2-inch display, Dynamic Island, and more
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Exclusive: iPhone 15 CADs reveal larger 6.2-inch display, Dynamic Island, and more Original
Apple’s iPhone 15 is still months away from being announced, but we have some exciting news to share with you today. Just a week after we posted exclusive renders of the iPhone 15 Pro based off CAD files, we managed to obtain 3D CAD files for the iPhone 15, which reveal some of the design changes and features that Apple is planning for its next-generation smartphone. One of the most noticeable changes is that the iPhone 15 will ditch the notch for a Dynamic Island instead.
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