Tell HN: Apple not letting removal of AI models on macOS 27 is outrageous
I feel like there's not enough outrage over Apple not removing their Apple Intelligence models on macOS 27 even after disabling Siri. I have a 512 GB Mac mini but because I have so much data, I also have a 2 TB monthly iCloud subscription. I have Siri AI turned off. Yet, my storage settings show 30 GB is occupied by useless Apple Intelligence models which I don't use. And these models can't even be moved to my 2 TB iCloud subscription. It's really pissing me off. I feel like there needs to be a lot more negative publicity about this to get Apple's attention. More tech blogs should be writing about how horrible of a decision this is. I am hoping this post does that.
Discussion Highlights (13 comments)
lode
While I agree with you, there is an unofficial (and reversible) tool which can help you reclaim this space: https://github.com/omlahore/RemoveMacAI (to be complete: it seems to be based on https://github.com/4evy/pared ) discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49957116
monkellipse
100% agreed, outrageous. Sadly I don’t know what else to say or do, feels like shouting into the wind at this point…
aeturnum
I also do not use them - but there are lots of bits of the OS that I don't use and AI does not feel different to me. Given its many uses and that there are people who are enthusiastically adopting it I think adding it makes sense and you can't totally remove most other OS features so it feels odd to expect it here.
blauervogel
I am having the MacBook Air M1 with 256gb. I won’t upgrade until the removal is possible
throwuxiytayq
Apple still only start treating their own users with respect once we lawfully require them to support Linux on all Apple devices. Which is what we should be doing.
anon48293
I personally feel that whatever storage is being advertised, ought to be actually user-usable storage. 100gb storage, but 10gb is OS and 20gb is reserved for other nonsense? Fine, but then you ought to only be allowed to advertise as having 70gb storage. Same for cloud storage. And whilst we’re at it, internet speeds with “up to” speeds. Seems like a worthy citizen initiative to get the EU to look at.
dyauspitr
Hopefully this finally forces Apple to offer much higher storage on their base models. That being said, I don’t mind these on device models because it gives app developers an additional tool to do on device processing rather than pay for compute on the cloud.
robthebrew
does nobody read comments? https://github.com/4evy/pared
Simulacra
Downgrade. Golden Gate is a golden pile of poo. Took me two hours but now I'm happily back on Sequoia
anilgulecha
No better time, specially with open source apps seeing a huge growth, than now, to give Linux a chance. I recommend Fedora Silverblue - hassleless, secure, fully auto updated, easy to setup.
RhysU
You're outraged that Apple is exerting control over its closed ecosystem? It's... Apple. You surrendered this control long ago. There were and are alternatives.
altairprime
We already have had threads this past month where we largely agree with your annoyance; yet another one isn’t going to influence Apple further, as they do not in general acknowledge or care about outrage posts on HN. Support call tickets are, however, meaningful to them. You’ll have much better luck opening an AppleCare support case via phone call about unexpected disk space usage one day after an upgrade and then asking them how to free the 20GB of space used; I encourage having set up the computer beforehand so that it has 25GB of space free before the update and take screenshots.
VCFundedGenYer
This has been covered to death already. Please search and read before making yet another thread.