There's not much evidence that any upgrade actually happened. The photo show someone has managed to desolder the RAM & SSD chips, which isn't really news.
Also, looks like they only upgrade the 8GB/256SSD to 16G/1TB SSD, which is a supported configuration, so at best this is someone skilled at soldering BGA parts.
I'd be more interested if someone had managed to get 32GB RAM working.
Maybe not GP directly, but this could be a possibility for an "upgrade as a service".
I have no idea what the cost of desoldering and resoldering the modules is, but given Apple's markup on RAM and SSD, it might make it worthwhile, just as there are many shops doing repairs on iPhones.
I've thought of this myself. As devices get more integrated, it could be worth having a professional with the right tools and machinery to upgrade laptops/phone/tablets by unsoldering and re-soldering in new modules.
Upgrade your RAM for cheaper, replace NAND Flash modules near their write capacity or slowing down with fresh ones, breathing new life into a device...
There might be a market for it, also it would be an eco friendly way of upgrading old devices so they remain usable instead of throwing them away and creating more e-waste
You'd be surprised what chinese smart phone repair shops in Shenzen can do with tiny parts. Soldering Macbook BGA parts will be trivial in comparison. I don't think there is a western equivalent to this though.
The market is already fairly flooded with the lowest spec models, while the higher-spec ones are more sought after - for a new device each upgrade step costs 300€.
What I find outrageous is that consumers accept the fact that their expensive new Mac has become a non upgradable black box. Apparently, years of exposure to the dependency from tight closed cellphones did the job.
Long gone are the days of the Apple II; I still recall it being labeled as the best possible home computer for being so open to expansion and tinkering.
the connectors for storage and ram can be very low profile. There is no reason any sane layout with connectors would add to the thickness. Its especially egregious storage is a soldered device. Not just from an upgrade standpoint but data recovery point of view.
If some other part fails and basically makes the device a brick there is now no easy way to recover the data.
I've got this old HP-42s calculator here in front of me, which has no viable upgrade path, and adjusted for inflation it was more expensive than an entry level M1.
I have an HP-67 and an HP-97 as well, neither of which has any upgrade path and they each cost half as much as a new economy car when they came out.
They were different products for different tasks, and the fact that they can still be used after decades shows how much they're different from a computer, particularly a modern computer.
Today not being able to upgrade the RAM or storage, or having a non replaceable battery can mean halving the life of a product, which in today figures would not be like 15 years instead of 30 but rather 2.5 instead of 5.
My X240 isn't yet 10 years old, but as of today is among the fastest machines in my house: It literally flies with Debian+XFCE. It's remarkable how long hardware can last if we ditch bloated software.
All the iDevices (including laptops since at least T1) use the same NAND packages. Pre-iPhone 8 / T2 devices use a BGA60 package, while NANDs in devices after that use a BGA110 package.
For example, the NAND chip found in the iFixit teardown of the 2019 16 inch (TSB4227) is explicitly listed as supported by the programmer linked above: https://i.imgur.com/06a0KEg.jpg
There's a video of a western guy living in China learning to desolder Flash memory chips from an iPhone and then solder higher capacity chips in their place from back in 2018.
Being in Shenzhen China, he was able to buy the needed tools and many broken boards to practice on, and eventually managed to do it on a live board himself.
Actually this news is still not confirmed well since there is no evidence. However with all these customized iDevices things from Shenzhen guys, I think it's likely true.
Wait for further investigation.
I think, starting in May, Chinese engineers will be ready to upgrade the M1 to M1X for you for a separate fee and 3 months before the start of official sales. :)
The pedantic in me will just obsess over the fact that the CPU cover plate is now cut in half and it will now affect heat dissipation and cause crashes.
What kind of details? It's all pictured really - find the memory or storage chips, replace the chips. It's difficult/impossible without specialised tools, but nice that the OS accepts this modification without throwing a wobbly.
Its generally a little more than removing the chips with a hot air rework station, and soldering larger ones. I am sure the sizes of the RAM and flash chips is also set in firmware on the main SoC. You would also have to update those values in firmware.
Also, looks like they only upgrade the 8GB/256SSD to 16G/1TB SSD, which is a supported configuration, so at best this is someone skilled at soldering BGA parts.
I'd be more interested if someone had managed to get 32GB RAM working.