13 ms·

The bizarre role reversal of Apple and Microsoft

227 points by steven 10y ago

BipolarElsa 10y ago
When M$FT profits are double Apple's then we'll talk about "role reversal"...
- skylan_q 10y ago
  Heh heh heh... that'll show the author.
- fluxsauce 10y ago
  > M$FT I'm sorry, are you from the past?
  - TelmoMenezes 10y ago
    "Hacker" as in "Hacker News" is from an even more distant past. The word just got appropriately decaffeinated, so as to be acceptable within our current iteration of group think.
    - oldmanjay 10y ago
      Is the groupthink in this case laughing at the anachronistic usage of M$?
      - TelmoMenezes 10y ago
        No. The groupthink is what causes the usage of M$ to be anachronistic now, and also what made it fashionable at some point in the past. Treating subjective opinions as objective facts and laughing at members of the out-group are symptoms of being engaged in groupthink. Nothing wrong (or right) with any of that. I'm just observing.
    - greenshackle2 10y ago
      I tried going to a 'hacker' meetup in my city. It was disappointing. I was asking people if they were programmers, the median reaction was "a programmer? oh lord no, I'm a [marketing/UI/non-technical] person". It seems the term was coopted and gutted by some in the startup scene. (I'm aware there are legitimate hackers in the startup scene, this was just one particular event in one particular city.)
      - mancerayder 10y ago
        In my city there's 'growth hacking' meetups. It's too nakedly marketingistic to even consider seriously. I fear in the English language the word 'hack' is often being used as a synonym for 'shortcut'. The Lifehacker 'hacks' being prime examples.
        greenshackle2 10y ago
        This one was advertised as for developers/coders/engineers/designers, but I'm in a second-tier (for developers) Canadian city. Many talented tech folks move to first-tier Canadian cities, or to first tier U.S. cities, which are zeroth tier by Canadian standards, if they aren't tied down.
      - rbanffy 10y ago
        > I'm a [marketing/UI/non-technical] person". They are obviously confusing a hack with a hacker. /me ducks
      - sliverstorm 10y ago
        Even if it wasn't non-technical people, it seems the pop culture of "hacker" attracts all the worst stereotypes of geeks. The really sharp ones don't seem interested in self-identifying as "hacker".
  - stcredzero 10y ago
    Some of us are. Once, a long time ago, using the $ was "cool." And "so it goes" with all forms of online culture. (Has Kurt Vonnegut gone out of fashion yet? I used to coxswain crew boats past his summer home.) I would be quite amused if young "Microsofties" suddenly decided to co-opt "Micro$haft" but with a Richard Roundtree vibe.
    - BipolarElsa 10y ago
      I was debating on saying Mi¢rosoft, but I decided against it at the last minute. Oh well.
    - mwfunk 10y ago
      Let's be clear: using the $ was NEVER cool by any stretch of the imagination, it was just a lot more common in the Internet of the '90s. The people who thought it was cool were always the same people who think it's funny to make up derogatory puns for the names of things they don't like, such as "Internet Exploder" or "Crapple". This is a category of humor that will be forever associated with bitter, angry, condescending-yet-clueless, neckbearded, fedora-wearing morbidly obese IT guys with phone holsters and Bluetooth earpieces that continued making "all your base" references well into the 2000s.
      - worg 10y ago
        So let's offend them, because denostating products/companies (as childish as it is saying M$, CrApple et al) in your opinion is the same as denostating other human beings, why not just ignore the bad jokes?
  - michaelcampbell 10y ago
    > I'm sorry, are you from the past? Isn't everyone?
    - fluxsauce 10y ago
      Sure, and that's part of the joke. It's also an IT Crowd reference.
- untog 10y ago
  Well, given that Microsoft's profits were once double that of Apple, yes, it is quite a reversal. (irony of using "M$" when you're talking about them not making money is great, btw)
  - wnevets 10y ago
    more like $pple, am I rite?
    - jfoutz 10y ago
      App£e. or Appl€. Ideally you could use the $ symbol but there's no s in Apple. Sure, you can just throw in whatever character you want, but !nevets doesn't make a lot of sense. what you're shooting for here is a pun. You want something that looks like a regular character, so @pple is kind of cute, but there are two obvious problems. One, it kind of looks like a direct message to pple, which falls apart. &pple isn't bad, but & doesn't have the association with money, so you don't get the pun. There are a bunch of currency symbols you can use, there's a list here [1]. Check it out ₩₦€v€t$, then all of your currency puns will be money. [1] http://www.xe.com/symbols.php http://www.xe.com/symbols.php
      - wnevets 10y ago
        yeah I was going to do that but apple is an american company and it doesnt make sense to use the euro. Using $pple is just as lazy as using m$ to call microsoft greedy.
        dragonbonheur 10y ago
        Apple is an Irish company. /S http://www.forbes.com/sites/leesheppard/2013/05/28/how-does-apple-avoid-taxes/#5581274ed6f7 http://www.forbes.com/sites/leesheppard/2013/05/28/how-does-...
        clock_tower 10y ago
        Which makes Appl€ particularly fitting!
- mhurron 10y ago
  Obligatory Penny Arcade - https://www.penny-arcade.com/S=0/comic/2002/07/22 https://www.penny-arcade.com/S=0/comic/2002/07/22
  - pyrophane 10y ago
    Yea, things have changed... a lot. Back in the anti-trust days of bundling IE, bullying OEMs and undermining standards, MS was the evil empire of the day. Now you've got Google backtracking on privacy and siphoning up user data to create ads that know you a little too well, Amazon as more threatening Walmart of the digital age, and Facebook trying to make sure that the only way you can experience the online world is through the censored lens of Facebook itself. It makes all of the once-held fear of Microsoft dominance seem quaint. At least Apple is still building pretty gear and killing useful ports, just like back in the day.
CuGi 10y ago
I feel like Apple is trying to force innovation with their latest offerings. I'm not against change, but change for the sake of change is annoying. The idea well must be running pretty dry at Cupertino
- threeseed 10y ago
  20 years Apple released the iMac which did away with SCSI, ADB, RJ232 etc in favour of USB. What they have done now with the MacBook Pro is exactly the same thing. They are trying to establish USB-C as the one port to rule them all just like they successful did with USB-A. Yes change can be hard and some people like yourself clearly struggle more than others. But change is needed sometimes to push the industry forward.
  - GVIrish 10y ago
    Unifying to one standard port is kind of cool, except for the fact that not even Apple's other devices use that type of connection and users will have to buy dongles for almost everything. That represents a concrete step backwards in user experience. There is a time to be bold and throw your weight behind a better standard, but there's also a time when doing so makes things inconvenient with little to no benefit. That wouldn't be so bad if the Macbook were significantly more powerful but here we have a machine with the same max RAM as the Macbook they sold 4 years ago while PC laptops are shipping with 4 times as much. It just seems like Apple is focusing on making a sleek and visually pleasing device, rather than a device that will be most useful to those who want to work on MacOS.
    - sahaj 10y ago
      The next iPhone will likely have a USB-C port. They couldn't have changed the lightening port on the iPhone after only being on the iPhone for a single generation.
      - dpark 10y ago
        You think they're going to ditch lightning after everyone buys a bunch of accessories? They could, but I doubt it. What would switching to USB C do for Apple?
aaron-lebo 10y ago
> Just check out its striking video for the Surface Studio — it is so influenced by Apple’s playbook that I’m surprised there’s no Jony Ive narration. What's happened is that other companies have figured out how to emulate Steve Jobs's playbook that's now several decades old and there's nobody at Apple to write new plays. Jobs always talked about how Microsoft didn't have taste and when you look at MS products up until around 2005ish in comparison to Apple products, he was right. At some point a lot of business people realized what was making Apple successful - they weren't just selling computers, they were selling a lifestyle, they were selling cool. Oh, you are a creative? Well, shouldn't you have a Mac? It's what Einstein and Gandhi would have used. Jobs was an absolutely brilliant marketer. Since 2005 other companies have gotten successively better at emulating Apple's design, experience, and marketing. They've distilled what Jobs knew intuitively into a formula that they can iterate on. It's not just MS, it's Dell, it's every medium and high-end manufacturer, it's Google. Please tell me what the difference between this [1] Pixel commercial and every Apple commercial made within the last decade is with the exception of the logo. It's the Applefication of tech production and marketing and Apple doesn't have anything to stand out anymore. 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCI1tcu8tQw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCI1tcu8tQw
- gxs 10y ago
  This is exactly right. Apple's rising tide lifted all of us: it forced every other computer manufacturer take a look at the quality of what they were selling, not just feature lists and requirements. We've all benefited from this tremendously: android was quite literally unusable crap until the last few years (queue rooters and apologizers), laptop pc's were similarly crap, and you just never got the feeling that someone who cared put these things together. Now? Everyone is starting to put effort into the little things: the packaging, the presentation, quality of materials, usability, etc. It's a tremendous win. I'm almost tempted to say we owe Apple, but then I remember their coffers are already full. I imagine there are other stones still left unturned, and the next Apple will be the ones to pay similar attention to detail and craftsmanship in an area where there previously wasn't any.
  - jmiserez 10y ago
jimbokun 10y ago
I was thinking recently how Bill Gates often said the biggest competitor to Windows was the previous version of Windows. Alternate OSes didn't have enough market share or compatible software to really be a threat, but customers always had the option of just not upgrading. iPhone seems in a very similar position. Sure, there are some people who will switch from iPhone to an Android phone. But Apple's biggest challenge seems to be convincing their current customers they need a new phone at all.
- cptskippy 10y ago
  > Apple's biggest challenge seems to be convincing their current customers they need a new phone at all. That's not much of a challenge for Apple. There is always a laundry list of features that people want but that aren't necessarily mature (e.g. Wireless Charging, NFC, waterproofing) and Apple keeps those in it's back pocket incubating. Occasionally it pulls one out and slaps it on one of their devices to boost sales. They also drive sales by adding or removing features from their devices (e.g. Firewire 400/800, USB-C/MagSafe, Lightning) or dropping support for legacy systems. Mechanical failure is also a common reason to upgrade but Apple seems to be cannibalizing this revenue stream by replacing mechanical devices (e.g. switches, buttons, touchpads) with solid state ones that use haptic feedback. I'm curious how that will play out, will Apple's Taptic engine be the point of failure?
  - erichocean 10y ago
    Pretty sure iPhones today have NFC, it's just not available for anything other than Apple Pay.
    - dep_b 10y ago
      That's why so many payment terminals work with Apple Pay
    - cptskippy 10y ago
      They do but it's locked down. They might one day open that up or create peripherals to use it. Similar to how the 3rd or 4th gen iPod Touch magically gained Bluetooth via software updates.
doodpants 10y ago
"A day later, Apple ended the long wait for laptop users yearning for an upgrade by unveiling a new line of MacBook Pros." Meanwhile, they did nothing to end the long wait for desktop users yearning for an upgrade. I was expecting at least a cursory spec bump for their Mac Mini and iMac lines. I was hoping to replace my 6-year old Mac Mini sometime soon, but I don't want to do so with a 1-2 year old product.
gigatexal 10y ago
Thursday's reveal of new MacBooks was so lackluster I am rethinking my loyalty to Apple. The Apple platform has always been the most productive platform for me. But other firms seem to be innovating and iterating on things quicker than Apple has: rumor has it that Apple will more or less copy the edge-to-edge display of Chinese handsets or the rounded edges of the S7 Edge, wtf, what happened to doing really bold things that nobody else has, or can? I guess we might have just hit peak-phone handset. In any case Apple wants to push into the enterprise but won't make a surface like device (what the iPad Pro should have been). Oh well. OS X is still the killer feature for me so I will remain securely on Apple and I'm not leaving my iPhone for any other handset but this is still very disconcerting.
- twblalock 10y ago
  > I guess we might have just hit peak-phone handset. This is what happens in mature product segments. The first iPhone was released 9 years ago, and that was the last real revolution -- a smartphone whose front was pretty much all screen. Everything Apple and everyone else has done since then has been incremental -- better screens, larger screens, better cameras, faster processors, thinner chassis -- but definitely the same paradigm. The same thing happened to laptops before that. Some of the older laptops had pretty odd and uncomfortable designs. Sometime in the 90s, everyone standardized on the clamshell laptop with a 4:3 screen (later moving to widescreen), a low-profile keyboard, and a central trackpad below that. If you compare a 20-year-old laptop to a new one, you'll see the same incremental changes that happened to phones -- larger, better screens, faster processors, thinner chassis. I think the bottom line is that the smartphone market has become as mature and predictable as the laptop market.
  - thaumasiotes 10y ago
    > Sometime in the 90s, everyone standardized on the clamshell laptop with a 4:3 screen (later moving to widescreen) How did that happen? It used to be that a normal laptop had a 4:3 screen and a ridiculous, huge laptop had a huge, 16:10 screen. Now both of those are gone, and normal laptops have even shorter 16:9 (!) screens. It's hard to think of a more user-hostile progression. I don't want to work in a series of cramped side-by-side windows. I want a screen that can display more than one paragraph of text at once.
deleted 10y ago
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sumoboy 10y ago
I don't think it's a role reversal at all, rather everybody has been chasing Apple for so long the competition has caught up and surpassed in some aspects. Who doesn't have a laptop that hasn't been modeled after the macbook. Also remember that everything Apple introduces doesn't turn to gold every time, they have plenty of product feature failures. The only innovation I saw yesterday which will be copied really came out of Microsoft with the Surface Studio and Surface dial. I'm sure microsoft would really like to see a surge in high-end desktops. The only worthwhile technical feature Apple did was adding touch id in the touch bar, but even then how often would I use this? Also seems like the more logical place for touch id is actually on the mouse where my fingers are a majority of the time. The only commonality between these two is there marketing departments thinking people want to spend $3k+ on products, no reversal there.
- rjbwork 10y ago
  >Who doesn't have a laptop that hasn't been modeled after the macbook. As soon as they can pack the power i'm looking for in my laptops into an apple style case, i'll be there. Until then i'll be sticking with my boxy black Clevo.
  - bitwize 10y ago
    Surprise: Virtually all laptops are modelled after an Apple machine. The boxy black ones are PowerBook clones. Apple established the dedign language used by every laptop manufacturer since, in the early 90s: clamshell case, hinge at the rear, keyboard towards the back of the lower half with the trackpad front and center and all that wonderful blank space on either side usable as wrist rests.
    - kbutler 10y ago
      Surprise: Apple wasn't the first with a "clamshell case, hinge at the rear, keyboard towards the back of the lower half...all that wonderful blank space on either side usable as wrist rests." 1983: http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/cosyhard.htm http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/cosyhard.htm - http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/ampropn.gif http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/ampropn.gif (note: no trackpad - but then, the original powerbook didn't, either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerBook_100 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerBook_100, and that round trackball is in just the same position as that round lid latch...) Apple does a great job integrating elements that may have existed before, and is definitely a trendsetter in styling, but they also get credit for creating a lot of elements that existed before. ("Great artists steal.")
bradleybuda 10y ago
I'll keep buying Apple hardware (even if the latest rev isn't great) since macOS is the only usable operating system. Windows is (still/increasingly?) a tire fire that's only useful if you're a gamer, and Linux is for programmer-masochists.
- nathas 10y ago
  Why do you think Windows is a tire fire and OSX is usable? I used my first OSX machine ever earlier this year. I wanted to add some extra keyboard commands, so I had to download a 3rd party program that had to unlock accessibility controls and essentially take full control of the machine. That's absurd to me. I also hit tons of external display problems. Things wouldn't connect or sync right, desktops not correctly moving to the right screens, no window snapping even though it's a high res screen, etc. I hit way more beach balls/lags than I do with my modern Windows machines. Windows 7 was solid, Windows 8 was a bit of a mess (as has been every 1st iteration of Windows [98, 2000, ME, XP, Vista, 7, 8, 10]), but Win 10 is really enjoyable. It's unfortunate that the BSODs caused largely by shitty drivers in Windows 98/XP has hounded the Windows ecosystem for over a decade, even though the driver verifier has fixed the vast majority of those.
  - jolux 10y ago
    How do you edit which keys do what on Windows? I had to do registry edits to get the caps lock to function as control which is baked into the macOS preferences. You can also add as many shortcuts as you like that control anything on macOS in the Keyboard pane. Sure you can't remap every key to something different out of the box but I don't think you can do that on Windows either.
    - lqdc13 10y ago
      https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/globalization/keyboardlayouts https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/globalization/keyboardlayou...
      - jolux 10y ago
yladiz 10y ago
The thing is, hardware is important but software is arguably more important because it's what you interact with every day (yes, you interact with the hardware too but not directly, besides the keyboard and touch pad). In that respect, I trust Apple more than either Microsoft or Google. I will not trust Google with any of my data unless it's necessary and Microsoft isn't so great in my eyes either due to their ad and data collection policies for the new Windows OS. I think Macs are designed very well, even though I do question the decisions of the new MacBooks, and I would prefer to have a little bit more than 4 USB ports and thin laptop. I also really like Mac OS, even with it's thorns, because its design is much better than whatever version of Linux I would use (not a big fan of Ubuntu's Unity). Most likely, my next laptop purchase will be either a 2015 MacBook Pro or some nice non-Apple product with Ubuntu installed.
- pretodor 10y ago
  > I also really like Mac OS, even with it's thorns, because its design is much better than whatever version of Linux I would use (not a big fan of Ubuntu's Unity). I would love to hear your thoughts on the Cinnamon DE. Genuinely curious.
  - yladiz 10y ago
    I didn't really go into my preferred Linux environments, but my preference is generally KDE. Cinnamon is a fork of an older GNOME that's reskinned, in my understanding, and I guess the whole GNOME look isn't my preference in general. I think a big part of it is the interactions, and from what I remember there were things I didn't quite like about GNOME that I liked a lot better in KDE. Caveat: I haven't used a Linux GUI in ~3 years, so my opinions might have changed a lot since then.
- tajen 10y ago
  A paid Linux! That's what I said on this comment about "Ask HN – What innovation would you want to see", which 84 people upvoted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12570030 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12570030 I wish we would have executed on that wish a year ago, because with the two Microsoft & Apple events, it's clear there is demand for "a Surface Studio, but not with Windows 10". Yesterday people effectively said they stay on Macs because of macOS, but envision switching to PCs because the innovation and specs are much better. Had we worked on that, we would have released a credible alternative to Macs, with distrib that would have embraced the Surface Studio while providing 1. the design, 2. the experience and 3.the privacy that everyone is looking for in an Apple computer... As a reminder, the idea of a Paid Linux is to fund the open-source community with the same flow of money that Apple and Microsoft get from their OS (at $200/yr), in order to provide the same "red carpet" experience for specific profiles of users (either 3D workers, either graphists, whatever profile we target first). At the market level, one great experience for one type of work would develop adoption for Linux on the desktop. At a more selfish level, the benefit to paying for Linux instead of MS/A is that the new improvements are effectively open-source, so we're effectively raising the baseline of what every other distrib can do. The way to make people pay is by only providing their upgrades through authenticated PPAs, which means professionals will pay because it's easier, and hackers will redistribute versions on Torrent, which we don't mind, because hackers are a benefit for Linux. Besides, even hackers understand the value of funding open-source, so they might still participate. A lot of people would rather pay for open-source than closed-source. I didn't execute on that wish, because I'm not an OS-level person, and I don't have the UX design background necessary for this endeavour. Nor the marketing know-how to execute at a high level. But I really wish someone would do it.
chadcmulligan 10y ago
People talk about games/3d hardware for MS products, but I do a lot of work in 2d graphics, animation and Typography and the amount of work apple puts into these compared to MS is superior imho. Even more when you come to compatibility with these in MS land compared to apple, Apple just works, and works beautifully, MS is a mire of API's that perform adequately. 2d is the interface that most people see and really the focus on this is the reason that 'creatives' flock to apple imho.
nilkn 10y ago
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- basch 10y ago
  >a developer who needs a Unix-based OS. Windows 10 includes binary compatibility. bit-for-bit, checksum-for-checksum Ubuntu ELF binaries running directly in Windows. all of Ubuntu user space. a full copy of ubuntu built in. Windows not working as a unix-like os for developers isnt reality anymore.
  - nilkn 10y ago
    I have Windows 10 on my desktop machine, so I'll try it out. However, all that means (assuming it works perfectly, as you seem to suggest) is that Windows is usable to me. That's not enough of a reason for me to get a Surface Book. I'm less than thrilled with Windows right now because just the other day the built-in Mail app started crashing within a few seconds of opening; it's now unable to connect to my Exchange account. After spending 10+ hours trying to diagnose and fix the problem, I've accepted that nothing short of a complete wipe of the machine will fix the problem.
    - basch 10y ago
      I think the surface book is microsofts NUC, a way to raise the bar and make the windows market competitive. they are fine with you buying a dell, lenovo, or hp as long as you use and develop on windows. if you log into a new user profile, does mail work? if so you dont need a machine wipe.
    - nxc18 10y ago
      My MBP periodically crashes any app that tries to invoke an open/save dialog. Its great when I try to download a file, accidentally make preview think I edited something, or try to save a document. You can pick individual bugs to complain about all day. Every OS has plenty. Sorry to hear about your issues with the mail app though.
    - nxc18 10y ago
lowbloodsugar 10y ago
Cutting edge Macbook Pro: 16GB RAM "because battery". o_0 My 2011 MBP has 16GB.
nicolas_t 10y ago
The Surface Studio is a major coup for Microsoft not because it'll necessarily sell well (although I think it has the potential to) but because it's made Microsoft cool. I showed the video to my wife and she was so impressed that she looked at all the videos Microsoft did detailing the development. She's been a mac user for more than 20 years and tt's the first time she's ever looked at a Microsoft product. Apple during the Steve Jobs era had a reputation for taking risks, for coming up with new products that impressed and that people just wanted. A lot of people I know were excited by the announcement of new products and tried to watch the keynotes or follow the live coverage. In the past year, none of my friends care about them anymore. I only cared about yesterday's event because I've been waiting to upgrade my macbook pro and the event was lackluster. For better or worse, by not taking risks and not introducing new products, Apple seems less cool than it used to be and Microsoft showing off the Surface studio highlighted this. It's a huge blow for Apple in term of marketing. (As an out of topic aside, Apple even sucks at doing boring incremental improvements, the iMac, Mac Pro and Mac Mini are languishing and the new macbook pro 15 inch design choices are non-sensical for professionals)
- brazzledazzle 10y ago
  >the new macbook pro 15 inch design choices are non-sensical for professionals You can't imagine how disappointed I was that they tap out at 16GB of RAM. I don't use that much memory every day but sometimes it would be really nice to have. I haven't bothered watching it again but the announcement gave me the impression that it started at 16 and going to the purchase page was a sad time.
  - kobayashi 10y ago
    I totally can, as I'm in the same boat. And the 240 CAD increase just for an extra 8GB of RAM - what a ripoff!
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
olalonde 10y ago
> A day later, Apple ended the long wait for laptop users yearning for an upgrade by unveiling a new line of MacBook Pros. Was this a coincidence? I'm guessing not but no idea really.
MaggieL 10y ago
Bizarre role reversal? I still remember MSFT and IBM doing the same thing in the 90's.
kilroy123 10y ago
I keep reading about how unhappy people are with Apples latest reveal. I feel the same way. No way am I upgrading my 2015 Mac Book Pro with the new one. Still, Apple will not change a thing unless people actually vote with their wallets. If you're really so upset, do NOT buy this damn computer! If this latest line sees very little sells, they'll get the idea.
- grzm 10y ago
  Initial indications are that they're selling well. Touch Bar model shipping estimates were already slipping 3–4 weeks within 6 hours of going on sale: http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/27/macbook-pro-shipping-estimates-begin-slipping/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/27/macbook-pro-shipping-est...
  - josephg 10y ago
    I'm honestly not surprised. The 13" model looks like a great replacement for my now 4 year old 11" air. Its thankfully not much heavier, but with increased screen space, retina display, battery life improvement and support for 2 external 4k displays. I've been holding out because until now all the apple laptops on offer have required huge compromises for me. The macbook is too gutless (expecially its GPU which apparently can't drive big external displays smoothly). The recent airs still don't have retina displays and the old macbook pros are so big and heavy. After owning an 11" air I can't imagine travelling with the previous generation 15" mbp. The only downside is the exorbitant price. But to replace a machine I've used just about every day for 4 years I can easily justify the cost. And I hope (and expect) the price to drop over the next few years. The air, macbook and retina mbp all started out pretty expensive and then dropped steadily over the lifetime of the design.
- pjlegato 10y ago
  Suppose you need a new computer for work. Your other options are Windows or a Linux desktop experience, both of which are vastly worse in other ways. (No, I don't want to dork around with spending days compiling kernel patches and installing soundcard drivers before I can use the computer.) I'd gladly buy any other laptop that was simple and just worked out of the box in the sense that a Mac does. But there aren't any.
orionblastar 10y ago
Apple should have had touch screen Macs a few years ago with a pressure sensitive pen and other devices. They should have given the iMac a touch screen, and given the Macbook series a touch screen as well. Microsoft got artists with the Surface Pro tablets and pressure sensitive pens, etc.
pavs 10y ago
I don't use apple products because of the shiny, sexy hardware. It doesn't hurt to have a visually nice looking device to look at when you are spending most of your day on it. I use apple computers (don't use iPhone), specifically because of the OS. I just can't see myself working on Windows ever (unless it makes some major leap of improvement). MacOS has its problems, but its still many time better than the POS Windows OS. The only other option is Linux/Ubuntu, which is nice but wouldn't be my first choice, but definitely a second choice. You can't cover a shitty OS with a Shiny dress and fool most people who have been burned by it. They can copy all they want, at the end of the day it still has windows installed...
- drvdevd 10y ago
  I can agree with that and felt the same way until I realized (or was forced to admit repeatedly) that 90% of my time using Windows or OS X is now spent either in an SSH session, a web browser, or a virtual machine. Frankly all of these releases, from both companies, come off as rather boring to me. I think all the most interesting innovation, from my perspective, is happening in software now and less "flashy" embedded systems.
- kalleboo 10y ago
  Part of the reason that macOS works so well is due to the good integration with the hardware. Looking at the poor experience of other commenters in this thread, it looks like Microsoft hasn't realized that is how Apple has managed to do it, and the Surface devices are really "just another PC" and not first-class Windows hardware.
kalefranz 10y ago
I was actually fine with Apple's "courage" to take away my headphone jack on my phone. But the courage to take away my Esc key crosses the line for me.
partycoder 10y ago
Apple focused on creating a specific experience. To achieve that, they started by only targeting specific hardware. Android supports various hardware and so does Windows. Does iOS and macOS do the same? no. Because it would compromise the experience, which is tied directly to the value of their brand, which is ultimately what allows them to price their products the way they do. Apple focused on creating products people want to buy. I am not from a wealthy country, and I have seen people who have put basic needs aside to purchase an iPhone. For a much lower price you could purchase an Android phone, but they did not care. This is the power of a consistent, pleasant experience, something that Microsoft and Google seek to now obtain through the Surface and Pixel respectively. Let's see what happens.
nikolay 10y ago
Microsoft was always more innovative than Apple - just Steve Jobs did a great job at marketing, borrowing Porsche design, etc. Let's face it - Jony Ive is now boring, Jobs was really inspiring people. I miss Jobs, Ive is no match. It's so funny how Apple doesn't release a dual-mode touchscreen laptop because they are afraid their iPad sales will tank. So cowardly - unlike Jobs' Apple!

227 points by steven 10y ago

BipolarElsa 10y ago

When M$FT profits are double Apple's then we'll talk about "role reversal"...

skylan_q 10y ago
Heh heh heh... that'll show the author.
fluxsauce 10y ago
> M$FT I'm sorry, are you from the past?
- TelmoMenezes 10y ago
  "Hacker" as in "Hacker News" is from an even more distant past. The word just got appropriately decaffeinated, so as to be acceptable within our current iteration of group think.
  - oldmanjay 10y ago
    Is the groupthink in this case laughing at the anachronistic usage of M$?
    - TelmoMenezes 10y ago
      No. The groupthink is what causes the usage of M$ to be anachronistic now, and also what made it fashionable at some point in the past. Treating subjective opinions as objective facts and laughing at members of the out-group are symptoms of being engaged in groupthink. Nothing wrong (or right) with any of that. I'm just observing.
  - greenshackle2 10y ago
    I tried going to a 'hacker' meetup in my city. It was disappointing. I was asking people if they were programmers, the median reaction was "a programmer? oh lord no, I'm a [marketing/UI/non-technical] person". It seems the term was coopted and gutted by some in the startup scene. (I'm aware there are legitimate hackers in the startup scene, this was just one particular event in one particular city.)
    - mancerayder 10y ago
      In my city there's 'growth hacking' meetups. It's too nakedly marketingistic to even consider seriously. I fear in the English language the word 'hack' is often being used as a synonym for 'shortcut'. The Lifehacker 'hacks' being prime examples.
      - greenshackle2 10y ago
        This one was advertised as for developers/coders/engineers/designers, but I'm in a second-tier (for developers) Canadian city. Many talented tech folks move to first-tier Canadian cities, or to first tier U.S. cities, which are zeroth tier by Canadian standards, if they aren't tied down.
    - rbanffy 10y ago
      > I'm a [marketing/UI/non-technical] person". They are obviously confusing a hack with a hacker. /me ducks
    - sliverstorm 10y ago
      Even if it wasn't non-technical people, it seems the pop culture of "hacker" attracts all the worst stereotypes of geeks. The really sharp ones don't seem interested in self-identifying as "hacker".
- stcredzero 10y ago
  Some of us are. Once, a long time ago, using the $ was "cool." And "so it goes" with all forms of online culture. (Has Kurt Vonnegut gone out of fashion yet? I used to coxswain crew boats past his summer home.) I would be quite amused if young "Microsofties" suddenly decided to co-opt "Micro$haft" but with a Richard Roundtree vibe.
  - BipolarElsa 10y ago
    I was debating on saying Mi¢rosoft, but I decided against it at the last minute. Oh well.
  - mwfunk 10y ago
    Let's be clear: using the $ was NEVER cool by any stretch of the imagination, it was just a lot more common in the Internet of the '90s. The people who thought it was cool were always the same people who think it's funny to make up derogatory puns for the names of things they don't like, such as "Internet Exploder" or "Crapple". This is a category of humor that will be forever associated with bitter, angry, condescending-yet-clueless, neckbearded, fedora-wearing morbidly obese IT guys with phone holsters and Bluetooth earpieces that continued making "all your base" references well into the 2000s.
    - worg 10y ago
      So let's offend them, because denostating products/companies (as childish as it is saying M$, CrApple et al) in your opinion is the same as denostating other human beings, why not just ignore the bad jokes?
- michaelcampbell 10y ago
  > I'm sorry, are you from the past? Isn't everyone?
  - fluxsauce 10y ago
    Sure, and that's part of the joke. It's also an IT Crowd reference.
untog 10y ago
Well, given that Microsoft's profits were once double that of Apple, yes, it is quite a reversal. (irony of using "M$" when you're talking about them not making money is great, btw)
- wnevets 10y ago
  more like $pple, am I rite?
  - jfoutz 10y ago
    App£e. or Appl€. Ideally you could use the $ symbol but there's no s in Apple. Sure, you can just throw in whatever character you want, but !nevets doesn't make a lot of sense. what you're shooting for here is a pun. You want something that looks like a regular character, so @pple is kind of cute, but there are two obvious problems. One, it kind of looks like a direct message to pple, which falls apart. &pple isn't bad, but & doesn't have the association with money, so you don't get the pun. There are a bunch of currency symbols you can use, there's a list here [1]. Check it out ₩₦€v€t$, then all of your currency puns will be money. [1] http://www.xe.com/symbols.php http://www.xe.com/symbols.php
    - wnevets 10y ago
      yeah I was going to do that but apple is an american company and it doesnt make sense to use the euro. Using $pple is just as lazy as using m$ to call microsoft greedy.
      - dragonbonheur 10y ago
        Apple is an Irish company. /S http://www.forbes.com/sites/leesheppard/2013/05/28/how-does-apple-avoid-taxes/#5581274ed6f7 http://www.forbes.com/sites/leesheppard/2013/05/28/how-does-...
        clock_tower 10y ago
        Which makes Appl€ particularly fitting!
mhurron 10y ago
Obligatory Penny Arcade - https://www.penny-arcade.com/S=0/comic/2002/07/22 https://www.penny-arcade.com/S=0/comic/2002/07/22
- pyrophane 10y ago
  Yea, things have changed... a lot. Back in the anti-trust days of bundling IE, bullying OEMs and undermining standards, MS was the evil empire of the day. Now you've got Google backtracking on privacy and siphoning up user data to create ads that know you a little too well, Amazon as more threatening Walmart of the digital age, and Facebook trying to make sure that the only way you can experience the online world is through the censored lens of Facebook itself. It makes all of the once-held fear of Microsoft dominance seem quaint. At least Apple is still building pretty gear and killing useful ports, just like back in the day.

CuGi 10y ago

I feel like Apple is trying to force innovation with their latest offerings. I'm not against change, but change for the sake of change is annoying. The idea well must be running pretty dry at Cupertino

threeseed 10y ago
20 years Apple released the iMac which did away with SCSI, ADB, RJ232 etc in favour of USB. What they have done now with the MacBook Pro is exactly the same thing. They are trying to establish USB-C as the one port to rule them all just like they successful did with USB-A. Yes change can be hard and some people like yourself clearly struggle more than others. But change is needed sometimes to push the industry forward.
- GVIrish 10y ago
  Unifying to one standard port is kind of cool, except for the fact that not even Apple's other devices use that type of connection and users will have to buy dongles for almost everything. That represents a concrete step backwards in user experience. There is a time to be bold and throw your weight behind a better standard, but there's also a time when doing so makes things inconvenient with little to no benefit. That wouldn't be so bad if the Macbook were significantly more powerful but here we have a machine with the same max RAM as the Macbook they sold 4 years ago while PC laptops are shipping with 4 times as much. It just seems like Apple is focusing on making a sleek and visually pleasing device, rather than a device that will be most useful to those who want to work on MacOS.
  - sahaj 10y ago
    The next iPhone will likely have a USB-C port. They couldn't have changed the lightening port on the iPhone after only being on the iPhone for a single generation.
    - dpark 10y ago
      You think they're going to ditch lightning after everyone buys a bunch of accessories? They could, but I doubt it. What would switching to USB C do for Apple?

aaron-lebo 10y ago

> Just check out its striking video for the Surface Studio — it is so influenced by Apple’s playbook that I’m surprised there’s no Jony Ive narration. What's happened is that other companies have figured out how to emulate Steve Jobs's playbook that's now several decades old and there's nobody at Apple to write new plays. Jobs always talked about how Microsoft didn't have taste and when you look at MS products up until around 2005ish in comparison to Apple products, he was right. At some point a lot of business people realized what was making Apple successful - they weren't just selling computers, they were selling a lifestyle, they were selling cool. Oh, you are a creative? Well, shouldn't you have a Mac? It's what Einstein and Gandhi would have used. Jobs was an absolutely brilliant marketer. Since 2005 other companies have gotten successively better at emulating Apple's design, experience, and marketing. They've distilled what Jobs knew intuitively into a formula that they can iterate on. It's not just MS, it's Dell, it's every medium and high-end manufacturer, it's Google. Please tell me what the difference between this [1] Pixel commercial and every Apple commercial made within the last decade is with the exception of the logo. It's the Applefication of tech production and marketing and Apple doesn't have anything to stand out anymore. 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCI1tcu8tQw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCI1tcu8tQw

gxs 10y ago
This is exactly right. Apple's rising tide lifted all of us: it forced every other computer manufacturer take a look at the quality of what they were selling, not just feature lists and requirements. We've all benefited from this tremendously: android was quite literally unusable crap until the last few years (queue rooters and apologizers), laptop pc's were similarly crap, and you just never got the feeling that someone who cared put these things together. Now? Everyone is starting to put effort into the little things: the packaging, the presentation, quality of materials, usability, etc. It's a tremendous win. I'm almost tempted to say we owe Apple, but then I remember their coffers are already full. I imagine there are other stones still left unturned, and the next Apple will be the ones to pay similar attention to detail and craftsmanship in an area where there previously wasn't any.
- jmiserez 10y ago

jimbokun 10y ago

I was thinking recently how Bill Gates often said the biggest competitor to Windows was the previous version of Windows. Alternate OSes didn't have enough market share or compatible software to really be a threat, but customers always had the option of just not upgrading. iPhone seems in a very similar position. Sure, there are some people who will switch from iPhone to an Android phone. But Apple's biggest challenge seems to be convincing their current customers they need a new phone at all.

cptskippy 10y ago
> Apple's biggest challenge seems to be convincing their current customers they need a new phone at all. That's not much of a challenge for Apple. There is always a laundry list of features that people want but that aren't necessarily mature (e.g. Wireless Charging, NFC, waterproofing) and Apple keeps those in it's back pocket incubating. Occasionally it pulls one out and slaps it on one of their devices to boost sales. They also drive sales by adding or removing features from their devices (e.g. Firewire 400/800, USB-C/MagSafe, Lightning) or dropping support for legacy systems. Mechanical failure is also a common reason to upgrade but Apple seems to be cannibalizing this revenue stream by replacing mechanical devices (e.g. switches, buttons, touchpads) with solid state ones that use haptic feedback. I'm curious how that will play out, will Apple's Taptic engine be the point of failure?
- erichocean 10y ago
  Pretty sure iPhones today have NFC, it's just not available for anything other than Apple Pay.
  - dep_b 10y ago
    That's why so many payment terminals work with Apple Pay
  - cptskippy 10y ago
    They do but it's locked down. They might one day open that up or create peripherals to use it. Similar to how the 3rd or 4th gen iPod Touch magically gained Bluetooth via software updates.

doodpants 10y ago

"A day later, Apple ended the long wait for laptop users yearning for an upgrade by unveiling a new line of MacBook Pros." Meanwhile, they did nothing to end the long wait for desktop users yearning for an upgrade. I was expecting at least a cursory spec bump for their Mac Mini and iMac lines. I was hoping to replace my 6-year old Mac Mini sometime soon, but I don't want to do so with a 1-2 year old product.

gigatexal 10y ago

Thursday's reveal of new MacBooks was so lackluster I am rethinking my loyalty to Apple. The Apple platform has always been the most productive platform for me. But other firms seem to be innovating and iterating on things quicker than Apple has: rumor has it that Apple will more or less copy the edge-to-edge display of Chinese handsets or the rounded edges of the S7 Edge, wtf, what happened to doing really bold things that nobody else has, or can? I guess we might have just hit peak-phone handset. In any case Apple wants to push into the enterprise but won't make a surface like device (what the iPad Pro should have been). Oh well. OS X is still the killer feature for me so I will remain securely on Apple and I'm not leaving my iPhone for any other handset but this is still very disconcerting.

twblalock 10y ago
> I guess we might have just hit peak-phone handset. This is what happens in mature product segments. The first iPhone was released 9 years ago, and that was the last real revolution -- a smartphone whose front was pretty much all screen. Everything Apple and everyone else has done since then has been incremental -- better screens, larger screens, better cameras, faster processors, thinner chassis -- but definitely the same paradigm. The same thing happened to laptops before that. Some of the older laptops had pretty odd and uncomfortable designs. Sometime in the 90s, everyone standardized on the clamshell laptop with a 4:3 screen (later moving to widescreen), a low-profile keyboard, and a central trackpad below that. If you compare a 20-year-old laptop to a new one, you'll see the same incremental changes that happened to phones -- larger, better screens, faster processors, thinner chassis. I think the bottom line is that the smartphone market has become as mature and predictable as the laptop market.
- thaumasiotes 10y ago
  > Sometime in the 90s, everyone standardized on the clamshell laptop with a 4:3 screen (later moving to widescreen) How did that happen? It used to be that a normal laptop had a 4:3 screen and a ridiculous, huge laptop had a huge, 16:10 screen. Now both of those are gone, and normal laptops have even shorter 16:9 (!) screens. It's hard to think of a more user-hostile progression. I don't want to work in a series of cramped side-by-side windows. I want a screen that can display more than one paragraph of text at once.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

sumoboy 10y ago

I don't think it's a role reversal at all, rather everybody has been chasing Apple for so long the competition has caught up and surpassed in some aspects. Who doesn't have a laptop that hasn't been modeled after the macbook. Also remember that everything Apple introduces doesn't turn to gold every time, they have plenty of product feature failures. The only innovation I saw yesterday which will be copied really came out of Microsoft with the Surface Studio and Surface dial. I'm sure microsoft would really like to see a surge in high-end desktops. The only worthwhile technical feature Apple did was adding touch id in the touch bar, but even then how often would I use this? Also seems like the more logical place for touch id is actually on the mouse where my fingers are a majority of the time. The only commonality between these two is there marketing departments thinking people want to spend $3k+ on products, no reversal there.

rjbwork 10y ago
>Who doesn't have a laptop that hasn't been modeled after the macbook. As soon as they can pack the power i'm looking for in my laptops into an apple style case, i'll be there. Until then i'll be sticking with my boxy black Clevo.
- bitwize 10y ago
  Surprise: Virtually all laptops are modelled after an Apple machine. The boxy black ones are PowerBook clones. Apple established the dedign language used by every laptop manufacturer since, in the early 90s: clamshell case, hinge at the rear, keyboard towards the back of the lower half with the trackpad front and center and all that wonderful blank space on either side usable as wrist rests.
  - kbutler 10y ago
    Surprise: Apple wasn't the first with a "clamshell case, hinge at the rear, keyboard towards the back of the lower half...all that wonderful blank space on either side usable as wrist rests." 1983: http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/cosyhard.htm http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/cosyhard.htm - http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/ampropn.gif http://cosy.com/language/cosyhard/ampropn.gif (note: no trackpad - but then, the original powerbook didn't, either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerBook_100 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerBook_100, and that round trackball is in just the same position as that round lid latch...) Apple does a great job integrating elements that may have existed before, and is definitely a trendsetter in styling, but they also get credit for creating a lot of elements that existed before. ("Great artists steal.")

bradleybuda 10y ago

I'll keep buying Apple hardware (even if the latest rev isn't great) since macOS is the only usable operating system. Windows is (still/increasingly?) a tire fire that's only useful if you're a gamer, and Linux is for programmer-masochists.

nathas 10y ago
Why do you think Windows is a tire fire and OSX is usable? I used my first OSX machine ever earlier this year. I wanted to add some extra keyboard commands, so I had to download a 3rd party program that had to unlock accessibility controls and essentially take full control of the machine. That's absurd to me. I also hit tons of external display problems. Things wouldn't connect or sync right, desktops not correctly moving to the right screens, no window snapping even though it's a high res screen, etc. I hit way more beach balls/lags than I do with my modern Windows machines. Windows 7 was solid, Windows 8 was a bit of a mess (as has been every 1st iteration of Windows [98, 2000, ME, XP, Vista, 7, 8, 10]), but Win 10 is really enjoyable. It's unfortunate that the BSODs caused largely by shitty drivers in Windows 98/XP has hounded the Windows ecosystem for over a decade, even though the driver verifier has fixed the vast majority of those.
- jolux 10y ago
  How do you edit which keys do what on Windows? I had to do registry edits to get the caps lock to function as control which is baked into the macOS preferences. You can also add as many shortcuts as you like that control anything on macOS in the Keyboard pane. Sure you can't remap every key to something different out of the box but I don't think you can do that on Windows either.
  - lqdc13 10y ago
    https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/globalization/keyboardlayouts https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/globalization/keyboardlayou...
    - jolux 10y ago

yladiz 10y ago

The thing is, hardware is important but software is arguably more important because it's what you interact with every day (yes, you interact with the hardware too but not directly, besides the keyboard and touch pad). In that respect, I trust Apple more than either Microsoft or Google. I will not trust Google with any of my data unless it's necessary and Microsoft isn't so great in my eyes either due to their ad and data collection policies for the new Windows OS. I think Macs are designed very well, even though I do question the decisions of the new MacBooks, and I would prefer to have a little bit more than 4 USB ports and thin laptop. I also really like Mac OS, even with it's thorns, because its design is much better than whatever version of Linux I would use (not a big fan of Ubuntu's Unity). Most likely, my next laptop purchase will be either a 2015 MacBook Pro or some nice non-Apple product with Ubuntu installed.

pretodor 10y ago
> I also really like Mac OS, even with it's thorns, because its design is much better than whatever version of Linux I would use (not a big fan of Ubuntu's Unity). I would love to hear your thoughts on the Cinnamon DE. Genuinely curious.
- yladiz 10y ago
  I didn't really go into my preferred Linux environments, but my preference is generally KDE. Cinnamon is a fork of an older GNOME that's reskinned, in my understanding, and I guess the whole GNOME look isn't my preference in general. I think a big part of it is the interactions, and from what I remember there were things I didn't quite like about GNOME that I liked a lot better in KDE. Caveat: I haven't used a Linux GUI in ~3 years, so my opinions might have changed a lot since then.
tajen 10y ago
A paid Linux! That's what I said on this comment about "Ask HN – What innovation would you want to see", which 84 people upvoted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12570030 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12570030 I wish we would have executed on that wish a year ago, because with the two Microsoft & Apple events, it's clear there is demand for "a Surface Studio, but not with Windows 10". Yesterday people effectively said they stay on Macs because of macOS, but envision switching to PCs because the innovation and specs are much better. Had we worked on that, we would have released a credible alternative to Macs, with distrib that would have embraced the Surface Studio while providing 1. the design, 2. the experience and 3.the privacy that everyone is looking for in an Apple computer... As a reminder, the idea of a Paid Linux is to fund the open-source community with the same flow of money that Apple and Microsoft get from their OS (at $200/yr), in order to provide the same "red carpet" experience for specific profiles of users (either 3D workers, either graphists, whatever profile we target first). At the market level, one great experience for one type of work would develop adoption for Linux on the desktop. At a more selfish level, the benefit to paying for Linux instead of MS/A is that the new improvements are effectively open-source, so we're effectively raising the baseline of what every other distrib can do. The way to make people pay is by only providing their upgrades through authenticated PPAs, which means professionals will pay because it's easier, and hackers will redistribute versions on Torrent, which we don't mind, because hackers are a benefit for Linux. Besides, even hackers understand the value of funding open-source, so they might still participate. A lot of people would rather pay for open-source than closed-source. I didn't execute on that wish, because I'm not an OS-level person, and I don't have the UX design background necessary for this endeavour. Nor the marketing know-how to execute at a high level. But I really wish someone would do it.

chadcmulligan 10y ago

People talk about games/3d hardware for MS products, but I do a lot of work in 2d graphics, animation and Typography and the amount of work apple puts into these compared to MS is superior imho. Even more when you come to compatibility with these in MS land compared to apple, Apple just works, and works beautifully, MS is a mire of API's that perform adequately. 2d is the interface that most people see and really the focus on this is the reason that 'creatives' flock to apple imho.

nilkn 10y ago

[deleted]

basch 10y ago
>a developer who needs a Unix-based OS. Windows 10 includes binary compatibility. bit-for-bit, checksum-for-checksum Ubuntu ELF binaries running directly in Windows. all of Ubuntu user space. a full copy of ubuntu built in. Windows not working as a unix-like os for developers isnt reality anymore.
- nilkn 10y ago
  I have Windows 10 on my desktop machine, so I'll try it out. However, all that means (assuming it works perfectly, as you seem to suggest) is that Windows is usable to me. That's not enough of a reason for me to get a Surface Book. I'm less than thrilled with Windows right now because just the other day the built-in Mail app started crashing within a few seconds of opening; it's now unable to connect to my Exchange account. After spending 10+ hours trying to diagnose and fix the problem, I've accepted that nothing short of a complete wipe of the machine will fix the problem.
  - basch 10y ago
    I think the surface book is microsofts NUC, a way to raise the bar and make the windows market competitive. they are fine with you buying a dell, lenovo, or hp as long as you use and develop on windows. if you log into a new user profile, does mail work? if so you dont need a machine wipe.
  - nxc18 10y ago
    My MBP periodically crashes any app that tries to invoke an open/save dialog. Its great when I try to download a file, accidentally make preview think I edited something, or try to save a document. You can pick individual bugs to complain about all day. Every OS has plenty. Sorry to hear about your issues with the mail app though.
  - nxc18 10y ago

lowbloodsugar 10y ago

Cutting edge Macbook Pro: 16GB RAM "because battery". o_0 My 2011 MBP has 16GB.

nicolas_t 10y ago

The Surface Studio is a major coup for Microsoft not because it'll necessarily sell well (although I think it has the potential to) but because it's made Microsoft cool. I showed the video to my wife and she was so impressed that she looked at all the videos Microsoft did detailing the development. She's been a mac user for more than 20 years and tt's the first time she's ever looked at a Microsoft product. Apple during the Steve Jobs era had a reputation for taking risks, for coming up with new products that impressed and that people just wanted. A lot of people I know were excited by the announcement of new products and tried to watch the keynotes or follow the live coverage. In the past year, none of my friends care about them anymore. I only cared about yesterday's event because I've been waiting to upgrade my macbook pro and the event was lackluster. For better or worse, by not taking risks and not introducing new products, Apple seems less cool than it used to be and Microsoft showing off the Surface studio highlighted this. It's a huge blow for Apple in term of marketing. (As an out of topic aside, Apple even sucks at doing boring incremental improvements, the iMac, Mac Pro and Mac Mini are languishing and the new macbook pro 15 inch design choices are non-sensical for professionals)

brazzledazzle 10y ago
>the new macbook pro 15 inch design choices are non-sensical for professionals You can't imagine how disappointed I was that they tap out at 16GB of RAM. I don't use that much memory every day but sometimes it would be really nice to have. I haven't bothered watching it again but the announcement gave me the impression that it started at 16 and going to the purchase page was a sad time.
- kobayashi 10y ago
  I totally can, as I'm in the same boat. And the 240 CAD increase just for an extra 8GB of RAM - what a ripoff!
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

olalonde 10y ago

> A day later, Apple ended the long wait for laptop users yearning for an upgrade by unveiling a new line of MacBook Pros. Was this a coincidence? I'm guessing not but no idea really.

MaggieL 10y ago

Bizarre role reversal? I still remember MSFT and IBM doing the same thing in the 90's.

kilroy123 10y ago

I keep reading about how unhappy people are with Apples latest reveal. I feel the same way. No way am I upgrading my 2015 Mac Book Pro with the new one. Still, Apple will not change a thing unless people actually vote with their wallets. If you're really so upset, do NOT buy this damn computer! If this latest line sees very little sells, they'll get the idea.

grzm 10y ago
Initial indications are that they're selling well. Touch Bar model shipping estimates were already slipping 3–4 weeks within 6 hours of going on sale: http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/27/macbook-pro-shipping-estimates-begin-slipping/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/27/macbook-pro-shipping-est...
- josephg 10y ago
  I'm honestly not surprised. The 13" model looks like a great replacement for my now 4 year old 11" air. Its thankfully not much heavier, but with increased screen space, retina display, battery life improvement and support for 2 external 4k displays. I've been holding out because until now all the apple laptops on offer have required huge compromises for me. The macbook is too gutless (expecially its GPU which apparently can't drive big external displays smoothly). The recent airs still don't have retina displays and the old macbook pros are so big and heavy. After owning an 11" air I can't imagine travelling with the previous generation 15" mbp. The only downside is the exorbitant price. But to replace a machine I've used just about every day for 4 years I can easily justify the cost. And I hope (and expect) the price to drop over the next few years. The air, macbook and retina mbp all started out pretty expensive and then dropped steadily over the lifetime of the design.
pjlegato 10y ago
Suppose you need a new computer for work. Your other options are Windows or a Linux desktop experience, both of which are vastly worse in other ways. (No, I don't want to dork around with spending days compiling kernel patches and installing soundcard drivers before I can use the computer.) I'd gladly buy any other laptop that was simple and just worked out of the box in the sense that a Mac does. But there aren't any.

orionblastar 10y ago

Apple should have had touch screen Macs a few years ago with a pressure sensitive pen and other devices. They should have given the iMac a touch screen, and given the Macbook series a touch screen as well. Microsoft got artists with the Surface Pro tablets and pressure sensitive pens, etc.

pavs 10y ago

I don't use apple products because of the shiny, sexy hardware. It doesn't hurt to have a visually nice looking device to look at when you are spending most of your day on it. I use apple computers (don't use iPhone), specifically because of the OS. I just can't see myself working on Windows ever (unless it makes some major leap of improvement). MacOS has its problems, but its still many time better than the POS Windows OS. The only other option is Linux/Ubuntu, which is nice but wouldn't be my first choice, but definitely a second choice. You can't cover a shitty OS with a Shiny dress and fool most people who have been burned by it. They can copy all they want, at the end of the day it still has windows installed...

drvdevd 10y ago
I can agree with that and felt the same way until I realized (or was forced to admit repeatedly) that 90% of my time using Windows or OS X is now spent either in an SSH session, a web browser, or a virtual machine. Frankly all of these releases, from both companies, come off as rather boring to me. I think all the most interesting innovation, from my perspective, is happening in software now and less "flashy" embedded systems.
kalleboo 10y ago
Part of the reason that macOS works so well is due to the good integration with the hardware. Looking at the poor experience of other commenters in this thread, it looks like Microsoft hasn't realized that is how Apple has managed to do it, and the Surface devices are really "just another PC" and not first-class Windows hardware.

kalefranz 10y ago

I was actually fine with Apple's "courage" to take away my headphone jack on my phone. But the courage to take away my Esc key crosses the line for me.

partycoder 10y ago

Apple focused on creating a specific experience. To achieve that, they started by only targeting specific hardware. Android supports various hardware and so does Windows. Does iOS and macOS do the same? no. Because it would compromise the experience, which is tied directly to the value of their brand, which is ultimately what allows them to price their products the way they do. Apple focused on creating products people want to buy. I am not from a wealthy country, and I have seen people who have put basic needs aside to purchase an iPhone. For a much lower price you could purchase an Android phone, but they did not care. This is the power of a consistent, pleasant experience, something that Microsoft and Google seek to now obtain through the Surface and Pixel respectively. Let's see what happens.

nikolay 10y ago

Microsoft was always more innovative than Apple - just Steve Jobs did a great job at marketing, borrowing Porsche design, etc. Let's face it - Jony Ive is now boring, Jobs was really inspiring people. I miss Jobs, Ive is no match. It's so funny how Apple doesn't release a dual-mode touchscreen laptop because they are afraid their iPad sales will tank. So cowardly - unlike Jobs' Apple!