9 ms·

The Macintosh Endgame

60 points by MaysonL 10y ago

api 10y ago
He's ignoring a rather large elephant in the room: iOS is the most locked down OS in history. That's going to keep two kinds of people from ever moving to it as their primary computing device: people who care about freedom, and power users who care about versatility and complex work flows. The latter includes most developers. You just can't do that stuff on iOS. You can barely even run your own apps on it. I suppose you could push a model where all the interesting stuff lives in the cloud or headless metal servers and the iOS device is a portable terminal with apps and the Web as sophisticated terminal emulations more or less. Think of an app or a big JS site as a giant analog of a VT macro. I see PC sales declining and then leveling off after having lost most casual and low end users to tablets and mobile.
- maxwell 10y ago
  Agree on all points. iOS is limited by the inability to develop iOS apps on iOS devices, because software not hardware. (Same for Android of course.) Swift Playgrounds suggests they're moving in that direction, but it looks like a very far cry from Xcode. Hardware-wise, the iPad Pro, new MacBook, and new MBP seem to be closing in on convergence to an "iPadBook" (too bad the iBooks app means no resurrection of the iBook brand...), i.e. dual screen iPad. When I first typed on a new MB, I got the feeling the flat keys were partly preparing people to transition to touchscreen typing. The touchbar is another step in that direction. Something a bit like this feels inevitable: https://bencollier.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/20101021-075628.jpg https://bencollier.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/20101021-0... Software-wise, macOS and iOS still seem far apart though. But I'm no Mac or iOS developer. Hell, at this point I basically only use iOS for testing my company's apps before a release. (Funny that the reasons I went to, and have stayed on, Android this year have zero to do with software, i.e. USB-C, fingerprint sensor on the back, and Project Fi. All the apps I want are on both platforms, and I would never develop for either.)
- adventurer 10y ago
  He's missing the big picture, in my mind. Pc sales may be in decline but aside from a few quarters, Apple has sold more macs by more than 6 times it did when it plateaued ten years ago. Sales have been on a steady incline because they were always selling miniscule amounts compared to the other cheap brands on the market. There was almost no where to go but up. It's not milking anything.
- heisenbit 10y ago
  Productive work - unlike consumption - is based on the file metaphor. Not well supported on iOS. The workplace runs on written conversations and that means keyboards are required. The high road leads to no good place. Apple has been there in the past. SGI and many other bodies are laying rotting left and right. Prices for PC are declining and in any case there is already a significant and probably unsustainable gap. Macs have 4 cost drivers that Apple can tackle to ensure they keep growing their market share: - Manufacturing - Intel - Apple margins - Mac features Compromising manufacturing would damage the brand. Intel is somewhat kept in check by the threat of Ax (and fighting back by providing more function/lock-in around the CPU) but ultimately an Ax processor may be attractive. Apple margins are something to consider both from appropriateness for the market and as a stop-gap measure. Providing a low feature Mac may be another and imho the most promising one. A 12-13'' laptop aimed at the basic educational need and simple business use case market priced around $1000. Not much CPU/GPU but enough battery to last a day.
  - api 10y ago
    This is a great point. Keep am eye on the "Raspberry Pi clamshell case" type laptops. These are truly disruptive. A much higher end version of this could be interesting. I'd consider an Octacore A64 with 8-16GB RAM and 4K or better display.
anindha 10y ago
"In a fantasy world, Apple produces an Ax-based Mac" Combining the iPad and Macbook is equivalent to rolling the iPod into the iPhone. I also have a Macbook and its the perfect computer for normal laptop tasks. I am surprised by how many people don't know this exists. "But what would an Ax Mac mean in the real world, to software developers?" There are lots of companies producing iOS and Mac apps. It is going to be easier than porting programs from Windows to Mac.
- redial 10y ago
  > I also have a Macbook and its the perfect computer for normal laptop tasks. I am surprised by how many people don't know this exists. They know it exists, they also know is $1300 and up.
  - op00to 10y ago
    The MacBook Air is $999, with plenty of discounts to be found. Also a nearly perfect computer for the vast majority of use cases. Any cheaper, and you're into disposable shittop range.
    - rz2k 10y ago
      The list of Kaby Lake laptops of all sizes is starting to get pretty long[1], with more and more of them having better performance, battery life, weight and screen resolution than the MacBook Air for less than $1000 if you're willing to deal with Windows[2]. I think Apple will have something new in the same space as the Air or non-Pro MacBook soon, but the options aren't great right now. [1] http://www.ultrabookreview.com/11638-intel-kabylake/ http://www.ultrabookreview.com/11638-intel-kabylake/ [2] Driver support probably isn't great for Linux yet.
      - op00to 10y ago
        Will these laptops last 3+ years? Anything I've bought sub $1k fell apart or failed in some expensive way within 18 months.
mark_l_watson 10y ago
Good article, and as the ex-CEO of Apple, he thinks more deeply about Apple's business than most of us. Even though I have several Linux laptops and a Chromebook, the device I use the most is my 12" iPad Pro. It is great for light weight writing, SSHing into a server to trouble shoot a problem, run updates, etc. I just bought a new MacBook, which I am starting to like a lot, after a period of getting used to the keyboard, but I just use it for work. If my wife sees me using the MacBook then she assumes I am working (programming). With the iPad, I could be having fun or working. I look at the iPad as the future for most people. That said, what I really want is convergence. I want one seemless environment that seems the same no matter what device I am on. I actually more or less have that, in a kluge way, but I want something more polished and effortless. I think Apple, and perhaps Microsoft have a good shot at doing this near term. With some trade offs, you can get this now with a Chromebook, Android phone, Chromecast, and Google Home but as much as I like Google's garden I don't want to live in it all the time.
- redial 10y ago
  He was never the CEO of Apple. He was Head of Macintosh Development.
- abrowne 10y ago
  He was an Apple exec, but never CEO.
  - iainmerrick 10y ago
    He was also a founder of Be, which may contribute to people misremembering. There was talk of Apple buying Be back in the day, but they ended up buying NeXT instead. In some parallel universe, Gassée ended up playing the role of Steve Jobs.
- userbinator 10y ago
  I want one seemless environment that seems the same no matter what device I am on. Microsoft tried going in that direction with Windows 8, and it still appears to be somewhat of a trend, but all they did was dumb-down the desktop interface to mobile touchscreen levels of usefulness.
Alex3917 10y ago
Much of the shrinking market is due to the fact that laptops used to need to be replaced every three or four years, and now only need to be replaced every six years or so. That's about how long it takes for the hardware to wear out, and for the next generation of hardware to be significantly better. In 2022 Intel plans to have 7nm CPUs available. Those laptops will be considerably more powerful, and laptop's purchased today will be starting to fall apart. So it's unlikely that folks are going to go ten years between new laptops any time soon, meaning the size of the market should level off somewhat. There is plenty of room for Apple to continue to make improvements within this general form factor, and to reduce the price. And if tablets or phones really do somehow make laptops obsolete, then Apple will just license or open source OS X. That way it wouldn't have to deal with making laptops, but developers would still have a good platform for making iOS apps. The idea that OS X or MBPs are going anyway makes no sense, at least for the next decade or so.
- partiallypro 10y ago
  I agree with the first portion of your post, but I'm not entirely convinced on the second. I do think it is entirely within the realm of possibility that Apple will kill off their desktop and laptop lines. I think it's a ways off, but Apple's refusal to evolve in any meaningful way in the space might make their efforts a legacy line at best.
  - grzm 10y ago
    I think it's a ways off Want to weigh in on a time line? To misquote Fight Club, “On a long enough time line, the survival rate for every product drops to zero.” Apple's refusal to evolve in any meaningful way in the space Given the complaints about the changes Apple made in the most recent MBP update, what evolution are you looking for? Touchbar, larger trackpad, and USB-C aren't meaningful? Continuing to reduce the size of the machine? Those all seem evolutionary (rather than revolutionary), and quite typical of the iterative updates Apple is known for. Are only increased memory and CPU speeds meaningful? Or the lack of a touch screen? Maybe no equivalent to the MS Surface Book? What would constitute a meaningful change for you? Feeling my oats a little bit, so feel free to push back. I can understand people not being happy with the new Macbook Pros for a variety of reasons. However, refusal to evolve in any meaningful way sounds unjustified.
IBM 10y ago
>Microsoft contends that the Surface hybrid, now in its fourth iteration, is the best-of-both-worlds that their customers want. Microsoft contends this because the market forced their hand. They have no presence in smartphones or tablets so having a separate operating system for them is untenable. They tried very hard to get developers on board and it didn't work.
- bhauer 10y ago
  Surface didn't work? Its current generation is making a profit and is well-reviewed by users and tech journalists alike. For what it's worth, Surface products are exactly what I want in a portable computer. I find both traditional tablets (such as Android tablets and iPads) and legacy-style laptops (including the new Macbook Pro) unexciting and ultimately not worth my money.
  - prodigal_erik 10y ago
    They had to go back to hardware that runs Win10 x64 apps, because nobody wanted to ship WinRT ARM apps.
    - bhauer 10y ago
      Oh is that what we're talking about? Yeah, WinRT was needlessly limited. But it's also a distant memory. Speaking about it today is about as relevant as discussing iOS 6 or Android 4.1.
      - fencepost 10y ago
        Possibly. Still, when you think about the death of Windows RT, remember that there's still a version of Windows running on ARM, and the ecosystem of applications that run on it is now called "Windows Universal apps." Windows Phone may be moribund in the market but that ARM capacity and the admittedly not ready for prime time Continuum (phone + monitor /keyboard /mouse) desktop could lead to a better supported and accepted descendant returning to the market currently dominated by Chromebooks.
honkhonkpants 10y ago
JLG seems deliberately stuck in the past. Just for starters they retired the Macintosh brand 18 years ago.
- lambdasquirrel 10y ago
  Or it might be intentional tongue-in-cheek nostalgia or something along those lines. The guy was once head of Macintosh division back when PCs mattered a lot more. Give him some cred. :P
  - honkhonkpants 10y ago
    Perhaps but I'm not sure it's healthy to be nostalgic for the Macintosh line of 20 years ago. It was a train wreck, really.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
rackforms 10y ago
My brother, a comparatively well paid teacher in the Midwest desperately wants but cannot afford a new MacBook Pro. At the same time his school and many others are awash in perfectly functional Chromebooks. In my own experience then we've got Apple purposely cutting off vast swaths of potential buyers due to lackluster/irregular updates and high prices on one end, and seemingly unaware of a vast market for education and lower price users on the other. A declining market is one thing but this, so far as it looks to me, is Apple simply throwing potential customers away. That's not riding a wave, it's just plain bad business. What am I missing here?
- cyberferret 10y ago
  Does the Apple educational pricing discounts still not make it worthwhile? I have no idea what the discount percentage is now, but I remember years ago some teacher (and tertiary student) friends of mine being delighted in being able to afford and Apple Macbook due to this incentive.
  - AlexeyBrin 10y ago
    Last time I checked the educational discount was around $100 for a $2K+ laptop. Here is the relevant link http://www.apple.com/us-hed/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro/13-inch http://www.apple.com/us-hed/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro/13-inch if someone is interested.
    - cyberferret 10y ago
      Hmm, I thought I could remember my friends saying the educational discount was around 20%. Perhaps I am not remembering correctly, or the discount has changed a lot lately.
      - grzm 10y ago
        I remember larger discounts as well. That said, summer vacation seemed longer, too.
      - 10y ago
nikolay 10y ago
I just bought an HP, which was half the price of the new MacBook Pro, has better specs, and looks as good if not better. And instead of having a fancy touch-friendly strip, my entire screen is touch-enabled. I've invested tons of money into little, but expensive apps that allow me to maximize windows instead of making them full-screen (Moom), or make a large number of icons fit in the menubar (Bartender), but this is getting ridiculous! I think Windows 10 Pro is a better OS and is more developer-friendly than MacBook nowadays, too.

60 points by MaysonL 10y ago

api 10y ago

He's ignoring a rather large elephant in the room: iOS is the most locked down OS in history. That's going to keep two kinds of people from ever moving to it as their primary computing device: people who care about freedom, and power users who care about versatility and complex work flows. The latter includes most developers. You just can't do that stuff on iOS. You can barely even run your own apps on it. I suppose you could push a model where all the interesting stuff lives in the cloud or headless metal servers and the iOS device is a portable terminal with apps and the Web as sophisticated terminal emulations more or less. Think of an app or a big JS site as a giant analog of a VT macro. I see PC sales declining and then leveling off after having lost most casual and low end users to tablets and mobile.

maxwell 10y ago
Agree on all points. iOS is limited by the inability to develop iOS apps on iOS devices, because software not hardware. (Same for Android of course.) Swift Playgrounds suggests they're moving in that direction, but it looks like a very far cry from Xcode. Hardware-wise, the iPad Pro, new MacBook, and new MBP seem to be closing in on convergence to an "iPadBook" (too bad the iBooks app means no resurrection of the iBook brand...), i.e. dual screen iPad. When I first typed on a new MB, I got the feeling the flat keys were partly preparing people to transition to touchscreen typing. The touchbar is another step in that direction. Something a bit like this feels inevitable: https://bencollier.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/20101021-075628.jpg https://bencollier.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/20101021-0... Software-wise, macOS and iOS still seem far apart though. But I'm no Mac or iOS developer. Hell, at this point I basically only use iOS for testing my company's apps before a release. (Funny that the reasons I went to, and have stayed on, Android this year have zero to do with software, i.e. USB-C, fingerprint sensor on the back, and Project Fi. All the apps I want are on both platforms, and I would never develop for either.)
adventurer 10y ago
He's missing the big picture, in my mind. Pc sales may be in decline but aside from a few quarters, Apple has sold more macs by more than 6 times it did when it plateaued ten years ago. Sales have been on a steady incline because they were always selling miniscule amounts compared to the other cheap brands on the market. There was almost no where to go but up. It's not milking anything.
heisenbit 10y ago
Productive work - unlike consumption - is based on the file metaphor. Not well supported on iOS. The workplace runs on written conversations and that means keyboards are required. The high road leads to no good place. Apple has been there in the past. SGI and many other bodies are laying rotting left and right. Prices for PC are declining and in any case there is already a significant and probably unsustainable gap. Macs have 4 cost drivers that Apple can tackle to ensure they keep growing their market share: - Manufacturing - Intel - Apple margins - Mac features Compromising manufacturing would damage the brand. Intel is somewhat kept in check by the threat of Ax (and fighting back by providing more function/lock-in around the CPU) but ultimately an Ax processor may be attractive. Apple margins are something to consider both from appropriateness for the market and as a stop-gap measure. Providing a low feature Mac may be another and imho the most promising one. A 12-13'' laptop aimed at the basic educational need and simple business use case market priced around $1000. Not much CPU/GPU but enough battery to last a day.
- api 10y ago
  This is a great point. Keep am eye on the "Raspberry Pi clamshell case" type laptops. These are truly disruptive. A much higher end version of this could be interesting. I'd consider an Octacore A64 with 8-16GB RAM and 4K or better display.

anindha 10y ago

"In a fantasy world, Apple produces an Ax-based Mac" Combining the iPad and Macbook is equivalent to rolling the iPod into the iPhone. I also have a Macbook and its the perfect computer for normal laptop tasks. I am surprised by how many people don't know this exists. "But what would an Ax Mac mean in the real world, to software developers?" There are lots of companies producing iOS and Mac apps. It is going to be easier than porting programs from Windows to Mac.

redial 10y ago
> I also have a Macbook and its the perfect computer for normal laptop tasks. I am surprised by how many people don't know this exists. They know it exists, they also know is $1300 and up.
- op00to 10y ago
  The MacBook Air is $999, with plenty of discounts to be found. Also a nearly perfect computer for the vast majority of use cases. Any cheaper, and you're into disposable shittop range.
  - rz2k 10y ago
    The list of Kaby Lake laptops of all sizes is starting to get pretty long[1], with more and more of them having better performance, battery life, weight and screen resolution than the MacBook Air for less than $1000 if you're willing to deal with Windows[2]. I think Apple will have something new in the same space as the Air or non-Pro MacBook soon, but the options aren't great right now. [1] http://www.ultrabookreview.com/11638-intel-kabylake/ http://www.ultrabookreview.com/11638-intel-kabylake/ [2] Driver support probably isn't great for Linux yet.
    - op00to 10y ago
      Will these laptops last 3+ years? Anything I've bought sub $1k fell apart or failed in some expensive way within 18 months.

mark_l_watson 10y ago

Good article, and as the ex-CEO of Apple, he thinks more deeply about Apple's business than most of us. Even though I have several Linux laptops and a Chromebook, the device I use the most is my 12" iPad Pro. It is great for light weight writing, SSHing into a server to trouble shoot a problem, run updates, etc. I just bought a new MacBook, which I am starting to like a lot, after a period of getting used to the keyboard, but I just use it for work. If my wife sees me using the MacBook then she assumes I am working (programming). With the iPad, I could be having fun or working. I look at the iPad as the future for most people. That said, what I really want is convergence. I want one seemless environment that seems the same no matter what device I am on. I actually more or less have that, in a kluge way, but I want something more polished and effortless. I think Apple, and perhaps Microsoft have a good shot at doing this near term. With some trade offs, you can get this now with a Chromebook, Android phone, Chromecast, and Google Home but as much as I like Google's garden I don't want to live in it all the time.

redial 10y ago
He was never the CEO of Apple. He was Head of Macintosh Development.
abrowne 10y ago
He was an Apple exec, but never CEO.
- iainmerrick 10y ago
  He was also a founder of Be, which may contribute to people misremembering. There was talk of Apple buying Be back in the day, but they ended up buying NeXT instead. In some parallel universe, Gassée ended up playing the role of Steve Jobs.
userbinator 10y ago
I want one seemless environment that seems the same no matter what device I am on. Microsoft tried going in that direction with Windows 8, and it still appears to be somewhat of a trend, but all they did was dumb-down the desktop interface to mobile touchscreen levels of usefulness.

Alex3917 10y ago

Much of the shrinking market is due to the fact that laptops used to need to be replaced every three or four years, and now only need to be replaced every six years or so. That's about how long it takes for the hardware to wear out, and for the next generation of hardware to be significantly better. In 2022 Intel plans to have 7nm CPUs available. Those laptops will be considerably more powerful, and laptop's purchased today will be starting to fall apart. So it's unlikely that folks are going to go ten years between new laptops any time soon, meaning the size of the market should level off somewhat. There is plenty of room for Apple to continue to make improvements within this general form factor, and to reduce the price. And if tablets or phones really do somehow make laptops obsolete, then Apple will just license or open source OS X. That way it wouldn't have to deal with making laptops, but developers would still have a good platform for making iOS apps. The idea that OS X or MBPs are going anyway makes no sense, at least for the next decade or so.

partiallypro 10y ago
I agree with the first portion of your post, but I'm not entirely convinced on the second. I do think it is entirely within the realm of possibility that Apple will kill off their desktop and laptop lines. I think it's a ways off, but Apple's refusal to evolve in any meaningful way in the space might make their efforts a legacy line at best.
- grzm 10y ago
  I think it's a ways off Want to weigh in on a time line? To misquote Fight Club, “On a long enough time line, the survival rate for every product drops to zero.” Apple's refusal to evolve in any meaningful way in the space Given the complaints about the changes Apple made in the most recent MBP update, what evolution are you looking for? Touchbar, larger trackpad, and USB-C aren't meaningful? Continuing to reduce the size of the machine? Those all seem evolutionary (rather than revolutionary), and quite typical of the iterative updates Apple is known for. Are only increased memory and CPU speeds meaningful? Or the lack of a touch screen? Maybe no equivalent to the MS Surface Book? What would constitute a meaningful change for you? Feeling my oats a little bit, so feel free to push back. I can understand people not being happy with the new Macbook Pros for a variety of reasons. However, refusal to evolve in any meaningful way sounds unjustified.

IBM 10y ago

>Microsoft contends that the Surface hybrid, now in its fourth iteration, is the best-of-both-worlds that their customers want. Microsoft contends this because the market forced their hand. They have no presence in smartphones or tablets so having a separate operating system for them is untenable. They tried very hard to get developers on board and it didn't work.

bhauer 10y ago
Surface didn't work? Its current generation is making a profit and is well-reviewed by users and tech journalists alike. For what it's worth, Surface products are exactly what I want in a portable computer. I find both traditional tablets (such as Android tablets and iPads) and legacy-style laptops (including the new Macbook Pro) unexciting and ultimately not worth my money.
- prodigal_erik 10y ago
  They had to go back to hardware that runs Win10 x64 apps, because nobody wanted to ship WinRT ARM apps.
  - bhauer 10y ago
    Oh is that what we're talking about? Yeah, WinRT was needlessly limited. But it's also a distant memory. Speaking about it today is about as relevant as discussing iOS 6 or Android 4.1.
    - fencepost 10y ago
      Possibly. Still, when you think about the death of Windows RT, remember that there's still a version of Windows running on ARM, and the ecosystem of applications that run on it is now called "Windows Universal apps." Windows Phone may be moribund in the market but that ARM capacity and the admittedly not ready for prime time Continuum (phone + monitor /keyboard /mouse) desktop could lead to a better supported and accepted descendant returning to the market currently dominated by Chromebooks.

honkhonkpants 10y ago

JLG seems deliberately stuck in the past. Just for starters they retired the Macintosh brand 18 years ago.

lambdasquirrel 10y ago
Or it might be intentional tongue-in-cheek nostalgia or something along those lines. The guy was once head of Macintosh division back when PCs mattered a lot more. Give him some cred. :P
- honkhonkpants 10y ago
  Perhaps but I'm not sure it's healthy to be nostalgic for the Macintosh line of 20 years ago. It was a train wreck, really.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]

rackforms 10y ago

My brother, a comparatively well paid teacher in the Midwest desperately wants but cannot afford a new MacBook Pro. At the same time his school and many others are awash in perfectly functional Chromebooks. In my own experience then we've got Apple purposely cutting off vast swaths of potential buyers due to lackluster/irregular updates and high prices on one end, and seemingly unaware of a vast market for education and lower price users on the other. A declining market is one thing but this, so far as it looks to me, is Apple simply throwing potential customers away. That's not riding a wave, it's just plain bad business. What am I missing here?

cyberferret 10y ago
Does the Apple educational pricing discounts still not make it worthwhile? I have no idea what the discount percentage is now, but I remember years ago some teacher (and tertiary student) friends of mine being delighted in being able to afford and Apple Macbook due to this incentive.
- AlexeyBrin 10y ago
  Last time I checked the educational discount was around $100 for a $2K+ laptop. Here is the relevant link http://www.apple.com/us-hed/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro/13-inch http://www.apple.com/us-hed/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro/13-inch if someone is interested.
  - cyberferret 10y ago
    Hmm, I thought I could remember my friends saying the educational discount was around 20%. Perhaps I am not remembering correctly, or the discount has changed a lot lately.
    - grzm 10y ago
      I remember larger discounts as well. That said, summer vacation seemed longer, too.
    - 10y ago

nikolay 10y ago

I just bought an HP, which was half the price of the new MacBook Pro, has better specs, and looks as good if not better. And instead of having a fancy touch-friendly strip, my entire screen is touch-enabled. I've invested tons of money into little, but expensive apps that allow me to maximize windows instead of making them full-screen (Moom), or make a large number of icons fit in the menubar (Bartender), but this is getting ridiculous! I think Windows 10 Pro is a better OS and is more developer-friendly than MacBook nowadays, too.