4 ms·

Some where someone wrote: It's not that Apples hardware isn't cost competitive, they just don't have en entry level option (or even a low mid-level option). Th

Some where someone wrote: It's not that Apples hardware isn't cost competitive, they just don't have en entry level option (or even a low mid-level option). The cheapest MacBook Air, which is fine for most of my needs is €1260/$1370 and while it's a wonderful laptop, it's just a bit much for running Safari, VSCode and a terminal. It really is a €950 laptop, but if they could hit that price then what else would you really want to buy? A major issue for me is that I wouldn't know what else to get. Given the current state of Windows, I'm not running out to get a Windows machine. Honestly, if the layout of my house was different, so I could get my desk closer to the living room and family, I'd go for a desktop running Linux next time around. Other than that, I think Apple have the market cornered. You want a great laptop, with an OS that just works (for most people), then what else are you going to buy?

Mindwipe 4y ago
The sticker shock of having to purchase the RAM/storage for the lifetime of the device isn't typical, and is above market rates for those things.
nicoburns 4y ago
Their base models are usually vaguely reasonably priced. But they charge a huge markup for RAM/disk upgrades.
- eastbound 4y ago
  I got a surprise when going to System76’s buy page. Upgrades to 1To or 32GB are only two-digit numbers, not three digits! Coming from Apple, it’s refreshing. (But the second adapter is 110$ and requires a separate 120$ shipment).
fastaguy88 4y ago
Yesterday, the cheapest MacBook Air (M1, 8Gb/256GB) was under $800 at Costco in the US.
- mrweasel 4y ago
  I suspect that's excluding VAT, which would add 25% where I am, making it a $1000 laptop. I understand Apple isn't responsible for VAT, but I still need to pay it. Still it's hitting the price point I think it should be at, it's just not really an offer that's available to me.
  - microtonal 4y ago
    Where are you, because that's a pretty normal price point? E.g. where I am (The Netherlands), you can get that model for 949 Euro including VAT.
_fat_santa 4y ago
I feel like Apple is shooting themselves in the foot with app developers. First you make your system a complete walled garden, you need Apple hardware to develop MacOS/iOS apps and there is no alternative. It would be one thing if you had a walled garden + affordable hardware but that's not the case, you have a walled garden and you have prohibitively expensive hardware to develop apps for that walled garden. Hell even when it comes to development, you can't just build your iOS/MacOS app on a regular Linux CI machine, no you must have MacOS machines for building, so you need that special hardware on top of all the other expenses. I almost feel like Apple setup the developer program with the idea that it's just going to be 15 year old prodogies making apps on their parents computer, their whole stack just seems incompatible and PIA to work with when it comes to actual software development. It should be a sign when you have popular products like CodePush that were designed specifically to address the shortcomings of developing iOS apps.
- scarface74 4y ago
  Yes because app developers aren’t going to develop for the phone being bought by people with the highest incomes and willingness to spend money. It’s been over a decade since indy developers really made a dent in the App Store. Android is not exactly a piece of cake to develop for, the tool chain is slow, the emulator is slow, the device market os fragmented and people are still mostly running old versions of Android you have to support. Not to mention most Android devices on the market are slow.
  - realusername 4y ago
    I can agree with the market all you want but on the tech side, Android is miles ahead of Apple for any developer stuff, there's not even a debate. xcode itself is 12GB and doesn't support partial updates, the projet file is some hot garbage and plays badly with git, the whole ide is lagging pretty hard on clicka, app upload is so broken Apple themselves had ro release a third party tool to bypass it, the developer portal looks like it hasn't changed since 2010 and has a number of shameful bugs...
    - 4y ago
codedokode 4y ago
By the way Framework also has no cheap options like $400-$500: the prices start with 750 Euro for tiny 13-inch version. I guess you can't profit much from selling reasonably priced laptops.
- myself248 4y ago
  I suspect that the hardware margins might be there, and the sticking point is the additional overhead to cover support. When they sell ten million units and have six-sigma'd any manufacturing and support wrinkles to near-irrelevance, I wouldn't be surprised if they move down-market. For the time being, there's apparently a customer base willing to pay those prices. They're not spec-competitive, but once you assign value to the brand, and the moral stance of supporting the idea, and the secondary value of intentionally-not-obsolete components, they have a lot going for them. And notably, the customers who consider those factors to be important, are generally aiming mid-high in the market anyway.

Mindwipe 4y ago

The sticker shock of having to purchase the RAM/storage for the lifetime of the device isn't typical, and is above market rates for those things.

nicoburns 4y ago

Their base models are usually vaguely reasonably priced. But they charge a huge markup for RAM/disk upgrades.

eastbound 4y ago
I got a surprise when going to System76’s buy page. Upgrades to 1To or 32GB are only two-digit numbers, not three digits! Coming from Apple, it’s refreshing. (But the second adapter is 110$ and requires a separate 120$ shipment).

fastaguy88 4y ago

Yesterday, the cheapest MacBook Air (M1, 8Gb/256GB) was under $800 at Costco in the US.

mrweasel 4y ago
I suspect that's excluding VAT, which would add 25% where I am, making it a $1000 laptop. I understand Apple isn't responsible for VAT, but I still need to pay it. Still it's hitting the price point I think it should be at, it's just not really an offer that's available to me.
- microtonal 4y ago
  Where are you, because that's a pretty normal price point? E.g. where I am (The Netherlands), you can get that model for 949 Euro including VAT.

_fat_santa 4y ago

I feel like Apple is shooting themselves in the foot with app developers. First you make your system a complete walled garden, you need Apple hardware to develop MacOS/iOS apps and there is no alternative. It would be one thing if you had a walled garden + affordable hardware but that's not the case, you have a walled garden and you have prohibitively expensive hardware to develop apps for that walled garden. Hell even when it comes to development, you can't just build your iOS/MacOS app on a regular Linux CI machine, no you must have MacOS machines for building, so you need that special hardware on top of all the other expenses. I almost feel like Apple setup the developer program with the idea that it's just going to be 15 year old prodogies making apps on their parents computer, their whole stack just seems incompatible and PIA to work with when it comes to actual software development. It should be a sign when you have popular products like CodePush that were designed specifically to address the shortcomings of developing iOS apps.

scarface74 4y ago
Yes because app developers aren’t going to develop for the phone being bought by people with the highest incomes and willingness to spend money. It’s been over a decade since indy developers really made a dent in the App Store. Android is not exactly a piece of cake to develop for, the tool chain is slow, the emulator is slow, the device market os fragmented and people are still mostly running old versions of Android you have to support. Not to mention most Android devices on the market are slow.
- realusername 4y ago
  I can agree with the market all you want but on the tech side, Android is miles ahead of Apple for any developer stuff, there's not even a debate. xcode itself is 12GB and doesn't support partial updates, the projet file is some hot garbage and plays badly with git, the whole ide is lagging pretty hard on clicka, app upload is so broken Apple themselves had ro release a third party tool to bypass it, the developer portal looks like it hasn't changed since 2010 and has a number of shameful bugs...
  - 4y ago

codedokode 4y ago

By the way Framework also has no cheap options like $400-$500: the prices start with 750 Euro for tiny 13-inch version. I guess you can't profit much from selling reasonably priced laptops.

myself248 4y ago
I suspect that the hardware margins might be there, and the sticking point is the additional overhead to cover support. When they sell ten million units and have six-sigma'd any manufacturing and support wrinkles to near-irrelevance, I wouldn't be surprised if they move down-market. For the time being, there's apparently a customer base willing to pay those prices. They're not spec-competitive, but once you assign value to the brand, and the moral stance of supporting the idea, and the secondary value of intentionally-not-obsolete components, they have a lot going for them. And notably, the customers who consider those factors to be important, are generally aiming mid-high in the market anyway.