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It seems reasonable when you consider TCO, but you still have to pay 100% up front. Not everyone can drop $2k on a laptop, most people don’t need to.
by j33zusjuice 3y ago
It seems reasonable when you consider TCO, but you still have to pay 100% up front. Not everyone can drop $2k on a laptop, most people don’t need to.
- FredPret 3y agoThey have lots of monthly payment plan options here in Canada, and probably in the US too. It even used to be zero interest. Not sure about the rest of the world.
- matwood 3y agoApple Card offer this in the US, but you have to get the card. I buy all my Apple gear this way. 0% loans are great.
- kayg04 3y agoAlso many no interest options in India but the prices are higher here, somewhat so for the Macs but significantly higher for the iPhone as it is such a social status thing here in the north.
- prmoustache 3y agoBut more people can certainly afford a second hand mac mini which doesn't cost more than the sum of the parts of a typical hackintosh.
- wkat4242 3y agoAnd you can drop it and lose the $2k in one single second. You can insure against that but it costs another small fortune. TCOs are great calculations for companies but don't work for individuals.
- zozbot234 3y agoBuild a Hackintosh out of a rugged laptop case, problem solved.
- nerdawson 3y agoAppleCare+ on the $2k 14" MBP is $279 or +14% for 3 years of coverage. That seems pretty reasonable to me.
- izacus 3y agoSo now you made it a 2.3k$ MBP didn't you? Funny how the 999$ MacBooks tend to explode in price when you configure them to make them useful.
- nerdawson 3y agoCorrect. It’s an insurance product. Whether you take it is all about your risk tolerance and in no way impacts the usefulness of the machine. I believe 14% is worth it.
- raydev 3y agoI don't understand how this relates to paid warranty or insurance. Your TCO for a non-Apple laptop can also include a protection fee or cost to repair with no insurance.
- zozbot234 3y ago> Not everyone can drop $2k on a laptop That's what most laptops used to cost back in the 1990s or so (after adjusting for inflation). If you look further back in time, hardware was even more expensive - and it couldn't even do 10% of what a modern MacBook does. Modern hardware is ridiculously cheap.
- wkat4242 3y agoIn the 90s most people didn't have a laptop for that very reason. They just owned desktops which were way cheaper. I studied computer science then and I knew 1 student out of 50 that had an actual laptop. Even at the uni we had to use their computer rooms full of desktops and X terminals.
- zozbot234 3y agoCheaper for sure but not "way cheaper", at least nowhere near as cheap as desktop hardware is today.
- ponector 3y agoIn the 90s no one I know had a computer at home. Nintendo/Sega maybe, rich guys had Play Station, but no one had PC.
- wkat4242 3y agoOh here people did. Internet was booming and I set up so many PCs. It was great business.
- Fnoord 3y agoI had a Gameboy, parents had a PC. Friends all had a game console. NES, SNES, SEGA, Amiga, C=64, etc. PC went booming in 90s though. Because here you could buy a PC tax deductible via a law called 'pc-privé'. This was to stimulate citizens to learn to use a computer in their private time. Still, even with tax deduction a PC was very expensive. Not like a car, but expensive still.
- greedo 3y ago
- shagie 3y agoBuying a new MacBook Air https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air/13-inch-m2 https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air/13-inch-m2 $999.00 or $83.25/mo.per month for 12 mo. With a footnote: > Monthly pricing is available when you select Apple Card Monthly Installments (ACMI) as payment type at checkout at Apple, and is subject to credit approval and credit limit. Financing terms vary by product. Taxes and shipping are not included in ACMI and are subject to your card’s variable APR. See the Apple Card Customer Agreement for more information. ACMI is not available for purchases made online at special storefronts. The last month’s payment for each product will be the product’s purchase price, less all other payments at the monthly payment amount. ACMI financing is subject to change at any time for any reason, including but not limited to, installment term lengths and eligible products. See https://support.apple.com/kb/HT211204 https://support.apple.com/kb/HT211204 for information about upcoming changes to ACMI financing. ---- You do not have to drop $2000 on a new laptop up front.
- duskwuff 3y agoDon't forget the $700 Walmart special: https://www.walmart.com/ip/609040889 https://www.walmart.com/ip/609040889
- internet101010 3y ago8gb model doesn't count as a usable computer. It's absurd that it is even being offered in 2024.
- skydhash 3y agoAnd that's how you know someone has not used the 8GB MBA model. 8GB is more than enough for the light usage you'd buy a 8GB model to begin with. Which means not running 3 IDEs and 5 VMs at the same time.
- Nullabillity 3y agoSure, then just add $100 each for a decent amount of RAM and storage. Oh, wait... forgot that these are designed to be landfill fodder.
- duskwuff 3y agoEntry-level price for a new Mac, right now, is $700 (M1 Macbook Air at Walmart). It doesn't get you the best or the fastest, but it's a perfectly usable laptop. Or, if you're okay with something lightly used, a refurbished M1 Mac Mini is ~$500.
- bluescrn 3y agoBut Apple's entry-level Macbooks aren't intended to be bought. They have almost comically low amounts of storage and RAM for 2024 (8GB/256GB). It's all about the upsell on those non-upgradeable parts.
- hparadiz 3y agoVSCode remote to my Linux desktop on LAN. The upsell is obvious but I'm not gonna drop $500 on 256 gb of disk space
- greedo 3y agoThe M1 MBA being sold by Best Buy and Walmart are perfectly fine for 99% of the computing world. Maybe not for gamers (most laptops suck for this), or for someone needing to crunch large datasets, but when this first came out, tons of developers were perfectly happy using it, even with small storage. Hell, my iMac I used up until buying a Mac Studio only had 256GB.
- duskwuff 3y agoYep. 8 GB RAM isn't great, but for basic use -- web browsing, word processing, some light photo/video editing, etc -- it'll be perfectly adequate. Not everyone needs a supercomputer.
- pjmlp 3y agoDepends on how much browser tabs they dare to keep open, and how many pictures and videos they want to keep around on their computer stored in high resolution.
- 3y ago
- lijok 3y agoLower specced macs don’t cost 2k. Go for a generation or two old refurb and you’re looking at 600-800~