4 ms·

From my experience, TCO on most apple products ends up being roughly the same when you factor in resale value. You'll be able to sell your M4 mac mini in 5 yea

From my experience, TCO on most apple products ends up being roughly the same when you factor in resale value. You'll be able to sell your M4 mac mini in 5 years for $150 for an instant-cash offer from backmarket or any other reseller, while you'd be lucky to get $30 for the equivalent Beelink or BOSGAME after 6 months on ebay.

mkagenius 2y ago
Is there a black market for old macbooks/minis? My macbook pro 15 inch, mid 2017 is valued at $195 by apple trade in. Bought for 2k iirc.
- graeme 2y ago
  https://www.ebay.ca/b/2017-Apple-MacBook-Pro-15-4-Inch-Laptops/111422/bn_108861823 https://www.ebay.ca/b/2017-Apple-MacBook-Pro-15-4-Inch-Lapto...
- singhrac 2y ago
  No need for a black market, there's plenty of public ones (Backmarket, eBay, etc.). That being said $200 seems not terrible given the step change in performance since then (I own a 2019 MBP and think we were very unlucky with our purchase timing). Backmarket seems to sell yours for ~$350-500, so maybe you'll get a little bit more trade-in for it. I owned a 2014 MBP (~$1200?) for a long time and as late as 2019 it was resellable for $500.
- sylens 2y ago
  It’s a casaulty of the Apple Silicon transition. The Intel Mac’s are not worth much
- gwervc 2y ago
  There's a legal second hand market where prices are obviously way higher than whatever Apple is offering for trade in.
diffeomorphism 2y ago
So wait 6 months and buy the equivalent beelink for $30 instead of wasting $600 on the mac?
- malshe 2y ago
  I’m curious about your definition of the word waste. If a $600 Mac lasts 5 years and still worth $150 and another machine loses all its value in six months, how is Mac a waste?
  - chipdart 2y ago
    > If a $600 Mac lasts 5 years and still worth $150 and another machine loses all its value in six months (...) Your hypothetical scenario is so absurd you didn't even noticed your catastrophical scenario falls well within any warranty period. In the meantime, I own cheap miniPCs that I used as daily drivers, and they soldier on for years. I mean, do you really believe that NUCs from Intel and AMD will simply fall apart if they don't have an Apple sticker on them?
    - TheNewsIsHere 2y ago
      I do think we should at least use the same measure of time to compare. Even if that means one reaches $0 by the time the other reaches $150. Macs do generally hold their resell value better than PCs, but that doesn’t necessarily have any correlation to usefulness. I have bought several ThinkCenter small form factor PCs used for about $200 each, and they’ve each been about 5-7 years old. They’re perfectly fine and I can even get new parts from Lenovo, depending on the part and machine. Fantastic deal. They run loads of services in my home.
  - diffeomorphism 2y ago
    600-150 is a bigger number than 30 last time I checked. So even if the $30 machine were to loose all its remaining value instantly, not even scrap metal, you would be far, far ahead. These are the dollar numbers claimed in the above post.
drcongo 2y ago
I just checked out backmarket as I've been shopping for a mini PC with oculink and hadn't thought of them. They have a primary nav across the top of the site which has 5 generic categories (laptops, consoles etc.), one Google product (pixel), 4 Samsung items, and 20 Apple items - more than all the others put together. I guess this very much proves your point.
nordsieck 2y ago
> You'll be able to sell your M4 mac mini in 5 years for $150 for an instant-cash offer from backmarket or any other reseller If you want to put in a bit of elbow grease, you can get a much better deal. M1 Mac Minis in my area are regularly selling for $350+ on FB Marketplace right now.
chipdart 2y ago
> From my experience, TCO on most apple products ends up being roughly the same when you factor in resale value. This reads like the epitome of Apple's reality distortion field. I mean, you're trying to convince yourself that a product is not overpriced when compared to equivalent products and subjecting customers to price gauging by asserting that you might be able to sell it later. That's quite the logical leap.
- renaudg 2y ago
  No that's an accurate TCO calculation. It's interesting that on this topic, the inventor of the PC also seems to be caught in that supposed "Apple reality distortion field" and can't confirm the "price gouging" that you're trying to convince yourself Apple practices. https://www.cio.com/article/236396/ibm-says-macs-save-up-to-543-per-user.html https://www.cio.com/article/236396/ibm-says-macs-save-up-to-...

mkagenius 2y ago

Is there a black market for old macbooks/minis? My macbook pro 15 inch, mid 2017 is valued at $195 by apple trade in. Bought for 2k iirc.

graeme 2y ago
https://www.ebay.ca/b/2017-Apple-MacBook-Pro-15-4-Inch-Laptops/111422/bn_108861823 https://www.ebay.ca/b/2017-Apple-MacBook-Pro-15-4-Inch-Lapto...
singhrac 2y ago
No need for a black market, there's plenty of public ones (Backmarket, eBay, etc.). That being said $200 seems not terrible given the step change in performance since then (I own a 2019 MBP and think we were very unlucky with our purchase timing). Backmarket seems to sell yours for ~$350-500, so maybe you'll get a little bit more trade-in for it. I owned a 2014 MBP (~$1200?) for a long time and as late as 2019 it was resellable for $500.
sylens 2y ago
It’s a casaulty of the Apple Silicon transition. The Intel Mac’s are not worth much
gwervc 2y ago
There's a legal second hand market where prices are obviously way higher than whatever Apple is offering for trade in.

diffeomorphism 2y ago

So wait 6 months and buy the equivalent beelink for $30 instead of wasting $600 on the mac?

malshe 2y ago
I’m curious about your definition of the word waste. If a $600 Mac lasts 5 years and still worth $150 and another machine loses all its value in six months, how is Mac a waste?
- chipdart 2y ago
  > If a $600 Mac lasts 5 years and still worth $150 and another machine loses all its value in six months (...) Your hypothetical scenario is so absurd you didn't even noticed your catastrophical scenario falls well within any warranty period. In the meantime, I own cheap miniPCs that I used as daily drivers, and they soldier on for years. I mean, do you really believe that NUCs from Intel and AMD will simply fall apart if they don't have an Apple sticker on them?
  - TheNewsIsHere 2y ago
    I do think we should at least use the same measure of time to compare. Even if that means one reaches $0 by the time the other reaches $150. Macs do generally hold their resell value better than PCs, but that doesn’t necessarily have any correlation to usefulness. I have bought several ThinkCenter small form factor PCs used for about $200 each, and they’ve each been about 5-7 years old. They’re perfectly fine and I can even get new parts from Lenovo, depending on the part and machine. Fantastic deal. They run loads of services in my home.
- diffeomorphism 2y ago
  600-150 is a bigger number than 30 last time I checked. So even if the $30 machine were to loose all its remaining value instantly, not even scrap metal, you would be far, far ahead. These are the dollar numbers claimed in the above post.

drcongo 2y ago

I just checked out backmarket as I've been shopping for a mini PC with oculink and hadn't thought of them. They have a primary nav across the top of the site which has 5 generic categories (laptops, consoles etc.), one Google product (pixel), 4 Samsung items, and 20 Apple items - more than all the others put together. I guess this very much proves your point.

nordsieck 2y ago

> You'll be able to sell your M4 mac mini in 5 years for $150 for an instant-cash offer from backmarket or any other reseller If you want to put in a bit of elbow grease, you can get a much better deal. M1 Mac Minis in my area are regularly selling for $350+ on FB Marketplace right now.

chipdart 2y ago

> From my experience, TCO on most apple products ends up being roughly the same when you factor in resale value. This reads like the epitome of Apple's reality distortion field. I mean, you're trying to convince yourself that a product is not overpriced when compared to equivalent products and subjecting customers to price gauging by asserting that you might be able to sell it later. That's quite the logical leap.

renaudg 2y ago
No that's an accurate TCO calculation. It's interesting that on this topic, the inventor of the PC also seems to be caught in that supposed "Apple reality distortion field" and can't confirm the "price gouging" that you're trying to convince yourself Apple practices. https://www.cio.com/article/236396/ibm-says-macs-save-up-to-543-per-user.html https://www.cio.com/article/236396/ibm-says-macs-save-up-to-...