6 ms·

At this point I think few people really will care about that spec difference. The accumulated brand trust of Apple, and the negative brand trust of Microsoft o

At this point I think few people really will care about that spec difference. The accumulated brand trust of Apple, and the negative brand trust of Microsoft outweighs the numbers. Even many technically savvy people believe Apple can deliver a higher quality computing experience with 8GB of RAM than Microsoft can with 16GB, and they're often correct.

thewebguyd 7mo ago
> The accumulated brand trust of Apple This is an important thing to Apple, and Apple users know it. They would not have put out this macbook if it was going to be a subpar experience. Microsoft has no such qualms about OEMs shipping an underspecced disaster of a beater laptop (see Vista). You can (generally) but any Apple product and know you are going to get something quality and a good experience, even from the base/budget models. They don't really have any "bad" products.
- 1attice 7mo ago
  The Vision Pro and butterfly keyboard would like a word
  - thewebguyd 7mo ago
    Fair enough, although I wouldn't call the vision pro a bad product necessarily, it's just too expensive for what it is.
    - 1attice 7mo ago
      Yes, you see them on the subway all the time
      - spacedcowboy 7mo ago
        I bought mine for air travel, when I can strap it to my head for 12 hours and be in a completely different place. I can lie back in my lay-flat seat, so there’s no weight pulling my head down, and it’s an absolutely fantastic experience. I fly sufficiently that this is well worth it. The fact that it doubles as a mobile computer in the hotel room is just icing on the cake. So subway ? Maybe not, but don’t pretend they don’t have their own niche…
  - matwood 7mo ago
    The VP by most accounts is best in class. It’s just too damn expensive. There’s also still an open question if people really want to strap goggles to their face.
- leptons 7mo ago
  >They would not have put out this macbook if it was going to be a subpar experience. "You're holding it wrong" - Steve Jobs Apple has put out plenty of subpar experiences in the past, and there's no reason they wouldn't do it in the future.
  - thewebguyd 7mo ago
    And despite antenna gate, the iPhone 4 was still the best smartphone of that year and leaps ahead of it's closest competition (the Galaxy S), and remained the #1 best selling smartphone at year after launch
    - leptons 7mo ago
      You can only buy hardware that runs Apple software from Apple, but Android mobile devices far outsell Apple devices and always have. Apple is and always has been a minority player in the overall smartphone market (and desktop/laptop as well). Globally, Android has had about 70% to 75% market share, and Apple has always had a much smaller slice of the total. iPhones are not as popular as you seem to think they are. You don't have to believe me, the data proves it: https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/worldwide/#monthly-200901-202602 https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/worldwide/...
      - thewebguyd 7mo ago
        Sure, but that doesn't change the fact that the iPhone 4 was the single most purchased smartphone model in the US between 2010 and 2011 (during antenna gate that we are talking about). Android has the majority share because "Android" is anything from a $100 piece of junk to a $1200 phone. If you look at only the premium market, Apple holds ~70% market share. Despite antenna gate, it still sold plenty, which proves the point about brand trust that the thread was about. If the brand equity wasn't there, the Galaxy S would have out sold the iPhone 4, but it didn't, it sold half as much.
        leptons 7mo ago
pjmlp 7mo ago
In laptop keyboards, UI refactorings, or Siri? Where is exactly the premium quality?
- kettlecorn 7mo ago
  Apple's UX quality, design focus, and respect for its customers is higher quality and more consistent than Microsoft's. Apple is also imperfect and I feel leaves tremendous room to do better, but they are still much better than Microsoft. Take one topic: UI refactorings. Apple has rolled out disruptive UI refactorings but they've also rolled them out consistently across products and throughout their software. Microsoft did not have the internal leadership discipline or commitment to design to ever get their products in alignment around a design language. It is common on Windows that the included software all uses different design toolkits and design paradigms. For years Windows was infamous for having multiple ways to configure even common settings, often requiring falling back to the old version, because they were not able to ship a unified UX. Microsoft routinely has 'UX design scandals' of various sorts with dark patterns forcing Microsoft's preference on users. Apple has those as well, but far less often.
  - pjmlp 7mo ago
    There is no room for imperfections when paying premium. Where is the Apple from "I am a PC, I am a Mac"?
    - sbuk 7mo ago
      Evidently, and especially in comparison to Windows 11, alive and well. In rude health in fact.

thewebguyd 7mo ago

> The accumulated brand trust of Apple This is an important thing to Apple, and Apple users know it. They would not have put out this macbook if it was going to be a subpar experience. Microsoft has no such qualms about OEMs shipping an underspecced disaster of a beater laptop (see Vista). You can (generally) but any Apple product and know you are going to get something quality and a good experience, even from the base/budget models. They don't really have any "bad" products.

1attice 7mo ago
The Vision Pro and butterfly keyboard would like a word
- thewebguyd 7mo ago
  Fair enough, although I wouldn't call the vision pro a bad product necessarily, it's just too expensive for what it is.
  - 1attice 7mo ago
    Yes, you see them on the subway all the time
    - spacedcowboy 7mo ago
      I bought mine for air travel, when I can strap it to my head for 12 hours and be in a completely different place. I can lie back in my lay-flat seat, so there’s no weight pulling my head down, and it’s an absolutely fantastic experience. I fly sufficiently that this is well worth it. The fact that it doubles as a mobile computer in the hotel room is just icing on the cake. So subway ? Maybe not, but don’t pretend they don’t have their own niche…
- matwood 7mo ago
  The VP by most accounts is best in class. It’s just too damn expensive. There’s also still an open question if people really want to strap goggles to their face.
leptons 7mo ago
>They would not have put out this macbook if it was going to be a subpar experience. "You're holding it wrong" - Steve Jobs Apple has put out plenty of subpar experiences in the past, and there's no reason they wouldn't do it in the future.
- thewebguyd 7mo ago
  And despite antenna gate, the iPhone 4 was still the best smartphone of that year and leaps ahead of it's closest competition (the Galaxy S), and remained the #1 best selling smartphone at year after launch
  - leptons 7mo ago
    You can only buy hardware that runs Apple software from Apple, but Android mobile devices far outsell Apple devices and always have. Apple is and always has been a minority player in the overall smartphone market (and desktop/laptop as well). Globally, Android has had about 70% to 75% market share, and Apple has always had a much smaller slice of the total. iPhones are not as popular as you seem to think they are. You don't have to believe me, the data proves it: https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/worldwide/#monthly-200901-202602 https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/worldwide/...
    - thewebguyd 7mo ago
      Sure, but that doesn't change the fact that the iPhone 4 was the single most purchased smartphone model in the US between 2010 and 2011 (during antenna gate that we are talking about). Android has the majority share because "Android" is anything from a $100 piece of junk to a $1200 phone. If you look at only the premium market, Apple holds ~70% market share. Despite antenna gate, it still sold plenty, which proves the point about brand trust that the thread was about. If the brand equity wasn't there, the Galaxy S would have out sold the iPhone 4, but it didn't, it sold half as much.
      - leptons 7mo ago

pjmlp 7mo ago

In laptop keyboards, UI refactorings, or Siri? Where is exactly the premium quality?

kettlecorn 7mo ago
Apple's UX quality, design focus, and respect for its customers is higher quality and more consistent than Microsoft's. Apple is also imperfect and I feel leaves tremendous room to do better, but they are still much better than Microsoft. Take one topic: UI refactorings. Apple has rolled out disruptive UI refactorings but they've also rolled them out consistently across products and throughout their software. Microsoft did not have the internal leadership discipline or commitment to design to ever get their products in alignment around a design language. It is common on Windows that the included software all uses different design toolkits and design paradigms. For years Windows was infamous for having multiple ways to configure even common settings, often requiring falling back to the old version, because they were not able to ship a unified UX. Microsoft routinely has 'UX design scandals' of various sorts with dark patterns forcing Microsoft's preference on users. Apple has those as well, but far less often.
- pjmlp 7mo ago
  There is no room for imperfections when paying premium. Where is the Apple from "I am a PC, I am a Mac"?
  - sbuk 7mo ago
    Evidently, and especially in comparison to Windows 11, alive and well. In rude health in fact.