Apple Blames Low Mac Sales on iMac Supply Constraints

[FightTheFuture]

Originally Posted by blackhand1001

Those risky design techniques on the imac provided no benefit to the user at all. ... Heck most people would be happy with a mid tower since they aren't spending extra on a form factor they don't need.

Have you ever lived in an apartment before? You need to maximize as much space as possible. A big clunky tower on the ground with wires running all over the desk and floor doesn't help your average small home dweller.

[blackhand1001]

Originally Posted by FightTheFuture

Have you ever lived in an apartment before? You need to maximize as much space as possible. A big clunky tower on the ground with wires running all over the desk and floor doesn't help your average small home dweller.

Umm, the tower is going under the table anyway which is space you probably wouldn't have used. There are plenty of non all in one systems that take up less than a square foot. I am not talking about a mac pro sized machine here. if you can't spare a single square foot of space then you probably can't afford the new imac. Not to mention the new imac doesn't save any space over the previous generation. The base is still the same size.

[blackhand1001]

Originally Posted by smoledman

Tim Cook has already said that the iPad will replace the desktop computer.

There is more to replacing desktop than just the raw power involved. Theres also the form factor itself. The lack of a physical keyboard and the fact that the onscreen keyboard has to block half the screen limits its use in many ways. Tim Cook just spews this nonsense as mobile devices is apples only real source of income. The desktops add up to less than 5 percent of apples revenue.

[sodajerk]

Our company IT guy went to the local Apple store in mid December to order 5 BTO iMacs so we could retire some of our aging Mac Pro Towers (architecture office with +/- 50 Macs). They had no iMacs in stock - neither old ones nor new ones. Really poor execution on Apple's part.

Finally received delivery today of our new iMacs - over a month later.

[AlaskaMoose]

Originally Posted by StellarSoul

I'd also say that the insanely high price for a retina MacBook Pro (with decent hard disk space) is as larger factor in the sales drop. If they introduce Haswell models with a price drop this year plus revamped Airs I'm sure sales will rebound.

I agree with you that what has kept Apple products sales low is the high price. Steve Jobs kept the price of the Mac computers relatively the same for years. For example, years ago I paid $1,1000 for a 17" iMac G5, then within the last two years I bought two 21" iMacs for $1,100 each.

The new iMac costs a little over $1,200. Yes, it has a Retina display, but it lacks a DVD drive. While quite beautiful, with the state of our economy not too many people want to spend so much money for a new computer, be it PC or Mac. The same can be said about the iPad Mini. It's simply overpriced.

[AlaskaMoose]

Originally Posted by class77

It's supposed to be an "all in one", not a desktop that needs to have extra parts to do the same job that the 2011 version did. Who the heck cares if the edge is 5 mm thick? You're not slicing cheese with the freaking thing, it's a DESKTOP computer. Weight is not a consideration and to many people the disk drive is an important feature.

I know that many techies adapted everything over streaming downloads years ago, but out in middle America, people still burn CDs full of music and pictures, watch movies, and have other uses for a CD drive. User accessible RAM is an important feature to most people. An SD slot on the back is dumb because you can't easily access it. Dropping the mike input also hurt certain buyers and all of it was available on the 2011 model.

I just think Apple cut into too many features just to obtain a thin edge and it was a poor decision that is being reflected in the number of iMacs sold

Agree with you. The previous iMac was already thin enough, and could handle heat well. I prefer an optical drive to a thinner screen. Having a thinner screen is not an improvement, and the later is what Apple should have concentrated its efforts (improving existing products, and the OS).

[blackhand1001]

Originally Posted by AlaskaMoose

I agree with you that what has kept Apple products sales low is the high price. Steve Jobs kept the price of the Mac computers relatively the same for years. For example, years ago I paid $1,1000 for a 17" iMac G5, then within the last two years I bought two 21" iMacs for $1,100 each.

The new iMac costs a little over $1,200. Yes, it has a Retina display, but it lacks a DVD drive. While quite beautiful, with the state of our economy not too many people want to spend so much money for a new computer, be it PC or Mac. The same can be said about the iPad Mini. It's simply overpriced.

It does not have a retina display.

[AlaskaMoose]

Originally Posted by blackhand1001

It does not have a retina display.

Thanks. I stand corrected.

Seems like it's even a worst deal than what I thought, and it costs more than the one it's replacing. And the thinner screen Retina display would probably make the iMac prone to overheating (?) I remember the iMac G5 The fans would be screaming trying to keep it cool, and then the problem was over with the Intel iMacs. My wife's and mine are very quiet.

[NeroAZ]

I did my part, I bought a Mac mini 2.3 i7 model and put 16gb ram in it.

[AlaskaMoose]

Originally Posted by NeroAZ

I did my part, I bought a Mac mini 2.3 i7 model and put 16gb ram in it.

Not a bad idea.

[Thunderbird]

I heard the 2014 iMac is going to be even thinner.

[Woyzeck]

Originally Posted by Thunderbird

I heard the 2014 iMac is going to be even thinner.

I heard the 2014 iMac will have no drive at all. Just online storage in the cloud. They call it the FutileDrive.

[FightTheFuture]

Originally Posted by blackhand1001

Umm, the tower is going under the table anyway which is space you probably wouldn't have used. There are plenty of non all in one systems that take up less than a square foot. I am not talking about a mac pro sized machine here. if you can't spare a single square foot of space then you probably can't afford the new imac.

Lots of people in cities live in apartments. If you can afford an apartment in NYC for instance, I'm sure you can afford an iMac.

Footprints are footprints when you're in a small space. A desktop is taking up the space of another object, a chair, file storage, your legs - whatever. The new iMac is a smaller machine than the previous iteration. It's only 0.5"-1" smaller dimensions, but it is smaller and it is faster. More space + less clutter is worth it to many people.

[blackhand1001]

Originally Posted by FightTheFuture

Lots of people in cities live in apartments. If you can afford an apartment in NYC for instance, I'm sure you can afford an iMac.

Footprints are footprints when you're in a small space. A desktop is taking up the space of another object, a chair, file storage, your legs - whatever. The new iMac is a smaller machine than the previous iteration. It's only 0.5"-1" smaller dimensions, but it is smaller and it is faster. More space + less clutter is worth it to many people.

The new imacs footprint is identical to the old one. The stand and base are the same size. You don't gain any space back.

[tmroper]

He should have added: "Some potential iMac buyers are also delaying their purchases while they figure out what to do about our decision to not offer Firewire ports anymore. In response, we do, however, plan to reiterate the kludgey fixes available to people who prefer to cling to the past."

[Technarchy]

Originally Posted by blackhand1001

There is more to replacing desktop than just the raw power involved. Theres also the form factor itself. The lack of a physical keyboard and the fact that the onscreen keyboard has to block half the screen limits its use in many ways. Tim Cook just spews this nonsense as mobile devices is apples only real source of income. The desktops add up to less than 5 percent of apples revenue.

That's really interesting...

I'm typing this on my iPad with a logitech Ultrathin keyboard right now. This combo sees far more use than my Windows 8 box or my 13" MacBook Air.

I must not have this form factor problem.

[pcd109]

You folks don't get it, do you? Since OSX 10.4 Apple has not released a single feature oriented towards professionals. All of the company focus was towards 'eye candy' and iToys. Professionals started to move away from Apple, me included. This move creates an opposite effects of what we, the visuals, film and audio folks created years ago. Every respectable professional had an Apple machine, and Apple had a good name because of it. I can't count the number of people asking me 'what windows is this'? No, it's OS9, or OSX, and the computer it's an Apple, a PROFESSIONAL GRADE MACHINE - i responded. Now, all i can say is: 'it's useless and outdated'. All a company have it's is name. When you show the finger to artists, graphic designers, compositors, Final Cut users and list continues then your name is going to get hurt. And when this happens, nothing will bring it back. No one will invest in a machine without knowing if it's going to be a next release(mac 'pro', what a piece of joke). Professionals moving away from Apple, means Apple has no longer an army of advocates and PR man in the most influential positions. Now, the low end iMac costs in Europe the equivalent of 2000$ . And this is for a machine without OD(yes, business still use it), upgrade RAM, audio input output, Firewire etc. The politics of Apple 'screw professionals' hits them back in the face. My 2 cents. This is what happens when you ignore your hard core users..... But maybe this will awake them before it gets too late.

[NitroZip]

Originally Posted by 1Alec1

Who uses DVDs? Anyone who uses a camera (except for Sony cameras) uses an SD card and probably wants to put the card in the computer. Anyone who knows what RAM is probably doesn't want to pay the Apple price for it.

Everyone I know uses DVD's, They watch movies, burn movies, burn data and photo DVD's.

[MowingDevil]

Originally Posted by class77

It's supposed to be an "all in one", not a desktop that needs to have extra parts to do the same job that the 2011 version did. Who the heck cares if the edge is 5 mm thick? You're not slicing cheese with the freaking thing, it's a DESKTOP computer. Weight is not a consideration and to many people the disk drive is an important feature.

I know that many techies adapted everything over streaming downloads years ago, but out in middle America, people still burn CDs full of music and pictures, watch movies, and have other uses for a CD drive. User accessible RAM is an important feature to most people. An SD slot on the back is dumb because you can't easily access it. Dropping the mike input also hurt certain buyers and all of it was available on the 2011 model.

I just think Apple cut into too many features just to obtain a thin edge and it was a poor decision that is being reflected in the number of iMacs sold

+1

If anyone here really believes the main reason they got rid of the optical drive is because no one uses them anymore, you're a fool. The main reason is they are obsessed w/ making everything thinner. Case in point, the SD slot is now on the back. Who knows, if they could have found a spot for the optical drive on the back they may have crammed it in there.

I don't need a thin desktop computer, I need a useful one. I was going to buy this latest model of iMac the day it came out but I opted against it. Now I may just upgrade my laptop or consider a Mac Mini instead.

[AidenShaw]

Originally Posted by MowingDevil

If anyone here really believes the main reason they got rid of the optical drive is because no one uses them anymore, you're a fool. The main reason is they are obsessed w/ making everything thinner.

The change (removing optical) has been in the works for years.

It began when Apple started using complicated, unreliable slot loading drives. Apple users got used to the idea that optical drives were junk (while everyone else was using tray loading drives without any significant problems).

Just look for the posts saying "glad they got rid of optical drives, they never worked anyway".

Clever.

[thehustleman]

Originally Posted by AidenShaw

The change (removing optical) has been in the works for years.

It began when Apple started using complicated, unreliable slot loading drives. Apple users got used to the idea that optical drives were junk (while everyone else was using tray loading drives without any significant problems).

Just look for the posts saying "glad they got rid of optical drives, they never worked anyway".

Clever.

Yep, and when apple says it, you can't tell the fanboys it isn't true.

If apple says it, it MUST be true so they must buy!

With that said, I actually prefer the dvd driven to not be attached because it being an AIO if that drive went bad the whole computer hasn't be replaced.

I don't care about it being thin.

[AidenShaw]

Originally Posted by thehustleman

Yep, and when apple says it, you can't tell the fanboys it isn't true.

If apple says it, it MUST be true so they must buy!

With that said, I actually prefer the dvd driven to not be attached because it being an AIO if that drive went bad the whole computer hasn't be replaced.

I don't care about it being thin.

All of my Dell Latitude (business class) laptops with optical have the optical drive in a bay - so that it takes seconds to swap out the optical (or replace it with a second battery or a second hard drive).

Same for my Lenovo laptops.

My ProLiant servers also use laptop form factor bay drives, so that opticals can be swapped out (or shared) on the servers.

The Imac's problem is that Apple used an unreliable mechanism in a device that was basically not serviceable by the end user. (And the sheep believed in the lie that a visible seam around an ejectable optical/ssd/hdd was aesthetically unacceptable.)

Art is art - but consumer electronics disposable every other year are not art - especially if "form over function" decisions make them disposable rather than repairable and upgradeable.

[thekev]

Originally Posted by AidenShaw

The Imac's problem is that Apple used an unreliable mechanism in a device that was basically not serviceable by the end user. (And the sheep believed in the lie that a visible seam around an ejectable optical/ssd/hdd was aesthetically unacceptable.)

I'm more annoyed by the idea that battery swelling with old age is somehow to be expected.

[AidenShaw]

Originally Posted by thekev

I'm more annoyed by the idea that battery swelling with old age is somehow to be expected.

It's only expected if you buy an Apple.

Having bought hundreds (literally) of Dell/Lenovo/HP business class laptops - I've never had a swollen battery. I've had some batteries prematurely die and have had them replaced (Dell will even put a 3 year warranty on the battery for a small fee) - but no swelling.

Batteries that swell and deform the case are an Apple innovation.

[mrsir2009]

Originally Posted by smoledman

Tim Cook has already said that the iPad will replace the desktop computer.

The iPad will never be able to replace a proper computer with a keyboard, mouse and a proper operating system. No matter how powerful it becomes, it will still just be a tablet.

----------

Originally Posted by Woyzeck

I heard the 2014 iMac will have no drive at all. Just online storage in the cloud. They call it the FutileDrive.

The ISPs are rubbing their hands together in delight.