Do you think MacBook Pro with retina technology will go down in price?

xxcysxx said:

Like the tittle says, do you think MacBook Pro with retina screen will go down in price after a few iterations? Or do you think this is a new price standard that we all will have to adjust to.

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I think the technology will work it's way across the whole line personally, and prices will stay the same.

That said, with the explosion of Apple's popularity I'm seeing sales on new hardware and a drop in resale value that's not existed in years past, so unless Apple keeps their hardware on the apex of the technology curve they're going to have to offer more at the same price point or lower pricing to remain competitive. While Win8 gains groans in the tech space, there is some very nice hardware coming out running it at technology levels higher than Apple and at price points much lower.

Ccrew said:

I think the technology will work it's way across the whole line personally, and prices will stay the same.

That said, with the explosion of Apple's popularity I'm seeing sales on new hardware and a drop in resale value that's not existed in years past, so unless Apple keeps their hardware on the apex of the technology curve they're going to have to offer more at the same price point or lower pricing to remain competitive. While Win8 gains groans in the tech space, there is some very nice hardware coming out running it at technology levels higher than Apple and at price points much lower.

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IMHO , the last statement is sort of a myth ..Today , if you go to price out a laptop PC with equivalent functionality and specs of say, the base RMBP 15 ..you're very close to or in the same pricing range .. This means adding the 256 SSD, Higher end Display ( full HD or HP DreamColor equivalent) , 8 Gig of memory, and an equivalent I7 processor , oh yeah, and a discrete graphics card ( not the quatro stuff.. that starts to put one way up) .. i tried this w/ HP and Lenovo , and was surprised where the pricing ended up .. equivalent to the base rMBP ..so trickle down to the medium price ranges isn't specific to Apple ..

the price is going to be that way. the only windwos 8 laptop i know of with that resolution is this samsung one and it cost 2.2k so its comparable . in many many years when 720p fades out then okay the price will come down but not anytime soon. im glad tablets like the nexus 10 have 1600p tho so hopefully everyone else follows suit

IMO, eventually all of the current line up will be replaced with retina models. I can see the cMBP being phased out and the rMBP being offered at price points similar to the current cMBPs.

Although I don't think this will happen any time soon or suddenly. I think prices and the gradual disappearing of cMBPs will happen over the course of a number of years.

Furifo said:

IMO, eventually all of the current line up will be replaced with retina models. I can see the cMBP being phased out and the rMBP being offered at price points similar to the current cMBPs.

Although I don't think this will happen any time soon or suddenly. I think prices and the gradual disappearing of cMBPs will happen over the course of a number of years.

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I am also of this same persuasion.

snoylekim said:

IMHO , the last statement is sort of a myth ..Today , if you go to price out a laptop PC with equivalent functionality and specs of say, the base RMBP 15 ..you're very close to or in the same pricing range .. This means adding the 256 SSD, Higher end Display ( full HD or HP DreamColor equivalent) , 8 Gig of memory, and an equivalent I7 processor , oh yeah, and a discrete graphics card ( not the quatro stuff.. that starts to put one way up) .. i tried this w/ HP and Lenovo , and was surprised where the pricing ended up .. equivalent to the base rMBP ..so trickle down to the medium price ranges isn't specific to Apple ..

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Actually there are lots of laptops that will float around the -$1200 range with full HD (1080p), i7 quad core processor, discrete graphics, 8 gigs of RAM, and 256 gb (or more) SSD.

Some examples being the Lenovo Y580 (which was on Black Friday sale a couple weeks back), and the HP Envy 15 (which was recently discontinued and replaced with a Envy dv6).
Of course, none of these screens are retina-level, but they're still very nice IPS 1080p full HD displays.

Samsung already made their own "Retina" display with the same pixel density as Apple offers right now. That's being said, if Samsung and other laptop manufactures would produce Retina-like displays, the price eventually would go down.

Moshe1010 said:

Samsung already made their own "Retina" display with the same pixel density as Apple offers right now. That's being said, if Samsung and other laptop manufactures would produce Retina-like displays, the price eventually would go down.

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But then Apple will sue Samsung because they are copying them.

samuelk0814 said:

Actually there are lots of laptops that will float around the -$1200 range with full HD (1080p), i7 quad core processor, discrete graphics, 8 gigs of RAM, and 256 gb (or more) SSD.

Some examples being the Lenovo Y580 (which was on Black Friday sale a couple weeks back), and the HP Envy 15 (which was recently discontinued and replaced with a Envy dv6).
Of course, none of these screens are retina-level, but they're still very nice IPS 1080p full HD displays.

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That would be a great price ..and I , perhaps incorrectly , exclude 'consumer grade' machines when I was looking .. I only look at enterprise or workstation level machines ( Ultrabooks, Thinkpads , or Latitude..) .. I am biased because of the build quality, etc that I need for my use .. I do put the Macbook Pro in this category ..

AbyssImpact said:

But then Apple will sue Samsung because they are copying them.

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Apple can't sue Samsung on Retina display because the displays are originally from Samsung (or LG). Samsung is selling the technology to Apple; Apple doesn't have any patent on Retina displays (except for the name).

AbyssImpact said:

But then Apple will sue Samsung because they are copying them.

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Apple may own the trademark. I haven't looked it up. Apple doesn't own high resolution displays. I don't think they could even patent the scaling method, as interpolation methods have existed for many years. If they came up with the display design, they may have patents on parts of the construction. It's just not possible to have a patent on something as broad as high resolution displays, especially when they initially surfaced in specialized fields prior to the original iphone, and higher resolution in itself is a naturally progressive concept. In fact late CRTs could display higher levels than we had in lcd displays prior to a few years ago. Make sense? I'm responding just in case this wasn't sarcasm. It appears to be, yet I'm never truly sure on this site.

Let's see:

1. Uncle Sam running deficits at $1-2 trillion a year.
2. The Fed buying 50%+ of that (monetizing the debt).
3. Unfunded liabilities from social security and medicare + drug company subsidy at $120 trillion+ (that's not a typo).

Nope, prices on rMBPs won't be going down until we get the new currency. Prices won't be going down on anything until then, after that they'll come down a lot.

I don't think it's the retina display that made the rmbp more expensive than the regular one. It's the SSD.

kinda feel bad saying it but I hope not... I just got mine and I hate when something gets way cheaper AFTER I decide to get it!

Haiku214 said:

I don't think it's the retina display that made the rmbp more expensive than the regular one. It's the SSD.

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Are you kidding? the display costs $800 (MSRP) compare it to $150-200 display of the MBA or $250-300 of the cMBP.

The ssd bay is big enough for a hdd. It will cheapen it but you won't get the ssd.

Haiku214 said:

I don't think it's the retina display that made the rmbp more expensive than the regular one. It's the SSD.

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SSDs aren't that expensive. Apple prices them high as they know people will pay, but it doesn't have to be that expensive to include such a density into a standard configuration. If you're looking at cto pricing, you pay for every configuration you make to any machine. It's not just the price of the part. You pay for the custom configuration. It's a bit different when they try to make such a thing into a standard model.

Moshe1010 said:

Are you kidding? the display costs $800 (MSRP) compare it to $150-200 display of the MBA or $250-300 of the cMBP.

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Are you deriving those from their repair quotes?

Yes, over time but not as fast as some people here are expecting it For the 2013, I don't see the prices of rMBPs coming down at all...

Would loved to be proved wrong though

I think the 2013 15-inch rMBP will come down in price, but not by much. Apple has done this in the past with their laptop lines (see e.g. the Macbook Air). 2013 is going to be a small upgrade for the rMBP.

My guess is Apple would drop the price of the base rMBP to $1999. They would also make it lighter (~4 pounds), give it the Haswell processor, and update the graphics card. Everything else will stay the same.

thekev said:

SSDs aren't that expensive. Apple prices them high as they know people will pay, but it doesn't have to be that expensive to include such a density into a standard configuration. If you're looking at cto pricing, you pay for every configuration you make to any machine. It's not just the price of the part. You pay for the custom configuration. It's a bit different when they try to make such a thing into a standard model.



Are you deriving those from their repair quotes?

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The repair quotes are about right (this is why I wrote MSRP). You won't find any 15" rMBP display over the net less than $500, and nobody insure you that this is an original display (LG or Samsung). Go on eBay and see the prices by yourself. The display is the main cause for the rMBP price mark.
256GB SSD costs $150-170 (Samsung 830/840), but Apple still charges over $1/GB on these - with no good reason.

Moshe1010 said:

The display is the main cause for the rMBP price mark.

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Agreed. I viewed it as Apple bundling enough things to justify the high cost of entry. I only wondered where you derived such exact figures, but I figured it was most likely repair rates.

Moshe1010 said:

256GB SSD costs $150-170 (Samsung 830/840), but Apple still charges over $1/GB on these - with no good reason.

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I am fully aware of this. They use them to push high margins. Other oems do this with cto parts as well. The big difference is that Apple makes it difficult to use third party options. The machine is not officially user serviceable, and a special screwdriver is required to access the machine. At that point the ssd is still a proprietary form factor rather than something like mSATA, so you're stuck with a couple possible vendors that have to absorb any development costs from a small number of sales. The ram is soldered in, so you're at Apple's mercy there too. That's the real difference. Cto upgrades tend to be expensive, but they're coupled here with the lack of a do-it-yourself option.