Never, must've been a misunderstanding.
And Dell, Lenovo, and HP make premium ones as well.
You keep saying that, but it goes very much against my experience and what I can find on the web right now.
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8GB RAM in M3 MacBook Pro Proves the Bottleneck in Real-World Tests
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I’ve shown many examples of high-performance premium Windows PCs that charge the same or more than Apple for RAM. You may disagree, but I’ve seen and shared many examples. And again, the new base model even configured to 16GB of RAM is still cheaper than the last two year’s models.
I don’t understand it either, especially considering that even if you configure the new base spec to 16GB RAM, it’s still cheaper than the last two years base models.
Here's a scenario no one mentions. You buy a Mac only really needing 8GB today, but you try to future proof it by buying the 16Gb upgrade.
Then you buy a new app or get a new job and have a new workflow that requires 32, or 64, or 128.
Or for the e-waste question, when Granny doesn't need 16GB, why is it OK to give it to her anyway? Isn't that e-waste as well?
Then you buy a new app or get a new job and have a new workflow that requires 32, or 64, or 128.
Or for the e-waste question, when Granny doesn't need 16GB, why is it OK to give it to her anyway? Isn't that e-waste as well?
If you were to spend time comparing Windows laptops, especially from companies like Lenovo, you would know that there are almost always sales, bundles, discounts etc. and the "normal" price mostly only exists to make you feel like you're getting a deal. So no, that's not a fair comparison. You're choosing the narrowest of scenarios to try and make a point.
Is this a comment in favour of user upgradable RAM?
Not at all, these are tools to me. I have zero interest in digging into the computer to upgrade it.
Just a brief aside: I use to work a a big aerospace company and each year they would compete who would supply laptops, desktops and engineering workstations for machines to be refreshed. Depending on the year it would be either Dell or HP. The engineering staff and most of the support staff learned to avoid the HP machines and to wait for a Dell year. Dell were much more reliable and consistent as compared to the HP machine.
I always remember this when anyone lumps HP and Dell together
I always remember this when anyone lumps HP and Dell together
I have spent time comparing Windows laptops, and just because they’re on sale at times doesn’t equal “the normal price doesn’t exist”. You’re asking me to compare sale pricing against normal pricing, which is inherently unfair. Of course I’m not going to compare a discount deal vs normal price, I can’t believe you’re asking me to do so with a straight face and pretending that that would be a fair comparison. And it isn’t the “narrowest of scenarios” to compare against Windows laptops that actually offer similar things to the MacBook Pro.
In the PC market, there are so many more options. If you're okay with going with Windows and want 16GB of RAM within a specific price bracket, you find a good computer that can give that to you. You're not really stuck with one model or manufacturer. That's just not the case in the Mac ecosystem, if you want more RAM, you really have no choice but to pay prices that are much higher than the industry averages.
Just because a PC can be found with the same upgrade prices doesn't mean that that price represents the industry norm. When microsoft charges high prices, it's just as bad of a deal as when Apple does it (in my own humble opinion).
A lot of people say "just don't buy a Mac" - but those people are wrong to be trying to shut people down in my opinion. There are a lot of good reasons someone might want a Mac instead of a PC, this isn't analogous to buying a Mercedes Benz. Microsoft has been so terrible with regards to privacy (they literally have a keylogger enabled in the OS by default) that I'm surprised Windows isn't considered borderline malware at this point.
You’re on point. Whether you like 8 GB of RAM or not, doesn’t really matter apparently - all three of my local Best Buy’s have nothing but the base model in stock and no option to order the upgraded config. That’s not ok to me, and I’m sure, to many other pros who need more.
The Windows computers that are actually in the same category as the MacBook Pro tend to charge about the same or more for RAM upgrades. I’m not saying to buy a Windows computer if you don’t want to. And lots of PC competitors are fairly close to Apple when it comes to RAM upgrade cost, even on mid-tier setups. And again, whether or not the RAM prices are too expensive or not isn’t the subject of the article, the article is saying that an 8GB option shouldn’t exist. These content creators that are stirring up this artificial controversy are claiming 8GB isn’t enough for anyone, and shouldn’t exist. Whether or not the RAM upgrade pricing is to expensive or not is an entirely separate discussion, and people are conflating them as if they’re one.
Won’t self-proclaimed “pros” be opting for the 14” and 16” models? Either way, it shouldn’t affect them as they normally wouldn’t consider the M3 MBP, iMac or MBA models either way.
I mean, that's kinda subjective though. If I want something analogous to a MacBook Pro, I'm generally not looking at a Microsoft Surface. I'm usually looking at something more like a Thinkpad, and those don't charge anywhere near those kinds of prices (you can find a listing with that kind of price somewhere, but that doesn't mean that these kinds of prices for 16GB systems are the norm). There are a whole plethora of systems out there that aren't Microsoft Surfaces and that are still very high end.
One might say "compare other things about the system too and find something equivalent," and yes, Apple offers a great value for the whole package, but I'm referring to specs, not to screens.
I know for a fact I could get a very nice windows laptop that has expandable memory, swappable SSD drives that are fast, thunderbolt 4, etc etc etc. But at the end of the day it isn't going to run Mac OS anytime soon; and I prefer Mac OS over Windows 10 or 11; even if I am sacrificing some overall performance. And I will admit that the M3 Max is turning out to be a hell of a laptop chip. Verdict is still out whether the M3 Ultra (if they make one) is going to return the Mac Pro tower to being a proper workstation.
I also see the fact that Apple upgrade pricing does not make a whole lot of sense; but at the end of the day that isn't going to affect me too much since my next work sponsored laptop is more than likely going to be max specs (except for SSD size).
Apple does not bother me for offering a 8GB base spec model, but it does bother me that they charge the same for 8GB upgrade as they do for 16GB upgrade in higher spec'd baseline starting points. The 8GB upgrade should be $100, not $200; just my overall opinion. It matters not what type of RAM, how it is packaged; that really doesn't matter since Apple is more than likely being charged the same whether they solder 8GB, 16GB or 128GB to the SoC package.
I also see the fact that Apple upgrade pricing does not make a whole lot of sense; but at the end of the day that isn't going to affect me too much since my next work sponsored laptop is more than likely going to be max specs (except for SSD size).
Apple does not bother me for offering a 8GB base spec model, but it does bother me that they charge the same for 8GB upgrade as they do for 16GB upgrade in higher spec'd baseline starting points. The 8GB upgrade should be $100, not $200; just my overall opinion. It matters not what type of RAM, how it is packaged; that really doesn't matter since Apple is more than likely being charged the same whether they solder 8GB, 16GB or 128GB to the SoC package.
8GB RAM costs Apple ~1% of the sale price. There's no argument for shortchanging anyone on a premium device when that's the cost implication. It's the very definition of penny pinching.
I suspected Apple’s motivation is to collect more money from upgrades. More greed than penny pinching.
You may think a Thinkpad is in the same league as a MacBook Pro, but I seriously don’t understand how. They’re not generally what I’d consider in the premium category, or even necessarily that high-performance. 🤷🏼♂️. Not to say Thinkpads are bad, they‘re just not generally considered “high-end”, at least not that I’ve ever seen. They’re generally more business oriented, not really designed for visual art or 3D or stuff like that. Now, I will say that the concept of “high-end“, ”premium”, and ”high performance” can be fairly subjective. But the laptops I compared the pricing on with the MacBook Pro actually compare fairly favorably against the MacBook Pro as far as specs go, at least on the average.
And the display is a spec. It’s actually a very important spec for lots of people, because it’s literally the part of the computer you look at every day.
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And there are non-upgradeable PC laptops as well. Any laptop using LPDDR RAM is soldered, they don’t make it in upgradeable cards.
The M3 MBP specifically. There's still the models with the M3 Pro and M3 Max, which I assume would be right up their alley if they are really serious about video editing or photoshop.
The M3 MBP looks like it was intended to replace the M2 MBP with Touch Bar, which as far as I can see, was "pro" in name only, because it was virtually identical to the MBA (just with an added fan).
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If a Thinkpad isn't isn't considered premium or high-performance, the microsoft surface most definitely isn't.