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Apple Ceases Development of 'AirPort' Wireless Routers as Engineers Reassigned to Other Products
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Sure. Except my TV comes on when Apple TV comes on. I do not want that for music and podcasts. (And I do want that for TV.) And the new Apple TV only has HDMI-out. Unless I am missing something, this doesn't help me if I want to send sound to an amp. (I use Sonos, and yes Apple Music works with it, but if I want to carry on listening to a podcast at the point I left off, AirPlay is great.)
Eero looks like being a better product. I will see where the market is for Time Capsule replacements and it sounds like there are options. I know sync isn't back-up, but Documents in the Cloud does help. I can see why Apple wants us to think about the cloud and long term, they are correct.
But I am worried about AirPlay. Even then, I've been trying to help a friend get a receiver with AirPlay built in, and fewer and fewer do. The writing is on the wall. Largely, people seem happy with Bluetooth to a speaker. "We" might not be, but that isn't how Apple rolls.
Yep, Apple screwed the pooch with this decision. This was a convenient way to stream lossless files to our high end analog system. Looks like we will be playing vinyl all the time.
To the Apple folks that read this thread. I won't be buying:
1) A new MacBook to replace my maxed out 11" Air, it can't process large photo files when traveling, has no MagSafe and is a pita to use with peripherals.
2) A new 15" Retina MacBook Pro, with only 16 gig of RAM. My current maxed out version already struggles with large photo files. No MagSafe and no SD card slot, NO SALE APPLE.
3) A new 13" Macbook Pro to replace my wife's current 13" Retina. No MagSafe and no SD card slot, NO SALE APPLE.
4) A replacement Apple product for the 11" Air that serves as our household hub.
5) Replacements for the two 13" Macbook Pro's that have bedroom duty. No MagSafe and no SD card slot, NO SALE APPLE.
6) No new replacement iPhones, no headphone jack for our Etymotics, Bluetooth sounds like POOPOO! Besides, my iPhone 6 battery failed within ten months...
7) No Apple product to run the CNC gear in our shop (would have been purchased this week)
8) New iPods if the headphone jack is removed.
9) Obviously no more Apple routers.
I've been a loyal Apple customer for 30 years. Apple's recent product cleansing is coming close to the idea of Leica discontinuing rangefinder cameras. Obviously Apple believes less is more. Time to sell your Apple stock before more is less.
Holy crap. There is one anonymously sourced article at the start of this. Why do all you people take that as gospel and go wild? I realize the word "rumors" is in the URL for this site, but get a grip. This story is going to be partly, mostly or completely false once the dust settles.
Well, the clue is in the name of the site. This is not MacConfirmedNews.com…
But also this is a Bloomberg story. No, it is not confirmed, but it is not the Taiwanese supply chain either.
I subscribe to Youtube Red, so I get GM in the process. I much prefer Apple Music and when you add Siri to the mix, it is just a much better option for music (for me) since I am on iOS. I have no need for Sonos unless Apple abandons Airplay and I will re-evaluate if that happens. It hasn't happened yet, so I would stick with third party options (which there are many) rather than leaving Airplay at this point.
As I said, if they get rid of Airplay on future versions of iOS, I will re-evaluate whether I want to continue to buy Apple products going forward. They have the right to move on, if they think it is in their best interest, but it will make it much less likely that I buy Apple products in the future (especially iOS - I have a 7 Plus and an iPad Pro 9.7).
The problem with this theory is that a router needs a constant internet connect from a modem. An Echo-like device is meant to be taken room to room as needed without wires, so I don't see how this would work.
I see what you're saying, and I hope you're wrong and they are merging some departments. If this story were about any other company, I'd say perhaps Bloomberg got ahead of itself and ran the story too soon -- before Apple announced a change in the makeup of some of their departments. That said, Bloomberg is no fool and I'm sure they don't want to piss off Apple by running with a story ahead of time.
An Apple TV/AirPort mesh network makes a lot of sense. That seems to be the "next big thing" in wireless connectivity. Most homes have multiple TVs anyway so an Apple TV + Wi-Fi access point in multiple rooms in the house makes sense. We'll see what happens.
This is disappointing news. It seems that Apple are systematically pulling apart their own ecosystem. What happened to the days where they covered EVERY part of the computer tech that a user would have in their home, and it worked together seamlessly?
I guess this means that Airplay will be the next thing to go.
I guess this means that Airplay will be the next thing to go.
Apple are obviously not familiar with the 80/20 rule:
80% of a companies profits come from 20% of their products.
However, if you don't have the 80% of your products that don't make as much money, customers may go elsewhere for ALL their goods, and you may loose the profits you get from the 20%.
So what happens to Time Capsule, this is a vital backup and the fact it works seamlessly is the reason I own one. Does it mean third party time capsules?
They always said it. All you have to do is listen. Their strategy is Mobile, Wireless, iCloud. I think in their opinion Time Capsule is old school and a dinosaur from history. I do own 4 air port express an 2 Time Capsule devices. Love them because of the design and ease of use. But that is not their strategy. That is not where apple is heading to. Routers are a commodity product. True mobility means backups even when you are away from home. And there comes iCloud. On iOS they have iCloud backups already in place. I bet more sooner than later apple will introduce iCloud backups for Macs.
Preplexing..
its not about dollers and cents on every little item..
Its about a complete product line and synergic ecosys.
Lose that and you lose the luxury of the premium you charge .
its not about dollers and cents on every little item..
Its about a complete product line and synergic ecosys.
Lose that and you lose the luxury of the premium you charge .
Well that sucks. I only just purchased the AirPort Extreme a couple of months ago and I was thinking of picking up the express as well.
One thing I wish to confirm.... Have they been discontinued or is it only the development of new products?
So we won't be seeing new Airport products but will the production of the current ones will continue until the rumoured Siri hub arrives???.....
One thing I wish to confirm.... Have they been discontinued or is it only the development of new products?
So we won't be seeing new Airport products but will the production of the current ones will continue until the rumoured Siri hub arrives???.....
Thank goodness I trashed my airport devices a couple of years ago and went with Ubiquiti. I am slowly moving away from Apple every year I have noticed. It is not intentional but I'm getting bored and Apple is moving backwards in life.
What I think they fail to realize is that for many who are all in the the echo system, this is a deal breaker.
I have set up 3 families (mine, folks, in-laws) with phones, iPad, Apple TV, Extreme Router and Express routers for music distribution. When they basically killed Home Sharing we switched to Plex (which works on any phone), when they quit making Express routers I will need to find another way to distribute music and killing the router that was so easy to operate and setup that my folks could fix it from there phone or iPad is not a good thing. Basically I had seen the writing on the wall and when Apple failed to honor the warranty on my wife's Iphone 6 that was it for me. As a result I will gradually be weaning my relatives off Apple as older parts fail. With no echo system there is no compelling reason to by the phones.
I have set up 3 families (mine, folks, in-laws) with phones, iPad, Apple TV, Extreme Router and Express routers for music distribution. When they basically killed Home Sharing we switched to Plex (which works on any phone), when they quit making Express routers I will need to find another way to distribute music and killing the router that was so easy to operate and setup that my folks could fix it from there phone or iPad is not a good thing. Basically I had seen the writing on the wall and when Apple failed to honor the warranty on my wife's Iphone 6 that was it for me. As a result I will gradually be weaning my relatives off Apple as older parts fail. With no echo system there is no compelling reason to by the phones.
Apple's ecosystem is breaking apart and they aren't even noticing it. I've already ditched iTurd, erhm I mean iTunes for Spotify, ditched iPhoto for Lightroom, and now Apple is telling me screw airplay, airport etc, go elsewhere.
Given the central positioning in Apple's ecosystem this news item has to forshadow a shift to a new hardware/software solution. It simply isn't conceivable that Apple would abandon its wireless system wholesale.
As several others have speculated, it looks as if we may see a converged Apple "monolith" in the living room.
Consider: the lineup is muddled right now. AirPort Express, AirPort Base Station, AirPort Time Capsule... plus AppleTV in a couple configurations and strong rumors of a Siri pod to boot.
We saw Apple attempt to make the AppleTV the center of HomeKit, so they're thinking in that direction for sure. The device is basically an iPhone that you plug into the wall running its own iOS version. There's no reason why it couldn't become a router, AppleTV, Siri pod device that renders the AirPort line completely irrelivant. Maybe even an Echo/Echo Dot situation where the tower has a Time Machine drive in it.
Again, I'm just echoing the things others have said. I wouldn't be so quick to write Apple off just yet. They still command the most capable and accomplished group of designers, engineers, technologists and commercial artists in the world.
As several others have speculated, it looks as if we may see a converged Apple "monolith" in the living room.
Consider: the lineup is muddled right now. AirPort Express, AirPort Base Station, AirPort Time Capsule... plus AppleTV in a couple configurations and strong rumors of a Siri pod to boot.
We saw Apple attempt to make the AppleTV the center of HomeKit, so they're thinking in that direction for sure. The device is basically an iPhone that you plug into the wall running its own iOS version. There's no reason why it couldn't become a router, AppleTV, Siri pod device that renders the AirPort line completely irrelivant. Maybe even an Echo/Echo Dot situation where the tower has a Time Machine drive in it.
Again, I'm just echoing the things others have said. I wouldn't be so quick to write Apple off just yet. They still command the most capable and accomplished group of designers, engineers, technologists and commercial artists in the world.
3rd part time capsules have existed for a while now. They are called Routers with a USB Hard Drive attached
Some people in this thread keep writing "there are many good wireless routers on the market". True, there are. Which of them are getting regular software/security updates for at least three years after the release and are not killed by them dead like it sometimes happens to Asus? Which of these routers are available outside US, not like Eero and Amplifi mentioned by some here?