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Apple Doubles the Price of RAM Upgrade on Entry-Level 13-Inch MacBook Pro

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Apple today doubled the price for upgrading the RAM on the entry-level 13-inch MacBook Pro, with customers in the United States now being charged $200 to move from 8GB to 16GB compared to the previous $100 upgrade price. Similar increases are seen in other countries, such as moving from EUR125 to EUR250 in Germany and from £100 to £200 in the United Kingdom.

macbook_pro_13_ram_increase.jpg
Current pricing on RAM upgrade for entry-level 13-inch MacBook Pro​

While Apple does sometimes adjust upgrade pricing as its costs for components change over time, what makes today's change unusual beyond the fact that it is an increase rather than a typical decrease is that the 13-inch MacBook Pro just launched less than a month ago.

The entry-level model is largely similar to its predecessor, using the same 8th-generation Intel processors and many other internal components have similarly been carried over. Still, it is considered an updated model with changes like the new Magic Keyboard and it's extremely rare for Apple to adjust pricing so soon after launch, suggesting an unexpected increase in Apple's costs being passed along to consumers.

macbook_pro_13_ram_old.jpg
RAM upgrade pricing yesterday​

Supply chains around the world have been disrupted in recent months due to the current health situation, but China, where most of Apple's manufacturing partners operate, has been reopening ahead of many other countries around the world as it was the first to shut down. So with pricing having been set on the 13-inch MacBook Pro just a month ago, the supply situation should generally have improved since then rather than worsened.

Apple does not appear to have altered pricing for RAM upgrades on its other Mac lineups, although different machines use different types of RAM, so a shortage or cost increase for one specific type would not necessarily affect all of Apple's Macs. Even the high-end 13-inch MacBook Pro is unaffected, as it uses a faster type of RAM paired with its newer 10th-generation Intel processors and upgrading from 16GB to 32GB remains priced at $400.

Update June 1: Apple has told The Verge that the change is a "price correction" which puts the $200 RAM upgrade on par with similar upgrades for other Macs like the iMac and MacBook Air.

(Thanks, Ashlin!)

Article Link: Apple Doubles the Price of RAM Upgrade on Entry-Level 13-Inch MacBook Pro
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2020/05/30/13-inch-macbook-pro-ram-upgrade-doubled/
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"suggesting an unexpected increase in Apple's costs being passed along to consumers."

That is complete nonsense.

RAM prices have not moved, they want to maximize profit and adjusted due to price elasticity which they were able to evaluate after the first sales statistics.
 
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C00rDiNaT0r said:
Is Apple offering a 16GB upgrade by adding an extra 8GB RAM on top of the stock 8GB RAM, or do they now discard the original 8GB RAM part and insert a 16GB RAM, leaving the secondary slot available? That might change pricing.
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RAM is soldered to the systemboard so Apple makes two types of system boards - one with 8GB installed and one with 16GB installed.



Frankly, if this price hike remains only for this model, then I don't see this as just "Apple being Apple" and jacking up the price because they can. They have effectively now invalidated offering the older 8th generation models at $1299 and $1499 with anything other than 8GB of RAM because adding $200 brings you so close to the $1799 model with 16GB which also has a 10th Gen CPU and two more TB3 ports.

So the supply shortage might not be in RAM, but in 16GB system boards for the 2 TB port model and Apple is using the price hike to discourage people from purchasing this configuration and either go 8GB or upgrade to the $1799 model (which offers far better value for the $100-200 over a 16GB 2 port model at the new pricing).
 
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Nik said:
RAM prices have not moved, they want to maximize profit and adjusted due to price elasticity which they were able to evaluate after the first sales statistics.
Click to expand...
!!! said:
Yep. DRAM prices fluctuate, but they don't double.
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JPack said:
"The contract prices of DDR4 8 Gigabit (Gb) DRAMs, which are used for personal computers (PCs), averaged US$3.29 as of the end of April, up 11.9 percent from US$2.94 in March, according to market research firm DRAMeXchange on May 4."
Click to expand...

These are all false arguments because the models under question use LPDDR3e RAM. First, all smartphones have gone to LPDDR4. Second, LPDDR3e is a specialty "overclocked" variety which was not commonly used in smartphones, leaving Intel ULP platforms as the primary market. Third, you have market stress conditions (COVID) which means vendors aren't prioritizing something with a tiny market share.

You cannot extrapolate commodity market pricing to the price of specialty, outdated RAM.

The same thing happens in embedded systems which still use DDR1 and 2. You have to go to specialty vendors who charge much more than commodity PC prices ever were.
 
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If they only just let you upgrade it yourself none of this would matter. That's the way it used to go. You would buy from Apple and upgrade the RAM yourself as it was much less expensive that way.

Apple wants to be eco-friendly. Well here's a comparison when it comes to replaceable parts. My Power Mac G4 Cube (think i got it in 2000) is still running because I was able to *very* easily replace the graphics card in it when it went bad. My white Intel iMac (I think ca. 2007 or so) is inoperable because to fix anything on that machine you pretty much have to destroy it first.

It's going to be the same years later with all these machines that have the SDD and RAM soldered onto the logic board. People will have their data trapped on the machines.

Edit: Don't expect the iCloud to be there, either. Apple is mercurial with cloud services. If you had been on a deserted island several points in the last decade and come back to civilization hoping your data was still on Apple's cloud services, you would have found it gone. Yes, they gave transition time, but it's not the same as having peace of mind that it's there for good. Have found Time Machine to be untrustworthy as well. That's why I personally rely on cloned back ups (which as in a recent article the developer of Carbon Copy Cloner pointed out is having problems with Apple's APFS file system).
 
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BlueTide said:
17 years here. It's not that I even care about the price, but I just don't want to feel like being ripped off.
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I understand. TBH I’m actually a bit sad as Macs have never let me down. I remember 12 year old me being very excited when my dad brought our first ever Mac. We didn’t mind paying a little more back then as the price wasn’t ridiculously expensive but now I think to myself what’s the point?
 
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sananda said:
Perhaps the previous price was a mistake. It was £100 to increase from 8GB to 16GB on MacBook Pro but £200 to do the same on MacBook Air. Now they are the same.
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It should be less expensive on the MacBook Pro 13".

The Pro logic board has space for 4 LPDDR packages while the MacBook Air has room for only 2. This means Apple must use higher density chips on the Air. Not only does the Pro use older, less expensive LPDDR3, it has more room for more lower density chips.
 
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Lozza013 said:
Stuff like this is why after twelve years of using Macs I’m moving Away from Macs to Windows as I can’t justify the prices Apple charge anymore. If I could buy a third-party laptop like Lenovo or HP and install MacOS on it, I’d do it in a heartbeat But alas it’s not possible.
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Lenovo charges $150 for the same upgrade (Thinkpad X1 Carbon G7/8) and HP charges $136 (Elite Dragonfly), so until today you'd be paying more.
 
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I gotta sell my 2017 pro. Its almost out of Apple Care and has needed $3600 (Canadian) in repairs over the time I have owned it (if I had to actually pay for them). keyboard (H key not working), screen (bad flex cable), logicboard (died entirely), then logicboard and ssd (on a complete replacement laptop they gave me after those first three failures), now keyboard again as my S key fell off. This was in a 4 year period because when they replaced the entire computer (after replacing the keyboard, screen, and logic board all within one year) the warranty renewed because it was a new unit.
 
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I wish they could’ve averaged the Air and MBP upgrade prices and made both $150. Would’ve felt fairest.
 
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