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Apple Notebook Refresh Expected Late This Quarter, But Only Modest Shipment Growth for 2013

mrsir2009 said:
Here you are :)
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Ha, nice. With a student discount, it actually is cheaper than $1000 by a meaningful amount, but I'd rather just get an iPad instead of a tiny laptop.

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Mr Fusion said:
I hope the future of their laptop line is just one type of machine:
- Air body
- Pro features (external optical if needed)
- Retina display
In 11, 13, 15 & 17" sizes. Add an Apple-designed discrete graphics card (so it'll fit in the Air's body) as a BTO option.

One model. Four sizes. Keep things nice and simple. :)
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It's not really possible since the Air body doesn't leave room for pro (or even just advanced consumer) ports.
 
kobyh15 said:
The prices need to drop on all the rMBPs. They're too expensive, and I think the numbers are showing it.
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That's why they kept the non-retina models. Google's high end chromebook pricing showed us 2 things:

1) retina display technology at 13"+ is very expensive
2) Despite all the cries about the Apple tax and Apple ripping off its customers, Apple priced their retina models very aggressively and is helping to make this tech more affordable by being the first to manufacture them in volume
 
Mr Fusion said:
I hope the future of their laptop line is just one type of machine:
- Air body
- Pro features (external optical if needed)
- Retina display
In 11, 13, 15 & 17" sizes. Add an Apple-designed discrete graphics card (so it'll fit in the Air's body) as a BTO option.

One model. Four sizes. Keep things nice and simple. :)
Click to expand...

There's several significant problems with your idea:

1) It makes a lot of sense.

2) The four sizes are ideal.

3) The Air Body style is uniquely Apple & the Best Looking.

4) These four would likely be in very high demand.

5) This plan contains too much common sense.

6) Apple hasn't thought of it. Why? See #5


Oh Well, I thought it was a Winning Idea :eek:
 
13 is weaker because its just an enlarged Retina Air..
no discrete Gpu,no Quad core?And still YOU-APPLE want that money for?
I.m.o NO WAY.Give me a 7xxm with quad core inside the 13 and maybe i'll make a call to my wallet!

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PatriotInvasion said:
Ah, it's called the 13" Retina MacBook Pro with about 3 extra millimeters and a smaller footprint.

Keep waiting though I guess, but don't expect a Retina Air for $1,199.
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You stole my words:D
 
Mr Fusion said:
I hope the future of their laptop line is just one type of machine:
- Air body
- Pro features (external optical if needed)
- Retina display
In 11, 13, 15 & 17" sizes. Add an Apple-designed discrete graphics card (so it'll fit in the Air's body) as a BTO option.

One model. Four sizes. Keep things nice and simple. :)
Click to expand...

OH APPLE, Can you just please see the beauty of this idea and implement it?
What a fantastic concept. How could they fail with it. It's just not possible.

The elegance of Apple was originally simplicity of design and high quality. If ever they are to bounce back it must be through tsimple logic.
mmm... is this like truth and beauty?

Come on Apple, Make it so!
 
Frankly I'm not surprised one bit that sales of the 13" MBP are sluggish. Apple seems to have lost a grip on what people want to see in upper end or Pro equipment. The 13" MBPs no longer cut the mustard and are grossly over priced considering what they offer. Even the AIRs are a bit stiff in price as Apple has refused to follow the downward spiral on flash pricing.

In any event to get back to robust sales on the 13" machine they need to lower the price and deliver real "pro" benefits. As someone already pointed out a fusion drive would be a big help here as would a significant boost in performance. In a nut shell the 13" Pro has fallen victim to Apples twisted and artificial positioning of the unit. The machine is clearly overpriced considering what it offers.
 
I just bought a 15" rMBP. I love it, but the price is astonishingly high. I can't see too many people having the means to purchase one to be honest.

They shouldn't have neutered the non-retina line. That was a poor choice.
 
Apple - just introduce a discreet graphics card into the 13", why else crop out all the volume of an optical drive just to make it a fat MBA with retina screen?
 
HurryKayne said:
13 is weaker because its just an enlarged Retina Air..
no discrete Gpu,no Quad core?And still YOU-APPLE want that money for?
I.m.o NO WAY.Give me a 7xxm with quad core inside the 13 and maybe i'll make a call to my wallet!

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You stole my words:D
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Yep, instead if focusing on what Pro user might actually want in a 13" machine they went the fat AIR route. As such the 13" doesn't offer much over the AIRs in real capability. Instead of trying to market a fine machine in its own right they instead built a machine to fill an imaginary slot in their laptop line up. It makes about as much sense as their continued castration of the Mini.

What will be interesting to see is if Apple has learned their lesson here. Will the next 13" MBP be an artificially constrained machine to fill some marketeers idea of what a laptop line up should look like or will the 13" MBP become a passable pro machine. As it is today the 13" MBp can't rationally be called a Pro machine, it isn't even a good step up from the AIRs.

Somebody should be reassigned at Apple because it is becoming obvious that Apples jerking around has become tedious with the customer base. They have fallen victim to the idea shared by many marketing organizations that you can continue to fool the masses indefinitely. Unfortunately we in America are still free enough to think for ourselves.
 
e-coli said:
I just bought a 15" rMBP. I love it, but the price is astonishingly high. I can't see too many people having the means to purchase one to be honest.
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I'm not surprised that the retina machines are more expensive. What does bother me is that the retina machines didn't lead to significantly lower prices on the non retina machines or at least upgraded features to justify the price.
They shouldn't have neutered the non-retina line. That was a poor choice.
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It was completely stupid. A poor choice would be making Anne configuration a poor value. Stupidity is taking an entire lineup and to turning it into some sort of scaled marketing line up turning what was once good values into expensive crap.

Case in point deleting an optical drive should have generated a payoff for the customers. That means either a discrete GPU or a CPU with more cores. Instead Apple just gave users the shaft. I'm not the least but surprised that the 13" MBPs are selling like crap, it is the direct result of making them effectively more expensive relative to previous models.
 
yearofthe said:
I just bought the 13" 256GB Macbook Air Friday; should I return it back and wait, or it's not really worth it?
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well...
If you get good serious use from the machine in the intervening two months (estimated) between now and whenever, then it's probably already being a good purchase.
And as the news & rumors so far suggest not too huge a difference in real-world experience, that is IF the anticipated notebook machine adopted the new CPU chip, which is itself still an unknown, then the new hardware may not be massively different in terms of end-user experience.
But who knows.
The rule of thumb(s) has always been: (A) If you need the machine now, then buy it.
(B) If the new hardware is not at least 10-15% faster in overall end-user applications (not just benchmarks), then it will not be noticeable to most folks.
(C) If it's an optional purchase and you just gotta have the latest hotest highest hardware throughput and are willing to wait, well, then there's lots of waiting and lots of paying when they come out... ;)
 
Someone clarify please, i recall intel making a rule all computers using Haswell would have to be touch capable. Is this still true to macs then? Or does Apple get the exception? ;)
 
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wizard said:
Yep, instead if focusing on what Pro user might actually want in a 13" machine they went the fat AIR route. As such the 13" doesn't offer much over the AIRs in real capability. Instead of trying to market a fine machine in its own right they instead built a machine to fill an imaginary slot in their laptop line up. It makes about as much sense as their continued castration of the Mini.

What will be interesting to see is if Apple has learned their lesson here. Will the next 13" MBP be an artificially constrained machine to fill some marketeers idea of what a laptop line up should look like or will the 13" MBP become a passable pro machine. As it is today the 13" MBp can't rationally be called a Pro machine, it isn't even a good step up from the AIRs.

Somebody should be reassigned at Apple because it is becoming obvious that Apples jerking around has become tedious with the customer base. They have fallen victim to the idea shared by many marketing organizations that you can continue to fool the masses indefinitely. Unfortunately we in America are still free enough to think for ourselves.
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wow, really?
 
Agreed. The 13" rMBP is way too expensive for what it offers. It needs a discrete GPU, updated quad core processors, and a 16GB ram option. That'd make me happy. Oh, and how about no IMAGE RETENTION.
 
intothepolis said:
Agreed. The 13" rMBP is way too expensive for what it offers. It needs a discrete GPU, updated quad core processors, and a 16GB ram option. That'd make me happy. Oh, and how about no IMAGE RETENTION.
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All these phantom problems with the rMBP. They don't actually exist in the proportion people claim they do, but nevertheless forum posters keep harping on about them. (People who are trying to talk themselves out of a purchase, I suspect.)

Bought one in March. Love it. Have had zero problems and I can honestly say it's my favourite laptop I've ever owned.
 
paul4339 said:
I believe how it can be hard for consumers to justify paying in the $1400+ range for notebooks, especially if they are switching over from Windows. Being accustomed to the Windows world, the problem I always had with Apple was how expensive their RAM prices & HD prices (ie, you want to upgrade from a base config, but after you add it up it's well beyond your expectations, making you re-think things or hesitate).
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I think this is even more of an issue with the MacBook Pro product where pros need to be able to future-proof the investment to some degree (i.e. adequate RAM and SSD space). If you can't upgrade the RAM or SSD yourself, then as you state you have to add up the up-front costs -- and the incremental prices of additional RAM and SSD space from Apple are much too high.

I need the ability to add RAM or SSD space myself, or give me a reasonable price to do so on the initial purchase. At least double the prevailing price is not reasonable.

I'd gladly sacrifice a little weight and thickness for access to RAM and SSD slots.
 
JoEw said:
Someone clarify please, i recall intel making a rule all computers using Haswell would have to be touch capable. Is this still true to macs then? Or does Apple get the exception? ;)
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The "rule" is if you make a ultrabook (or name say product a ultrabook) touch capable is a must or else the chip will explode :eek:
 
I imagine a lot of consumers see the pro as too expensive, and a lot of pro users would always opt for the 15" if they could.

With the retina displays initially being so expensive, I guess they had to keep the non retina models. But it does seem to be verging on having too many models now - essentially there are two laptops - the Air and the MBP, but 11 off the shelf options. Hopefully it won't be too long when they can drop the non retina models, and bring the price of the retina models down closer to the current non retina prices.

Much as I love the MBP, once you get to £1,500 + for a laptop it is a bit eye watering!
 
Mr Fusion said:
I hope the future of their laptop line is just one type of machine:
- Air body
- Pro features (external optical if needed)
- Retina display
In 11, 13, 15 & 17" sizes. Add an Apple-designed discrete graphics card (so it'll fit in the Air's body) as a BTO option.

One model. Four sizes. Keep things nice and simple. :)
Click to expand...

To "keep things nice and simple", I propose consolidation to 14" and 17" models, with perhaps an 11"er added for those who must have a laptop an inch or so bigger than an iPad.

The 17" will please the 'PRO' crowd, while the 14" model, especially if it had a thinner bezel around the screen, would please most of those users who now purchase 13 & 15" laptops.
 
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