Apple Says Original 12-Inch MacBook Will Be Obsolete at End of June

[Xand&Roby]

Quite the Sherlock Holmes you are! You found a commercial composant that’s in it to sell goods… how utterly unusual and probably evil!

Many here are confusing their own wants and desires for Apples strategy with what the majority of their customers want. While I quite liked the 12 and still run one, the fact that they did not create a new one by now likely means it would be a bad business decision for them to do so, nothing more, nothing less…

You're geniuses, really.

Still think, in 2023, that companies give customers what they want.

But what are you going to do in the universities?

Rather than cutting comments by cherry picking, and then repeating what I have already written, why don't you try to explain to us why in some markets the screen diagonal is an important sales parameter, when in reality it doesn't say anything about product quality, and why those who live in these markets believe that all markets are theirs.
Maybe that way you can boast the title of Sherlock Holmes too.

Trivialities.

 

[GalileoSeven]

The 11" MBA might not have matched this in terms of style, but certainly had it beat in terms of performance/durability

 

[chucker23n1]

Oh, one more thing: I am firmly convinced that Apple is no longer able to design miniaturised hw, nor does it want to do so, as it is not profitable.

I am firmly convinced AirPods and Apple Watch prove you wrong.

It practically lost all the challenges on miniaturisation:
Mac Pro 2013, MacBook 12” Retina, MacBook Pro 2016, iPhone SE 2016, iPhone mini 12 and 13, Apple Watch 38/40.

I'll give you the Apple Watch having become slightly larger, which is a bummer.

As for iPhones, it's because people don't buy small iPhones. It has nothing to do with Apple is "able to design" smaller ones.

Apple wants to sell, if the diagonal of the screen charges more for Apple's products it can only be fine: bigger products are less complicated and they charge more.

Except that the 12-inch MacBook was much more expensive than the current 13-inch MacBook Air.

 

[Xand&Roby]

I am firmly convinced AirPods and Apple Watch prove you wrong.



I'll give you the Apple Watch having become slightly larger, which is a bummer.

As for iPhones, it's because people don't buy small iPhones. It has nothing to do with Apple is "able to design" smaller ones.



Except that the 12-inch MacBook was much more expensive than the current 13-inch MacBook Air.

I would like to understand how, since both AirPods and Watch have increased in size and not decreased.

Here, you say so too.

No, it's not because people don't buy small phones. It's because it's easier for manufacturers to make big phones. Samsung produces screens, has every interest in selling large screens and phones. Moreover, Samsung practically has a monopoly in East Asia, where there is a reason why people choose large screens: usually smartphones and tablets were the only computer devices for the masses. In the USA this motivation does not work, the average American has a smartphone, a tablet, a computer. In the USA there is the 'big is better' belief in the masses, which is why the large diagonals sell more.
Apple simply adapted, because Jobs had the ability to impose itself on the type of products he wanted to sell, Cook, on the other hand, does not have these expectations, it is enough for him to sell.

My mistake in the translation: I meant that larger screens cost less and give less problems to the company and sell more in certain markets. Unfortunately it turned out the opposite, it seemed to mean that the 12” cost less, I didn't mean that.

 

[Xand&Roby]

The 11" MBA might not have matched this in terms of style, but certainly had it beat in terms of performance/durability

Everyone can think what they want but the only Air interesting to me was the first, just because it was really a revolution. The 11” looked like a NetBook as useability, due to the 16:9 screen. The Air Retina or the latest Intel and Apple Silicon, are better made, but previous generations are really something unwatchable.
For a period of time Apple was selling the Air 13” which was wider, longer and with a worse screen than the MacBook Pro 13”, which was obviously heavier. It was the MacBook Pro 2012. How can someone sell a “light” product more bulky than a “heavy” product only Apple and those users who bought it knew (my sister bought 2 in 5 years, the Air 13” 2012 and the latest Air 13” not Retina. Two scraps that I had to put my hands on several times to repair them).

 

[4389842]

But what are you going to do in the universities?

Rather than cutting comments by cherry picking, and then repeating what I have already written, why don't you try to explain to us why in some markets the screen diagonal is an important sales parameter, when in reality it doesn't say anything about product quality, and why those who live in these markets believe that all markets are theirs.
Maybe that way you can boast the title of Sherlock Holmes too.

Trivialities.

Your point being?

Fact remains Apple focuses on global market trends and consumer demand and it likely offers the product quality people seem to consider sufficient. They do not focus on whatever niche you might find yourself in. Don’t generalize your perceptions of these products to apply to everyone.

If you don’t like it, vote with your wallet and buy something else.

 

[Xand&Roby]

Your point being?

Fact remains Apple focuses on global market trends and consumer demand and it likely offers the product quality people seem to consider sufficient. They do not focus on whatever niche you might find yourself in. Don’t generalize your perceptions of these products to apply to everyone.

If you don’t like it, vote with your wallet and buy something else.

Facts facts facts: facts remains that who has nothing to talk believes market has facts.
Market, at best, has numbers of sells, not facts.
You can't argue your own thought and talk about facts, but what facts? Fantasies.

The point is you are repeating what I wrote days ago, but while I’m made my thought (and it can’t intend to be a fact) you’re talking about “facts” that you believe are truth.
Grow up, facts.

“and it likely offers the product quality people seem to consider sufficient.”: tries to fix a minimally coherent point.
Do products come from global trends? And then when they produced the 12” it was because the global trend had required it, otherwise they wouldn't have produced it.
Or are all products that don't sell well born out of someone's imagination while those that sell well were born from the facts?

Try to apply a minimum of scientific method in what you say.

If you are not an engineer you have all the parameters to become one. And it's not a compliment.
Facts.

 

[chucker23n1]

Market, at least, has numbers of sells, not facts.

Yeah, and small phones don’t have the numbers.

 

[darngooddesign]

I would like to understand how, since both AirPods and Watch have increased in size and not decreased.

The AirPods 3 themselves are smaller than the 1/2, but their case is slightly larger due to the improved battery life.

 

[Xand&Roby]

Yeah, and small phones don’t have the numbers.

Of course, and when they designed them instead they had the numbers about them, otherwise they would not have produced them, unless in Apple there is someone who is hired to lose Apple’s money, and then I recommend them to hiring someone like you, who always have the solution ready (it's simple, just do it big).
Or explain to us why they produced them, these small phones, if they knew they wouldn't sell them.

 

[Xand&Roby]

The AirPods 3 themselves are smaller than the 1/2, but their case is slightly larger due to the improved battery life.

I don't have a comparison on volumes, but what the AirPods 3 lose as volume in microphone length seems to me they gain in width of the headset, compared to the AirPods 2. A precise comparison should be made.
To see them they seem bigger to me, both for a larger battery and for new solutions that the AirPods 2 don't have.
The charging case yes, it's bigger.

 

[darngooddesign]

I don't have a comparison on volumes, but what the AirPods 3 lose as volume in microphone length seems to me they gain in width of the headset, compared to the AirPods 2. A precise comparison should be made.
To see them they seem bigger to me, both for a larger battery and for new solutions that the AirPods 2 don't have.
The charging case yes, it's bigger.

I’ve had both the AP 2 and 3, the 3 feel smaller to me (if you have small ears then the 3’s might feel larger), and I did not notic a size difference between the case. The AP3 have much better sound, and better speakers require more internal space.

AP3 on the left.

 

[dwaite]

Oh, one more thing: I am firmly convinced that Apple is no longer able to design miniaturised hw, nor does it want to do so, as it is not profitable.

I think they can (and do internally), but it is indeed not profitable. People don’t buy for miniaturization.

The iPhone mini likely would have failed eventually, but 2020 couldn’t have been a worse launch year for it

 

[dwaite]

Everyone saying how good this was.

Wasn’t this the first butterfly keyboard.

Bought one launch day, first keyboard issue was five years later after it was handed down.

IIRC the rumors at the time were that later runs of that model had a manufacturing issue - the keyboard manufacturer substituted a different metal that would deform more easily if particles got wedged underneath.

 

[dwaite]

Yeah, this form factor should be the Air, and the current Air's should just be Macbooks. I really don't get how Apple has screwed up this extremely obvious marketing snafu so badly.

Easy. People go into the store to buy a MacBook Air.

Naming a machine that doesn’t meet their needs the MacBook Air means people will either get confused or leave the store with the wrong computer.

Eliminating the name air means killing off their most successful Mac product line.

The speculation was that the MacBook was supposed to replace the air, like the iPhone X replaced the home button form factor. They couldn’t get there with price point or with Intel chips.

The moment they shipped the Air retina, the MacBook was considered failed as a product. Which is a shame, because a lot of people (including Apple execs) loved it

 

[chucker23n1]

Of course, and when they designed them instead they had the numbers about them, otherwise they would not have produced them, unless in Apple there is someone who is hired to lose Apple’s money, and then I recommend them to hiring someone like you, who always have the solution ready (it's simple, just do it big).
Or explain to us why they produced them, these small phones, if they knew they wouldn't sell them.

Um, what?

They used to sell them because way back in the day, they sold better. Then they continued to sell them because they were hoping they’d found a niche. Now they don’t any more because it turns out they had overestimated them niche.

It isn’t any more complicated than that.

 

[Xand&Roby]

Um, what?

They used to sell them because way back in the day, they sold better. Then they continued to sell them because they were hoping they’d found a niche. Now they don’t any more because it turns out they had overestimated them niche.

It isn’t any more complicated than that.

Your world must be very beautiful where a company that sells 95 million devices a year (the company's first item of earnings) decides so, with hope, that 1/4 of those devices, so 24 million, might like it or maybe even not, and take the risk of doing so.

In my world, however, the same company does a whole series of market research, focus groups and all those beautiful things that have been on this planet for almost a century, and only when the numbers of the sales forecast justify the risk with a reasonable margin, they design it and put it into production.

But really, I appreciate the effort to make the world simple: don't we want to risk it? Let's make it bigger.

 

[chucker23n1]

Your world must be very beautiful where a company that sells 95 million devices a year

About twice that, but yes.

(the company's first item of earnings) decides so, with hope, that 1/4 of those devices, so 21 million, might like it or maybe even not, and take the risk of doing so.

In my world, however, the same company does a whole series of market research, focus groups and all those beautiful things that have been on this planet for almost a century, and only when the numbers of the sales forecast justify the risk with a reasonable margin, they design it and put it into production.

But really, I appreciate the effort to make the world simple: don't we want to risk it? Let's make it bigger.

"Market research" and "focus groups" won't tell you reality. Trying to sell something and seeing how it does will. Sometimes, you get it wrong; see, for example, the 12-inch MacBook, the iPhone mini, or the Power Mac G4 Cube, if you want to go back that far.

But yes, we can also go with your conspiracy theory that the product would be successful, but Tim Cook has decided to spite you personally by not selling it.

 

[Wanted797]

Bought one launch day, first keyboard issue was five years later after it was handed down.

IIRC the rumors at the time were that later runs of that model had a manufacturing issue - the keyboard manufacturer substituted a different metal that would deform more easily if particles got wedged underneath.

Ah okay. I personally never liked the butterfly keyboard for feel.

I think this would be killer with an M series chip.

I feel 14” is the absolute sweet spot though.

 

[dwaite]

Ah okay. I personally never liked the butterfly keyboard for feel.

I think this would be killer with an M series chip.

I feel 14” is the absolute sweet spot though.

Yeah, I didn't mind the butterfly keyboard.

But, I could imagine certain people for whom ultraportables would appeal to and who typed for a living - say, journalists for online publications - would have been the absolute worst group to get broken butterfly keyboards that felt bad on their best days.

Apple seems to try to stick to a redesign cycle (say, 3 years for iPhones and AirPods, 5 years for most other things), and 'panic and put a classic keyboard into our slim laptop and add nearly a quarter inch thickness' wasn't something they were willing to do to a product that was still selling perfectly well.

Gotta figure a good portion of articles about the Mac line being abandoned were at least partly about journalists disliking the keyboard used in the laptops.

 

[leeuk321]

Love my 2017 12" Macbook. I'm hoping that if Apple release a 15" MacBook Air as anticipated, it'll pave the way for the smaller MBA to be refocused into being a "travel size" Air, with the 15" being more suited to home use. At the moment, the current 13.6" model kind of covers both markets.

I don't think we'll return to the 2.03 lbs / 0.92 kg weight, but I'm hoping that the 13.6" MacBook Air can be trimmed down from 1.24 kg to less than 1.1 kg. I think that if Apple aimed for 2.4 pounds it'd play well in the marketing, because 2.4 lbs just sounds a lot less than 2.7 lbs, it's kind of like human nature rounds 2.4 off to 2 whereas people hear 2.7 and think "just under 3 lbs". Kind of. And that'd translate to 1.09 kg, which just "feels" like a kilo.

2.4 lbs / 1.09 kg is a compromise I'd be more than happy with, to keep the guts of the MacBook Air with the portability of the Macbook. If they reduced the screen and/or bezel size, I'm sure they could achieve this. Obviously it'd involve having less space to work with in the main body, but I'd say it's hopefully doable.

 

[Sowelu]

The 12” MacBook failed because the perception was that it was underpowered, ran hot, had a terrible keyboard, and was too expensive, not because it was too small. Its size was the initial appeal and draw, but ironically, also its Achilles heel due to hardware limitations at the time.

Apple Silicon and the latest MacBook keyboards would address all these issues. Apple could make the fastest, coolest-running, smallest and lightest MacBook in history, but as others have pointed out, perhaps they don’t want to take away from their expensive iPad Pro line, or they just don’t see a large enough market for a tiny MacBook.

It would be an instant buy for me, even at a premium. Especially if it had integrated 5G. Ah, one can dream…

 

[Xand&Roby]

About twice that, but yes.



"Market research" and "focus groups" won't tell you reality. Trying to sell something and seeing how it does will. Sometimes, you get it wrong; see, for example, the 12-inch MacBook, the iPhone mini, or the Power Mac G4 Cube, if you want to go back that far.

But yes, we can also go with your conspiracy theory that the product would be successful, but Tim Cook has decided to spite you personally by not selling it.

But what conspiracy theory.. simply the adult world is a complex place, and there are no simple answers to complex problems. All the products that did not sell had behind a good feedback to be put into production, otherwise they would not have been produced, but on the market they encountered a series of situations that did not play in their favour, cancelling the sales forecasts.
But it's a complex set of factors, not 'facts' and 'make it big'.
With this nonsense of the 'make it big' we got that the development of Apple products is adds 1 inch every year to all products. They suck, they have battery problems and sw, but just make it bigger and “hey, I’ll buy it!”. If you be happy go on..

perhaps they don’t want to take away from their expensive iPad Pro line, or they just don’t see a large enough market for a tiny MacBook.

Even the front camera of the iPad 10 in landscape position doesn't give positive hope: it means that Apple knows that most of its customers use iPad as a cheaper Mac, and they don't care, as long as it sells. Already the keyboards in landscape mode (does anyone remember the first iPad keyboard in portrait mode?) were saying "hey, do you want to use it like a Mac? Okay!" (the advertisement 'what is a computer?' pushed to use it as a Mac), with the camera in landscape mode in step is complete. They should fix the rear Apple logo. In fact, competitors sell them all to be used in landscape mode, not portrait mode.
What is this (OnePlus Pad), if not an updated MacBook 12”?

 

[chucker23n1]

The 12” MacBook failed because the perception was that it was underpowered, ran hot, had a terrible keyboard, and was too expensive, not because it was too small. Its size was the initial appeal and draw, but ironically, also its Achilles heel due to hardware limitations at the time.

But the "terrible keyboard" achilles heel would remain. Yes, they have much better SoC options now, but we already have an answer to "what would a fanless laptop with an Apple ARM SoC, designed from scratch look like?": the M2 MacBook Air has a completely new design. So the question remains: would a smaller laptop, with the inevitable limitations that would entail, be worth it? And so far, their answer is clearly: no.

(Would they be able to fit an M2 in a 12-inch MacBook-like chassis? Probably; it does fit in the 11-inch iPad Pro, after all.)

Apple Silicon and the latest MacBook keyboards would address all these issues.

The latest MacBook keyboards are much thicker. Which was really the mechanical issue in the first place: they simply had too many compromises in order for it to fit. Typing speed and reliability suffered.

Apple could make the fastest, coolest-running, smallest and lightest MacBook in history, but as others have pointed out, perhaps they don’t want to take away from their expensive iPad Pro line, or they just don’t see a large enough market for a tiny MacBook.

A tiny MacBook with a keyboard whose reputation is poor. Or one with a better keyboard, but not so tiny at all. In fact, barely smaller than the current Air, at that point.

 

[Xand&Roby]

A tiny MacBook with a keyboard whose reputation is poor. Or one with a better keyboard, but not so tiny at all. In fact, barely smaller than the current Air, at that point.

Insist with this “make it big” theory: all Apple laptop keyboards are the same as the larger ones. The 12” PowerBooks keyboard had the same size as the 15” and 17” PowerBooks, the 12” iBooks the same size as the 14” iBooks. The same happened with the keyboards of the MacBook 12” and 13”, at some point in 2012 to standardise production the Airs received the same size of the top lid as the MacBook Pro 13”, while until 2011 they were slightly smaller. Only the 11”, both iPad and MacBook Air, had smaller keyboards.

As seen so far you have your own mental form and you continue to support it.
Make it big!