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Well I agree their prices have gone up outrageously, I'm also a realist who understands reality. An inflation calculator shows a 12.4% increase since 2011 which can't simply be ignored.

Inflation rates look at a basket of commodity items. Pretending it has any relevance at all to tech is beyond foolish. Tech drops in price over time.

In 1954, a black and white 19 inch TV was $1000. Using your inflation calculator that works out to $9400 in 2018 dollars. So, by your logic today a black and white 19" CRT TV with vacuum tubes should cost nearly $10,000 and a 75" flat panel 4k color display should be astronomically more expensive. Yet that 75" flat panel is well below $2000.

The point is pretending that inflation works flat across the board is just foolish, it gives you a general idea of what your money is worth overall, and in the case of tech, it emphasized that prices are falling far faster than it even appears. In fact that $2000 TV today is under $250 in 1954 dollars, less than a quarter the price of the 19" back in the day.

And before you pretend this is too esoteric. Computer prices have been plummeting since 2011 outside the Apple ecosystem. One TB of very fast SSD (Evo 960) is currently below $300 for black Friday, it was about $500 this time last year. Look at the Apple price for a TB of storage. It's sickening. If you look at a midrange or high end laptop today outside of Apple, it's cheaper than a similarly ranked machine cost in 2011. Intel NUC boxes blow the 2018 mac mini out of the water so badly it's not even funny anymore. And fully loaded, the NUC is about 1/3rd the price of the vastly inferior mac mini. In 2012, the mac mini was better value than any other SFF computer on the market. And don't even get started on the iMac Pro. Non-Apple tablets are insanely cheaper than they were in 2011, yet the iPad is beyond $2000 (with pencil and keyboard). This has nothing to do with inflation, tech prices are dropping as Apple prices are skyrocketing.
 
Yeaaaaa, no they wouldn’t be.....

I don't know...a fully loaded iMac Pro is $13,400 (not including the software BTO options). Half price at $6,700 is still a bit steep when you price out the actual hardware you get. I mean that price includes $2,400 for an extra 96 gig of ram, and $2,800 for an extra 3 TB of SSD. Just crazy even at half price.
 
Apple's deals have historically not been quite as good as discounts available from third-party retailers, so if you're shopping for something specific on Black Friday, it's best to take a look at all of the available deals at each retailer before making a decision.
Have they ever been as good?
 
When is the last time Apple did a BF event? It's been some years IIRC since they actually had discounts on products. I haven't kept up in the recent years.

Would love a deal on the iPad Pro or S4 Watch. Even if it just matches BH no tax effectively.
 
You know it's "shopping" event, not "sale" event. It gives you that good social feeling that you attended shopping event with other people. Without this event you would not be feeling that good spending your money. Sales are lame.
 
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Apple is a premium luxury brand. You ever see Louis Vuitton or Gucci have Black Friday sales?

Apple is a premium brand but not an exclusive brand.

There are key differences with the fashion labels you mention and Apple. For one, Apple is for mass consumers. Gucci and Louis Vuitton maintain exclusivity through the hyper-inflation of prices.

Apples and oranges springs to mind....
 
The wheels are falling off the Apple cart.

In years gone by I'd laugh at a comment like this, but the sheer greed coupled with the incredible lack of progress & innovation with their product lines is alarming.

Time to stop thinking about the shareholders for a change and focus on the customer or trying to win back some people with innovative products. And innovation is not an excuse to keep jacking up the pricing to ridiculous levels.
 
Wondering if it's US exclusive.

In my country one of official Apple premium resellers has only one day of Black Friday deals and they offer for example 10% off most of Macs, iPhone X for 849 € and stuff like that
[doublepost=1542708329][/doublepost]I would really welcome deals for cables! Asking 30 EUR for 1m USB-C to Lightning cable is outrageous.
[doublepost=1542708493][/doublepost]
Inflation rates look at a basket of commodity items. Pretending it has any relevance at all to tech is beyond foolish. Tech drops in price over time.

In 1954, a black and white 19 inch TV was $1000. Using your inflation calculator that works out to $9400 in 2018 dollars. So, by your logic today a black and white 19" CRT TV with vacuum tubes should cost nearly $10,000 and a 75" flat panel 4k color display should be astronomically more expensive. Yet that 75" flat panel is well below $2000.

The point is pretending that inflation works flat across the board is just foolish, it gives you a general idea of what your money is worth overall, and in the case of tech, it emphasized that prices are falling far faster than it even appears. In fact that $2000 TV today is under $250 in 1954 dollars, less than a quarter the price of the 19" back in the day.

And before you pretend this is too esoteric. Computer prices have been plummeting since 2011 outside the Apple ecosystem. One TB of very fast SSD (Evo 960) is currently below $300 for black Friday, it was about $500 this time last year. Look at the Apple price for a TB of storage. It's sickening. If you look at a midrange or high end laptop today outside of Apple, it's cheaper than a similarly ranked machine cost in 2011. Intel NUC boxes blow the 2018 mac mini out of the water so badly it's not even funny anymore. And fully loaded, the NUC is about 1/3rd the price of the vastly inferior mac mini. In 2012, the mac mini was better value than any other SFF computer on the market. And don't even get started on the iMac Pro. Non-Apple tablets are insanely cheaper than they were in 2011, yet the iPad is beyond $2000 (with pencil and keyboard). This has nothing to do with inflation, tech prices are dropping as Apple prices are skyrocketing.

This argument with EVO 960 is very very flawed. Apple offers ultra fast PCIe SSD, not SATA SSDs. Have a look at price of 1 TB SSD PCIe from Samsung and you will see the prize around 700 USD which is roughly what Apple asks for.
 
This argument with EVO 960 is very very flawed. Apple offers ultra fast PCIe SSD, not SATA SSDs. Have a look at price of 1 TB SSD PCIe from Samsung and you will see the prize around 700 USD which is roughly what Apple asks for.

No, it's not. 1 TB SSD PCIe from Samsung (970 PRO, the best there is) is less than $400, I checked BestBuy and Newegg, and Apple asks $600 for it (in the new Mac Mini for example) – and that's on top of the standard 256GB that you're not getting and must cost them something.
 
Apple is a premium luxury brand. You ever see Louis Vuitton or Gucci have Black Friday sales?
How on earth did you come to that conclusion? Yes they’re expensive but premium AND luxury they are not. The brands you mentioned charge far more than their competitors. Apple charge more but not 10x the amount. The only example of them being premium luxury is the $10,000 Watch.
 
Right now I could get a Mac mini for 200€ off the original price from third-parties and had I waited a few days more I would've gotten my MacBook Air with a similar discount. Doubt Apple is that generous.
 
What's the deal there, I'm clueless about regulations.
I’m not familiar with the exact details but in the U.K. companies would have fake ‘sales’ of items that had only been at the full price for very short periods. So the law was changed some years ago, products had to be on sale at the full price for a certain length of time before the price could be reduced and called a ‘sale’.
Probably an E.U. wide thing.
 
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This argument with EVO 960 is very very flawed. Apple offers ultra fast PCIe SSD, not SATA SSDs. Have a look at price of 1 TB SSD PCIe from Samsung and you will see the prize around 700 USD which is roughly what Apple asks for.

Then why are you mentioning SATA SSDs? You understand that EVO 960 comes as PCIe, right? Currently $309 on newegg, I don't feel like looking it up atm, but in the past few days I've seen black friday ads below $300 as I said.
 
Apple is basically known for NOT giving BF deals. This def indicates that they are struggling. Please spare a few $ for Timmy this Christmas season.
Um, the article clearly states the had one last year. They had record sales and profits so no struggle.
 
How on earth did you come to that conclusion? Yes they’re expensive but premium AND luxury they are not. The brands you mentioned charge far more than their competitors. Apple charge more but not 10x the amount. The only example of them being premium luxury is the $10,000 Watch.

I sort of agree, can we really call mass produced products from China a luxury just due to the price?
 
Then why are you mentioning SATA SSDs? You understand that EVO 960 comes as PCIe, right? Currently $309 on newegg, I don't feel like looking it up atm, but in the past few days I've seen black friday ads below $300 as I said.

Ok my bad. I found it on Amazon for 275 USD. However, I also saw 1 TB PCIE SSDs for 700 USD and it was mentioned that it was quality and speed equivalent of those which Apple uses in Macs.
 
Hyperbole, but you should get the sentiment.

I don't know...a fully loaded iMac Pro is $13,400 (not including the software BTO options). Half price at $6,700 is still a bit steep when you price out the actual hardware you get. I mean that price includes $2,400 for an extra 96 gig of ram, and $2,800 for an extra 3 TB of SSD. Just crazy even at half price.

I think we can definitely agree that the SSD and RAM upgrade prices are ripoffs. Even the storage upgrades in iPhones are quite high.
 
Nobody really knows that Apple does black Friday deals other than they want you to buy that stupid bag fill something up with overpriced cases and claim it as if you're getting more than what you paid for. Third party always makes more sense to buy Apple products check-out online like B&H. For a ridiculously Apple pricing right now getting out from that NYC tax feels like a black Fridays deals.
 
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Seeing as Apple were giving away a beats solo 3 headphones (RRP at 250GBP) with the Macbook 12'' as part of the back to school promo, it wouldn't surprise me to see that deal either cover everyone for 4 days OR 200GBP on a gift card. Same with Macbook Pro's and iMacs.

I doubt they'll discount anything, more than likely bundle in free store credit.
 
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