I still believe the 17 will be back and here is why:

[Ryan1524]

Source?

Some posts by Puevlo:

There's this new thing called 'humour'. Ever heard of it?


the 17" Macbook Pro was a magnificent thing, but the Sales figure showed people want small devices or the complete opposite: a home desktop computer. The loyal small fan base has limits, and I don't think a super-expensive $4000 R-MBP is within that limit. In the end, the costs outweigh the gains and the business decision was made.

Apple may have been 99% in tune with its customers, but they're still a for-profit business, not a charity.

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

There's this new thing called 'humour'. Ever heard of it?

No, never. Is this a new disease?

Apple ... not a charity.

2bad4me

 

[Jiten]

Apple killed a bunch of good products for many reason but mostly to improve their bottom line. A few off the top of my mind were the old Newton (Steve then wanted to focus on the Mac) and G4 Cube (definitely poor sales). I'm hoping myself that Apple stopped the production of the 17" is because there are no retina displays on the 17" yet. Probably the 13" will get retina and later the 17."

One can hope, no?

 

[the-wanderer]

Maybe it wouldn't cost millions but it wouldn't make them any money and more importantly, they chose not to do it. Even if you could prove it would make them millions, they are NOT doing it. They could make millions selling laptops with Windows preinstalled as the default operating system. But that's not a line of business they choose to be in.

a modern 17" would make money if spec/configured for the right market, pro and gamers love high end 17" and 18.4" machines but none of them would come close to touching the outdated 17" apple made.

apple
no e-sata
no blu-ray
until recently no usb3
outdated graphics
outdated cpu
weak audio
etc
etc
OVERPRICED

 

[NewbieCanada]

I'm hoping myself that Apple stopped the production of the 17" is because there are no retina displays on the 17" yet. Probably the 13" will get retina and later the 17."

One can hope, no?

How does the fact that they didn't stop production on either of their 13" laptops fit into that hypothesis?

 

[Dammit Cubs]

adding a 17" in LCD and expanding the body to accomodate it, would hardly cost millions, since apple essentially packs a high-end 15" mbp into the larger enclosure.

This apple were are talking about there. Change to Magsafe 2 probably took them a year to decide. If its not perfect (according to their eyes), its not coming out so expect multiple versions (in house)

----------

Source?

According to Kuo's estimates for the first calendar quarter of 2012, Apple sold roughly 3.1 million notebooks, with nearly half of them being the 13-inch MacBook Pro, far and away the company's best-selling Mac product. But while Kuo predicts sales of nearly 1.5 million units of the 13-inch MacBook Pro, he sees much lower sales of roughly 500,000 15-inch models and only 50,000 17-inch models.

These are based on analyst's number. He gets his numbers for Year over year sales. If you predicted 1.6%, that tells you alot.
it actually becomes 1.6% ...my bad.

another article:
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware/why-apple-dumped-the-17-inch-macbook-pro/20761

 

[the-wanderer]

This apple were are talking about there. Change to Magsafe 2 probably took them a year to decide. If its not perfect (according to their eyes), its not coming out so expect multiple versions (in house)


i don't buy that it has to be perfect. look at the bugs in the software, hardware... look at that debacle with the antenna.

but maybe they are THAT bloated, bureaucratic and afraid of change that no one wants to pull the trigger and build it.

maybe they have no leaders or innovators and everything is done by consensus or committee.

on the apple employment site i've earmarked a few positions that are important for r&d and production and have noticed that they've had the positions posted for at least 4 years now.

 

[elmarjazz]

I understand what you are saying. The desktop area is basically the same, and I'll probably have to look at the 15" retina screen at some point to see how it 'feels'. But, the difference between 17" and 15" with the same desktop dimensions means something has to give, and that means actual text and image size on the screen. I remember users complaining about the 17" and the size of text when it came out, it works great for me, and there is nothing like a big screen for images, or at least as big a screen as I can get.

You definitely have every right to be unhappy about Apple axing the 17" MacBook Pro. But the fact that the 15.4" MacBook Pro with Retina Display can comfortably display the same 1920x1200 workspace should ease the pain. That makes it a far different scenario than if Apple were to axe the 15" Macbook Pro and expect customers to move from a 1920x1200 workspace to one that's only 1280x800.

 

[Cory Bauer]

I understand what you are saying. The desktop area is basically the same, and I'll probably have to look at the 15" retina screen at some point to see how it 'feels'. But, the difference between 17" and 15" with the same desktop dimensions means something has to give, and that means actual text and image size on the screen. I remember users complaining about the 17" and the size of text when it came out, it works great for me, and there is nothing like a big screen for images, or at least as big a screen as I can get.

I definitely agree that bigger is better in terms of screen size for content creation, but in my experience the extra 2" of the 17" model just wasn't enough to overcome that constrained feeling of a small laptop screen. I still felt the need to plug in a 24" or greater display to really get work done, so for me the added weight and bulk of the 17" model just didn't pay off the way I had intended it to.

 

[davidhunternyc]

Please MacRumors, is there anyone who can get to the Apple guys and confirm or deny future 17" MacBook Pro's? I just can't believe that Apple would give up this segment to Sony, Samsung, and all the others.

 

[Trey M]

Please MacRumors, is there anyone who can get to the Apple guys and confirm or deny future 17" MacBook Pro's? I just can't believe that Apple would give up this segment to Sony, Samsung, and all the others.

Only about 50 people in the world will know the answer to this question, so no one is going to have a definitive answer.

I would say that a 17'' laptop is un necessary for many people and I think many would be happy with a 15'' screen as well.

 

[elmarjazz]

And so what to do… ?

It is feeling like its time to update my 2 year old 17", or maybe not given the choices; a refurbished late model 17" non-glossy [of course] w/ high end processor, or a new [ more money] 15" retina?

Given that Apple is about profits more than ever - not a bad thing for a company we like - it seems the 17" will be something we users look back on with good memories.

I may wait till one pops up with the specs I want on the refurbished section here in Japan and grab to use for a couple more years till the kinks are all worked out of the retina and everything is working smoothly.

BTW: I did visit the Apple Store with my 17" to view side-by-side with the 15" retina. Yes the retina was maybe slightly 'crisper' and with good contrast, but the 17" was very close and to me a NICE BIG SCREEN even if the dimensions can be viewed in the same 1920x1200. Interestingly the folks that complain about the 17" total package size compared to the 15", and say the screen isn't much bigger, for me the total package of the 17" isn't much bigger, but the screen seems so much more so than the 15"

Wish Apple gave us a choice these days, so we could all have what we really want.

 

[vpro]

The 17" represents something like 1% of the sales. That might not be enough to cover the R&D of new ones.

I had a 17" a long ways back, I really enjoyed it. However I had to get get rid of it because it was hurting my back lugging it around.

I wouldn't expect much in the way of updates for it.

i hope your back improved? there is a great acupuncture technique for that, or you can just straighten your posture from time to time and suck it up princess.

i have been 'lugging' my 2007 17 inch MACBOOK PRO since and still am in my handsome 'incase' backpack I got with it, it is not a 'burden' at all, it is my recording studio everywhere i go, it has been my workhorse and more.

the PROsumers out there have held on and been extremely productive with their 17" MACBOOK PROs thank you very much, we have been patiently waiting for much needed refreshes, but the shafted us by not officially shedding any light on the reason for the "discontinue".

everyone is too easily keen on blaming this so called 'market', i spit on that very much, it is a better wiser thing to say that the PROsumers are busy still working away while the rest of the CONsumers buy every new idiotic toy that the produces.

we the 17" PROsumers demand explanations and accountability around here.

thanks.

by the way I don't care for a retina display or anything for the 17", i care for the size and this is the limit size for portability in my books. i care for beefy innards and a little thinner form, sure, i can live without the cd-burner, i have a few laying around - what ever. retina is great on tiny toy screens like the ifad toy. i may get a 15" retina macbook for fun cos i can. but it wont be for work i can tell you that much, it is a worthless workhorse, how many people out there are using it for pro use anyways, i read more about 'overclocking' games and heat issues (cry babies) about the games running too hot etc etc etc going at lengths about the most ridiculous topics on this toy, they should remove the PRO cos to me it is just a retina macbook period.