Mac OS X. I’m not a fan of what MacOS has become
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If you could revive one discontinued Apple product or abandoned project…
- Thread starter Jeeve Stubbs
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why would you want a 9inch screen computer?
The original iMac mouse, just so I can beat up kids with it and tell them how easy they have it with user interput interfaces these days.
i never got the hate for this mouse. looks lovely 😂
albeit i must say the 1 button mice(any) were crippling usability and it lasted all the way until 2005
If you don't get it, then you haven't used one. It was so small that you couldn't properly hold it, and got hand cramps using it. It looked great, but I do consider it Apples worst productivity design.
Oh man don't start me on this I'll be here all day. It's mostly stuff that iCloud got rid of that I want back. I want my stuff offline
- XServe hardware, particularly the storage array + Xsan and associated software.
- AirPort time capsule, but with 2x 2.5" disks for RAID1.
- The little remote control for Front Row and associated software.
- iPod classic - with an SSD as standard would be nice.
- More plastic hardware. Much more pleasant to use in our European winters.
…or they’ve never used a better mouse (and the current Tragic Mouse is only borderline better…)
Plus, being circular, it was hard to tell by feel which way it was pointing so you had to look down and check every time you let go of it or changed your grip.
However, I have never ceased to be amazed by people’s willingness to struggle with something because “it looks great”.
...I've already said this about Airport, but the same applies to XServe: how would an XServe distinguish itself from the 1001 other Mac-compatible (& non-cloud) products now on the market, which cover the whole spectrum from home NAS boxes to enterprise-grade rackmount servers? Plus, however much I agree about not wanting to rely on the cloud it's impossible to ignore that it has taken a massive bite out of the market, esp. for small workgroups.
When XServe arrived, the rest of the PC world was still dominated by proprietary networking OSs/products like Windows Server and Netware which (a) were complicated to use c.f. Mac's plug & play AppleTalk networking (b) didn't work with Macs without expensive/half-baked/both proprietary software and (c) often came with expensive per-seat licensing. XServe (and the Mac Mini server model - or any suitably-configured Mac Pro) worked seamlessly with Mac, had a user-friendly Mac interface sitting on top of a "real" Unix OS and didn't need per-user licensing.
Also, at the time, the PPC architecture still had something unique to offer in terms of performance (although that didn't last).
Now, Linux is a serious force in the server world (& potentially free, depending how much support you want to pay for), and expensive proprietary networking OSs are a legacy niche. The industry has partly shifted to more open protocols, while Mac has dropped AppleTalk in favour of SMB (now effectively open - despite Microsoft - and the leading implementation, SAMBA, added Mac/Time Machine extensions long ago). Most of the key server-side software products are written for POSIX-like environments and are easily portable between Mac and Linux, and user-friendly config can be done via HTML rather than some proprietary GUI. The fact that the XServe had a nice GUI is pretty irrelevant (anyway, GUI is great for point-and-drool basics but for serious server configuration you can't beat a Unix-style command line & config files). As I said, there are now a ton of good, easy-to-use NAS/server products that work fine with Mac.
With the switch to x86, XServe was - at best - just another rackmount x86 server with the largely irrelevant ability (for a server) to run MacOS Apps & the Mac GUI and an Apple price-tag. With Apple Silicon... maybe an Apple Silicon XServe would be more interesting, but then we're down to the problem that Apple Silicon just isn't designed as a server chip and lacks the requisite shedload of PCIe lanes and/or spinning-rust interfaces. It could be made to work, but really isn't the tool for the job.
What need there is seems to be filled by Mac Minis sitting in rack adapters. I suspect the market for that isn't huge, though.
There I agree. Not because I think there's a substantial market for it, but because a 25th Anniversary iPod Classic is something Apple could afford to throw some cash at just for the nostalgia of it - considering that it was probably the product that saved the company. Maybe there is a market for releasing a strictly music/audiobook/podcast device at a time when people are worrying about the mental health aspects of 24/7 phones and social-media...
Releasing something like that & pitching it as an unapologetically vintage "re-issue" could have created a lot of good publicity for Apple...
[sarcasm]The iPod Sock, of course.[/sarcasm]
...because we all want to promote the image of Apple as an overpriced tat merchant...
Well I do the other side of it. The problem we generally have is that it's pretty damn difficult getting companies to look after hardware sometimes. HPE for example have supply problems on basic replacement parts for some of their kit. Apple could do far better supply chain management there due to reach. Not only that they now have a far better processor architecture. We get charged by the amp and the ARM CPUs are far more punch-per-watt.
It's no different now. The market is so broken that the biggest seller for cloud-first services is "it's so hard that it's expensive".
We could do with a sensible user interface over a decent quality platform at this point. Linux isn't it. If you run a lot of Linux machines you'll understand what I'm talking about. Need FreeBSD/ZFS class tooling which macOS can provide (if they bother).
We have ARM
Open protocols I 100% agree. However Linux is absolutely terrible and should not be a force in the server world. It's just ubiquitous as it was the first zero cost thing to get on the market. The amount of weird problems I've had over the years with it is insane and getting anyone to even deal with it, on paid support is hilariously difficult. Even Microsoft is better. This is at large scale, not a couple of machines or a desktop. The boot process is hell, the storage architecture is terrible and it seems to be strung together in increasingly weird and ****ed up ways (thanks Poettering for that one). Then there's the package management of critical OS stuff - another nightmare. Add a layer of containerisation over the top of that and it's pain. We can do better.
Portability under POSIX is a joke. I won't even go there as that's a several page long rant.
There's no reason why Apple Silicon can't be a server class chip. They can add more PCI lanes absolutely fine. It scales up far more linearly than any x86-64 platforms do per core. The interconnect between the components in the SoC has more than enough bandwidth. And forget rust, throw the PCI lanes out to U.2 slots.
That is nice yes. But crippled by bad storage options mostly.
Ultimate hipster iPod. I'd buy it!
100%.
My short list:
1. Aperture!
2. Multiple years between macOS major upgrades!
3. Xserve and a proper Mac OS X Server again. Apple has always had this available in some form until they killed macOS Server altogether.
4. iMac G4
1. Aperture!
2. Multiple years between macOS major upgrades!
3. Xserve and a proper Mac OS X Server again. Apple has always had this available in some form until they killed macOS Server altogether.
4. iMac G4
I miss the way I was able very easily to turn volume up and down and change tracks straight from my pocket without taking the iPod out.
I would like to see them revive the airport time capsule, but also make it a NAS. Generally the things that Apple releases works well with other Apple products.
I could say without a doubt "yes" indeed to the iPhone 5. In my opinion that one and the iPhone 7 was the best form factor. I still have my old iPhone 7 (it is really thin) and use it as my clock alarm next to my bed.
But I also liked the iPhone 5s which was basically the iPhone 5.
I loved my iPhone 5 so much I still have it! I'm pretty happy I'm not still using it though. It was fantastic for its day, but it's just WAY too small now. I don't think I would last long using one these days, but that's a moot point. You'd have a fight on your hands trying to tear my iPhone 14 away from me!
I'll echo the calls for getting some iPods back. Something with quality audio I can plug my Beyerdynamic headphones into would be amazing. Or just put that DAC and audio circuitry back into an iPhone Pro. I didn't miss my iPods when my iPhones did that job, but I'm not spending MORE money on BT headphones or a headphone amp just to add a cumbersome way to use my fantastic headphones.
I'd be pretty happy for Aperture to return too!
I'll echo the calls for getting some iPods back. Something with quality audio I can plug my Beyerdynamic headphones into would be amazing. Or just put that DAC and audio circuitry back into an iPhone Pro. I didn't miss my iPods when my iPhones did that job, but I'm not spending MORE money on BT headphones or a headphone amp just to add a cumbersome way to use my fantastic headphones.
I'd be pretty happy for Aperture to return too!
So many!
Seeing this list makes me realize how much Apple hates me.
Absolutely, probably my all-time favorite Apple product, it is still sitting right in front of me.
Mac Studio makes me sad.
Yes. My soul dies a little more every time I start Lightroom. (And every time I receive the monthly bill from Adobe.)
This is probably first on my list. I would pay $3000 for a 3G/3GS form factor with edge to edge display and pro-iPhone screen technology and camera system.
The 12" PowerBook G4 and 11" MacBook Air were my favorite laptops, never did end up owning the 12" MacBook.
I would pay another $3000 for a MacBook in an 11" iPad form factor.
Slightly thicker would be fine.
Second on my list.
I miss these every time my $2000 Netgear Orbi system fails in some new way, which is quite often.
Third on my list, or possibly tied for second.
And finally, two I haven't seen mentioned.
Seeing this list makes me realize how much Apple hates me.
Absolutely, probably my all-time favorite Apple product, it is still sitting right in front of me.
Mac Studio makes me sad.
Yes. My soul dies a little more every time I start Lightroom. (And every time I receive the monthly bill from Adobe.)
This is probably first on my list. I would pay $3000 for a 3G/3GS form factor with edge to edge display and pro-iPhone screen technology and camera system.
The 12" PowerBook G4 and 11" MacBook Air were my favorite laptops, never did end up owning the 12" MacBook.
I would pay another $3000 for a MacBook in an 11" iPad form factor.
Slightly thicker would be fine.
Second on my list.
I miss these every time my $2000 Netgear Orbi system fails in some new way, which is quite often.
Third on my list, or possibly tied for second.
And finally, two I haven't seen mentioned.
- Apple Extended Keyboard II
- iPod Sock (Sorry, this is not it: https://www.apple.com/shop/product/hs8p2zm/a/iphone-pocket-by-issey-miyake-long-sapphire)
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I am with you there. The G4 Cube was a marvel of design (and intent). In a long and storied history of Mac ownership, it was doubtlessly my favourite product Apple product. The Cube walked so the Mac mini and Mac Studio could run.
Yes, RSI inducing and the cable was so short you ran out of desk space when using it (especially if you're right handed and needed to use a USB port on the left). Position tracking wasn't great either. The Magic Mouse is a huge improvement