"Apple's approach has been to cripple the hardware so that in 3-5 years, that laptop will feel slow so you want to upgrade. Almost all the refreshes we've seen have been to reduce performance and costs to Apple, while we've seen increases to the price."
I maybe an outlier, but I have a 8 year old iMac 3.06 GHz Core 2 Duo that is running OK. I still run 10.6 due to legacy programs, but also run 10.11. 10.11 seems to be speedier than any of the more recent Mac OS.
That said, I still long for a 'prosumer' Mac desktop that I can open up and upgrade. If they made one I would purchase it immediately.
The old hardware used to be very strong and robust. the "thicker" iMac's were all getting desktop parts cause cooling wasn't crippled. The Mac Mini had a quad core part that with an SSD upgrade is still perfectly capable today. And those Cheese grater Mac Pro's could last a decade with a few small upgrades (RAM / SSD)
This is counter productive to Apple's business model of commoditizing computer parts. Apples business model in almost all categories is built around constant turnover. They want you to replace your devices every couple years.
in the last 2 years. We have seen every single PC of theirs receive some form of performance decrease. If not performance, some other feature that will be obsoleted in 2-3 years, with hope that you replace your entire unit, all at once.
The Mac Pro because a proprietary box, using almost entirely proprietary components. the ONLY thing that can reasonably be upgraded is RAM. the CPUs are already 2 years old. The GPU's are outdated and haven't received any updates and are crippled for most everyday use.
the iMac's for the most part had their Desktop CPU's cut out and replaced with Low Voltage or ULV parts. the 23" iMac's for example use the same CPU's as the MacBook Air lineup. and the 27" iMac's, despite promise of power, suffer from thermal throttling due to "thin" obsession.
the MacBook pro's and MacBook air's are their BEST computer products. bar none. But the MacBook Air has been neglected for well over a year without any updates to their parts. They're still rockign Haswell. They're still rocking one of the worst ultrabook screens in the entire market.
the retina Macbook... well, I'll leave that alone for now. there's enough current threads arguing why it's a crippled product.
At the end of the day, the last year for Apple PC's has seen everyone get LESS but still expected to pay the high premium price Apple wants. Is it any surprise that modern Apple PC's in the last year
You're not an outlier. You're actually very common. Troll a lot of forums and one thing you'll hear a lot of Apple users say is how they're sticking with their older, upgradable, and higher performing parts.