Great machines till you start having issues with the rubbish LG panels Apple use. Ive had extensive experience with them and the issues they have. Hopefully you have a better run then I have.Love my i7, 27’ built to order imac i7, 32gb ram last November last year.
Not expecting any updates soon.
Powerful enough to drive me for next 3 years at least
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Popular Mac Developer Slams Apple for 'Sad State of Macintosh Hardware'
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Notice no Ubuntu 18.04 support yet. They said it’s coming w/Swift 4.2 (which is linked to either iOS 12 or MacOS 10.14 release). Unacceptable delay. Already a second-class effort on Linux.
Great point. I’ve had retina displays across MbP and iMacs, dealing with 6 years of “image retention” that only gets worse over time. Very premium feel, Apple. Moreso that they never recalled or fixed the problem. Maybe that’s why we have dark mode coming.
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Yeah I know all about that damn Image retention.
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My fingers are crossed for you!!No probs here so far
Curenntly on Mojavy OS.
No probs to report
I don't think the problem is that the computers aren't being updated - to those who don't want to buy a new computer right now, this is not an issue. The problem is that Apple is raising the prices constantly (old iMac < thin iMac < iMac Pro, old MacBook < new MacBook, non-retina MacBook Pro < Retina MacBook Pro) and then quietly phasing out the old versions, effectively making their entire (already very expensive) lineup even more expensive. And they're doing this while reducing serviceability. So you're buying a computer that costs more, and also costs much more to maintain and repair. It seems unfair to me that I should pay more because Apple was lazy and used glue instead of screws everywhere - I shouldn't be punished for that, it's none of my business. Apple should pay for their mistakes, they should be the ones cursing when they have to replace yet another swollen battery and have to take apart the entire machine and use solvent to dissolve the glue off the battery. This should cost them money and time, not me. I just bought a computer, it's none of my business how it was assembled and how it is repaired.
The thing is called warranty and for some reason Apple gets away with providing just 1 year of it, thus getting themselves out of having to repair their own mistakes at their own cost, making it possible for them to keep producing poor quality engineered products. Other, lower end companies provide at least 2, but most often 3 years of warranty. So if they produce bad products, they have to fix it themselves at their own cost, meaning it's not in there interest to produce bad products. With Apple, that doesn't apply so they keep making worse quality stuff.
Why does no one talk about this?? Apple provides 1 year of warranty on a computer that costs thousands of dollars. Other companies provide 2 or 3. How is this okay?
Oh and before you tell me that people should just buy Apple Care - why should I pay more for warranty? Warranty is supposed to be free, that's the whole point. If it's free, it makes it against Apple's interest to produce bad products. If I have to pay for warranty then it makes it Apple's interest, literally, to produce bad products.
I am not responsible for hardware failures that happen during normal use and cannot be explained by wear and tear. I'm also not responsible for how complicated and infuriatingly expensive it is to replace a battery, since I'm not the one who glued it in there. Why does a GPU just fail, why does a battery just explode, why does a screen coating start flaking off, why does a keyboard stop working, if I did not drop, damage, or misuse the product? Why should I pay for it? Apple should pay for the repair and then apologize, and then fix the issue in their next lineup so it doesn't happen again.
If Apple wants to help the environment, they must not glue batteries - that will always eventually fail - to the damn computer! How is that not planned obsolescence? They know the battery is going to fail eventually, before the computer does, and yet they link the battery's fate to that of the computer. That should be illegal.
Sent from my 2007 Mac Mini running Snow Leopard that I'm forced to use while my MacBook Pro spends ONCE MONTH in repairs while they replace the battery. A simple operation which on other computers takes 1 minute to do.
The thing is called warranty and for some reason Apple gets away with providing just 1 year of it, thus getting themselves out of having to repair their own mistakes at their own cost, making it possible for them to keep producing poor quality engineered products. Other, lower end companies provide at least 2, but most often 3 years of warranty. So if they produce bad products, they have to fix it themselves at their own cost, meaning it's not in there interest to produce bad products. With Apple, that doesn't apply so they keep making worse quality stuff.
Why does no one talk about this?? Apple provides 1 year of warranty on a computer that costs thousands of dollars. Other companies provide 2 or 3. How is this okay?
Oh and before you tell me that people should just buy Apple Care - why should I pay more for warranty? Warranty is supposed to be free, that's the whole point. If it's free, it makes it against Apple's interest to produce bad products. If I have to pay for warranty then it makes it Apple's interest, literally, to produce bad products.
I am not responsible for hardware failures that happen during normal use and cannot be explained by wear and tear. I'm also not responsible for how complicated and infuriatingly expensive it is to replace a battery, since I'm not the one who glued it in there. Why does a GPU just fail, why does a battery just explode, why does a screen coating start flaking off, why does a keyboard stop working, if I did not drop, damage, or misuse the product? Why should I pay for it? Apple should pay for the repair and then apologize, and then fix the issue in their next lineup so it doesn't happen again.
If Apple wants to help the environment, they must not glue batteries - that will always eventually fail - to the damn computer! How is that not planned obsolescence? They know the battery is going to fail eventually, before the computer does, and yet they link the battery's fate to that of the computer. That should be illegal.
Sent from my 2007 Mac Mini running Snow Leopard that I'm forced to use while my MacBook Pro spends ONCE MONTH in repairs while they replace the battery. A simple operation which on other computers takes 1 minute to do.
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This is akin to how Windows Phone forums were when I was on Windows Phone. People kept clamouring MS to get a move on and come out with kickass phones after the Nokia takeover. I called it they would drop Windows Phone and I am calling it now, Mac is dead. The writing is on the wall. You don't keep products hanging for 3+ years and turn around and say with a straight face that you care about the lineup. Just go Windows. There are some very beautiful laptops out there. The Razer Blade manages to fit a gaming GPU in a same chassis as the MacBook.
I will not buy a Mac until Apple fixes the broken keyboard on my MBP 2016
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Apple has one more chance with me. I'm pinning all my hopes on the new Mac Pro. Cost isn't that much of an issue – my current MP has lasted eight years, so Apple hasn't exactly had too much cash from me in the last decade – but the machine needs to deliver. The deprecation of OpenGL is also a worry, but I hope developers can move to Metal and continue to provide apps for macOS.
I can't agree more with the initial post.
On Mac: (1) I had recently to replace my dead 2010 mac mini (used as a file and media server, directly connected to my TV) with a new one. The only reason I did buy an outdated, pricey, no-4k-video-capable mac mini was I'm fluent with mac and I had not enough time to move to another OS and setup my ecosystem. Strong disappointment to spend my money this way. (2) I did buy the new MacBook pro with the touchbar: I don't like the keyboard, and I just HATE the virtual ESC key. Seriously did they make any user study before releasing this? Strong disappointment again.
On iOS: Xcode is not planned to come to Windows soon, so Apple is spitting at the face of App developers, forcing them to use outdated computers and to buy them at full price. Who wants to start a company and invest on old&pricey stuff? I can't see how can the situation be good for iOS ecosystem either...
On Mac: (1) I had recently to replace my dead 2010 mac mini (used as a file and media server, directly connected to my TV) with a new one. The only reason I did buy an outdated, pricey, no-4k-video-capable mac mini was I'm fluent with mac and I had not enough time to move to another OS and setup my ecosystem. Strong disappointment to spend my money this way. (2) I did buy the new MacBook pro with the touchbar: I don't like the keyboard, and I just HATE the virtual ESC key. Seriously did they make any user study before releasing this? Strong disappointment again.
On iOS: Xcode is not planned to come to Windows soon, so Apple is spitting at the face of App developers, forcing them to use outdated computers and to buy them at full price. Who wants to start a company and invest on old&pricey stuff? I can't see how can the situation be good for iOS ecosystem either...
My MacBook Pro broke after about 5 years. If I couldn't add memory, I would have given up on it much earlier, because with every new version of MacOS the memory footprint increases. I pray that my current MacBook Pro will last at least until there is a reasonable replacement without TouchBar and with enough connectivity.
My HP desktop is much older and still doing fine. I just had to replace the graphics card 2 years ago. New graphics card: about 70 €, exchange took 10 minutes.
The company I work only uses Apple notebook. Developers get a maxed out Macbook Pro, top RAM and processor speed. Company policy allowed to ask for a new notebook every two years (and you get the old one for personal use). This policy was updated about two years ago extending the usage period from two to three years because new MacBooks were not such a big upgrade in comparison to the old ones. This way the company cut costs and to be sincere it was a reasonable decision considering RAM remained 16 Gb, processor mostly the same, graphic is not important for developers (starting from a certain base performance level), same for extended screen color space and refresh rate.
What is also happening is that even colleagues reaching the three years limit, are still nor rushing to upgrade their MacBook Pro because they don't see the new one worth the change in term of convenience for their work: especially for the myriad of adapters required, the keyboard, the not requested Touch Bar.
Of course we don't even consider the price aspect for all these unrequested features, as the company pays, but that I definitely would add to the equation when buying a personal notebook.
Let's say Apple current lineup is luxury oriented in a world where we need flexible, customisable tools.
What is also happening is that even colleagues reaching the three years limit, are still nor rushing to upgrade their MacBook Pro because they don't see the new one worth the change in term of convenience for their work: especially for the myriad of adapters required, the keyboard, the not requested Touch Bar.
Of course we don't even consider the price aspect for all these unrequested features, as the company pays, but that I definitely would add to the equation when buying a personal notebook.
Let's say Apple current lineup is luxury oriented in a world where we need flexible, customisable tools.
You have a partial point here, I am in the camp where my teams updating frequency has fallen off massively in the Mac sphere. I used to update my PCs (self builds) annually. When I switched to Mac in 2006/7, Apple updated their hardware in component terms twice per year, hence the 'early' and 'late' year designations. I tended to update my Macs on 2-3 yearly basis. So 2006, 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012...and I adjusted my purchase type.
As a team, we recently retired 2 x 2006 17 inch MBPs, a 2009 MBA, 2 x 2009 iMacs, 2 x 2006 Mac Pros and a 2008 Mac Pro. We are still running 3 x 2012 Mac minis, 1 x 2009 Mac Pro, 2 x 2011 iMacs, 1 x 2012 iMac, 2 x 2011 11inch MBAs, 1 x 2012 iMac, 2 x 13inch MBPs and 2 x 2015 MBPs. We purchased these sequentially as part of a team. I have also had a 2015 MB but gave that to my Father as it was too slow, port constrained and had an awful keyboard....crap compared to the old MBAs in terms of ease of use.
Why have we not upgraded the old kit?
Well the 2012 Mac minis did receive a backward revision in 2014 (basically putting the MBA inside the MM case), so the 2012 model is the only quad core CPU, i.e. there has been no similar or better upgrade for that function subsequently.
The 2012 iMac was an upgrade for one 2011 iMac (thin version replacing fat version) but we kept the 2011 as a backup. Why haven't we replaced the 2012 iMac? Well this is when the speed of updates started faltering and there was little iterative improvement in the CPU/GPU combination until the 5k iMac - which we almost did buy but we couldn't get a matching second monitors as the graphical connector standards were not up to it. So we invested in my 2015 MBPs as a mobile workstation instead, these can run 2 x 4K external monitors and their own displays at the same time, i.e. they are more flexible than the then 5K iMac.
We haven't updated either the 2013 MBPs or the 2015 MBPs because of the keyboard issue. We were planning to replace the 2013 MBPs in 2015/16 but held off for the MBP update that was pending and when it got the MB keyboard we refused to upgrade (crap keyboards). This was why we plumped for the end of line 2015 MBPs, get the best keyboard ever while we could (a further reason, in addition to the 5K iMac problem). These MBPs also have the ports we use regularly. The current MBP line up just isn't good enough and would be dongle-tastic.
Why haven't we changed the 2011 MBAs? Well they killed the 11 inch models (which you could use on an airline economy seat tray table with ease). We tried the MB and it was rubbish, so that was out. These fit a niche below the MBP. Finally, the current MBA got a speed bump the other year of 200MHz (because Intel stopped making the lower speed Broadwell) but this was not a real upgrade, the actual last proper MBA update was 2014/5. At that time we were buying the other kit. We have not updated them since because it pains us to spend so much on such old tech, so we have not bothered and TBH the performance differences between 2011 and 2015 are minimal, plus the 11 inch is no longer available.
The 2009 Mac Pro is our oldest functioning device. This is a remote server. We could have got the 2010 or 2012, which we probably should have done. The updates appeared minimal and we had other priorities at the time. By the time we were ready we knew that the 2013 Mac Pro was rumoured...and that ended up being a disappointment as it didn't have the internal flexibilities of the cheese grater. So we got the Mac minis instead!
Meanwhile in iOS terms I personally have had the iPod Touch (2008), iPod Touch (2010), iPad 2 (2011), iPad 4 (2012), iPad Mini (2013), iPad Air 2 x 2 (2014), iPad Mini 3 (2014), iPad Pro 9.7 (2016), iPad Pro 10.5 (2017). For the iPhone, I have had the iPhone 5 (2012), iPhone 5s (2013), iPhone 6s and 6s Plus (2015), iPhone SE (2016), iPhone X (2017).
Why have I bought iOS items almost on an annual basis? Well the iterations are so fast that the gains are noticeable.
Quietly clearly we buy where the speed of innovation lies. We have not purchased recent Macs because 1) they are the same as the old kit, and 2) they are downgrades in terms of function if you buy the newer designs. We are now getting to the point where we need to consider if we switch from Mac, and that hurts.
Clearly Apple innovation effort is in the iOS domain. This is not all Apple's 'fault' as Intel has not bathed itself in glory but Apple has not bothered to even keep up with Intel iterations for their old designs in any real sense either, nor have they corrected poor design decisions affecting new products in the Mac arena, which wouldn't take much effort to correct.
The Mac feels dead and probably will continue to be so until Apple start their desktop/mobile ARM strategy and then, despite what they say, iOS and macOS boundaries will blur.
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This is a phenomenal amount of Comments. Pro computing is a vacuum at the moment, and Apple is showing absolutely none of it’s DNA. I would imagine Cook’s motivating force is investors and he knows he doesn’t have the vision to inspire said shareholders like Jobs would. I don’t want Windows or Mac. I might as well go live in a tree.
Apple’s original content may be created in iMac Pro and the future Mac Pro, but will anybody else’s?
Apple’s original content may be created in iMac Pro and the future Mac Pro, but will anybody else’s?
And there is the gigantic Catch-22 for MacRumors itself: how often do you see this site treating benchmark improvements as the most important aspect in comparing smartphones or tablets? Basically never at this point. Despite Android phones constantly trailing in performance, significant benchmark improvements for Apple devices are usually mentioned but not treated as a primary issue for smartphone buyers. They almost always pooh-pooh the numbers and say that Android phones have "caught up" or that "users won't notice in daily use" despite the obvious disparity.
Now compare that to the hysteria they're trying to whip up with Macs not getting marginal updates from Intel. Does it really make any sense from a tech perspective? No. It's not even really a tech issue. It's just nonsense.
I fully agree that the most problematic recent practices by Apple of eliminating serviceability and upgradeability, while pushing dependence on Apple Care, is clearly indicative of the corporate strategy of Apple today to maximize profits, while lowering standards of build quality - environment be damned.
Marketing is everything I suppose at Apple these days...without substance hardware wise - "we love the mac!", "be creative!". We are green!, engineering genius, innovation, and excellence of design at Apple, is quickly becoming a hard sell to markets worldwide, as Apple computers have gained the reputation of being expensive disposable non upgradeable hardware, not exactly what the pro or semi pro creative community aspires to invest in, when it comes to the MAC.
So it seems that Apple does not care anymore about the creative industry, and is focused on the "iphone masses" who many most probably do not even need a computer for social media and communication. So if no more for the creative community, what is Apple new market differentiator?. When microsoft has the enterprise market, most of the edu market, and is seriously pushing and succeeding into the creative market, what does Apple stand for anymore, the "digital Sharper Image Catalogue" of the future? (yes Angela, I know you would love that).
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1 year warranty on computers (and electronics) is standard. If you use an AMEX card you automatically get 2x the warranty and you can also buy an extended warranty (applecare) if you're worried.
I got a 2010 13" MBP a few months back for a road trip, works great and cost me about $130AU or less than 10% the new cost for the cheapest Apple Laptop. Why buy new?
I keep hearing this argument that CPU's are close enough in performance that it doesn't matter if Apple is using year(s) old models and selling them for a premium...in fact, we should be happy to buy it. I suspect if Apple applied that logic to the iPhone line, people would be rioting...the iPhone X was marketed as being jam-packed with innovative and cutting edge technology, not as "you should be happy because it's simply good enough."
Technically, that isn't correct, there were iMacs with Skylake CPUs. They just were released at the end of 2015 and only in the 27" iMac:
- iMac 21.5", Late 2013: Intel Core i5 (4570R, 4570S) or Core i7 (4770S) ("Haswell")
- iMac 27", Late 2013: Intel Core i5 (4570, 4670) or Core i7 (4771) ("Haswell")
- iMac 21.5", Mid 2014: Intel Core i5 (4260U) ("Haswell refresh") -- added 1.4 GHz processor option
- iMac 27", 5K, Late 2014: Intel Core i5 (4690) or Core i7 (4790K) ("Haswell refresh") -- added 5K display option
- iMac 27", 5K, Mid 2015: Intel Core i5 (4590) ("Haswell refresh") -- added 3.3 GHz processor option
- iMac 21.5", Late 2015: Intel Core i5 (5250U, 5575R) ("Broadwell") -- Intel HD or Iris Pro
- iMac 21.5", 4K, Late 2105: Intel Core i5 (5675R) or Core i7 (5775R) ("Broadwell") -- Intel Iris Pro
- iMac 27", 5K, Late 2015: Intel Core i5 (6500, 6600) Core i7 (6700K) ("Skylake") -- AMD Radeon R9
And A11-series processors were available massively since September 2017, yet iPads still have A10-series processors.
Ehh... I'm not 100% convinced. I'm 29 back in school for nursing and the vast majority of Students still whip out their Mac to take notes. I see very few people taking notes or doing homework on an iPad. While an iPad is best for consuming content, I do not think it's a great device for creating content.
Maybe the wait is because there is a major, every-product, sweeping hardware update coming.
Redesigned consumer-accessible cases, the latest Intel chips, fixes for laptop keyboards, a modular, Apple TV-sized Mac mini that, combined in quantity, serves as the basis for the new Mac Pro.
Hey, I can dream right?
But there’s this: why would they update MacOS yearly like clockwork if the Mac had no viable future? It seems to me that they would let that stagnate as well if there was true corporate disinterest in the Mac hardware.
What’s on your wish list?
Redesigned consumer-accessible cases, the latest Intel chips, fixes for laptop keyboards, a modular, Apple TV-sized Mac mini that, combined in quantity, serves as the basis for the new Mac Pro.
Hey, I can dream right?
But there’s this: why would they update MacOS yearly like clockwork if the Mac had no viable future? It seems to me that they would let that stagnate as well if there was true corporate disinterest in the Mac hardware.
What’s on your wish list?
Looking at the growth of desktops, Apple would've not as "successful" as today if they stayed committed to desktops. Even Steve Jobs already acknowledged this as Apple put more focus on their laptops in his era, with the creation of the Macbook Air.
Yes, Apple could've spin off the Mac division, but considering how control "freak" Jobs was, I doubt there are any mechanism put in place to let the company do anything like that. Considering Apple of today is still following Jobs' vision, no spin off will happen.