Rant: This is getting ridiculous!

[yodermk]

A classic Business 101 Story:
Marketing Geek: We need to price our new product at $x.
Finance Geek: But we'll lose $1 per unit!
Marketing Geek: No problem - we'll make it up on volume.

Apple is a hardware company (repeat that 3 times). It should only sell high-margin products since once you take the discount road there's no going back. (Want to buy a high-end eMachine?)

I don't think I buy that. You can get a great PC minitower for, say, $800. Apple could sell something with similar specs for $1200.

I agree it's worth an Apple premium for OS X and the fact that Apple uses quality parts. They would certainly make money at that point.

 

[yadmonkey]

dmaxdmax, I think that to consider Apple to be a hardware company primarily shows a profound misunderstanding about what has made Apple into the company it is today. The fact is, there is no software without hardware and there is no hardware without software, so the lines are blurred, but first and foremost, Apple has built its company on software.

These days, once you look under the hood, the line between a Mac and a PC are blurred more than ever. They are using the same hard drives, the same processors, the same video cards and their logic boards are using the same chipsets and controllers. The only real differences are for the sake of keeping the Mac software tied to the hardware and for style. Clearly, it's the Mac OS and all of the great bundled software which makes Apple what it is and makes it worth putting up with things like less-than cutting edge hardware and the lack of BYO and customization options.

 

[yadmonkey]

Let's put this to rest. A recent direct quote from Steve Jobs:

“The big secret about Apple, of course–not-so-big secret maybe–is that Apple views itself as a software company..."

 

[krunk]

Let's put this to rest. A recent direct quote from Steve Jobs:

“The big secret about Apple, of course–not-so-big secret maybe–is that Apple views itself as a software company..."

Yep, mac hardware is just the most expensive dongle ever conceived of by man.

 

[Ladybug]

Let's put this to rest. A recent direct quote from Steve Jobs:

“The big secret about Apple, of course–not-so-big secret maybe–is that Apple views itself as a software company..."

Interesting indeed! I guess I see them as being a hardware/software kind of company myself. My thoughts are that: If they were basically a software company, why wouldn't they create a version of OSX and apps to run on any standard/generic PC? Answer of course would be, if they did this why buy a Mac, and secondly one of the reasons OSX runs so beautifully is because they have complete control over the hardware thats its run on.

 

[krunk]

secondly one of the reasons OSX runs so beautifully is because they have complete control over the hardware thats its run on.

This is the primary reason given by Jobs and the point of philosophical contention between Jobs and Gates.

Gates believes in creating an OS that is open to all manufactures and allows users the choice of hardware they wish to use. In other words, he feels that software should not meddle in the world of hardware giving users maximum freedom in that regard.

Jobs believes that limiting hardware choice and hardware lock-in is the only way to ensure a smooth software environment.


I know it's funny and seems counterintuitive that Microsoft is more open then Apple in this regard. But it's very true and they unabashedly promote these ideals.

 

[dmaxdmax]

When you walk into an Store the place is dedicated to showcasing the hardware. There are tons of machines laid out so you can choose the product of your choice. Would they need their own chain if they didn't have a major focus on hardware?

Look, I understand that the software is vital but it is through hardware sales that they make their money.

Don't kid yourselves - it's all about the money. Pension fund and mutual fund managers don't care about passion - they care about stock price.(current and projected) If they abandoned the stock the price would plummet and SJ would have a major problem.

 

[yadmonkey]

Don't kid yourselves - it's all about the money. Pension fund and mutual fund managers don't care about passion - they care about stock price.(current and projected) If they abandoned the stock the price would plummet and SJ would have a major problem.

That notion is pretty sad, but I suppose without it we wouldn't have the accountants and CFOs who support the creative talent. I'm starting to doubt that there's going to be a way to make you see the light here, but in the spirit of trying, here's another quote from the same interview, which I believe illustrates that passion, not money, is always at the forefront of innovation:

Rob: Thanks, Steve and Bill. Rob Killion, here with my business partner. We’ve got a 100-person Internet media business. I’m wondering what would be the single most valuable piece of advice you’d give us to even attempt to create some of the value that you guys have done in both your very impressive companies.

Bill: Well, I think actually–it may be in both cases–correct me if I’m wrong–the excitement wasn’t really seeing the economic value. You know, even when we wrote down at Microsoft in 1975, “a computer on every desk and in every home,” we didn’t realize, oh, we’ll have to be a big company. Every time, I thought, “Oh, God, can we double in size?” Jeez, can we manage that many people? Will that feel fun still? You know, and so every doubling was, like, okay, this is the last one. And so the economic thing wasn’t at the forefront. The idea of being at the forefront and seeing new things and things we wanted to do and being able to bring in different people who were fun to work with eventually with a pretty broad set of skills and figuring out how to get those people those broad skills to work well together has been one of the greatest challenges. You know, I made more of my mistakes in that area maybe than anywhere, but, you know, eventually getting some of those teams to work very well together. So, you know, I think it’s a lot about the people and the passion. And it’s amazing that the business worked out the way that it did.

Steve: Yeah. People say you have to have a lot of passion for what you’re doing and it’s totally true. And the reason is because it’s so hard that if you don’t, any rational person would give up. It’s really hard. And you have to do it over a sustained period of time. So if you don’t love it, if you’re not having fun doing it, you don’t really love it, you’re going to give up. And that’s what happens to most people, actually. If you really look at the ones that ended up, you know, being “successful” in the eyes of society and the ones that didn’t, oftentimes, it’s the ones [who] were successful loved what they did so they could persevere, you know, when it got really tough. And the ones that didn’t love it quit because they’re sane, right? Who would want to put up with this stuff if you don’t love it?

So it’s a lot of hard work and it’s a lot of worrying constantly and if you don’t love it, you’re going to fail. So you’ve got to love it and you’ve got to have passion and I think that’s the high-order bit.

 

[tristan]

The first thing you must understand as an Apple customer is that if you want the best value, you have to purchase on Apple's schedule, not your own.

Example: I have an older PBG4, and have been considering buying a desktop for ergonomics. Today I just bought a new Apple. What was it: Mac Pro? iMac? Mac Mini? Nope, a refurb MBP.

Why? Because even though I don't need an MBP right now, I know I'll need one within six months, and I don't want to get stuck buying at the end of the product cycle. And, with the new product introductions, the old ones are heavily discounted, which means I'll get a bigger percentage back in the resale down the road, just like I will when I resell my PBG4 in two weeks.

Now's a good time to buy a laptop, but not a desktop, so I didn't buy one. In perhaps a month, Apple will update the desktop line, and maybe then I'll consider buying a desktop. But if I don't buy then, I know I'll have to wait six to eight months for the next good opportunity.

This is totally new and probably frustrating to people who come from the PC world, although they should be used to dealing with Intel's and AMD's schedule by now.

 

[mahashel]

I've done pro 3D benchmark testing (mostly SPEC) on a large array of both Nvidia and ATI workstation cards.

The Nvidia G80 8xxx-family was designed for a high degree of hardware flexibility (as such, it doubles as a forced-air furnace.Very flexible. heh) It was designed specifically to be Nvidia's flagship DX10 offering. Tons of memory bandwidth and 3D acceleration. Tuned for gaming and video rendering (read: not CAD, SolidWorks, SolidEdge, etc).

The Quadro family is the OpenGL workhorse variety. These cards are slightly slower but are heavily optimized to toss around massive amounts of data without breaking a sweat. They're not fast, per se, but they're reliable. Folks doing mineral & gas exploration don't necessarily want "FPS". They want it to work, whether their dataset is 200KB or 200GB.

In the end, Apple's decision to go with the Quadro line for the MacPro gives me the impression that it is designed specifically to be an OpenGL workstation.
This is what disappoints me. There really isn't a gaming-centric desktop offering from Apple. The laptops are there, clearly defined: consumer / pro. The tricked-out iMac is *close* to being gamer-worthy (I agree that it really is a MBP in a different form factor), while the MacPro (while the subsystems are the stuff gamers drool over) only offers a video card configuration aimed squarely at OpenGL professionals. Gamers get left out.
To me, adding an 8800Ultra as a MacPro BTO option would be a simple solution. It'd be dreadfully overpriced, of course, but at least the choice remains.

 

[snowfall]

The first thing you must understand as an Apple customer is that if you want the best value, you have to purchase on Apple's schedule, not your own.

Well, we can certainly urge Apple on its schedule... but I see what you were saying. The unfortunate thing is its really really hard to know what Apple's schedule is. Do I buy a mini or not? Frankly, I wish I had bought an iSight when I could.

I'd love to see whatever kind of marketing maps Apple uses these days, to see where they think the gaps are whether or not they care. For certain, management at Apple is making decisions on its best available information, and probably is doing its fair share of "inventing the future, not predicting it".

Still though, when a new development like the iPhone takes up so many internal resources that you had to slow down development of your next generation OS for your core market, you're definitely taking a gamble. Especially when your major competitor in that market has just released their own version.

Of course, Apple's released a lot of really cool products, everyone keeps expecting them to up the ante!

 

[krunk]

Apple's really not in any rush to keep current in hardware, this is fairly obvious and as frustrating as it can be it's no surprise either.

I think they should take a page from Microsoft and set a schedule. Say a hardware update cycle of 6 months.

That way, June 1st comes around. . . no update? You can safely purchase and know that you have at least 6mths of apple's version of "current hardware".

Folks have mentioned before that this is the same as waiting for ATI, AMD, or Intel to bring a new product to market. But it's actually very different. Price drops are fairly linear in the PC world. The latest and greatest starts at about X and gradually decreases in price to Y...somewhere along the line a the upgraded product is released and costs right about X and the cycle begins again.

So even if you buy something and get surprised with an update the next week, rarely is it a "HA! You could have gotten the latest and greatest for the same price if you just waited a day!" situation.

When your at the end of an Apple product cycle you just know your gettting the shaft.

Some might respond "They'd never do that J00! No one would buy at the end of a cycle!". . . I'd say the same folks that think the Mac Pro's are "fine" now would buy them at the end of a set cycle too, the ones that care aren't buying now either. So really it's a win/win situation: the folks that care get a bit of security and planning and those that don't never cared anyway.

 

[Umbongo]

Apple's really not in any rush to keep current in hardware, this is fairly obvious and as frustrating as it can be it's no surprise either.

I think they should take a page from Microsoft and set a schedule. Say a hardware update cycle of 6 months.

That way, June 1st comes around. . . no update? You can safely purchase and know that you have at least 6mths of apple's version of "current hardware".

That would mean very outdated hardware in some cases, like if new chips became available in July for example. Apple seem very much to be updating around the time Intel moves forward, however people need to understand that just because Intel release something it doesn't mean it'll be instantly on the shelves, nor does it mean it'll make it in to every product and again it would kill sales leading up to the known update dates. There isn't really a solution that is ideal for both consumers and company unfortunatly.

Folks have mentioned before that this is the same as waiting for ATI, AMD, or Intel to bring a new product to market. But it's actually very different. Price drops are fairly linear in the PC world. The latest and greatest starts at about X and gradually decreases in price to Y...somewhere along the line a the upgraded product is released and costs right about X and the cycle begins again.

So even if you buy something and get surprised with an update the next week, rarely is it a "HA! You could have gotten the latest and greatest for the same price if you just waited a day!" situation.

I can definatly agree with this, it's very different, and in the desktop world you may only be updating a single component, rather than waiting for a major purchase and for something like the Intel processors we know exactly when price drops and new models are comming and all the details, people can make wise purchasing decisions as there is often more information available as it is flowing through so many channels, when compared to Apple's tight secrecy.

 

[dmaxdmax]

That notion is pretty sad, but I suppose without it we wouldn't have the accountants and CFOs who support the creative talent. I'm starting to doubt that there's going to be a way to make you see the light here, but in the spirit of trying, here's another quote from the same interview, which I believe illustrates that passion, not money, is always at the forefront of innovation:

With all due respect I don't think there's an issue of me seeing or not seeing the light. I'm neither a troglodyte nor a windows troll but I am a realist. I also think it's possible to amiably disagree. With this in mind, here are a few thoughts:

Naturally SJ is all about passion and vision - that's his job. His passion creates the great products that drive the company. But Apple is more than him and Ive. I am sure a great many employees are dedicated to the money and I'm not just talking about the CFO and accounting geeks. I'm sure the warehouse manager (and his staff) spend a great deal of time managing inventory levels to minimize excess while keeping enough in the pipeline to satisfy the customers. No easy task and if they mess it up sales of even the greatest products will be hurt. I suspect the people who buy components are really tough on their suppliers and have no problem squeezing every dollar from a fan manufacturer. (same for the guy who buys pallets of post-it notes) I am especially certain that the exec in charge of the retail stores is very very very concerned with their contribution to revenue and profit. I'm also certain that the majority of those profits are the result of hardware sales.

This became necessary when Apple incorporated and they started playing with OPM (other people's money). 71% of AAPL is owned by institutional investors (Fidelity, TIAA-CREF etc) who are soulless heartless monsters. They care not a whit for passion or innovation provided future growth is certain. At a minimum, 71% of the owners believe that Apple's entire reason for being is to give them a return.

What if I had a crystal ball with 20/20 vision but only for 5 years. It tells me that Apple products will evolve beyond anyone's dreams and they'll invent gizmos that make the iPhone and iPod look like bags of rocks and software that makes FCS on OS-X look like Visicalc on DOS. However, to keep them affordable they'll have to slash margins. They can afford to since they're sitting on a pile of cash but the stock wonks hate low margins and without the benefit of my crystal ball they don't know how great it's going to be. Would you buy the stock? It's a guarantee that lower margins that eat up the cash balance will result in a greatly reduced share price until things settle down which will take years. If you think it's about passion then you'd buy the stock today. If you think it's about money you'll wait for a drop and buy in a few years. If the decline doesn't reverse itself the 71%ers will vote Jobs' out of the corner suite and he'll have a lot more time for Disney.

There's something to the argument that the Mac is a dongle but there's also something to the argument that iLife is a marketing tool used to sell hardware. Stand-alone sales of it can't possibly cover the development expense. Only hardware can do that. I think many people accept that the iTMS runs at very low margins but serves as a great boost to iPod hardware sales.

 

[tristan]

Well, we can certainly urge Apple on its schedule... but I see what you were saying. The unfortunate thing is its really really hard to know what Apple's schedule is. Do I buy a mini or not? Frankly, I wish I had bought an iSight when I could.

Just follow the buyer's guide. The best time to buy any Apple product is three to six weeks after the line is updated. Then you have your choice of freshly updated new product, discounted old product, and sometimes even discounted new product.

 

[alfonsog]

I "switched" in 2000, and I've constantly heard people wanting a "headless" iMac. I highly doubt it will happen, in fact I was very surprised when the Mac mini came out. And anyone that thinks that the average person wants one doesn't know what an average person is. The average person would never post on here.

 

[pcorajr]

You got me there I still love you Apple just update the GPU and RAM!!!!

And give the others the new iMac

Amen. That is wat im holding back for. And here is why.

In my case im switching because my PC broke, i have a budget and a few things im going to reuse. (Display keyboard etc.) To get a computer that will compare to what i currently have i would have to get the mac pro or the 24" Imac. Why should i spend almost 2400 just so that i can get the GPU and amount of ram that I want. I rather wait and hope for Apple to do the same thing they did with the MBP

In the end If apple is able to give me the following on the updated 20" I mac i will be very happy.

Imac 20" "hope for specs"

nvidia 8XXX with 128 and 256 ram options
2GB standard on the memory

Price tag of the current 20"

Please Apple give us and update soon

 

[chefjohn]

Stop Crying and Buy The Mac Pro

Be happy that you have the money to buy a Mac Pro or anything apple makes.. Theirs more thing in life then having the best of things...

While you waiting to buy the next best thing it already old so who cares about upgrades and ***** .. I wanted a Mac Pro so I older the best of what they had and now Im using it and making why money back so take my advice and this buy it, enjoy it and be happy that you are able to have something that other people would love to have

here what I order

mac pro 3.0 8 core
4GB of memory
2*500GB HD
airport and bluetooth
ati radeon x1900

apple HD 23" display

 

[youngestchild]

i can understand why the iphone would hold up leopard.. but the new imac? i don't get!

the iphone is only going to be available in the US of A this year... and yet it's holding up the time frames of things (10.5, imacs etc) that fans the world over would be very happy to have... it's annoying!

 

[tristan]

The average person would never post on here.

We're all above average.

I think the issue is that Apple has returned to their 9 month product cycle. 2006 was very different because of the Intel switch which demanded lots of new product introductions. But that's not and can't be typical.

Anyway, you'll see speed bumps and maybe price drops in the iMacs and PowerMacs soon. I don't know about that redesign, that sounds like wishful thinking to me.

 

[snowfall]

Just follow the buyer's guide. The best time to buy any Apple product is three to six weeks after the line is updated. Then you have your choice of freshly updated new product, discounted old product, and sometimes even discounted new product.

I think the buyer's guide is useful when apple sticks to its historical trends, but right now the mini and the iMac are at almost double the buyer's guide's length, definitely in the "do not buy" zone of the guide. I gave the example of the iSight because it was a case where buying it before you might have personally needed it was good advice, because if you waited too long it was gone. Now they are gone but the demand still exists (evidenced by the high prices on EBay for them) and Apple has offered no replacement for it.

And since Apple doesn't share it's update schedule, it's hard to plan for such things or not. Do I buy a mini soon because Apple is going to discontinue them, or do I wait to see if Apple releases something new? The magic question is when and if such updates will happen (so we can buy in the window you suggest).

 

[whooleytoo]

To be honest, looking forward all we're likely to see is incremental updates to Apple's lines. Since the move to Intel they're locked into the same upgrade cycles as every other manufacturer. In fact, hardware introductions (apart from new lines such as the Apple TV or iPhone) don't even seem to merit a mention in keynotes any more. New aesthetic design? Sure, show it. New CPU, bus or hard drive? Nah, silent update on the website.

 

[netdog]

IMO notebooks are the future of computing for people who don't need huge workstations. They take up way less room and are much more convenient.

I far prefer my iMac for many tasks, and don't want to be tethering my MBP to a dock or cable(s) whenever I want it to give me what my iMac 24 does.

IMO, the future of computers is computers everywhere in everything.

 

[jklps]

To be honest, looking forward all we're likely to see is incremental updates to Apple's lines. Since the move to Intel they're locked into the same upgrade cycles as every other manufacturer. In fact, hardware introductions (apart from new lines such as the Apple TV or iPhone) don't even seem to merit a mention in keynotes any more. New aesthetic design? Sure, show it. New CPU, bus or hard drive? Nah, silent update on the website.

Would gladly take an incremental update to the iMacs to make their internal computer parts comprable to the MBPs.

Yes I know one is consumer one is professional, but I'm pricing them out at the same amount, and price/what you get for it is what actually matters.

 

[tristan]

And since Apple doesn't share it's update schedule, it's hard to plan for such things or not. Do I buy a mini soon because Apple is going to discontinue them, or do I wait to see if Apple releases something new? The magic question is when and if such updates will happen (so we can buy in the window you suggest).

You buy the mini when it's updated, because you have to assume that if you don't buy, you're nine months away from the next purchasing window.

You have to take the MacBuyer's guide literally. BUY NOW isn't just a friendly suggestion. It's advice designed to save you from this hell. When I see people complaining about updates, I have to ask, "well, why didn't you buy when the iMac was last updated?".

Now I'm not saying this is how Apple should work or that its right. I agree that it is a pain to be caught in mid-product cycle and have no idea whether you're making a good purchase. But this is how Apple works, no amount of complaining will change it, and ultimately you have to learn how to work the system if you want to get the most out of your Apple purchases.