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This is how laptop upgradeability should be

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bigpoppamac31

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Aug 16, 2007
2,457
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Canada
So I came across this review on YT. I personally would never buy an Alienware as I have never found them attractive machines. At least no their laptops. But when watching the review I noticed that they made it so that the user could upgrade the ram and SSD (two slots) on their own. Apple could easily do this (especially with their MBP) and the laptop wouldn't be any thicker than the 2015 rMBP. It certainly would be a great feature for Pro users and would give money and sales back to third party makes who make ram and SSD drives. Maybe Apple should again have a Macbook and Macbook Pro line like they did before (or iBook and Powerbook before that). Pro users want pro feature like user upgradeability and multiple forms of I/O (at least until TB/USB-C becomes truly standard in another few years).


Also when Apple still had true pro-user upgradeability in it's desktops.

Even the iMac could be killer computer again if it regained some thickness and had true user upgradeability. A desktop doesn't need to be super thin and light. :rolleyes:
 
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cmaier said:
Most users will never upgrade their machines. I'm happy Apple doesn't make my machine worse so that a tiny percentage of people can perform such upgrades.
Click to expand...

And that's what it boils down to, right there.

The OP, even Macrumors as a whole, are a tiny percentage of Apples customer base.
[doublepost=1478458344][/doublepost]
raqball said:
Make machines worse by allowig upgrades? LOLOL

I get some people want to defend Apple and / or their purchase decisions but c'mon man, really?
Click to expand...

Understanding Apples reasoning based on their view of the market and the customers that they serve isn't defending Apple. It's being realistic.

The folks on here that complain about upgradeability and lack of ports are the minority and obviously not who Apple wants to sell products to(or cares about for that matter).
 
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cmaier said:
Most users will never upgrade their machines. I'm happy Apple doesn't make my machine worse so that a tiny percentage of people can perform such upgrades.
Click to expand...

Then get the consumer model. This is what I'm saying. When Steve came back in the late 90's he tidied up the product line into just 4 quadrants. Two for desktop and two for portables. One each for professionals and standard users. I think that was a great strategy that Apple news to return to. Besides why should user upgradeability be removed just because some users don't take advantage of it? Apple has forsaken it's longtime user base that kept it alive when Microsoft was kicking it's ass in the 90's. That means that many pro users who stuck with Apple all these years could in turn go back to Windows PCs or be first time buyers cause Apple is no longer supporting them. I'm not even a pro user and I really want and miss the user upgradeability cause I learned how to do those things. It was pretty simple anyways. Why dumb down the machine just cause people don't want to learn?
 
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T5BRICK said:
And that's what it boils down to, right there.

The OP, even Macrumors as a whole, are a tiny percentage of Apples customer base.
[doublepost=1478458344][/doublepost]

Understanding Apples reasoning based on their view of the market and the customers that they serve isn't defending Apple. It's being realistic.

The folks on here that complain about upgradeability and lack of ports are the minroty and obviously not who Apple wants to sell products to(or cares about for that matter).
Click to expand...

Apple used to care about those pro users but no longer. They have forsaken the pro market which Apple used to be big on.
 
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bigpoppamac31 said:
Apple used to care about those pro users but no longer. They have forsaken the pro market which Apple used to be big on.
Click to expand...

Is that a surprise? "Pro" hasn't meant anything for years.
[doublepost=1478458775][/doublepost]
bigpoppamac31 said:
How compassionate of you. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

It's been 5 years. I'm tired of "Steve wouldn't have done this/that." Yeah, he would have and he did. Apple has always made mistakes and people have always complained.
 
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tubeexperience said:
Err, what?

Making laptops upgradable doesn't make it worse.
Click to expand...

Exactly. It makes it better. I enjoyed upgrading my own Mac and I'm not even a pro user.

T5BRICK said:
Is that a surprise? "Pro" hasn't meant anything for years.
[doublepost=1478458775][/doublepost]
Click to expand...

In a way it's not surprising. Just really sad. If it keeps going like this I can see the Mac being gone completely. May as well hand over the win to MS now.
 
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bigpoppamac31 said:
Then get the consumer model. This is what I'm saying. When Steve came back in the late 90's he tidied up the product line into just 4 quadrants. Two for desktop and two for portables. One each for professionals and standard users. I think that was a great strategy that Apple news to return to. Besides why should user upgradeability be removed just because some users don't take advantage of it? Apple has forsaken it's longtime user base that kept it alive when Microsoft was kicking it's ass in the 90's. That means that many pro users who stuck with Apple all these years could in turn go back to Windows PCs or be first time buyers cause Apple is no longer supporting them. I'm not even a pro user and I really want and miss the user upgradeability cause I learned how to do those things. It was pretty simple anyways. Why dumb down the machine just cause people don't want to learn?
Click to expand...

Steve would've dropped all the ports and told you along with the complainers on MacRumors to pound sand.
 
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I 100% agree.

Apple has totally shifted their target audience. Where they used to target creative professionals, as well as basic users, now they target basic users, and people who aspire to be professionals.

I still use my 2011 MacBook Pro 15". I paid $1800 for it 5 year ago. It still performs better in multicore than an current 13" model(which is at the price point the 15" once way".

I upgraded it with 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. The result is 5 year old laptop that can run Final Cut Pro better than the new 13" MacBook for significantly less cost.

Here is why Apple doesn't allow upgradability:
-Money; 16GB of RAM is a $200 upgrade on the MBP, which is nuts. I just paid $70 for 16GB DDR3 for my 2011. Are you saying that going from 8 to 16 should be $200 premium? No, it's incredibly high margin.
-Money, again; Same goes for the SSD. Apple scares consumers into paying $$$ for big SSD now, by saying you can't replace it. Many users would opt to get a small SSD from Apple and upgrade to save money. You might buy a 512GB now, and when that fill up in a few years upgrade to 1TB when NAND prices have fallen.
-Size; surface mount soldered components take up less space than socketed version, that's a fact.​
 
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You don't need to go the slab-route for upgradability: SDD/HD, RAM, wireless etc are upgradable in many 15" ultrabooks. It's rarer in 13", but there are a few.
 
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grimakis said:
I 100% agree.

Apple has totally shifted their target audience. Where they used to target creative professionals, as well as basic users, now they target basic users, and people who aspire to be professionals.

I still use my 2011 MacBook Pro 15". I paid $1800 for it 5 year ago. It still performs better in multicore than an current 13" model(which is at the price point the 15" once way".

I upgraded it with 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. The result is 5 year old laptop that can run Final Cut Pro better than the new 13" MacBook for significantly less cost.

Here is why Apple doesn't allow upgradability:
-Money; 16GB of RAM is a $200 upgrade on the MBP, which is nuts. I just paid $70 for 16GB DDR3 for my 2011. Are you saying that going from 8 to 16 should be $200 premium? No, it's incredibly high margin.
-Money, again; Same goes for the SSD. Apple scares consumers into paying $$$ for big SSD now, by saying you can't replace it. Many users would opt to get a small SSD from Apple and upgrade to save money. You might buy a 512GB now, and when that fill up in a few years upgrade to 1TB when NAND prices have fallen.
-Size; surface mount soldered components take up less space than socketed version, that's a fact.​
Click to expand...

True and sad. I'm not against "thin and light" in general. That's what a laptop should be. But at the same time they're forsaking what kept them in the game years ago. Even their desktops are sad now. No update to the Mac Pro in 3 years?? That's uncalled for. I equate it to when WWE became "family friendly" around 2008. It's like they turned their back on all us fans who supported them when WCW was kicking their ass in the ratings each week.
 
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AdonisSMU said:
I'm usually writing programs when I'm at starbucks or experimenting with some new ways to write software. What do you do with your machines?
Click to expand...

I run Linux VM on mine.

It's a custom distro based on Debian that my school made for computational purposes.
 
bigpoppamac31 said:
True and sad. I'm not against "thin and light" in general. That's what a laptop should be. But at the same time they're forsaking what kept them in the game years ago. Even their desktops are sad now. No update to the Mac Pro in 3 years?? That's uncalled for. I equate it to when WWE became "family friendly" around 2008. It's like they turned their back on all us fans who supported them when WCW was kicking their ass in the ratings each week.
Click to expand...

I have one more issue with Apples laptops nowadays. Went I went to college in late-2010, the MacBook Pro was a very attractive option for students. It was relatively affordable. The 13" started at $1200 USD and the 15" started at $1800 I believe. At least in 2011 those were the prices.

Many students I observed had the 13" or 15". It was very popular. It was well made. It had good battery life. It had a very attractive display. It was the gold standard for a college notebook.

$1200 in 2011 w/ inflation is $1287 today. Yet the cheapest MacBook Pro is $1500. It comes with 2 USB-C ports, and nothing else. Obviously you're getting better hardware, but is it on par with what the 13" was in 2011? No. It really isn't.

The new MacBook line appears to be targeting typical users and college students, yet is probably further out of their budgets than ever.

I think it all boils down to the Intel M overpriced 12" MacBook. That's the issue. All because of that overpriced machine, they have to bump the price on literally everything else to keep the different models from competing with each other.
 
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raqball said:
Make machines worse by allowig upgrades? LOLOL

I get some people want to defend Apple and / or their purchase decisions but c'mon man, really?
Click to expand...

Yes, worse. Less rigid, more opportunity for things to go wrong, thicker, heavier. These are all things that would make my experience less good. What I'm giving up is the opportunity to upgrade RAM and disk, which I wouldn't have done anyway.
 
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cmaier said:
Yes, worse. Less rigid, more opportunity for things to go wrong, thicker, heavier. These are all things that would make my experience less good. What I'm giving up is the opportunity to upgrade RAM and disk, which I wouldn't have done anyway.
Click to expand...

The SSDs are already removable anyway.

It would be upgradable if replacement parts are available.
 
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