Where's the Macbook update?

[Mad Mac Maniac]

It's crazy that Apple hasn't updated the Macbook line in over 400 days! According the to Buyer's guide that is over twice the average refresh cycle!

Obviously Apple is losing interest in the Macbook. What do you think is the future of the macbook line? Will the MB disappear as the MBA replaces it as the low end notebook? Or do you think Apple will start giving the mb the updates it deserves?

The MB is the ONLY mac line that has just ONE product. There are 5 MBP's, 4 MBA's, 4 iMacs, 4 Mac Pro's, and even 2 Mac Mini's (which is widely regarded as perpetually being ignored and black sheeped by apple). If apple wants the mb to be its' budget notebook line you gotta get it cheaper than the $999 which is equal to the MBA. I'm sure Apple could update the current $999 macbook significantly and offer an additional model (comparable in specs to the current mb) that drops the entry level price to $799. That would be huge! When was the last time you could buy a mac notebook for less than $999?

 

[tersono]

I suspect the basic Macbook has pretty much reached the end of its days. I have to say that I wouldn't even consider buying one now - 11" MBA looks like a much better buy to me.

 

[Chiuy]

Apple should really lower its price on the regular MacBook
Why?
I'm pretty sure a first time buyer wants to actually try a MacBook before buying an expensive MacBook Pro.
Maybe if they drop it down to like $799, then I'm pretty sure they can revive the MacBook. Otherwise, I would gladly spend an extra $100 on the MBP. (Education Discount)

 

[SiliconBear]

Maybe not only for new Mac users. :-(

I have been using ibook, iMac, and MBP for five years. I recently need a new laptop, and have been waiting for any sub-1000 apple laptops with reasonable CPU power (need the horsepower for compiling source code). Unfortunately, I really cannot convince myself paying almost 1k for a C2D laptop despite I think I work much more efficiently under OSX than Windows.

So the only choice for me is a 1.1k low-end MBP. But I'm not sure if it's worth to pay 2X, compare to a similar laptop, e.g., from ASUS. The gap is so large such that I'm consider to suffer from the slightly lower productivity of a Linux laptop. The positive side is I seldom use GUI, so it shouldn't be too bad.

It's somehow funny that the only reason I haven't switched back to PC is MS Office. I hate it, but all my colleagues use it, and creating/editing documents using openoffice often leads to document-sharing nightmare.

Apple should really lower its price on the regular MacBook
Why?
I'm pretty sure a first time buyer wants to actually try a MacBook before buying an expensive MacBook Pro.
Maybe if they drop it down to like $799, then I'm pretty sure they can revive the MacBook. Otherwise, I would gladly spend an extra $100 on the MBP. (Education Discount)

 

[Dark Void]

been saying it for some time...

13.3'' black/white plastic unibody (matte) @ 1440x900 resolution with an i3, 4gb, nvidia gpu, and 5400 rpm for $899.00

not real though haha, although i think they would sell tons.

 

[LarryC]

I completely agree. They need to either update it, drop it, or lower the price a lot! This is very irresponsible on apples part (in my opinion). The iBook used to be their biggest seller. Charging one thousand dollars for the current model that only offers USB 2.0 I/O? What a joke.

 

[MagicBoy]

It's probably in the wings waiting for the Lion launch...

 

[orfeas0]

I completely agree. They need to either update it, drop it, or lower the price a lot! This is very irresponsible on apples part (in my opinion). The iBook used to be their biggest seller. Charging one thousand dollars for the current model that only offers USB 2.0 I/O? What a joke.

I read somewhere in these forums that the core2duo processors have reached their EOL(end of life), which means intel will stop producing them. When they do, apple will only have 2 options. Either update it, or drop it, can't keep producing it, even at a lower price!
So we'll see very soon, probably together with lion and mba in july.

 

[LarryC]

I read somewhere in these forums that the core2duo processors have reached their EOL(end of life), which means intel will stop producing them. When they do, apple will only have 2 options. Either update it, or drop it, can't keep producing it, even at a lower price!
So we'll see very soon, probably together with lion and mba in july.

I am glad to hear that they will be forced to actually do something.

 

[winston1236]

I am glad to hear that they will be forced to actually do something.

Its seems cheap to wait until then but it seems thats what happening. So much for "back to mac"