Why does the MD101 still exist?

[Naimfan]

You miss the overall point - someone can be just as productive on a MD101 as they can on a new rMBP. As I wrote, the new rMBPs offer a different set of advantages and disadvantages, nothing more. There are workplaces to which I cannot take a rMBP because it doesn't have ethernet and the Apple dongles have not been approved by security.

One certainly CAN compare Air to Pro - people here, yourself included, do it all the time. To claim otherwise is absurd.

You clearly have a preference for the rMBP. That is certainly your right, but to build your claim by attempting to trash the MD101 reduces your credibility. Rather, acknowledge that you recognize the MD101 for what it can do and state your preference for a different machine. And if you're referring to three year old technology, specify that from the beginning - your arguments are shifting as different facts are pointed out.

You can't compare apples with oranges, or Air with Pro.

And also did you conveniently neglect the far better display, integrated GPU and also the PCIe SSD, plus lighter weight and better thermal design? I think it's safe to say that the retina display can actually improve productivity, because you can work longer on the screen without straining your eyes as much.

The non-retina display is already beyond shouting distance alone. And so is the integrated GPU.

The 3 year old technology part largely refers to the non-retina display, SATA3 interface, SuperDrive and the weight. In raw CPU performance it may be similar, but in all other aspects, there's no contest.

 

[MagicBoy]

It's a fairly high-margin product by this point, and if I had to guess, they probably have tons of them in a warehouse somewhere.

Bad guess.

 

[iSheep5S]

If Apple needs to drop a non retina, HDD, i5 equipped thin laptop from their line then...

On the windows side pretty much everything needs dropped but the top tier stuff...

 

[redheeler]

Two words - education market.

Yep, that's the reason. It's cheap and does fine for educational use.

 

[darngooddesign]

But the HDD is a dog....

$70 for a 120GB SSD for the OS, and replace the optical with the platter drive or upgrade it to a 1TB model. Rig this up as a fusion drive.

Stick the optical in a cheap enclosure.

This scenario is significantly cheaper than the rMBP with equivalent drive sizes.

 

[srshaw]

The one thing I really dislike about the new mbp is the difficulty in upgrading. I have a early 2011 mbp, and it became slow and the hd full. For approx £200 I was able to upgrade to a 2tb hd and 16gb ram. My computer is now nice and fast. If I had wanted, I could have put in a ssd in, thats the beauty, I had a choice.

Until it is possible to upgrade the hd of the new retina mbps. I can't see me every buying one. Last time I looked it was something like £600 extra for a 1TB drive, which is the minimum I would want.

 

[deepen03]

So the Apple website re-design kicked it down to the bottom of the Buy page for Macbook Pro.. Looks like they are slowly getting it out of customer's minds. It used to be the first one shown on the Macbook Pro page.

Please Apple kill this thing now.

If you don't kill it, why not upgrade it to at least a 4th or 5th gen Intel chip? and Make 1080P and 8GB RAM standard? Turn the 500GB into a Fusion drive, then sell it and I have no problem.

Apple is too worried about compromising Retina MB Pro sales. I can't imagine how many customers get milked into thinking the non-Retina Pro is actually a latest model.

 

[T5BRICK]

Please Apple kill this thing now.

Why? Plenty of people will keep buying it. Why do you think Apple keeps selling it?

If you don't kill it, why not upgrade it to at least a 4th or 5th gen Intel chip? and Make 1080P and 8GB RAM standard? Turn the 500GB into a Fusion drive, then sell it and I have no problem.

Apple is too worried about compromising Retina MB Pro sales. I can't imagine how many customers get milked into thinking the non-Retina Pro is actually a latest model.

Seriously, why? If you don't like the computer, don't buy it. I tried to talk my sister out of buying this model and she wouldn't listen. She didn't want to spend the extra for a "faster hard drive that she isn't going to notice." As it turns out, she did notice and a few months ago she ended up buying a SSD and I installed it. It's her own damn fault, not Apples.

 

[simonsi]

why not upgrade it to at least a 4th or 5th gen Intel chip? and Make 1080P and 8GB RAM standard? Turn the 500GB into a Fusion drive, then sell it and I have no problem.

Well thats good to know. Im sure Apple would be much happier that your "problem" would be sorted out.

Perhaps you would be better inside one of the worlds planned economies as you seem to dislike personal choice?

The purchasing base for that machine dont want the latest screen, or a faster chip (they have choices they could make in that regard), they DO have a choice to change the drive later on and they are typically price-sensitive (thats a fancy way of saying they may not have your spending priorities).

Leave them be and let them buy what they wish. Really. Or move to N Korea.

 

[darngooddesign]

The purchasing base for that machine dont want the latest screen...

I compared the a 2015 Air against my 2008 MBP and my Pro has a slightly better screen, which means that a the six years newer screen will be even better than the current Air.

So the 11" Air actually has the worst screen in the lineup; while the 13" Air and 13" Pro are neck and neck depending on what you place a higher importance on, higher res or higher quality.

 

[deepen03]

Why? Plenty of people will keep buying it. Why do you think Apple keeps selling it?



Seriously, why? If you don't like the computer, don't buy it. I tried to talk my sister out of buying this model and she wouldn't listen. She didn't want to spend the extra for a "faster hard drive that she isn't going to notice." As it turns out, she did notice and a few months ago she ended up buying a SSD and I installed it. It's her own damn fault, not Apples.

still a slow 3rd Gen processor, 800P screen and god knows what other outdated parts are in there. So she probably ended up spending what would have been the price of the Retina Pro, on sale this week for $1149 at Best Buy

 

[deepen03]

Well thats good to know. Im sure Apple would be much happier that your "problem" would be sorted out.

Perhaps you would be better inside one of the worlds planned economies as you seem to dislike personal choice?

The purchasing base for that machine dont want the latest screen, or a faster chip (they have choices they could make in that regard), they DO have a choice to change the drive later on and they are typically price-sensitive (thats a fancy way of saying they may not have your spending priorities).

Leave them be and let them buy what they wish. Really. Or move to N Korea.

If Apple just dropped the model, then people would just be forced to get the Retina. That is what Apple should do. I am all for consumer choice, but selling a 5 year old design laptop with 3 year old parts is just ridiculous for any company. I don't see any Windows OEMs pushing out 3 year old laptop models.

 

[ApolloBoy]

Leave them be and let them buy what they wish. Really. Or move to N Korea.

 

[gngan]

I still owe a 2011 MacBook PRO. I love it because it's portable, it's cheap when I can upgrade parts (8gb ram, 128 SSD + 1TB HDD).

If only Retina can only be Pro then Mac Pro user will say Retina can't be called a Pro too. It all depends on your perspective.

 

[deepen03]

Another month... and it still lives!

I know I'm just beating on a dead horse here, but come on Apple! Discontinue it or upgrade it to Broadwell and 1080P!

 

[T5BRICK]

Another month... and it still lives!

I know I'm just beating on a dead horse here, but come on Apple! Discontinue it or upgrade it to Broadwell and 1080P!

I still don't get why you care. If you don't want one, don't buy one. Apple still sells it because people still buy it.

 

[scaredpoet]

Another month... and it still lives!

I know I'm just beating on a dead horse here, but come on Apple! Discontinue it or upgrade it to Broadwell and 1080P!

As long as people continue to buy it, it will continue to be sold. /thread.

 

[ApolloBoy]

I know I'm just beating on a dead horse here

Yes you are, just stop already.

 

[MarvinHC]

Another month... and it still lives!

I know I'm just beating on a dead horse here, but come on Apple! Discontinue it or upgrade it to Broadwell and 1080P!

What has this poor thing done to you? Haunting you in your dreams? I agree with previous posters, it is still a good machine and if portability is not so important, it is great, upgradable and has plenty enough power for most users. It just does not go well with the 'retina fetishists'....

 

[MushroomMan]

It exists because Apple uses a "cheapy" in their one up, and this has several benefits for them. Think iPhone 5c, iPod shuffle, and iPad Mini 2 etc. They have done similar things continuing sales of the old-style iPod and an older iMac from memory.

For this cheapy strategy to work the specs(costs) can not really change - that would be a deal breaker.

1. I am guessing that upgrading the processor to a newer Broadwell etc. would require Apple having a completely new logic board developed - one which is unusable in any other product and one which would only supply a very small segment of their total laptop offering.

2. It only exists because it is cheap - a cheap entry point into the portable world of Apple

3. A few years ago it would have been a no-brainer to keep it on the list, but now heading into the end of 2015 the MD101 is certainly outdated, yes - but unsaleable I think not just yet.

FWIW, throw in an SSD, a large 2nd HDD, 16GB of RAM and I think you have a very capable machine - not that this makes financial sense for most.

 

[2984839]

What has this poor thing done to you? Haunting you in your dreams? I agree with previous posters, it is still a good machine and if portability is not so important, it is great, upgradable and has plenty enough power for most users. It just does not go well with the 'retina fetishists'....

Stop liking what he doesn't like!

I'm glad it's still around, just because it is an island of sanity in a sea of spec chasers.

 

[scaredpoet]

It exists because Apple uses a "cheapy" in their one up, and this has several benefits for them. Think iPhone 5c, iPod shuffle, and iPad Mini 2 etc. They have done similar things continuing sales of the old-style iPod and an older iMac from memory.

Another reason is that there are still a LOT of diehards who aren't ready to buy a laptop with no Optical drive, and no built-in firewire/ethernet ports. I just tried myself to persuade someone heavy into media, not to buy the MD101 cMBP and get an rMBP instead. They rarely use optical media anymore, and the video gear they're migrating to records to SD cards now. But because they have a few old video cameras that still use firewire, and because they just might have a need to play a DVD someday, they went ahead and bought the MD101.

They splurged to max out the RAM and configured an SSD, so it actually performs really nicely. But those improvements pushed the cost just a bit higher than the mid-level $1499 macbook pro, which would've matched the same specs they CTO'd. But they felt they HAD to have that optical drive and firewire port... to the point where they would not have bought a Mac at all if this version wasn't available. *shrug*

Ultimately, it's their choice and if they're happy with it, hey, more to them. But again, this is why Apple keeps selling it.

 

[TechZeke]

Another reason is that there are still a LOT of diehards who aren't ready to buy a laptop with no Optical drive, and no built-in firewire/ethernet ports. I just tried myself to persuade someone heavy into media, not to buy the MD101 cMBP and get an rMBP instead. They rarely use optical media anymore, and the video gear they're migrating to records to SD cards now. But because they have a few old video cameras that still use firewire, and because they just might have a need to play a DVD someday, they went ahead and bought the MD101.

They splurged to max out the RAM and configured an SSD, so it actually performs really nicely. But those improvements pushed the cost just a bit higher than the mid-level $1499 macbook pro, which would've matched the same specs they CTO'd. But they felt they HAD to have that optical drive and firewire port... to the point where they would not have bought a Mac at all if this version wasn't available. *shrug*

Ultimately, it's their choice and if they're happy with it, hey, more to them. But again, this is why Apple keeps selling it.

One thing I've learned after being the Friends, family, and office go-to tech geek is that when it comes to laptops people usually have an idea of they want and stick to it no matter how hard you explain. For example, my cousins, aunt, and uncle all use HP. So when my cousin's father gives her a blank check for a new laptop for college, what does she do? Get a $700 17" HP after I told her multiple times she should get a Mac. Even my uncle was shocked and even asked if she was truly sure she didn't want to get a MacBook. A month after getting the HP, she now wishes she would have gotten a Mac.

My boss told me to recommend a few good windows laptops. He said he wanted a Toshiba, and I showed several other better options for the money that offered better build quality, good specs, and had an SSD. What does he do? Get the exact Toshiba model he was looking at from the beginning anyway.

I've given up on trying to recommend laptops to people. They almost always have an idea in their mind of what they want, and no amount of rational reasoning is going to change their mind.

The fear of losing an Optical drive and certain ports is so strong that some will pay whatever the cost to get it.

 

[deepen03]

Another reason is that there are still a LOT of diehards who aren't ready to buy a laptop with no Optical drive, and no built-in firewire/ethernet ports. I just tried myself to persuade someone heavy into media, not to buy the MD101 cMBP and get an rMBP instead. They rarely use optical media anymore, and the video gear they're migrating to records to SD cards now. But because they have a few old video cameras that still use firewire, and because they just might have a need to play a DVD someday, they went ahead and bought the MD101.

They splurged to max out the RAM and configured an SSD, so it actually performs really nicely. But those improvements pushed the cost just a bit higher than the mid-level $1499 macbook pro, which would've matched the same specs they CTO'd. But they felt they HAD to have that optical drive and firewire port... to the point where they would not have bought a Mac at all if this version wasn't available. *shrug*

Ultimately, it's their choice and if they're happy with it, hey, more to them. But again, this is why Apple keeps selling it.

I still don't get why you care. If you don't want one, don't buy one. Apple still sells it because people still buy it.

What has this poor thing done to you? Haunting you in your dreams? I agree with previous posters, it is still a good machine and if portability is not so important, it is great, upgradable and has plenty enough power for most users. It just does not go well with the 'retina fetishists'....

No company should be selling 5 year old hardware first of all. It had its last update in 2012 which added 3rd gen Intel (6th gen Skylake out in 3 weeks).

Charging $1100 for it is ridiculous.

A very small group of people actually use FireWire, Ethernet or a Disc Drive.

I would get an Air over this thing or any other laptop like the $1149 HP SPECTRE or my very own ASUS Zenbook UX303 at $1200

 

[deepen03]

One thing I've learned after being the Friends, family, and office go-to tech geek is that when it comes to laptops people usually have an idea of they want and stick to it no matter how hard you explain. For example, my cousins, aunt, and uncle all use HP. So when my cousin's father gives her a blank check for a new laptop for college, what does she do? Get a $700 17" HP after I told her multiple times she should get a Mac. Even my uncle was shocked and even asked if she was truly sure she didn't want to get a MacBook. A month after getting the HP, she now wishes she would have gotten a Mac.

My boss told me to recommend a few good windows laptops. He said he wanted a Toshiba, and I showed several other better options for the money that offered better build quality, good specs, and had an SSD. What does he do? Get the exact Toshiba model he was looking at from the beginning anyway.

I've given up on trying to recommend laptops to people. They almost always have an idea in their mind of what they want, and no amount of rational reasoning is going to change their mind.

The fear of losing an Optical drive and certain ports is so strong that some will pay whatever the cost to get it.

Windows 10 is out in 6 days and your friend would love it. Instead of a $700 HP, she should have gotten the $1149 SPECTRE and I bet she would love it