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Why The MBP Mystery?

P

paddler40

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 25, 2010
32
0
I'm new to MacRumors and how Apple does things but I find it very odd that a company as big and with such a loyal fan base as Apple would be so hush hush about their refresh times on products. Where is the logic in doing this? Some have made the comment that they will go to PC. Does Apple know that they will not lose customers to PC. or do they feel the people who would leave would be maginal at best.
Just an observer I see people that are concerned that they will spend a lot of money on an investment only to find out it has been outdated. Some people say if you need a laptop get it but that is easier said then done when you are preparing to spend a lot of money on a quality product. You want the best and the latest for that price.
Obviously there is a reason Apple does not give dates as to product refreshes but what is it? Looking at these threads people are wanting to know when to buy their MBPs. Would it not be in the best interst of Apple to let people know when they can get the latest product? It would save people a lot of stress and conjecture on silly theories that may or may not show a pattern of WHEN Apple will release said product.
:confused:

Forgive me if this is a silly question but as a new observer to Apple it does not make sense.
 
Obviously so they can sell the old product that they already produced for more money than what it's worth.
 
Most hardware vendors do not give dates for when their products will be refreshed, except maybe a day or two before hand. If Apple (or HP, or Dell, or Lenovo, or...) said that All their laptops will receive a major refresh in 2 months!! Then they would see their sales plummet into the toilet. No one would buy them because the new ones are out in 2 months.

Every manufacturer does this. The only difference with Apple is that they don't make ANY product announcements until the actual release date, while others might announce a few days ahead. So what?
 
quadG5guy said:
Most hardware vendors do not give dates for when their products will be refreshed, except maybe a day or two before hand. If Apple (or HP, or Dell, or Lenovo, or...) said that All their laptops will receive a major refresh in 2 months!! Then they would see their sales plummet into the toilet. No one would buy them because the new ones are out in 2 months.

Every manufacturer does this. The only difference with Apple is that they don't make ANY product announcements until the actual release date, while others might announce a few days ahead. So what?
Click to expand...

This is true. I'd add also that Apple's simplified product line is also to blame. PC makers have a wider variety of models, and will stick the outgoing generation's hardware in cheaper systems and get newer stuff out to the public ASAP. Apple, instead, charges top dollar for the old till it's gone.
 
rdowns said:
<cough>iPhone<cough>
<cough>iPad<cough>
Click to expand...
What does this mean? I don't remember the iPhone launch, but the iPad launch was total secrecy. Nobody knew what they were announcing until SJ got on stage. Sure there was rumor and speculation as always, but no official announcements. Heck, people thought they were announcing new MBP's and MP's but they didn't.
 
It was reported today that 90% of $1000+ computers sold in the US last year (or quarter?) were Macs.

They know what they are doing.:cool:
 
It also builds hype because of the mysterious lead-up, followed by an unusually theatrical unveiling.
 
Because if they let out the details, people would be disappointed over a long period of time, instead of immediate letdown like right after an announcement.
 
hypermog said:
It also builds hype because of the mysterious lead-up, followed by an unusually theatrical unveiling.
Click to expand...
^^^ this exactly. Toshiba releases a new notebook and nobody gives a flying fart. They simply update their web site. No media events. No big announcements. Most folks don't even notice.

Apple wants song and dance and huge event with noise and fanfare. Aka "Hype". So long as Apple keeps making record quarterly profits, the industry hype will remain. But watch, they hit two or more quarters in a row without breaking their profit records and the hype will disappear as fast as it arrived...
 
I'm sure there are many reasons, but the two most obvious are to (a) prevent a drop in sales and maintain a healthy margin, and (b) to be protected from being tied down to any date or product. It's just smarter for business to keep the mystery rather than set unrealistic expectations.
 
Anyone telling you they'll be migrating to a PC instead is a class one joker. Anyone who has used a Mac and understood the foundation of OSX won't "return" to Windoze.

Even then if someone insists, they just want better hardware but obviously don't care much about :apple:-software. Which is ofcourse not even close to a reason to migrate to registry madness and DLL hell.

Present machines are good enough, future machines will hopefully be better. If you need one right now, buy it, if you can wait, wait another 1 month. It can't get simpler.

As for the original question at hand, every company has their native business strategy. I'm assuming you're not an MBA since then you wouldn't think it so simply. So since you're not, the answer once again is : business strategy. (The excitement also gives Apple free advertisement on blogs and forums. Have you ever seen people holding their breath for Sony VAIO machines with pink keyboards ?)
 
fatgorilla said:
Anyone telling you they'll be migrating to a PC instead is a class one joker. Anyone who has used a Mac and understood the foundation of OSX won't "return" to Windoze.

Even then if someone insists, they just want better hardware but obviously don't care much about :apple:-software. Which is ofcourse not even close to a reason to migrate to registry madness and DLL hell.

Present machines are good enough, future machines will hopefully be better. If you need one right now, buy it, if you can wait, wait another 1 month. It can't get simpler.

As for the original question at hand, every company has their native business strategy. I'm assuming you're not an MBA since then you wouldn't think it so simply. So since you're not, the answer once again is : business strategy. (The excitement also gives Apple free advertisement on blogs and forums. Have you ever seen people holding their breath for Sony VAIO machines with pink keyboards ?)
Click to expand...

Steve-kids aside.. I come out fully in support of the things meant by the original question. Seriously, why the mystery? :confused: Arrogance could be one of the reasons. Some sane people have mentioned good points in this thread though.

But hey! I'm the consumer.. and I need my updated hardware when the rest of the PC world is phasing in those new Core i3/i5/i7s. MBA or no MBA, who cares.. the base macbook pro now looks more like outdated junk each passing day. Good for the fanbois and sons, but not good enough by a long shot for people on the fence, like myself. And for god's sake, was that base macbook so-called Pro ever a Pro?? :cool:

I'd love to try out the mac platform, but I refuse to a.) buy pre-historic C2Ds ;) and b.) Shell out extra cash upgrading the specs on a base macbook pro; every mac must have begun with 4GB memory and about 500GB hard disk in the first place :rolleyes: *<Cough> am talking about commonplace config in the PC world with high end notebooks (and yeah, they have e-sata too and usb3 coming up).

I'm a "PC" for now, yet I am not slave to any platform.. I can just figure out my around computers, PC or MAC or Linux. The whole thing about DLL hell, viruses, registry items about Windows is too overdone. The current Windows 7 is a nice OS, and the amongst OSes - Windows still remains the only one for serious gaming!!!!

I'd say, if you feel like waiting for a new MBP to be released.. sure go ahead. But, if you need a computer right now, you should say goodbye to Apple and go buy a nice PC. There are quite a few good ones out there. Oh.. and with all that extra memory and hard drive space you get by default in high-end Windows machines, you can run VMs (run Fedora, Mint, Ubuntu, FreeBSD, PC-BSD whatever... and get your Unix experience chugging along).

Jokes/Jokers are nice to have.. good to make people around you, laugh a bit :) Hardware comes first for many users, especially if apple looks to convince PC users to switch... ! So, the joke's gonna be on Apple, if they stop listening to the community.
 
fatgorilla said:
Anyone telling you they'll be migrating to a PC instead is a class one joker. Anyone who has used a Mac and understood the foundation of OSX won't "return" to Windoze.

Even then if someone insists, they just want better hardware but obviously don't care much about :apple:-software. Which is ofcourse not even close to a reason to migrate to registry madness and DLL hell.

Present machines are good enough, future machines will hopefully be better. If you need one right now, buy it, if you can wait, wait another 1 month. It can't get simpler.

As for the original question at hand, every company has their native business strategy. I'm assuming you're not an MBA since then you wouldn't think it so simply. So since you're not, the answer once again is : business strategy. (The excitement also gives Apple free advertisement on blogs and forums. Have you ever seen people holding their breath for Sony VAIO machines with pink keyboards ?)
Click to expand...

I'm not joking about buying a "PC" instead of a macbook pro if they do not come with new MBP. I can easily go to Linux since all the leading scientific software I use is also available for Linux and it's the fastest OS at the moment. And I can always install OSX on it if I really want to :rolleyes:
 
fatgorilla said:
Which is ofcourse not even close to a reason to migrate to registry madness and DLL hell.
Click to expand...

I'm a Mac guy through and through, but I hate propaganda like this. Just because it's hell to you doesn't mean it is to everyone. I lived with a guy who could just pop into the registry, edit stuff, and pop back out no problem. He found it quite easy. Windows 7 is actually a good OS (except the settings... takes me 3 minutes to find anything in the control panel) and does away with most of the problems people had with DLLs and registries.
 
iThinkergoiMac said:
I'm a Mac guy through and through, but I hate propaganda like this. Just because it's hell to you doesn't mean it is to everyone. I lived with a guy who could just pop into the registry, edit stuff, and pop back out no problem. He found it quite easy. Windows 7 is actually a good OS (except the settings... takes me 3 minutes to find anything in the control panel) and does away with most of the problems people had with DLLs and registries.
Click to expand...

I've used Windows for 12 years before switching to a Mac in 2007, so I know what its like. I still use Windows 7 for LAN gaming. Isn't it nice when it asks you to download drivers, or your audio stops working suddenly because its experiencing a conflict with something else ? And that too on a freshly installed genuine copy of Windows.

You "know" someone who can edit registry, well that's personal knowledge - I know someone who can fly a plane. I know someone who can talk suicidal people out from killing themselves. I know someone who can teach advanced thermodynamics. So ? So what ? Who cares ? On the other hand I know thousands of people who are sick of Windows, including me, and because Mac is too much simpler than it. Haven't tried Linux so can't tell but when I talked about "PCs", I meant Windows.

I also mentioned that if you are bent to really migrate to a PC because of hardware, you didn't get Mac at all. You just want hardcore hardware, you don't care much about the software part.

Most people I know still use XP. They either don't want to upgrade to Windows 7 or they have (unfortunately) experienced Vista. Operating systems are built on top of the preceding one. Windows 7 is nothing to be proud of when you compare it to OS X.
 
Look at Apple's growth rate in Mac sales. Then look at the PC industry's growth rate. Apple is outpacing growth at 3x the rate of the PC industry... I don't think they're worried.
 
i was on www.dell.com last month pricing out a laptop. There was a huge banner above some of the models saying DO NOT BUY as this model will be upgraded with better hardware in the next few weeks
 
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