Will Apple ever increase the base storage for Macs?

[blahbrah]

I've been astonished at how low base storage for all new Macs are continuing to be at 256GBs. I've had a 500GB hard drive in all my Macs since the 12 Macbook Pro and it's astonishing that what would be considered a small size for an M.2 drive is still the standard on a laptop over 1k.

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

 

[UBS28]

The only thing Apple will ever increase is the price.

 

[jav6454]

Well, here is the thing about storage. Right now almost all Macs have SSDs as main drives. SSDs depend on the variability of the NAND chip market. Also, SSD capacity depends on the densities currently made which incur higher costs, more so with current inflation problems.

For base capacity to come down, manufacturers of SSD need to either increase densities in an economical manner or find a cheaper way of making them.

 

[UBS28]

Well, here is the thing about storage. Right now almost all Macs have SSDs as main drives. SSDs depend on the variability of the NAND chip market. Also, SSD capacity depends on the densities currently made which incur higher costs, more so with current inflation problems.

For base capacity to come down, manufacturers of SSD need to either increase densities in an economical manner or find a cheaper way of making them.

You can buy a 1TB Samsung SSD’s with 3.5 GB/s read and write speed for only $100. And Apple gets huge discounts as they buy in bulk.

If MacBooks were user upgradable, you would be able to buy a fully maxed out MacBook Air / Pro for cheap. But Apple charges crazy BTO prices.

 

[dz5b609]

I've been astonished at how low base storage for all new Macs are continuing to be at 256GBs. I've had a 500GB hard drive in all my Macs since the 12 Macbook Pro and it's astonishing that what would be considered a small size for an M.2 drive is still the standard on a laptop over 1k.

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

They will eventually, but with shortages not right now.

Also I'm afraid that for a lot of people that 256GB is plenty (hard to believe I know), but I do have friends that really don't have a lot of stuff on their macbooks, photos and documents plus a couple of apps is basically it and I think that goes for the majority of macbook users especially taking work-macbooks (in non-artistic environments) into account.

 

[ArkSingularity]

Well, here is the thing about storage. Right now almost all Macs have SSDs as main drives. SSDs depend on the variability of the NAND chip market. Also, SSD capacity depends on the densities currently made which incur higher costs, more so with current inflation problems.

For base capacity to come down, manufacturers of SSD need to either increase densities in an economical manner or find a cheaper way of making them.

The market is a little more chaotic than usual, but I think a lot of that is starting to ease up. Even in today's market, Apple's $200 upgrade to go from 256GB to 512GB is well above the market rate (even for high end SSDs), so they're profiting quite a lot off of these upgrades.

I have a feeling opportunity cost plays a part. It probably costs Apple less than $50 to actually source the extra storage, but if they were to offer it by default, they would lose out on potentially upwards of $150 of profit they could earn by charging extra for it. For that reason, I think we're looking at a few more years before they upgrade the base storage.

 

[UBS28]

They will eventually, but with shortages not right now.

Also I'm afraid that for a lot of people that 256GB is plenty (hard to believe I know), but I do have friends that really don't have a lot of stuff on their macbooks, photos and documents plus a couple of apps is basically it and I think that goes for the majority of macbook users especially taking work-macbooks (in non-artistic environments) into account.

Even with the current shortages right now, you can buy very fast 1TB SSD from Samsung for only $100. It is Apple simply being cheap to offer only 256GB.

There is a reason why Apple is the richest company in the world.

 

[jav6454]

The market is a little more chaotic than usual, but I think a lot of that is starting to ease up. Even in today's market, Apple's $200 upgrade to go from 256GB to 512GB is well above the market rate (even for high end SSDs), so they're profiting quite a lot off of these upgrades.

I have a feeling opportunity cost plays a part. It probably costs Apple less than $50 to actually source the extra storage, but if they were to offer it by default, they would lose out on potentially upwards of $150 of profit they could earn by charging extra for it. For that reason, I think we're looking at a few more years before they upgrade the base storage.

Yes, there is also money involved, after all, this is Apple.

 

[bobcomer]

I've been astonished at how low base storage for all new Macs are continuing to be at 256GBs. I've had a 500GB hard drive in all my Macs since the 12 Macbook Pro and it's astonishing that what would be considered a small size for an M.2 drive is still the standard on a laptop over 1k.

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

Probably.

What you are really asking is it going to get cheaper to buy Macs with more storage, and to that I'd say, it's Apple, so no.

 

[wonderings]

You can buy a 1TB Samsung SSD’s with 3.5 GB/s read and write speed for only $100. And Apple gets huge discounts as they buy in bulk.

If MacBooks were user upgradable, you would be able to buy a fully maxed out MacBook Air / Pro for cheap. But Apple charges crazy BTO prices.

I have complained about this for a long time. Hard drives are cheap, Apple charges a fortune for basic storage needs. Why everyone just seemed content with hard drive sizes dropping while prices went up is beyond me. This was all happening before the pandemic when shortages were not an issue either. Just more Apple being Apple gouging wherever they can and the masses smiling and gleefully handing them money.

 

[leman]

Sure they will. Once the industry moves to new standards. You might not like it, but 256GB is the current standard for premium ultraportables.

 

[MayaUser]

I've been astonished at how low base storage for all new Macs are continuing to be at 256GBs. I've had a 500GB hard drive in all my Macs since the 12 Macbook Pro and it's astonishing that what would be considered a small size for an M.2 drive is still the standard on a laptop over 1k.

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

they did increase with iphones, and with macs...we had macs with 128ssd before
so they will increase in the future to 512

 

[kschendel]

The 256GB SSD's are probably available to Apple for a pittance. 512GB, not quite. Raising the base storage to 500GB would be charging a lot of people for storage they don't need. I've had a 256GB SSD as the only storage in my rMBP laptop (primary office machine) since 2014, and it's workable.

I imagine that eventually we might see 500GB as the base, but only if they become as cheap as 256GB SSD's.

 

[Kelly Jones]

I've been astonished at how low base storage for all new Macs are continuing to be at 256GBs. I've had a 500GB hard drive in all my Macs since the 12 Macbook Pro and it's astonishing that what would be considered a small size for an M.2 drive is still the standard on a laptop over 1k.

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

It will take a while for 512GB to become the entry level standard. For a long time on Macs with SSDs, the entry level storage was 128GB. It took them a long time to move to 256GB. Apple seems more reluctant than most to move their base storage a step higher.

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

I have complained about this for a long time. Hard drives are cheap, Apple charges a fortune for basic storage needs. Why everyone just seemed content with hard drive sizes dropping while prices went up is beyond me. This was all happening before the pandemic when shortages were not an issue either. Just more Apple being Apple gouging wherever they can and the masses smiling and gleefully handing them money.

i too do not understand why people keep defending apple on certain decisions.

i like the macbook air,in fact ,i love it.i like apple API and sdk . i like the overall feel of their devices.but you can't deny that they charge you a LOT for very little base hw.64gb storage in iphones and ipads is ridicoulous.8/256 laptop for 1500 bucks is a monstruosity .

 

[t0rqx]

By the time they upgrade the base storage to 500 GB the MacOS probarbly already takes up 70% of diskspace. Forcing you to pay a premium to upgrade.

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

im actualy wondering the same thing about RAM ,when will we get more than 8gb as mainstream ? be it 16 or 12 if possible. wondering if that may possibly happen before 2035

 

[wonderings]

i too do not understand why people keep defending apple on certain decisions.

i like the macbook air,in fact ,i love it.i like apple API and sdk . i like the overall feel of their devices.but you can't deny that they charge you a LOT for very little base hw.64gb storage in iphones and ipads is ridicoulous.8/256 laptop for 1500 bucks is a monstruosity .

Here in Canada it would push any Apple device to at minimum $2,000 just to get a computer with a 500 gig hard drive. M2 drives and other storage options are much cheaper and smaller. The problem is of course Apple does not make them so they can't talk about how much better their drives are and why you can't really compare the prices.

 

[G46&Fbnth5]

I expect a MacBook SE starting with 128 GB next year.

 

[dz5b609]

Even with the current shortages right now, you can buy very fast 1TB SSD from Samsung for only $100. It is Apple simply being cheap to offer only 256GB.

There is a reason why Apple is the richest company in the world.

That's way too simplistically thought. Yes Apple overcharges for their SSD's, but wholesale bulk pricing for Flash storage is really weird and so are external SSD (or HDD)-prices. Just look up SSD or HDD shucking and see how it's a practice to shuck external drives because they're cheaper than the internal ones (for the same drive).

 

[deconstruct60]

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

When 512GB NAND prices fall and stay consistently at what Apple paid 255GB NAND costs for then probably they'll switch. In short, they will switch when their margins take zero hit on making the move.

NAND production both hiccuped a bit over last 2 years ( like lots of other products) and the somewhat 'chessy' path of going to quad / quin bit data storage per cell to squeeze capacity while needed to do more tap dancing on wear management is probably enough to spook Apple into continuing to by the older , more consistent stuff for now.

That "now cheaper" factor has to apply to most of the other components also. For example when the MBA 13" M2 gets a more expensive screen. Poof! there goes the budget to increase SSD bill-of-material costs. So still suck at 256GB entry capacity levels. M2 MBP 13" gets a non-binned 8 core 10 GPU SoC. So again... poof goes the window to increase the SSD capacity level.

When the case design is "mature", the screen is not moving , the SoC doesn't have die size bloat, and SSD NAND prices are trending down at a steady state level. ... then Apple will raise the entry capacity. Until then... they just ask higher prices (and drop more money in the Scrooge McDuck money pit down in the basement of HQ )

So probably a couple of years into the future. If the component supply chains all catch up and even out next year , it could be the year after that. For now though... not going anywhere.

 

[Brandon42]

The market is a little more chaotic than usual, but I think a lot of that is starting to ease up. Even in today's market, Apple's $200 upgrade to go from 256GB to 512GB is well above the market rate (even for high end SSDs), so they're profiting quite a lot off of these upgrades.

I have a feeling opportunity cost plays a part. It probably costs Apple less than $50 to actually source the extra storage, but if they were to offer it by default, they would lose out on potentially upwards of $150 of profit they could earn by charging extra for it. For that reason, I think we're looking at a few more years before they upgrade the base storage.

Apple used to over-charge for upgrades to milk the maximum out of big organizations that would order the specs they needed rather than upgrading elsewhere. Then the iPod/iPhone came along with essentially non-upgradeable (after purchase) storage. The high prices stayed and people paid them. Then Macs started to lose after purchase upgradability and people paid the high prices. As long as enough people pay to upgrade at the high prices, Apple will do it, that is just business. The only way for things to change is if the market forces Apple to reconsider. If people held back on upgrades, Apple would need to lower upgrade prices to maximize revenue.

 

[Analog Kid]

Do you all think Apple will ever increase the base storage of just about every Mac to 512?

No. Never.

 

[phillytim]

... The only way for things to change is if the market forces Apple to reconsider. If people held back on upgrades, Apple would need to lower upgrade prices to maximize revenue.

I've held back on upgrading my Early 2011 MacBook Pro (with a standard 500GB HD, now a 1TB SSD thanks to myself) for years and years, thinking Apple would provide greater storage capacities in the future - 'of course'.

Obviously, it just isn't going to happen. Apple just wants us to buy tons of iCloud storage subscriptions.

I am now contemplating a move to a nice Windows laptop that can be upgraded as my needs grow.

 

[deconstruct60]

Even with the current shortages right now, you can buy very fast 1TB SSD from Samsung for only $100. It is Apple simply being cheap to offer only 256GB.

Apple probably should do a better job talking about the quality built into their drives ( in terms of endurance , wear , etc) , but there are range of SSDs out there. The 'most affordable' SSDs are not using the high performance, high endurance NAND chips. There is definitely a sizable mark up on Apple drives. But they also are not picking the cheapest components possible either.

A Samsung 980 x4 PCI-e v3 1TB is about $100 . But a Samsung 980 Pro is about $150-190. That is a 50-90% increase in cost. Yes, Apple is charging around $400/TB ( up until top two capacity tiers when when ramp back a bit on the mark up on top of mark up. )

It isn't commodity , older inventory being dumped isn't a very good baseline to judge the Mac SSD prices. Faster , modern drives are substantively above the $100 mark. That still leaves Apple over and above those also, but where Apple has built their own custom SSD controller ( versus commodity controller) and a specific set of NAND chips that have to meet Apple quality control .

There is a reason why Apple is the richest company in the world.

It isn't just margin though. They also are pretty good at risk shifting. If some 3month old SSD fails and they have to replace the whole motherboard , then they have collected enough margin on the working ones to dray most of that cost.