As a fellow current Mac user, I can understand why people, especially techies, are frustrated. Apple is well funded with high standards, making them a fashionable, luxury company that focuses on tech. They have a high price point for their products from which people expect high quality. More importantly, they control both the hardware and software stack. Unlike MS which has to cater to an infinite number of different hardware combinations from different vendors, Apple development teams just deal with a much smaller set of hardware products and components which theoretically should result in a more secure and stable product.
As other HN users have pointed out, there are hints as to why this is happening: https://www.theverge.com/2016/12/21/14037686/apple-macbook-m...
Apple is hollowing out the OSX/Mac OS team in favor of iOS.
While they did limit High Sierra's scope, maybe they needed to push back the release date as well given that they gutted the Mac OS team?
Regardless, the natives are getting restless.
To be fair it's because they charge 3-4x what other platforms charge (the ones that do) and use to have a slogan saying "It just works". People paid the Apple tax because they didnt have to deal with these issues and now they do and still pay the Apple tax.
Wait... where is this 3-4x number coming from? Are there any examples?
When it comes to laptops, the Apple tax is only about 2x more unless you compare it to an MS Surface Laptop which is about equal in price and quality.
Ok please show us the laptop that is 1/4 of the price of the same-specs MBP. Or how one could build one.
I do it like once a month, and this "3-4x" claim is strictly false. If you spec MBP versus Dell or HP or Lenovo or whatever with the same parts, Apple may be anything between 5%-30% more, nowhere near 300%-400% that you claim.
Sure thing. Long as you remember to show us the laptop 3-4x cheaper than the equivalent MBP.
True, most doesn't come with nvme ssd, but you can always upgrade (which you cannot on a macbook), processors and graphics are way better for half the price, and you usually get a matte screen in which you can actually see anything besides reflections.
You made a claim. If you can't back up that claim with some basic evidence, we tend to call that claim "bullshit".
Given that other posts identify a laptop with a 1920x1080 display to a retina MacBook Pro, the concept of "equivalent" is clearly not the same for everyone.
E.g. http://www.techradar.com/reviews/xiaomi-mi-notebook-pro/2
It’s the price of the midrange Windows laptops, but the specs and build quality of the MacBooks.
The downside is Windows of course. But it is supposed to work pretty well under Linux.
"specs and build quality of the MacBooks"? Great, can we see that mythical laptop that is 3-4x cheaper than equivalently-specced MBP or not? Url?
Or is it just empty talk?
I think it’s more like 2.5 to 3 times cheaper than 3 to 4, but it’s pretty easy to find.
A$1400: https://www.lightinthebox.com/xiaomi-laptop-15-6-inch-intel-....
Vs
A$3500: https://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=MP... (with weaker CPU and GPU)
It also doesn’t come with OSX. Pretty sure you can find some other differences too.
I’m sure for some people the screen is a deal breaker. Others won’t care.
How so? It does not seem to have a single Thunderbolt 3 port. MBP has four of them. Instead, Xiaomi has a bunch of USB-whatever &c. That is not "better", that is strictly "worse" and cheaper.
> can we see that mythical laptop that is 3-4x cheaper than equivalently-specced MBP or not?
So, how is it even remotely equivalent?
I don’t think the resolution is interesting at all, but I agree some will.
For some people the great MPB trackpad is enough to sell it. Some people want the Xiaomi NVidia GPU. Some want retina screen, some want resolutions with better Linux support.
If you don’t like it don’t get it. But don’t nitpick to try to find some way they aren’t exactly the same: no one thinks that they are.
Nevertheless they are both high quality, i7, 16GB aluminium notebooks which suit developers.
Evidently you're not an iTunes user. But agreed on the fact that most Apple applications are pretty decent, with the exception of iTunes (bloated) and Pages (not bloated enough).
I do hope they have a skunkworks project to rewrite the whole thing from scratch, though. It could really use it.