The user looks at a storage upgrade as "I get twice as much for X". They don't break it out to $ per GB, and they don't start to compare to low volume wholesale (i.e. NewEgg) component prices.

Automobiles are very similar, especially the higher end you go. Though even for family sedans, the "cost" of a V6 over a four-cylinder in a family sedan isn't several thousand dollars. Even if you include upgrades to the transmission and the rest of the driveline, the raw cost doesn't come close. It's tasty front-end margin, plain and simple, and I can't think of many people who complain about the cost per additional horsepower. The cost to produce 19" wheels over 18" wheels on a Porsche Boxster isn't anywhere near the extra $1560 they charge you, but if you want stiffer sidewalls, it's what it's going to cost straight from Porsche. Trim levels? Trust me, a V12 sedan doesn't cost 50% more than a V8 sedan, regardless of interior upgrades. There's a lot of pure profit built into top-trim levels of models.

You should never price things based solely on how much the inputs cost. If people are willing to pay huge premiums for incremental RAM upgrades, Apple will gladly let them.

You can always stick the cheap ram in your clunky Dell laptop.

  > your *clunky* Dell laptop

If I put it next to my wife's MacBook Pro, well, the only word for it is "clunky". Put a reasonably handsome man next to George Clooney and he'll look clunky, too.

Of course, they have also made it somewhat shamelessly MacBook like in certain respects: large touchpad, calculator-style keyboard...

HP has been working towards making better products through better design. Sony keeps working on creating these crazy, over-styled products, but they are different. Dell seems to be cranking out the same basic thing.

But you do have a choice. Apple still makes the older MBP design with greater upgradeability. The tradeoff, though, is that if you want the sexy screen, you give up the upgrade options.

Lenovo, for example, wanted $1,060 to go from 4GB to 16GB in the ThinkPad X230.

Regardless, I don't think anyone looking at such an expensive notebook to begin with would have a problem paying $200 for more RAM if they think they might need it some day if it means a thinner notebook.

I'm fine with vendors charging way more than the ram is worth, as long as I have the option to purchase my ram somewhere else.

There's no denying that the new MacBook is a very nice machine, it just sucks that they either had to make huge concessions to get the form factor the way it is or they wanted to.

Does anyone know if the Samsung Series 9 allows for user upgradable memory? If so, there is no excuse for Apple.

Dell's XPS 13 Ultrabook appears to have a user replaceable SSD, but not RAM. That Lenovo X230 appears to allow both. Seems other ultrabooks allow one or the other, or none.

While I do like to upgrade things myself (upgraded the RAM and put an SSD in my current 13" Pro) and would prefer notebooks have that option, Apple's targeting an audience that would rather have their notebooks be as thin as possible than have the ability to do something that they'll never care to do. People that don't like that, can just buy something else, in Apple's opinion.

At a guess I'd say that's because they're using matched 8GB sticks, whereas Apple is using 4x 4GB. (Just a guess.)

I also just navigated the labyrinth that is HP.com and looked at pricing on the 15" Envy (15t-3000 series specifically). The base model comes with 6GB and it costs $315 to go to 16GB (8GBx2)[3].

So, Apple's pricing really doesn't seem bad at all.

[1]: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226... [2]: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226... [3]: No direct link possible apparently.

To follow up on the RAM specifications, would the chip count/size for the 16 GB model be equivalent to two 8 GB DIMM's or to one 16 GB DIMM (as they are currently constructed)? (Asking anyone who knows.) I assume the latter, representing higher per-chip density, would reflect significantly higher cost.

P.S. I'm not a fan of small, light gray text on a white background (the specs listing on the Apple product page).

I'd say it looks roughly equivalent to two 8GB DIMMs.

One way Apple has done this is to provide some of the initial capital needed for new plants/technologies. For example, if retooling a plant for new LCD production costs $1 billion, Apple might front 1/2 the money in exchange for 6-18month exclusivity on those panels.

Also, Apple has scale in its favor. They can negotiate better terms and ensure that their quota gets filled first.

Your argument would carry more weight if Apple had a much larger chunk of the market than all others.

For "Retina"-class displays, they absolutely do.

It was easy to see this coming years ago, and it was indeed inexcusable for everyone else to be caught flat-footed. Any fool should have been able to see exactly what was going to happen the minute they laid eyes on a non-Retina iPad.

If a manufacturer could out do the iPhone 4, iPad or MBP screen, they would have. Especially since they are traditionally spec driven.

I think a major reason other manufacturers haven't done this may be that they ship Windows boxes. My logic for that is as follows:

- There are manufacturers that ship numbers of their high-end laptops that are in the same order as the number of MacBook Pro's that Apple ships.

- Apple, by supplying only one form factor, reaps economies of scale.

- That form factor may be suboptimal for some, but it is what they will have to buy if they want to run Mac OS.

- If other manufacturers tried the same, they would lose sales to other parties that do provide machines with different feature sets that also run Windows.

On the other hand, I do not know whether it is that more expensive to have a single high-DPI line crank out multiple sizes of display. If it is not, it all boils down to balls. Other manufacturers may be spec driven, but they do that by buying the best the market has to offer. Apple, on the other hand, is willing (and able) to tell the market what it wants, and put money on the table up-front for it.

http://www.macmyth.com/2012/06/touch-screens-5-440-dpi-at-lg...

But as others noted there are some with comparable displays, I was just unfamiliar with them.

Does this change your point?

For example, a Mass-Market brand, like Casio, may produce some nice Premium products [1], and those products may sell decently. But it's hard for them to target and sell products to people who want "the best", for the simple fact that subconsciously (and sadly) price and quality are mixed, and marketing exploits that fact. It doesn't have to be "the best" technically, but subjectively (perceived value, coolness, status brand and so on).

And of course, one of the main reasons that a product is considered Premium is its exclusivity. That's the problem that Armani faces right now, with its multiple brands targeted at different segments and markets, making their brand equity dilute[2]. Now imagine what would happen if Rolex made a cheaper watch, to compete with Casio.

Before you think I'm comparing in the same terms the competence between Apple/Samsung to Rolex/Casio (that hardly compete each other), I know it's not the best analogy. At least in the smartphone and tablet market, their products overlap. But what I'm saying is that their products are targeted to different segments. Apple is clearly a Premium brand. Samsung is a Mass-Market brand. Apple takes advantage of their brand value perception, and uses products like that screen to preserve and push that brand value forward. Samsung and the others instead, are focusing in the bigger market, people that will not spend half the household's monthly income (or even 2 or 3 full household's monthly income in some countries in Europe, Americas and Asia) in a computer. [3] So, they focus in building products with the best features possible while at the same time, having the lowest possible price. When they make a premium product, they do it to position their brand against other Mass-market Brands (DELL vs ASUS, Samsung vs HTC vs Motorola). Not to compete with a Premium Brand.

If those screens are still expensive to produce in large quantities, Samsung (or any other producing them) has not the need to create a product yet to use them, simply because they sell those screens anyway. And Apple is surely paying a nice premium to keep it that way. When they can start producing those screens at larger quantities, sure, there will be others using them.

But by keeping this strategy, Samsung is able to make money from both markets (premium and mass-market), while Apple is able to keep it's brand equity, in this case, by maintaining the exclusivity of the display. It's a very profitable win-win strategy.

And unless someone has VERY deep pockets to pay the same and more than Apple to cut the deal... (and Apple has lots of cash to avoid this from happening) I doubt that someone can offer those displays right now. Hopefully in a year, it will be easier and we can have more and more displays like this.

Until then... "I doubt it would be that difficult for others to source an equivalent display" Yes, it's that difficult. :)

[1] http://www.watchshop.com/Premium-G-Shock-Watches.html [2] http://www.venturerepublic.com/resources/giorgio_armani_-_th... [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_Wide_Smartphone_Sale...

I'm seeing 4 GB DDR3 DIMM's at around $23, while 8 GB DIMM prices -- a bit scant in quantity -- appear to average in the low $50's.

So, say $46 versus $110, for a $64 difference? Very approximately. And I didn't look closely at bus speeds -- just very off-the-cuff.