New MacBook Pro is selling like crazy | Hacker News Reader

New MacBook Pro is selling like crazy

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15 pointsrayiner34 comments

I suspect the good sales come from a lot of people (like myself) who have simply been holding out for a long time for a new Apple laptop. The macbook is the only laptop Apple has which has been updated this year. Until the new macbooks came out most of apple's line has been using quite old hardware (the old pro and airs hadn't been updated in nearly 2 years). Unsurprisingly the sales of the pro and air lines have been pretty flat for awhile.

Lots of people have been complaining online that the new macbook pro isn't a 'pro' machine because it sacrifices performance for portability. The new macbook pro is really the spiritual successor to the macbook air laptops with upgraded hardware. Another way of thinking about it is that instead of making a faster pro, apple made the pro smaller and gave it great battery life.

There's a very vocal segment of the macbook pro market who's really mad about this. And fair enough - Apple is genuinely no longer catering to the market segment who want a powerhouse you can lug between meetings. But the sales numbers clearly show those users are a minority. For all the noise, almost nobody needs 32 gigs of ram[1]. (Really, most people don't need more than 8.)

I think the majority of users just want a decently performing laptop (check) which looks good (check), is small and light (check) and has great battery life and a decent screen (check and check). ... And doesn't come pre-installed with all the awful manufacturer software you get on modern windows laptops.

I had a look at one in the shop yesterday - the new 13" macbook pro is barely bigger than my old 11" air. Except for the price the new machine is exactly what I want in a replacement laptop. And this is the first laptop apple has released in years for which I can say that - the new macbook is too gutless, the air has a crappy screen and the old pro line was too heavy. Except for the price, I think apple has released a fantastic product.

[1] https://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=6355

> Lots of people have been complaining online that the new macbook pro isn't a 'pro' machine because it sacrifices performance for portability.

> I think the majority of users

I do agree that the new Mac Book Pro is what majority of the users want, unfourtanatly professional users are the minority and the Pro is supposed to cater to this minority.

The other reason people have certain expectations is: the price tag.

I am aware that the RAM tradeoff was done to have a great battery life, which is great for people who need mobility, however those people are probably going to buy an Air anyway.

> unfourtanatly professional users are the minority and the Pro is supposed to cater to this minority.

Most professionals don't need a more powerful machine. I certainly don't - I've been using a 4 year old macbook air for development work (with 8 gigs of ram) since 2012. Honestly, its been fine. The biggest problem I have developing on it is (surprisingly) SSD speed.

> which is great for people who need mobility, however those people are probably going to buy an Air anyway.

The air is being discontinued. The 13" pro-without-touch-bar is the upgrade path for air users who need something more powerful than the 12" macbook.

When there's been a drought, the flavor of the rain becomes less important when it finally arrives. Let's wait until people have satisfied their thirst to find out if the water's actually palatable.

Hahha I'm not sure how strong this analogy is tho. Do you ever taste rain with different flavors :)?

Ever heard of acid rain?

Actual URI is http://bgr.com/2016/11/08/macbook-pro-sale-apple-13-inch-rev...

Submitted URI is a google AMP proxy

And that is a rehash of https://intelligence.slice.com/apples-macbook-pro-launch/

One claim they make surprises me: "Slice Intelligence is the only service to measure digital commerce directly from the consumer, across all retailers".

Does that mean they have data from Apple's sales (stores and online) or do they not consider Apple a retailer?

So two things worth thinking about:

1. MBP hasn't seen an update in ages.

2. HN and Reddit tech groups are a terrible predictor of what general population think.

The MacBook (not sure of the differential vs. the Pro) has held the crown of "most popular laptop model" for years and years now, a fact Apple used to advertise somewhat heavily.

I've always thought that a big determining factor there is that Apple's laptop competitors generally have a dizzying array of different models all selling at once, so even when a line is doing well, it doesn't hold a candle to the MacBook just through dilution alone. Unless things have changed drastically since last I looked several years ago Asus, Lenovo, and Dell each sell more than 10 times as many different simultaneous quasi-competitive models than Apple, even if you restrict things to the high end.

Are the other laptops shown particularly strong sellers from those manufacturers? When I think of a current Dell MacBook competitor, I think of the XPS series. I wouldn't pick out any particular Asus machine, but I'd be surprised if their crown jewel was a Chromebook.

I'm actually most surprised by the relatively high sales of the Surface Book, which is definitely Microsoft's proper entry here, though I can't really tell how much of the difference is down to the Surface Book just costing much more than the other non-Apple entrants in the chart.

I think a lot of people are just giving in. You know, when you have to upgrade and have some cash to get the best machine for yourself you just do what you have to do. I am a Windows user and I honestly think that you would be buying the best machine on the market when buying a Macbook Pro (new or old) if not for performance, than definitely for the build quality. I think Macbooks have the lead here at least for a few more months before the grip will start losing power. Perhaps until the new Surface Book or the new XPS release, both of which have been great products so far, but just not quite there yet in terms of build quality and design. Moreover, I think i7-4980HQ is still a beast (and compares great to i7-6700HQ in XPS) and has at least 2-3 solid years in it.

Where does this data come from?

> Slice gets its data from e-receipts – not a browser, app or software installed by the end-user – so its measurement reflects comprehensive shopping behavior across multiple devices, over time which are key in an increasingly omnichannel retail world.

Pardon my ignorance, but what are e-receipts and how does Slice acquire them? Do retailers sell their receipts?

[1] https://intelligence.slice.com/apples-macbook-pro-launch/

It looks like they offer a service where consumers let Slice scan their inboxes and keep track of purchases and shipping/tracking info and so forth, and Slice aggregates and monetizes that data.

Ah, here it is. They scan people's emails/inboxes.

> Slice Intelligence data comes from several sources, including the receipts in the e-mail inboxes of consumers who use the popular Slice online shopping service, Slice, and through strategic partners, including users of Slice’s API platform. Each e-mailed receipt contains a treasure trove of data.

Yeah no doubt reading people's emails is a treasure trove of data.

Looks like consumers are giving lots of confidence on the Touch Bar, which is the most innovative thing from Apple in the last 5 years IMHO.

My first MacBook was a mid-2011 MacBook Pro. I still use it every day. I have fallen hard for the promise of the Touch Bar and actually look forward to upgrading eventually.

Out of curiosity, for what use case?

This, obviously:

https://youtu.be/E7Or2M7XUb4

https://github.com/avatsaev/touchbar_nyancat

Nothing strange or even very interesting, just two general things.

First is that it should allow applications to reduce the number of persistent UI elements they draw to screen without actually losing context.

Second is it will let me jettison the cognitive load of remembering so many application-specific keyboard shortcuts.

I don't think the first will happen, since there are still millions of Macs in the wild (and many models still in production) which will not have the touchbar. Thus, the easiest path will be to simply duplicate on-screen functionality (or expose functionality already hidden behind menus).

That's naive.

I would expect there will be more third party integration for the Touch Bar in the near future. Slack maybe?

Have you seen this?

http://railsware.com/blog/2016/11/07/touch-bar-interface-for...

In other area, Apple offers discount for education sector, it may boost some interest to get Macbook over other branding.

They've offered that for literally decades. Competitors (e.g. Dell) also offer discounts. I don't think that's a huge factor, especially in November, which is off-cycle for EDU purchases.

In our country, there is no Dell across all the schools. It's Apple, Lenovo, Asus and HP.

I'm not commented that count for November but for more growth in the future which is on sale twice a year.

Okay, can we maybe discuss how riddiculously that data is cherry picked?

Why compare only to 12 inch model? Why compare only to hybrids? (Which are rather niche in the first place)

I'm building a beastly hackintosh and I'll keep my underpowered but perfectly fine MBA for when I'm not at my desk.

I think Apple just kills its best product, the non-Retina thirteen-inch MacBook Pro which is affordable and powerful for entry level Mac users.

It's also been 527 days since the previous refresh, the longest ever by far. So some of that is pent up demand for something, anything.

I'm still using my 2011 MBP. Lots of people have been holding off for a while to upgrade.

I'm really thinking to upgrade to latest good MBP - the 2015 model.

Keep in mind that Apple just signaled that they are unlikely to ever again update the Mac Mini, the iMac, the Mac Pro, and the Macbook Air.

It would be more accurate to compare this to overall Mac sales, since all of those other types of users are being funneled toward buying the new Macbook Pro.

Selling like crazy to Slice users. These stats are useless.

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