Some people just need or want a beefy desktop built with upgradable components (in addition to a laptop).
Or, crazy idea here, they could licence their OS if they don't want to make pro gear anymore.
Maybe some are too young to remember 'Power Computing', the company that licensed MacOS in the 90s. That was juuuuust before Apple ran in to major problems, and had to file bankruptcy. The first thing Jobs did when he came back was borrow 55 million dollars from Bill Gates and buy back all the licenses and shut down production of all mac clones. One of the only true things Apple has is its reputation for quality. You want to bleed that out, you would do it by allowing clones, thus bringing about the destruction of the brand as a whole.
A clone program now would have a totally different dynamic, since Apple is incredibly successful rather than close to bankruptcy. I still don't know if it would make business sense for them, but for Mac users like me it would be absolutely terrific.
Apple never filed for bankruptcy protection.
http://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/051115...
https://www.wired.com/2009/08/dayintech_0806/
From this source they borrowed 150 million from MS.
I think Apple makes high end computers for consumers now.
They just don't cater to special audiences like they did before, which is unfortunate for people who don't want computers that cater to consumers (i.e., content creation pros, developers, etc).
I can't blame Apple for following the money, but it is what it is, I guess.
Another one to chime in that I don't consider this crazy...any more.
It didn't work the first time around partly because the cloners had much smaller volume and could therefore always scoop Apple on the most profitable high-end gear, which didn't have component availability.
The licensing model was always a gamble, with the hope that the loss of margin would be offset by an increased base. The problem was that it was "bet the company" stakes at the time, and when it didn't quite work out as hoped they had to shut it down or shut down the company.
Now the Mac line in general and the pro line in particular is a sufficiently insignificant part of the overall business that they could afford the gamble.
Apple is a hardware company. What you're suggesting doesn't make business sense for Apple. They rely on being able to sell new hardware. Allowing upgrades wouldn't make sense. A laptop last for five years, for most people, being able to slap in extra memory, a new graphics card or just a new SSD would "rob" Apple of a sale of a new computer for an additional two or three years.
Somebody who will sell a high-end desktop system with: dual-socket Xeons, gobs of ECC memory, lots of storage, multiple 16x PCIe slots, and a very limited selection of high-end graphics cards.
That would satisfy the power users, and wouldn't cost them anything.
Sure they are losing customer, but compared to the hoards of students buying Apple laptops or iPhone customers, it not really an issue.
Latest problem I had were with the printer driver (Brother HL-1110 which doesn't seem to know that this printer has much less memory than advertised)
Where the Linux desktop is truly unparalleled is for a developer. As a developer I'm comfortable enough with the technical details to handle the quirks (like doing things from the command line), and the strengths of Linux truly shine (again, the commandline, as well as choices in DE, software, etc). One great example is Arch. On Arch I can install any developer tool directly from the command line with very little effort. Anywhere else and you have to click through endless menus.
If they licensed Magsafe to a clone manufacturer they would definitely lose sales. So many Mac users love the Magsafe.
It's really too bad they discontinued it.
I think they should give people what they want - a high powered upgradable machine. If they don't want to make it upgradable, then they should at least refresh it annually.
Having content producers using macOS is a huge benefit to their brand and I think it's a big part of driving sales of their iOS devices. At the very least, if they lose the content producer market there will be significantly more friction to producing iOS apps.
Yes, there's a halo effect, but I don't think it's all that huge especially with respect to video pros and I bet it mostly works in the other direction - people like their iPhone so they are more likely to buy a macOS laptop or desktop. Nobody is buying a Mac Pro because they like their iPhone.
The driver for iOS development is profit and as long as iOS users are willing to pay more for apps, it will continue to dominate. And if you want to make an iOS app, you are going to buy a Mac, but probably not a Mac Pro.
The Mac Pro is like the iPod in that it exists in this weird space where it continues to be sold but is clearly not something that Apple thinks is important.
Personally, I think letting the trash can linger on for over 3 years is a pretty loud indicator that Apple's not exactly concerned with the line and that, internally at least, they're well aware of just how big a mistake the design was. Of course, it's possible that it's just a reflection of far larger problems with how the company views and supports its Mac engineers.[0] Plus, the Mac Pro's manufacturing here in the US is problematic for the company. That little political ploy can't be easily reversed, especially with the anti-trade FUD that's so prevalent now.
If Apple were willing to acknowledge the problems, they could certainly design a restrictive licensing program that would allow third-parties to build Macs that target higher-end professionals without cannibalizing their consumer lines too much while avoiding some of the problems from the 90s. Strict design requirements for case aesthetics, limitations on software bundling, and other requirements could be used to limit third-party machines to high-end machines to avoid eating their consumer and laptop sales.
Not that I expect it to happen, or even be considered. But something has to change if Apple wants to keep their hold on creative professionals who are now either being forced to switch, doing extensive upgrades on their old Mac Pros to bide as much time as possible, or building Hackintoshes
0. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-20/how-apple...
This is already worked like gangbusters for them for monitors: http://www.macworld.com/article/3169308/macs/apple-stores-st...
Microsoft beat Apple for a decade, then Apple beat Microsoft. Both companies are still around, making fortunes. Even Yahoo's still around.
I don't mind using macOS, it's a pretty nice experience, definitely nicer than windows but when I buy an Apple machine the thing I'm buying is definitely the hardware and I'm not convinced the clones do a good enough job of matching that, can I get 14 hours of battery life from the leading air-clone?
The event that changed everything was getting a 34" Ultrawide monitor and the Mac experience was just so much more solid and respective of the screen space. I can't quite put my finger on it but I felt more in control.
I have a Surface Book on my desk, but my Macbook Air is what I use daily. For me, Mac wins with:
- Predicable window management - everything stays where you put it
- Tidier fonts and app bevels so it doesn't waste screen space
- Access to apps like Sketch
- No UI delays when using Adobe Premiere, despite the less capable hardware - definitely an issue on Windows
- Much better command line support (not used the Windows Linux subsystem)
- Apps are easier to handle and less bloatware
- Notes app that is actually helpful
- Fast with an SSD - absolutely rubbish without (my mac mini is unusable)
- I have gotten used to clicking the window first, before it doing something in that app - so fewer accidental actions
But, I do still love Windows, it wins on the following:
- Better graphical support (ok, hardware specific)
- Windows Explorer is much better than Finder for me
- Window snapping is easier (but might be also frustrating, can't put my finger on it)
- I can open multiple calculator instances
- Wider app support, but less of an issue these days for what I use
Windows does have a lot more bugs, such as incorrectly scaled cursors in Premiere, or apps that a impossibly small or stupidly large when using a non-retina second monitor.
I love the iOS platform, it just works and has never failed me (I am leaving iTunes out of this). However, even with the scaling/DPI issues I find Windows 10 fast and easy to use. It must be biased as I've used Windows more, but I thought I'd love macOS more than I do, having loved my iPhone & iPad experience. I do always have to put the taskbar at the top of the screen, but that I think goes back to my Amiga Workbench days!
Jeez is that an actual thing on OSX? That would just make it feel unresponsive to me.
If you don't want to focus the background window -- or you want to use an element that can't be used if the window is backgrounded -- then holding 'cmd' will pass the click through.
Whoa. I had no idea!
Damn, is there any equivalent functionality (be it integrated or third party) for windows? I'd love to be able to run games in fullscreen exclusive mode without having them lose focus every time I want to look at a different chrome tab on my secondary display.
Kinda. Just for scrolling apparently.
/Applications/Calculator.app/Contents/MacOS/Calculator&
open -na CalculatorA developer friend I know used to always prefer the even older unix command line tool, dc. It operates with reverse Polish notation.
Now, I often just start the python repl (type 'python' at the command line) for quick calculations that might require slightly more power than bc.
To bring this back to the original topic, it is this easy access to the underlying unix tools that made me switch to Macs in the first place. Windows, IMHO, lost some points with the emphasis on touchscreen based UI and gained some points with the new Linux shell support.
In regard to both, I suppose that there is an opening to something more complex.
After having given Powershell a chance I don't want to go back to bash.
Pretty much anyone I know on a Mac uses iTerm, which is definitely more capable than the Windows 10 command prompt.
> And posix doesn't seem to hold a candle to Powershell.
In what specific ways? It seems way more intuitive to me and powerful enough for any task that it's not worth bringing a language like Python/Ruby/Go etc. for.
Window management is vastly superior in my opinion, I frequently just full screen everything and swipe between the full screens, this is particularly notable in my case since I almost exclusively use the keyboard (get bad RSI from mice)
Updates feel like they have much less friction.
But basically it comes down the underlying unix-y system. I'm never going to do serious development on a laptop but if I pick up a macOS machine it has the unix core tools that I need to get stuff done, vim, ssh etc. (Though there are some pain points mostly they're fixed by brew for machines I'll use for any length of time).
Also, I helped someone set up Parallels the other day on their MBP and tried out air drop for the first time, show me friction-less 4GB ISO copying OTA between Windows laptops that aren't on the same network!