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Comment by pyeri | Hacker News Reader

Anyone remembers Toshiba laptops? Their build quality was top-notch and they were quite durable at the price point they came. Then around 2012-14, they started disappearing from the market, what happened to them?

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For me, the MacBook Air happened.

My progression was Toshiba Satellite in 1999 and 2002, then HP business line laptop in 2005 and 2008, and then once I tried MacBook Air and I could close the lid without worrying the laptop would stay on and overheat in my backpack, I never went back to Windows. Plus it was lightweight and the battery was the most long lasting.

I am guessing businesses using Windows used mostly HP/Dell/Lenovo business line computers because they had extensive same day/next day on site support, so the business Windows market went to them, and lots of personal laptop market went to MacBook Air, leaving an untenable smaller, low margin market for non HP/Dell/Lenovo companies.

And then some of that went to smartphones/tablets too. And after SSDs hit the market, technological advancement slowed so a new laptop was not that much better than an old laptop, so you could keep using it for 5+ years easy. I typed this on a 2015 Air.

I am not picking on you in particular but want to bring a general point up to readers:

Why is it I always read the parent opinion when it comes to laptop shopping, but never the opposite (which is mine):

-Bigger -> better

-Thicker -> better

-Terrible battery life

-Desktop CPU and GPU

-Blow torch thermal exhaust

-Maximum storage and RAM

All so I can run lm-studio, having Llama 3 pump out my edgy 4chan shitposts and effortposts for me, within the absolute comfiness of Qubes OS. I couldn't imagine relying on something thin and low powered unless it did very specific things (and, if it can't run Qubes, then it stays offline).

Because what you've described isn't a laptop but a shitty desktop computer. Laptops that large are heavy, which sucks to travel with. Such a monstrosity isn't convenient to throw into your bag and bring with you everywhere all day. If you're not even using it for graphics, get a desktop, install Tailscale, and remote in for your shitposts.

Is the opinion, anyway. Nothing wrong with your opinion (or mine), they're just opinions after all, but if I was on my feet all day in the field and needed a laptop, I'd rather something small and light with a long battery life. If I wanted something luggable, I'd go for a usb-c monitor and as small a desktop chassis as would fit a proper GPU inside of a mobile one. But dealing with the cables for that would get old real quick, so a laptop like you describe would be my pick in those circumstances. Eg my friend's a VJ and performs at random clubs and a gaming laptop like you described is the most appropriate device.

Because the magnitude of demand similar to yours is so low, that I doubt many manufacturers can exist profitably in that space, hence Toshiba and others exiting the market.

You want a gaming laptop.

I agree. I am typing on a Macbook Air but I don't like it much. Too thin, terrible keyboard, terrible buttonless trackpad. It has almost no ports and no expansion. There's no easy way to middle-click without addons.

The only reason I use it is its battery life. Work provided it; it's not mine and I'd not choose one myself.

For my own, I want a big thick chunky thing with 3 physical mouse buttons, lots of ports, a swappable (and ideally hot swappable) battery and ideally 2 of them.

There's a space for thin'n'light, but there are next to no commercial options for those who want fat'n'flexible.

I absolutely agree. There are such clear benefits to thicker and heavier laptops. Drawbacks as well, obviously, but it is crazy how lopsided the market seems to be in favor of compactness, even at the cost of power, battery, and reliability.

Same applies to phones.

Having worked at an electronics retailer, I can tell you that "lots" is doing some heavy-lifting in terms of characterizing how much of the laptop market is taken up by Macbooks, let alone the Air, specifically. Certainly, many college students wouldn't be caught dead with a Windows computer, but most people were happy to walk out with something half the price of a Mac, particularly when they're far more used to Windows at school and work than OS X. Acer and Asus were beginning to take up a decent portion of our sales by the time I left.

MacBook Airs are cheap, in my opinion. I spent $900 on mine 9 years ago. The amortized cost over its lifetime is very competitive with even the cheapest Windows laptops.

Even now, an M3 13in with 16GB ram and 512GB SSD is only $1,300. An M3 13in with 8GB ram and 256GB SSD is $900, and that would be good enough for 90% of people for 5+ years easy.

https://www.costco.com/macbook-air-laptop-13-inch---apple-m3...

And (what to most consumers seems like) an equivalent Windows machine can be had for less than half that. After 2.5 years, you can upgrade. This argument has been had ad nauseum; it's not interesting anymore. I just wanted to point out what seemed like a mistake in your analysis re: sales. If you'd like to discuss that, that's fine.

>After 2.5 years, you can upgrade.

This is a huge drawback for most people. I don’t want to “upgrade”, and spend time and effort transferring to new devices. I want the device I have to work for as long as possible.

Again, from my experience selling these things: "most people" don't want to be stuck with a laptop with 8gb of RAM soldered to the board. They wait until the cost to repair is more than the price of a new laptop, or for when the time for a repair would be too long, or until their hard drive is full (these people don't bother transferring if they're not getting a device with a higher capacity drive). Then, they buy the cheapest laptop that fits their power needs/brand loyalty and that seems like it'll last 2-4 years. Your wants are atypical.

I think the exiting of basically all laptop makers that used to sell non soldered RAM proves what the market wants.

People just want stuff to work. They don’t want to think about how it works. I am using 4GB RAM today on a 2015 MacBook Air, and it works acceptably for excel, editing PDF, emails, maps, watching video, YouTube, web browsing, chatting, video calling, and pretty much everything else that the vast majority of people do.

An 8GB M3 laptop today will easily last 5+ years for most people’s needs. And they don’t even have to worry about what RAM is or does.

On a different niche Panasonic with their toughbooks secured a solid spot.

They rebranded to Dynabook I think?

Just Googled and came to know they sold their stake in PC division to another Japanese company called Sharp in 2018, this Sharp then later rebranded as Dynabook. But it no longer has the same traction as original Toshiba, nor is it available on most online ecommerce stores.

Can someone with a background in marketing explain why so many companies drop their recognizable brand names and start using other names, which have lower market penetation?

My theory is either mergers/spinoffs.. or someone in markering wants to get a bonus, so they kill the brand.

Someone at blizzard wanted to rename battle.net to blizzard app for example

There are a lot Of reasons, often not good ones, but it’s often the case that the existing brand doesn’t really represent what the company does any longer or is too narrow.

Of course it may just be a marketing VP who wants a prestige project on their resume.

Cause could be regulations, or some bigger brand strict rules.

For example, anti-monopoly regulators looking very formal, when somebody appear to share more than 30% of market, then just turn on prohibitively high taxes.

Other example, Nintendo limited number of games published from one brand, so big companies have created daughter companies who formally own some of IP.

And how is changing the brand name supposed to help with that?

I sure mean not just brand, but other legal entity. Nintendo don't have much spare resources to make through research and to release that those new entities are owned by already known others and these others own more than said.

They were always called Dynabooks by Toshiba[1] and still continue to be sold today, but they retreated to only selling in Japan a long time ago and Toshiba ultimately sold the Dynabook brand off to Sharp in 2018 as part of selling off most of their businesses to avoid bankruptcy.

For those who aren't aware, Toshiba is the quintessential example of Japanese Exceptionalising Into Failure(tm)[2].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynabook_Inc.

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fujio_Masuoka

I still have a Toshiba Dynabook lying around. Big and heavy, but otherwise a fine laptop.

Got a Dynabook too. It's a tank.

I'm still in love with Panasonic's Let's Note series, still made in japan and very durable

There was also the Sony Vaio Laptop line that i remember as being quite a good product?

But yeah they all seemed to die out.

Fujitsu lifebook. Smallest laptop with a removable CDROM drive.

vaio brand got bought and reincarnated with very uninspiring lineup

probably get resurrected by some Taiwanese laptop oem/odms

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