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> the whole Louis Rossmann's youtube worth of other hardware features meant to remind you to buy a new Apple laptop every couple of years

Apple have a couple of extra mechanisms in place to remind us to buy a new device:

- On iOS the updates are so large it doesn't fit on the device. This is because they purposely put a small hard drive i. It serves a second purpose - people will buy Apple cloud storage because nothing fits locally.

- No longer providing updates to the device after just a few years when it's still perfectly fine. Then forcing the app developer ecosystem to target the newer iOS version and not support the older versions. But it's not planned obsolescence when it's Apple, because they're the good guys, right? They did that 1984 ad. Right guys?

> No longer providing updates to the device after just a few years when it's still perfectly fine.

This is a weird one to complain about because Apple leads the industry in supporting older devices with software updates. iOS 26 supports devices back to 2019. And they just released a security update for the iPhone 6S, a model released a full decade ago, last month.

The oldest Samsung flagship you can get Android 16 for is their 2023 model (Galaxy S23), and for Google the oldest is the 2021 model (Pixel 6).

We’re moving away from hardware and into software and longevity in this discussion but wrt “apple leads the industry in supporting older devices with software updates” i would point out that Red Hat is probably more of a beacon / industry leader here as the main promise of RHEL is 10 years of support and updates. But again we don’t ship hardware so I see the narrower sense that you’re making but still would like to push back on the idea that giant companies cannot continue to keep complicated legacy code bases secure and functional about 2x longer in most cases than what Apple has done

Main problem, not just from Apple, is that as phone tech gets standardized and more long-lasting the software support cycles have not gotten longer.

It is abysmal that Android phone makers still need to customize the OS so much for their hardware. Apple has no incentive for longer support cycles if Android does even worse on it.

It has always been like that since CP/M and commercial UNIX days.

Vertical integrations like everyone sell a product, a brand, a whole ecosystem experience.

If all OEMs sold the same CP/M, UNIX, MSX, MS-DOS, Windows software stack, on the what is basically the same hardware with a different name glued on the case, they wouldn't get any brand recognition, aka product differentiation.

Thus OEMs specific customisations get added, back in the day bundled software packages are part of the deal, nowadays preinstalled on the OS image, and so on.

"You cheated on me last night!"

"This is a weird one to complain about, look at Donnie, he cheated on his girlfriend 3 times last month!"

i don't get it, how long do you think is reasonable?

I tend to look at technology prices in terms of cost per unit time of useful life.

If Apple continues to supply updates for six-year-old phones, iPhone 17 prices range from $11/month (base model iPhone 17) to $28/month (iPhone 17 Pro Max w/2TB storage), meaning it's only about 20% more expensive to store data on a RAID 10 array of iPhone 17 Pro Maxes running current iOS versions than on standard-tier S3 (not a relevant comparison, obviously, but it amuses me).

So I don't know what's reasonable, but Apple's policies certainly appear to be.

I'm still salty that Apple no longer offer battery service on my OG Apple Watch, however, so reason has its limits.

Suppose you always want to be running the latest iOS release, but you want to replace your phone as infrequently as possible. You would "only" have to have purchased 4 iPhones since 2007:

    | Model     | Launch date        | Obsoleted by | Price 
    |-----------|--------------------|--------------|------
    | iPhone    | June 29, 2007      | iOS 4        | $399 (*price cut)
    | iPhone 4  | June 24, 2010      | iOS 8        | $599
    | iPhone 6  | September 19, 2014 | iOS 13       | $649
    | iPhone 11 | September 13, 2019 | -            | $699

Adjusted for inflation, the total for these phones is $3,287 excluding carrier contracts. Assuming the iPhone 11 will be obsoleted by iOS 27 in September 2026, this costs you about $14.29/mo.

I was a long time Android user - but I realised I was getting through 2 or more phones in the time my wife had one. They'd either become obsolete or just die. I reluctantly bought an iPhone on this basis - it's actually going to work out cheaper if I get 5 or 6 years out of it.

However, I find the iPhone keyboard so bad and the settings concept so muddled that I'm going to return to Android when this experiment is over. Probably not for another 4 years though!

If we're talking anecdotes, my wife changes her iPhone every 4 years because it gets worse and worse. Daughter does the same. I change my Galaxy every 4 years because it gets worse and worse as well. Not sure how some people can say their <insert beloved brand> holds forever, unless they don't really use it of course. No brand really keeps up with the requirements, unless all you do is make phone calls - which is why my dad still has a Sony Ericsson.

You know you can sell and replace your phone if you don't like it. Recent Pixels have 7 years of support and they don't die. That's what I'd recommend you get instead. You can even trade in your iPhone for up to $700 when you buy a Pixel. You really don't need to force yourself to use a phone you don't like, leave alone for that long.

Technically not updates but if you hook up a PowerPC mac with 10.4 Tiger on it you can still get it updated to the latest version released, 10.4.11

I demoed that exact feature (though on 10.5) not so long ago and people didn’t believe me…!

The part that really gets me is that the price per GB to go from a 256 to a 512 GB iPhone is $2.54 (since the next storage option up costs $200 total). Two and a half dollars!!! A 512 GB micro SD would run you $0.10/GB. They have been charging 25x the market rate for storage on a device with no expandable storage at all for years. Baffling that they aren't called on it more. It should be criminal.

I had the 2019 cheesegrater Mac Pro. 7TB (going from 1 to 8) would cost me $3,000.

So I bought a 4xM2 PCI card, 4 2TB Samsung Pro SSDs for $1,100. And as a result got 6.5GBps versus the onboard 1TB's 5GBps.

Same with memory. 160GB (32 to 192GB) from Apple was also around $3K. OWC sold the exact same memory chips, manufacturer, spec, speed, for $1,000 for 192GB.

I recently found my ipad mini 2 (released in 2013) that had been boxed up when I moved a few years ago. After charging up the battery and booting it up, I checked for system updates. The latest system available for it was ios 12.5.7, released in 2023. It loaded fine, and I’ve been using the mini as an ereader ever since – the screen is fine, and wifi works.

A Macbook is the only Apple device I have in my entire array of computers and computer-related stuff, so I've got plenty of points of comparison. While Apple's hardware design isn't perfect, all of what you bring up seems wildly blown out of proportion to me. I can say I've never seen anyone with molten keyboards and displays. I've used the charger cable on my main charging brick for about five years now, and it's still going strong, despite being used for charging everything everywhere. And while Apple has committed many sins in terms of doing their absolute best at preventing anyone from touching their sacred hardware (we just need DRMed cables and enclosures to complete the set), this only affects repair. In terms of planned obsolescence, Macbooks statistically don't seem much less reliable than any other laptops on the market. They make up a majority of the used laptop market where I am.

And of course, just had to bring up the whole mouse charger thing. Back when Apple updated their mouse once and replaced the AA compartment with a battery+port block in the same spot to reuse the old housing, and a decade later people still go on about the evil Apple designers personally spitting in your face for whatever reason sounds the most outrageous.

Apple produced at least three mice that were very different and terrible in different ways. Their laptops are good, but don't waste your time defending their other peripherals.

Apple's unwillingness to admit that one button isn't enough is legendary. They added a fucking multi-touch area to the fucking mouse because that's apparently easier to use and more efficient. It's funny as hell.

I've barely ever tried them, but I've never liked the shaping of any that I have held, and I don't think that the touchpad addition justified the discomfort that it causes in all other use cases. That being said, the whole "Apple added the charging port on the bottom to be evil and prevent you from using the mouse" thing had become such an entrenched internet fable over the last decade that it's impossible for me to come by it and not comment on it. I'll clarify that no one but the designers themselves knows the original intention, but since it's the exact same design as the AA model, just with internal changes, it seems like an open-and-shut case.

We do know the intention though. Apple thinks a mouse with a cable looks messy and ugly, so they made the mouse charge fast and put the port on the bottom. Made it impossible to use it whilst charging but you could get 2 hours of use out of like 10 minutes or charging. The end result Apple hoped for was people always seeing the mouse on the desk, cableless, charged.

I'm surprised it came out during the Jobs era because he strongly believed in "form follows function".

Again, this is something that's often repeated all over the internet, but there is no source for this, it's just speculation - and fairly unconvincing speculation at that, since it has to go so far in assigning the designers these strong opinions and unwillingness to compromise just for it all to make sense. I feel like what I proposed is a far simpler and more straightforward explanation. Occam's razor and all. Just look at what the mouse looked like through its generations[1]. When redesigning it, they obviously just took out the single-use battery compartment and replaced it with a section containing the rechargeable battery and the charging port. In fact, they really couldn't have done it any other way, because the mouse is so flat that its top and bottom sides taper all the way to the desk, with no space for a charging port. So, when making the gen 2 model, just putting the port where it is was probably a far simpler drop-in solution that saved them from having to redesign the rest of the mouse.

[1] https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0572/5788/5832/files/magic...

> I'm surprised it came out during the Jobs era because he strongly believed in "form follows function".

The Jobs era of Apple had a ton of pretty but less functional designs. Jobs is quoted as saying that, but he was full of it. He didn't actually practice that philosophy at all.

I’ll admit to owning one and I use it.

The charging port location is weird and stupid, but I have never needed to charge it while I am using it. When it hits about 15%, I plug it in at the EOD and don’t have to charge it again for maybe a month. I am a neat freak and you have to look hard to see any cable on my desk rig.

The multi touch stuff works fine for me, but perhaps I am just used to it.

The only complaint I have is the shape, it’s not “comfortable” to use. Easily addressed by a stupid 3D printed humpback add on that changes the aesthetic but makes it comfortable for me to use. I shouldn’t have to buy a mouse accessory…but I did.

Here is the thing though…it’s just a mouse. I point, I click, then I move my hand back to the keyboard. It’s fine. While I’m sure there is a better designed one out there, is any mouse truly revolutionary?

>Apple added the charging port on the bottom to be evil

I don't think anyone does anything "to be evil".

But clearly they had a choice between what was good for the user (being able to use the mouse while charging) and what suited their aesthetic, and they chose the latter. Open-and-shut case, indeed.

That's Apple for you. Any time there's a conflict between aesthetics and user friendliness, aesthetics will always win out.

“I'll clarify that no one but the designers themselves knows the original intention, but since it's the exact same design as the AA model, just with internal changes, it seems like an open-and-shut case.”

“Legendary attention to detail”

Indeed, it is pretty open-and-shut.

which is really funny, since the Microsoft mice (only a few are left) and keyboards (discontinued) are by far some of my favorite peripherals.

On the apple mouse side, I got a white corded mouse with the tiny eraser looking mousewheel back in around 2003 or so, it's still in use today with a M4 mac mini. Works like a champ, Keyboard from that era is also still in use and used daily in our family.

I daily drive the Microsoft Touch Mouse, have for 10+ years. It is by far my favorite piece of hardware. I've never seen another one used in the wild, which might explain why they discontinued it.

The remote controls for Apple TV are among the all time worst peripherals I have ever used. Remotes aren’t hard. They reinvented the wheel by making it rectangular.

To be fair, since the Logitech Harmony One went EOL there hasn't been a decent remote available from anyone.

There was a third-party battery module[1] for the original AA Magic Mouse that would allow it to charge wirelessly, a feature that Apple somehow still has not managed to steal!

[1] https://techpp.com/2011/04/19/mobee-magic-charger-for-magic-...

> How I miss that time on a Macbook, with all the chords you have to press whenever you need a Home or End button to edit the line!

???? ctrl+a and ctrl+e? That works on most Linux setups, too. Only Microsoft screws that up. I love how in Mac Office apps, Microsoft also makes ctrl+a and ctrl+e do what they do in windows lol.

Can you be specific about your bad experiences with Apple hardware? I've gone through 5 MacBook Pros since 2008 and my only complaint was the old Intel models always got too hot. Nothing ever broke on them and I guess I kept them relatively clean?

I also have all of the adapters that came with the MBPs too, all perfectly functioning, the oldest still attached and powering my 2013 model with the dead battery (2008 model was sold, still working). The magsafe cable is pretty yellow now, and maybe a little wonky from the constant travelling, but no fraying/fire hazard yet.

Was there a Gateway that did better?

n=4 but my niece spilled a whole cup of milk and a whole cup of matcha on my M2 (twice on 1 device). I just flipped it up, dried it out with a hair dryer (apparently shouldn't do that) and it still works 2 years later.

Can't relate to what you're saying, had 4 MacBooks, and many PCs too.

Also they leak charge onto the case.

Any properly grounded device will do that with specifically incorrect electrical wiring and/or a shoddy charger. Did this happen with a properly wired outlet, and an undamaged Apple charger?

I have doubts that it did, as that would warrant a safety recall.

Can confirm it does happen. UK, both on my ThinkPad and a friend's MacBook when plugged in. It's a somewhat unavoidable side effect of the switching AC adapter designs - the output is isolated from the mains, but there is a tiny leakage current that can sometimes be felt as a "vibration". This is completely safe (far below the currents needed to cause harm) and no recall is needed.

Thank you. I always felt this vibration and wondered what it was.

If you replace the two prong plug on the AC adapter for a three prong cable, your MacBook case will be properly grounded and you won’t feel any vibration.

Cast aside your doubts, I've been to different parts of Europe a few times with different, healthy MBPs (I buy a new one every 4-5 years) with healthy adapters.

Plugging into the wide EU outlet with the Apple-manufactured plug, from the "World Travel Adapter Kit", can lead to uncomfortable "vibration" that you feel when you touch the top case, depending on the the hotel/airbnb. Whenever I visit I expect I should charge while I'm not using the device.

In researching why it was happening to me, I found sufficient forum posts complaining about it that it seems to be commonplace.

I have my doubts that Apple would admit enough to perform a safety recall given the issues they've had with their garbage chargers in the past. Other companies have no problems with building hardware that lasts. Apple seem to prefer their customers pay for replacements.

Found this out one time when I went to touch my MBA and it was like I stuck my finger in a light socket.

>Oh, that smell of molten keyboard plastic, those yellow spots burned into a display with its own heat exhaust, those laser-machined loudspeaker holes next to keyboard, all filled with grime! How I miss that time on a Macbook, with all the chords you have to press whenever you need a Home or End button to edit the line! Not to mention the power button right next to backspace. It's so rewarding when its charger dies in a month, and you feel superior to your colleague, whose vintage 6 months old charging cable with none of that extraneous rubber next to the connector catches fire along with your office. What a time to be alive!

None of the above sound like anybody's actual experience. Which is also they have the biggest resale value retention among PC laptops, and biggest reported user satisfaction.

Now, if you were about the lack of ports (at least for a period) or the crappy "butterfly" keyboard (for a period), you'd have an actual point.

Home/End is just Control-A/E.

Never seen "molten keyboard plastic". I'm sure you can find some person who has that somewhere on the internet. I doubt it's a problem beyond some 0.0001% rare battery failures or something like that.

"yellow spots burned into a display with its own heat exhaust". Not sure what this even means. Especially AS Macs don't even get hot. I haven't heard the fan ever, and I use a M1 MBP of 5+ years with vms and heavy audio/video apps.

"when its charger dies in a month" is just bs.

Staingate?

I had a GPU issue (that was the subject of a recall that matched my symptoms precisely (and I could make the MBP core dump on demand in the Genius Bar) but "recall declined, does not fail diagnostics".

Damaged charging circuit on an MBA. Laptop worked perfectly. Battery health check fine. Just could not charge it. "That will be a $900 repair. Maybe we can look at getting you into a new Mac?" (for one brief moment I thought they were going to exchange mine... no, they wanted me to buy one. And of course, my MBA couldn't be traded in because it was damaged...).

I've also had multiple Magsafe connectors fray to the point of becoming like a paper lantern with all the bare wire visible, despite the cable being attached to a desk with cable connectors so there was near zero cable stress (and often only plugged/unplugged once a week).

While I was in law school, every student who had an Apple laptop had to get their laptop replaced at least once (some multiple times) over the course of our program. The biggest problem was the bulging keyboard, due to the bulging battery, but their were also numerous issues with displays and with chargers not lasting very long. Most chargers lasted at least a semester, but few of the Apple chargers lasted an entire school year. They simply weren't designed with durability in mind. Quite humorously, after one student's laptop keyboard began bulging during torts, the professor began an impromptu lecture on product liability laws.

The only PC laptops that were replaced were the ones that got damaged in accidents (car accidents, dropped off a balcony, used as a shield in self defense during a robbery, etc.). Dell Latitudes of that era were sturdy, and not noticeably heavier than their fragile Apple counterparts.