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Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

9to5mac.com

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Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#61

Post by Shivetya »

jclardy wrote: post #10

Makes sense with Apple's current terrible product line setup. Both the retina MacBook and 2016 MacBook Pro are much more niche than their last generation. Also much more confusing as the MacBook Air successor is $500 more than the 13" Air was (The non-touchbar MacBook Pro is the spiritual successor to the air.) The true 13" Pro for 2016 is also $500 more than the last gen. The 12" MacBook is there...but it is a super…

How Apple can leave the Mac Pro and Mini in their old configuration this long is beyond reason. 1000 days since its debut. Apple should be ashamed of this. Yet this company is operating like the days before Steve returned except this time there is no Steve to right it

I expect the iMac to get a new chipset but I would like to see the Mac mini updated. Either update the Mac Pro or pull it.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#62

Post by astrodust »

guelo wrote: post #53

Both Dell and Lenovo's websites are awful. They try so hard to segment the market that they make it almost impossible to shop their products. I want to buy but I can't figure out what they are selling.

Dell's laptop picker is bad enough. Try their enterprise server configuration tool and you'll want to burn down their headquarters and steal their red stapler.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#64

Post by feross »

jclardy wrote: post #10

Makes sense with Apple's current terrible product line setup. Both the retina MacBook and 2016 MacBook Pro are much more niche than their last generation. Also much more confusing as the MacBook Air successor is $500 more than the 13" Air was (The non-touchbar MacBook Pro is the spiritual successor to the air.) The true 13" Pro for 2016 is also $500 more than the last gen. The 12" MacBook is there...but it is a super…

"If you want to write fast software, use a slow computer" - Dominic Tarr

The 12" Macbook is the best computer I've ever owned. Switched to it from a 2014 Macbook Pro, and found it very easy to adjust. The only time it struggles a little bit is when I run Windows in VMware, on occasion.

The biggest benefit of the Macbook 12" is that if software runs well on your computer, you know it's guaranteed to run extra buttery-smooth on other computers, which all have beefier CPUs and GPUs.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#65

Post by astrodust »

Shivetya wrote: post #61
jclardy wrote: post #10

Makes sense with Apple's current terrible product line setup. Both the retina MacBook and 2016 MacBook Pro are much more niche than their last generation. Also much more confusing as the MacBook Air successor is $500 more than the 13" Air was (The non-touchbar MacBook Pro is the spiritual successor to the air.) The true 13" Pro for 2016 is also $500 more than the last gen. The 12" MacBook is there...but it is a super…

How Apple can leave the Mac Pro and Mini in their old configuration this long is beyond reason. 1000 days since its debut. Apple should be ashamed of this. Yet this company is operating like the days before Steve returned except this time there is no Steve to right it I expect the iMac to get a new chipset but I would like to see the Mac mini updated. Either update the Mac Pro or pull it.

They claim there's updates in the works. Here's hoping they push them out soon.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#66

Post by ArtDev »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #56
bostand wrote: post #2

Given the CES announcements from Lenovo, Samsung and asus I can only assume 2017 will be even worse for Apple. Laptop with 25 hrs battery? Give me two please!

And yet no one but Apple can seem to make a decent track pad (even for windows). It's a show stopper for me whenever I think of moving back to a PC.

My Lenovo has an amazing trackpad.

It is better than my wife's Macbook Air (though my machine is much much newer than hers).

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#67

Post by jclardy »

rigden33 wrote: post #59
jclardy wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, but should we really count a laptop with a horrible looking TN panel, 1440x900 resolution, and a processor two generations behind that costs $1k to be a viable option for people? That laptop should cost $700 max in 2017. The only reason they have it is likely for education sales, since they have no other reasonable laptop right now.

Yes, why wouldn't we count it? It's an entry level laptop for a reason; it's going to have entry-level specs.

I guess what I'm really asking (given the original subject of the post being declining Mac sales) is who is going to buy it? You can buy a Chromebook with a 13" IPS touchscreen that looks better than the Air for $250. The air is a decent machine for doing dev work, but compared to what its competitors it is a complete rip-off. Its only selling point is running OS X.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#68

Post by michaelbuckbee »

feross wrote: post #64
jclardy wrote: post #10

Makes sense with Apple's current terrible product line setup. Both the retina MacBook and 2016 MacBook Pro are much more niche than their last generation. Also much more confusing as the MacBook Air successor is $500 more than the 13" Air was (The non-touchbar MacBook Pro is the spiritual successor to the air.) The true 13" Pro for 2016 is also $500 more than the last gen. The 12" MacBook is there...but it is a super…

"If you want to write fast software, use a slow computer" - Dominic Tarr The 12" Macbook is the best computer I've ever owned. Switched to it from a 2014 Macbook Pro, and found it very easy to adjust. The only time it struggles a little bit is when I run Windows in VMware, on occasion. The biggest benefit of the Macbook 12" is that if software runs well on your computer, you know it's guaranteed to run extra buttery-…

It's a good quote, but I feel it reflects a time when I didn't also need to run a stack of Redis, RabbitMQ, Postgres and webserver apps on my development box.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#69

Post by kajecounterhack »

jclardy wrote: post #37
TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh? No, Apple's entry-level laptop is the $999 MacBook Air 13″, which has an i5. The 11″ MacBook Air was discontinued, but the 13″ is still around.

It is, but should we really count a laptop with a horrible looking TN panel, 1440x900 resolution, and a processor two generations behind that costs $1k to be a viable option for people? That laptop should cost $700 max in 2017. The only reason they have it is likely for education sales, since they have no other reasonable laptop right now.

Anecdote: Most of my non-technical friends are happy to use iPhones and purchase Macs that they can afford (the lowest price point, as bad as the specs are) because to them it's all the same. "It's an iPhone. / It's a Mac."

They don't care what the exact specs are as long as they can use their browser, word processing, watch netflix, and do minor photo editing. They don't know what IPS or TN are, and don't seem to care.

Hell I have a 15" mbp all spec'ed out and most of what I do is browser, terminal, netflix.

Re: Mac sales declined nearly 10% last year as Lenovo, Dell and others gained ground

#70

Post by rigden33 »

jclardy wrote: post #67
rigden33 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, why wouldn't we count it? It's an entry level laptop for a reason; it's going to have entry-level specs.

I guess what I'm really asking (given the original subject of the post being declining Mac sales) is who is going to buy it? You can buy a Chromebook with a 13" IPS touchscreen that looks better than the Air for $250. The air is a decent machine for doing dev work, but compared to what its competitors it is a complete rip-off. Its only selling point is running OS X.

Well what do most people (not just devs) like about macbooks? I would say build quality, "it just works" (macOS), and status as an apple product. The entry level macbook air still has those things. As for the chromebook comparison, macbooks have always been more expensive than its competitors at the same spec level, so this is nothing new.

I feel like saying it isn't a viable machine because of old specs isn't necessarily true since people will still buy it.

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