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Re: Apple Business

#121

Post by Petersipoi »

codeulike wrote: post #105
selectively wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft is a giant enterprise software company that also publishes Candy Crush and Call of Duty. Intune and Windows are 'nice to have' but are not the business-business. The business is 365 (which runs on Macs and is worlds better than Apple's office suite + Apple's hosted email is god awful) and Azure.

Exactly. So many people on hn have no idea how diversified Microsoft is, and have no inkling of what the enterprise market is like

On the contrary, nobody here is suggesting Microsoft isn't really diverse. They're suggesting that Apple is going to start to eat into their SMB market.

Nobody at Microsoft is saying, "we don't care if Apple chips away at SMB because we have Call of Duty"

Re: Apple Business

#122

Post by 999900000999 »

dangus wrote: post #99
999900000999 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

*499$ with an EDU discount which definitely means they have margin for business deals. Revenge of the Mac. Theirs simply no reason for any normal person to buy anything else. The year of Linux is deferred yet again.

I keep shouting from the rooftops the fact that the Neo is really not that disruptive or even necessarily that good of a deal. Like, have any of you actually looked at street prices at Micro Center or Best Buy recently? In the price range of the higher model Neo you can get a Yoga 7 with an OLED convertible touch screen, 1TB storage, 16GB of RAM, along with a processor with better multicore and iGPU performance (Ryze…

And it comes with Windows.

Back in the normal world people don't use Linux. If you have the funds you can get an M4 Air with 16GB for 800$.

I still have a 8GB M1 air, it's fine for filling out paper work and watching YouTube, which is the extent of what most people do

Re: Apple Business

#123

Post by Petersipoi »

dangus wrote: post #111
martibravo wrote: post #17

599$ serviceable MacBooks, easy to use MDM, Cloud, Email and Calendar and flat-fee AppleCare all baked in? New businesses under 50 employees are going to eat this up like there's no tomorrow. I'd be scared if I was certain Redmond corporation who makes their money on 365 and Intune.

Serviceable != upgradable or long-lasting. So many people are going to get burned by the hypnotism of these Neos. They're going to be gateways into being traded in within 2-3 years to get something with more RAM and storage when their owners find out how much they struggle with basic tasks due to insufficient RAM and storage. If you actually go on Best Buy or Micro Center websites and look at street prices you'll rea…

$500 for 2-3 years is great. And it will last much longer than that in reality.

It's pretty plain to see that the Neo eats any competitors lunch at that price point. It isn't close.

Re: Apple Business

#124

Post by selectively »

Petersipoi wrote: post #121
codeulike wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. So many people on hn have no idea how diversified Microsoft is, and have no inkling of what the enterprise market is like

On the contrary, nobody here is suggesting Microsoft isn't really diverse. They're suggesting that Apple is going to start to eat into their SMB market. Nobody at Microsoft is saying, "we don't care if Apple chips away at SMB because we have Call of Duty"

Microsoft offers Office for Mac. It's a thing they do. It's the full fledged Office suite. They see a Mac user the same way they see a Windows user - a source of revenue.

Re: Apple Business

#125

Post by dangus »

selectively wrote: post #118
dangus wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree strongly. Again, I tried it in store at the exact same time as trying other laptops. Yes, it's a little bit better than the alternatives, but, critically, not by much. Not by enough to sway a purchase decision. It's not better than diving board mechanical trackpads by enough of a margin for most consumers to notice. Also, macOS over-relies on trackpad gestures. You don't really need them anywhere near as m…

One of the things is an Acer. The other is a Mac. That sways purchase decisoons - one is a nice thing, the other one is a low end PC. I have used countless modern PC devices, including some from Acer. Few PCs have a trackpad of the level of the Neo and none from Acer. Your logic with "Apple's intentions" reveals a person who is incapable of decent analysis; macOS relies on gestures a lot because the vast majority of…

My point is that Apple is in many ways joining Acer, not bringing their luxury product down to the masses.

Yes, in many ways they’re bringing a very polished product to the space. But in many other ways, look closely and you’ll see the cut corners.

Again, I’ve felt the Neo in person. The chassis feels nice, sure. It’s not built to the same level as Apple’s other products, though.

The bottom plate is not CNCed, it’s a stamped aluminum plate. That means there is variation in the gap along the bottom of the laptop between the man case and the bottom plate that doesn’t exist on the Air or Pro.

Again, the trackpad is good but is worse than many haptic trackpads offered by PC manufacturers like Lenovo.

Again, if you think the PC industry has no chance of competing, go to your retailer website and look at street prices. Look at laptop reviews from places like Just Josh Tech on YouTube. PC manufacturers aren’t making trash.

Acer is actually a great example of a really solid PC. I felt the $530 model Micro Center is selling and it seemed to do the job: thin and light enough, felt sturdy, similar trackpad to the Neo, better specs and I/O. I’d say I only wanted the display to be a little better, though on the plus side it was bigger than the Neo’s cramped 13”.

This isn’t 2005. There is a misguided assumption to assume that PCs are still trash like they were 10 years ago. They just aren’t.

One little random bit to point out: there are 100 million Mac users globally as of 2024. There are more than 900 million PC gamers globally.

So, if I’m a high school student or college student who has money for one computer and I am a member of that group of 900 million PC gamers, I might just go get a last gen Lenovo LOQ with the RTX 4050 or something similar in the current gen from someone like MSI with an RTX 5050.

I would deal with a chunkier plastickier laptop but it would get similar battery life to the Neo for office tasks and I could actually play games. 16GB RAM. Modular storage. Price is around $700.

And I’ll be honest, that trackpad ain’t gonna be much worse than the Neo. And I’ll get to keep my backlit keyboard and have some I/O.

Re: Apple Business

#127

Post by selectively »

dangus wrote: post #125
selectively wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the things is an Acer. The other is a Mac. That sways purchase decisoons - one is a nice thing, the other one is a low end PC. I have used countless modern PC devices, including some from Acer. Few PCs have a trackpad of the level of the Neo and none from Acer. Your logic with "Apple's intentions" reveals a person who is incapable of decent analysis; macOS relies on gestures a lot because the vast majority of…

My point is that Apple is in many ways joining Acer, not bringing their luxury product down to the masses. Yes, in many ways they’re bringing a very polished product to the space. But in many other ways, look closely and you’ll see the cut corners. Again, I’ve felt the Neo in person. The chassis feels nice, sure. It’s not built to the same level as Apple’s other products, though. The bottom plate is not CNCed, it’s a…

You are deeply confused (you do not understand public perception/you do not understand how choosing a ''good pc'' is hard for most people/you don't grasp that a luxury brand versus Acer for the same price is a no brainer for most people, regardless of I/O or whatever) and - frankly - you are not worth discussing anything with. Have a good rest of your day.

Re: Apple Business

#128

Post by sleepybrett »

dfabulich wrote: post #97

Strategically, Apple's not setting themselves up for success here by giving Apple Business away for free (with paid per-user storage bumps). As a lot of people on this thread have pointed out, Apple's Business Manager needs a lot of improvements. ("Bring your own device" support is terrible, for example. Changing business names requires a perilous migration step. Support reps don't have the tools to fix serious issue…

Seems like par for the course for a product launch like this. I'll see where they are in a year.

Re: Apple Business

#129

Post by chipotle_coyote »

selectively wrote: post #106
genthree wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's office suite is my favorite I've ever used, and it's not close. After that, old copies of MSOffice. Next-best would be a hodgepodge of the lighter options on Linux and such. Gnumeric, Abiword, that sort of thing. Not great, but at least they're light on resources and easy to use. Distantly after that, LibreOffice. Then, modern MSOffice in last place. The only reason I'd count any of them as "worse" than moder…

I liked the way Pages 09 looked - it was beautiful - but the compatibility wasn't there. Modern Pages is hideous. And you hit the nail on the head with the whole 'Office = the document always opens/looks right' thing.

It's not pretty, but both Pages and Numbers are pretty powerful in their modern incarnations. If you actually need Microsoft Office, then you need it, but a lot of people who don't think they could get away with just Apple's freebies probably could.

(Disclosure: I write 99% of my stuff in Emacs now, so I'm not going to go that far out on a limb for iWork. It's just that it's the best "Works"-style suite that I've used.)

Re: Apple Business

#130

Post by sleepybrett »

genthree wrote: post #72
selectively wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft is a giant enterprise software company that also publishes Candy Crush and Call of Duty. Intune and Windows are 'nice to have' but are not the business-business. The business is 365 (which runs on Macs and is worlds better than Apple's office suite + Apple's hosted email is god awful) and Azure.

Apple's office suite is my favorite I've ever used, and it's not close. After that, old copies of MSOffice. Next-best would be a hodgepodge of the lighter options on Linux and such. Gnumeric, Abiword, that sort of thing. Not great, but at least they're light on resources and easy to use. Distantly after that, LibreOffice. Then, modern MSOffice in last place. The only reason I'd count any of them as "worse" than moder…

I used word for windows 2.0 well into the early 2000s. My needs aren't crazy and I don't think word has added a single feature I've cared about since. Pages is my current go-to.
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