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Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

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Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#181

Post by [deleted] »

_mgr wrote: post #127
adl wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question, what makes Apple laptops beat the rest of the industry? No docking station, can't change batteries, no touch screens, no spill resistant keyboards, no matte screen option,etc. You also need those dongles for ethernet and video and can't upgrade RAM or hard drives on the retina models. Sure, the OS (if you need/like OSX, there is little choice), and the trackpad (if you like that those) are good, the…

Probably something to do with forgoing all the things you mentioned so that they could nail the true purpose of a laptop, while also making it aesthetically pleasing. This is a tenet of who Apple is as a company. Whether you agree with the aesthetic position is a personal preference. The figures speak for themselves though... a large proportion of consumers which includes IT professionals want what Apple sells more t…

[deleted]

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#182

Post by far33d »

hyp0 wrote: post #44

Apple has the technology headroom to keep making more powerful iphones for several more generations... but will it reach a point where people don't need a more powerful phone? (that they don't get any benefit from it, so that power is not utilized). I would have thought they were more powerful than a phone needs to be already, but obviously not! One view is that they are still replacing desktops, suggesting users wil…

Never underestimate the human ability to consume power / CPU / memory / sensors / etc. So far we've never had "enough" of any of these.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#183

Post by thrownaway2424 »

adl wrote: post #121
potatolicious wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More than Windows sucking, the OEM laptop industry has largely fumbled hardware. For a while it looked like Dell and/or Samsung might actually give Apple a run for its money in terms of design and quality, but that fell flat on its face. I'm a pretty biased sample, but honestly I know more people running non-OSX on Apple laptops than I know people running non-OSX on non-Apple laptops. Apple's laptops beat the rest of…

Serious question, what makes Apple laptops beat the rest of the industry? No docking station, can't change batteries, no touch screens, no spill resistant keyboards, no matte screen option,etc. You also need those dongles for ethernet and video and can't upgrade RAM or hard drives on the retina models. Sure, the OS (if you need/like OSX, there is little choice), and the trackpad (if you like that those) are good, the…

I'd rather have a ThinkPad, too, and I'm using one to write this. But I think you have to recognize that the PC market is massively fragmented and if you walk into a retail outlet you're going to see a lot of laptops, and none of them are going to be ThinkPads. Lenovo undermines their own products through the same fragmentation. If I just search on Google for "laptop" there are 8 top-ranked shopping items, one of which is a link to Best Buy to buy a 15.6" AMD-based Lenovo G50, which is a complete piece of shit no matter how you look at it. There are no piece of shit in Apple's catalog.

Now let's suppose it was just ThinkPads going head-to-head with MacBooks. I'd take the ThinkPad every time, except if it was a ThinkPad made in the last two years. They took a break from making good computers and instead decided to make expensive, fragile ThinkPads with useless keyboards and no mouse buttons. Apple can ship a laptop with no mouse buttons because Apple's software works. Lenovo doesn't have that luxury; they run Windows.

And let's not forget how many years Lenovo spent pissing on their loyal customers. For YEARS they insisted that it was not possible to 1) economically source IPS displays, and 2) source 4:3 displays. Then Apple comes out with the iPad, it has a 4:3 IPS display. Turns out Lenovo just didn't care if you had a good screen; they know you need a laptop and they are just trying to squeeze more profits out of you. Apple actually wants you to have a better product.

Now as I said I'm typing this on a ThinkPad. Why? Only two reasons: trackpoint, which is God's own pointing device, and a huge Esc key, for using vim. There are other minor reasons, like the fact that if you drop a MacBook it's guaranteed to get bent or dented, whereas if you drop a ThinkPad some little plastic giblet will break off, which is a better outcome in my experience. But if you forced me to think about it I'd have to admit that it's a reasonably durable case and a decent keyboard and mouse wrapped around a really mediocre computer. And the display is ghastly.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#184

Post by desdiv »

Alterlife wrote: post #151
freshyill wrote: post #37

Remember, Apple needs to target the low end to succeed in China. They need to put out the crappiest, cheapest phone they possibly can otherwise Samsung and Xiaomi will eat their lunch. Edit: Obvious sarcasm is apparently not obvious enough.

I know you said sarcasm, but Apple is selling the last gen iphones at a competitive price against Samsung mid range in India. For example: the iPhone 4S, 5c and 5s are 17,500 and 23,000 37500 Indian Rupees respectively. Compare that to the Galaxy S4 at ~26000 grand 2 at 17000, galaxy note 3 at 34000. Atleast in India, the last gen Apple phones seem to be priced competitively with the last gen Samsung phones. This is…

Are you sure you didn't mix up the model numbers? These sites [0][1] are saying it's the iPhone 5c that's 37500 Indian Rupees, which is 609 USD. In comparison, Walmart is offering the 5c, contract-free, at $549.[2]

[0] http://gadgets.ndtv.com/mobiles/news/iphone-5c-8gb-variant-l...

[1] http://tech.firstpost.com/news-analysis/priced-at-rs-37500-w...

[2] http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2428171,00.asp

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#185

Post by MBCook »

slantyyz wrote: post #179
MBCook wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had that kind of problem before, and I can also tell you the old PowerBooks in the G4 era could be pretty bad. You were thrilled to upgrade because it made a big difference. I've owned some of the older laptops where bits would start wearing out. My current laptop is a 2010 MBP and I've upgraded both the RAM and the HD, neither one is an option now. The upfront costs are higher than they used to be, and I'm not…

Well, let me tell you, I have never retired a PC laptop for any other reason that it got slow with age. That includes the cheap ones. My Macbook Pro was almost four years old but still quite fast. I replaced the logic board once under AppleCare, but it died out of warranty just before Christmas. I am not interested in paying 500+ for a new logic board with the same defect that my two previous logic boards had. There…

I don't blame you. I'm not sure what I'd do in that situation. "Wait it out" is a good strategy if there is a design element in the new machines you don't like (I did that with the early glossy screens) but if your current machine is defective and basically can't be fixed I wouldn't blame you for jumping ship at all.

It's too bad situations like this end up in court where even if you get made whole it takes years and years and in the mean time you're just stuck with extra costs.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#186

Post by ZanyProgrammer »

adl wrote: post #121
potatolicious wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More than Windows sucking, the OEM laptop industry has largely fumbled hardware. For a while it looked like Dell and/or Samsung might actually give Apple a run for its money in terms of design and quality, but that fell flat on its face. I'm a pretty biased sample, but honestly I know more people running non-OSX on Apple laptops than I know people running non-OSX on non-Apple laptops. Apple's laptops beat the rest of…

Serious question, what makes Apple laptops beat the rest of the industry? No docking station, can't change batteries, no touch screens, no spill resistant keyboards, no matte screen option,etc. You also need those dongles for ethernet and video and can't upgrade RAM or hard drives on the retina models. Sure, the OS (if you need/like OSX, there is little choice), and the trackpad (if you like that those) are good, the…

People want the *nix underpinnings of OS X. So many people would be lost if they had to transition to Windows. You don't see many non Visual Studio programmers programing in Windows. Certainly not your Ruby on Rails Macbook sitting in Hackerdojo/Red Rock types.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#187

Post by spydum »

puranjay wrote: post #52
fidotron wrote: post #6

Truly phenomenal. But then when no one else is making decent laptops this is what happens. If anything the gap has grown thanks to Windows 8. I'm not a fan of Yosemite by any stretch, but it is very much the least bad of the available options. And on mobile, iOS is very clearly in for the long haul now. There was a time a couple of years ago when Android looked like it might gain enough momentum to sweep them away, b…

Google's lack of oversight in the Play store (which is actually a core philosophy) is really holding back Android. There are countless really, really crappy apps and clones crowding the app store. Plus, since most people pirate, developers can't make money (Monument Valley saw around 95% piracy rate and just $250k in revenue from Android, vs. $5.5M from iOS). This sunk Windows Mobile, which I still believe has the be…

I think the real major difference is the psychological factor: Google as a brand stands for "free": Gmail, search, YouTub.. You name the top major Google products or brands, and they are considered free in most consumers minds.

You then look at Apple, and what do their users think of the brand? Expensive maybe, but valuable or luxury. This brand identity carries over into the App Store / play store comparisons quite heavily. It would really curious to compare metrics between the two sites with regard to the ratio of free vs non-free browsing of apps between the two marketplaces.. I suspect Play has a higher ratio of free-loaders vs Apple App Store.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#188

Post by gilgoomesh »

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #175
hollerith wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A salary increase of $180K quarterly (== $720K annually)!

Wow... Is that correct?

The numbers are correct.

A better interpretation would be: if the employees owned the company, they'd (effectively) get that much more per year. Instead, shareholders own the company so that money is (effectively) given in equity to the shareholders each year.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#189

Post by aklemm »

gxx wrote: post #177
MBCook wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The places where my hands interact with the machine are much more efficient and pleasing on a mac In general I'll agree with you but there is ONE thing that I don't like on Macs and still exists to this day (I believe). The notch in the aluminum below the trackpad to make it easy to open the machine has sharp left and right right angles, and that pokes me from time to time. I figure that's one of those 'this looks…

Every Macbook I buy I use some sandpaper (medium coarse and then fine) to round the sharp corners between the sides and the surface containing the keyboard & trackpad. I especially round the sharp points on the corners of finger-cutout to open the lid. I also slightly round the edges where the sides meet the top and bottom surface of the case. The result is that those sharp unpleasant feeling corners are now silky sm…

I do the same and can confirm it works like a charm.

Re: Apple Reports Record First Quarter Results

#190

Post by fru2013 »

hkmurakami wrote: post #139
puranjay wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a big branding issue as well. I know Apple makes two laptops: MBAs and MBPs. I don't know what all laptops Dell or Lenovo make. I don't know if they have ultrabooks, and if they do, what are their names. When I buy a new Windows laptop, I sort by specs, not brand. I avoid a few brands (HP, Acer), but as long as I get good enough specs at a good enough price, I'll buy anything. I don't care about specific models/…

A perfect demonstration of this problem is when you search Amazon for "Asus zenbook". It gives me a hundred results with various SKUs and model years and I have NO idea as a consumer which one is the best fit for me.

Search Amazon for "macbook". And you will see a similar pattern.
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