Apple's white polycarbonate MacBook, which has long served as the company's entry-level notebook, may be slowly phased out this year, according to one insider.
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of Concord Securities shared with AppleInsider Tuesday that industry checks show that Apple's internal shipment forecast for the white MacBook suspiciously drops-off in August of this year, which leads him to believe that the notebook may go "end of life" around the same time.
In his view, Apple's $999 MacBook Air is a more than suitable replacement for the identically priced white MacBook. An updated MacBook Air with 128GB minimum hard drive space is expected to see an introduction as early as Wednesday.
Kuo said that monthly shipments for the Core 2 Duo MacBook have fallen to between 80,000 and 100,000 units, and therefore comprised less than 10 percent of Apple's total Mac shipments during the first half of 2011. Though Apple continues to offer the yesteryear notebook as part of its Mac portfolio, this data indicates consumers are proactively choosing notebooks with the latest technology, like the new MacBook Airs or MacBook Pros.
While some industry-watchers believe the white MacBook could continue to serve as a low-cost, entry-level Mac with a price reduction (similar to what Apple has done with the iPhone 3GS), it's uncertain that the Cupertino-based company remains interested in continuing to market the hefty, previous-generation design alongside its sleek new Mac OS Lion operating system.
AppleInsider first revealed in late June that supply of the white MacBook was severely constrained. Weeks later, stock-outs remain at resellers like Amazon, where the notebook is advertised to ship within two to five weeks. However, that's the same lead time Amazon has reflected on an on-again, off-again basis for the past three weeks. In fact, just two of seven authorized resellers tracked in the Mac Pricing Guide (below) are reflecting availability.
The Intel-powered MacBook was first launched in May of 2006, replacing the PowerPC-based iBook and PowerBook. Sporting a 13-inch display, it originally came in both black and white flavors.
The notebook was redesigned in 2009, when it was given a unibody construction like the MacBook Pro. The new notebook was also given an LED-backlit display, integrated battery and multi-touch glass trackpad.
While the MacBook stood alone at the $999 price point among Apple's notebooks for years, that changed in 2010, when the MacBook Air was redesigned and expanded to include an 11-inch model. Upon its introduction, that $999 notebook saw strong sales as consumers took to the thin-and-light device.
Advantages for the current $999 MacBook Air over the existing MacBook include a unibody aluminum enclosure, and a thin-and-light design with fast and reliable solid-state flash memory storage. But the entry-level MacBook Air also has some disadvantages when compared to the white MacBook, namely a smaller 11-inch screen and fewer ports, including lack of Ethernet.
If you have a touch screen you don't want a mouse, and if you have a mouse you don't want a touch interface. They're such different paradigms that any software that works naturally with one is going to be bleeding orrible with the other.
A mouse or for that matter a trackpad demands a pointer, which is anathema to a touchscreen.
I agree that's why I'm suggesting a user interface that adapts depending upon the user input. I didn't say it would be easy.
I hope they're heading to a back and forth kind of system.
My idea for this is named uOS, Universal Operating System. It would come with everything. But when installing on a device, it would load only the parts the device could handle. When moving from a phone to an iPad, there would be more, and a more sophisticated overall system. Moving to a notebook or bigger machine, everything would be available.
But if you plugged in accessories, it would recognize that, and the appropriate drivers and API's would be activated.
The concept would be a smooth increase in power the higher you went, opening up areas as you go, such as a file system, drop down menus, mice, etc. I think people would find that easy and natural to use.
All along, you could use touch. I imagine that by that time, the slide down iMac, or whatever it would become, would allow touch on a full sized device, and Apple would have solved the problems some think exist now.
Obviously, this concept needs to be refined.
That's exactly what I have in mind but you said it much better.
Keyboards are fine, or at least should be - everytime you were entering text on a pad you were doing it via a virtual keyboard anyway so the idioms match up. The mouse idiom is completely different though. What is the touchscreen equivalent of double-click? What is the mouse equivalent of pinch to zoom? What's the touchscreen mouseover? What's the mouse pan for an embedded-pane? There are no good answers and the joy of iOS was that it never occurred to you to ask because it was designed with touch idioms from the ground up.
There's no good technical solution to this because it's not really a technical problem - it's a human/machine interface problem.
Well, again, your just being argumentative, and it's only your opinion. A mouse hover could be very easily accommodated if apple wanted to do that. There is no reason why anything couldn't be done.
Sometimes Apple goes to the extreme to force people into doing something their way, but it's not always the best way, if it has to be done that way every time.
I may be misremembering, I'm sure I read somewhere that NAND prices were staying stubbornly high due to unexpected demand for FLASH in SANs and other data-centre applications.
No, prices have been dropping the past 6 months or so. Not as fast as RAM though. What I see at OWc is that SSd prices drop in lockstep with their RAM pricing, though much less, as an SSD is much more than a stick of RAM in complexity.
I agree that's why I'm suggesting a user interface that adapts depending upon the user input. I didn't say it would be easy.
And that why I've been suggesting that user choice gets more sophisticated as the devices become more sophisticated. He thinks I'm suggesting a mouse with an iPhone.
Apple isn't interested in getting into more homes by making their products as crappy as PCs. In fact, they have said many times that they just won't do it.
Higher specs don't make for a better machine. They don't make for a longer lasting machine, and they can't come close to Apples service and support.
If people want a cheap PC, then let them buy them.
PC does not equal crappy. Get over that now. I'd prefer Apple, but my new laptop is pretty whiz-bang plus a bag of chips. It's not "crap" just because it's not Apple.
iOS4 will've been with us approx. 1 1/2 year -- June10-Oct11
This will be the case wih iOS5 -- a 1 1/2 year wait until the next one -- that's just so Lion can be said to've at least lasted more than a year.
And what will be the "Next One"?
A combination of OS X+iOS
iOS
+
OS X
=
iOS i X
One OS to rule them all ....
Desktops/Notebooks/Tablets/iPods.
I thought they might do a foundation upgrade next in a tick/tock method (not unlike Intel CPU releases) with the next version being Mountain Lion, just as Leopard moved to Snow Leopard, but with the new GAAP accounting on Lion there is no need for that now.
PC does not equal crappy. Get over that now. I'd prefer Apple, but my new laptop is pretty whiz-bang plus a bag of chips. It's not "crap" just because it's not Apple.
No; that's not Apple's way (and, obviously, we can see that Apple's never going to produce a sub-$999 notebook now). But it's flat-out wrong to say that can't.
PC does not equal crappy. Get over that now. I'd prefer Apple, but my new laptop is pretty whiz-bang plus a bag of chips. It's not "crap" just because it's not Apple.
That's the semi official definition of "PC", piece of crap.
Seriously though, Pcs just aren't made as well, the support isn't as good, etc. You get what you pay for.
I thought they might do a foundation upgrade next in a tick/tock method (not unlike Intel CPU releases) with the next version being Mountain Lion, just as Leopard moved to Snow Leopard, but with the new GAAP accounting on Lion there is no need for that now.
A Mountain Lion is a much lessor cat. It would be a step backwards. I do believe that the next version will be even more radical. They have to work us into it. To do it all at once would be too disorienting.
How about Elephant? It's really big, it stomps on everything, and it has no rivals.
A Mountain Lion is a much lessor cat. It would be a step backwards. I do believe that the next version will be even more radical. They have to work us into it. To do it all at once would be too disorienting.
How about Elephant? It's really big, it stomps on everything, and it has no rivals.
Not a cat, though.
We're at Lion, so the only way we can step up is Mac OS X 10.8 Saber.
Or just end OS X and finally get a fully multitouch desktop OS.
A Mountain Lion is a much lessor cat. It would be a step backwards. I do believe that the next version will be even more radical. They have to work us into it. To do it all at once would be too disorienting.
How about Elephant? It's really big, it stomps on everything, and it has no rivals.
1) A snow leopard is smaller than a leopard so by your reasoning Mac OS X 10.6 was a "step backwards" from Mac OS X 10.5. But it wasn't; it was aesthetically similar but the unpinnings were greatly redesigned, hence they used the same codename with an additional word. If they do a tick/took method again it's not unprecedented for Apple to do the same thing again.
2) As long as it's Mac OS X ? not Mac OS XI ? I don't think they'll move from the cat names. I also don't think elephant would be used as there arent many paciderms to choose from.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Not a cat, though.
We're at Lion, so the only way we can step up is Mac OS X 10.8 Saber.
Or just end OS X and finally get a fully multitouch desktop OS.
1) Sabertooth tiger would indicate that Mac OS X is long in the tooth.
We're at Lion, so the only way we can step up is Mac OS X 10.8 Saber.
Or just end OS X and finally get a fully multitouch desktop OS.
That's why I broke with cats. I think Apple is through with them. Elephant is tongue in cheek of course, but hopefully it will represent the reality when the next version comes out in two years or so.
Oh yes, I think Apple is moving in that direction. But we know how Apple is. They don't show their hand until the latest possible moment.
Look at how amazingly clumsy Win8 is. The writers who like it are too tecky. I'm reading business articles that are saying that managers are going to stay a long way from it and probably wait for Win 9, or whatever it will be called.
Apple is working very hard to get changes in, but to also not confuse us too much. MS went in whole hog. They tried to put lipstick on that hog, but the tusks are showing.
Comments
Apple's white polycarbonate MacBook, which has long served as the company's entry-level notebook, may be slowly phased out this year, according to one insider.
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of Concord Securities shared with AppleInsider Tuesday that industry checks show that Apple's internal shipment forecast for the white MacBook suspiciously drops-off in August of this year, which leads him to believe that the notebook may go "end of life" around the same time.
In his view, Apple's $999 MacBook Air is a more than suitable replacement for the identically priced white MacBook. An updated MacBook Air with 128GB minimum hard drive space is expected to see an introduction as early as Wednesday.
Kuo said that monthly shipments for the Core 2 Duo MacBook have fallen to between 80,000 and 100,000 units, and therefore comprised less than 10 percent of Apple's total Mac shipments during the first half of 2011. Though Apple continues to offer the yesteryear notebook as part of its Mac portfolio, this data indicates consumers are proactively choosing notebooks with the latest technology, like the new MacBook Airs or MacBook Pros.
While some industry-watchers believe the white MacBook could continue to serve as a low-cost, entry-level Mac with a price reduction (similar to what Apple has done with the iPhone 3GS), it's uncertain that the Cupertino-based company remains interested in continuing to market the hefty, previous-generation design alongside its sleek new Mac OS Lion operating system.
AppleInsider first revealed in late June that supply of the white MacBook was severely constrained. Weeks later, stock-outs remain at resellers like Amazon, where the notebook is advertised to ship within two to five weeks. However, that's the same lead time Amazon has reflected on an on-again, off-again basis for the past three weeks. In fact, just two of seven authorized resellers tracked in the Mac Pricing Guide (below) are reflecting availability.
The Intel-powered MacBook was first launched in May of 2006, replacing the PowerPC-based iBook and PowerBook. Sporting a 13-inch display, it originally came in both black and white flavors.
The notebook was redesigned in 2009, when it was given a unibody construction like the MacBook Pro. The new notebook was also given an LED-backlit display, integrated battery and multi-touch glass trackpad.
While the MacBook stood alone at the $999 price point among Apple's notebooks for years, that changed in 2010, when the MacBook Air was redesigned and expanded to include an 11-inch model. Upon its introduction, that $999 notebook saw strong sales as consumers took to the thin-and-light device.
Advantages for the current $999 MacBook Air over the existing MacBook include a unibody aluminum enclosure, and a thin-and-light design with fast and reliable solid-state flash memory storage. But the entry-level MacBook Air also has some disadvantages when compared to the white MacBook, namely a smaller 11-inch screen and fewer ports, including lack of Ethernet.
[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]
This would be wise on apple's part as the new MBA triumphs over the existing white mac book and at the same price it is a no briainer
If you have a touch screen you don't want a mouse, and if you have a mouse you don't want a touch interface. They're such different paradigms that any software that works naturally with one is going to be bleeding orrible with the other.
A mouse or for that matter a trackpad demands a pointer, which is anathema to a touchscreen.
I agree that's why I'm suggesting a user interface that adapts depending upon the user input. I didn't say it would be easy.
I hope they're heading to a back and forth kind of system.
My idea for this is named uOS, Universal Operating System. It would come with everything. But when installing on a device, it would load only the parts the device could handle. When moving from a phone to an iPad, there would be more, and a more sophisticated overall system. Moving to a notebook or bigger machine, everything would be available.
But if you plugged in accessories, it would recognize that, and the appropriate drivers and API's would be activated.
The concept would be a smooth increase in power the higher you went, opening up areas as you go, such as a file system, drop down menus, mice, etc. I think people would find that easy and natural to use.
All along, you could use touch. I imagine that by that time, the slide down iMac, or whatever it would become, would allow touch on a full sized device, and Apple would have solved the problems some think exist now.
Obviously, this concept needs to be refined.
That's exactly what I have in mind but you said it much better.
It's not a question of power - it's a question of idiom. Adding mice to a touch screen would be like adding the Finnish case system to English.
That's your opinion, and that's fine. I don't agree. I use my iPad hours a day, and there are times I would be very happy with my trackball.
Do you have an iPad?
Keyboards are fine, or at least should be - everytime you were entering text on a pad you were doing it via a virtual keyboard anyway so the idioms match up. The mouse idiom is completely different though. What is the touchscreen equivalent of double-click? What is the mouse equivalent of pinch to zoom? What's the touchscreen mouseover? What's the mouse pan for an embedded-pane? There are no good answers and the joy of iOS was that it never occurred to you to ask because it was designed with touch idioms from the ground up.
There's no good technical solution to this because it's not really a technical problem - it's a human/machine interface problem.
Well, again, your just being argumentative, and it's only your opinion. A mouse hover could be very easily accommodated if apple wanted to do that. There is no reason why anything couldn't be done.
Sometimes Apple goes to the extreme to force people into doing something their way, but it's not always the best way, if it has to be done that way every time.
You have a very limited way of looking at things.
I may be misremembering, I'm sure I read somewhere that NAND prices were staying stubbornly high due to unexpected demand for FLASH in SANs and other data-centre applications.
No, prices have been dropping the past 6 months or so. Not as fast as RAM though. What I see at OWc is that SSd prices drop in lockstep with their RAM pricing, though much less, as an SSD is much more than a stick of RAM in complexity.
I agree that's why I'm suggesting a user interface that adapts depending upon the user input. I didn't say it would be easy.
And that why I've been suggesting that user choice gets more sophisticated as the devices become more sophisticated. He thinks I'm suggesting a mouse with an iPhone.
That's exactly what I have in mind but you said it much better.
Thanks.
Or, Apple could just be drawing down on inventories for a product refresh. I think the biggest advantage of the MacBook is the optical drive.
Props to Ming-Chi Kuo. His kungfu is looking pretty good after some decent hits.
Apple isn't interested in getting into more homes by making their products as crappy as PCs. In fact, they have said many times that they just won't do it.
Higher specs don't make for a better machine. They don't make for a longer lasting machine, and they can't come close to Apples service and support.
If people want a cheap PC, then let them buy them.
PC does not equal crappy. Get over that now. I'd prefer Apple, but my new laptop is pretty whiz-bang plus a bag of chips. It's not "crap" just because it's not Apple.
Now, we've reached the pinnacle of catdom, the Lion.
What's after that?
... they've gone to the top, perhaps that's telling us something.
Oh, absolutely.
Consider ....
iOS4 will've been with us approx. 1 1/2 year -- June10-Oct11
This will be the case wih iOS5 -- a 1 1/2 year wait until the next one -- that's just so Lion can be said to've at least lasted more than a year.
And what will be the "Next One"?
A combination of OS X+iOS
iOS
+
OS X
=
iOS i X
One OS to rule them all ....
Desktops/Notebooks/Tablets/iPods.
Oh, absolutely.
Consider ....
iOS4 will've been with us approx. 1 1/2 year -- June10-Oct11
This will be the case wih iOS5 -- a 1 1/2 year wait until the next one -- that's just so Lion can be said to've at least lasted more than a year.
And what will be the "Next One"?
A combination of OS X+iOS
iOS
+
OS X
=
iOS i X
One OS to rule them all ....
Desktops/Notebooks/Tablets/iPods.
I thought they might do a foundation upgrade next in a tick/tock method (not unlike Intel CPU releases) with the next version being Mountain Lion, just as Leopard moved to Snow Leopard, but with the new GAAP accounting on Lion there is no need for that now.
PC does not equal crappy. Get over that now. I'd prefer Apple, but my new laptop is pretty whiz-bang plus a bag of chips. It's not "crap" just because it's not Apple.
what did you buy ??
But why should they?
No; that's not Apple's way (and, obviously, we can see that Apple's never going to produce a sub-$999 notebook now). But it's flat-out wrong to say that can't.
PC does not equal crappy. Get over that now. I'd prefer Apple, but my new laptop is pretty whiz-bang plus a bag of chips. It's not "crap" just because it's not Apple.
That's the semi official definition of "PC", piece of crap.
Seriously though, Pcs just aren't made as well, the support isn't as good, etc. You get what you pay for.
I thought they might do a foundation upgrade next in a tick/tock method (not unlike Intel CPU releases) with the next version being Mountain Lion, just as Leopard moved to Snow Leopard, but with the new GAAP accounting on Lion there is no need for that now.
A Mountain Lion is a much lessor cat. It would be a step backwards. I do believe that the next version will be even more radical. They have to work us into it. To do it all at once would be too disorienting.
How about Elephant? It's really big, it stomps on everything, and it has no rivals.
A Mountain Lion is a much lessor cat. It would be a step backwards. I do believe that the next version will be even more radical. They have to work us into it. To do it all at once would be too disorienting.
How about Elephant? It's really big, it stomps on everything, and it has no rivals.
Not a cat, though.
We're at Lion, so the only way we can step up is Mac OS X 10.8 Saber.
Or just end OS X and finally get a fully multitouch desktop OS.
A Mountain Lion is a much lessor cat. It would be a step backwards. I do believe that the next version will be even more radical. They have to work us into it. To do it all at once would be too disorienting.
How about Elephant? It's really big, it stomps on everything, and it has no rivals.
1) A snow leopard is smaller than a leopard so by your reasoning Mac OS X 10.6 was a "step backwards" from Mac OS X 10.5. But it wasn't; it was aesthetically similar but the unpinnings were greatly redesigned, hence they used the same codename with an additional word. If they do a tick/took method again it's not unprecedented for Apple to do the same thing again.
2) As long as it's Mac OS X ? not Mac OS XI ? I don't think they'll move from the cat names. I also don't think elephant would be used as there arent many paciderms to choose from.
Not a cat, though.
We're at Lion, so the only way we can step up is Mac OS X 10.8 Saber.
Or just end OS X and finally get a fully multitouch desktop OS.
1) Sabertooth tiger would indicate that Mac OS X is long in the tooth.
2) Mac OS X has been multitouch for years.
2) Mac OS X has been multitouch for years.
Yep. I said fully.
Not a cat, though.
We're at Lion, so the only way we can step up is Mac OS X 10.8 Saber.
Or just end OS X and finally get a fully multitouch desktop OS.
That's why I broke with cats. I think Apple is through with them. Elephant is tongue in cheek of course, but hopefully it will represent the reality when the next version comes out in two years or so.
Oh yes, I think Apple is moving in that direction. But we know how Apple is. They don't show their hand until the latest possible moment.
Look at how amazingly clumsy Win8 is. The writers who like it are too tecky. I'm reading business articles that are saying that managers are going to stay a long way from it and probably wait for Win 9, or whatever it will be called.
Apple is working very hard to get changes in, but to also not confuse us too much. MS went in whole hog. They tried to put lipstick on that hog, but the tusks are showing.