Because too many people don't think for the long (or even medium) term when making economic decisions.
Guess they won’t last long as professionals, then, which was the topic. As for consumers, they don’t care about such things in the first place, nor should they have to. As counterintuitive as it sounds to those of us who’ve spent our lives doing system hardware updates, having a set amount of RAM is a good thing. It forces software developers to actually create tight code again. Not anything like the mid-1980s, sure, but closer to than than the solution today. “Needs more RAM? Pour some more into the system, then; it’s their problem, not ours!”
Why do you think the entire Western world is currently embroiled in a debt crisis?
Idiots, not endemic of humanity as a whole.
Originally Posted by Frank777
Yeah, I caught that. But in fairness, buying an Pro machine without Thunderbolt or USB3 hasn't been a terribly smart decision either.
Wow. You see Mac users getting this defensive a lot on PC forums, but rarely on AI.
iFixit isn't completely wrong. In the current economic climate, buying a $1000. computer and then not being able to supplement the RAM a couple years later is terribly shortsighted.
You and the other iHaters keep saying that, but you've never been able to support it.
What percentage of people would upgrade a 21" iMac even if they had the option?
Of that number, what percentage will be just as happy (or happier) with the alternative (taking advantage of the high resale value and buying a new one)?
And, what percentage of people are happier with the soldered RAM because it makes the system more robust and reliable?
Until you can answer those questions, you're just whining.
Well yes, but I was talking about the past few years.
And we don't even know the price of the new Pro yet.
Hopefully, it won't be so far off as to push the Prosumer/Small Business market to iMacs.
(By that I mean there's hopefully a sub-$3000. model for business professionals. I know it's unlikely the Pro will be cheaper than the model it replaces.)
The difference isn't all that much? Some of those brands have twice as many problems as Macs - and even the average is at least 50% higher.
That's why I mentioned "the top PC desktops". For example Lenovo does pretty well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jragosta
In the end, repairability matters only for the 10% of users who have a problem and of that 10%, only the very small fraction who would fix the computer themselves if it were more accessible, but choose not to because it's difficult on the Mac. That is undoubtedly less than 10% of the people who have problems (i.e., well under 1% of total customers). So, you have 10% of customers with a problem with Macs vs 15% with PCs - a reduction of 33% - in exchange for 1% of potential users who might be slightly inconvenienced. That sounds like a good tradeoff.
When you say "good tradeoff", what is your alternative? Most people lamenting the recent iMac's lack of repairability are probably wishing for a more repairable Mac, not a PC. I'm not sure why you brought PCs into this discussion in the first place. What disadvantages of making the iMac's hard drive (the most failure-prone component of any computer) more easily accessible would outweigh the benefits?
My question is, how the hell is Apple going to design an even thinner iMac after this?? Its going to end up a desktop Mac Air with internal SSD only (also like that Mac Pro), that's way too anal isn't it? But in a way since mechanical hard drives have a higher chance of failure, its not so bad that its external, although cost of ownership will go up, and SSDs are way faster. We shall see ... I need to prepare for that mentally jeeze, my next upgrade although years away might be an extreme thin desktop like that. Do wish they make a fatter iMac at some point, yeah yeah focus focus ... so not likely more desktop SKUs.
Let's start with a simple question:
1. What percentage of iMacs break down vs what percentage of PCs? (Hint: the numbers are published and Macs have far greater reliability).
From personal experience
100% of my iMacs have failed
in total, 50% of my Macs have failed
What often gets ignored is that there's a tradeoff. Systems that are more repairable may be less reliable to start with.
As just one example, soldered RAM is harder to fix, but it fails far, far, far less often than memory sticks that are inserted into a slot. Personally, I'd rather have a system that's designed not to fail than one that fails frequently, but is easier to fix.
I've seen this claim asserted many times but haven't found data to support it. Can you supply a link? You are implying that the RAM socket is more likely to fail than the memory module. But if that were true, why does Apple still design many of its computers with memory slots? Why hasn't it soldered the RAM to all of its models?
I've seen this claim asserted many times but haven't found data to support it. Can you supply a link? You are implying that the RAM socket is more likely to fail than the memory module. But if that were true, why does Apple still design many of its computers with memory slots? Why hasn't it soldered the RAM to all of its models?
It doesn't imply any such thing.
The memory chip has a certain likelihood of failure.
Soldered joints have a certain likelihood of failure.
Sockets have a certain likelihood of failure.
iMac:
Memory chips plus one solder connection.
Conventional
Memory chips plus two solder connections (motherboard to socket, socket to memory board, and memory board to chip) plus socket failures.
They both have the same rate of memory chip failure. The iMac's soldered memory has 1/3 the number of solder joints and totally eliminates the socket failures.
No matter what the numbers are, soldered memory is more reliable.
The memory chip has a certain likelihood of failure.
Soldered joints have a certain likelihood of failure.
Sockets have a certain likelihood of failure.
iMac:
Memory chips plus one solder connection.
Conventional
Memory chips plus two solder connections (motherboard to socket, socket to memory board, and memory board to chip) plus socket failures.
They both have the same rate of memory chip failure. The iMac's soldered memory has 1/3 the number of solder joints and totally eliminates the socket failures.
No matter what the numbers are, soldered memory is more reliable.
You are correct that eliminating the socket should decrease the overall failure rate, but by how much? You are neglecting the rate of memory chip failure, which for all we know could overwhelm that of a solder failure. I would like to see some hard numbers. So eliminating a few solders might reduce overall failures by a negligible amount but would vastly increase the expected repair costs. When any part of soldered ram goes bad you need to chuck the whole motherboard and everything soldered to it, like the CPU.
At any rate, if soldered RAM is actually significantly more reliable than socketed RAM, why hasn't Apple adopted soldered RAM across the board? Why do the 27 inch iMac and the upcoming Mac Pro have memory slots?
From personal experience,
0% of my iMacs have failed.
In total, 0% of my Macs have failed, going back to the Apple ][e’ (that’s plural) and<span style="line-height:1.4em;"> ][gs in my basement.</span>
100% of my* PCs (also around 10; small world) have failed.
[SIZE=8px]*PCs with which I’ve been forced to work.[/SIZE]
There's also a sad side to this: the percentages don't increase when applying the comparison of iPhones to other smartphones.
You are correct that eliminating the socket should decrease the overall failure rate, but by how much? You are neglecting the rate of memory chip failure, which for all we know could overwhelm that of a solder failure. I would like to see some hard numbers. So eliminating a few solders might reduce overall failures by a negligible amount but would vastly increase the expected repair costs. When any part of soldered ram goes bad you need to chuck the whole motherboard and everything soldered to it, like the CPU.
I don't have any figures, but the point is that it IS more reliable. Apple thinks the reliability advantage is sufficient to put up with all the whining from people like you and I suspect that they have a lot better figures than you do.
At any rate, if soldered RAM is actually significantly more reliable than socketed RAM, why hasn't Apple adopted soldered RAM across the board? Why do the 27 inch iMac and the upcoming Mac Pro have memory slots?
Because people buying high end machine are more likely to want to upgrade their memory, of course.
I don't have any figures, but the point is that it IS more reliable. Apple thinks the reliability advantage is sufficient to put up with all the whining from people like you and I suspect that they have a lot better figures than you do.
Because people buying high end machine are more likely to want to upgrade their memory, of course.
So people paying the premium for a higher-end Mac are getting a significantly more failure-prone machine? It seem absurd that Apple would design their flagship iMac to be less reliable than their entry-level 21 inch model. But that would follow if Apple knew that socketed RAM had a significantly higher failure rate than soldered RAM and chose to use slots anyway. After all, Apple could have just soldered in 16gb or 32gb of RAM to begin with; and high-end customers could order all the RAM they would need at the outset, like they do with the retina Macbook Pro. Professional workstations and servers are designed to run 24/7, yet they all use socketed RAM. Therefore, the claim that Apple solders the RAM into the 21 inch iMac for "the reliability advantage" seems quite dubious.
I don't have any figures, but the point is that it IS more reliable. Apple thinks the reliability advantage is sufficient to put up with all the whining from people like you and I suspect that they have a lot better figures than you do.
Because people buying high end machine are more likely to want to upgrade their memory, of course.
So people paying the premium for a higher-end Mac are getting a significantly more failure-prone machine? It seem absurd that Apple would design their flagship iMac to be less reliable than their entry-level 21 inch model. But that would follow if Apple knew that socketed RAM had a significantly higher failure rate than soldered RAM and chose to use slots anyway. After all, Apple could have just soldered in 16gb or 32gb of RAM to begin with; and high-end customers could order all the RAM they would need at the outset, like they do with the retina MBPs. Professional workstations and servers are designed to run 24/7, yet they all use socketed RAM. Therefore, the claim that Apple solders the RAM into the 21 inch iMac for "the reliability advantage" seems quite dubious.
What is it that you don't get about the concept of cost-benefit tradeoff, or are you just being argumentative? You already agreed that removing one potential failure point (the socket) must increase reliability to some extent, as well as reducing manufacturing cost. No one disagrees that replaceable and upgradeable RAM is advantageous to some degree, probably mostly in the high-end part of the market where upgradeability has always been more highly valued. Failure of socketed systems can also be reduced by more expensive components and manufacturing techniques. So no, I'm sure that the higher-end Macs are not more failure prone, and probably less, since overall they use better components.
What is it that you don't get about the concept of cost-benefit tradeoff, or are you just being argumentative? You already agreed that removing one potential failure point (the socket) must increase reliability to some extent, as well as reducing manufacturing cost.
[...]
So no, I'm sure that the higher-end Macs are not more failure prone, and probably less, since overall they use better components.
I fully agree that it's somewhat cheaper to use soldered RAM, and that I believe is the main benefit to Apple. I was merely arguing against the notion that Apple chose to use a non-repairable setup because it would be significantly more reliable than the alternative of using the same high quality of components but with socketed RAM.
You state that "the higher-end Macs are not more failure prone, and probably less, since overall they use better components." What better components?
--> Better solder? It would seem counter to Apple's culture to save a cent or two worth of solder per unit at the expense of lower reliability. We're talking about Apple, which obsesses over the slightest details even if they aren't visible to the public. Apple differentiates its product lines by features, not by the quality of the components, especially something as fundamental as solder.
--> If we agree that the 21 inch iMac does not use an inferior solder, and that the 27 inch iMac achieves comparable reliability using socketed RAM, that strongly suggests that the addition of RAM sockets and the extra solder joints do not actually affect the overall failure rate to any noticeable degree. That's the point I've been trying to make.
Who cares? Apple doesn't design their products around getting a good score from iFixit.
I care
I salivated over the new iMacs, but when it came time to plunk down my coin, I backed away. Instead I picked up an Apple refurb of a mid 2011 3.4 GHz Intel Core i7 27" iMac. The slightly thicker iMac had essentially the same processor as was in the new iMacs (available at the time.) I got essentially the same performance for way less money, plus it has a DVD SuperDrive, and I can [with some effort] crack it open to upgrade the hard drive or replace failed parts. It's very sad that Macs are becoming like iOS devices—de facto, unserviceable.
And the environment cares.
I'm not into tossing my iMac just because some little part goes bad. I want to be able to fix it. Apple has made great strides in making hardware that is more recycleable and energy efficient. But over the last few years, repairability and recycleablity has suffered in all Apple products. Modern Macs are extremely energy efficient. So efficient, in fact, that repairably and recyclability become even more important factors. Gone are the days when deciding to toss an older (energy wasting) Mac and replacing it with a new (energy sipping) one is a "no-brainer." Today's "older Macs" don't use much energy and "new Macs" aren't all that repairable or recyclable. In the full product life cycle, modern Mac's energy of use no longer overwhelms their energy of production and disposal, despite the improved computing performance.
So people paying the premium for a higher-end Mac are getting a significantly more failure-prone machine? It seem absurd that Apple would <span style="line-height:1.4em;">design their flagship iMac to be less reliable than their entry-level 21 inch model. But that would follow if Apple knew that socketed RAM had a significantly higher failure rate than soldered RAM and chose to use slots anyway. After all, Apple could have just soldered in 16gb or 32gb of RAM to begin with; and high-end customers could order all the RAM they would need at the outset, like they do with the retina Macbook Pro. Professional workstations and servers are designed to run 24/7, yet they all use socketed RAM. Therefore, the claim that Apple solders the RAM into the 21 inch iMac for "the reliability advantage" seems quite dubious.</span>
OK, so you don't get math. Or logic.
TOTAL failures of Macs are around 10% according to the survey that someone published. That includes software problems, power supplies, video, RAM, CPU, GPU, and hard disk (or SSD). The number of failures due to RAM is only a fraction of those - perhaps 1% of all Macs sold. So a slight increase in RAM problems does not make the model junk. People who want upgradeable RAM are willing to accept that in exchange for the ability to swap RAM. But not all users want that - particularly those buying entry level computers.
It also does not mean that there's zero difference.
Comments
Because too many people don't think for the long (or even medium) term when making economic decisions.
Guess they won’t last long as professionals, then, which was the topic. As for consumers, they don’t care about such things in the first place, nor should they have to. As counterintuitive as it sounds to those of us who’ve spent our lives doing system hardware updates, having a set amount of RAM is a good thing. It forces software developers to actually create tight code again. Not anything like the mid-1980s, sure, but closer to than than the solution today. “Needs more RAM? Pour some more into the system, then; it’s their problem, not ours!”
Idiots, not endemic of humanity as a whole.
Yeah, I caught that. But in fairness, buying an Pro machine without Thunderbolt or USB3 hasn't been a terribly smart decision either.
Problem: Solved!
You and the other iHaters keep saying that, but you've never been able to support it.
What percentage of people would upgrade a 21" iMac even if they had the option?
Of that number, what percentage will be just as happy (or happier) with the alternative (taking advantage of the high resale value and buying a new one)?
And, what percentage of people are happier with the soldered RAM because it makes the system more robust and reliable?
Until you can answer those questions, you're just whining.
Solved!
Well yes, but I was talking about the past few years.
And we don't even know the price of the new Pro yet.
Hopefully, it won't be so far off as to push the Prosumer/Small Business market to iMacs.
(By that I mean there's hopefully a sub-$3000. model for business professionals. I know it's unlikely the Pro will be cheaper than the model it replaces.)
The difference isn't all that much? Some of those brands have twice as many problems as Macs - and even the average is at least 50% higher.
That's why I mentioned "the top PC desktops". For example Lenovo does pretty well.
In the end, repairability matters only for the 10% of users who have a problem and of that 10%, only the very small fraction who would fix the computer themselves if it were more accessible, but choose not to because it's difficult on the Mac. That is undoubtedly less than 10% of the people who have problems (i.e., well under 1% of total customers). So, you have 10% of customers with a problem with Macs vs 15% with PCs - a reduction of 33% - in exchange for 1% of potential users who might be slightly inconvenienced. That sounds like a good tradeoff.
From personal experience
100% of my iMacs have failed
in total, 50% of my Macs have failed
0% of my PCs (around 10) have failed
There we have it. The world can stop buying iMacs. jfanning says that 100% of them have failed.
And PC support businesses had better close up shop today. jfanning says that PCs don't fail.
/s
What often gets ignored is that there's a tradeoff. Systems that are more repairable may be less reliable to start with.
As just one example, soldered RAM is harder to fix, but it fails far, far, far less often than memory sticks that are inserted into a slot. Personally, I'd rather have a system that's designed not to fail than one that fails frequently, but is easier to fix.
I've seen this claim asserted many times but haven't found data to support it. Can you supply a link? You are implying that the RAM socket is more likely to fail than the memory module. But if that were true, why does Apple still design many of its computers with memory slots? Why hasn't it soldered the RAM to all of its models?
It doesn't imply any such thing.
The memory chip has a certain likelihood of failure.
Soldered joints have a certain likelihood of failure.
Sockets have a certain likelihood of failure.
iMac:
Memory chips plus one solder connection.
Conventional
Memory chips plus two solder connections (motherboard to socket, socket to memory board, and memory board to chip) plus socket failures.
They both have the same rate of memory chip failure. The iMac's soldered memory has 1/3 the number of solder joints and totally eliminates the socket failures.
No matter what the numbers are, soldered memory is more reliable.
It doesn't imply any such thing.
The memory chip has a certain likelihood of failure.
Soldered joints have a certain likelihood of failure.
Sockets have a certain likelihood of failure.
iMac:
Memory chips plus one solder connection.
Conventional
Memory chips plus two solder connections (motherboard to socket, socket to memory board, and memory board to chip) plus socket failures.
They both have the same rate of memory chip failure. The iMac's soldered memory has 1/3 the number of solder joints and totally eliminates the socket failures.
No matter what the numbers are, soldered memory is more reliable.
You are correct that eliminating the socket should decrease the overall failure rate, but by how much? You are neglecting the rate of memory chip failure, which for all we know could overwhelm that of a solder failure. I would like to see some hard numbers. So eliminating a few solders might reduce overall failures by a negligible amount but would vastly increase the expected repair costs. When any part of soldered ram goes bad you need to chuck the whole motherboard and everything soldered to it, like the CPU.
At any rate, if soldered RAM is actually significantly more reliable than socketed RAM, why hasn't Apple adopted soldered RAM across the board? Why do the 27 inch iMac and the upcoming Mac Pro have memory slots?
100% of my iMacs have failed
in total, 50% of my Macs have failed
0% of my PCs (around 10) have failed
From personal experience,
0% of my iMacs have failed.
In total, 0% of my Macs have failed, going back to the Apple ][e’ (that’s plural) and ][gs in my basement.
100% of my* PCs (also around 10; small world) have failed.
*PCs with which I’ve been forced to work.
There's also a sad side to this: the percentages don't increase when applying the comparison of iPhones to other smartphones.
I don't have any figures, but the point is that it IS more reliable. Apple thinks the reliability advantage is sufficient to put up with all the whining from people like you and I suspect that they have a lot better figures than you do.
Because people buying high end machine are more likely to want to upgrade their memory, of course.
I don't have any figures, but the point is that it IS more reliable. Apple thinks the reliability advantage is sufficient to put up with all the whining from people like you and I suspect that they have a lot better figures than you do.
Because people buying high end machine are more likely to want to upgrade their memory, of course.
So people paying the premium for a higher-end Mac are getting a significantly more failure-prone machine? It seem absurd that Apple would design their flagship iMac to be less reliable than their entry-level 21 inch model. But that would follow if Apple knew that socketed RAM had a significantly higher failure rate than soldered RAM and chose to use slots anyway. After all, Apple could have just soldered in 16gb or 32gb of RAM to begin with; and high-end customers could order all the RAM they would need at the outset, like they do with the retina Macbook Pro. Professional workstations and servers are designed to run 24/7, yet they all use socketed RAM. Therefore, the claim that Apple solders the RAM into the 21 inch iMac for "the reliability advantage" seems quite dubious.
I don't have any figures, but the point is that it IS more reliable. Apple thinks the reliability advantage is sufficient to put up with all the whining from people like you and I suspect that they have a lot better figures than you do.
Because people buying high end machine are more likely to want to upgrade their memory, of course.
So people paying the premium for a higher-end Mac are getting a significantly more failure-prone machine? It seem absurd that Apple would design their flagship iMac to be less reliable than their entry-level 21 inch model. But that would follow if Apple knew that socketed RAM had a significantly higher failure rate than soldered RAM and chose to use slots anyway. After all, Apple could have just soldered in 16gb or 32gb of RAM to begin with; and high-end customers could order all the RAM they would need at the outset, like they do with the retina MBPs. Professional workstations and servers are designed to run 24/7, yet they all use socketed RAM. Therefore, the claim that Apple solders the RAM into the 21 inch iMac for "the reliability advantage" seems quite dubious.
What is it that you don't get about the concept of cost-benefit tradeoff, or are you just being argumentative? You already agreed that removing one potential failure point (the socket) must increase reliability to some extent, as well as reducing manufacturing cost. No one disagrees that replaceable and upgradeable RAM is advantageous to some degree, probably mostly in the high-end part of the market where upgradeability has always been more highly valued. Failure of socketed systems can also be reduced by more expensive components and manufacturing techniques. So no, I'm sure that the higher-end Macs are not more failure prone, and probably less, since overall they use better components.
What is it that you don't get about the concept of cost-benefit tradeoff, or are you just being argumentative? You already agreed that removing one potential failure point (the socket) must increase reliability to some extent, as well as reducing manufacturing cost.
[...]
So no, I'm sure that the higher-end Macs are not more failure prone, and probably less, since overall they use better components.
I fully agree that it's somewhat cheaper to use soldered RAM, and that I believe is the main benefit to Apple. I was merely arguing against the notion that Apple chose to use a non-repairable setup because it would be significantly more reliable than the alternative of using the same high quality of components but with socketed RAM.
You state that "the higher-end Macs are not more failure prone, and probably less, since overall they use better components." What better components?
--> Better solder? It would seem counter to Apple's culture to save a cent or two worth of solder per unit at the expense of lower reliability. We're talking about Apple, which obsesses over the slightest details even if they aren't visible to the public. Apple differentiates its product lines by features, not by the quality of the components, especially something as fundamental as solder.
--> If we agree that the 21 inch iMac does not use an inferior solder, and that the 27 inch iMac achieves comparable reliability using socketed RAM, that strongly suggests that the addition of RAM sockets and the extra solder joints do not actually affect the overall failure rate to any noticeable degree. That's the point I've been trying to make.
Who cares? Apple doesn't design their products around getting a good score from iFixit.
I care
I salivated over the new iMacs, but when it came time to plunk down my coin, I backed away. Instead I picked up an Apple refurb of a mid 2011 3.4 GHz Intel Core i7 27" iMac. The slightly thicker iMac had essentially the same processor as was in the new iMacs (available at the time.) I got essentially the same performance for way less money, plus it has a DVD SuperDrive, and I can [with some effort] crack it open to upgrade the hard drive or replace failed parts. It's very sad that Macs are becoming like iOS devices—de facto, unserviceable.
And the environment cares.
I'm not into tossing my iMac just because some little part goes bad. I want to be able to fix it. Apple has made great strides in making hardware that is more recycleable and energy efficient. But over the last few years, repairability and recycleablity has suffered in all Apple products. Modern Macs are extremely energy efficient. So efficient, in fact, that repairably and recyclability become even more important factors. Gone are the days when deciding to toss an older (energy wasting) Mac and replacing it with a new (energy sipping) one is a "no-brainer." Today's "older Macs" don't use much energy and "new Macs" aren't all that repairable or recyclable. In the full product life cycle, modern Mac's energy of use no longer overwhelms their energy of production and disposal, despite the improved computing performance.
Why did Apple post record numbers every single quarter during the recession, then?
Negating your point above…
Wow. An appeal to financial expediency.
What an uncharacteristically and pitifully, lame argument.
I'm disappointed in you tallest.
OK, so you don't get math. Or logic.
TOTAL failures of Macs are around 10% according to the survey that someone published. That includes software problems, power supplies, video, RAM, CPU, GPU, and hard disk (or SSD). The number of failures due to RAM is only a fraction of those - perhaps 1% of all Macs sold. So a slight increase in RAM problems does not make the model junk. People who want upgradeable RAM are willing to accept that in exchange for the ability to swap RAM. But not all users want that - particularly those buying entry level computers.
It also does not mean that there's zero difference.
TOTAL failures of Macs are around 10% according to the survey that someone published.
You just gotta love the internet.