The point about Apple's production process is that there are more efficient ways to accomplish the same result, which you seem not to have realized........
In any event, it should seem self-evident that the use of an unnecessarily expensive production process which brings no additional utility or other benefit to the product places the product at a competitive disadvantage.
Hmmm. So what are your credentials for talking so knowingly about manufacturing costs and what those processes bring to the table.
I'm pretty sure that Apple is in business to make money. I'm sure that they weighed costs of various types of manufacturing. I'm betting they factored in costs for hardware support for various types of manufacturing. I expect that they know how much it cost to support previous hardware.
So why do you think you know more about their business costs than they do?
Apple's new aluminum laptop case design is one of the most energy inefficient around. Not only that, but it is one of the most expensive manufacturing processes that could be used to accomplish the result.
You can't series think that pouring molten Al into millions of notebook sized casts makes sense. Besides the logistical issues and costs of having a factory with hundreds, if not thousands of casts, Apple would now have to move it's case manufacturing plant into the same plant that smelts the metal. Then you have issues with bubbles and other imperfections that won't be know until after the cooling. Then you have the issue of certain molds not being as good as others.
With a CNC machine you have precise calculations that can be adjusted for the whole lot with simple precision. You also have cost and environmental savings from Apple buying the cyclinders of purified Al, not having to buy ore and run a smelting factory. That job is best held as it is.
Not to mention that the molds can only be used so many times before you have to replace them. And creating a mold is a 4-6 step process that has no benefit of customization. Any change in ports for instance requires making new molds. They decide to change things with the milling process they need only change the computer program. Milling the case lends itself to sturdier, more dent resistant cases. And the DO recycle the aluminum that is milled off, requiring much less energy than digging for new.
Many small fabricators use milling as an inexpensive way to fabricate. Especially one-offs. Once the initial investment is made, parts coming off the macine is no moreexpensive than buying the blank stock to mill.
Not to mention that the molds can only be used so many times before you have to replace them. And creating a mold is a 4-6 step process that has no benefit of customization. Any change in ports for instance requires making new molds. They decide to change things with the milling process they need only change the computer program. Milling the case lends itself to sturdier, more dent resistant cases. And the DO recycle the aluminum that is milled off, requiring much less energy than digging for new.
And as Virgil-TB2 pointed out the cooling process will lead to some shrinkage. On top of that, could a slight torquing of such thin molds occur that could potentially make the case not fit well, thus leading to even more waste? Then there is the fact that milling would have to occur on some level. First there is the basic finish of all those curved parts and the milling of the pour point, and then there is milling for screw holes, at the very least.
Quote:
Many small fabricators use milling as an inexpensive way to fabricate. Especially one-offs. Once the initial investment is made, parts coming off the macine is no moreexpensive than buying the blank stock to mill.
This is an interesting point. Most companies can't afford to do what Apple is doing here. Del, HP et al. have so many models with slight variances that the making this process viable would be difficult, i not impossible. The only machines that they sell enough unit to make it work are the cheap machines, which make it financially unsound. The only company I can think of that even comes close to having the two main factors is Sony, but even then I don't think their volume per model is even close to Apple's.
If I'm ready to spend hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars at your store, and you tell me I can't even have a bag, you won't be getting a dime from me. That is not being green, it's just piss-poor customer service.
Are people really too lazy to bring your own bags when you go shopping? You don't have bags at home you could reuse instead of getting new ones every time you shop, using them for half an hour, then throwing them away? That's pretty sad.
Quote:
Originally Posted by johnmcboston
They've put stores in the inner cities, and we WALK to them. Are Apple employees going to help me walk home now?
Again, you're too lazy to bring a bag when you go shopping?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gyokuro
This is good because not using a plastic bag will help put food on the table of those less fortunate to not even be able to afford an Apple computer.
Who said anything about food? Not using a plastic bag means one less plastic bag in a landfill or blowing around on the street. You really think less bags blowing around your yard is "killing our culture"? Get a clue.
And for the record, many people are using reusable bottles now instead of drinking bottled water.
Paper bags and biodegradable plastic are still far more wasteful than using no bag or bringing your own.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RBR
If you had read my post, you would have noticed the recycling of waste.
So if Apple's process recycles all the aluminum and doesn't waste any, what are you whining about?
Quote:
Originally Posted by mjtomlin
Oh please. Macs have been proven to last twice as long as their PC counter parts thanks to Apple's ability to make its OS speedier with each new release.
Those of us running perfectly acceptable quad G5's that are only about 3-4 years old but will probably lose support with 10.6 beg to differ.
That's a terrible discount, especially considering it's SMALLER than the original price with EDU discount - for a teacher or student, buying the previous generation got even more expensive.
"Going green" my ass. My Mac Mini arrived in 2 boxes outside of the Mini's box. One was twice the size of the mini, and the other could have held two of the former box. I also ordered a keyboard. This box was ridiculous: while the keyboard's packaging was, like, 1x6x18, the containing box was 20x20x30!
So, how do you ship a small package in a large box? Yards and yards of paper wadding, my friends.
What.ever.
I don't subscribe to this whole going green BS, and neither does Apple's fulfillment department, it seems.
I think it's funny that posters here are using computers and the internet --all powered by greenhouse gas-producing utilities-- to debate the value (or lack thereof) of reducing plastic bag distribution.
If you were serious about wanting to provide the maximum beneficial impact on the planet, you'd turn off your computers & go outside instead of sitting inside a heated (or cooled) building, continuously postulating about the next electricity-sucking device you'll buy, and whether the "sales experience" will be acceptable to your precious ego.
At least the people seeking only a satisfactory way to carry their purchases are being honest. Anybody who hangs out on an website forum to show their concern for the planet is already doing more damage than a freakin' plastic bag from the Apple Store.
I think it's funny that posters here are using computers and the internet --all powered by greenhouse gas-producing utilities-- to debate the value (or lack thereof) of reducing plastic bag distribution.
If you were serious about wanting to provide the maximum beneficial impact on the planet, you'd turn off your computers & go outside instead of sitting inside a heated (or cooled) building, continuously postulating about the next electricity-sucking device you'll buy, and whether the "sales experience" will be acceptable to your precious ego.
At least the people seeking only a satisfactory way to carry their purchases are being honest. Anybody who hangs out on an website forum to show their concern for the planet is already doing more damage than a freakin' plastic bag from the Apple Store.
Your argument works until one actually thinks about it. To say that hanging out outside is better for the environment than using a computer is weak. Do you also suggest we go back to paper mail transported via planes, trains and automobiles to reduce greenhouse gases while still being able to communicate? Of course not, computers have reduced our footprint greatly in that front. There is also a reduction on our footprint by being able to do so much from a single location. Then there is the reduced size and lower power usage over previous generations. It's the increased populations that are sucking up more water and electricity, so perhaps a modest proposal should be made to open a chain of Soylent restaurants.
I think the bag thing is ridiculous. While I consider myself to be an environmentalist, there's a big difference between a thick, high-quality drawstring bag, like those Apple uses and are likely to be reused, and the thin bags that supermarkets use. Furthermore, you might obtain 2-4 bags per day from a supermarket whereas you might only obtain 2-4 bags per year from Apple. If I'm buying lots of items from an Apple Store, I need a bag. If one is driving to a mall store, you might have a cloth bag in your car, but in large cities where people use public transportation, it's unlikely that we're walking around with cloth bags all the time.
If Apple wants to switch their plastic drawstring bags to a recycled paper bag, I'm fine with that, but there needs to be a bag.
If Apple wants to discourage bag use and only give you a bag if you ask for it, I'm fine with that too.
Do you also suggest we go back to paper mail transported via planes, trains and automobiles to reduce greenhouse gases while still being able to communicate?
Good grief, and you call my argument weak? What statistics indicate noticeable reduction of vehicle emissions since the advent of electronic interpersonal communication? What electronic communication equipment was built without the transportation of millions of pounds of raw materials, internal components, and finally, finished devices and their packaging by truck, rail and aviation, and finally, consumer transport to the end user location?
And frankly, no, I didn't suggest that, nor did I need you to paraphrase my comment just to be argumentative.
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism
There is also a reduction on our footprint by being able to do so much from a single location.
Let's get this straight... you consider posting your personal opinions and judgmental commentaries thousands of times to AI forums an accomplishment? I'm not sure a jury of your peers would acquit you on the charge of pointless energy consumption based on that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism
Then there is the reduced size and lower power usage over previous generations.
Again, link us the research you're quoting that says the carbon footprint of personal computer manufacturing, life cycle operation and final disposal is reduced over any period in the past, instead of making another wild claim to justify your personal behavior.
Pre-1990s PCs weren't left on for endless hours, checking for email when there isn't any, playing online games, sitting in sleep mode, building pointless Facebook pages and personal web sites, blogging endless diatribes that very few care about or see, posting and forwarding endless jokes, pithy sayings, funny photos, outrageous videos and chain letters, not to mention destructive viruses and endless advertisements. They weren't constantly attached to personal, business and shared wired and wireless networks as they are today, all continuously in operation, all manufactured in plants using vast amounts of energy, all shipped by planes, trains and internal combustion engine-powered vehicles, all with reams of paper-based instructions, warranty statements, and EUAs.
Face it, you're addicted to forum posting, and you're attempting to rationalize and justify the harmful environmental effect of your problem by overstating the obvious: computers make life easier. But it's not necessarily better for everyone just because you have a problem with an easy operational methodology: Turn on, tune in, open up your high-volume opinion firehose.
You aren't communicating WITH anyone when you post here, you're merely BROADCASTING your opinions in a rather vain effort to seem important to people you don't know and have never interacted with beyond this board. You feel superior because you have a high post count and some industry experience. You provide the definitive answer that doesn't need evidential proof because, after all, it came from you. That's not communicating... that's being a gasbag.
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism
It's the increased populations that are sucking up more water and electricity, so perhaps a modest proposal should be made to open a chain of Soylent restaurants.
Let's not be modest, let's move forward on that proposal. First, don't reproduce. Really. If you do or have, give your children up for adoption.
Next: Arrange to have yourself killed and processed into food, and I'll get into what I'm guessing will be a lengthy line to take a final bite out of your pompous ass. Just think of the good it will do mankind if somehow all your wisdom will be passed to us in one easy step, like Planaria.
Comments
The point about Apple's production process is that there are more efficient ways to accomplish the same result, which you seem not to have realized........
In any event, it should seem self-evident that the use of an unnecessarily expensive production process which brings no additional utility or other benefit to the product places the product at a competitive disadvantage.
Hmmm. So what are your credentials for talking so knowingly about manufacturing costs and what those processes bring to the table.
I'm pretty sure that Apple is in business to make money. I'm sure that they weighed costs of various types of manufacturing. I'm betting they factored in costs for hardware support for various types of manufacturing. I expect that they know how much it cost to support previous hardware.
So why do you think you know more about their business costs than they do?
Apple's new aluminum laptop case design is one of the most energy inefficient around. Not only that, but it is one of the most expensive manufacturing processes that could be used to accomplish the result.
According to? Site your sources please.
You can't series think that pouring molten Al into millions of notebook sized casts makes sense. Besides the logistical issues and costs of having a factory with hundreds, if not thousands of casts, Apple would now have to move it's case manufacturing plant into the same plant that smelts the metal. Then you have issues with bubbles and other imperfections that won't be know until after the cooling. Then you have the issue of certain molds not being as good as others.
With a CNC machine you have precise calculations that can be adjusted for the whole lot with simple precision. You also have cost and environmental savings from Apple buying the cyclinders of purified Al, not having to buy ore and run a smelting factory. That job is best held as it is.
Not to mention that the molds can only be used so many times before you have to replace them. And creating a mold is a 4-6 step process that has no benefit of customization. Any change in ports for instance requires making new molds. They decide to change things with the milling process they need only change the computer program. Milling the case lends itself to sturdier, more dent resistant cases. And the DO recycle the aluminum that is milled off, requiring much less energy than digging for new.
Many small fabricators use milling as an inexpensive way to fabricate. Especially one-offs. Once the initial investment is made, parts coming off the macine is no moreexpensive than buying the blank stock to mill.
Not to mention that the molds can only be used so many times before you have to replace them. And creating a mold is a 4-6 step process that has no benefit of customization. Any change in ports for instance requires making new molds. They decide to change things with the milling process they need only change the computer program. Milling the case lends itself to sturdier, more dent resistant cases. And the DO recycle the aluminum that is milled off, requiring much less energy than digging for new.
And as Virgil-TB2 pointed out the cooling process will lead to some shrinkage. On top of that, could a slight torquing of such thin molds occur that could potentially make the case not fit well, thus leading to even more waste? Then there is the fact that milling would have to occur on some level. First there is the basic finish of all those curved parts and the milling of the pour point, and then there is milling for screw holes, at the very least.
Many small fabricators use milling as an inexpensive way to fabricate. Especially one-offs. Once the initial investment is made, parts coming off the macine is no moreexpensive than buying the blank stock to mill.
This is an interesting point. Most companies can't afford to do what Apple is doing here. Del, HP et al. have so many models with slight variances that the making this process viable would be difficult, i not impossible. The only machines that they sell enough unit to make it work are the cheap machines, which make it financially unsound. The only company I can think of that even comes close to having the two main factors is Sony, but even then I don't think their volume per model is even close to Apple's.
If I'm ready to spend hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars at your store, and you tell me I can't even have a bag, you won't be getting a dime from me. That is not being green, it's just piss-poor customer service.
Are people really too lazy to bring your own bags when you go shopping? You don't have bags at home you could reuse instead of getting new ones every time you shop, using them for half an hour, then throwing them away? That's pretty sad.
They've put stores in the inner cities, and we WALK to them. Are Apple employees going to help me walk home now?
Again, you're too lazy to bring a bag when you go shopping?
This is good because not using a plastic bag will help put food on the table of those less fortunate to not even be able to afford an Apple computer.
Who said anything about food? Not using a plastic bag means one less plastic bag in a landfill or blowing around on the street. You really think less bags blowing around your yard is "killing our culture"? Get a clue.
And for the record, many people are using reusable bottles now instead of drinking bottled water.
Paper bags and biodegradable plastic are still far more wasteful than using no bag or bringing your own.
If you had read my post, you would have noticed the recycling of waste.
So if Apple's process recycles all the aluminum and doesn't waste any, what are you whining about?
Oh please. Macs have been proven to last twice as long as their PC counter parts thanks to Apple's ability to make its OS speedier with each new release.
Those of us running perfectly acceptable quad G5's that are only about 3-4 years old but will probably lose support with 10.6 beg to differ.
About $209 off, not much
http://www.appleinsider.com/mac_price_guide/
That's a terrible discount, especially considering it's SMALLER than the original price with EDU discount - for a teacher or student, buying the previous generation got even more expensive.
So, how do you ship a small package in a large box? Yards and yards of paper wadding, my friends.
What.ever.
I don't subscribe to this whole going green BS, and neither does Apple's fulfillment department, it seems.
If you were serious about wanting to provide the maximum beneficial impact on the planet, you'd turn off your computers & go outside instead of sitting inside a heated (or cooled) building, continuously postulating about the next electricity-sucking device you'll buy, and whether the "sales experience" will be acceptable to your precious ego.
At least the people seeking only a satisfactory way to carry their purchases are being honest. Anybody who hangs out on an website forum to show their concern for the planet is already doing more damage than a freakin' plastic bag from the Apple Store.
I think it's funny that posters here are using computers and the internet --all powered by greenhouse gas-producing utilities-- to debate the value (or lack thereof) of reducing plastic bag distribution.
If you were serious about wanting to provide the maximum beneficial impact on the planet, you'd turn off your computers & go outside instead of sitting inside a heated (or cooled) building, continuously postulating about the next electricity-sucking device you'll buy, and whether the "sales experience" will be acceptable to your precious ego.
At least the people seeking only a satisfactory way to carry their purchases are being honest. Anybody who hangs out on an website forum to show their concern for the planet is already doing more damage than a freakin' plastic bag from the Apple Store.
Your argument works until one actually thinks about it. To say that hanging out outside is better for the environment than using a computer is weak. Do you also suggest we go back to paper mail transported via planes, trains and automobiles to reduce greenhouse gases while still being able to communicate? Of course not, computers have reduced our footprint greatly in that front. There is also a reduction on our footprint by being able to do so much from a single location. Then there is the reduced size and lower power usage over previous generations. It's the increased populations that are sucking up more water and electricity, so perhaps a modest proposal should be made to open a chain of Soylent restaurants.
If Apple wants to switch their plastic drawstring bags to a recycled paper bag, I'm fine with that, but there needs to be a bag.
If Apple wants to discourage bag use and only give you a bag if you ask for it, I'm fine with that too.
Do you also suggest we go back to paper mail transported via planes, trains and automobiles to reduce greenhouse gases while still being able to communicate?
Good grief, and you call my argument weak? What statistics indicate noticeable reduction of vehicle emissions since the advent of electronic interpersonal communication? What electronic communication equipment was built without the transportation of millions of pounds of raw materials, internal components, and finally, finished devices and their packaging by truck, rail and aviation, and finally, consumer transport to the end user location?
And frankly, no, I didn't suggest that, nor did I need you to paraphrase my comment just to be argumentative.
There is also a reduction on our footprint by being able to do so much from a single location.
Let's get this straight... you consider posting your personal opinions and judgmental commentaries thousands of times to AI forums an accomplishment? I'm not sure a jury of your peers would acquit you on the charge of pointless energy consumption based on that.
Then there is the reduced size and lower power usage over previous generations.
Again, link us the research you're quoting that says the carbon footprint of personal computer manufacturing, life cycle operation and final disposal is reduced over any period in the past, instead of making another wild claim to justify your personal behavior.
Pre-1990s PCs weren't left on for endless hours, checking for email when there isn't any, playing online games, sitting in sleep mode, building pointless Facebook pages and personal web sites, blogging endless diatribes that very few care about or see, posting and forwarding endless jokes, pithy sayings, funny photos, outrageous videos and chain letters, not to mention destructive viruses and endless advertisements. They weren't constantly attached to personal, business and shared wired and wireless networks as they are today, all continuously in operation, all manufactured in plants using vast amounts of energy, all shipped by planes, trains and internal combustion engine-powered vehicles, all with reams of paper-based instructions, warranty statements, and EUAs.
Face it, you're addicted to forum posting, and you're attempting to rationalize and justify the harmful environmental effect of your problem by overstating the obvious: computers make life easier. But it's not necessarily better for everyone just because you have a problem with an easy operational methodology: Turn on, tune in, open up your high-volume opinion firehose.
You aren't communicating WITH anyone when you post here, you're merely BROADCASTING your opinions in a rather vain effort to seem important to people you don't know and have never interacted with beyond this board. You feel superior because you have a high post count and some industry experience. You provide the definitive answer that doesn't need evidential proof because, after all, it came from you. That's not communicating... that's being a gasbag.
It's the increased populations that are sucking up more water and electricity, so perhaps a modest proposal should be made to open a chain of Soylent restaurants.
Let's not be modest, let's move forward on that proposal. First, don't reproduce. Really. If you do or have, give your children up for adoption.
Next: Arrange to have yourself killed and processed into food, and I'll get into what I'm guessing will be a lengthy line to take a final bite out of your pompous ass. Just think of the good it will do mankind if somehow all your wisdom will be passed to us in one easy step, like Planaria.