It's really sad how we let idiots make decisions for us. Glue does not make the laptop any less recyclable - and Apple leads the industry (by far) in recyclability of its computers.
It's not the glue that is the issue so much as the use of torque screws not regular Philips etc ones.
Bull. We are talking about two or three steps, and you know it, or you should know it.
And Steve could have bought a muscle car instead of a Volkswagen van or just hit his brakes too late one time and boom, no Apple.
The butterfly effect is so fickle as to be meaningless. Since all instances of every event do exist and occur, you can't idolize the ones you remember from your timeline.
Read the book. Nobody (in Palo Alto) who did acid had a muscle car. Better yet, drop some acid. You will no longer diminish complex cultural causation with a facile term like "the butterfly effect." You will see lots of patterns. You will lose your ego for a while as it's sent out for a washing. But that will be ok. Everything will suddenly make sense. It will stay with you for life, as it did for Jobs.
Palo Alto could have been like Houston if it were not for the Beats.
Read the book. Nobody (in Palo Alto) who did acid had a muscle car. Better yet, drop some acid. You will no longer diminish complex cultural causation with a facile term like "the butterfly effect." You will see lots of patterns. You will lose your ego for a while as it's sent out for a washing. But that will be ok. Everything will suddenly make sense. It will stay with you for life, as it did for Jobs.
Palo Alto could have been like Houston if it were not for the Beats.
But what's the real deal? Is Apple's new "design direction" simply ignoring environmental concerns (producing dirty but cute iStuff), is the EPEAT certification somehow faulty (to which Apple objects), or is something else going on?
My guess is that they want to force changes in the standard. Note that EPEAT rates the ability for regular waste processors to recycle equipment. It says nothing about a manufacturer's own recycling program. An EPEAT-certified computer that gets tossed in the trash is no better for the environment than a non-EPEAT-certified Mac that gets returned to Apple for recycling at one of its processors.
I am most likely going to make my next computer a unix laptop of some kind. I know it will be clunky and unpolished. I know I will have to mess around in the command line. I know most users wouldn't really like such a machine. It won't be unibody. It will be plastic. It won't have much of the software that I have grown accustomed to. But at least I won't be subject to the whims of Apple.
You are going to be part of a niche, however. It's your prerogative, but be aware of the risks. Microsoft is heading in the same direction. Most users want PCs to be appliances, the way cars have been for the past 20 years or so. People generally don't "tweak" their dishwashers or TVs. They plug them in and use them. That's where both Apple and Microsoft see things heading in the "post-PC" world.
Tim Cook is a bean counter MBA type. The company is making money hand over fist, but what does he do? He glues in the batteries on a $2500+ laptop to save a bit on machining.
Actually it's to save size, weight and yes - even waste. Overall the new MacBook Pro uses less material which means less overall waste at the end of it's lifetime. Apple sells MILLIONS of these things, and every ounce (or fraction of an ounce) is a significant difference.
EPEAT was started with the goal to foster consumer recycling.
It was a nobel ideal, but it flopped. People can't be bothered. So Apple has been and will no doubt continue to be the most aggressively recycled manufacturer because they collect up their old stuff and recycle it professionally. Where something like a bit of glue won't be a problem.
EPEAT needs to be updated. It's not really relevant to todays market.
And I love how no one seems to mention that EPEAT is a private company, not affiliated with the government or any regulatory agency in any way, and manufacturers have to pay to be listed on it. If I were Apple I would be protesting any government awards they didn't get because of EPEAT exclusions and demand to know the basis for such exclusion over and above some blind adherence to a now irrelevant standard (that they did help create initially)
He institutes a proprietary solid state drive system so users can't upgrade their SSD after purchase.
Really? Someone better tell OWC/macsales.com that they are doing the impossible!
He forces users to max out their memory by making it non-upgradeable.
Er, the default 8 GB is all the vast majority of PC laptop will even accept - let alone be upgradeable to. And they very plainly and very up front mention it on the store. And it's a pretty reasonable fee to upgrade to the maximum amount too.
I don't buy the argument that what's OK for iPads and iPhones is OK for a pro-level $2500+ laptop.
Then buy their other pro level laptop that is still upgradeable. Personally I prefer the thinner and lighter weight one and don't find it that big a deal to just order the thing maxed out. But then again I'm not purposly agitating about a product I never intend to buy either....
An elite laptop is a full computer. It is built with a different philosophy and for a different purpose. If I choose to spend my money on an elite laptop, I expect the freedom to fix and upgrade my machine. I don't expect a souped up iPad with a keyboard and a nice screen.
Sigh - other than RAM and the hard drive, what exactly do you "upgrade" on a laptop anyway? What have you EVER upgraded on a laptop? Maybe a battery, or on the really clunky PC laptops where size apparently does not matter they have media bays where you can swap out a DVD drive for a second battery or hard drive...
Still, it's not like you are changing out the CPU, watercooling/overclocking or tweaking out the non-existent video cards.
These are PORTABLE COMPUTERS and one of the compromises of them is things are integrated and there is less choice. The whole non-removeable battery turned out to be, unsurprisingly, a complete non-issue. This whole "unupgradeable" crap with the Retina MBP will turn out to be the exact same non-issue because, at the end of the day, it is a complete non issue. Tempest in a teapot. Something for those who were never going to buy the machine anyway to fuss and fume over.
Pathetic. Not quite as pathetic as me typing out this response :P congratulations....
There seems to be a philosophy growing at Apple that takes control away from the user.
Then go buy from someone else. All the "restrictions" you are chaffing against foster stability and a stellar user experience and are the reasons Apple is my preferred vendor. So stop bitching that they aren't like every other miserable experience computer vendor and just go buy from any other vendor and we promise we won't miss your whining and complaining about how Apple isn't like everyone else. Everyone wins!
The thing about not complying with EPEAT standards is the disassembly with common tools part. I don't think a heat gun is a common tool at least not in the sense of a screwdriver or wire cutters.
I would think that the part that would trip up Apple on EPEAT is the pentalobe torx, that's a special tool you have to order. A heat gun you can get at any hardware store.
You are going to be part of a niche, however. It's your prerogative, but be aware of the risks. Microsoft is heading in the same direction. Most users want PCs to be appliances, the way cars have been for the past 20 years or so. People generally don't "tweak" their dishwashers or TVs. They plug them in and use them. That's where both Apple and Microsoft see things heading in the "post-PC" world.
Yes, I suppose I will be a niche. But I think Apple should be careful not to anger users like me. I am a teacher. I have brought my MBP to work every day, because I hate working on the locked up MS crap workstations that are provided. That MBP has a nice Apple icon that faces the class every day. It is quite an advertisement. I teach the elite kids, the ones who will go on to be engineers and such. Since I am something of a role model, my choices matter to quite a few students. I have over the last few years been quite positive about OSX. I have discussed the differing engineering philosophies between MS and OSX. I have discussed how OSX is unix based and how unix was from the beginning an operating system that was designed to run multi-user mainframes, and had to e secure and robust. I think I have likely influenced quite a few purchasing decisions. I am one of those users who has played an outsize role in the ascendency of Apple over the past few years. If I choose to buy and use a proper unix laptop, I suspect I will influence some important students.
You say that most people don't tweak their dishwashers or TV's. That is true. However, the freedom that proper computers have provided have given all everyday users freedoms and services that they have grown accustomed to. If computers had been designed early on as locked down appliances, I doubt the world wide web would have come into existence. The large network players, such as, say AOL or Compuserve would have done everything in their power to prevent such a powerful competing network. They would likely have done deals with the companies controlling the locked down computing machines to lock out or cripple competing technologies. You can see such tendencies in closed platforms such as the PS3, where Sony does a great deal to push you into their Playstation Network, or into Netflix, or their other partners. The web browser is an afterthought.
Also, free computing and free networking vis the Internet brought filesharing, which put pressure on the media conglomerates to loosen their grip on content distribution. iTunes was only grudgingly accepted after filesharing had already become rampant. Now we take digital distribution for granted, but if computers had been as locked down as, say the PS3 or even the iPad, I doubt these things would have come into existence in the form they appear in today.
I suppose my main point is this: I do not want to have my freedom to run the software of my choice beholden to the whim of any particular company. One can argue that Apple has been fairly benign in its control of iOS but the fact that it does have such control causes me concern for the future of computing freedom. For that reason, I will make decisions to consume in such as way as to go against the "post PC era". That will include running a clunky unix laptop.
are you a medical doctor? pshychologist? psychiatrist? can you please post your credentials? have you examined our politicians? can you post a link to your report?
This is a genuine question - Do standards such as EPEAT, etc (actually, any "green" program) take into account things like product lifespan, etc? And cost of manufacturing? Or just "on a single day comparison, X vs Y?
As an example:
PC X life expectancy of 3 years
Mac life expectancy of 4 years.
12 years = 3 Macs vs 4 PCs.
Not saying any of this is realistic number wise, but I mean is this something that is looked at.
Another example. "Waterless" toilets. We have them at work. ALWAYS have the blue chemical leaking, service guys coming out (in their big trucks), etc. Is this REALLY a net improvement? What goes into making and recycling Pirus batteries. Or Chevy Volt ones.
Not saying we shouldn't advance, but is this "cost" accounted for?
I would think that the part that would trip up Apple on EPEAT is the pentalobe torx, that's a special tool you have to order. A heat gun you can get at any hardware store.
The following has already been mentioned never-the-less it is worth repeating- heating batteries with a heat gun is not a good idea.
On a wider point, whilst the Apple recycling scheme will overcome many of the perceived problems not all Macs will be returned to Apple.
History shows that history is perhaps the most useless subject since we are doomed to repeat it, all the knowledge does is let you see the freight train at the end of the tunnel, not like you can do anything about it.
But lets use history to "forecast":
- Apple has been focusing on its target market which is becoming more and more: upper class teenagers. As the global economy continues to degenerate, the "professional" class which are the buyers of their pro machines will shrink since they will have less people able to pay them for service. In five years or so, they will only have iOS devices, in ten years they will become like Nokia, the Android market will have beaten them, and they will release their first Android Device.
- A more accurate prediction is as time approaches infinity, everything disintegrates, proving that all is meaningless.
Considering how most people just toss their old computers into the trash bin, EPEAT is meaningless, people are too selfish and lazy to recycle. The only surprise is I thought their current market was "Prosumers" who need to feel "special" when they want to show off to people that they are "writing" in the Starbucks. The lack of EPEAT must be a blow to their superiority complex.
Comments
It's not the glue that is the issue so much as the use of torque screws not regular Philips etc ones.
You're joking, right? You can get penta- and hexalobe screwdrivers nearly anywhere.
Read the book. Nobody (in Palo Alto) who did acid had a muscle car. Better yet, drop some acid. You will no longer diminish complex cultural causation with a facile term like "the butterfly effect." You will see lots of patterns. You will lose your ego for a while as it's sent out for a washing. But that will be ok. Everything will suddenly make sense. It will stay with you for life, as it did for Jobs.
Palo Alto could have been like Houston if it were not for the Beats.
Now you've devolved into pure nonsense.
Quote:
Originally Posted by gbdoc
But what's the real deal? Is Apple's new "design direction" simply ignoring environmental concerns (producing dirty but cute iStuff), is the EPEAT certification somehow faulty (to which Apple objects), or is something else going on?
My guess is that they want to force changes in the standard. Note that EPEAT rates the ability for regular waste processors to recycle equipment. It says nothing about a manufacturer's own recycling program. An EPEAT-certified computer that gets tossed in the trash is no better for the environment than a non-EPEAT-certified Mac that gets returned to Apple for recycling at one of its processors.
Quote:
Originally Posted by catchblue22
I am most likely going to make my next computer a unix laptop of some kind. I know it will be clunky and unpolished. I know I will have to mess around in the command line. I know most users wouldn't really like such a machine. It won't be unibody. It will be plastic. It won't have much of the software that I have grown accustomed to. But at least I won't be subject to the whims of Apple.
You are going to be part of a niche, however. It's your prerogative, but be aware of the risks. Microsoft is heading in the same direction. Most users want PCs to be appliances, the way cars have been for the past 20 years or so. People generally don't "tweak" their dishwashers or TVs. They plug them in and use them. That's where both Apple and Microsoft see things heading in the "post-PC" world.
The chase in The Rock wasn't half bad either.
In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is a gibbering idiot.
Actually it's to save size, weight and yes - even waste. Overall the new MacBook Pro uses less material which means less overall waste at the end of it's lifetime. Apple sells MILLIONS of these things, and every ounce (or fraction of an ounce) is a significant difference.
EPEAT was started with the goal to foster consumer recycling.
It was a nobel ideal, but it flopped. People can't be bothered. So Apple has been and will no doubt continue to be the most aggressively recycled manufacturer because they collect up their old stuff and recycle it professionally. Where something like a bit of glue won't be a problem.
EPEAT needs to be updated. It's not really relevant to todays market.
And I love how no one seems to mention that EPEAT is a private company, not affiliated with the government or any regulatory agency in any way, and manufacturers have to pay to be listed on it. If I were Apple I would be protesting any government awards they didn't get because of EPEAT exclusions and demand to know the basis for such exclusion over and above some blind adherence to a now irrelevant standard (that they did help create initially)
Really? Someone better tell OWC/macsales.com that they are doing the impossible!
Er, the default 8 GB is all the vast majority of PC laptop will even accept - let alone be upgradeable to. And they very plainly and very up front mention it on the store. And it's a pretty reasonable fee to upgrade to the maximum amount too.
Then buy their other pro level laptop that is still upgradeable. Personally I prefer the thinner and lighter weight one and don't find it that big a deal to just order the thing maxed out. But then again I'm not purposly agitating about a product I never intend to buy either....
Sigh - other than RAM and the hard drive, what exactly do you "upgrade" on a laptop anyway? What have you EVER upgraded on a laptop? Maybe a battery, or on the really clunky PC laptops where size apparently does not matter they have media bays where you can swap out a DVD drive for a second battery or hard drive...
Still, it's not like you are changing out the CPU, watercooling/overclocking or tweaking out the non-existent video cards.
These are PORTABLE COMPUTERS and one of the compromises of them is things are integrated and there is less choice. The whole non-removeable battery turned out to be, unsurprisingly, a complete non-issue. This whole "unupgradeable" crap with the Retina MBP will turn out to be the exact same non-issue because, at the end of the day, it is a complete non issue. Tempest in a teapot. Something for those who were never going to buy the machine anyway to fuss and fume over.
Pathetic. Not quite as pathetic as me typing out this response :P congratulations....
Then go buy from someone else. All the "restrictions" you are chaffing against foster stability and a stellar user experience and are the reasons Apple is my preferred vendor. So stop bitching that they aren't like every other miserable experience computer vendor and just go buy from any other vendor and we promise we won't miss your whining and complaining about how Apple isn't like everyone else. Everyone wins!
I would think that the part that would trip up Apple on EPEAT is the pentalobe torx, that's a special tool you have to order. A heat gun you can get at any hardware store.
Quote:
Originally Posted by KPOM
You are going to be part of a niche, however. It's your prerogative, but be aware of the risks. Microsoft is heading in the same direction. Most users want PCs to be appliances, the way cars have been for the past 20 years or so. People generally don't "tweak" their dishwashers or TVs. They plug them in and use them. That's where both Apple and Microsoft see things heading in the "post-PC" world.
Yes, I suppose I will be a niche. But I think Apple should be careful not to anger users like me. I am a teacher. I have brought my MBP to work every day, because I hate working on the locked up MS crap workstations that are provided. That MBP has a nice Apple icon that faces the class every day. It is quite an advertisement. I teach the elite kids, the ones who will go on to be engineers and such. Since I am something of a role model, my choices matter to quite a few students. I have over the last few years been quite positive about OSX. I have discussed the differing engineering philosophies between MS and OSX. I have discussed how OSX is unix based and how unix was from the beginning an operating system that was designed to run multi-user mainframes, and had to e secure and robust. I think I have likely influenced quite a few purchasing decisions. I am one of those users who has played an outsize role in the ascendency of Apple over the past few years. If I choose to buy and use a proper unix laptop, I suspect I will influence some important students.
You say that most people don't tweak their dishwashers or TV's. That is true. However, the freedom that proper computers have provided have given all everyday users freedoms and services that they have grown accustomed to. If computers had been designed early on as locked down appliances, I doubt the world wide web would have come into existence. The large network players, such as, say AOL or Compuserve would have done everything in their power to prevent such a powerful competing network. They would likely have done deals with the companies controlling the locked down computing machines to lock out or cripple competing technologies. You can see such tendencies in closed platforms such as the PS3, where Sony does a great deal to push you into their Playstation Network, or into Netflix, or their other partners. The web browser is an afterthought.
Also, free computing and free networking vis the Internet brought filesharing, which put pressure on the media conglomerates to loosen their grip on content distribution. iTunes was only grudgingly accepted after filesharing had already become rampant. Now we take digital distribution for granted, but if computers had been as locked down as, say the PS3 or even the iPad, I doubt these things would have come into existence in the form they appear in today.
I suppose my main point is this: I do not want to have my freedom to run the software of my choice beholden to the whim of any particular company. One can argue that Apple has been fairly benign in its control of iOS but the fact that it does have such control causes me concern for the future of computing freedom. For that reason, I will make decisions to consume in such as way as to go against the "post PC era". That will include running a clunky unix laptop.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Quadra 610
Is it fair to say Apple Knows Best? That's probably reaching, but if you want a poster-child for that idiom, Apple usually comes closest.
I'm not certain it is fair to say that Apple knows best. But Apple certainly knows how to turn a buck, and knows how to influence public opinion.
My guess is that their EPEAT decision will not result in significantly diminished profitability.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bottleworks
This is a hint of "Apple 3.0" -- The slow, arrogant, downfall of Apple, Inc.
Maybe, but betting against Apple is rarely a wise move.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
If Canada wasn't so damn polite and gave all the territory they won off the USA back, everything North of the Mississippi would be Canada right now.
I'm pretty sure that everything North of the Mississippi IS Canada. Doesn't the Mississippi start in Minnesota?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pooch
are you a medical doctor? pshychologist? psychiatrist? can you please post your credentials? have you examined our politicians? can you post a link to your report?
He's a Doctor of Science. Respect!
Pretty much.
This is a genuine question - Do standards such as EPEAT, etc (actually, any "green" program) take into account things like product lifespan, etc? And cost of manufacturing? Or just "on a single day comparison, X vs Y?
As an example:
PC X life expectancy of 3 years
Mac life expectancy of 4 years.
12 years = 3 Macs vs 4 PCs.
Not saying any of this is realistic number wise, but I mean is this something that is looked at.
Another example. "Waterless" toilets. We have them at work. ALWAYS have the blue chemical leaking, service guys coming out (in their big trucks), etc. Is this REALLY a net improvement? What goes into making and recycling Pirus batteries. Or Chevy Volt ones.
Not saying we shouldn't advance, but is this "cost" accounted for?
Quote:
Originally Posted by JeffDM
I would think that the part that would trip up Apple on EPEAT is the pentalobe torx, that's a special tool you have to order. A heat gun you can get at any hardware store.
The following has already been mentioned never-the-less it is worth repeating- heating batteries with a heat gun is not a good idea.
On a wider point, whilst the Apple recycling scheme will overcome many of the perceived problems not all Macs will be returned to Apple.
History shows that history is perhaps the most useless subject since we are doomed to repeat it, all the knowledge does is let you see the freight train at the end of the tunnel, not like you can do anything about it.
But lets use history to "forecast":
- Apple has been focusing on its target market which is becoming more and more: upper class teenagers. As the global economy continues to degenerate, the "professional" class which are the buyers of their pro machines will shrink since they will have less people able to pay them for service. In five years or so, they will only have iOS devices, in ten years they will become like Nokia, the Android market will have beaten them, and they will release their first Android Device.
- A more accurate prediction is as time approaches infinity, everything disintegrates, proving that all is meaningless.
Considering how most people just toss their old computers into the trash bin, EPEAT is meaningless, people are too selfish and lazy to recycle. The only surprise is I thought their current market was "Prosumers" who need to feel "special" when they want to show off to people that they are "writing" in the Starbucks. The lack of EPEAT must be a blow to their superiority complex.