Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
Buzz off hater.
No one knows anything until Apple starts shipping these. I will give Apple the benefit of doubt then wait and see what the actual information says. I suspect 3rd party vendors will have Apple-compatible drives.
One person's hater is another person's realist. Exactly what doubt do you have that they WON'T charge an arm and a leg based on their pricing history for upgrades? 3x is a pretty spot-on number when it comes to their pricing in the past.
You could have left off the insult and still made your point nicely with what was left. Why the insult?
Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
I really doubt that. Apple has shown time & again that their engineers lead with what they believe is the best solution for the product. The pundits and rumormongers just come up with their own invented reasons, which are conjecture only.
Just like the current MacPro was the best solution for the product?
Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
I really doubt that. Apple has shown time & again that their engineers lead with what they believe is the best solution for the product. The pundits and rumormongers just come up with their own invented reasons, which are conjecture only.
Actually, Apple has been known to just take a standard connector, flip the pins to different locations, and charge you differently. AirPort cards were just PCMCIA cards with 2 pins swapped. They started cheaper than PCMCIA cards but eventually the cost of a PCMCIA card dropped but the AirPort card stayed the same.
When it comes to flash storage, same thing.
As proof, here is a simple adapter that turns a standard SSD into one that works in your MacBook Air or Pro. The adapter is tiny because it contains no logic converters - it just, **surprise** swaps the pins!
To courageously innovate around that, in 2016 they soldered the flash straight on to the logic board - giving you no choice but to pre-buy all the storage you anxiously worried that you might need down the road - and they charged handsomely for it.
Fanboys will say nobody upgrades. Pro users will say they upgrade if they can (that is why the new Mac Pro is the most upgradeable Mac ever - a course correction against the cylindrical Mac Pro). So who is right? Would MacBook Pro users buy less flash to start with, and buy more flash later (when it dropped in price) - if they could?
A company doesn’t boast a 38% margin (while the rest of the industry struggles to get past single-digit margin) and higher ASP just because they were able to be 38% cost efficient when everyone else was only 9% cost efficient. It is very hard to be 400% better than your long-lived competitors.
I’m not saying Apple is evil. They’re just doing business. They can compete any (legal) way they want to.
What I am saying is, some of us have had enough of these shenanigans. And we have proof that is what these actions are - shenanigans.
While I’m expressing my disappointment, “Apple pays every tax dollar it owes” is mindless drivel. Of course it does! Else they end up in jail! But “what it owes” isn’t some fair number arrived at that is mutually beneficial to the countries it operates in - it is a number arrived at where one country (Ireland) decides to be corrupt and set an artificially low tax rate in hopes of getting some revenue and shutting out other countries.
I'm not particularly impressed with the 2.6GB/s sequential read and 2.7GB/s sequential write performance. You would think that for a pro machine they could RAID stripe a startup volume on separate buses to double the storage speed for a huge overall performance bump.
This gives me reason to pause on ordering one of these.
As much as I want to have a headless desktop Mac that (hopefully) will have a long service life, Apple's propensity for proprietary connectors and stuff is a serious concern. I want to see the thing for myself and see what aftermarket stuff will be possible as Apple charges a king's ransom for memory on everything it sells.
I would love to order one of these and have it on day one, but at these prices, I will have to wait and see.
This gives me reason to pause on ordering one of these.
As much as I want to have a headless desktop Mac that (hopefully) will have a long service life, Apple's propensity for proprietary connectors and stuff is a serious concern. I want to see the thing for myself and see what aftermarket stuff will be possible as Apple charges a king's ransom for memory on everything it sells.
I would love to order one of these and have it on day one, but at these prices, I will have to wait and see.
I would argue that at $6K starting, most of us aren’t in the target market for a Mac Pro. And that is perfectly okay!
They’re aiming at studios with reference monitors, where the Apple $5K/6K display beats the incumbent reference monitor at $43K or whatever that is - so with the $30K+ saved - a very well featured Mac Pro is basically “free” compared to last year’s budget.
For someone in the market for 28 Core Xeon power (such a CPU alone is $15K) then a few thousand here and there to round out the system, make it crazily expandable and quiet, movable with wheels, etc. - is incredibly good value, or chump change depending on how wealthy you are.
The Mac Pro is both a very practical powerhouse or workstation, and at the same time an aspirational computer for many, and also tells the industry that Apple (once again, although they kind of said this with iMac Pro) makes seriously powerful computers that are quiet and well-designed.
If I were in the market for 6 cores I would get a Mac mini 2018 with the minimum storage, plug in a USB-C SanDisk 1TB for cheap, get an LG 43” 4K, and call it a day. Some people on the WayTools forum have tried that with great success, and laughed all the way to the bank with the money they saved.
If I wanted 8 cores I would wait for the Mac mini refresh.
Just to state. I don't agree with the custom SSD connectors but I understand the main reasoning. 1 being control of available hardware. Apple wants to make sure they don't have to deal with poorly made hardware being put into the system. While people complain about the price I would like to point out that this system is designed for studios that need high end processing as video rendering and editing take gobs of resources. If you're an average user the correct Mac for you is a Mac mini. Or if you are a power user you can get a imac. Otherwise if you are buying one of these machines the t2 chip is a must as well as the enhanced read and write cycles. (Like the 970pro). Nearly every component has error correcting which is a must in the studios. None of these things are for the average user or a high end gamer. Before you criteque you should examine the product for the intended target. Now maybe someday Apple will make a machine for the gamers, but I wouldn't hold my breath.
That's one thing I'm concerned about the T2 because they bottleneck the SSD performance since both flash modules and controller keeps improving over time. Judging on the iMac Pro, I'm sure those "SSDs" are just raw flash modules, whereas the T2 chip ties the controller within. That limited any future performance improvement, but every computer with an M.2 running PCIe 3.0 have the potential to upgrade a faster SSD.
Maybe that's not a problem for a Mac Pro, but not the iMac Pro and MacBook Pros.
I'm not certain that they'll get that much faster. While the theoretical max speed of the PCI-E 3.0 x4 connector with a M.2 slot is 3600 megabytes per second or so, the reality is a bit less, perhaps 2900 megabytes per second.
I don't think that's the case. x4 should run at 3.9GB/s maximum and M.2 is just another form of it. Source?
But whether it's 3.6 or 3.9, it left both the iMac Pro and MacBook Pros lots of room for improvement.
Huh, TIL.
Still, there is NVMe storage overhead too. I just don't think there's as much leeway for growth as you do, is all.
I've talked to a friend about this and he thinks the T2 is better optimized for APFS. That might be true, but I'm not sure some software improvements will overcome hardware advancements.
Then again, I know nothing about SSD controllers. All of them could have different architectures.
There are over a half dozen major SSD controller architectures out there. New ones come around every year or two.
Right, which is why I think locking your SSD in the T2 isn’t a good idea. 1. No upgrade options, once obsolete, forever obsolete. 2. (Some) nearly impossible to remove, you’ll need to perform SMD soldering.
This gives me reason to pause on ordering one of these.
As much as I want to have a headless desktop Mac that (hopefully) will have a long service life, Apple's propensity for proprietary connectors and stuff is a serious concern. I want to see the thing for myself and see what aftermarket stuff will be possible as Apple charges a king's ransom for memory on everything it sells.
I would love to order one of these and have it on day one, but at these prices, I will have to wait and see.
This is foolish.
You have a pile of PCIe slots, into which you can put PCIe cards that can hold (for example) up to 4x NVMe SSDs from any maker (Samsung, WD, Intel, whatever). This can easily hit 10GB/s in an x16 slot, and I can pretty much guarantee that you're not going to need that any time soon. But if some day you do, the option is there.
That said... I'm surprised and disappointed that Apple didn't improve the T2 to offer more bandwidth to the flash. This is the only way that the nnMP is slightly subpar compared to high-end workstations (bandwidth to SSDs can be >10% better with some SSDs, and >20% soon if not already, even not counting the PCIe4 SSDs on AMD
x570 boards).
I think they backed themselves into a bit of a corner with the T2 design, and it now seems that it was a grievous error to put the flash controller inside it. What they should have done was to use standard NVMes (possibly fiddling with the connector, if they wanted to keep it expensive and proprietary), and have the T2 do encryption before handing off to the NVMes. They could have increased BW to flash much more easily that way, just by adding cores or MHz to the T2. The current T2 situation - at least until the nnMP, which may be a little better since the cards are removable - is completely stupid: if your logic board dies, it's likely you'll never be able to recover your data. Of course, this all depends on *how* the encryption key is stored - you'd still need to put your hands on that, even if you had removable NVMEs (or, as with the nnMP, removable Apple flash modules).
...which is actually a really good question. Mike, if you talk to any Apple people about this, ask them if there's a way to recover the data if your logic board dies but you have working flash modules?
This gives me reason to pause on ordering one of these.
As much as I want to have a headless desktop Mac that (hopefully) will have a long service life, Apple's propensity for proprietary connectors and stuff is a serious concern. I want to see the thing for myself and see what aftermarket stuff will be possible as Apple charges a king's ransom for memory on everything it sells.
I would love to order one of these and have it on day one, but at these prices, I will have to wait and see.
It's becoming clear to me that there are a lot of folks that would like what is basically an iMac /iMac Pro in a mid-sized tower without a screen using industry standard I/O and slots and industry standard RAM and SATA connectors. I am sure Apple could sell a boatload of these at around $2-4K depending on the BTO. The Mac Pro is a wonderful machine but I don't see any video industry pro wanting the base model they will be ordering mid to high end versions. The entry version serves no user base I can think of.
Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
I really doubt that. Apple has shown time & again that their engineers lead with what they believe is the best solution for the product. The pundits and rumormongers just come up with their own invented reasons, which are conjecture only.
Right now, yours is also conjecture. If Apple explain what is superior about this connector and format, then it will be something we can all discuss with facts on the table.
EDIT: and, seeing the other post detailing Apple’s habit of swapping pins just to make standard connectors incompatible, you’re actively incorrect.
This gives me reason to pause on ordering one of these.
I would love to order one of these and have it on day one, but at these prices, I will have to wait and see.
I would argue that at $6K starting, most of us aren’t in the target market for a Mac Pro. And that is perfectly okay!
If I wanted 8 cores I would wait for the Mac mini refresh.
I have the top CPU Mac mini and it is a nice basic desktop but is hobbled by integrated graphics and thermal issues due to the case design. Simply transcoding video spools up the fan quickly and uses significant resources, so it is not a reasonable solution to replace the work of my Cheesegrater Mac.
I will buy the standard configuration of the new Pro and maybe bump up the memory. I can afford the $ but only for a headless workstation that can be upgraded- not anything like the iMac or iMac “Pro”. A nice 4K monitor will be fine for my purposes. My mini is using an H-P 32” UHD and I would love a 4K in that size for my desktop.
My needs are personal- not professional- I do video, music and photography and despise all in ones. Empty nest and home is paid for. When you have $1000 lenses on your camera, $6k is not unreasonable.
Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
Buzz off hater.
No one knows anything until Apple starts shipping these. I will give Apple the benefit of doubt then wait and see what the actual information says. I suspect 3rd party vendors will have Apple-compatible drives.
One person's hater is another person's realist. Exactly what doubt do you have that they WON'T charge an arm and a leg based on their pricing history for upgrades? 3x is a pretty spot-on number when it comes to their pricing in the past.
You could have left off the insult and still made your point nicely with what was left. Why the insult?
Typical drive-by troll that’s why.
Does nothing to add to the discussion and plays the tired “Apple is greedy” card.
But if you want to continue enabling and babysitting these players go right ahead. I will continue to call them out.
Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
Buzz off hater.
No one knows anything until Apple starts shipping these. I will give Apple the benefit of doubt then wait and see what the actual information says. I suspect 3rd party vendors will have Apple-compatible drives.
One person's hater is another person's realist. Exactly what doubt do you have that they WON'T charge an arm and a leg based on their pricing history for upgrades? 3x is a pretty spot-on number when it comes to their pricing in the past.
You could have left off the insult and still made your point nicely with what was left. Why the insult?
Typical drive-by troll that’s why.
Does nothing to add to the discussion and plays the tired “Apple is greedy” card.
But if you want to continue enabling and babysitting these players go right ahead. I will continue to call them out.
You're the troll. Near enough everyone here is an Apple fan, but many of the long-time fans are concerned that Apple isn't producing the products they and many other people want.
You're the kind of person that Windows fanatics - in this case rightly - laugh at, blindly defending Apple even in the face of facts proving the opposite StrangeDays is exactly the same. Apple is well known for using proprietary connectors for standard interfaces and charging stupid amounts for RAM and flash upgrades. How do you justify them charging 3x the market price for a 1TB Fusion drive to 512gb SSD upgrade? It's really, really expensive to make custom busses, which is why pretty much all the busses in the Macs are actually the exact same standard ones that're on the average £200 PC, but with fudged connectors so people can't use standard components.
Also, what has your reply added to the discussion? Absolutely nothing.
The way Catalina installs with the OS on one Drive and the User + Apps on a different "Drive", I think 256GB should be enough, although people are going to HAVE to setup external storage (or the internal carriage), with whatever drives they want/can... but I am looking for the command line / tools that help with this... LOL
That's one thing I'm concerned about the T2 because they bottleneck the SSD performance since both flash modules and controller keeps improving over time. Judging on the iMac Pro, I'm sure those "SSDs" are just raw flash modules, whereas the T2 chip ties the controller within. That limited any future performance improvement, but every computer with an M.2 running PCIe 3.0 have the potential to upgrade a faster SSD.
Maybe that's not a problem for a Mac Pro, but not the iMac Pro and MacBook Pros.
I'm not certain that they'll get that much faster. While the theoretical max speed of the PCI-E 3.0 x4 connector with a M.2 slot is 3600 megabytes per second or so, the reality is a bit less, perhaps 2900 megabytes per second.
I don't think that's the case. x4 should run at 3.9GB/s maximum and M.2 is just another form of it. Source?
But whether it's 3.6 or 3.9, it left both the iMac Pro and MacBook Pros lots of room for improvement.
Huh, TIL.
Still, there is NVMe storage overhead too. I just don't think there's as much leeway for growth as you do, is all.
I've talked to a friend about this and he thinks the T2 is better optimized for APFS. That might be true, but I'm not sure some software improvements will overcome hardware advancements.
Then again, I know nothing about SSD controllers. All of them could have different architectures.
There are over a half dozen major SSD controller architectures out there. New ones come around every year or two.
Right, which is why I think locking your SSD in the T2 isn’t a good idea. 1. No upgrade options, once obsolete, forever obsolete. 2. (Some) nearly impossible to remove, you’ll need to perform SMD soldering.
Change security settings after setting up the initial admin account so you can boot from "external drives" - which may allow booting from PCIe cards as well if the OS itself has built-in drives for that - worst case from an external Thunderbolt drive that could be using whatever the latest technology is.
If it's not the T2, it's another controller of some sort that handles the storage and whatever connector the motherboard comes with like M.2 that has limits as well. in the case of the T2 though, it looks like whatever apple does is just a PCIe connection to the flash chips (in the MacMini or MacBook Pro's it's soldered instead) - the T2 handles all the stuff the "on-board" SSD chip functions would do plus a more integrated encryption solution.
The way Catalina installs with the OS on one Drive and the User + Apps on a different "Drive", I think 256GB should be enough, although people are going to HAVE to setup external storage (or the internal carriage), with whatever drives they want/can... but I am looking for the command line / tools that help with this... LOL
That's interesting, I wonder if they're doing that so they can use APFS snapshots to revert the OS if there's a problem. Is this documented online or did you discover it through the developer beta?
Apple greed at work, they will charge 3x what other SSDs cost.
I really doubt that. Apple has shown time & again that their engineers lead with what they believe is the best solution for the product. The pundits and rumormongers just come up with their own invented reasons, which are conjecture only.
Actually, Apple has been known to just take a standard connector, flip the pins to different locations, and charge you differently. AirPort cards were just PCMCIA cards with 2 pins swapped. They started cheaper than PCMCIA cards but eventually the cost of a PCMCIA card dropped but the AirPort card stayed the same.
When it comes to flash storage, same thing.
As proof, here is a simple adapter that turns a standard SSD into one that works in your MacBook Air or Pro. The adapter is tiny because it contains no logic converters - it just, **surprise** swaps the pins!
To courageously innovate around that, in 2016 they soldered the flash straight on to the logic board - giving you no choice but to pre-buy all the storage you anxiously worried that you might need down the road - and they charged handsomely for it.
Fanboys will say nobody upgrades. Pro users will say they upgrade if they can (that is why the new Mac Pro is the most upgradeable Mac ever - a course correction against the cylindrical Mac Pro). So who is right? Would MacBook Pro users buy less flash to start with, and buy more flash later (when it dropped in price) - if they could?
A company doesn’t boast a 38% margin (while the rest of the industry struggles to get past single-digit margin) and higher ASP just because they were able to be 38% cost efficient when everyone else was only 9% cost efficient. It is very hard to be 400% better than your long-lived competitors.
I’m not saying Apple is evil. They’re just doing business. They can compete any (legal) way they want to.
What I am saying is, some of us have had enough of these shenanigans. And we have proof that is what these actions are - shenanigans.
While I’m expressing my disappointment, “Apple pays every tax dollar it owes” is mindless drivel. Of course it does! Else they end up in jail! But “what it owes” isn’t some fair number arrived at that is mutually beneficial to the countries it operates in - it is a number arrived at where one country (Ireland) decides to be corrupt and set an artificially low tax rate in hopes of getting some revenue and shutting out other countries.
Oh, for crying out loud. I’ve been using Macs since 1988, but PCs since 1981, and computers since 1966. I’ve seen it all. Most of what you’re saying is pure drivel. Industries that mostly use Macs don’t use them because they’re overpriced, and marketed well. If you don’t understand that, then don’t bother to be in the conversation.
for those who do understand it, professional level equipment is always expensive. While Apple gets pilloried for a $995 monitor stand that’s a machined, large piece of metal, with a complex, and supposedly reliable mechanism, RED charges $500 for a simple aluminum handle for their video cameras. Others charge similarly for simple parts. I had automatic paper cutters in my lab. A small circuit board, about 3” x 5” cost $1,000 as a replacement part before 2004 (when we sold the lab). There was nothing special about that part. Agfa charged $1,200, for a power supply, that I found out later, could be bought from the manufacturer for $250. And even worse, all of the broken ones I had were still under original manufacturer’s warrantee! They told me to send them in, and they repaired them for free.
apple is not only not worse, but they’re better. Yes, you can buy cheap Wintel computers, but that’s what you’re getting. Most Wintel users won’t pay more than a minimum, so that’s what those companies make, and their margins are at the bone, so they have financial problems. Look at Dell’s problems. And look at what happened to Hp. Are those the shining examples that Apple is supposed to follow? I hope not.
as far as taxes go. If it’s legal, then I hope a company is taking every advantage of that. The reality is that Apple did nothing illegal in Europe. Many European companies do exactly the same thing. So I say, change the laws. Companies will then be forced to follow them. But if the laws allow something, a company should do it. It’s not their responsibility to pay more taxes than they have to. It’s not like tipping in a restaurant. It’s like paying the bill itself.
Comments
You could have left off the insult and still made your point nicely with what was left. Why the insult?
Actually, Apple has been known to just take a standard connector, flip the pins to different locations, and charge you differently. AirPort cards were just PCMCIA cards with 2 pins swapped. They started cheaper than PCMCIA cards but eventually the cost of a PCMCIA card dropped but the AirPort card stayed the same.
When it comes to flash storage, same thing.
As proof, here is a simple adapter that turns a standard SSD into one that works in your MacBook Air or Pro. The adapter is tiny because it contains no logic converters - it just, **surprise** swaps the pins!
https://www.amazon.com/Sintech-Adapter-Upgrade-2013-2016-2013-2015/dp/B07FYY3H5F/
To courageously innovate around that, in 2016 they soldered the flash straight on to the logic board - giving you no choice but to pre-buy all the storage you anxiously worried that you might need down the road - and they charged handsomely for it.
Fanboys will say nobody upgrades. Pro users will say they upgrade if they can (that is why the new Mac Pro is the most upgradeable Mac ever - a course correction against the cylindrical Mac Pro). So who is right? Would MacBook Pro users buy less flash to start with, and buy more flash later (when it dropped in price) - if they could?
A company doesn’t boast a 38% margin (while the rest of the industry struggles to get past single-digit margin) and higher ASP just because they were able to be 38% cost efficient when everyone else was only 9% cost efficient. It is very hard to be 400% better than your long-lived competitors.
I’m not saying Apple is evil. They’re just doing business. They can compete any (legal) way they want to.
What I am saying is, some of us have had enough of these shenanigans. And we have proof that is what these actions are - shenanigans.
While I’m expressing my disappointment, “Apple pays every tax dollar it owes” is mindless drivel. Of course it does! Else they end up in jail! But “what it owes” isn’t some fair number arrived at that is mutually beneficial to the countries it operates in - it is a number arrived at where one country (Ireland) decides to be corrupt and set an artificially low tax rate in hopes of getting some revenue and shutting out other countries.
I would argue that at $6K starting, most of us aren’t in the target market for a Mac Pro. And that is perfectly okay!
They’re aiming at studios with reference monitors, where the Apple $5K/6K display beats the incumbent reference monitor at $43K or whatever that is - so with the $30K+ saved - a very well featured Mac Pro is basically “free” compared to last year’s budget.
For someone in the market for 28 Core Xeon power (such a CPU alone is $15K) then a few thousand here and there to round out the system, make it crazily expandable and quiet, movable with wheels, etc. - is incredibly good value, or chump change depending on how wealthy you are.
The Mac Pro is both a very practical powerhouse or workstation, and at the same time an aspirational computer for many, and also tells the industry that Apple (once again, although they kind of said this with iMac Pro) makes seriously powerful computers that are quiet and well-designed.
If I were in the market for 6 cores I would get a Mac mini 2018 with the minimum storage, plug in a USB-C SanDisk 1TB for cheap, get an LG 43” 4K, and call it a day. Some people on the WayTools forum have tried that with great success, and laughed all the way to the bank with the money they saved.
If I wanted 8 cores I would wait for the Mac mini refresh.
1. No upgrade options, once obsolete, forever obsolete.
2. (Some) nearly impossible to remove, you’ll need to perform SMD soldering.
EDIT: and, seeing the other post detailing Apple’s habit of swapping pins just to make standard connectors incompatible, you’re actively incorrect.
I will buy the standard configuration of the new Pro and maybe bump up the memory. I can afford the $ but only for a headless workstation that can be upgraded- not anything like the iMac or iMac “Pro”. A nice 4K monitor will be fine for my purposes. My mini is using an H-P 32” UHD and I would love a 4K in that size for my desktop.
My needs are personal- not professional- I do video, music and photography and despise all in ones. Empty nest and home is paid for. When you have $1000 lenses on your camera, $6k is not unreasonable.
Does nothing to add to the discussion and plays the tired “Apple is greedy” card.
But if you want to continue enabling and babysitting these players go right ahead. I will continue to call them out.
You're the kind of person that Windows fanatics - in this case rightly - laugh at, blindly defending Apple even in the face of facts proving the opposite StrangeDays is exactly the same. Apple is well known for using proprietary connectors for standard interfaces and charging stupid amounts for RAM and flash upgrades. How do you justify them charging 3x the market price for a 1TB Fusion drive to 512gb SSD upgrade? It's really, really expensive to make custom busses, which is why pretty much all the busses in the Macs are actually the exact same standard ones that're on the average £200 PC, but with fudged connectors so people can't use standard components.
Also, what has your reply added to the discussion? Absolutely nothing.
If it's not the T2, it's another controller of some sort that handles the storage and whatever connector the motherboard comes with like M.2 that has limits as well.
in the case of the T2 though, it looks like whatever apple does is just a PCIe connection to the flash chips (in the MacMini or MacBook Pro's it's soldered instead) - the T2 handles all the stuff the "on-board" SSD chip functions would do plus a more integrated encryption solution.
for those who do understand it, professional level equipment is always expensive. While Apple gets pilloried for a $995 monitor stand that’s a machined, large piece of metal, with a complex, and supposedly reliable mechanism, RED charges $500 for a simple aluminum handle for their video cameras. Others charge similarly for simple parts. I had automatic paper cutters in my lab. A small circuit board, about 3” x 5” cost $1,000 as a replacement part before 2004 (when we sold the lab). There was nothing special about that part. Agfa charged $1,200, for a power supply, that I found out later, could be bought from the manufacturer for $250. And even worse, all of the broken ones I had were still under original manufacturer’s warrantee! They told me to send them in, and they repaired them for free.
apple is not only not worse, but they’re better. Yes, you can buy cheap Wintel computers, but that’s what you’re getting. Most Wintel users won’t pay more than a minimum, so that’s what those companies make, and their margins are at the bone, so they have financial problems. Look at Dell’s problems. And look at what happened to Hp. Are those the shining examples that Apple is supposed to follow? I hope not.
as far as taxes go. If it’s legal, then I hope a company is taking every advantage of that. The reality is that Apple did nothing illegal in Europe. Many European companies do exactly the same thing. So I say, change the laws. Companies will then be forced to follow them. But if the laws allow something, a company should do it. It’s not their responsibility to pay more taxes than they have to. It’s not like tipping in a restaurant. It’s like paying the bill itself.