Problem is not currency rates (affecting all). This time Apple is to blame:
No continuous improvements on hardware. All desktop models have been on/off life support.
Few and terrible new improvements - touchbar, keyboards, removal of Magsafe, and even forced Retina (expensive screens, GPU, battery consumption, reliability issues).
Product quality - recalls. No upgradeability. Excessive cost of repairs due to glue/bad design (the touch sensor on MacBooks adds 1 hour to any repair).
Design moved from unique to stale.
Hardware blockers - no Nvidia, no Ryzen, no docks (I love having a dock for my HP) - why is the Mac without?
But the main reason IMHO is macOS. It used to be the best to support how we work, study, and create. It was coherent across applications with shared shortcuts, shared UX, great usability, and clear guidelines. Apple pushed the platform forward. Now it is bloatware with annual "new features" from iOS tacked on. It seems Apple is not interested in letting macOS handle problems we face today. Instead Apple adds keyboards, pens, multitasking, and more to the iPad.
gentooguy said: none of the loyalty that they did maybe 20-25 years ago when companies had the "we only wear Brooks Bros, drive Mercedes and use IBM here."
In the early 90s I worked for a federal agency which rented office space in a building owned by IBM. IBM asked that the employees from our agency not use the main building entrance since our dress code wasn’t up to snuff despite wearing standard business attire.
Our company is a heavy buyer of Dell workstations and laptops. Without exception that are unmitigated pieces of junk that barely last 2 years. The number of failures we have with Dells is tragic and they are just poorly designed built to a price I throw away crap. Compared to the amazing longevity of Apple hardware there is no comparison. Just helped a friend replace his perfectly functional 2008 MacBook Pro. My 2014 27” iMac is a joy to use.
Shockingly none of my several former workplaces that used Dell had similar experiences. Case in point: my Iast Dell worked fine for 8 years until the power unit died. I inherited it from someone else when I started, used it until it was time for a refresh and they just gave it to me, and it was my main home laptop for 3 more years. Similarly if you go on the many Windows forums, none of them report such problems with Dells. Including - gasp! - your job. Because look ... if Dells were nearly as bad as you claim your company would have gone out of business long ago.
Look, I know that you like and prefer Macs - I cannot blame you as my work issued 13 inch MBPro is the single most favorite laptop that I have ever owned or used and my #4 favorite among all tech devices I have ever owned behind my NES, my Sony Walkman and my Samsung Galaxy Mega smartphone - but there is no reason to just make up stuff. Windows, Android, ChromeOS etc. would never succeed in the marketplace if they were half as bad as Apple fans claim that they are. The funny thing is that it is mostly one-sided. Few Windows, Android or ChromeOS users bash Apple products, and when they do 99% of it is either price or because the devices are a bit more locked down than they prefer, i.e. perfectly valid - and actually accurate - economic or tech reasons. But go to the Apple forums and it is endless trashing of users of other platforms simply for the crime of merely existing. And for the vast majority of them it is easy to tell that they have never seriously used - or used at all - the devices they are trashing.
Word. My experience. Except android tablets, they are pretty pathetic.
fed up with Apple's high price, though my next computer still going to be a Mac, at the end of the day, they spent a lot on macOS and the ecosystem, they have to make the money back form somewhere
I still have a 2005 vintage Dell Inspiron 9300 that runs Lbuntu perfectly fine to this day. Sure, one of Ctrl keys fell off and the fans are noisy, and the beautiful high res screen has more backlight leakage than I like, but it’s still getting the job done. I’ve used at least a dozen Dell Latitude laptops over the years for work and they survived well with plenty of backpack trips around the world. The biggest knock I have with Dell is that they seem to source major components from multiple vendors and you may end up with an undesirable combination that has a higher failure rate and/or lots of driver issues. I’ve also had to replace 3-4 keyboards and of course several battery packs, sometimes involving recalls.
My first Mac was a 2008 iMac 24” loaded to the gills. Unfortunately, part of the “gills” package was a faulty NVidia graphics card that rendered the whole damn thing useless. I’ve seen online articles about removing and baking (yes, as in Betty Crocker!) the video card to reflow the solder but I haven’t tried it yet. Just getting the damn thing apart and dealing with several dozens of screws and tiny connectors puts it on the back burner of my personal 1-to-N things on my procrastination list. I know I can do it because repairing the fans on my Dell 9300 was a tedious adventure, but I’m not sure the baking will actually work. I wish I could at least use the ‘08 iMac as a monitor, but it’s not supported that far back.
My newer Macs have done okay, but the late 2012 iMac 27 has been under the knife of an Apple Genius 3 times, once for a recalled Fusion Drive, once for a faulty microphone, and once for a failed hard drive.
Still, I wouldn’t draw any conclusions from anecdotal stories. There is no such thing as a defect free computer. My personal feelings are that you’re more likely, on average, to get what I consider a “good” computer from Apple unless there’s a recall level issue that affects the model you bought. On the PC side I believe you are more likely to encounter issues that only affect your specific computer because most if not all PC makers source components across a much wider group of suppliers. All you have to do is to read the online reviews to see that there are a subset of people getting dud instances of PCs that are well reviewed, even with the most valued aspect of a particular product, for example Lenovo keyboards. Read the current reviews of the latest Dell XPS 13 on Dell’s website.
The last thing I ever want to do when buying a new computer (unless I’m building it myself) is to feel that I need to cherry pick the bill of materials for the build to avoid ending up with a dud that defies the otherwise stellar reviews for the product. With Apple, if the reviews for the product I’m interested in are overwhelmingly positive I feel confIdent that the unit I get from Apple will live up to my expectations.
That is just my approach, but it has generally worked out well, except the 2008 iMac that was plagued with a congenital defect from NVidia that affected a very large percentage of buyers shortly after their AppleCare coverage expired. I’m sure the old 24” iMac with a 3.06 GHz Core 2 Duo would run Linux exceedingly well and I could retire the noisy Dell 9300. But it’s just sitting there like a pretty brick with mangled video, unable to boot.
Our company is a heavy buyer of Dell workstations and laptops. Without exception that are unmitigated pieces of junk that barely last 2 years. The number of failures we have with Dells is tragic and they are just poorly designed built to a price I throw away crap. Compared to the amazing longevity of Apple hardware there is no comparison. Just helped a friend replace his perfectly functional 2008 MacBook Pro. My 2014 27” iMac is a joy to use.
Shockingly none of my several former workplaces that used Dell had similar experiences. Case in point: my Iast Dell worked fine for 8 years until the power unit died. I inherited it from someone else when I started, used it until it was time for a refresh and they just gave it to me, and it was my main home laptop for 3 more years. Similarly if you go on the many Windows forums, none of them report such problems with Dells. Including - gasp! - your job. Because look ... if Dells were nearly as bad as you claim your company would have gone out of business long ago.
Look, I know that you like and prefer Macs - I cannot blame you as my work issued 13 inch MBPro is the single most favorite laptop that I have ever owned or used and my #4 favorite among all tech devices I have ever owned behind my NES, my Sony Walkman and my Samsung Galaxy Mega smartphone - but there is no reason to just make up stuff. Windows, Android, ChromeOS etc. would never succeed in the marketplace if they were half as bad as Apple fans claim that they are. The funny thing is that it is mostly one-sided. Few Windows, Android or ChromeOS users bash Apple products, and when they do 99% of it is either price or because the devices are a bit more locked down than they prefer, i.e. perfectly valid - and actually accurate - economic or tech reasons. But go to the Apple forums and it is endless trashing of users of other platforms simply for the crime of merely existing. And for the vast majority of them it is easy to tell that they have never seriously used - or used at all - the devices they are trashing.
Word. My experience. Except android tablets, they are pretty pathetic.
Yeah. Google knee-capped Android tablets in order to give Chromebooks a fighting chance. Some manufacturers tried to keep them going without Google's guidance or help with great devices like the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro (hardware/form factor wise an iPad Pro 18 months before Apple came out with theirs), the Asus Transformer (think Surface Book) and some Lenovo Yoga Android devices (think Surface Pro) but they all failed due to lack of software support and publicity (Google provided neither).
It is great that Samsung, Lenovo, Asus and Acer are coming out with 2-in-1 Chromebooks similar to Surface and iPad Pro designs that run 3 operating systems: ChromeOS the main one with Android and Linux in containers. Especially since the top-of-the-line models have internals that rival the MacBook Air: Intel i5 CPUs plus 128 GB or more of storage and 8 GB or more of RAM like the Lenovo Yoga Chromebook C630 and the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook. (NOT Pixels mind you because Google for bad design reasons prefers the "low power" Intel CPUs, which would make sense if they LTE devices but they aren't so Google is just hobbling them for no reason.) If you are savvy enough to leverage apps/applications/functionality available on all 3 operating systems you can just about approximate the functionality of a MacBook Air too ... and on devices with 4K graphics, touchscreens, styluses and keyboards built in. Which is neat for those who prefer not to have a MacBook or a Windows PC.
But it doesn't come anywhere close to replacing what Android tablets could have been - and should have been - had Google not abandoned them in favor of ChromeOS in 2012. Case in point: where 15-20 million Chromebooks are sold a year, Apple sells 35-50 million iPads a year.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Notebooks made up a big part of Apple Mac sales, and the butterfly keyboard disaster finally caught up with them. You can see Apple somewhat has recognized that fact, but even the replacement keyboard has less key travel than my mid-2015 model. It boggles my mind that some Mac lovers might abandon Apple over a keyboard, but it's not impossible to imagine. As for me, I simply have not upgraded because I like the machine I have now, and I want an SD card slot and at least one USB-A port too -- all reason for me NOT to upgrade to a newer Apple notebook despite the speed gains.
As to the iMac, Apple released the Pro which is more expensive than most people can afford, so naturally those sales numbers won't be great. I think the regular iMac is the best value of any Mac (even when compared to the Mini), but many frugal people like me try to get as many years out of their existing Macs as possible. My iMac at home, for example, is a late 2009 model kept alive by multiple makes of the video card.
The Mac Pro is so expensive it is barely a blip on total Mac sales. And now with Corona, Mac sales will only get worse since most people buying computers now are worried about family finances and those who perceive Macs as a "luxury" will choose a silly Windows machine over the Mac, or stick with the Macs they have. Apple has never been about competing with low cost machines, so I don't see this downward sales trend as improving. Apple hopes iPadOS can change things in terms of overall computer sales (since the iPad is a computer), but there's so much the iPad cannot do because iPadOS really cannot compare with the flexibility of a Mac.
I think what Apple will need to do to sustain the Mac is become a bit more consumer focused. Rather than flash us with what they deem a brilliant design (e.g., butterfly keyboards and no SD card slots only to make thinner machines none of us really need), Apple will need to see what people really want and the prices consumers deem affordable. I don't think that would tarnish the Apple image but merely show that Apple is concerned about the needs of its users over the wants of Apple's internal marketing and design departments.
What I'd like to know is, [1] for what purposes are people predominantly using Macs and [2] does Apple have a plan for, or interest in, advancing the Mac in markets/sectors in which it is poorly represented? I performed a search for answers to the first question but was met with huge self-interest and less than useful information in web sites that were returned and about the latter...
Without yet answers to queries in my previous post, I'll trouble the reader with a further thought. I listened recently to an interview with a prominent technologist and visionary(?) during which Elon Musk was featured. While I realise that discussions regarding Musk can soon degenerate into a shambles, the technologist made several interesting observations. Some centred on Elon's strengths, one of which was that when presented with an idea or new technology, he will ask "tell me why I need it?". I would like to be able to ask the same question of the Mac and the response to be "because this is only possible on a Mac". There was a time when this was true. A time when applications such as Mathematica (https://www.wolfram.com) and Labview (https://www.ni.com/en-au.html) (and Word/Excel?) ran only on Macs and gave users of these systems access to capabilities otherwise unaccessible. Mathematica is pretty much up to date still but Labview provides a sub-optimal experience on the Mac. I believe that Apple can do this again, given the strength of hardware and growing services capabilities. One product (a combination of hardware and services) would take some time to bring to market but would be quite a leap in computing (and no, it doesn't at its heart involve AR, VR or quantum computing, although each could play a part).
Apple has the money, the platform and engineering talent from which to take personal computing to new levels.
As painful as it is, we are replacing all Mac minis that were used as servers with HP kit running Linux.
Apple also has an issue with continuously making new systems with inadequate cooling. Some of the testing of the latest MBA is outright shocking with the CPU consistently running at 100 C under anything above trivial load, resulting in throttling and the machine too hot to comfortably rest on a lap.
The 2018 minis are basically in the same position. Throw load at them and they throttle like never before. MBPs too.
Combine this with an increasingly locked and dumbed down macOS where flexibility is decreasing, and add to that price hikes in combination with currency fluctuations making Apple kit forbiddingly expensive outside the US, I don’t have a problem seeing the decline projected being real.
The coronavirus issue is only part of the explanation.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
They don't need to reinvent anything.
They need to revert to building flexible, expandable, serviceable machines that don't run hot. Also, the constant focus on making macOS behave more and more like iOS and locking it down, is bound to throw off a lot of people who use their systems for work and projects iOS was never built for.
Finally Apple needs to come to realization that more and more people don't want to store everything about their life in the cloud, and that businesses by law in most countries cannot store very large portions of their business and personnel data in the cloud. Therefore the systems Apple creates must also appeal to these users, which they sadly decreasingly do.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
They don't need to reinvent anything.
They need to revert to building flexible, expandable, serviceable machines that don't run hot. Also, the constant focus on making macOS behave more and more like iOS and locking it down, is bound to throw off a lot of people who use their systems for work and projects iOS was never built for.
Finally Apple needs to come to realization that more and more people don't want to store everything about their life in the cloud, and that businesses by law in most countries cannot store very large portions of their business and personnel data in the cloud. Therefore the systems Apple creates must also appeal to these users, which they sadly decreasingly do.
I agree with aspects of what you have written, especially about iOS. However, regarding core Mac OS capabilities, your post reads a little like saying "they need to build a better (aka faster) horse".
Edit: I mean no disrespect, I agree too with more than just your iOS comments. Apple needs more than better versions of their hardware.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
They don't need to reinvent anything.
They need to revert to building flexible, expandable, serviceable machines that don't run hot. Also, the constant focus on making macOS behave more and more like iOS and locking it down, is bound to throw off a lot of people who use their systems for work and projects iOS was never built for.
Finally Apple needs to come to realization that more and more people don't want to store everything about their life in the cloud, and that businesses by law in most countries cannot store very large portions of their business and personnel data in the cloud. Therefore the systems Apple creates must also appeal to these users, which they sadly decreasingly do.
I agree with aspects of what you have written, especially about iOS. However, regarding core Mac OS capabilities, your post reads a little like saying "they need to build a better (aka faster) horse".
Performance wise macOS is not bad at all compared to the alternatives.
The issue over time for many users has become that as macOS and applications increasingly need more and more resources year by year, they have been sold locked down systems where there are virtually no upgrade path like there used to be i.e. add more memory or disk. PC users also have the ability to upgrade both GPU and CPU in many machine configurations. So while macOS and apps evolves and grows, their hardware system can no longer grow with them. Which IMO clearly negates the higher price for an Apple system, as many of the configs become throw away systems with short useful lifecycles (the 2014 mini with 4GB memory and a super slow HD is the horror example).
Let's face it, the butterfly keyboard MacBook was something you bought if you had to because you were tied into the Apple operating system, not something you aspired to, so if you've got to settle for something you don't want then why would anyone pay a premium price for that when you could get a cheaper Windows PC you didn't really want instead?
I am typing this on my mid-2015 15" MacBook Pro and I have dreaded anything going wrong with it in case it meant I had to replace it with one of the pre-16" range. It looks like we are about to enter the biggest global recession since the last one so if Apple is moving towards the radical business model of selling products people want at prices they can afford then maybe they could do something about the webcam, too? We are all Zooming and FaceTiming each other and nearly every TV news broadcast is sent from the reporter's webcam so if they ported just a fraction of the camera technology they have developed for the iPhone onto the MacBook it might help remove one more sales barrier.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
They don't need to reinvent anything.
They need to revert to building flexible, expandable, serviceable machines that don't run hot. Also, the constant focus on making macOS behave more and more like iOS and locking it down, is bound to throw off a lot of people who use their systems for work and projects iOS was never built for.
Finally Apple needs to come to realization that more and more people don't want to store everything about their life in the cloud, and that businesses by law in most countries cannot store very large portions of their business and personnel data in the cloud. Therefore the systems Apple creates must also appeal to these users, which they sadly decreasingly do.
I agree with aspects of what you have written, especially about iOS. However, regarding core Mac OS capabilities, your post reads a little like saying "they need to build a better (aka faster) horse".
Performance wise macOS is not bad at all compared to the alternatives.
The issue over time for many users has become that as macOS and applications increasingly need more and more resources year by year, they have been sold locked down systems where there are virtually no upgrade path like there used to be i.e. add more memory or disk. PC users also have the ability to upgrade both GPU and CPU in many machine configurations. So while macOS and apps evolves and grows, their hardware system can no longer grow with them. Which IMO clearly negates the higher price for an Apple system, as many of the configs become throw away systems with short useful lifecycles (the 2014 mini with 4GB memory and a super slow HD is the horror example).
I understand, particularly concerning the likes of your Mac Mini example. New systems need to be configured carefully w.r.t. memory, CPU and storage to ensure the longest possible service life. I have a 2009 iMac in which the monitor fails from time-to-time but which suits me to have around running an older version of the OS for legacy compatibility. It does however, run the latest versions of my needed productivity software (which does not include office). My analogy of your post to a famous quote about a horse (which might actually have been a quote about a buggy) was not a great one but I used it to highlight my belief that a new paradigm is necessary and perhaps even possible. The adage, which I've always understood to be an old Chinese curse, of 'may you live in interesting times' is perhaps uncomfortably close right now but in terms of Apple computing, I hope is true.
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
A kindred spirit! I've actually been working on my Mac 512K recently, which still has the original 64K ROMs and 400K internal drive. (Only machines with the 128K ROMs can use 800K drives, so you must have had a 512Ke.) Anyway, I purchased a FloppyEMU a while back which has really streamlined the experience. I can easily write software to an SD card on any modern Mac, then put that SD in the FloppyEMU for booting the Mac. And Macintosh Garden is stocked with all the old programs we loved back in the day, including good old Cap'n Magneto!
I've loved Apple since my 128K in 1984 and have never to this day owned even a single Windows machine. With that said...
Much of what you wrote applies also to me. My first Mac was a 512 k. (On its single double density, dual-sided 'floppy' disk, were stored the operating system, applications and documents.) I believe though that Apple needs to re-invent personal computing and technologies exist (some on the horizon) to achieve this where others can't.
A kindred spirit! I've actually been working on my Mac 512K recently, which still has the original 64K ROMs and 400K internal drive. (Only machines with the 128K ROMs can use 800K drives, so you must have had a 512Ke.) Anyway, I purchased a FloppyEMU a while back which has really streamlined the experience. I can easily write software to an SD card on any modern Mac, then put that SD in the FloppyEMU for booting the Mac. And Macintosh Garden is stocked with all the old programs we loved back in the day, including good old Cap'n Magneto!
I sold my 512K (yes, with the 800K drive) a long time ago for $50 when I bought an LC, which also served me well. I know where to find the buyer, perhaps she has it in a box somewhere. I sold it with the canvas carry case and external drive.
All manufacturers would have seen a huge slump in sales due to the lockdown. The reason why the PC makers got off lighter is that corporates went on a crazy buying spree ahead of the lockdowns to try try and equip workers so they could work from home.
That certainly happened at my company. Sadly most companies are still locked-in to Windoze...
Comments
- No continuous improvements on hardware. All desktop models have been on/off life support.
- Few and terrible new improvements - touchbar, keyboards, removal of Magsafe, and even forced Retina (expensive screens, GPU, battery consumption, reliability issues).
- Product quality - recalls. No upgradeability. Excessive cost of repairs due to glue/bad design (the touch sensor on MacBooks adds 1 hour to any repair).
- Design moved from unique to stale.
- Hardware blockers - no Nvidia, no Ryzen, no docks (I love having a dock for my HP) - why is the Mac without?
But the main reason IMHO is macOS. It used to be the best to support how we work, study, and create. It was coherent across applications with shared shortcuts, shared UX, great usability, and clear guidelines. Apple pushed the platform forward. Now it is bloatware with annual "new features" from iOS tacked on. It seems Apple is not interested in letting macOS handle problems we face today. Instead Apple adds keyboards, pens, multitasking, and more to the iPad.A discussion of the terminology, though specifically about smartphones, not PC's, appears here: http://www.asymco.com/2012/05/28/shipped-and-sold-a-brief-introduction/
It is great that Samsung, Lenovo, Asus and Acer are coming out with 2-in-1 Chromebooks similar to Surface and iPad Pro designs that run 3 operating systems: ChromeOS the main one with Android and Linux in containers. Especially since the top-of-the-line models have internals that rival the MacBook Air: Intel i5 CPUs plus 128 GB or more of storage and 8 GB or more of RAM like the Lenovo Yoga Chromebook C630 and the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook. (NOT Pixels mind you because Google for bad design reasons prefers the "low power" Intel CPUs, which would make sense if they LTE devices but they aren't so Google is just hobbling them for no reason.) If you are savvy enough to leverage apps/applications/functionality available on all 3 operating systems you can just about approximate the functionality of a MacBook Air too ... and on devices with 4K graphics, touchscreens, styluses and keyboards built in. Which is neat for those who prefer not to have a MacBook or a Windows PC.
But it doesn't come anywhere close to replacing what Android tablets could have been - and should have been - had Google not abandoned them in favor of ChromeOS in 2012. Case in point: where 15-20 million Chromebooks are sold a year, Apple sells 35-50 million iPads a year.
Notebooks made up a big part of Apple Mac sales, and the butterfly keyboard disaster finally caught up with them. You can see Apple somewhat has recognized that fact, but even the replacement keyboard has less key travel than my mid-2015 model. It boggles my mind that some Mac lovers might abandon Apple over a keyboard, but it's not impossible to imagine. As for me, I simply have not upgraded because I like the machine I have now, and I want an SD card slot and at least one USB-A port too -- all reason for me NOT to upgrade to a newer Apple notebook despite the speed gains.
As to the iMac, Apple released the Pro which is more expensive than most people can afford, so naturally those sales numbers won't be great. I think the regular iMac is the best value of any Mac (even when compared to the Mini), but many frugal people like me try to get as many years out of their existing Macs as possible. My iMac at home, for example, is a late 2009 model kept alive by multiple makes of the video card.
The Mac Pro is so expensive it is barely a blip on total Mac sales. And now with Corona, Mac sales will only get worse since most people buying computers now are worried about family finances and those who perceive Macs as a "luxury" will choose a silly Windows machine over the Mac, or stick with the Macs they have. Apple has never been about competing with low cost machines, so I don't see this downward sales trend as improving. Apple hopes iPadOS can change things in terms of overall computer sales (since the iPad is a computer), but there's so much the iPad cannot do because iPadOS really cannot compare with the flexibility of a Mac.
I think what Apple will need to do to sustain the Mac is become a bit more consumer focused. Rather than flash us with what they deem a brilliant design (e.g., butterfly keyboards and no SD card slots only to make thinner machines none of us really need), Apple will need to see what people really want and the prices consumers deem affordable. I don't think that would tarnish the Apple image but merely show that Apple is concerned about the needs of its users over the wants of Apple's internal marketing and design departments.
Apple has the money, the platform and engineering talent from which to take personal computing to new levels.
They need to revert to building flexible, expandable, serviceable machines that don't run hot. Also, the constant focus on making macOS behave more and more like iOS and locking it down, is bound to throw off a lot of people who use their systems for work and projects iOS was never built for.
Finally Apple needs to come to realization that more and more people don't want to store everything about their life in the cloud, and that businesses by law in most countries cannot store very large portions of their business and personnel data in the cloud. Therefore the systems Apple creates must also appeal to these users, which they sadly decreasingly do.
Edit: I mean no disrespect, I agree too with more than just your iOS comments. Apple needs more than better versions of their hardware.
The issue over time for many users has become that as macOS and applications increasingly need more and more resources year by year, they have been sold locked down systems where there are virtually no upgrade path like there used to be i.e. add more memory or disk. PC users also have the ability to upgrade both GPU and CPU in many machine configurations.
So while macOS and apps evolves and grows, their hardware system can no longer grow with them. Which IMO clearly negates the higher price for an Apple system, as many of the configs become throw away systems with short useful lifecycles (the 2014 mini with 4GB memory and a super slow HD is the horror example).
Sadly most companies are still locked-in to Windoze...