danvm

Microsoft has priced the Surface Studio 2 at a very high tier -- it starts at $3,500, with nothing underneath it in the Surface lineup apart from its three mobile products. That's $200 more than Apple's 27 inch iMac upgraded to a Core i7, 16GB of DDR4 RAM and 1TB of SDD storage at Apple's premium prices.

Apple is known -- and often reviled by PC fans -- for its premium pricing. Yet in this case, an iMac is not just cheaper when similarly configured, but offers a wide range of significantly lower priced options starting at $1,800 for the 5K iMac, or $1,100 for the smaller 4K model where Microsoft does not.

T

Microsoft has never sold so many Surface PCs in a year, and its sales haven't really grown since it launched the Surface idea, so it's not really clear what he's trying to say in calling Apple's vastly larger Mac business "mediocre at best." But the words he uses are that "Apple is in a position where it can let the Mac line go old and stale because Apple isn't a computer company anymore. It's now a company that sells the iPhone."

In reality, the fact is that Apple's Mac operations have generated $25.2 billion in revenues over the last four quarters. Microsoft's total Surface revenues over the same period were $4.7 billion. Of course, most of that was from sales of its hybrid tablets, more comparable to Apple's iPad business which itself generated another $19.5 billion.

macxpress said:

larrya said:

Should this really take 2 years??

You realize that most Apple products that are totally brand new take many years to design, engineer, and fine tune before its announcement? This isn't just slapping parts together like a DIY PC and call it good. Apple is not Dell, HP, etc. If all you want is a bunch of parts slapped together then by all means, go get that or create your own.

If you need a professional Mac in the meantime, the iMac Pro is actually a great Pro Mac to get. It will still have significant value, even next year should you want to sell it for a new Mac Pro.

GeorgeBMac said:

If its online it can be hacked & stolen -- and identity theft is a growth industry.

Why would I trust Microsoft with my ID?
Actually, that's one of the big reasons why I stick to Apple products -- security and privacy.  They're not invulnerable, but they're better than the rest.   Far better.

StrangeDays said:

Johan42 said:

Diminishing returns is here. Apple’s planned obsolescence as well. Who will prevail? The customer who has no sense will.

You’re high. Apple devices have the longest lifespan in the business — both in official support terms (iOS), and in real world useful lifespan. My primary desktop is a 2011 iMac. I have an iphone 4s that was used as a primary device by a family member until a year or two ago and now is a backup device. What other brand has the same support and lifespan longevity? 

AppleInsider said:

RAM stays at 8GB and storage starts at 512GB on entry-level M3 configurations.

entropys said:

I have a touch screen on my work HP f dragonfly. I don’t use it. For scrolling, and that is about it. And let’s be honest, touchscreens are probably offered because for some unfathomable reason windows trackpads are crap, and have always been crap, despite the mac example to copy.

if apple goes touch screen in 2025, it will be because the iPadisation of MacOS is complete; or it has become too hard to get a non touch OLED display.

Ironically, we are getting a thinkpad P14s workstation for engineering student daughter. It doesn’t have a touchscreen. And comparably priced to a very tricked out MBP. But I digress.

danox said:

Apple is hardly behind but they are on a different path and actually are able to execute on hardware and software Apple doesn't need Google the Tensor is 5 or 6 years behind Apple right now and Google is a long way from running AI locally on their feeble Tensor SOC'S and Samsung is (hopelessly) even further away and Microsoft isn't even in the mobile ball game right now, note Wall Street is clueless about this little detail in their AI Hype train.

AI on the edge is the pathway Apple is on, phoning home and having the end user wait is the path Google, Microsoft, Meta, Qualcomm and Samsung are on. Why? Their SOC'S/OS software are way behind Apple. 

What Apple does need to do/consider is leveraging the full benefit of Apple Silicon, the low power/wattage, speed, UMA memory combined with a OS optimized to the hardware just screams out, the M3 Studio Ultra with 256 gigs (coming at WWDC) or a Mac M3 Extreme (CarPlay wasn't all for nothing) Pro tower with 512 gigs just says welcome to the world of inference on the Mac. Apple is/has been working on software tools to support developers for long time.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/08/apple-explains-how-it-uses-machine-learning-across-ios-and-soon-macos/.  From 2020 before the current AI Hype

https://venturebeat.com/ai/apple-researchers-achieve-breakthroughs-in-multimodal-ai-as-company-ramps-up-investments/

https://daily.dev/blog/mm1-the-advanced-30b-parameters-multimodal-llm-from-apple

Apple has been consistent in their AI/ML on the edge pathway. Apple won't be using Google anymore for AI than they currently use Google maps.

netrox said:

libertyforall said:

So add side loading, disable by default, give customers the choice.  
VOILA.  

That's not how it works.

When Facebook and Netflix decide not to do on App Store, what choice do you have? They will force you to pay on the side, not in App Store to get around the 30% fee. 

I am tired of people thinking that they should have a free choice when it's deigned to protect you from criminals. 

ericthehalfbee said:

waveparticle said:

Apple, Microsoft, and Google are the only companies that build OSs that are running on personal computers. They will decide the future of AI. 

You mean Apple. Google doesn’t have a real OS on the desktop. They have that wannabee pretend ChromeOS. Microsoft doesn’t have a mobile OS.

Only Apple has a complete OS ecosystem comprising mobile & desktop.

danox said:

Microsoft is flushing $69 billion dollars, buying a nebulous game content company, if they were buying Unreal Engine, or Unity, that would be worthwhile, particularly Unreal Engine, buying a hollow game company were the actual talent isn’t tied to the company and usually hired on a per game basis and then let go at the end of a project, all Microsoft is getting in the end is just the game titles, but the talent is free to go anywhere to work that isn’t a good deal, the federal government unintentionally was saving Microsoft from itself.

That $69 billion acquisition is probably more than what Apple has spent in its entire history on mergers and acquisitions. In fact, it probably is three times maybe four times more. And most of the talent can just fly away because that is the nature of game development, once a particular project is over usually you’re gone.

When your competition is about to make a big mistake let them, smile and congratulate them, Tim Cook is probably smiling……