Rogue01

When you upgrade the memory and storage in the 15" MacBook Air, you are only a few hundred dollars away from the 14" MacBook Pro with more memory and the same storage configuration.  The 14" MacBook Pro is a faster Mac, with more features, and offers a much better cooling system than the MacBook Air.  The article mentioned the benefits, but forgot to mention that the 14" has a better cooling system, which is important because the Air will throttle sooner and more often than the 14" model.  I think most would prefer the 14" model for a few hundred dollars more.

applebynature said:

Yup, we've known about the required facial scanning for proper fit since June.
I'm curious how big of a fiasco it's going to be to go into an Apple Store to demo a unit. They should do it by appointment with a required face scan before the appointment so everything is ready for you to try out. If they're just allowing everyone to come in to wait around in the store for one of the scarce demo units to be available, then having to go through a fitting and set up process along with being trained how to use it, man that will be a disaster with the time involved and so many waiting around to try it. But on the other hand, I can see people going to the store to try it out and being told, oh you have to make an appointment, the next one is in 3 weeks, and that not going over too well with customers either, so who knows.

At $3,500, no one is really interested in this at all.  So probably won't be any lines of people waiting to try it because people would rather spend $3,500 on anything else.  This product does not solve any problems and AR/VR has never been a popular item for decades.  People don't want to wear googles to run apps or watch movies.  The battery is about 2 hours unless you are physically tied to a power source.  Apple created something that no one really has any desire for.  Maybe super rich people that have nothing better to spend money on.  No one bought iPod Hi-Fi, and that was only $349.  No one bought the $10,000 Apple Watch Gold either and Apple said you had to have an appointment to see it.  The iPhone captured the smartphone market.  This captures no market at all.  Big difference.  I love Apple and have been using Apple products since 1989, but you have to wonder why Apple even made this product when consumers are not really into that product category at all.  Very few consumers use AR for games.

And remember, most consumers wear prescription lenses so another $150 for special lenses will a big deal breaker, especially when prescriptions typically change year after year for people that do wear glasses.

Apple already prototyped this back in 2007 with a MacBook Pro and nixed the idea.  Everyone already has a phone with Hotspot so they don't need to waste money on extra hardware and an extra data plan costing more money when the phone can already do it for the price of one data plan.  The cellular radio will also be another 'feature' to drain the MacBook battery and increase the cost of the laptop, for a feature that would rarely be used.  The WiFi iPad outsells the Cellular version by leaps and bounds because it is less expensive and people can use their phone's hotspot or a public WiFi, just like they already do with existing MacBooks.

Did Gurman figure this out all by himself?  Apple has had September phone events for years.  Nothing he says is 'new' information.  It was already long expected.  Next year, Apple will have an iPhone 16 event in September 2024.  Gurman will make it sound like no one has ever heard of such a thing.

The iMac 27" 2020 has slotted SSDs, when it is the 4TB and 8TB model.  The 8TB model uses two 4TB SSDs.  However, due to the T2 Security Chip, the SSDs are encrypted to the board so you cannot replace or upgrade them on your own.  Same concept with Apple Silicon.

Even if the slotted SSD in the new mini was upgradable by Apple, they would still stiff you a full $2400 for 8TB, just like they rip people off with the Mac Pro SSD upgrade options.  It is just a way for Apple to rip people off with SSD upgrades, and memory upgrades too.  It really is disgusting that Apple does this.  An 8TB NVMe PCIe4 SSD is about $650, but Apple charges $2400.

Nice that it is slotted so there is a repair option by Apple without having to replace the entire motherboard when the components are all soldered down.

Poor writing and poor headline.  It was not a Windows update.  It was an update pushed out by CrowdStrike, for their software.  Companies that don't use their software were not affected.

MisterKit said:

AVP can be a huge success even if it never becomes a huge consumer success. The possibilities for education, training, assisted skills, are staggering.

Apple designed it for one person only.  The majority of people need prescription lenses.  So how do you use it for education, training, or assisted skills when the device is pretty much fit for one person only?  Anyone with glasses can't put on VisionPro and see the AR image clearly, since Apple designed it to require special lenses if you need glasses.

A 25 minute sales pitch.  So it is like getting suckered into a timeshare purchase.

Yeah, Apple has a lot of convincing to do.  No one has interest in the AR space, and $3500 isn't going to convince anyone for running iPad apps in 'space'.

The iPhone solved a problem.  This solves nothing.

apple4thewin said:

I forgot already, is carplay 2.0 standalone in car system or an updated tether experience?

It still requires the phone, either wired, or wireless, if the vehicle supports wireless CarPlay.  This is more on the vehicle manufacturers to decide if they even want to implement this CarPlay 2.0.  When Apple first introduced CarPlay, originally called iOS in the Car, it took almost 4 years before vehicles actually offered the feature.  So I would imagine this would take even longer since it takes over the entire vehicle, including the gauge cluster.  Something I would not want.  CarPlay has enough bugs with connectivity and UI issues.  I had to do a full factory radio reset/reboot to fix the connection issues, the phone constantly disconnected every few minutes.  The UI issues remain.  Listening to music, the next song won't appear on the display unless I track skip.  Now if you tap on the album name, you no longer get the list of songs on the album.  So that is now broken.  So imagine that with your gauge cluster going crazy.  No thanks.

Since Apple appears to be moving back to socketed storage, likely to reduce their repair costs - since soldered parts means replacing the entire motherboard, they really need to dump that secure enclave encryption of the SSD so consumers can go back to upgrading their own storage, and it would be great if they would do the same with the memory too.  It is highway robbery with their insanely excessive mark ups for memory and SSD.  Sorry, but 256GB and 512GB is useless storage.  The Macs should be 1TB standard and not charge $2400 for 8TB storage when you can get an 8TB NVMe PCIe4 stick for about $650.

Apple threw a fit and refused to replace the swollen battery and top cover in my 2015 MacBook Pro because I installed an OWC 2TB SSD.  I had to reinstall the 1TB Apple SSD for them to do the battery replacement, or they were going to charge me $1200 for the 1TB SSD.  I told them, since when did upgrading storage prevent them from replacing an item that was completely unrelated.  They refused to budge so I reinstalled the 1TB SSD.  Then I reinstalled the 2TB SSD when I got the Mac back.  They never used to be like that with the Power Macs when you can self install 4 hard drives.