mac_128

MacPro said:

mac_128 said:

MacPro said:

Seems like yesterday!  It was tough going at first but then in the November of that year, we had a ton of them delivered for the "Test Drive a Macintosh" campaign which went very well.  Our clients could take a Mac home for the night.  Many 'tests' converted to sales even though the buyers had no actual use or need, they were just so damn cool.

November 8, 1984

We’re those 128K or 512K Macs?

It is all a bit fuzzy but the 128 was released in September and this campaign in November was no doubt to bolster its sales after the lackluster sales of the original Mac.  We were still shifting lots of Apple ][s, Apple ///s and several Lisas at that point.

I think you mean the 512K was released in September. I seem to recall reading it was the 512K which was really needed to re-launch the Macintosh to the public for that campaign. The 128K just simply didn't have enough memory to use with one 400K disk, and most weren't buying the external drive at the $2500 price point. That extra RAM allowed the entire application programs to be held in memory along with large documents and files, not to mention actual multi-tasking. I think by the time the 512K was released, the Lisa 2 was already using the Macintosh emulator too, followed shortly by the Lisa being rebranded Macintosh XL. Those must have been interesting times to be in that business. Do tell -- how many Apple ///s did you personally repair by dropping it on the floor? Ha

MacPro said:

Seems like yesterday!  It was tough going at first but then in the November of that year, we had a ton of them delivered for the "Test Drive a Macintosh" campaign which went very well.  Our clients could take a Mac home for the night.  Many 'tests' converted to sales even though the buyers had no actual use or need, they were just so damn cool.

November 8, 1984

We’re those 128K or 512K Macs?

Odd. When I checked AI, after all models sold out around 5:30 PM PST, this story wasn’t posted yet. Did they restock and sell out again?

kpom said:

bitmod said:

Coming soon: The completely portless MacBook Pro. 
MacBook battery run out of charge? No problem, the Apple trade-in program will refund you 5% of your previous days MacBook. Or visit an Apple Store daily for a battery replacement for only $599.
Ives: "The completely portless, un-chargable MacBook Pro has let us make it 1mm thinner - revolutionizing the personal computing experience..."
Average Appleinsider commenter: "People who charge their MacBooks daily are a niche market..."

In all seriousness, we are probably only a few years away from an all-wireless PC. Wireless charging is getting better, and most people don’t use a lot of ports anymore. Expect it to start with mobile devices, though. 

And this is pretty much why Apple is not going to switch to USB-C anytime soon on the iPhone.

GeorgeBMac said:

mac_128 said:

wood1208 said:

Plenty lightening cables around so it's all good if 2019 iPhone stays with Lightening port. But in future if Apple going to move iPhone to USB-C than sooner is better. I don't see another physical port standard on horizon unless everyone move to Wirless for charging and Data/music transfer.

I don't see any reason ever to move the iPhone to USB-C. Wireless charging is the next standard Apple will likely move to, and drop the exposed port concept from their phones entirely. They've steadily been moving to seal it up completely. For the optional need to make a physical connection for a very small portion of Apple's iPhone base, something like the SmartConnector is likely the way to go. For most customers, wireless will suffice to meet all of their needs, and encourage use of Apple's Cloud services -- which after all is a stated goal of their transition away from hardware focused profits. 

I totally agree with all of your points....
But, there's another (very potential) aspect for the future:   The iPhone is becoming powerful enough to be the driver of a laptop or even a desktop.  Technically, the potential for it to be plugged into a hub with a 27" monitor, keyboard, mouse and external storage exists.  Or, previously, somebody floated the idea of a laptop with an iPhone slotted into it in place of a trackpad and the iPhone provided the trackpad, CPU, GPU, memory, storage, and connectivity.

Will Apple ever do that?  It's not really science fiction anymore.
...  I think Steve would have had the guts to do it.   I'm not sure that current Apple management does.

And I don’t disagree with your point. But, Apple seems to be solidly focused on the Cloud as a solution for sharing data between different configuration platforms, rather than docking solutions of any kind. Docks have been rumored for decades, but Apple hasn’t made one since the sublime Duo.

If Apple ever gave us a dockable iPhone, then there would be no reason not to give us the Mac/iPad hybrid, mouse control on an iPad, phone apps on iPads and Macs, and so on... 

Maybe Apple is planning a paradigm shift in the way they market hardware, and basically become an expensive iPhone maker, with expansion docks to turn the one device into every dedicated device Apple now sells, by just plugging it into a larger screen and hub. But even then I have to wonder whether Apple wouldn’t just expand on airplay to extend the screen wirelessly, with wireless keyboard and mouse, with expansion storage in the cloud.

Either way, I’d bet we’re years away from Apple merging file and operating systems between devices to accommodate that, in which case switching to USB-C now is extremely premature where the majority of iPhone customers only use Lightning for charging. I’d still argue that wireless is still the short term goal, and that if Apple ever did turn the iPhone into a dockable solution they’d introduce a brand new proprietary connector compatible only with their docks. For now, USB-C still only makes sense to me on PC-centric devices. I’d even be surprised to see the low cost consumer iPads switching to USB-C in the very near future. Maybe once USB-C is so common that a cable can be found anywhere, then maybe Apple switches the iPhone to it, assuming the iPhone still has a port at all.