Eric_WVGG

GeorgeBMac said:

Eric_WVGG said:

dysamoria said:

I will be incredibly surprised if Apple lowers prices on any Mac as a result of this transition, and IF they actually do, it will be a short-lived reduction to inspire transitional purchases.

I quite disagree. Apple, and Tim Cook in particular, are sticklers about profit margins. They pick some number (usually 32%) and price accordingly. .....

Do you have a reputable source for that assertion?   I've heard speculation about such things but never anything actually informed.

And, in actuality, the only ones who actually know the real margins are Apple cost accountants and execs.  Everybody else is guessing.  And their guesses usually reveal a fundamental lack of understanding of cost accounting and margins.

No, here’s an example quarterly report: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2019/10/apple-reports-fourth-quarter-results/

And here’s a twenty year graph, basically flat ever since Cook took the reigns. https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/AAPL/apple/profit-margins

There are benefits to an approach like this beyond thin-ness. In fact, I think it would have the opposite effect.

Every Macbook I've owned, after a few years, develops faint scrapes on the screen where the edges of the keys are. This is due to keys rubbing against the screen while being moved around. If the keys recessed into a "pressed" position when the screen was closed, the screen would stay pristine over time.

If this means using magnets to pull keys down, that's more hardware in the keyboard; if it means moving the entire keyboard "down" while the screen is shut, that means a new recess under the keyboard which would take more space. Neither of these approaches would make the laptop more thin.

This sounds to me like one of those cool speculative patents that never goes anywhere.

that elusive and delightful intersection between Genius and Stupid

prismatics said:

sflocal said:

Apple does this because 99% of buyers will never upgrade their machines after the initial purchase, not because of what you describe.  Fact.  Why should Apple add additional engineering, height, etc to accommodate The < 1%?  Makes no sense.

Maybe it's just a feeling that it's 99%. I have a different feeling, more like 50%.

no offense, but that’s ridiculous. 99% of modern users have never even seen a motherboard before. It's not the nineties anymore.

I was actually thinking along similar lines! It's clear that Apple wanted to keep selling the 12" Macbook, and contrary to forum-nerds opinions, it was a very popular product. Up until the pandemic I was still seeing them all over NYC, mostly in the hands of people I took to be sales, management, or journalists. 

One strategic way to deploy ARM Macs is to start with models that are used by people who don't install a lot of third-party software, anyone whose life revolves around a web browser, email, messages, and some light word processing and spreadsheet stuff isn't going to care how long it takes Adobe to port Creative Suite. That sounds like the 12" Macbook crowd.

Last March, I bought one for my girlfriend who was slumming in Europe for the winter (thanks AppleInsider for the w00t link!). I mailed it about a week before "the shutdown," and to the best of my knowledge it's lost forever in a warehouse or the bottom of the ocean. If a 12" ARM Macbook happens, I might buy her another.