Arfshesaid...

It is still way too overpriced as an entry level Mac. Apple could easily afford to make a new Mac mini a loss-leading computer to bring Wintel/Amdow users into the Apple family. Had Apple pitched this new mini at $450 it would easily have become the number one computer in the western world (possibly the far-east also). As an Apple user since inception and shareholder thereafter, I would far rather take a small reduction or loss of dividends in return for much greater Mac OS penetration. As a socialist I believe Apple can well afford to embrace the less well off.

Is this Apple Corp. giving a nod and a wink to frustrated and vexed governments who want Apple to relax security or (better) give them a direct access backdoor? By leaving remote access security to third parties (many of whom would be protected under the umbrella of "National Security" and could actually be security software developers on government pay-rolls), when a government department or foreign state gain access to a Mac users data, Apple can simply say to customers and the media "...it wasn't Apple who let the Russian/USA/EU/UK/Israel security services gain access your data...You should have taken more of an active roll in researching how to secure your Mac from people who don't respect your privacy...like, cough, cough...we at Apple do". Thus protecting a sham "Boo nasty Government", "Power to the People" trope.

Apple Remote Desktop is horrendous. It takes an age to connect, and navigating the remote Mac computer is nigh on impossible with an Apple Magic Trackpad 2. I have to use a wired mouse to move the cursor around, especially when I'm remotely trying to scroll up or down inside a long document. ARD is also very expensive when compared to Windows Remote Desktop (which performs far better, is quicker to load, seamless to navigate) as the latter is FREE and makes working on a remote PC no different to being sat in front of it. With correctly installed drivers, WRD also handles the Magic Trackpad 2 inputs with no lag. ARD has been around for years and little improvement has been made to its core performance. It is slow, buggy, and overly complex for day-day use.

Andrew_OSU said:

Arfshesaid... said:

I'd mostly prefer Siri being scrapped. It is a waste of time effort and a Mac users intelligence. It's plugged in to crappy old code like DevCALDev which can't handle multiple timed events in a single 24hr period. Siri's problems are very similar to those which the ill-fated Newton suffered from. Asking Siri to do anything beyond the most obviously mundane is like using a first generation Mac from way back when...

Ok well, that certainly isn't going to happen. Siri is too crucial. It is a big feature on literally all of Apple's main products. It is the ONLY way to interface with the HomePod. Siri isn't going anywhere.

Siri, sir, is not a big feature. Big features feature bigly. Siri's comprehension is not dissimilar to a drunk who is high on LSD. Siri is the computing equivalent of a person hard of hearing and suffering irreversible dementia. Apple needs to start afresh. Rip all Siri code completely from their products and start over. There has to be startup companies or private individuals who have prototype voice recognition code which is way beyond Siri's current capabilities. I remember when early Mac's had poor voice recognition and dictation prefs which performed almost as well as Siri does today and in some instances was better.