wanderso

This is a great innovation.  

Timely article. I will be upgrading our mini soon with a new mini, relegating the older one to home server and media server use on the network. Wouldn’t I be better off to use VNC for free to accomplish what I need? 

As as an aside, I have an iMac that had the video card fail. I wish that I had enabled this before I woke up one day with a no warning, no prior glitches failure. That would have given me access and potential use as a server. The lesson I have there is thinking that I should enable this on all Macs we have just in case. https://www.geckoandfly.com/23203/vnc-client-viewer-windows-mac-linux/

Mojave added a security setting that you have to do in order to enable the Free built in VNC server already on your mac. (Extra step not needed on prior versions)
https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/339114/allowing-vnc-to-control-computer-under-10-14-mojave

I have the $499 Mac mini. The hard drive was so slow that it was unbearable - almost unusable! Swapping out for an SSD was $100 and it made it very useable, even for Final Cut X if you can believe that. My iMac video card failed and it costs more in parts to fix than buying this 1 year old Mac Mini on Craigslist ($350) in anticipation for the eventual upgrade that Apple would offer.   I learned in this hardware failure that I won’t buy an iMac again for our primary machine despite having had 5 previous models. Why? All other components on the machine are in perfect shape but I can’t use it without being creative. (Didn’t have Remote Desktop installed prior to the failure).  We have 3 other mac laptops in the house. (All MacBook Air).  My view is that the $799 model should have 512GB of storage. A budget model that used the same chassis but installed a slower, but still very performant 2.5” SSD would be acceptable to me if Apple offered it, even with “slower” SSD for 512GB and the same $799 price.   Can I use an external hard drive instead? Sure.  Yet I shouldn’t have to. My current mini will be relegated to a media server, DVR and network storage for backups very soon. 

Last note: the SSD should have not been soldered to the logic board. SSDs do fail. Best not to use the internal SSD for video scratch disk and use external to assure longevity due to fewer write cycles. Users also do want to increase storage later. This is a mini, not a laptop. Opening it up should be expected.

 I’m very happy that the memory is upgradable.  I’ll probably get the new mini once more performance tests are out. Yet I’m not happy about the price of SSD storage if I bump it back up to 512.  May have to settle on 256 and external storage. 

ireland said:

DAalseth said:

I've moved about 3/4 of my work to my iPP. I'm very pleased at the gains in ability and I can see the day when I will use my last Mac. It might even be my two year old iMac. But I'm not there today.

You mentioned several times about adding mouse support. No, just no. I direct you to this article:
https://techpinions.com/the-pencil-is-mightier-than-the-mouse/53995
In it the author argues that a mouse is just a precision pointing device and the Apple Pencil 2 with the added features and gestures IS the mouse for the iPad. I already use my AP on my year old iPP as my mouse more and more of the time. This is only going to get better. But, and I say this as someone who a year ago thought that the iPad DID need a mouse, the LAST thing we need on an iPad is a pointing device from the last century. It's time to move on.

I disagree because when used with a keyboard, using a mouse is less tiring than using a pencil on a near-vertical surface. Even having mouse support purely for text editing alone with make writing and coding much easier on an iPad. All we’d need is the cursor to appear when you connect and use the trackpad in its keyboard case. They could even time the cursor to disappear after a duration and go away when the keyboard is disconnected. The Pencil is for drawing, sketching, painting, note taking and editing photos and other similar uses. It’s not meant for editing a complex multi-layer linear timeline, and at that angle. A mouse cursor is way more productive for such use, and I don’t see that changing at this point. iOS needs mouse cursor and trackpad support for those scenarios when people need them. And Apple will eventually add it. That’s my prediction. That and external hard drive support and the iPad becomes more capable. And it’d want to be and the prices Apple is charging.

I agree.   I hate to admit it, but the Surface idea, albeit imperfect execution, seems to more closely meet the true replacement option. There is no technical reason that an IPad can’t support a mouse. Just like Apple limiting what the USB camera adapter can do (can’t import a PDF file for example while IOS supprts PDFs) so too Apple restricts certain things for marketing reasons to force choices and perhaps buy redundant devices. 

My my dream “pro” device would be:

dual monitor - extended desktop (not just mirror) support

ability to connect to external physical storage needed for video scratch disk, offloading files and more without having the cloud as the only real (far slower) option

end ripping us off by not having a storage expansion slot for high performance external memory cards.  

mouse support for when I want it

true multi-tasking.  

True thunderbolt, not just USB-C


Aside: Steve’s idea that we moved to cars after being less of an agrarian society today has limits.  Car sales are dropping dramatically.  People buy trucks, SUV’s and crossovers - even though they commute to work with them.  The #1 sold vehicle in the world for decades is the F150. Having the utility you need, in one device, has good appeal.  Crossovers have a car-like ride, better utility, and similar MPG these days as cars of the past.  I can tow a 2,800 pound trailer with my Subaru, climb a mountain in the snow, drive it to work if I’m not riding the bus, and still get 30 MPG. 

Thus, if they won’t do it with an iPad Pro, perhaps finally having a touch screen on a MacBook Pro that accepts Pencil and can pivot to different orientations is a “crossover” that the public would enjoy. 

StrangeDays said:

wanderso said:

Apple has a fiduciary responsibility to its shareholders to provide transparency. Like it or not, unit sales is a key metric of a company that sells hardware. Apple’s services business can be seen as a shift away from this but they can and should share this unit sales information going forward. If I owned Apple’s stock or was the manager of a fund that owns it, I would press for unit sales to continue to be openly shared.  

I can see Apple’s strategy here as they choose to be less transparent as unit sales decline and price increases make up for the difference.  After all, winning on market share can still be a very unprofitable venture that is not sustainable. 

By still showing unit sales figures and adding this visibility such things as Apple Watch sales, Apple shows an honest reality to shareholders.  It helps them understand how Apple is going up market and the success of various business lines.  It also allows them to hold the board and management team  accountable. By choosing to not be opaque, Apple has an opportunity to lead here - doing so by example.  I hope they they reconsider their stance.  Shareholders can and should bring this as a requirement. As consumers of their product, we should also expect nothing less. 

You don’t really invest, do you? No other major hardware company is reporting per product unit sales, so your claim is bunk. 

Your second claim is also ludicrous, as customers of the units have no bearing in this conversation between corporation and investor. I suspect you are only a consumer and this comment is the tip-off. 

Actually, I do invest.  I used to work at a publicly traded company and we included unit sales data in our quarterly conference call, broken out by market segment.  If you read the transcript of Dell’s recent earnings call you will note that they specifically call out their market share in several different segments they participate in, telling investors more than just the revenues by various segments.  (This is just one example; don’t get hung up on Apple vs Dell)

I agree with you that the 10k (for example) is important, especially items such as gross margin, operating income, inventory levels and the balance sheet.    

I also agree that privately held companies have an advantage over publicly held ones in keeping certain financial items outside of public scrutiny. 

Yet leading indicators in terms of share of market are important too.  Tim likes to brag that Apple sells more watches than anyone. That figure becomes harder to believe if he doesn’t release the number that they sell.