The MacBook Pro and Questions and Confusion
November 2nd, 2016Typical of any new product, there will be questions and criticisms. So the Late 2016 MacBook Pro costs a lot more than its predecessor. Is that a good idea, considering that Mac sales have been dropping in recent quarters? Is Apple looking for short-term gains, are there development costs to recover? To add to the confusion, Apple VP Philip Schiller says Apple does not produce products to a price — something that’s hard to believe — but that they are sensitive to the issue.
But maybe not sensitive enough.
Now lest we forget, the first iMac with 5K Retina display retailed for $2,499. Today, a similar 2015 model, with enhanced color, retails for $1,999. So Apple reduced the price by $500 in a single year; there’s also a $1,799 model with slower parts, and a regular hard drive, rather than the Fusion Drive.
What this indicates that a refreshed version of the iMac with a state-of-the-art display became 20% cheaper in a single year. That happened at a time when Mac sales were still increasing, ahead of a declining PC market. So it didn’t happen just because Apple needed to sell more computers. Apple found a way to make them cheaper, and passed the savings along to customers.
So there is a prediction that the MacBook Pro, particularly the versions with Touch Bar, will come down in price by the fall of 2017. How much? Well, perhaps the prices will come close to the former level. But does that mean that people who buy them now are paying an early adopters tax?
I will assume there are two years of development costs to recover, plus building up mass production of new components. But I’m making no guesses about profit margins, nor on whether Apple really and truly wants to gouge customers who can’t wait another 12 months or so.
Another argument is that these MacBook Pros are using last year’s Skylake processors, the six generation parts, rather than the new Kaby Lake processors. However, the quad-core processors aren’t shipping yet, so that explains why Apple didn’t use them in the high-end model. Would it have made sense to use the dual-core Kaby Lake chips on the 13-inch MacBook Pro? Possibly not, since it’s not that they are so much faster as to make a real difference to most users, except those obsessed with benchmarks.
Yet another complaint is the revelation that the two Thunderbolt 3 ports on the right side of the smaller MacBook Pro run slower than the left side. A secret plot on the part of Apple to cheat customers? No the limitation of the dual-core Skylake processors, which support 12 PCI-e lanes, thus explaining the side-to-side difference. The quad-core chips on the 15-inch MacBook Pro supports 16 PCI-e lanes, meaning that the Thunderbolt 3 ports on both sides run at full speed.
The choice of chips also explains why Apple supports LPDDR3 memory, resulting in a maximum of 16GB RAM on the new models. Schiller has explained that using any other RAM technology to allow for 32GB RAM would result in reduced battery life. But that doesn’t differ from previous models. Pros who expect 32GB on a MacBook Pro will have to wait for a future generation that natively supports LPDDR4.
These limitations, dictated by the chip architecture, can be used as ammunition that, not only is Apple overcharging for its new notebooks, but it’s deliberately limiting performance. As you see, that’s not quite true.
What is obvious is that Intel’s ongoing delays in releasing new processors in quantity has certainly hurt Apple’s progress in updating Macs. As to the Mac Pro, Apple might be waiting for new chips there too. So far, the Kaby Lake version of the Xeon, E3 1200 v6, has only been announced in four-core versions, and Apple wants 8-core and 12-core. So even if a refresh is coming, it may not arrive until the spring. So far, nothing has been announced about the Mac Pro’s future.
In fact, it may be that there will be another series of Mac updates to accompany the Mac Pro, including the Mac mini, iMac, and the MacBook. It’s very possible the latter will benefit from the third year of production, and take a $999 retail price, thus becoming the true replacement for the MacBook Air. That was sort of obvious when it was first announced, but it was too expensive.
Don’t forget that the MacBook Air cost several hundreds more when it first came out. In 2010, a 13-inch MacBook Air was priced the same as today’s Macbook — $1,299, and that represented a substantial price reduction from its predecessor.
There’s also a published report about alleged tepid demand for the new MacBook Pros. That might be true, but if you buy one of the models equipped with a Touch Bar, as I write this, prepare to wait four to five weeks, compared to two to three weeks right after last week’s announcement. That changed in just six hours, so somebody is ordering them. Sure, nobody outside of Apple and its manufacturing partners know how much stock is available, or whether there are problems ramping up production. But slipping delivery dates, meaning you may have to wait until early December to get one, seems promising for its ongoing success.
Moreover, in a recent interview, Schiller said, “And we are proud to tell you that so far our online store has had more orders for the new MacBook Pro than any other pro notebook before. So there certainly are a lot of people as excited as we are about it.”
But if I had any interest in buying one to replace my 2010 17-inch MacBook Pro, I’d definitely wait till next fall to check the prices of the 2017 refresh.
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Timing is everything. You are I think a typical MBP user. You buy and hold for years, because these computers last a long time, are powerful enough, and Apple supports them a long time…and they are expensive. This new MBP is, I think, the best ever, and the Touch Bar has the potential to be a game-changer. But timing is everything. The people bitching and moaning are doing so mostly regarding things that Apple has no control over (memory constraints, Intel processors, etc.). And a touchscreen MBP? A non-starter. If I weren’t on last year’s MBP (2.9 Ghz i5, 16GB DDR3, 500GB SSD), I’d definitely consider upgrading, but I have the luxury of being able to wait…years, if I want to. Timing is everything.
While I find myself to be amused by the chatter of the new MacBook Pros, at least there are a lot of news going around. Sort of like the loss of the headphone jack on the iPhone 7.Maybe a repeat of a lot of noise in the beginning and then silence as we move forward.
I did find interesting that Apple had selected for the 2014 MacBook Pro, the Intel processor “Haswell with Iris Pro Graphics.” For 2016, Apple skipped the Skylake ones released early in the year and went to the not Iris Pro ones released in September 2015. Was it cost ($100 extra), performance, timing or two ships passing through the night?
For me the most important thing is the OS, not like to go over to a Windows PC. I don’t like that there’s no longer a MagSafe connection for power (saved my Macs from many a fall), or that now one must carry around a bunch of adapters to connect to peripherals. And having only 2 USB ports on the lesser 13 inch MBP is a real downer–with my old, but still quite functional, top end late 2011 13″ MBP, I get 2 USB 2.0 ports, a FW 800–they may not be the fastest, but they work quite well for me and what I do/need; a Mini DP and an optical/analog I/O port. Not a photographer, so don’t really use the SD card slot. My next Mac notebook is likely to be a used one with the ports I need without needing/hauling a bunch of adapters. This is similar to what Apple did with the Mac Pro–everything has to be added via an adapter, adding more wires to one’s physical desktop.