Actually you are wrong when you say that PC manufacturers don't release yearly updates to their computers. They release multiple updates yearly. However the updates are small, like faster processor, faster RAM, etc. They just don't update the chassis hence the updated components doesn't mean it's a new model. On PCs you get always the newest tech almost immediately. Also PC manufactures drop their prices during a year as the tech gets cheaper. Apple keeps the same price several years
Okay let me blow your mind: Just like the halloween event was a giant ad for iPhone 15 Pro, this chip obsession is actually going in the direction of penetrating the game market, not making Macs better. It's misdirection. A slight of hand if you will. AAA Games are running natively on iPhone now, the world's largest gaming platform, technically. I think they are making a gaming console to rival the likes of PlayStation and XBox and will use the App Store to do it. Apple Arcade was step 1. Apple is going to make a screenless device smaller than the Mac Studio that runs the beefiest chip and is nicely cooled, and every game in existence will be portable to that platform, barring exclusives, MAYBE. But we have seen what they did with Rosetta. Just watch. Ray Tracing capabilities were unlocked this time. We are nearing that devices' announcement, mark my words.
And to be clear, the small screenless device plugs into your tv, and you log in with your Apple ID. It will be subscription based, and continuity allows you to play your games on the iPhone on the go because of iCloud.
I have been waiting for a 27” m chip iMac to replace my 2015 / 2012 27” iMacs… has to be 27” + though… in the meantime i have been using my 2018 i9 MBP… I am very likely to upgrade to the M3 MBP in the next few weeks
A very good point. People are quick to praise the latest macbooks and recommend them, but any savvy consumer should be able to see, you don't need to spend $1000 to get a capable computing machine with an M1 @ $799.
Mac Sales are down because Tim Cook spent a decade chasing off the pro-sumer end of Apple's business in pursuit of being a consumer oriented company and then hasn't offered consumers anything compelling relative to the PC market. Like how are you changing people over a grand for an iMac with a 24"inch screen in 2023...Even the offer towards the higher end users of a 27" display for $1600 is insulting. The lowest screen size for an iMac should be 27" the pro market should be 30"+ and then there is the nickel and diming on hard drive space and making it sodered/non-user upgradable. Charging for keyboards and mice on a $4k Mac Studio. Increasing Apple Care pricing by $100 - on and on. This is the apple of 2004 when they were a niche company that appealed to their niche fanatics.
I don’t think it would be a bad thing if Apple reverted to a 2 year release cycle. As someone that has an m1 MacBook Air and uses it for video editing and college it’s the best laptop for most in my opinion
Agreed, I'm a Windows guy, and honestly, the M1 Mac is too much of a tempting offer. Great processing power and battery for $800 and it outperforms just about any laptop at it's price point.
There will always be people who don’t buy hardware the moment it releases. I would rather Apple sell the most up to date hardware they can as fast as they can at least on the inside. Major exterior changes seem to be years between. I think they should have offered the M2 in the iMac rather than skipping it. Creating FOMO is a smaller crime than selling a new customer something lesser
I honestly feel like that’s what they’re going to start to do. Release the MacBook pros first and then the following year, release the iPads, Mac Studios, etc. the M4 won’t come until 2025. The proof is that they’re releasing the vision pro Q1 2024 likely with an M3 chip in it. I doubt they’re going to release a better chip later in 2024. I feel as if anything that Apple creates that can fit in your pocket will be on a yearly cycle and anything that can’t will be on a 2 year cycle moving forward.
Seems they really screwed up offering M3 in the MacBook Pro and should have just stuck to the M3 Pro and better. Leave M3 in the non-Pro machines. This will keep everyone happy that the "pro" label doesn't get misapplied
The biggest problem is Apple charges hideously expensive upgrades of rams and storage capacities that people are defiantly seeing right through that greed when they leave customers with highly unappealing options!
Exactly this MBP M3 with 8GB RAM for 1700€ (tax exld).... ye, no thanks Apple. I just got a MBP M1 Pro 16'' 16GB/1TB for 1150€ (excld tax, expense for firma), the plan is to upgrade to M3 Pro when M4 or M5 releases, haha. Same with iPhones, when 15 PM released I got 14 PM for half price refurb, saved 500€ right there. Will sell it probably with only losing 100-200€ value when 16 PM relaeses and grab 15PM for again 500-600€ less than 16.
Mac shipments have returned to pre-pandemic baseline. If you zoom out and do a Mac shipment curve over the last 10 years, the current numbers are in line with that growth curve. The huge growth in shipment numbers from 2020-2022, which was brought upon by the shift to work from home and the move to Apple Silicon, is an exception to the longer term trajectory.
I upgraded my MacBook every 5 years for the last 3 that I've owned. The first two were Intel based. Got the base M2 Air when it released last year. I don't think the M2 is going to REDUCE that upgrade cycle for me...or pretty much anybody else.
yeah, because base model. Add an extra 8GB of ram and you'll be looking at a 3 to 5 years investment. M1 MacBook Air people who got the 16GB model, have absolutely no urge to change it and in fact is still being sold by Apple for a reason. It's still its most successful Apple Silicon MacBook.
Tbh no one ever replaced laptops every year that was never even a thing. Hell many only needed them for college so they only ever buy one to take seriously as cell phones cover most people’s needs these days.
After 3 years you start to think of an upgrade. Even Marques I quote “I am not upgrading to the M3 I will still use my M1, I don’t see a use for this” 😂
The issue is with the pricing and overlapping models specs. Apple need to price MacBook Air m2 at 999 which seems to be the sweeet spot. They also need to relase a model at the 600 range similar to the MacBook 2017
100% agree, the m1 air need to drop in price by a bit and that will get more people into the ecosystem and more accustomed to buying better macs in the future.
The fact is the performance gains just aren't wowing anyone yet since the m1 and m1 max. They were such perfect laptops... maybe they need add a new feature... maybe apple pencil support in the trackpad?
Only makes sense on the display and that would eat into iPad sales more than anything, I‘m afraid. On the trackpad would actually bo horrible I think, with the mouse acceleration or not enough distance to cover relevant portion of the screen.
It's more than that. Apple *handicapped* the M2 machines by reducing the SSD performance by half in base models and the M3 Pro by removing 2 performance cores.
I'm hoping for the entire keyboard to be replaced with a touch screen... it happened to the phone (would be super handy for digital artists) and edit the keyboard, I really want a number pad, so I would add that
I completely agree. I have an M1 MacBook Air, a late 2013 27" iMac running the latest macOS using OpenCore, and an iPhone 7. They all work fine, even if two are over five years old, which is ancient for technology! I've considered upgrading my iPhone for the past few years, but I'm not in any hurry because I have a nice DSLR and will miss Touch ID on any new phone, minus the SE.
You know things aren't going well when even people like MKBH see no need to upgrade from the M1 Max themselves. Even the base M1 is still amazing for most people.
This is spot on! When I was in college, I bought a Mac because I knew it would last my entire college career! The development cycle in a mature market like Mac (and even iPhone) can slow down. I have an M1 Max MBP, and it's great! Slowing down the development cycle for the Mac could benefit Apple. They save some money on annual iterations, it gives their supplier time to innovate, and our Macs don't become "last gen" so quickly. So, here is my "if I were Tim Cook" proposal for the Mac: a tick/tock cycle. In a "tick" year, the processors are updated. In a "tock" year, MacOS is updated. This gives a two year production cycle for both the chips and the OS. The chips would likely have better performance gains, and MacOS would have more time for new features and stability checks. They may not be able to get away with this for iPhone, but as a Mac owner, I would be happy with this arrangement!
I bought my first MBP in 2014 ( upgraded with 2 SSD ) and used it until 2021..I now have a M1 .. its super fast , does everything I need to do and more. I will not replace it until the latest MacOS is no longer supported ( sooo 8 years ?)
This is a great assessment. My tricked out mid 2010 desktop worked very well until I couldn’t upgrade software anymore. I only got a MacBook pro with M1 because I enrolled in grad school 2 years ago. I do video editing so I needed a powerful machine. I don’t see a need anytime soon for anything faster. My 11pro still works great but I went and got the 15pro just because of the better cameras. That being said I think Cook should review Jobs’s approach: consider aesthetics. Jobs would create products that inspired imagination along with functionality with good business and marketing. Cook is mostly business and functionality. If we could get back to that blend from the Jobs era Apple would make the sales they want.
I still tell people about when I bought my M1 MacBook Air which ran circles around my 2020 27 inch iMac with i7 and best graphics card possible. Not only did my M1 Air run circles around it, but it did so absolutely silently. As anyone who does any video or audio work will know, silence is truly golden.
I love how RU-vid geeks don’t even realize just how insane it is for a line up of 7-8 computers to generate $7.8 BILLION dollars in revenue in 90 days. The Mac business itself is larger than most companies.
I can still remember back in the early 0’s when all the revenue from all of Apple’s earnings finally hit one billion in a quarter. That would probably be off mostly the iPod, Mac and iTunes.
The point is that for the last 4 fiscal quarters, year over year Mac revenue has been shrinking. At this pace, the Mac business will be cut in half in no time.
bought a 14in M1 Pro this year right after the M2 came out. Got it for $600 off at bestbuy and a 2yr warranty for free. its amazing! I cant see myself upgrading for awhile
If they cut down on upgrade costs of RAM and storage by 50$ each, I guarantee that more people would buy higher tier models. In all fairness, they should lower them by 100$ to even come close to actual RAM and storage prices.
I have an intel mac pro and my next computer will be a PC. There was tremendous value in being able to dual boot and play games on windows, upgrade my hard drives and graphics card etc. Now you can't even replace a hard drive unless you want to spend $7k on a mac pro and even then there are caveats. Apple has always charged a premium but it used to represent tremendous value in a lot of ways as once you paid that higher price your experience was not tainted with what Apple is doing now - charging another $300 for a keyboard and track pad if you buy a $4k Mac Studio, charging almost $500 for insurance, requiring accessories for the Mac Studio to have front ports of a sufficient number and type, requiring dongles for an ipad to use a headphone jack - on and on. Throwing ads into the desktop music app (formerly itunes) for their subscription service instead of allowing me an ad free experience to access my own music was the last straw. There is literally very little left that isn't as annoying about Apple as there is about Windows - the only difference now is I'm being charged more for it.
In my personal opinion I think the only reason is creating these upgrades is to keep there lead from the competition so they can attract more of the market(Though I know some may argue doesn’t care much about that) and also because it’s reached to a point where I just see the M series chips as chips which showcase how far can go regardless if they are actually useful or not-It seems like you are right in saying has definitely trapped themselves.
You can't replace your m.2 your memory and people are getting sick of it along with the $4,000 price tag. When the cpu dies your screwed or you take it to apple and they charge you a absurd pricing to repair your mac and most of the time won't fix your device. mac is based on free BSD. I just feel Linux is a better offer and you have so many options to suit anyones needs as Linux is getting so much easier to use. Linux Mint, Fedora even Zorn OS for Windows and Mac users works well.
Not only is the M1 great but the constant price hike in times of inflation, trouble in the world and financial insecurities + not offering something new, like Face ID for Mac because of the gigantic notch causes the drop of sales!
When I upgraded to an M1 MacBook Air three years ago that replaced a fully maxed out late 2010 Intel MacBook Air that I had used daily since then, it even had a 2-3 hour usable battery life on it's original battery. So now, with the M1 I'm set for the next decade. Though I made sure to go for 16 GB RAM and 1 Tb storage, for the sake of longevity, even tough it's not needed now, it may be useful 3-5 years from now.
Hanging on to my 2015 MBP running Ventura (using OCLP) until I’m less broke. Still runs like a champ and gets what I need done, even though its definitely showing its age these days.
I totally agree with you. The Mac I had before was an Intel chip Mac. And then back in 2020 well whenever the M1 came out. I bought a new computer. It’s a small but for all the things I do at home typing looking at email paying bills it is excellent, I have no complaints with that computer. I have the touch bar. And I know some people are gonna say oh yuck. But it works fine for me. So I’m not in a real hurry to buy a newer computer although I can get the benefits of things going faster, but like you said, I’m not in graphics design or movie design I’m just a regular old person.
I made a comment just now about people like you which are most people. My question to you is why even have a computer if all you do is browse the web and check emails? You have your phone and can purchase a cheap tablet. Unless you’re running a business, your job supplies your computer. I actually haven’t bought a computer for years because of this.
Good theory but some of the windows companies are recovering lost sales faster than Apple. I'm certain Apple are loosing sales due to RAM and storage prices
Very true. I have an M1 Air and while I would like to upgrade to the M3 Pro since my laptop has become mostly my main computer, I’d like the nicer screen and some audio improvement, “I’d like” is not “I am going to spend money and needlessly upgrade”. At minimum the AppleCare has to run out and I personally prefer a four year cycle anyway.
I actually agree a ton. From what ive seen, every big tech youtuber has/had a M1 macbook, and even for them, it is perfectly fine today three years later. Along with the millions of people who have M1/M2 macbooks, there is no need AT ALL to upgrade. Imo only get a M3 macbook if you dont have one already and want to get into using a mac or if you are running out of ssd/ram, etc. When M4 comes out, i then think it will be time for M1 users to upgrade
I own an almost fully loaded 2017 MacBook which I mostly use for E-Mails and MS Word, sometimes to watch TV in my kitchen. It doesn’t even need 10% of its resources to accomplish that. Also my 2018 11” iPad Pro is good for another year. I make sure my iPhone gets refreshed every three years or so to always carry a camera up to standards. Now with 120 Hz and 5G on my 13 Pro 512 GB I might even wait up to four years if the 16 Pro doesn’t blow me away. I always keep the preceding iPhone as a hot spare/backup, almost couldn’t tell a difference on my XS watching videos using WiFi at home.
This is sort of “Scary Fast” because I fully agree with you. You’re starting to make sense to me. My M1 Max Mac Studio is far more than I need now and will continue to be for many years to come. I’m not going to “need” a new Mac for quite a long time.
Been using Opera for a few months and love it. Speaking of Mac's, totally agree, i have the 14inch Max with 64GB/4tb, absolute beast. Absolutely no reason for the upgrade!
Also I know a lot of people that don't even use a PC or Laptop anymore. They are more than fine with their smartphone, it gets done everything they need.
Honestly, the color getting darker almost got me but ultimately it wasn’t enough. Had they added a nifty, “cute” feature like the dynamic island or Face ID or something of the sort I might have tried harder to convince myself. But to go from M1 Pro to M3 Pro solely because of a color change didn’t seem responsible considering my current laptop is pretty much wasted on me. I feel as though they are catering too heavily to the creator scene and forget most people that buy these laptops are average joes who just want a nice computing experience. Hell, I opted for the Pro over the Air specifically because of the battery life and ports as well as the incredible screen. More features for the average Joe and I’m sure they’ll sell a lot better.
I upgraded my macbook pro in 2021 because the battery on my 2013 version one that I bought in 2015 was dying and I knew that it wasn't going to be supported much longer. My sister still has hers despite not being able to update to the current MacOS because she only uses it to watch shows since she has a company laptop to work from
the M3 Macs are the first macs that are really interesting to me, since it has everything my current laptop has, but I can take it around so much easier. Time to start saving for a macbook pro
Get a refurbished M1. It's still a very fine machine, and honestly, more than enough. I got a specd out M1 Max 16" MacBook Pro (32GB RAM, 10 core CPU, 32 core GPU, 1TB SSD) for $1999. That's lower than the price of the base model MacBook Pro M3 16". And it's so good! I get at least 10 hours of battery life, and I run apps like Davinci Resolve editing 4K 10-bit footage with a bunch of effects, Blender, Live Home 3D (running 2d and 3d views of a home at the same time), Premiere Pro, After Effects, sometimes multiple of these apps at the same time and there's never been any lag at all. These are extremely powerful softwares, but the fans barely turn on. Don't get M3, get M1 and spec it out!
@@max_wheelwright I’m planning to spec out an M3. I do a lot of gaming and having a decent on the go gaming rig will be nice. The new features geared towards gaming seem really nice.
The Pavlovian response I have whenever someone says “Let’s talk about that” is only going to get stronger and more ingrained in my psyche when you do stuff like this.
Even though I do video editing and a little bit of 3D modeling, a M1 or M2 Air would be just fine for college next year (with 16GB RAM of course). That's the best part about Apple imo - support for older devices and the fact that they last.
yeah, M1 was too good basically. I’ve had my base M1 MBA for 2.5 years and it still works like on day 1. Planning to hold on to it for at least 5-6 years
I love my M1 Pro 16”. Bought second hand and Worked with AppleCare support to get the AppleCare added back to it after it lapsed in October. Was a pain in the ass but worth it cuz I plan to keep this for a long time. I think it’s good they’re updating every year. Means when I am ready to upgrade it’ll be that much better but yea…they’re gonna have to rework things for better sales.
This is probably true, the laptop market as a whole was pretty much in decline before the M1 update. There were very slow updates for Intel processors. Of course the pandemic increased a lot of purchases but it was really temporary. Got an 13" M1 MBP from the launch, still feel it's strangely snappy and have unbelievably long battery life. The 10% battery warning seems really silly now because it's still about 2 hours until you run out.
Ya I have an m1 MacBook air.. and as shiny and nice as those new MacBook Pros , I really don’t need it.. maybe they should follow a 3 yr update cycle like some camera manufacturers
I think this is one of the reasons why Apple is trying to push gaming cause gamers are really the only general consumer that needs all that power. But until they make pricing a lot more reasonable, gamers are almost on the same page as college students.
Games nowadays require large hard disks to be practical. Which qpple charges too high a premium for. Many modern aaa games have require around 20-30gb. Some extreme cases like call of duty go above 200gb.
My only real reason to upgrade my M1Pro 14 inch MacBook Pro would be to update from the base storage. And even then I dont really worry about that right now.
Make Mac's user upgradable. Most people can't afford to spend thousands of dollars every year on anew laptop just to get a slightly faster chip. But if they were modular and you could upgrade your chip every other year for a few hundred dollars whilst keeping the same frame and screen (which are all the same on the new laptops anyways) then more people might buy upgraded chips. Or they could try adding new features to their laptops like faceID etc.
I’m getting close to probably thinking about the possibility of maybe potentially upgrading to a MacBook Pro M3 from my wicked cool space gray iMac Pro … that still works perfectly.
I have a maxed-out M1 Air (daily use on the road), maxed-out M1 MacMini (home machine), maxed-out M1 Max (photography post-production in studio), and base model M1 MacMini (as a server), and a maxed-out M1 iPad Pro. Unless & until an iMac Pro comes out, I do not anticipate updated most of my Mac's until about M6 or M7 timeframe.
I like to see specs, numbers and graphs just because I’m a nerd and like keeping up with that stuff. I’m also still carrying a 2020 SE and the A13 Bionic is still overpowered for anything I need a phone to do.
Yes, the m1 are still good however, if apple really made a full support for gaming and 3 dev, they would have a lot of new users for the gaming and 3dev stuff on the go, but they still have a long way with gaming specifically. In the meantime, they are checking the market with the vision pro, if the market likes it, they will go all in with that as a kinda future replacement for the Mac.
I'm still happy with my 2019 Acer Predator Helios 300 entry-level gaming laptop. Given how much more powerful the M1 is, I would think most customers would be happy with that (until it breaks and they cannot get it repaired and are forced to buy a new one).
I totally agree. They made M1 just too powerful extremely quickly. There is no motivation of getting more powerful chips for masses. And iPhone 15 or AW Ultra 2? Feels like SW update...
i have an m1 mac mini that i still use for editing - lol. yeah, the M series chips are too good for Apple's yearly release sales cycle. I have an m2 mac book pro and i can't see upgrading unless i just have a few $K to spare and buy a mac studio for funzzies.
I have an M1 pro MacBook from 2021 and I don’t plan to upgrade till maybe till M5 or M6 it’s still a powerhouse and a beast does everything I need to and I don’t see the point in upgrading every year
I’m saving up for a Mac mini sometime at the end of next summer (yes, I’m that poor that it’ll take me that long to save up for it) & that will be my first computer I’ve owned in almost 6 years. The only reason I’ll probably upgrade to a MacBook Air a few years after that (2-3 years) is because I’ll be going from online college classes to transferring schools & attending classes in person, so my needs will change a bit.
typically what we use computers for becomes more demanding when the chips are more capable, we just haven't made that jump yet. The future of computing, even for productivity stuff, is very graphics and AI intensive and the M series chips are still too weak for that. I'd expect the mac to eventually be replaced by Vision OS.
I have a fully spec’d out M1 Max MacBook and it easily chews through any footage I throw at it. I can’t see myself upgrading until 8k becomes the standard.
As a 3-D modeling RU-vid channel I spend a lot of time using my M1 and something I can say is that the M1 dramatically affects my workflow something that I really do hope the M3 can fix, especially with a lot of Apple focus on graphical computing with silicone on the M3. Things taking even five minutes to render out can become painstaking. I am actually glad that this new chipset focuses on graphical computing.
i say for the old mac’s they still have in back market sell them at a lower cost to make them more appealing to newer buyers of mac who don’t really need the latest and greatest. or just come out with a new mac every 3 or more years so whomever buys a new mac now can get the FULL use out of it and after that time period think i want a new mac now.
I usually upgrade my computers when i can get at least 50%+ better single core performance. I got a m1 pro so perhaps when m5 is out? What they could do is make them better for games. That might steal some market share. Also when you get a new game and your unhappy with the performance its tempting to upgrade.