Apple doesn’t understand what laptop users want
Among the larger announcements at MacWorld was the MacBook Air, a thin and light laptop made of an aluminum shell that lacks an optical drive and is dreadfully expensive, especially at the high end.
The MacBook Air lacks an optical drive and has too few ports to be of any real serious use. I’ll give Apple props for the design and engineering that went into the laptop, it’s a well designed and beautiful machine. But it makes too many compromises.
The default configuration is equipped with 2GB of memory, a specially designed Core 2 Duo processor at 1.6GHz and comes with an 80GB hard drive, a 13.3″ display and GMA X3100 graphics (expecting a dedicated card at this size is not realistic).
It’s processor is slow, 80GB is barely enough to be useful and the “premium” model ships with a faster 1.8GHz processor and 64GB SSD but costs an heart-attack inducing $3,100. The “base” model with the standard 80GB hard drive costs $1,800 which is more palatable but is not exactly cheap or good value, I suppose that’s the cost of want a thin and light with Mac OSX.
A lowly MacBook with a 2.0GHz processor, 160GB hard drive and 2GB of Memory and Combo drive costs only $1,399, going to a 2.2GHz processor and SuperDrive costs $1,524. It has less battery life and is “less portable” than the MacBook Air but it’s not possible by rational means to justify the difference in price, considering the MacBook manages to have more ports and the inclusion of an optical drive.
Then there’s the case of the MacBook Pro which has the aluminum case, 2.2GHz processor, SuperDrive, dedicated graphics, 2GB of memory and high-res display for only $1,999 which is nicely equipped but the best value is the 2.4GHz 15-inch model at $2,500 which is still cheaper than the “premium” MacBook Air.
There is a problem here. Apple doesn’t understand what those coming over from a PC and most of Apple’s customers these days are “switchers.”
What we have here are very different if not entirely separate not related in any way, product lines. The plastic case of the MacBook scratches too easily, the MacBook Air isn’t equipped with great hardware and is ridiculously expensive and there’s the MacBook Pro which fits the gaming/enthusiast market well enough.
The MacBook is designed for low cost but has a cheap case, the MacBook Air fills a mobility market that can be filled by purchasing any number of PC options for as little as $1,200 and the MacBook Pro is really the only laptop worth considering.
What would have been better announcements at MacWorld, aluminum based MacBooks with the option of less powerful dedicated graphics, backlit keyboard and redesigned display hinges so as to not interfere with the heat exhaust vent as well as a Mac Tablet (call it the MacBook Mini)
With that, Apple would only really need the MacBook, MacBook Mini and MacBook Pro, there’d be no need for the MacBook Air. And, multitouch trackpads for all.
Not to mention the fact that other thin and light laptops manage to include an optical drive in the price, even Apple could have included the “external” option but it’s $99 extra on an already hefty price tag. It’s the “Apple Tax” and I doubt it’s going to go away any time soon.
It would appear that Apple wants you to compromise on one or more features just to own one of their laptops and be able to run Mac OSX.
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January 17th, 2008
Engineering and product development *is* compromise. Every single product ever made with no exception is a testament to this.
For a company that doesn’t know what laptop users want, Apple seems to be selling a lot of laptops.
January 17th, 2008
To be honest, I didn’t read the article once I read the silly headline. How anybody could suggest that Apple doesn’t understand what laptop users want when they now have increased their laptop share of the market to 10%, and their laptops continue to receive the most consistent high ratings, even from PC based sources, is beyond me. Not only do Apple obviously understand what laptop users want, but they make the best laptop computers.
January 17th, 2008
I always laugh when people drag out the Windows comparisons.
“Why, I can get a Windows machine that does the same thing for…”
One of the things that I always find in these comparisons is that they’ve generally left off something because “It wasn’t important.”
For example, someone brought up the Fujitsu Q2010. It’s lighter and thinner than the MacBook Air. It’s also got a Core Solo CPU, a 12″ screen, less memory (non-upgradeable), and an older graphics controller. Someone else brought up the Eee PC, with it’s 900MHz Celeron, 512MB of RAM, etc.
So, here’s some homework for the afternoon: Find this mythical machine you talk about–the $1200 Windows machine which competes with the MacBook Air. One that has similar weight, memory, display, etc.
Now, I somewhat agree with your premise, that Apple missed something here–namely thickness. The MacBook Air is too big. It’s nice and thin, but I’d rather it be a couple of inches narrower. If that means making it thicker, I can live with that.
But the rest of your comments sound silly. You want a MacBook Pro in the same size as a MacBook Air for the price of a MacBook. Not gonna happen.
January 17th, 2008
“Not only do Apple obviously understand what laptop users want, but they make the best laptop computers.”
But only if you buy a MacBook Pro, the MacBook is… poorly designed, as I said in the article, if those issues could be fixed, yes, it would be a nice laptop.
January 17th, 2008
@Peter, it’s called the Sony VGN-SZ640, look it up online, it costs around $1,200.
January 17th, 2008
No, no I don’t want a MacBook Pro as the same size as the air, I never said that, read more carefully next time.
Aluminum cased MacBooks with a weaker dedicated card, I know it’s possible because smaller laptops are equipped as such, see comment above.
January 17th, 2008
okay lets put this in a simple way… all of you guys who comment on MacBook Air been a great product , how many of you will actual buy this laptop ??? you will probably not because it’s too expensive for what it offers… you don’t want to carry a laptop that doesn’t have a inbuilt optical drive or ethernet do you ? its sexy and looks great but i wouldn’t put my money on it… i’ll rather spend $3000+ on a feature rich product
January 17th, 2008
Come on guys. There are more important things in life than arguing/debating over a freaking laptop!
January 17th, 2008
I agree with most of the article. All you missed out was the expectation of updates to the MacBook Pro’s. Your comments about them are fine, but they’re very much due an overhaul. The 15.4″ model, for example, has a 1440x900px display, hopelessly small for all those professional designers they claim to cater for. To echo your own sentiments, many Dell laptops have a 1680×1050 at 15″ as standard.
Another point worth making is that the MacBook Air is clearly designed as a secondary machine, hence the compromises with optical drives and ports. Given that it has the same footprint as a lowly MacBook you’d surely use one of them for your other, more portable machine?
The MB Air is stricly a machine for grabbing headlines (like this very article), lobotomised fanboys, and rich women. As noted in the article, the MB pro is the only serious laptop they have, but in my view is now outdated.
Finally, they designed this because they could. I agree with the article’s sentiment, I do believe Apple are showing less focus with their recent products: the $200US price drop with the iPhone, the many criticisms of some aspects of Leopard’s GUI (much of which was, tellingly, from pro users – especially for gimmicky crap like Stacks), and now a laptop that doesn’t really have a market – too big to be small, too feature-poor to be taken seriously. Where is the magic here? Are Apple just believing their own hype?
January 17th, 2008
I don’t believe they were targeting the “actual laptop market”, but just those who like to buy things because they are small.
January 17th, 2008
Apple just doesn’t understand what YOU want.
I’m a reseller, and judging by the numbers of orders I’m taking, they understand what MANY laptop users want just fine, thank you very much.
January 18th, 2008
After reading the article and the comments it isn’t clear to me that folks understand the demographic for this product. I carry my MacBook (black) with me every day to work. I am a consultant in financial services and must travel to client sites on a continual basis and must also run Windows. I consider the difference in weight very significant as I have to carry it on a consistent basis. In this context I have never needed an optical drive (although it is clear that Apple came up with two nice solutions, the first an external drive, the second ‘borrowing’ another computers optical drive).
So who is being targeted?
It appears that Apple is attempting to make another stealth entry into the enterprise. It is intended for folks in the business world who need to run Windows but want their Mac. If you think about a memory footprint of 1 Gig is generally enough to run almost every program (usually many at the same time) with the notable exception of one; Parallels. While it works reasonably well 2 Gig is really what is required to truly run Windows and OS X side by side on a consistent basis.
So am I getting one? I haven’t decided if I’m ready to spend the additional money but I’m leaning heavily in favor of it.
January 20th, 2008
Jonathon, your thinking is good, and I appreciate your articles, however, your writing style leaves something to be desired. In your article, “Apple doesn’t understand what laptop users want”, of January 17, 2008, you fall prey to a common mistake of many “fresh” writers — wordiness. Refer to the “Elements of Style” and “cut words”. Please.
Just don’t do this again:
“Not to mention the fact that …”
and “It would appear that Apple wants …”
Thanks Jonathan. Other than that, you’re great.
January 21st, 2008
I agree with a lot of comments : the journalist seems do have absolutly no clues about the market. I nearly never use my CD/DVD player : it is a mess. Apple is a visionary firms, some journalists and other firms are only mee-too.
January 21st, 2008
I agree, I think Apple omitted too many features,etc. to achieve a certain look. It is a great looking laptop,but it is just not practical. And it only has 1 speaker?? With everyone listening to music, & watching more & more movies/videos on their laptops, it needs at least 2 speakers. If Apple was to create a 13″ MacBook Pro that was a smaller version of the 15″ with 2 usb ports, pci express card slot, optical drive, & better graphics(at least 1680×1050), it would sell like hotcakes!