I’m not asking for an iPhone with replaceable RAM. I understand the value of a sleek, highly integrated, highly custom product. But if the most important and expensive part of the desktop computer you’re looking to buy is the GPU, it’s insane to choose one that’s soldered to the motherboard.
Absolutely.
Thats Apples way, make people come back and back… My desktop is 6 years old.. quad core AMD with a Radeon R9 380.. plays everything i’ve thrown at it at ultra quality… the gpu is the only part I have needed to upgrade for a very very long time… Give people a system that can upgrade the gpu, they don’t come and buy a new system for a very very long time either… Apple knows this game, it’s business sense.
Hi,
Yes.
More specifically, Apple only need to support hardware they supply, and don’t need to spend a huge amount of $$ trying to support every random GPU that anyone might feel like plugging into a computer now or in the future.
– Brendan
The next version of OS X will support external GPU’s.
This will solve your problem.
This is like people wishing that Apple would be a little more open with their stuff – you might as well be asking for hell to freeze over. It’s just not Apple’s way. You either like it or you don’t. If you don’t, then STOP BUYING THEIR PRODUCTS.
/ thread
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The argument seems to be that they want Apple to make cheap hardware to compete with building your own PC box..
Sorry, ain’t gonna happen, and has never been what Apple is about.
What’s next? Someone complaining that the iPhone costs $800 and isn’t it a shame that they can get an Android phone for $100 and why can’t apple make a $200 iPhone?
The author says that they used to own Apple products but I doubt it. It has always been far cheaper to build your own PC boxes than buy Apple. The argument was as true 10 years ago as it is now.
100% agree. Also, with Thunderbolt 3 you can connect GPUs using an external case. Apple will support these external solutions officially in High Sierra providing drivers for nVidia (they presented a Sonnet box, but any TB3 box with sufficient power to feed the GPU will do the trick).
In fact, in the Mac community, We’ve been using TB2 external GPUs for years, people complaining about these kind of things are usually PC fanboys, they don’t give a shit about Macs and never will buy one anyway. xD
The only issue with TB3 enclosures is the limited number of lanes available. Obviously, lanes in future versions of TB will get faster, but I doubt we will see a 16X external PCI express connection anytime soon.
There’s also another issue with TB GPU enclosures: PRICE.
Literally, you end up spending an order of magnitude more to get significantly less BW than native PCIe connection.
That’s the apple way I guess; pay more for less.
leos,
I agree with your conclusion here, but the first statement seems a bit odd to me. Given the downward economic forces on the middle classes, it sounds perfectly logical to me that maybe he could be a former mac user who’s been priced out, just as he claims.
It doesn’t have to be cheap – a Mac Mini with a PCI-Express slot, or maybe even the external GPUs they now support. $1000 isn’t cheap btw.
And by the way, the iMac is cost competitive. Have you ever tried to make a similar system out of parts? You’ll blow your budget on the 5K screen alone. It’s not like they are a stranger to the idea.
Edited 2017-06-08 03:23 UTC
CaptainN,
Yeah, but on the other hand you’ll likely be plopping down large sums more frequently than with modular systems where you can upgrade/repair individual components. IMHO it makes sense to plan for upgrades, and it will save a lot of money over replacing the whole rig each time – even if you pay more for higher end components.
The other problem is being limited to a few models with hardwired components isn’t very flexible. I think many pro users would be happy for the “grater box” Mac to come back. I’ve personally upgraded the same midtower for most of my life, haha. No such luck with laptops though.
I don’t know. The three things I’ve upgraded or replaced regularly are the amount of RAM, hard drives, and maybe the GPU, but usually only because the old one burnt out.
I don’t even need a replaceable GPU to be honest – just something a bit more than an integrated middle range mobile GPU. Mainstream performance, and I’m all over it.
There are a few problems with upgrading parts over time. One is that the parts actually become scarce (just look for a quad core socket 775 Intel CPU for example – they can be expensive and hard to find). There are similar problems with GPU upgrades – my old Core 2 Duo board has PCI-Express 1.1 – I can put a newer GPU in there, but should I?
CaptainN-,
Haha, yea eventually you should replace that
I bought a new computer in a small form factor, I did so because I wanted to fit it in a smaller space than my tower, but I’m kind of disappointed with the power supply options and half size PCI cards. I’m not sure how well my upgrade endeavors are going to go with it.
Same! I have a Shuttle SP35P2.
I haven’t upgraded because I bought a Mac Book Pro, and haven’t needed to. 🙂
Why should I want to bleed my wallet on a 5K screen when I could get a great 32″ 4K screen that gives me a much more useful pixel density — for a fraction of the price?
Why should I want to buy a server class CPU (and the expensive ECC memory that goes with it) while there are kick ass desktop class CPUs that would be just as good for most workloads — for a fraction of the price?
And no, I have no interest in pissing contests, so “just because I can” is not a valid answer for me.
RT.
iMacs don’t run those things, and maybe 4K at 32″ is good for you, but I rather like the “retina” screen, and 5K at 27″ is to me a sweet spot.
To each their own though.
Your argument is “why would I pay more for better things when I could pay less for worse things?”.
Great. If you are happy with the lower specs then get that. Don’t be surprised that higher specs cost more money.
The only Apple hardware I own is an iPhone 5S that I bought for $80. I also don’t want to spend thousands of dollars for high end iMacs but that doesn’t mean I don’t understand why people do spend the money.
$1000 IS cheap when we’re talking Macintoshes. The entry level ones still sell for $700
You’ll never see Apple sell a “modular” Mac for less that $2500. They’d be cannabalising their own low-end market with a potentially high-end machine
I think the argument here is that they are already losing ground by not offering a higher end at a reasonable price, with a decent GPU. We’re looking for mainstream performance – not the toppest of the top end parts.
I also don’t agree again that Apples are expensive when you factor in build quality the glorious screen (though we wouldn’t have that here) and all that. Cost of ownership for Apple hardware is low.
The author seems to be disappointed that the products are being priced out of his range, and I agree they are expensive, however being price competitive isn’t really in apple’s DNA. They don’t care about people who can’t afford their products. And why should they, their customers are profitable. I know it sucks, but you know what: join the club. If I had money, or a generous employer footing the bill, there would be tons of expensive things I’d like to get my hands on, but I’ve always had to make my money stretch even when it means buying less known brands and refurbs.
I’ll browse for the products I want, and then I have to see where I can make concessions to make it more affordable, which has always ruled out apple computers under my budget. Oh well, that’s just life. Ironically apple laptops like the MBP are inadequate for my requirements anyways due to the lack of ports and features that I need – even if I could afford the sticker price. Hint: I dock a lot of points if I’m going to need external dongles.
Edited 2017-06-08 02:09 UTC
That is all.
What Apple need to do is release a nerfed version of macOS for generic PC’s.
By all means, remove any and all Apple services from it, such as messages and the App store, so it’s not cannibalising their hardware sales too much, and just license it like Microsoft licenses Windows.
Heck, they could slap a $200 price tag on it, and i’m sure the hackintosh community would still buy it.
That would be horrible idea. The very reason why Mac OS X / macOS is so highly regarded is precisely because it only runs on tightly controlled hardware, which allows Apple to deliver greatly polished user experience 100% of the time. Releasing macOS for generic hardware would be self-sabotaging move.
What a load of BS. Apple uses totally generic PC hardware. The only thing stopping Frankenmacs is Apples’ desire for huge profit margins.
Yes, totally generic COMPONENTS, but each single computer/laptop is assembled according to their specs, precisely put together and orchestrated to work well as a system.
Did you ever see what kind of abominations novice “PC builders” put together? Quite often what they “build” is such a crap bucket that any OS would be horrible running on it…
Can’t be any worse than my Macbook Air, with its lethargic 1.8GHz CPU, 4GB of SOLDERED RAM, and a puny 128GB SSD
And Apple sell this shit for $800! In fact, there are phones out there faster than my shitty piece of shit macbook air!
https://www.macrumors.com/2016/09/15/iphone-7-faster-than-macbook-ai…
Edited 2017-06-08 13:25 UTC
I never understood why would anyone in their right mind would buy MacBook Air… MacBook Pro is the way to go.
MacBook Air is basically just a pretty typewriter — enough to run some kind of notepad/wordpad, and that’s it.
Why are you pointing out that you made a bad purchase decision? Maybe think about what you are buying in the future before you buy it?
Who said I bought it?
Anyway, it’s still faster, lighter and has better graphics than my 2011 MBP
Speaking of abominations, have you used the new MBPro? That’s a rickety pile of crap for the price of a gold rickety pile of crap.
You mean the one with “butterfly keyboard” and “Genius bar”? Yeah, I totally agree with you. I use 15″ 2015 MacBook Pro instead.
Apple have made more than their fair share of shit laptops and PCs over the years.
Such as?.. Give me examples, and why exactly were they “shit”.
MacOS is based on an open source project (Darwin) which is in turn based on the Berkeley System Distribution (BSD). BSD is an implementation of Unix (Bell Labs). Huge slabs of the MacOS code are still taken directly from open source projects.
If you think that Apple actually writes it’s own graphics, printer drivers etc you have rocks in your head,
Where did I say that?..
I have a Hackintosh running very well. Actually it is pretty stable and fun to use. I have to admit that it took a weekend to get everything up and running, but that was mainly the getting used to part of things. I haven’t had to reinstall the OS in over a year, but knowing how to get things done, it wouldn’t take much time now. And imagine if Apple released a Clover-like bootloader and additional configuring tools…
But then again, I might be lucky that most of the parts I have are nearly supported out of the box. But honestly, I never had a kernel panic or anything.
Exactly. You are lucky (and smart enough) to do that properly. Now imagine if macOS/OS X was available for every wannabe PC builder to try and slap it onto the frankensystem he just unleashed upon the world… OS X/macOS would loose it’s “magic aura” of being perfectly polished and rock-solid in a blink of an eye. That’s the curse of Windows OS, too — MS has to try very hard to make it run somewhat acceptably on any possible random combination of el. cheapo hardware with crappy drivers, even though parts of the PC don’t want to work together at all.
All internal hardware is generic. The crappy driver problem was solved decades ago. Windows has been solid and reliable since 1999 (Windows 2000). Linux has been rock solid and easy to use for at least 15 years.
You can easily build a fast desktop system that will work flawlessly with Windows, Linux and the BSDs for <$300.
You can, but there are many people who cannot — that’s exactly my point. Mac is for those people who cannot (or don’t want to) build their own systems.
Edited 2017-06-09 07:55 UTC
You are just trolling.
Apple was selling 1980s shit OS9 and running totally outdated Motorola CPUs and weird prprietary hardware (nuBus, ADB etc) when Steve Jobs was rehired. They only survived by switching to NeXT (BSD) and standard PC hardware.
Nobody has ever been forced to build a PC. They were sold fully assembled and running compatible software by IBM more than three years before the first Mac was even sold.
So?.. What’s your point here? How does that contribute to the argument of Apple releasing OS X for everyone to use on anything?
I used to be a harsh Apple critic myself, but after trying a MacBook as a daily driver for several months I realized that there’s simply no other manufacturer (either IBM, HP, Dell, or anyone else) that can provide such a synergy between hardware and software + such a polished and pleasant user experience.
Slapping OS X on many random hardware configurations would break that experience completely (miserable battery life, inadequate performance, degraded visuals due to cheap TN panels in generic laptops, other inconsistencies, OEM bloatware injected into OS, etc. etc.)
I don’t give a shit about MacOS. [IMO it is a retarded version of Unix with extremely limited hardware and software support.]
I was responding to original poster who was claiming that Apple has a (literally) magical ability to combine hardware and software to obtain perfection.
I was simply pointing out to the OP that Apple uses generic PC hardware and a BSD based OS. He then went of on a nonsensical tangent claiming that only Apple knew how to combine these components to build functional computers and write proper drivers.
You completely misunderstood. No one ever said “only Apple could”. Fact is, only Apple tried and succeeded. If there was another company who would tightly control both hardware and software in order to polish final product to near-perfection, I would instantly try and likely buy it. Unfortunately, no one else bothers to do that.
Learn to interpret text properly before accusing others of something that was created purely in your imagination.
CATs,
Interesting, I sensed the opposite, consumers are not thrilled with Macs lately. If I were a macos user, I probably couldn’t be convinced to switch to windows in any case, but I’d honestly be disappointed in apple’s laptop and desktop PC offerings.
Well yeah, of course Apple’s hardware is in no way special or different than other OEMs. I never said that. What I said, is that Apple does the job of picking the right hardware components, putting them together into one well thought out system and then tuning the OS in such a way that battery life is amazing, screen is top notch, build quality is pretty great, performance is just about enough for everything without wasting too much power, the OS and it’s visuals are very consistent and intuitive (no awkward moments of “I wonder if this is clickable or just a text/decoration” like in Windows). Well, I could go on and on, but you get the idea.
Yes, you _could_ build such a system yourself if you are willing to dedicate time and energy to become and expert in hardware and software, assemble a good system from quality parts, then configure and tune both hardware and OS to the perfection… But I’d rather pay extra to Apple and have final product delivered to my door the same day. And honestly, for non-techie people manually assembling/configuring/tuning such a system is out of question completely.
Regarding Apple wannabes, oh how I wish you were right and majority of manufacturers were not just mimicking Apple… Sadly, every single one of them started putting Apple-like keyboards, Apple-like touchpads and making laptops look as similar to MacBooks as they legally can… The last Mohican was ThinkPad by IBM, with it’s truly awesome keyboard, great trackpoint (who needs touchpad when you have a trackpoint like that?) and really great build quality (even better than MacBooks). Sadly, when Lenovo took over, ThinkPads turned to shit. The very latest iterations of them seem to be very slightly less shitty, but more and more Apple-like…
CATs,
In what ways (specifically) do you feel they’re all becoming more “apple-like”?
Edited 2017-06-10 17:19 UTC
Keyboard, touchpad (_especially_ touchpad), overall look and feel of the casing (except they’re still black).
I have had and used many, many ThinkPads. Few generations back Lenovo introduced this absolutely rubbish touchpad that was completely unusable (according not just to myself, but also my colleagues). That one that was very large, but if you click it, the ENTIRE touchpad platform would go down a little bit, register the click, and then go back up again. It was so craptastic that I honestly thought it was broken and wanted to return it under warranty to fix. It appears it was designed that way… Now, I have one of the very latest ThinkPads at work, and the touchpad is much improved, but it feels almost identical to my MacBook’s touchpad at home… Except it feels cheaper, flimsier and less convenient — basically, a Chinese rip-off. Keyboard is also improved in comparison to older models, but still much worse than those pre-Apple keyboards on old ThinkPads such as x201. Things like that makes me think “How awesome that I have a _real_ MacBook at home” when I type or use touchpad on my work ThinkPad.
CATs,
The MBP touchbad is fine, however so is the touchpad on my acer.
I agree that some PC manufacturers put out very crappy models, and if you don’t do the research you might end up with one, especially at the lower end of the market. However apple isn’t alone in serving the high end of the market if you are willing to pay more for it. I still think the biggest reason to buy a mac (or not buy a mac) is the software requirements, that is clearly the biggest difference.
The expensive corporate laptops have easily met or exceeded Apple hardware specifications and build quality for quite a few years. The latest Surface Pros, HP Spectres etc are generally way ahead of their Apple counterparts.
First of all, since when is Surface Pro a laptop??? It’s a glorified tablet with paper keyboard. Build quality might be nice, but it should be compared to iPad pro, not MacBook Pro. You should have put Surface Book here instead — and oh look, that one looks absolutely 100% like a MacBook! From far away you would not be able to tell these are different laptops.
Second, HP Spectre has the same “Look at me I’m just like Apple” keyboard. It might be as good as MacBook’s, but it’s still a rip-off.
Third, does HP make their own OS for Spectre and optimise that OS for their laptops?
You will just refuse to read what I write and continue blabbering your own things that are maybe just remotely related to the point I am trying to make, are you?..
In fact, MS Surface Pro is direct analog and direct competition to this thing, and NOT to MacBook:
https://arstechnica.com/apple/2017/06/review-10-5-inch-ipad-pro-is-p…
And once again, they both look quite similar… Although in this case you might say Apple ripped off SurfacePro.
In fact, lately every single laptop maker tries to mimic Apple products. Even ThinkPads became MacBook wannabes. The problem is that those “impostors” mimc only superficial aspects of MacBook and in the end turn out shitty anyway. Then you start thinking, “ok, if all of them are trying to pretend to be a MacBook so hard, why don’t I just go and buy a real deal, even if it costs more?”
There already is, it’s called GNUstep and if people want it to be better pick up a swift/objective-c book and get coding. Apple doesn’t owe you shit, and all the people saying that Linux people should just get coding on WINE etc. Well get coding on GNUstep too because it’s in the same boat. With a bit of love to system preferences.app and the base libraries it’d be pretty mac like. Needs the webkit port finished, system preferences updated for audio/video/networking. Combine it with Etoile’s Apple style menu bar and a better theme and you have something approaching OSX. There was a time when people aspired for Linux to be more: http://jesseross.com/clients/etoile/ui/concepts/01/workspace_300.jp…
Edited 2017-06-08 08:19 UTC
source code compatibility is not very useful to the end user. Now, if they ported it to Darwin and made an effort at binary compatibility, maybe it would be more useful
To me the reason to use Mac OS X is that it’s an alternative to Windows that’s able to run commercial software unavailable on Linux.
Making GNUstep look like Mac OS X unfortunately doesn’t give it the ability to run Lightroom and Photoshop…
That’s precisely the reason why OS X was really the only viable alternative for me. I don’t do much work or productivity on my home computer, but when I do, it’s usually in Adobe Lightroom.
Apple needs to? Let me get this clear: Apple does not _need_ anything. It’s YOU who _want_ Apple to do this and that.
And it’s not going to happen just because you rephrase the sentence “I want them to…” as “They need to…”.
If you want a cheap PC then there are many better performing and less expensive machines out there. You can buy a really snazzy case, even an older apple case and put it in that. Guess how much I miss buying an Apple device? Not at all.
Don’t they sell now an external enclosure with built in RX 580?
Apple will never give up its minimalist design they are known for. This does not go well with dedicated GPU’s running at their full potential.
Even most gaming laptops do this by not providing full power to the GPU and letting it thermal throttle to keep the temperature down and battery life at acceptable levels.
You don’t upgrade your washer. You may get a more energy efficient model someday. Heck, maybe from the same brand.
Asking Apple to be more “PC” is a waste of breath.
Google will be able soon. As for Apple, time will tell.
My bet is that the modular mac pro is going to be based on eGPU. I don’t think there is any “engineering” reason not to have one box ready unless they are seeking to do another trashcan… that would be suicide.
Only reason to wait for next year would be, IMO, some key technology that is not yet ready (another thunderbolt iteration?) that would make that possible.
Creating an eGPU market that is open (as a peripheral) for both nvidia and amd to enter. Then build the “hub” computer (something that in size could be in line with mac minis) with a “consumer” and “pro” (xeon, ecc, more thunderbolt connectors, etc…) versions could make sense for Apple.
They already made storage external in the previous macbook pro (the internal SSD wasn’t big enough for serious pro use without an external storage solution, IMO).
This will allow to treat each of the different parts as a whole product. Each module in a different enclosure. No need to go beyond connecting some cables. It will cost extra, but Apple doesn’t care about that.
Considering how well Apple is doing they really don’t have to do that.