Apple going downhill?

Arachnae

Arachnae

Arachnae

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It it just me or is apple starting to lose some of its superior quality?

Their marketshare has unarguably grown in recent times, but I can't help but think that with this brings reduced quality as they try to increase it.

I personally don't use a mac for day to day stuff, and of course everyones experiences will differ.. I'm sure there will be a rabid foaming defence of such an outrageous accusation on my part by an extreme few, but I'd like to know what others feel about this?

Personally I find macs very expensive, and at the moment I wouldn't consider buying one for this reason.. case in point I bought a top of the range PC for the price of the cheapest macbook.
However I'm not sure I'd like a situation where market share between MS and apple for home use is 50-50 where neither has any real quality.

Thoughts?
 
Umm if anything I think Apple are at the peak (so far) of their build quality....tho, with anything, the more poeple own the ratio of hardware failures will rise, so long as it keeps to the same ratio as the numbers go up, its means they are still doing things right...and as long as their amazing CS keeps to teh same standard to deal with these, then its all good.

TO win this debate, go look at the specially Lg Developed 27" iMac screen, hardware wise that is a good 2 gens ahead of the Pc market in terms of cost and pricing.

And really if at all you are interested in working in Photography (Esp RAW/ TIFF files), Movie editing, 3D work etc, really you need to know the merits of paying for the OSX to be able to nativly run and recognise all these with such ease that the hardware Vs performance argument between Pc and Mac never really makes much sense to me.
 
I was thinking more from a software/OS standpoint, but I think you raise an interesting point.. if apple are to cater to the masses then they must support more machines and will probably have to support a wider range of hardware, I think this might become a weakpoint where mac has been traditionally strong.
 
I'd have to agree, quality seems to be at it's peak in my experience. My three year old macbook pro was excellent when I bought it and is still holding up well but the latest unibody versions are even better. The aluminium bodied ipod's are very durable, desktops are (and always have been) solid quality wise. My limited experience with their support and service has been far superior to any other technology company I've dealt with in the last few years.

Price wise, yeah they're expensive but personally I've no problem at all with that. I'll happily pay a premium for the quality and design, for a few reasons:

To me the value argument is similar to buying shoes and such, I could buy a £40 pair of inoffensive smart casual shoes and they'd last me a few months but I'd prefer to buy a really nice pair for £100 because they'll both last be longer and look better. My philosophy about buying stuff is spend money and buy quality, that and I just like having decent stuff. Cheap doesn't necessarily equal good value and £2k for a laptop every couple of years isn't a huge sum of money.
 
Arachnae said:
I was thinking more from a software/OS standpoint, but I think you raise an interesting point.. if apple are to cater to the masses then they must support more machines and will probably have to support a wider range of hardware, I think this might become a weakpoint where mac has been traditionally strong.
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Its fair to say that, as some comapnies have became very big, service has suffered, but I dont think thats Apples mantra really, they are working to a different plan overall.

Look at the market share say of the iPod/touch, with somthing like the iPod at its peak having 90% of the MP3 player market, for me, when the new 5th gen one came out, i got a new one, the battery died, the service was their to get it sorted (pickup was quick, replcement was quick, think I even got emails to tell me where it was and when it was coming back etc), so if they can act in such a way with the huge mass amount they had then, then I think its looking pretty good.
 
I have no qualms about paying money for quality, but value for money should also be a factor shouldn't it? Though I don't think the whole debate should boil down to price alone.

What got me thinking about this is the current generation head-to-head of the OS's Snow leopard vs windows 7.
I know a handful of people who use mac, and probably a lot more who use windows 7, and there are also a few who double dip. In contrast to the previous 2 new windows releases, windows 7 seems to have had a fairly problem free first couple of months, with snow leopard having an uncharacteristic wobble. I'm wondering if this is a sign of things to come or will both companies return to form? In an ideal world they would both be stable and usable by all, but that seems unlikely.

"If you don't use a Mac, then why worry?" - I like to have options, and if I do choose to switch to an apple environment in the future, I would certainly like it to be an improvement over what I left rather than something of comparable quality in a different wrapper.
 
Isn't that the point though, it is value for money? You're paying more but that doesn't mean it's not value for money. You have to think about the build of the machines, the components used and support. All are top notch and worth every penny.
 
Arachnae said:
I have no qualms about paying money for quality, but value for money should also be a factor shouldn't it? Though I don't think the whole debate should boil down to price alone.

What got me thinking about this is the current generation head-to-head of the OS's Snow leopard vs windows 7.
I know a handful of people who use mac, and probably a lot more who use windows 7, and there are also a few who double dip. In contrast to the previous 2 new windows releases, windows 7 seems to have had a fairly problem free first couple of months, with snow leopard having an uncharacteristic wobble. I'm wondering if this is a sign of things to come or will both companies return to form? In an ideal world they would both be stable and usable by all, but that seems unlikely.

"If you don't use a Mac, then why worry?" - I like to have options, and if I do choose to switch to an apple environment in the future, I would certainly like it to be an improvement over what I left rather than something of comparable quality in a different wrapper.
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I'm not sure what you mean about value for money, in my opinion Apple machines offer excellent value for money despite the high price, that was my point. The quality of the product justifies it's high price for me.

Personally, I use both snow leopard and windows 7 extensively (osx at home primarily, windows 7 on my work laptop) and I've had zero problems with snow leopard versus a few pain in the neck issues with windows 7 (took weeks for o2 to make my 3g dongle work for instance - not Windows I know but a consequence of the upgrade, whereas it kept working from leopard to snow leopard).

There have been a few high profile bugs with snow leopard but I think they affected very few users in the real world, the much publicized data loss bug related to guest accounts I don't know a single person who's experienced it. That said I don't think apple have ever been immune from bugs in new OS releases, there's always been a rule of not upgrading immediately (much like the old 'wait for the service pack' rule with Windows).
 
You didn't buy a top of the range PC for the price of a MacBook...

A top of the range PC would be closer to that of a Mac Pro.

It's an unfair comparison to say you bought a top of the range PC when there is far better PCs out there...go find a top of the range dell and i assure you it will come to nigh on 3 grand.

Macs are not overpriced though, you get what you pay for, it may not appear so judging by hardware specs but you get so much more in other areas. More important areas. They are however expensive, but you get what you pay for.

Also, what's this Snow Leopard "wobble"? I have been using Snow Leopard since release without a single hitch, on two different computers.
 
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Id take a Snow Leapord wobble over...umm....the entire reign of Vista.

I working both literally side by side, And the upgrade (be honest SL was never a new OS), was too easy, cd in..install...job done, no hickups, everything was and worked as before.

W7 installation, Ihad to go looking for drivers, for my soundcard, GPU, update the MB BIOS etc etc, all of which was nearly fine, but it was still up to me to have to go do all this, however, now that its working, im really liking W7, but overall I still preferr OSX, but I think the gap between the Os's has gotten a lot smaller.

Ohh and jsut another little point I could make, how much more can you sell an Apple that say about 4 years old over the equivilant Pc?...Apple products must have one of the best second hand market in the technology market.
 
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ou didn't buy a top of the range PC for the price of a MacBook...

A top of the range PC would be closer to that of a Mac Pro.

It's an unfair comparison to say you bought a top of the range PC when there is far better PCs out there...go find a top of the range dell and i assure you it will come to nigh on 3 grand. ....
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Anyone who buys top of the range from dell is an idiot.

Okay, maybe I was extending the truth when I said top of the range, however that depends on your definition.. the absolute best PC right now would probably cost a hell of a lot.. especially considering the new hardware released recently.. but for the price of the cheapest macbook, i bought my pc, which is no slouch.. it's an i7 920 rig with 6gigs of ram at 1600mhz and a very decent graphics card. But that is the nature of the pc market I guess? Upgrades come thick and fast.

I will agree with you thee cu3ed.. I hated vista, i still hate vista. However windows 7 i like, i dont knwo whether its due to my new pc being of a spec that is more than capable of handling the os, whereas before my pc was being slowed down by vista, or maybe the vista interface has grown on me over time?

Drivers are a biproduct of the nature of a windows system, not a fault with windows. To be fair to microsoft here, they have to support probably hundreds if not thousands more different pieces of hardware compared to apple, and of course apple have control over the hardware their OS is designed to run on, so of course you won't get any driver issues.. however I think it will be interesting to see how they cope if they make these sorts of compromises while trying to take more marketshare. They will innevitably have to start supporting custom built machines or non-specific hardware vendors if they're to take a greater hold in the market.

I think your comment about the price you can sell a second hand apple is sort of skewed. as mentioned earlier apple has far less hardware to support, and they upgrade their specs a hell of a lot less than a pc does. Not to say that a pc is constantly changing hardware, but the sheer number of possibilities coupled with the constant stream of new hardware coming out makes a pc outdated in days let alone months. Althoguh I admit you are correct, I do think the argument is a bit skewed.
 
To me, Apple has made some progress in their "low end" systems in terms of value. For example a Mac mini is a fairly good price and so is a MacBook (non Pro!).

But here is the odd bit. As soon as you make the choice to want something better, you have to SERIOUSLY pay for it.

MacBook Pro
15-inch: 2.66GHz
Intel Core 2 Duo
4GB Memory
320GB hard drive
SD card slot
Built-in 7-hour battery
NVIDIA GeForce 9400M + 9600M GT with 256MB

£1,499.00

Alienware M15x Cosmic Black
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64bit- English
Intel® Core™ i7 Processor 720QM (1.60Ghz, 6MB L3 cache)
15.6-inch Wide HD+ (1600 x 900) WLED display
4096MB 1333MHz Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM [2x2048]
500GB (7,200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive
1GB NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX260M graphics card
DVD+/-RW (DVD, CD read and write) Slot Load Drive
9-cell 85Whr Lithium Ion battery

£1,497

To me there is no excuse for the price of the MacBook Pro. It's shocking. And no "Mac OS X is better" "Look at my aluminium" "Go MagSafe" can even remotely make up for it.
 
The only advantage of this Alienware laptop is the Graphics card, which admittedly, is quite nice. This is where the advantages end. It's well known the current line of Alienware high-end notebooks suffer from major audio distortions, though I'm not sure if that applies to this specific model.

I'd easily spend more on a slightly less powerful system that ran OS X any day, and no "Windows is better" "Admire my plastic" "Go nondescript, vile power adapter" can even remotely make up for it.
 
Fillado said:
To me, Apple has made some progress in their "low end" systems in terms of value. For example a Mac mini is a fairly good price and so is a MacBook (non Pro!).

But here is the odd bit. As soon as you make the choice to want something better, you have to SERIOUSLY pay for it.

MacBook Pro
15-inch: 2.66GHz
Intel Core 2 Duo
4GB Memory
320GB hard drive
SD card slot
Built-in 7-hour battery
NVIDIA GeForce 9400M + 9600M GT with 256MB

£1,499.00

Alienware M15x Cosmic Black
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64bit- English
Intel® Core™ i7 Processor 720QM (1.60Ghz, 6MB L3 cache)
15.6-inch Wide HD+ (1600 x 900) WLED display
4096MB 1333MHz Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM [2x2048]
500GB (7,200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive
1GB NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX260M graphics card
DVD+/-RW (DVD, CD read and write) Slot Load Drive
9-cell 85Whr Lithium Ion battery

£1,497

To me there is no excuse for the price of the MacBook Pro. It's shocking. And no "Mac OS X is better" "Look at my aluminium" "Go MagSafe" can even remotely make up for it.
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What about the build quality of the case? How long is that battery going to last with an i7 and that graphics card? Are the fans going to be going nuts 24/7 just to keep it cool? How heavy is it? Its not very portable if it weights a ton. What are the discounts like for a student? Will it have 3 year warranty for people at University? Have you used Alienware support?
 
Fillado said:
To me, Apple has made some progress in their "low end" systems in terms of value. For example a Mac mini is a fairly good price and so is a MacBook (non Pro!).

But here is the odd bit. As soon as you make the choice to want something better, you have to SERIOUSLY pay for it.

MacBook Pro
15-inch: 2.66GHz
Intel Core 2 Duo
4GB Memory
320GB hard drive
SD card slot
Built-in 7-hour battery
NVIDIA GeForce 9400M + 9600M GT with 256MB

£1,499.00

Alienware M15x Cosmic Black
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64bit- English
Intel® Core™ i7 Processor 720QM (1.60Ghz, 6MB L3 cache)
15.6-inch Wide HD+ (1600 x 900) WLED display
4096MB 1333MHz Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM [2x2048]
500GB (7,200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive
1GB NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX260M graphics card
DVD+/-RW (DVD, CD read and write) Slot Load Drive
9-cell 85Whr Lithium Ion battery

£1,497

To me there is no excuse for the price of the MacBook Pro. It's shocking. And no "Mac OS X is better" "Look at my aluminium" "Go MagSafe" can even remotely make up for it.
Click to expand...

Well, your opinion is your own. Personally I'd never buy the alienware on the grounds it weighs a ton and looks like it's solely designed to appeal to 15 year old boys. Either of which would rule it out for me.

If you think buying a computer is just about the spec's then just forget about getting a mac full stop, they don't target that market. I've had my macbook pro 3 years and I'm only now feeling the need to replace it, in that time I've gone through 2 £1500 dell laptops both in terms of acceptable performance and coming apart at the seams...

Personally they could £500 on again and I'd buy it because I want a machine which runs OSX. I use Windows 7 every day on my work laptop and yeah it's better than vista and it works alright but it's not big on compelling features, it's entire marketing campaign could be 'it's not vista'.

But this gets away from the topic entire - does the OP actually have a specific way in which he feels apple's quality is going downhill? I haven't seen one mentioned aside from a couple of bugs in snow leopard...
 
Well thats not quite fair, you have always payed a premium for teh Apple stuff, so comparing it like for like is a waste of time, and where are you getting a M15 that comes with a 500gb HDD as standard, as the normal is 320 GB, and if you really wanna blieve its gonnahave a real work battery life compared to the macs.....hmmmm...well your living alittle in la la land....but overall...jsut look at the bloody thing lol, look a tthe friggin SIZE of it!..its only mean to be a 15" notebook...it alos panned in reviews.

....no I think its a really bad comparison TBH, small formfactors in any technical equipment has always came at a price too.

I make this statement regularly, go find a comparable lappy with as good a build quality in a Pc range.
 
English Genuine Windows® 7 Professional (64Bit OS)
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T9600 (2.8GHz,1066MHz,6MB)
4GB, 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel (2*2048)
Discrete nVidia FX370M Graphics Card (with 256MB dedicated memory)
Internal UK/Irish (Qwerty) Backlit Keyboard
320GB Serial ATA (5400 RPM) Hard Drive
8X DVD+/-RW Drive with Optical Media Included
Primary 9-cell 85 W/HR LI-ION Battery
EMEA Intel Pro Wireless WI-FI 5100 (802.11a/g/ Draft-n 1X2) MiniCard for Centrino 2 Label
EMEA Dell Wireless 370 Bluetooth 2.1 MiniCard
14.1in Wide WXGA+ (1440X900) Antiglare with LED

That's a reasonable comparison, a Dell Precision M2400 with a fairly similar spec and by all accounts an excellent laptop. Actually slightly lower spec as it's DDR2 RAM still. Comes in at around £1350 with VAT before discounts.

Yeah it's cheaper and broadly as good at most things, it's a similar weight and build quality is good (not as good as unibody macbook pro's but not much is these days as I'm not so wild about thinkpads as I once was).

Reasonably fair comparison, slightly cheaper for the Dell. Either you think the magsafe, OSX, aluminium body, backlit keyboard etc is worth the extra £150 or you don't. Same as any other product. There's no right and wrong, it's an opinion.
 
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