Has Tim Cook lost the plot?

[MagicBoy]

As was said much earlier in the thread, this iMac spec is aimed at Education, similar to the old LC and eMac lines. Primary school kids don't need typically need quad cores and the savings are worthwhile when you are buying large numbers of units.

Back on the retail side... Apple's customer service is very good so they retain customer loyalty. They've repaired and will now replace my very much out of warranty laptop at no cost to myself, without a fight.

A PC retailer I used to work for would only start to negotiate after legal action was initiated even if the customer was well within reasonable consumer rights.

 

[Faustus]

Caged writes ............The only alternative to a situation that allows people to buy something underpowered (because either they don't know what they are buying, or they lack the inclination to get any assistance at all with their purchase) is a product range starting at 'very expensive' instead of 'expensive', or lower profit margins. But being a shareholder and all that I wouldn't have thought you'd be in favour of that arrangement.

You've hit the nail squarely on the head with that statement and that is my point. I think a company like Apple given what the claim to be i.e. a premium brand, ought to be setting the bar somewhat higher.

They should leave the budget line to the Windows OEM's. I just don't see that taking the brand into a lower spec and lower price point does them any favours in the longer term. You can't claim to be premium and budget. I don't notice many budget Cartier watches.

 

[Faustus]

You're a fan boy in the way that only the product you own is good enough because it's exclusive, and them introducing a lower priced item 'devalues' your brand and in turn makes what you've bought seem cheap.

No, I'm saying quite the opposite!
The people who will buy this will be the type who want an Apple product but don't want to spend a lot of money. It's for the general public, the same general public who don't really care about specs!

Have you realised you haven't shown ANY evidence either?![/QUOTE

My ownership is not the issue - I'm saying if you claim to be premium then going down market dispels that claim. Why you think that makes me some sort to fanboy is a mystery. Your post says far more about your own feelings of self worth than mine.

 

[Deep]

The iMac is/was a premium brand computer. The clue is in the word - premium. If you then start to water down the product with inferior components and try to give it mass market appeal then the word 'Premium' no longer applies and so you devalue the brand.

You own one right?

It's still £900! How is that not a premium price for a desktop PC?

 

[Terminal_Boy]

Thats the strangest thing. If you ask most people now, they don't want to sit at a desk. They're swiping on phones and tablets. They don't want to be stuck at a desk. Nearly most people are on the move all the time or sitting in their living rooms browsing the web, chatting, listening to tunes and so on.

Apple should have done this years ago before little timmy and most 5 year olds had iPad's/iPhones.

Indeed, the home PC is only used for gaming and home admin these days as there's 2 iPads in the house.

I think this low-end iMac must be aimed at education and corporates where they have moved to OS X, but don't want to provide high spec machines to staff with basic admin jobs.

 

[Caged]

You've hit the nail squarely on the head with that statement and that is my point. I think a company like Apple given what the claim to be i.e. a premium brand, ought to be setting the bar somewhat higher.

They should leave the budget line to the Windows OEM's. I just don't see that taking the brand into a lower spec and lower price point does them any favours in the longer term. You can't claim to be premium and budget. I don't notice many budget Cartier watches.

So how much should it cost to buy an Apple product then? I think you're confusing premium with exclusive, the idea that £900 is a budget computer is laughable. And again, this isn't a new direction for Apple.

 

[Faustus]

You own one right?

It's still £900! How is that not a premium price for a desktop PC?

Read post 142 and you have your answer.

 

[Faustus]

So how much should it cost to buy an Apple product then? I think you're confusing premium with exclusive, the idea that £900 is a budget computer is laughable. And again, this isn't a new direction for Apple.

You are looking at the headline figure of cost. I am looking at cost plus specification. I already think the model prior to the introduction of this inferior MBA Desktop wasn't right either, and I'm not alone in that assessment. Non user upgradeable RAM with a 5400 HDD.

That base model is the one that replaced the one I own, which had often been considered one of the best Mac's for price versus spec. I think Apple should have drawn a line in the sand and said the spec cannot go any lower than X. If that means increasing the cost to buy then so be it.

If they want to provide something more basic for education etc. then it should only be available to education establishments and not for general release.

 

[MagicBoy]

Read post 142 and you have your answer.

Ha ha ha ha.

Apple are a high-end big brand. To use a car analogy something like Mercedes. If you think Apple are some sort of exclusive/boutique brand where their name gets whispered reverentially and if you have to ask how much it is you can't afford one then you are completely deluded. Go to your local Apple Store and customer watch for a while.

 

[Faustus]

Ha ha ha ha.

Apple are a high-end big brand. To use a car analogy something like Mercedes. If you think Apple are some sort of exclusive/boutique brand where their name gets whispered reverentially and if you have to ask how much it is you can't afford one then you are completely deluded. Go to your local Apple Store and customer watch for a while.

You are of course entitled to an opinion. That opinion is no more valid or less so than anyone else's. I don't remember saying anything about Apple being talked about reverentially.

I think you would be hard pressed to argue that they aren't a premium brand though, certainly in relation to their OS X product line.

 

[MagicBoy]

You are of course entitled to an opinion. That opinion is no more valid or less so than anyone else's. I don't remember saying anything about Apple being talked about reverentially.

I think you would be hard pressed to argue that they aren't a premium brand though, certainly in relation to their OS X product line.

I've spent long enough in the local Apple Store recently.

With the volume of iOS kit sold they're multitudes busier than the first one I visited in 2004.

As for OS X being a premium brand, remember the £339 original Mac mini?

 

[Faustus]

I've spent long enough in the local Apple Store recently.

With the volume of iOS kit sold they're multitudes busier than the first one I visited in 2004.

As for OS X being a premium brand, remember the £339 original Mac mini?

I also recall Ferdinand Porche making the Beetle - what's your point? Not that I said OS X was premium rather the product line.

 

[V F]

When people say aimed at Education… Are we talking the classy places? I can't see £900 iMac's or slightly discounted going towards lesser schools/colleges and such, surely?

 

[MagicBoy]

I also recall Ferdinand Porche making the Beetle - what's your point? Not that I said OS X was premium rather the product line.

I don't think I've ever seen the OP indirectly invoke Godwin's law before. Impressive.

When people say aimed at Education… Are we talking the classy places? I can't see £900 iMac's or slightly discounted going towards lesser schools/colleges and such, surely?

IME they're ordered less commonly than PCs. I'd guess 10-15% of schools here use OS X in the classroom. A lot more use iPads and are looking at OS X because of that.

Education prices are heavily discounted, plus they don't pay VAT- £180 at retail prices. I'll enquire at work, see if they've ordered any.

 

[Faustus]

I don't think I've ever seen the OP indirectly invoke Godwin's law before. Impressive.

I hardly think that designing a vehicle for the masses can be construed by any one but the desperate to have invoked Godwins Law but hey! you're clutching at straws so if it makes you happy.
There are after all many other examples I could have chosen.

 

[MagicBoy]

But you didn't. Ooopsie.

 

[V F]

IME they're ordered less commonly than PCs. I'd guess 10-15% of schools here use OS X in the classroom. A lot more use iPads and are looking at OS X because of that.

Education prices are heavily discounted, plus they don't pay VAT- £180 at retail prices. I'll enquire at work, see if they've ordered any.

Reason I'm asking as I remember 5 - 10 years ago it was the reason may places used to have, Hi-Grade computers? All they wanted was Windows because it was cheaper and well… A lot still got vandalised or parts stolen.

Education was always about being cheap in many places. They wanted it for as little as possible. Thats why I couldn't picture Apple in lesser schools and so on…

Some kids, teenagers, adults can be quite bad physically with the computers. Even fights over the computers. Rare but it happened. Equipment was always getting stolen though. Even in recent years with iPad's being vandalised or stolen or claimed they were stolen.

 

[Deleted member 651465]

My girlfriend teaches in a disadvantaged primary school (I'm talking the kind that can't afford £5 for their son or daughter to go on a trip).

Her class has recently ordered 5 iPads and an iMac (she had 1 school iPad and would use her personal iPad, with the children, before this). The classes also all have interactive white boards as standard.

As MagicBoy stated above.. It was the iPad that opened them up to the idea of the iMac, and they've gone from there. I suppose it depends on grants and budgets really, because I also know that another school (where my daughter goes) had a big grant to install an interactive TV in the school yard.

 

[v0n]

Bedroom computer is the old-but-new chosen direction for Apple at the moment. After shedding off video editors through Final Cut -> iMovie Pro, sorry - Final Cut X shift and Mac Pro to iBin replacement they now start shedding photo editors by dropping Aperture and replacing it with simplified version of iPhoto (called Photo, the "i" thing is soooo naughties). I guess audio guys will be next, and then it's just back to bedrooms and kitchen devices, like in days of clamshell notebooks and tearshaped imacs.

 

[Mattus]

Apple is now unashamedly and almost exclusively a consumer electronics company. People who just want to browse the web, upload photos to Facebook, send emails and play (what used to be called) Flash games are now its core audience.

It's pretty clear that Apple isn't going to put a lot of effort into courting pros and semi-pros going forward. I see the new Mac Pro as almost a 'halo product', i.e. something they've produced to show off their engineering and design prowess without expecting to shift an awful lot of them.

When you look at the profit figures, it's hard to argue with this strategy. My parents both have iPads, which they each use as nothing more than a web browser. They used to use Windows laptops. Personally I think we have conditioned people to use something which is less powerful, less flexible and represents poorer value for money than the tools it has largely replaced. But that's why I'm not Apple's target audience.