Today's Apple Event & New Releases

Overall we saw some great releases & refinements by Apple today. The fact that they took the next logical step with the introduction of the retina MBP 13", is pushing the industry as a whole.

 

Im honestly rather confused at their choices and direction.

1: mac mini loses its dGPU, it is now LESS capable than its predecessor for an HTPC, Editing station for photo or video work where I saw most of them in use

2: release iPad 4 so soon after the 3, Yes the inclusion of the Lightning port is a necessity eventually, but such a quick refresh annoys consumers who prefer to be ontop and also introduces the " i need to upgrade " mentality into consumers days before we see a flood of windows 8 RT tablets at lower price points.

3: iPad mini. ok here I dont get it, its marketed as a reader but is priced much higher, its low spec, it is low resolution. as it is a new competitor to the smaller tablet arena and honestly as a reader can learn things from others is priced too high IMO. if it stays mostly marketed as an e-reader etc it will be hard sell over kindle hd, nexus 7 etc.

4: rMBP 13" ... no surprises once so ever

5: iMac, again no suprises and a welcome refresh, still wishing for a few " pro " options

6: one more refresh, one more miss on the Mac Pro. putting even more of a crunch on the heavy power user and many creative professionals

 

Eh, I actually think today was more or less what I was expecting. The new iMacs look nice but I will never buy one, the 13" rMBP was expected but I was a little disappointed with the tech specs (no quad-core option, to dGPU option, essentially a 13" MBP with a thinner chassis and higher resolution display), the hardware in the iPad mini is a year behind, and the iPad 4 is much more like an iPhone 3S as its only upgrade is the inclusion of Lightning and the A6X processor (the A5X is already plenty fast). They are all good products but they didn't really surprise me with anything. I don't think that is necessarily Apple's fault but a bunch of information was leaked our prior to the event.

If I ever was on the market for a desktop (which I never am at this point), I would definitely go with an iMac. If I wanted a notebook now, I would probably opt for the 13" rMBP instead of the MBA. If I were to get a tablet, it would definitely be an iPad 4. I already have a notebook and tablet (MBA and iPad 3) and I don't feel as if I have to upgrade to what was released today. If I was on the market? Sure, I would definitely go with what Apple offered. I didn't really see any incentive to go out and buy one of these new releases as I already like what I have and it performs just fine compared to what has been released. Now, if the iPad 4 and iPad mini introduced drastically new hardware (quad-core ARM CPU with 8-core graphics and up to 128GB storage), I definitely would be upgrading (especially if all of that was in the mini). The iPad mini still seems like it will be fine, especially given the performance of the A5 with current hardware offered in Android tablets, but there isn't anything about it to pull iPad 2 and iPad 3 owners to it.

 

The rMBP 13 is remarkably similar to the Vaio Z...a niche product and a capable-looking one, but too expensive for most people. I do wonder if there's a certain point where more pixels become pointless, kind of like the race to put 8-speed, 9-speed, etc transmissions in cars (four speeds sucked, sure, but is six really not enough?). I've got a 1080p 11.6" device on the way and I can't imagine I'll look at it and say "needs moar pixel density."

The iPad Mini is a head-scratcher for me. It's too small for serious productivity use, so I assume it's meant for media consumption...yet it's 65% more expensive than the $199 standard entry-level price for 7" media consumption tablets, AND it has a lower-res screen than the Nexus 7, Fire HD, and Nook HD.

 

No we didn't.

13" Retina MBP - crap (too expensive, no discreet GPU)

iPad Mini - crap (last year's specs for 1.5x the price of a Nexus 7, how can you lose!)

New Mac Minis - crap (no more discreet GPU)

21.5" iMac - crap (no more user-upgradable RAM)

iPad 4 - Meh

The 27" iMac is pretty cool, I'll give them that. Otherwise, not an impressive showing. At all.

 

I was hoping the price would be lower on the 13.3" Retina MacBook Pro. That and I was also hoping there would be an Optimus chipset. And maybe a quad.

There sure are a lot of product announcements this week and next. Time to start building a spreadsheet to compare features and prices.

 

The timing of the Retina MBP 13 is really bad. It's introducing an ultra-high-res 13" screen exactly when Windows OEMs are unleashing a flurry of 10-13" Ivy Bridge machines with 1080p screens, generally in the $1000-$1200 range. Is 1080p really not enough for a 13" screen? Is 2560x1600 really worth a $500 price premium? Over a 1366x768 machine, sure, that's easier to justify, but with the increasing frequency of 1920x1080 on 13" screens or even 10-11" screens, I'm not so sure.

 

it looks exactly like the vaio z2 is. Its less powerful if you take the value of the PMD and the quad into account, not mention the raid 0 ssd.

For it to be a good product it should have more, quad 16gb of ram at least.
The price point is way too high. 200-300 less would make sense with that 128gb of storage.

 

Yea, you have to really love Apple products to buy the 13" Retina today.

 

ok nevermind what I said

 

Does anyone know what the 680MX offered in the new iMac is? You can get to Nvidia's page about it through Google, but then if you click off of it the page disappears.

google search takes me here: GeForce GTX 680MX | GeForce
then I click on 680M (clearly ranked below 680MX) and see, 680MX option gone from the side bar: GeForce GTX 680M | GeForce

 

I share people's disappointment with the Retina MBP 13. The RMBP 13 models are $500 more than the MBA 13 models and they're not appreciably more powerful or more upgradeable. $500 is a large premium just for the Retina display and you pay a penalty in size & weight. Also, there's only $200 difference between the 256GB RMBP 13 and the 256GB RMBP 15. The quad core CPU, GT 650M, and larger screen are easily worth the $200. So I would rather spend $1500-1600 on a well equipped MBA 13 if portability is a priority or $2200 on a RMBP 15 if power is more important.

But the iPad Mini makes perfect sense to me. By choosing to use the same screen res as the iPad 1&2 as well as the A5 chip, they ensure all the existing iPad apps & games will work and the battery life will be good. They could have gone for higher specs but they would potentially sacrifice compatibility and battery life. And I don't see what the problem is with the price. iPad 2 is still in the lineup at $399 (or $529 for 3G). Why should the Mini be any cheaper when it has all the same features and runs all the same stuff? It's a full fledged iPad that does everything the larger iPad does.

iPad 4 also makes sense to me. Rolling out the Lightning connector across the whole model lineup is important if they want 3rd party vendors who make iPxx compatible devices to release new products. This refresh also gives iPad 1&2 owners another enticement to upgrade and stay with Apple rather than consider switching to the Surface.

 

The only issue in coming out with an iPad 4 is that it is more like an iPad 3S and Apple released the iPad 3 back in March, a mere 7 months ago. The iPad doesn't seem to be fitting in with Apple's 1 year upgrade cycle as they came out with the iPad 2 9 months after the iPad was first released. These less than 12 month upgrade cycles might deter some people. Does this mean that Apple is going to come out with an iPad 5 in March of 2013 or was this a move to make the iPad's upgrade cycle close to that of the iPhone and iPod? If it was, couldn't Apple have waited until March before performing this incremental upgrade (and actually call it what it really is; the iPad 3S) and then perform a full re-design in October of 2013? The iPad 4 release seems a little off to me. I don't really care as I have absolutely no incentive to buy one (lose my 30 pin dock connector, would have to spend $30 to buy an adapter, and I would gain marginal CPU and GPU performance that I wouldn't notice) unlike the upgrade from the iPad to the iPad 2 or the iPad 2 to the iPad 3.

 

Then you'd have the exact same complaint in 2013.

 

I thought many things were disappointing...

Mac mini... lost the GPU option. Its still decent, but a downgrade in GPU capabilities. If your using it for simple stuff you could do with an iPad... or using it as a server, then its fine.

iMac... I actually liked that one... Very nice machines except of the horrid use of 512mb of vram on every single model except the top end 27"... which has 1gb and a higher GPU with 2gb option.. but allt he lower ones are 512 only? ouch...

rMBP 13" ... get real... what a waste... With all the extra space they had in there they couldn't use a Quad Core or a GPU? For that price I just don't get it.

iPad 4 ... decent all around good iPad... nothing majorly bad with it

iPad mini.... the most disappointing because I wanted to get one. but its a 1024x768 screen with all the innards of an iPad Touch... yuck. They should have made a high end version Mini as well with a A6 and retina display. i don't care if it cost more than the 10" iPad... the smaller form factor is better for me.

 

I have often felt that the amount of vram in many macs was a bit disappointing, on the Windows side you have manufacturers putting in ridiculous amounts for marketing purposes which is, well ridiculous, but i'd take too much over not enough. I'll never forget the 256MB vram GT330M in the 2010 MBP 15" since i was considering getting one of the specs turned out alright for what i wanted to do with it, needless to say that the GPU ended up being quite a disappointment. I wasn't expecting a top of the line GPU, but the 330m wasn't really an upgrade over my 9650M GT at that time.

 

the mid range 300m series was a serious disappointment, including the 5000m mid range series from amd as well, the jump in performance was too low

 

Not really. I could understand them updating the iPad 7 months after release if it was a huge upgrade, a re-design. A marginal update in March 2013 would have made sense if Apple decided to conduct a major re-design in October 2013 so that all of their products are updated in the Fall. To me, it doesn't make sense to come out with an upgrade now especially since they could very well come out with another update in March of 2013 making October's announcement meaningless. Coming out with an update now makes it hard to see where Apple is going whereas a marginal upgrade (i.e. what the iPad 4 is) early next year and a full on re-design in October would make more sense. Instead Apple might come out with a re-design in March and perform a minor spec bump on that in October 2013 thus making the iPad essentially fit a 6 month cycle (bleh).

 

I'm not convinced. I don't see why either release schedule is inherently better. There's no rule that I know of that says that products which were major upgrades from previous products must have a longer time-till-next-revision than products which were minor upgrades from previous products. If you believe this, then convince me why it is so.

To me, the positioning of the minor update isn't extremely critical. I suspect that the release timing has to do with gaming the holiday season and maintaining competitiveness with the market on benchmarks, so that high end android tablets dont pull too far away in terms of performance specs.

I think the bigger issue is the iPad product lineup. Instead of selling the previous generation iPad at a discount, they are continuing to offer the second gen iPad at a discount. Obviously, they are looking to hit a certain price point, but it seems like an oversight to offer iPad 2 and 4 but not 3. I think it would make a lot of sense to drop the iPad 2 and either swap in the 3rd gen or just let the mini take over that price range.

It's as if, when the iPhone 4S came out, they had decided to stop selling the iPhone 4 but to continue to sell the 3GS.

 

My main reason for not agreeing with this update schedule of the main iPad is not knowing what Apple is going to do in March 2013. I would expect this type of update then, maybe something a little more (A7X chip or something along those lines) but I was fully expecting to see an update in March. Now, with this update, Apple could still come out with another upgrade in March essentially releasing three generations of iPads all within a year. The October update wouldn't seem so bad if Apple doesn't upgrade the iPad again until October of next year but I'm not sure if they will do that. This incremental update, and then another one in March, and then another one in October 2013 seems like it is too much. An incremental upgrade now and then another upgrade in October 2013 seems OK. I understand that they wanted to have a new, new iPad out for the holiday shopping season but I'm not sure if Apple is just shifting the iPad's update cycle now (to lineup with the iPhone and iPad) or if they will come out with an updated model once every ~6 months.

I also don't understand why they are keeping the iPad 2 instead of opting to sell the iPad 3. Maybe it was left on there to push iPad mini sales as people will see the iPad 2 and realize it doesn't have anything (absolutely nothing) over the less expensive iPad mini so they will go with that. The iPad 3 might eat into iPad mini sales if it were only $70 more whereas the iPad 2 likely won't.

 

the teardown from ifixit made me have some hope, the rmbp 13 does indeed have a strange SSD caddy in there, and guess what? as the chinese guy said, it really looks like a 5-7mm drive should fit in there perfectly. Problem is, the price point is just too high still for that to be a more viable alternative, you are going to save money in the end, BUT I think that they skimped on the design there. They could have gone for the simple 2.5'' solution or put 2 sticks of SSD in there

MacBook Pro 13" Retina Display Late 2012 Teardown - iFixit

 

Look, over the past few years, I have witness some pretty lackluster special events by Apple. This event, wasn't a blockbuster, but is evidence that Apple is busy pushing their product line in a forward direction. Sure, rMBP 13" missed the mark, but the event touched on a few different releases that were pretty newsworthy. Cheers!

 

Well, unfortunately, that's just the reality when dealing with Apple. Their product release schedules are not public information, and you can certainly speculate and try to make sense out of it (works especially well in hindsight), but Apple could switch to a permanent 6 month release schedule at any time and we would have no idea, or maybe they wont and they just wanted to line up October. I see that your major complaint is the possibility of more 6 month releases, which is too fast in general (I think I agree), but Apple isn't catering their release cycle to people who want to try to wrap their heads around Apple's release cycles - they want to optimize sales. If they start releasing iPads every 6 months, I will certainly turn up an eyebrow, but a product launch that makes it more difficult for outsiders to speculate about the future doesn't make the product launch a bad idea.

 

One thing that crossed my mind, thing is we all know apple is going to axe the cmbp line, and go with the rmbp for everyone next year, its only logical.

Its also logical and stands to reason that you cant command such a high premium if you want to axe the aforementioned line.

We hoped that the rmbp 15 would receive a price decrease next year, there will be a more mature process of manufacturing, the lines arent going to be divided by the multiple 15'' you will have more gains in terms of scale and so forth. And you can put less storage in the base model akin to what they did with the rmbp 13, thus the price point of 1800 is easily reachable.

We can also expect the same thing from the rmbp 13, currently its not only terribly priced, its too close to the rmbp 15 and just 100 bucks away from the cmbp 15 which is borderline absurd. I think that next year they are going to use the same casing, no design changes at all, and put a HDD in that place to make it back to the 1200 price line, really you can find the cmbp 13 at 1k easily.

 

Haha. This is a great assessment of the whole affair. You should lend your insights to Gartner or something.

 

I think iPad 2 instead of iPad 3 at $399 is easy to understand -- iPad 3, with its retina display, just has higher cost than iPad 2 that if Apple reduces its price to $399 they would make too little profit per unit (which is probably still a lot, but not as much as Apple likes).

I am more surprised that Apple kept iPad 2 alive at all, given the fact that now it really has very little advantage over the iPad Mini and uses a 30-pin connector that Apple seems to be quite eager to get out of.

Kind of makes me want to spend an afternoon digging into the suppliers of iPad 2 & iPad 3 and see if iPad 3 has some Samsung parts that Apple wants to get rid off or if Apple is asking tons of royalty based on iPad 2 sales.

On the other hand, time to keep a close eye on when Verizon and AT&T start clearing out their inventory of iPad 3...

 

Price point or not, it's awkward to offer your 2 generation old product but not your previous gen product. I imagine that the Apple of old would not have made such a choice.

 

It isn't so much about speculation but rather trying to find a good time to buy an Apple product. For example, September/October would have been an alright time to pick up an iPad 3 as their next iPad event would have been about 5 months away at that point. That is about the cutoff that I advise people to take. Anything less than 5-6 months and you might as well wait for the next release which usually happens annually at a predictable time (September/October for iPods and iPhones now, March/April for iPads). It's like me buying an iPhone 5 now (which I recently did). I know it is a good time to pick up an iPhone 5 as Apple likely won't update it again until September/October of next year. That may not be the case with the iPad 5. If Apple decides to update it yet again 5 months down the line, that makes the iPad 4 a relatively bad purchase as 5 months is not that long of a wait.

I realize that there is always uncertainty in what Apple is going to do with their product refreshes and launches. That isn't the issue but rather trying to peg down an appropriate time to buy something. Right now the time to pick up an iPad 4 seems uncertain if Apple is going to update it again in March 2013. If they go through with that, it makes the purchase of an iPad 5 seem unwise if they are only going to update it in October later that year. There really won't be a good time to pick up a new iPad unless it is right after a new/updated one is announced. Before there was a large amount of leeway with the appropriate time to pick up an iPad (up to 6-7 months after it is released). That may no longer be the case and I can easily see customers getting tired of going through a 6 month upgrade cycle with the iPads. Not only that but it brings up the issue of how long Apple will support their iPads. Not everything in iOS 6 was handed over to the iPad 2. Is Apple going to start phasing out the iPad 3 next year despite it being only a year old? What happens if they release an iPad 5 in March? Will they phase out support of the iPad 4 when the iPad 6 comes out in October.

It just leaves so many questions about their future release schedules and how long they are going to support their iPads. The iPad one has already been completely dropped off the map even though it is just two years old (almost three). All of this will be fine if Apple waits a full year to come out with the iPad 5 but, right now, that is impossible to predict or even speculate on. That is my main issue. I could really care less about the rumors surrounding what the next iPad will be or what updates the new model will see but rather giving advice to people who are on the market for an iPad and eventually purchasing a new unit in another year or two for myself.

 

And yet they didn't even match "the price point." They're 65% more expensive than the standard starting price for 7" tablets, $199. If they're going to make a luxury product instead of a price-competitive product, they should go all out and make a luxury product with specs to match.

 

I spent some time with the 13" Retina MacBook Pro today.

The default "best" display setting seems to low to me. The scaled 1440x900 resolution seemed perfect on the Retina display and I didn't detect any odd lagging or performance issues. Sites using a heavy amount of Flash (like theverge.com) will stutter on quick scroll operations but this is actually pretty normal, for any machine.

Normally I like 1680x1050, but that's on a 15.4" screen. It seemed odd on the 13.3" Retina. I liked the vertical real estate, but I'm not sure I could handle the resolution all day long. The brightness in the Apple store doesn't give you a very good indication of long term comfort on that type of thing.

The 13" rMBP is a perplexing machine. I can't see it surviving if they ever put the Retina screen on the Air. If the Pro allowed for 16GB of RAM and an Optimus or other Hybrid video chipset, then maybe it would be worthy of the Pro designation. Extra ports and the Retina screen don't seem to get it done. It should be interesting to see how photographers and other artists like the machine. It seems hamstrung for some of the pro scenarios that come to mind.

My 2012 i5/8GB/256GB Air is getting the job done. I'd like the new screen. Seems like a no brainer it will eventually be on the Air.

 

Thing is with the improvements on performance of haswell regarding the gpu, and what we expect an increase on ram, and the possible move to quads, I can see this machine performing quite well, specially if they do use a normal 2.5 HDD in there, instead of that abnormal caddy

 

Performance doesn't seem to be a problem with the 13.3" rMBP. It's mostly price. $2000 is a lot to pay for an i5/8GB/256GB 13.3" notebook computer. Is the display the best on the market and does the machine deserve that kind of price? Maybe.

 

the problem that is with its the price not the performance is that, this line, the pro line is to be the performance line, now that the 13 can try to reach the 15 in terms of cpu, why not go there?

In terms of price, it compares to the sony z, which is not that bad, however its terrible in terms of what apple has done to their most popular and best seller mac, still they need to drop the price or push the mba more and more, which in turn needs the added performance of haswell.

So in the end, the rmbp 15 and 13, are going to be better next year due to the better performing and probably cooler cpus, we can hope that nvidia does something decent or that amd lands a good gcn+, dont have a preference, just performance. The mba is going to benefit from sharkbay and life goes on.

Broadwell will bring a new gpu arch, lets hope its a great one.

 

2 things:

1) fry is selling the base rmp 13 for 1550, that is a good price, although i would like it at 1500

2) ifixit is selling the rmbp SSDs at a significant discount, the 768 is 550, making it a bargain to get one there instead of apple. And seriously that price is good enough even for 2.5'' SSDs.