Steve: Here comes my rant: I certainly wouldn’t mind paying $25 or so for the upgrade, considering I just bought a $700 machine from them 4 weeks ago. However, $129 is freaking ridiculous.
He ain’t lying. In fact, I’m pretty freakin’ annoyed at Apple – and their zealots – about this constant pay-for-minor-release bullshit… they keep getting a shaft shoved up their collective asses and say “Yum good more!” just because it comes from Apple. Maybe they’re too busy pointing fingers and shouting in the wind at Redmond to notice it. Fact is, there are many problems with this practice…
I almost bought a Mac mini this weekend. Honest. If they had the 1.42 “ultimate” machine in the local Apple store, I probably would have gone against my gut and bought it (instead of the PSP). There was something holding me back from just going with a standard 1.42 model, though… same thing that prevented me from placing a web store order. I knew Tiger was coming. I didn’t know when it was coming, though. I didn’t know if there was a free upgrade program for recent system buyers, and I certainly didn’t know what it would cost (although I could have guessed given Jaguar and Panther). And that’s a problem. Since Apple feels it has to play cloak-and-dagger with every since product release, they’ve effectively made it impossible to make an informed technological purchase.
And I’ve been burned by this before, specifically by Apple. I bought my first iPod two days before the second generation was released. The price on my model dropped by $100 in one day and that was that. I didn’t get so much as a “oh, sorry” from Cupertino… I quickly learned that this is how Apple operates with product releases.
Then there’s the upgrade practice. 10.0 was a major release and worth $129. Hell, it could have been sold for $299, since it was such a major shift. But $129 for each dot release afterwards? From the Apple site, Tiger has four new features, once of which – RSS for Safari – should be called a plug-in or a free download for Safari itself. [Why is it that Apple gets to consider a browser update an OS feature/update? Oh yeah, I forgot – they are Apple!] And then 10.3: Panther added what? Rounded rectangle label support? A few new views in Finder? $129! I can’t figure out how an Apple system is more efficient if you have to spend $516 for a three year upgrade path! XP Service Pack 2 had new features in it – does that mean Microsoft should be charging for it? Can you imagine the vulgarity that would spew from Cupertino if they did? Laughable.
Add to that the base RAM on each of the Apple machines: 256MB. Sure you can run Panther on a 256MB machine. I did: an iBook 500-ish for a few months. Took 10-30 seconds for an app to open. And with Tiger, don’t expect to run more than one app at a time, with that much RAM… I played with the Mac mini at 1.42GHz with 256MB and it was painful – the models with 512MB were much, much better, so it’s a “required” upgrade. But, then, why ship your baseline product with such a crippling feature set? That’s like saying “buy this car for X but if you want tires to drive it away, it’s x plus 10%.” Not quite a bait and switch, but it’s pretty close to it.
The hardware factor was another concern that I had, that stopped me from buying this weekend. I’m under the impression that if Tiger “highly recommends” 512MB RAM and they start to bundle Tiger with new machines, then new machines will suddenly get a memory bump, out of the box. Why spend $599 on a machine that tomorrow might cost $499? And I don’t mean “down the road in three months” – I mean tomorrow. I just can’t plunk down that amount of cash, being that deep in the dark.
Apple had a shot to impress me, this this release… after all, this type of debate has been going on since 10.2 shipped. A release with $129/full and $49/upgrade would have done it. Or “bought a Mac in March or April? Free upgrade for you!” would have done it. The fact that it’s “We announced today – only upgrades from now to release will be upgraded for free” just sucks. It’s shafting all of the people that were early adopters for the Mac mini. It’s just bad customer relations on many angles.
And it’s got nothing to do with which is a better OS or who builds a better product, mind you. This is all simple business decisions and technological information at work here. Take your OS-religious war somewhere else: this is about business.
In fact, it’s made me wonder if there’s more of a monopoly in Cupertino than I had thought: this type of control can only come from controlling both hardware and software in the same business, and that’s exactly what we have going on here…
On the hardware front, Apple have a standard practice that you can upgrade an item if the price or model changes within 14 days of your purchase. I did this recently with an mini iPod when the latest models (more capacity and cheaper) were released a week after my purchase. They swapped for the new one and refunded me the difference without hesitation.
Unfortunately, they do not make this policy widely known.
Nor does it extend to resellers, which is where I found myself for my original iPod. Maybe if they weren’t so Cloak and Dagger about it a) I would have bought from them directly and b) people wouldn’t feel so worried about being kicked in the dick for buying a day or two before Mac Expo :)
cmon dude, just because you have bad timing with the iPod. I sell Macs, they’re not that bad TRUST ME, I have 3, and there are over 200 new features and updates to 10.4. It is a major update and i think its worth the money.
Dude, did you even READ the post?
Besides I’ve read the list of “200 new features” – I too can visit the web site – and it’s 196 tweaks and 4 new features. I mean “Buy Printing Supplies” and “QuickTime Fullscreen Controls”? Features?! Tweaks.
Oh and while we’re on the topic, why is Apple allowed to include TWO media players in their product (iTunes and QuickTime) and no one seems to cry foul in the EU? Bunk. Complete and total bunk.
Hi there i know the original post was in April but i am to really annoyed with Apple. These OSX updates are getting a bit to much. It’s bad enough buying a Mac before the upgrade to Tiger, but to buy a 20″ imac with the 1.8ghz when they first came out in the UK. To find that the imac i got is now the BOTTOM of the range cause Apple have brought out the 2.0ghz model. And then going on the Apple site and read them bragging about how fantastic and how much faster the 2.0ghz model is compared to the 1.8ghz is a real kick in the B.ll.cks. I wish i didnt love my mac.
Heh – it’s OK – you can say bollocks here. Besides more of us Yanks wouldn’t even know what ya meant (I’m enhanced to be British Slang-aware)
Well in that case….BOLLOCKS to you macintosh.