
Apple selling a $79 MacBook Pro power adapter without a USB-C cable goes too far - lisper
https://9to5mac.com/2016/11/10/opinion-macbook-pro-power-adapter/
======
jakobegger
It seems obvious that Apple is trying to reach iPhone-like levels of gross
margin in the Mac lineup. Prices of the new Macbook Pros are getting
ridiculous.

I'm pretty sure that's why they are getting out of the display business; they
wouldn't be able to sustain their ridiculous margins, so they leave that part
to someone else.

~~~
johansch
I think you nailed it. Their 40% gross profit margin is quite infuriating.
Particularly since they're just milking the franchise by now, rather than
actually innovating.

~~~
geodel
Well all other vendors are selling for much less profit. If margin is really
an issue others would end up having windfall.

~~~
johansch
But all the other vendors suck. We're all having this conversation because we
hold Apple to a higher standard. And more pragramatically speaking, because
we're tied to OS X, which is really the only desktop OS that does not suck
immensely on a laptop.

~~~
bandushrew
and THATS why we pay the 40% margin.

the choices are: buy a desktop OS that sucks immensely from from a vendor who
sucks, or pay a mere 40% extra.

feels cheap to me.

~~~
pawadu
>> But all the other vendors suck.

...

> buy a desktop OS that sucks immensely from from a vendor who sucks

Come on guys! If you want to buy Apple, then buy Apple. No need to crap on
EVERYONE ELSE like this to justify your choices.

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micaksica
Too far? Apple is a luxury good. You are buying the Prada, the
Audi/BMW/Benz/etc of laptops - they position themselves at the high end market
and will extract as much margin as they can from that market. These price
increases follow suit with their aspirational positioning. There is no "too
far", just what their target market with a lot of discretionary income will
still purchase.

~~~
johansch
There is a "too far". When it slides from being an expensive good tool to a
very expensive luxury item mostly used for show. It's a lot easier to be
pretty than to solve (new) problems.

Of course, their watch foreshadowed all of this. They are not interested in
solving problems; they want to turn into a Prada/Chanel/Hermes/LV style super
luxury brand.

~~~
micaksica
> they want to turn into a Prada/Chanel/Hermes/LV style super luxuary brand.

The Watch Edition showed that there's a step too far for them, but it's not
the definition you used. Nobody bought the thing. We had to get into the five
figures for that to happen, though, and it's because Apple didn't fully
understand the luxury watch market isn't entirely driven by how expensive the
thing is.

That said, Apple has been pushing the luxo market for quite some time, even
before the watch. There has almost always been cheaper items than Apple
products that fulfill roughly the same niche. iPhones are often a status
symbol, and now having the _newest_ one is, now that they are ubiquitous.

The fact that they are somehow supremely useful sometimes falls out for the
sake of design. Remember the little iPod shuffle that had absolutely no
buttons that they marketed like jewelry? What about the headphone-less iPhone
7 or the Thunderbolt 3 / USB-C only new MBP? Going older, what about the 20th
Anniversary Mac, the G4 Cube, or the iMac which didn't come with a floppy
drive and nearly everyone bought that Bondi Blue SuperDrive thing?

~~~
johansch
I think you're missing the point. We all looked to Apple for technical, user-
focused innovation.. now all we're getting is a good-looking and expensive
things that's best sold in a jewelers shop.

I really can't see this working out for them in the long run. (In the short
term, sure.)

~~~
micaksica
I believe that you are taking too much stock in believing that you and your
needs are Apple's primary market now. Software developers are but a small
niche compared to Apple's worldwide consumer base, and they are developing for
their market at large, that buys these products for the social signaling and
never use 30% of their capabilities. They _want_ good looking and expensive
things, and the capabilities of the devices Apple is producing is an
improvement over the last iteration as well as still above the common
consumer's resource consumption to start.

~~~
johansch
I'm not speaking as a software developer now. I think it's an established fact
that "normal" people love (loved) Apple products because they "just work"
(worked). The prettiness is a nice bonus, but they key thing was always the
concept of "things just working".

I now see Apple moving their focus from "just working" to "pretty", while
raising prices.

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pedalpete
Is there a reason why the power adapter wouldn't include a USB-C cable? Can it
be used without it? Does the power adapter work with older Macs using a
different cable?

I'm not trying to forgive apple, I'm trying to understand why/how a decision
like this could be made.

~~~
twiceaday
Perhaps most people who buy an adapter do it to replace an old one, so you can
use the old cable.

I prefer things modular like this. It lets me re-use / buy the right length
cable for the use-case. The only problem I see is the price here.

~~~
rincebrain
The prior generation of MBP didn't use USB-C for laptop charging, though, so
nobody except Macbook Air users would be doing this.

(I don't know if all USB-C cables were required to be able to carry 87W, so
I'd be slightly wary of reusing cables for that at the moment, too...)

edit: someone downthread pointed out that the laptop itself comes with the
USB-C cable you'd use for this, so this makes more sense now.

------
eridius
> _But I discovered that Apple did have one more hidden extra cost in store
> for 2016 MacBook Pro buyers_

This seems like an extremely misguided article. The overwhelming majority of
users don't buy extra power adaptors. I'd wager that most power adaptors that
are purchased are to replace the old power adaptor (because it was damaged or
lost). So no, this is not a hidden cost in store for MBP buyers, this is a
"hidden cost" in store for the handful of people who like to buy 2 spare power
adaptors to go with their brand new computer.

~~~
j45
I have one for each of my desk setups at work and home. I don't think I'm the
majority in any way but I don't think it's that uncommon either.

USB-C cables are cheap enough anyways as long as you find one that can handle
the power and amperage

~~~
eridius
Everybody that I've ever worked with (that uses an MBP) has an external
monitor at work, and external monitors provide power so you don't need a
separate charging brick.

~~~
j45
I think you might be referring to the thunderbolt display. I run 2 or 3 27"
monitors. The thunderbolt displays have not interested me because they haven't
been updated in so long. Many developers don't use the apple displays and
instead a solid dell, asus, etc as most of their work is text based.

~~~
eridius
Everybody here at work uses Thunderbolt displays, but with the new MBP, if
you're using a USB-C display, it should also provide the same functionality.

~~~
j45
Good to know. I'm not sprinting towards the new MBP but look forward to the
next gen hardware in that form-factor, not to mention hopefully some very
polished and performant usb-c docks

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doe88
One more time, this is greed. More than ever their North Star (to use an
expression of T. Cook) seems to be greed. I'm lucky enough to have enough
money to be able to buy their products but lately I seem to have reached a
threshold where I think there is something really wrong with their behavior,
I'm less and less inclined in enabling them by buying their stuff. First time
in years I thought about switching back to Linux as my main system.

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huangc10
The Macbook (2016) itself does come with a USB-C cable for the power adapter
right...? Does it?

~~~
NickHolt
Yes - a fact that most people seem to be forgetting.

People will be less apt to complain when they realize they don't have to
replace their entire adapter when they wear down the cable as is the case now.

~~~
dingaling
Although there was no technical reason that the old chargers had to have a
moulded-on DC cable. In fact it may have been better from a usability and
durability perspective if the DC cable had had a Magsafe connector at each
end, one for the PSU and one for the laptop.

And with that design they wouldn't have needed to introduce a new charger at
all..

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quink
Two complete power supplies for a MacBook Pro cost more than the ThinkPad my
dad is running Creative Cloud and Visual Studio and whatever else on.

With huge financial jump in the barrier of entry with these MacBook Pros, and
with my Mac Mini no longer being supported with this release of mac OS why
would I (and I suppose many others) still want to touch the Mac ecosystem with
even a ten-foot pole?

I think Apple is purposely squeezing the line dry for what they can still
wring out before they'll jump ship to what can only be called iOS "Pro".

~~~
eridius
I'm pretty sure ThinkPads cost more than $160.

~~~
quink
A$266 for two complete power supplies.

I just hopped on eBay and surprisingly lightly used T- or X-series ThinkPads
i5 and some i7 for under that price, shipped. Sure, they hold no candle to the
MacBook's display. But when you could buy literally ten ThinkPads for a
MacBook with effectively the same non-screen specs there's a bit of a gap
there.

And I've had way more problems with Apple build quality over the years than
ThinkPads.

~~~
eridius
Two power supplies is $160. The extension cable isn't necessary, and the USB-C
cable is just a generic USB-C cable that you can get from anywhere (and in
fact you don't even need to get one if you just keep your existing cable with
your laptop) And you're also comparing brand new top-of-the-line Apple
equipment with _used_ computers.

~~~
quink
Alright, I guess I can only buy six or eight lightly used Core i7, 256GB SSD,
8GB upgradeable RAM ThinkPads for the cost of a MacBook Pro instead of 10.

And you're calling a laptop with a Core i5 with integrated graphics "top-of-
the-line". I guess top-of-the-line is a distorted concept when the absolute
top of the line for the company hasn't been touched in 3 years and that I
could outclass by a factor of three in every way for a third of the price.

My point isn't that you can't afford it, good on you. My point is that the
barrier of entry for your BRIC or even EU consumer or developer is going to be
unreasonable.

And sure, they're going to get their USB-C cables elsewhere. But that guy in
Rio is meant to be paying... $4100 for the cheapest device with an official
mac OS touch bar for the time being.

~~~
eridius
Barrier of entry? What the hell are you talking about? You're literally
talking about the most expensive laptop Apple has and pretending it has
anything at all to do with _entry_. That's preposterous.

------
dcgoss
According to around 1:50 of
[https://youtu.be/zkOKtwiceVw](https://youtu.be/zkOKtwiceVw), Apple hid the
extension cable inside the box underneath everything else.

~~~
eridius
Wrong cable. That video is showing where the extension cable is, not the USB-C
cable. And that's talking about the MacBook Pro itself, not buying the power
adaptor as a stand-alone product.

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pman2000
I don't really care that they're no longer bundling the 2 together. What I DO
care about is having to pay $79 for a charger then another $20 for the cable.
Those prices are just f __ked...

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reustle
Well, I'm at least excited that this cable is a separate piece. I'm tired of
needing to get a new macbook charger every time the joint of the white thin
wire and the brick gets bent out of shape.

~~~
asp_hornet
That's not the problem. The problem is there isn't one included with the
charger. It doesn't need to be sold only included or only separately.

~~~
reustle
I understand that problem, I was just pointing out the silver lining :)

------
tdkl
They should just rebrand to Apple Accessories co. at this point, because the
level of greed is unprecedented.

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anonbanker
Author should read Thorstein Veblen's seminal work _The Theory of The Leisure
Class_. There is no "too far" when it comes to conspicuous wealth.

------
bhartzer
Won't there be third party vendors selling these adapters for much less? If
it's just for travel I won't mind using one that's not from Apple.

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nicky0
The gripe seems to be more with the price rather than the lack of a cable per
se. Since they sell the cables too.

~~~
tedunangst
I suspect one purpose of the gripe is to embed lots of amazon links.

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dman
This video explains the rationale from apples point of view -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XSC_UG5_kU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XSC_UG5_kU)

~~~
merb
I laughed my ass off :D

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Keverw
> the $69 (13-inch model) or $79 (15-inch model) power adapter

I wonder why they have two separate adapters and couldn't make one for both.
Seems to add a bit of fragmentation.

~~~
tylerwhipple
I do not know if the prices were different in the past, but 13" laptops
previously used a 60W power adapter, while the 15" used an 80W

~~~
Keverw
Interesting. I figured it was the same, like how the iPhone and iPhone Plus is
the same...

They should make a magic power adaptor. Since using USB C. If plugged in start
charging it at like 60W and then once the computer is booted up it could use
the data part of USB C to tell the adaptor to change if possible. Then when
the cable is unplugged from the laptop or adaptor then go back to 60W...

I also wonder if its any bad if people plugged their iPhone's into these power
bricks too hmm.

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gumby
It's just a USB Type C brick. I have several (from various vendors including
Apple) and use them with different (non-Apple) cables, including those with
Type C on one end and micro A on the other. No big deal.

Those adaptors should outlast your device and are hopefully relatively future
proof.

