
The Mac Platform Decline - milen
https://milen.me/writings/mac-platform-decline/
======
simonbarker87
I agree that the mac platform seems to have been neglected but Tim Cook isn't
stupid, he knows that without developers the iPad isn't going to grow how he
wants so I don't think this is the end of the Mac.

I think Tim Cook has ignored the Mac in favour of his favourite projects but
in the meantime Schiller and Federighi have been making sure the Mac is in his
periphery and fighting for resources.

I've chosen to view this update as the start of the uptick where we go back to
regular updates (perhaps with a longer period than historically) and more
exciting things to come.

I think the Mac Pro is over and the iMac will replace it with TB3 enabling
external devices to take the workload of what Apple don't want to handle
internally but other than that I hope we will see a strong line up in a couple
of years and look back at this time as the trough.

That or Apple is over and I need to work out what computer I will use in 15
years as I can't stand Windows and Linux is a nightmare.

Also, I think the TouchBar looks pretty damn cool and I'll be ordering one as
soon as I can.

~~~
swozey
> I've chosen to view this update as the start of the uptick where we go back
> to regular updates (perhaps with a longer period than historically) and more
> exciting things to come.

I'm just curious as to what brought you to that conclusion? Was something
said?

The last few years I've been sitting around kicking dirt waiting for an OSX
convertible type of machine, I know there's never been any talk of it, but I
figured if anyone could make it correctly it'd be Apple.

I've given up at this point. It almost feels like I was suffering from
Stockholm syndrome looking back at it.

~~~
IBM
Why were you sitting around waiting for a convertible when they've said on the
record multiple times they were never going to make OSX touch based? All the
way from Steve Jobs to the CNET interview with Schiller, Federighi and Ive.

~~~
swozey
Hey now, Apple also said nobody wants a stylus and that no one's going to buy
a "big" phone!

~~~
Zoon
Stylus for main input ≠ Drawing stylus.

One is overshadowed by multi-touch while the other is needed by professionals
among others.

------
jeffehobbs
This recent round of updates made me consider what I need from a "work"
machine. For me, it comes down to three items:

* Can I code on this machine? This means at minimum three tasks: write, deploy and test code. This also connotes a lot of things, including but not limited to access to a non-unobfucated file system.

* Can I view all file formats easily and successfully? This includes formats like XML and json which are not typically meant to be viewed by a human.

* Can I use and move freely between several web browsers? This also connotes a lot of things, including but not limited to access to browser extensions, console, etc.

The answer to all these questions is "Yes" for Mac/Win/Linux and solidly "No"
for iOS. Which, is too bad, because I'd love to use something like an iPad Pro
for work. But Apple has placed several _software_ based restrictions on iOS
which, above and beyond other hardware restrictions (lack of multiple
monitors, poor selection of input devices) add up to there being no reasonable
way to get "work" done on the platform.

I don't see myself as a power user, either: Apple seems completely stuck in a
time where all users needed was access to a decent office suite and the
ability to email and print in order to "do work".

That's not an adequate description of "work" any more, but apparently no one
has told Apple.

~~~
baby
> XML and json which are not typically meant to be viewed by a human

XML and json are meant to be viewed by a human. Those are visual encodings a
contrario to binary encodings.

~~~
landryraccoon
Agreed. When someone says "not meant to be viewed by a human" I think protobuf
or png, not XML/JSON.

------
nkw
I think most of the statements in the article are true, the problem is there
is not (right now) a superior alternative. Yes, Microsoft is trying with the
surface, Linux I'm sure has come far, but there is simply not any alternative
that can realistically compete with the Mac platform right now. There is
simply no pressure on Apple to dedicate further resources to this area,
because there is not much for them to gain. It sucks for users of their
products, but probably great for stockholders.

~~~
Chyzwar
Linux is already superior for developers. You servers all running Linux, all
dev tools are first released in Linux, everything just work with most
hardware.

For professional like video editing, photography, CADs, audio etc Windows is
better when you can buy better hardware for the same price as Mac.

There is no reason to by Mac when most hardware is terribly outdated and you
don't know when next upgrade will happen.

~~~
eknkc
I'm doing web dev on macOS. Tried to plan how I'd work on Linux desktop if I
ditched Mac and it doesn't look that bright actually.

\- I basically can't stand the usability linux desktop environments. But this
is subjective.

\- Our designers use a lot of mac software. I sometimes need to work with
Sketch, Photoshop etc. Even if it's in read only fashion.

\- Our team lives in Slack. Turns out these is no decent slack app for linux
and I'd have to use the web app. No thanks.

Development generally requires collaboration with other people. I can't see
myself easily working with non developers on a Linux desktop. I run Linux
servers because only the developers touch them.

~~~
baby
> \- Our team lives in Slack. Turns out these is no decent slack app for linux
> and I'd have to use the web app. No thanks.

the slack app for other platforms are made from the web app (Electron).

~~~
eknkc
Yeah but they are integrated (native notifications, file access, a window that
does not go away with the browser or tied to it, decent looking chrome etc).
When I need to use it that much I prefer an app, even if it's a shell
actually.

~~~
paulddraper
Eh, people said the same about Gmail but that no-install email client turned
out to be wildly successful.

~~~
CountSessine
Give it a rest - web applications running in generalized browsers make awful
desk-tray applications. The mac & windows Slack app is great - all of the
power and connected-ness of a web app without all of the annoyances of
accidental web browser navigation.

------
ascendantlogic
"It will be a switch from iOS developers using Macs at home to them using PCs
at home and having a "work Mac" for commercial development."

This is exactly what gave rise to the Mac and OSX in the last 10-15 years.
People worked on Windows PCs "at work" but had Macs for personal development.
Now I'm witnessing the exact same scenario play out now that Apple is the
market behemoth amongst power users and developers. Do I think Microsoft will
simply win everyone back? Not at this moment. They could keep stepping up
their game and possibly do so. Or the collective energy people were spending
on macOS could be spent on (finally) making Linux-on-desktop a viable option
that doesn't require inordinate amounts of fiddling with drivers and
configuration files.

Time will tell but I'm already pretty sure my next laptop will be a Dell XPS
or Razer Blade.

~~~
remir
There could be a third option "soon"; Fuchsia, the new OS Google is
developing. From what I see, it seems like a modular OS running Flutter apps,
with Material Design as the system's UI.

Google has folks who worked on BeOS, Danger, iOS, ChromeOS and Android working
on this new OS.

~~~
scotu
quite a list! a question that begs being asked: did they intentionally not
hire anybody that touched windows or was it by chance?

~~~
remir
This was just from the top of my head. I doubt they would refuse to hire ex-
Microsoft employees.

------
ChuckMcM
Wow, I really liked that article. I thought it articulated some really
important insights, first that Apple could reasonably be seen as abandoning
the core computer user market, and second an acknowledgement that the market
they are leaving in favor of the consumer market is probably immaterial to
their current business model.

It is clear that there are two "kinds" of users of computation platforms, the
"apps only" users and "developers." It is also becoming clear that "content
creators" (graphic artists, writers, video producers, Etc) are seen more and
more as "apps only" users rather than developers as well, even though their
content tools are very demanding on the platform.

If they are correct and the market is segmenting, then I think you can expect
to see "artist workstations" emerge as a category with tools wrapped around a
computer to help in their content creation, I think that certainly became true
of synthesizers which have "workstations" as a category distinct from
instruments you might play on stage or in a studio setting.

~~~
bane
Apple is fighting too many competitors at the moment. It used to just be
Microsoft, but Google's dominance in smartphones and slow but constant
pressure in tablets and "good enough for most people" laptops is causing the
company to lose focus.

Microsoft also traditionally didn't have a credible hardware story, giving
Apple a complete vertical integration story. Now both major competitors are
vertically integrating (Microsoft with Windows + Surface and Google with
Android/ChromeOS + Pixel).

I think Apple is having to choose where they're going to focus and tbh, the
Mac line is a smaller line of business for the company. If you simply don't
use a laptop/desktop at all, then nobody cares that you can't connect your
other devices cleanly to it, your other devices _are_ your primary computing
devices.

Microsoft doesn't have a good story on the phone front, but it's not
inconceivable that they'll try again with a shrunk down surface line if the it
proves successful enough.

Google's desktop story is also incomplete, but they're moving rapidly towards
_something_ if they ever stop having OS confusion.

The iPad Pro is large and powerful enough that it basically can be the "good
enough for most people" computing device. And they have a cohesive ecosystem
from small to large in the iDevices.

There's no significant future for Apple with the Mac line and the company is
allergic to commodification in ways that their competitors aren't (and that's
where that line is heading). Apple is more likely to keep playing with iDevice
sizing and software than to continue dedicated serious resources to keeping
the Mac line alive.

I'm not calling it a deathwatch yet, but it's clear it's a backburner line of
business for the company.

~~~
monkmartinez
The problem with the iPad Pro is that it is still an iPad. Look at the metrics
of iPad sales[1], down 15% or so. There is no compelling reason to upgrade
iPads on a year over year basis for most people that have them. Everyone else
bought a Kindle or Asus or <insert tablet> here for $100 and called it a day.

[1][https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/26/iphone-ipad-and-mac-
sales-...](https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/26/iphone-ipad-and-mac-sales-are-
down-but-apple-only-cares-about-services-now/)

~~~
bane
This seems to speak to a larger problem for Apple of identifying their "Pro"
markets and going after them. The iPad Pro seems to do a reasonable job
targeting visual artists in the hardware, but the software isn't there yet.

Notionally speaking, what would a Pro work environment look like using
tablets? I'd argue that Pro software tends to be hard to use and complicated
-- but highly efficient in that domain, and this has been a struggle for Apple
to get...and fundamentally there should be some kind of solution for cobbling
together several iPads and a couple peripherals into some kind of workstation,
where the iPads can do dual duty as both reconfigurable low-latency interfaces
and displays for various parts of a pro-oriented workflow.

Or at the very least offer real support for pro workflows with a Mac as the
main computer and the iPads acting as interfaces.

You sort of see some of this in things like DJ setups [1], but you'll notice
none of these solutions lets you just use more iPads as additional
screens/interfaces.

I write music as a hobby, and I wouldn't even know what to do with a single
screen for it, and I feel cramped on two. I'd love to be able to get a tablet
device, connect it to "the studio" and now it handles EQ or provides some
virtual knobs, or gives me a spectrogram or something. And the system just
sort of makes it work. A half dozen interfaces/displays would be great.

I also enjoy photography, why not have one display showing a gallery, one
showing the before edits, and one showing what I'm editing, with one or two
providing common edit controls?

But this interconnecting magic is simply missing.

1 - [https://www.algoriddim.com/hardware](https://www.algoriddim.com/hardware)

~~~
walterbell
There's another problem with the iOS ecosystem: it is very difficult for app
developers to make money: no trials, no way to reach customers, poor
discovery, and other well documented challenges. This does not bode well for
the future of Pro-grade software on iOS, in contrast to macOS.

[http://www.cultofmac.com/451594/we-made-our-app-free-and-
tha...](http://www.cultofmac.com/451594/we-made-our-app-free-and-that-sucks-
or-why-freemium-is-killing-the-app-economy/)

------
jasonjei
I see a lot of parallels of Tim Cook's Apple to John Sculley's Apple. Tim
Cook's, like John Sculley's, is focused on immediate short-term bottom line
improvements rather than long-term investments. John Sculley kept staying the
course, and Tim Cook is doing much of the same. If anything, the most recent
iteration of MBP is sidelining serious developers and content producers.

So yes, Apple's bottom line is growing. Lots of revenue are being made from
iCloud subscriptions to Apple Music. Steve Ballmer was very good at improving
Microsoft's bottom line too. But they lost search, music, and cloud at the
expense of chasing revenue.

~~~
zepto
I keep seeing people say things about how the Mac is sidelining serious
developers and content producers, but I haven't seen any actual argument as to
why this is so. Can you explain?

~~~
jasonjei
TouchBar killed the tactile ESC key. People using vim or BootCamp and/or
Linux, Windows, VMware, or Photoshop are in for a more difficult ride. So
instead of having access to ESC/Func keys, we can type emoji or use Apple Pay.

The hardware on all Macs are updated on a very infrequent basis as mentioned
in the article. GPUs sold with machines today are often the same as ones sold
years ago.

Apple killed their external monitor option.

~~~
threeseed
Look at all the screenshots of the Touch Bar. Many of them have the Esc key
present. And you must be seriously out of touch if you think it's a deal
breaker.

Also it's rumours that Apple killed their external monitor option.

~~~
wpietri
It's a dealbreaker for me.

I was considering switching from years of buying Thinkpads to getting some
Apple hardware. One of my big beefs with Lenovo is that they keep redesigning
the keyboards, steadily making them worse from my perspective. But the Esc key
thing kills it for me. Partly because the escape key location is baked into my
brain, and I want it to be a physical key with tactile response. And partly
because this is a sign to me that they are likely to keep screwing with the
keyboard in a way that makes it better for whomever they're targeting but
worse for programmers.

------
Razengan
I was a PC user my whole life, since the days of DOS and PC Tools, until I
made the switch to Macs in 2011. The last time I used Windows (10) was last
year when I was stuck with a PC for 2 months.

I don't feel the Mac is in decline at all.

Although the new MacBooks are out of my budget for now, there is still nothing
that makes me want to go back to PCs/Microsoft. I still remember the almost
daily frustrations I had with Windows, some of which continue to plague it to
this day. It remains a massive, kludgey hodgepodge of inconsistency. Even if
Windows wasn't bad in my opinion there really isn't anything bad enough on the
Mac side to make me switch.

------
jernfrost
I agree it worries me. I've been with the Mac since OS X came out. The focus
on more professional users like myself seems to have started a decline
beginning with Snow Leopard.

Of course I understand the rational. It is a small chunk of Apple revenue now,
but can't there be some solution to this?

What if they simply outsourced the professional products to other companies? I
know the clone makers was a disaster for Apple, but they can do it smarter
this time, by specifically only allow the clones to sell computers at the high
performance and high end. The consumer grade computers and laptops should be
Apple only.

Fortunately for me I see that a lot of Linux distros have gotten a lot more OS
X like over the years to if I got to switch there are actually systems out
there which somewhat resemble what I am used to.

Still Linux simply doesn't have the same breath of quality desktop
applications available as the Mac today. Every time I use Linux I get reminded
that while I might be able to get all the functionality I need, it is too
often served up in a package or UI which is extremely kludgy and poorly
thought out.

------
shripadk
> From where I'm standing, Apple are redefining (shrinking) their target
> audience for the Mac platform. If you feel left out by the latest updates
> and the neglect on the desktop, it's simple as Apple deciding not to serve
> your segment's needs. I know that it can feel quite personal to Mac
> devotees, like me, but it's simply business and strategy.

How does this work? Can someone please explain to me how Apple can neglect
macOS if all iOS/watchOS/tvOS app development needs to happen on macOS?

I'm with you however on the fact that Apple has seriously disappointed me with
the latest launch. I was hoping to finally get a much better, powerful
notebook and an accompanying iMac. I feel very sad that the legacy left behind
by Steve Jobs is being destroyed so badly.

If this is truly the decline of Apple as I'm starting to think, at the very
least, Apple should open-source macOS.

~~~
scotu
> How does this work? Can someone please explain to me how Apple can neglect
> macOS if all iOS/watchOS/tvOS app development needs to happen on macOS?

precisely because you are forced to use macos to access the lucrative ios
market, they can get away with a lesser experience for developers. (Note that
I'm not saying this is what is happening, just saying how that would work;
although I often feel like they are indeed leaving the pro/advanced user
market behind)

~~~
mahyarm
For iOS devs, you don't need that much RAM fortunately, since xcode takes
about ~2-4GB ram itself for large projects. But the tooling is not great and
it's annoying to run CI systems with them. iOS dev is definitely geared
towards small team projects.

------
CalChris
I bought an SE rather than a 7. Size is a better fit for me and I still use
the audio jack. A lot. So Apple had an upgrade path for me.

But with the new MacBook Pro, they cut out USB-A. If they'd kept it on the
entry level model, that'd be my upgrade path. Instead, I'll eek out maybe a
couple more years on my current MBP.

BTW, I'm not sure at all why they ditched MagSafe. They did all this and kept
the RCA port. Now that's a head scratcher.

On the plus side, I'm a big fan of the T1 Secure Enclave processor.

~~~
oneeyedpigeon
I think the losses of Magsafe and the 3.5" headphone socket will go down as
the point Apple finally lost it. Magsafe was such a perfect example of Apple
doing small innovation, utterly brilliantly; if they've ditched it purely to
save half a millimetre off thickness, it's all the proof I need that the
lunatics have taken over.

~~~
threeseed
You guys are hilarious.

I just picture you back when the iMac was first released without, god forbid,
a floppy disk drive or ADB ports.

The fact is that just like before in a year from now when all peripherals
support USB-C we will herald Apple as a visionary once again.

~~~
Aloha
Yeah - but probably 2-3 years. USB took that long to catch on.

I detect a whiff of hyperbole in everyone postings on the subject. The sky is
not falling. That said, I am annoyed at the net loss of two ports - just one
USB A port would have been helpful.

------
taylodl
Is it too much to ask to wait until we get the actual machines in our hands
and use them for 30 days before deciding our verdict? Maybe they suck. Maybe
they don't.

~~~
monkmartinez
You don't need a "hands on" nor 30 days to realize 16gb of RAM isn't going to
be enough for the CAPEX of a $2500 to $4000 dollar machine over the span of
(hopefully) 3+ years. That is just one example... there are many more.

~~~
matt4077
Pfew, I may not believe how professional you are if you had just used the word
"price" instead of "CAPEX".

~~~
monkmartinez
You are right... In my defense, it is not only "funner" to say the same thing
differently, but sometimes drives the point home "more better."

~~~
matt4077
That's very (p/f)unny, . Please don't let people like me take the fun out of
funding for you, and inform me if you ever start a religion, cult, country,
CAPEX LIMITING INVESTMENT SCHEME(TM) or hummus-based fast food chain,

------
f_allwein
The main premise here is "Apple did not update its desktops in a while, so
they don't care about this". I think this is inaccurate - according to
[http://www.macrumors.com/roundup/imac/](http://www.macrumors.com/roundup/imac/)
, they do plan to update them, but are still waiting for Intel to produce the
necessary chips.

Also, I seem to remember reading pretty much the same thing before the Mac Pro
was launched (which was apparently 1046 days ago...).

So yes, desktops are becoming less important, but no, I don't think Apple will
drop them any time soon.

~~~
Fomite
As a datapoint, I'm a very long-time Mac User (started with an LC) and have
used Macs heavily in scientific computing. A Mac Pro was my go-to machine for
a very long time. But when my lab got a grant to buy some new workstations?
The Mac Pro wasn't even on the list being considered.

------
matt4077
There's a basic premise this article gets wrong: that there is a tradeoff
between the Mac platform and the iUniverse. That's just not true, at least not
on the 5-years plus timescales that we've been hearing these complaints. The
most valuable company in the world can certainly afford staffing the Mac
division with what they had back in 2000 or so or whenever people believe they
were at their best. And the Mac business is without doubt profitable and
that's the only thing that counts. We're not even talking about "innovation"
issues anyway, where Apple may be constrained by not cloning SJ or JI. Note
people don't want innovation (no floppy, no headphone, no F9) but rather
simple grunt work like updating the chipsets.

I don't have any coherent theory. I'd say it's a combination of:

\- Mac Pro: possibly waiting for something that then didn't turn out as
expected? It's a segment that may actually be obsolete in that anything you
can't do on an iMac happens on a cluster? I mean – what's there besides video
editing and chrome compiling, two things the iMac is absolutely capable of.

\- MacBooks: There's a minority complaining very loudly, who just! can't!
work! professionally(!!) without 32GB of RAM and F7 – and they're real
professionals by the way, not like those unprofessional hipster-wannabes.

Meanwhile, there have been quite a few advances but it's just not exciting any
more: SSDs have had the most significant performance impact since the Pentium.
Battery life has reached the point of diminishing returns (as has battery
durability). Retina displays are on the level of vector fonts in terms of UI
improvements. No idea about wide-gamut colors, but I certainly thought "why
didn't this catch on 16 years ago?". A modern Apple trackpad is the hoverboard
my fingers have been making memes about for a decade. Build quality and
durability at the highest they have ever been, and if IFixIt complains, it's
because YouDontHaveToAnymore.

Software is a different story maybe, but a large part of that may just be that
it's solved. It's a stable, safe, fast, pretty OS. The Apple applications have
seen a bunch of stumbles, indeed. But even Photos does what I actually need
and there are alternatives for all of them.

------
walter_bishop
Yahoo finance says they're doing well. If this is a sign of decline then most
companies would be happy getting such results.

[https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AAPL?ltr=1](https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AAPL?ltr=1)

~~~
snom380
Yes. And Microsoft was doing extremely well during Ballmers reign, and
BlackBerry was doing extremely well for many years after iPhones release.

Current revenue doesn't necessarily say anything about future decline, you
need to look deeper than that.

~~~
wpietri
Exactly. Current revenues for Apple are a result of decisions they made years
ago. You can't look at this quarter's numbers to evaluate decisions made
today.

If anything, Apple's fat profits are a danger sign. That kind of money
attracts people who like spending lots of money. It removes any need for
discipline. It discourages innovation, because people are afraid to do
anything that might disturb the giant cash pipeline.

------
angryteabag
Easy fix, bring macOS to non Apple hardware.

~~~
mafro
I don't think "easy" is the way to describe that endeavour. Ever tried a
hackintosh?

~~~
WaltPurvis
_> > Ever tried a hackintosh?_

Yes, I've been running a hackintosh for several years now. It works
flawlessly. What point are you trying to make?

~~~
mahyarm
Years ago it wasn't working perfectly :D

------
geocar
I really just want an upgrade for the MBA.

There's finally a few Windows machines that don't look like complete dogshit,
but I don't know how to connect to multiple exchange servers in Outlook.

------
majewsky
Speculation time: What if the big master plan is an Apple Compute Cloud? It
would be a public cloud that can run all your favorite resource-intensive
macOS apps.

Then you could actually run Xcode and VMs and machine learning on your iPad
Pro, because it runs on the cloud instead and the iPad is just RDP'd into your
cloud account. The need for a separate Mac product line would then be
obliterated entirely.

Within that theory, the disappointing update can be explained as the Apple
Compute Cloud being delayed, so they had to scramble something together
quickly.

------
jamisteven
Its not just the mac but the entire product line. Unfortunately Jobs did not
do a good job of finding a sufficient replacement prior to his health issues
getting the best of him. \- Round edges on the iphone6 \- protruding lens on
the iphone6 \- removal of 3mm headphone jack on iphone7 \- forcetouch keys on
the new macbooks \- video cam on the pro

~~~
snom380
Sorry, but Steve Jobs also released lots of products with rough edges like
that. (Remember "antennagate"?)

I think we won't see how Apples management really works until there's a new
product space that Apple entirely misses, and I don't think we've seen that
yet (it could be AI, VR, or something entirely different we haven't thought
of). If they miss that just like Microsoft did in the tablet / mobile space,
then we can start comparing Tim Cook to Ballmer.

~~~
fzzzy
Steve Jobs died just over a year after antennagate. He had already been
extremely sick for years at that point.

~~~
snom380
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make, but he was still CEO at that
point (his biography has a section about how he dealt with the antennagate
issue) after having made a recovery from the transplant.

~~~
fzzzy
My point is being sick may have affected his abilities.

------
tlow
This is a poorly written article mainly complaining about the lack of an
update to the Mac Pro product despite it's thesis that: > Apple, the MacBook
Pro is not a pro-level computer. It’s simply not.

However, the article is indeed self-contradictory as it later goes on to say:
> Who needs anything more than a MacBook Pro? The answer is a very small
segment of high-demanding users.

So given that the main thesis that the Macbook Pro is not a professional
machine is entirely unsupported, I argue that the Mac Platform Decline
described in this article is not an accurate portrayal or reality.

Edit: Update The linked article even states the different thesis that the Mac
_DESKTOP_ product line is doomed.

> Apple’s desktop Mac lineup is headed for the graveyard. Dead. Done. Over.[1]

[1]
[http://www.tedlandau.com/slantedviewpoint/index.php/archives...](http://www.tedlandau.com/slantedviewpoint/index.php/archives/2016/2014)

~~~
casion
It doesn't sound like a contradiction to me. A very small segment of users are
'pro-level' users.

Now yes, it isn't supported, but if you accept that as the reality then it is
not contradictory.

~~~
mbernstein
I think the whole 'pro-user' description needs examined a bit. Tons of
developers at companies use macbook airs which are far less powerful than the
newest laptops.

Ex: Rob Pike uses a macbook air. Is he not a professional?

There's a huge range of needs even within the pro user camp and I'd posit that
the majority of them will be well served by the new Macs. If you're doing game
development I'd argue Apple hasn't made great machines for you in the past so
I'd expect a continued miss on the portable VR front as well.

For those that are doing visual work - are current generation machines
actually not powerful enough?

~~~
snom380
Nobody is claming that your're not a professional because you don't need a Mac
Pro. Of course the majority of pro tasks will be served by the new Mac
laptops. But that's not what we're discussing here.

For the ones that need more performance, it can be a dealbreaker to go so long
without updates.

For the ones that have their needs are met today, there's a very clear signal
now that if your needs ever grow, Apple won't be there to meet them.

