Need quick answers: Apple failing itself

[poofyhairguy]

They could have 75% of the market easily. They havn't done anything useful since jobs passed.

Um, they make 90% of the profit in the mobile phone market. I don't think they mind giving the low end low margin stuff to Android.

 

[poofyhairguy]

If one of the most well-known CE companies doesn't properly support their Android devices even after a public promise to do so, going with Android at all seems risky.

Two things on that:

1. Android updates and iOS updates aren't the same thing. Post-Android 5.0 the major applications (and a lot of the framework) actually update separately from the OS. So a lot of the things that iOS updates cover (core app updates, Safari updates, etc.) gradually roll out over the course of the year. There is much less of a benefit for being up-to-date in Android, especially because many skins take away the update specific features baked into the OS. Samsung's Android 5.0 looks very different from Motorola's 5.0.

2. If you are a developer or an enthusiast so you care about updates anyway there is always the Nexus program. The Nexus 7 2012 is updated to 5.1.1, which is as long as you get in Androidland.

 

[Ichinisan]

The 5c was revolutionary because it was only rounded on the back, and because it was made from plastic! Wow! And it moved the headphone jack!

yaknow?

Not sure what you mean.

• 5C wasn't the first to have plastic.
• 5C wasn't rounded on the back...? (at least, not like the 3G and 3GS were)
• 5C didn't move the headphone jack (the 5 moved the headphone jack a year before and every iPod touch had it there)

 

[88keys]

Apple is hardly failing. The iWatch and iPhone 6 were very successful upon release, not to mention that Jobs made sure he left better talent in charge before he passed.

As for Android vs iOS. I have to admit that While I'm happy with my Galaxy S4, I'm strongly considering an iPhone 6 or (6x) now that they have bigger screens available. Years ago, I used to have a 3GS and certain things that I miss about it. In particular, they way iTunes handles larger music collections. I still have yet to find anything that works as well. (Songbird was pretty close, but it is no longer updated). Plus there are alot of little things that bug me about other Android music apps. Like alphabetizing song titles that begin with the word "The" in the T's instead of alphabetizing using the next word in the title.
Not to mention the quality of android apps is poor overall. Sure they aren't as restrictive as apple when it comes to development, and it shows. I swear more than 50% of available apps for android don't work correctly. Not to mention all the shady spyware and crap some of them load on your phone.
But when you look at it from the average user's perspective is when iPhones start to look alot better. Your typical music app for android will load every single audio file on your phone and play it unless you tell it to look in a specific folder for music (which is too much trouble for most people). So notifications, and ringtones, and little voice recordings will randomly show up when you hit shuffle. The main reason they do this is because they know the average person is going to upload their songs to some random location and forget where they put them and complain that the app doesn't work. I can't tell you how often I have to help people find where they put their crap on the android device. Whether it's pictures, music, or whatever.

Apple might be more restrictive in what they allow a user to do with their phone, but what that does is puts them in control of the sandbox. This means lower maintenance, better security, and user friendliness for the average consumer. Steve Jobs understood something that alot of techies don't understand. And that is the average person does not want to have to spend alot (or any amount) of time tinkering with or fooling around with their device to get things to work. They want things to be done for them and Apple offers that which is why people were clamoring to spend $700 or whatever dollars on the first iPhone and nobody gives two shits about Blackberry today.

 

[CZroe]

Isn't EVERY iteration just a spec bump?

The s-versions typically bump the specs and features as much as any non-s version has done.

Indeed. The original iPhone and the iPhone 3G had identical specs except for the 3G baseband with GPS. The 3GS looked the same, but was the first that was a completely different phone.

 

[CZroe]

Apple is hardly failing. The iWatch and iPhone 6 were very successful upon release, not to mention that Jobs made sure he left better talent in charge before he passed.

As for Android vs iOS. I have to admit that While I'm happy with my Galaxy S4, I'm strongly considering an iPhone 6 or (6x) now that they have bigger screens available. Years ago, I used to have a 3GS and certain things that I miss about it. In particular, they way iTunes handles larger music collections. I still have yet to find anything that works as well. (Songbird was pretty close, but it is no longer updated). Plus there are alot of little things that bug me about other Android music apps. Like alphabetizing song titles that begin with the word "The" in the T's instead of alphabetizing using the next word in the title.
Not to mention the quality of android apps is poor overall. Sure they aren't as restrictive as apple when it comes to development, and it shows. I swear more than 50% of available apps for android don't work correctly. Not to mention all the shady spyware and crap some of them load on your phone.
But when you look at it from the average user's perspective is when iPhones start to look alot better. Your typical music app for android will load every single audio file on your phone and play it unless you tell it to look in a specific folder for music (which is too much trouble for most people). So notifications, and ringtones, and little voice recordings will randomly show up when you hit shuffle. The main reason they do this is because they know the average person is going to upload their songs to some random location and forget where they put them and complain that the app doesn't work. I can't tell you how often I have to help people find where they put their crap on the android device. Whether it's pictures, music, or whatever.

Apple might be more restrictive in what they allow a user to do with their phone, but what that does is puts them in control of the sandbox. This means lower maintenance, better security, and user friendliness for the average consumer. Steve Jobs understood something that alot of techies don't understand. And that is the average person does not want to have to spend alot (or any amount) of time tinkering with or fooling around with their device to get things to work. They want things to be done for them and Apple offers that which is why people were clamoring to spend $700 or whatever dollars on the first iPhone and nobody gives two shits about Blackberry today.

Android is getting Apple Music, which may influence me to switch back to Android. Hopefully it supports playback of local content like it does on iOS (replaces old Music app). It should. They still want to sell iTunes tracks, right?

 

[Murloc]

just go read the comments on the iWatch review and you'll find all the material you need.

 

[SamQuint]

I think you have to define what a win is for Apple. Making the most cutting edge highest quality products or returning value to their stockholders and increasing the size and wealth of the company. I would think Business 101 tells you that increasing stockholder wealth is job number one for any publicly traded company. To that I would say Apple is doing a great job. As long as they are growing and profitable they are winning. It does not matter what they are selling or how cutting edge they are.

I hate apple but they are not failing.

 

[ultimatebob]

Indeed. The original iPhone and the iPhone 3G had identical specs except for the 3G baseband with GPS. The 3GS looked the same, but was the first that was a completely different phone.

The iPhone 3G also had a plastic back instead of a metal one. The 3G cell network addition was kind of important, since it actually made web browsing usable on the iPhone on a wireless connection. On an Edge connection, it was pathetic.

 

[CZroe]

The iPhone 3G also had a plastic back instead of a metal one.

That's my point: MORE of what actually makes up the phone changes when we get a model that looks the same, LESS changes when we get a model that look completely different, so calling it "just a spec bump" ignores that it's as much a new phone as those with new designs. A new design has been shown to be almost completely cosmetic at least once in the iPhone's history and the things that actually make a new phone new seem to have bigger jumps in the S iterations.

It makes sense: You don't have to give us as much to convince us that it is new with a style update and you have to give us more to convince us if it looks exactly the same.

 

[yllus]

The thing about Apple is that while they may not quite be the innovator of days past, they still execute on hardware and software far better than most other companies - and they're probably the absolute best at melding that hardware and software together. It'll be hard to dethrone them when it's so incredibly difficult to do that well.

 

[IronWing]

just go read the comments on the iWatch review and you'll find all the material you need.

:biggrin:

I don't recall ever seeing so many unhinged posters on the business side of AT.

 

[Hugo Drax]

You can buy term papers online. Why not just do that? It seems to be the big thing I got college.

 

[IronWing]

Paper was due two days ago. What grade did you get?

 

[QueBert]

I'm not so sure about that. Samsung seems to make noticeable design changes to their Galaxy S phones every year. Whether or not those design changes are good are debatable, though.

Personally, I miss having the option of getting one with a replaceable battery.

LOL joking right? With the exception of the latest Galaxy, the "noticeable design change" from 1 model to another will be a .2" larger screen, or something even smaller.

 

[Ichinisan]

LOL joking right? With the exception of the latest Galaxy, the "noticeable design change" from 1 model to another will be a .2" larger screen, or something even smaller.

Yeah. I think I the tick-tock design cycle is hugely beneficial to those buying the "S" model because there are thousands of awesome fully-compatible accessories already available when you get your device.

It also encourages accessory makers to support each re-design because they expect to sell their accessories in high volume for at least 2 years. Even once their accessories are no longer compatible with the latest re-designed phone, the sales won't drop off nearly as fast as they do for non-Apple devices. There many millions of compatible devices that will still be in-use and handed-down for many years.

This kind of encouragement for accessory manufacturers greatly enhances the experience of owning the Apple device. There are far more accessory choices for someone with the latest iPhone than for someone with the latest Android phone. The 2-year design cycle is simply a genius move by Apple and I have absolutely no criticism for that.

 

[ultimatebob]

LOL joking right? With the exception of the latest Galaxy, the "noticeable design change" from 1 model to another will be a .2" larger screen, or something even smaller.

I didn't say they were GOOD design changes, just noticeable ones. If the consumer looks at the old model and the model at Best Buy, they can see a physical difference.

Personally, I liked the Galaxy S5 design better than the S6 because it was water resistant and had a replaceable battery.

 

[Gunbuster]

They have trashy poor people coveting and buying their devices (for a sizable % or their yearly income) Have walked past a apple store? Biggest bunch of mouth-breathers in the whole mall. They must somehow balance that with still having an "upscale" brand that trendy richy mc richersons want to be seen with.

 

[Blackjack200]

They have trashy poor people coveting and buying their devices (for a sizable % or their yearly income) Have walked past a apple store? Biggest bunch of mouth-breathers in the whole mall. They must somehow balance that with still having an "upscale" brand that trendy richy mc richersons want to be seen with.

Maybe sell an otherwise-identical gold version of your product for $10k?

 

[Aikouka]

This kind of encouragement for accessory manufacturers greatly enhances the experience of owning the Apple device. There are far more accessory choices for someone with the latest iPhone than for someone with the latest Android phone. The 2-year design cycle is simply a genius move by Apple and I have absolutely no criticism for that.

I think consumers like it too. I still hear complaints from people about the 30-pin to Lightning switch. People seem to be rather averse to change. It kind of reminds me of how hesitant I was to go from a phone with a keyboard (HTC TyTn II / AT&T Tilt) to an iPhone 3GS.

 

[shortylickens]

Sort of like religion!

Religion is easier to get out of.

Have never met an Apple user that broke free.
Not one person.

Though I do know a handful of multi-platform users. But they generally prefer Linux as their main work OS and one of the others for fun and experiments.

 

[ultimatebob]

Religion is easier to get out of.

Have never met an Apple user that broke free.
Not one person.

Though I do know a handful of multi-platform users. But they generally prefer Linux as their main work OS and one of the others for fun and experiments.

Really? I went from an iPhone 3G, to a Motorola Droid X, to a Samsung Galaxy S3, and back to an iPhone 6. I just made sure not to buy much from either the Apple Store or Google Play stores to get myself locked into a platform.

I also have a Nexus 7 and an iPad, so I'm pretty platform agnostic.

 

[ControlD]

Religion is easier to get out of.

Have never met an Apple user that broke free.
Not one person.

Though I do know a handful of multi-platform users. But they generally prefer Linux as their main work OS and one of the others for fun and experiments.

I went from pretty much all Apple stuff (4S, iPad, Macbook Pro) to no Apple stuff in a short amount of time. I like their hardware, hate their software and restrictions and that was enough to get me to change. You can break free! (The rest of my family is still trapped however)

 

[BUTCH1]

all fine and dandy to you...but it fucks up my jailbreak.

So the other 98% who's phones are not "jailbroken' should not get an update for you sake?, zero fucks given for you dude.

 

[sa7an1]

The thing about Apple is that while they may not quite be the innovator of days past, they still execute on hardware and software far better than most other companies - and they're probably the absolute best at melding that hardware and software together. It'll be hard to dethrone them when it's so incredibly difficult to do that well.

Apple's proprietary SSD's used in its Macbook Pro Retina and Macbook Air have no way of recovering data, even the major data recovery specialists have no way of doing it (Ontrack and DriveSavers)

On the topic of Apple's proprietary SSD's their cost is, honestly, retarded. if you say had a factory installed 256GB SSD that had failed and wanted to upgrade to a 512 GB since you ended up needing a larger drive... you cannot do a core exchange price through apple, you would have to buy one for full rip which on a 2015 MBP would run..... $1,199.00... or $1,699.00 for a 1TB

The new Macbook has EVERY major circuit on one board, SSD, RAM, WiFi/BT, MLB(motherboard), etc... so if anything other than the display, keyboard, trackpad, battery or the single USB-C port fail your repair bill will be ridiculous.

The aluminum they use is quite soft and the anodizing is nowhere near the strong, damn hard to scratch kind that is available, plastic framed PC laptops take general use better by far.

They just now (10.10.4 update) enabled trim support for 3rd party SSD's.... and even then it takes a command line action to enable.