A Look At OS X Yosemite And iOS 8.1
by Brandon Chester on October 27, 2014 8:00 AM ESTConclusion
It has definitely been a busy few months in the Apple world. September delivered the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, along with iOS 8, and a preview of the still mysterious Apple Watch. This month we got the iPad Air 2, the iPad Mini 3, the iMac with Retina 5K display, iOS 8.1, Apple Pay, and OS X Yosemite. Those last three points are some of the most interesting, and they all happen to be part of Apple's software ecosystem. I don't think that's a coincidence. We're reaching a point where it's becoming more and more difficult to differentiate your products based on hardware alone. Great software driving a great experience is where the focus needs to be moving forward.
Apple's strategy to provide that experience appears to be deep integration of their services across all of their product lines. It starts with the cloud, with new additions to iCloud like iCloud Drive and Photo Library. From there it goes to software commonality, with a design language that exists on both iOS and OS X, and applications that exist on both platforms. On the opposite end of the spectrum from the cloud are the new continuity features which provide integration between all the devices that you have right there with you. SMS Forwarding and iPhone call transferring expands communication on iPad and the Mac to new areas, while Handoff makes the transition between applications seamless and accurate right down to where your cursor was.
What interests me the most about Apple's stategy is how it provides incentive for a user with one Apple device to buy other Apple devices. This exists to a certain degree with other manufacturers as well. If you own a Samsung smartphone, you may be more inclined to buy a Samsung tablet due to the similar hardware design and user interface. But apart from any brand loyalty you feel, you don't really have any incentive to buy a Samsung laptop which runs Windows and doesn't integrate with your other devices. Apple's integration covers their entire lineup of devices. An iPhone user has a lot to gain by choosing a MacBook over a Windows Ultrabook, and an iPad over a Nexus 9. It would be interesting to analyze what percentage of people purchasing a new Apple device already own one or more Apple products.
Overall, I'm happy with the work that Apple has done with iOS 8.1 and OS X Yosemite. It's clear that a lot of this has been in the works for some time now, and integrating products and services to this degree requires a lot of planning to position your hardware and software so that it will be capable of working together in the ways you want them to. The Yosemite redesign has also gone quite well, and there aren't as many jarring inconsistencies as there were with iOS 7 at launch despite OS X being a more expansive operating system. Apple has definitely learned from their experiences with the iOS redesign. That being said, there is still a lot of work to do. Apple Pay needs to expand rapidly, and iCloud Photo Library isn't as far developed as I had expected it to be.
It's hard to say where Apple will go as we move forward. It will be hard to outdo the work that has been done with Yosemite. However, history tells me that there are still great things yet to come from Apple. It seems that year after year Apple is able to make updated products and proclaim them to be the biggest advancements in that product's history, and regardless of my initial reaction, I somehow always find myself agreeing .
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p_giguere1 - Monday, October 27, 2014 - link
Apple offers the max RAM the motherboard can support (16GB) at purchase.The only reason you might want to upgrade RAM yourself is to buy the 8GB RAM model only to tell yourself "I'll upgrade to 16GB down the road when RAM gets cheaper". You might save something like $100 by doing that as opposed to ordering 16GB RAM right away.
So essentially, what you're complaining about is the equivalent of "The 13" rMBP is $100 to expensive for me", correct? Would you not complain if the price dropped $100? Not only would it be equivalent financially, but you'd benefit from 16GB RAM right away and wouldn't have to deal with the RAM upgrade process. Or is this more of a matter of principle?
Cheesetogo - Monday, October 27, 2014 - link
Apple does not charge market value for RAM.ant1pathy - Tuesday, October 28, 2014 - link
Nor do they for the raw aluminum that the frame is made of. No company charges market value for their materials, that's what makes them a company.name99 - Monday, October 27, 2014 - link
Enter a coherent argument, not a random series of rants.Are you upset with every phone vendor because they solder their RAM? Are you angry that you can no longer change the tubes in your TV set? Are you livid that you can't open a Chromecast and change the flash storage?
The fact that people could change their RAM on PCs was a weird temporary anomaly of the PC world; it will go away because of the inevitable laws of physics, just like the ability to change your FPU has gone away and the ability to change your GPU will go away soon. Soldered RAM uses less power (relevant today) and can be run at higher frequencies (relevant tomorrow). What Apple is doing will be done by every vendor in three years because physics demands it.
LostAlone - Tuesday, October 28, 2014 - link
But soldered components are blatantly anti-consumer. The ability to change units is not just for power users who like to upgrade, it's critical for being able to service units. Things break sometimes, and being able to fix that yourself is pretty important. How would you feel if your car needed you to call a qualified Honda technician to change a flat tire?And no, the ability switch around components is not just a temporary thing. That is how systems exist and have done literally since the dawn of the personal computer. The first generation of home computers were sold as kits that you physically had to assemble yourself, chip by chip.
Ever since then ever generation of hardware has been built around interoperability and upgrading. The only places where you get soldered on CPUs in the PC market is in embedded systems and similar super-low powered systems like many Atom boards that come with the CPU attached. In every other non-mac system you can swap out parts.
Look at standards like SATA and PCI-Express - They exist specifically so end users can expand a barebones system over time; add a USB 3.0 card or an SSD hard-drive to an aging machine to extend it's life, or add a RAID card and totally repurpose the system into a server. These are important choices. The ability to do more with your hardware than just what it was capable of doing in the box is central to what being a PC user is. You can do more. I still use my ten year old PC as my headless network file server, because I can, because I have the option to do that.
So no, fixing your own PC isn't going anywhere, nor is upgrading. Sorry. Not happening. I cannot imagine why you would think otherwise. Just because Apple does something doesn't make it a good thing, and scrabbling around to find reasons to justify it when in fact what they are doing is flipping consumers the bird and declaring that they don't think you are smart enough to fix something yourself.
Ever since Apple gave up and OSX became just a different operating system running on stock PC hardware they have been trying anything to convince people that they are somehow getting something magically better, even though it's literally the exact same hardware. The fact that they STILL refuse to sell the OS separate to the hardware, even when that hardware is just normal every day PC components that they have assaulted with a soldering iron, is just wrong. It's part of a brand image that still relies on a lot of good will from the days when Macs actually were something different. Well, they aren't. And most users would be radically better of installing OSX onto another manufacturers PC.
The way that Apple handles their desktop and laptop exo system sucks. Don't apologize for them.
ex2bot - Tuesday, October 28, 2014 - link
Whatever your platform of choice (esp. Apple), itis inadequate and ill-advised. Thus I urge, nay, command you to immediately adopt my preferred platform as the obvious technically and morally superior choice. I'll be watching.You have been warned.
sunnohh - Friday, October 31, 2014 - link
12 years as a computer tech and I left to become a stock broker because I could very clearly see that everything should be soldered onto a single component. It's physically faster, tremendously increases reliability (no ram and cpu to unseat), and makes business sense for Apple or anyone serious about making money selling hardware. The industry is moving away from add on tointegrated components Apple isn't the only one: virtually every major manufacturers hi end ultra books are built exactly this way.As computers get faster and more integrated, replace and throw away is the only valid model. Upgrading hardware is nothing more than sentimental; replacing hardware is more economical.
We live in a throw away culture and computing is the ultimate disposable; mores law necessitates this.
Just ask component manufacturers they'll tell you this is happening; their sales prove it.
Buk Lau - Wednesday, October 29, 2014 - link
phones have soldered ram because of form factor. you really think you can fit a SO-DIMM slot inside a case that's less than a quarter of an inch? where did you get the fact that soldered RAM uses less power and can run at higher frequencies? so you are saying your soldered ram can beat 3000mhz DIMM ram? your "physics" seems very out of placemonopodman - Wednesday, October 29, 2014 - link
It's funny because I consider retina MBP one of the first Apple laptops actually worth buying compared to top competitors even regardless of OS X vs. Windows.... I'm totally fine with 16gb of RAM (and I don't care if it's soldered as long as it makes motherboard smaller due to easier routing) or built-in battery (I'd rather have one with higher capacity fit into a smaller and lighter enclosure).appliance5000 - Friday, October 31, 2014 - link
dunno - running an entire heavy graphic oriented system of an 11" air - faster than the old mac pro. Pretty amazing - though I agree regarding difficulty in upgrading -what's acceptable with a laptop is not so much with a desktop.On the other hand the new macpro is a beast and you can add stuff to it to your heart's delight.