Mac Book Pro To Be Replaced By New Mac Book Air

[JackD201]

Yup. My friend is sending me a cable in a bit. Jeez. How hard could it have been to give you a thunderbolt or USB to ethernet adapter or a thunderbolt to firewire cable. The first would probably cost a few cents the second a few dollars. I wish I had a place to hang a heavy bag right now just to let of some steam. Anybody have a used Slam Man around? LOL.

 

[DonH50]

Ah, I went to their site and checked. Thunderbolt to Ethernet or Firewire is a $29 (USD) adder (each) to the price.

 

[JackD201]

Nevermind the slam man then. I'm off to the gun range.

 

[DonH50]

Taking your new Mac?

 

[asiufy]

While I agree that it'd be nice to have these adapters in the box, at least for the first generations of a new product that gets rid of some old port, Apple traditionally never did that, always selling their own adapters for a premium, and letting others have at it for the cheapie crowd.

I still remember when Jobs got rid of that serial port, putting USB in everything, when PCs didn't even dream of having USB... Of course, no adapters in the box, but you could buy plenty online from other vendors...

When I bought my Retina MBP, I bought all the dongles and adapters Now I just have to remember to bring them along with me on trips...

alexandre

 

[GaryProtein]

While I agree that it'd be nice to have these adapters in the box, at least for the first generations of a new product that gets rid of some old port, Apple traditionally never did that, always selling their own adapters for a premium, and letting others have at it for the cheapie crowd.

I still remember when Jobs got rid of that serial port, putting USB in everything, when PCs didn't even dream of having USB... Of course, no adapters in the box, but you could buy plenty online from other vendors...

When I bought my Retina MBP, I bought all the dongles and adapters Now I just have to remember to bring them along with me on trips...

alexandre

I remember when they got rid of the high density floppy disk! We all had to get outboard floppy drives to use our years worth of data.

The ethernet port is ubiquitous, I can't imagine needing an adapter to get into ethernet based networks. I guess when you're an early adapter, you learn to make certain changes.

 

[JackD201]

While I agree that it'd be nice to have these adapters in the box, at least for the first generations of a new product that gets rid of some old port, Apple traditionally never did that, always selling their own adapters for a premium, and letting others have at it for the cheapie crowd.

I still remember when Jobs got rid of that serial port, putting USB in everything, when PCs didn't even dream of having USB... Of course, no adapters in the box, but you could buy plenty online from other vendors...

When I bought my Retina MBP, I bought all the dongles and adapters Now I just have to remember to bring them along with me on trips...

alexandre

Man, do you think someone buying a $2,000+ laptop would mind them adding 30 bucks to the price to have the friggin' adapter included? No! By the way, my Titanium did come with adapters for printers and external displays. The last generation of Al bodies had ethernet, USB, two kinds of FW and a serial to serial. They did away with the serial with the Unibody.

Migration has always been through FW. They should have given an adapter for the FW to Thunderbolt transition. If Apple has taken on the mentality that they can save millions by putting one less olive in a martini, they are in trouble. They are just lucky that at the moment there's no OS/Hardware package a Mac user finds easier to use. If that comes up I'm switching just like I did from Win to Mac in 2000. They better wake up and see that they are hosing loyal, long time users.

 

[JackD201]

I remember when they got rid of the high density floppy disk! We all had to get outboard floppy drives to use our years worth of data.

The ethernet port is ubiquitous, I can't imagine needing an adapter to get into ethernet based networks. I guess when you're an early adapter, you learn to make certain changes.

I had an external CDR drive for my black. I wasn't around during the Beige days, I was using a Win/Toshiba. That was transferable memory though.

I think this is a totally different issue. This is about ease of migration of personal data from an old device to its replacement, highlighted by the fact that this is a generation change. In my opinion you had better take care of the early adopters and not exploit them.

 

[asiufy]

My Titanium didn't come with any adapters! I still have it lying around the house...
And Jack, MacBook Airs didn't have Firewire, for a new of years now! So you can imagine my puzzlement when I got one, and wanted to restore from backup...
Of course, it doesn't have Ethernet either! Fortunately, I bought the USB-Ethernet adapter, and used that instead (the Migration Assistant works over a local network).
What I'm saying is that this is Apple's normal practice. They expect us (consumers) to just buy the adapters along with our shiny new expensive toys...


alexandre

 

[JackD201]

IMO standard practice doesn't always mean best practice.

 

[rblnr]

When I bought my Retina MBP, I bought all the dongles and adapters Now I just have to remember to bring them along with me on trips...

Yeah, that'll be my problem too. Getting the 13" retina soon and will need both the ethernet and FW adapters. Meanwhile, need to start scouting for some good Thunderbolt drives, probably OWC.

 

[Bill Hart]

Man, do you think someone buying a $2,000+ laptop would mind them adding 30 bucks to the price to have the friggin' adapter included? No! By the way, my Titanium did come with adapters for printers and external displays. The last generation of Al bodies had ethernet, USB, two kinds of FW and a serial to serial. They did away with the serial with the Unibody.

Migration has always been through FW. They should have given an adapter for the FW to Thunderbolt transition. If Apple has taken on the mentality that they can save millions by putting one less olive in a martini, they are in trouble. They are just lucky that at the moment there's no OS/Hardware package a Mac user finds easier to use. If that comes up I'm switching just like I did from Win to Mac in 2000. They better wake up and see that they are hosing loyal, long time users.

The Apple Business Model Applied to Ordering a New Car:
"Ah, Sir, did you want tires with that?"

 

[asiufy]

Nah, I think a more proper analogy would be if Apple created a new standard for car power adapters, and required you to buy an adapter to plug your existing stuff (chargers).


alexandre

 

[Bill Hart]

Alexandre~ I was referring to the Ethernet adapter. We are now pretty much all Apple at home- and my wife likes her Air. I'm going to need to buy something in the next month or so for school, since I am not hauling the desktop to Austin yet (and need something more than my iPad for word documents).

 

[asiufy]

The Ethernet thing was a trade off, as I could see.
If they kept the Ethernet jack there on the thinner machines (Air, Retina MBPs) they just wouldn't be as thin. I guess we can't have it both ways, built in Ethernet AND incredibly thin and light (AND MacOS!)...
If you're going to use the machine as a desktop replacement, it won't be a problem to keep the adapter permanently on the end of the Ethernet cable.

alexandre

 

[JackD201]

For me it is this simple. Put the damn adapter in the box and add the price to that of the laptop. $30 bucks is nothing.

It being a first generation, every one migrating to a TB unit is going to need and buy one anyway. Why **** off an old loyal customer at all? Probably because there are so many fan boys out there that just accept it for what it is and take PR matters into their own hands.

No offense alexandre but really, wouldn't you have just found it better to have the adapters included? Don't you think they could have saved at least five minutes of your time by doing so for money they will make anyway? While they were at it that would have been one less box for the landfill.

Yeah, I'm still pissed. It is a cheap way to do things for a company built on quality.

 

[asiufy]

Jack,

I'm with you on this, I'm not defending Apple at all. Specially since, on this matter, they're practically impossible to defend
Just because I try to understand their reasoning to doing things, doesn't mean I agree with it! And you're right too in that the user base (or the press!) hasn't complained about this matter in a long time, while they should be.


alexandre