Apple Reports Second Quarter Results
apple.comI’m not surprised that the iPad has a decline. My son has a few year old 9.7” iPad and it works great still. Consume media very easily and even have games. I can notice the difference between it and my 2018 iPad Pro but I could see people are just not going buy new ones every year or two. I’d like the M1 iPad Pro but it’s not worth the jump in price.
Yeah. Until Apple presents a good software reason to upgrade an iPad, most people are just going to stick with the iPad they have until it breaks.
Indeed, I think the artificial restrictions on iPadOS are the #1 reason the iPad isn't eating up a larger part of the laptop space. Until software on the iPad becomes more useful, there is less reason to upgrade.
Yeah, an iPad is mostly a "consumption" device and better screens or faster processors or more speakers aren't much of an incentive to upgrade the device when you also consider the higher cost. I guess that is why Apple has been trying to turn it into a laptop like device with the iPad Pro + keyboard. But then, when you consider the limitations of iPadOS, it's becomes very hard to justify the higher cost for the Pro when a laptop is cheaper and more productive for the same use case.
Outside niche games that require performance, there is just no reason to upgrade a dumb media device.
I use mine mostly for drawing.
Apple Pencil! iPad with procreate is bread and butter.
It was what got me to go for the pro.
The 2018 iPad 6th gen is also compatible with the Apple Pencil :)
While true it's a huge difference to draw with 60 Hz refresh rate and a big gap between the glass and the screen panel versus 120 Hz and a very tiny gap
My ipad mini 2nd edition works well but a number of apps are no longer available due the fact that they require a minimum os version. They will force upgrade by not providing software updates.
Mac was the fastest growing hardware product too
(ref: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/28/apple-aapl-earnings-q2-2022....)
Btw, the repurchase program just got way bigger:
> The board of directors has also authorized an increase of $90 billion to the existing share repurchase program.
Is the "Services" category under Net Sales where they're sticking the app store/B2B service revenue (ads, payments)?
Yes.
And yet, the stock goes down. Market expectation is truly unpredictable. FB missed revenue expectation and went up.
If you assume the market estimates the true value of a company, any reasonable model will have it predict a company’s value with an error that may be either too high or too low.
When a new data point comes in, the market adjusts its estimate. That can be lower than it was, certainly if its previous estimate was too high.
It seems the market expected Apple to do even better.
Because of something called P/E ratio
That has about as much to do with earnings as a coin flip. If it was entirely that everyone would just buy based on P/E. and since that’s a public number all stocks would be predictable. Instead we have TSLA at 128 P/E and AAPL at 28 P/E, MDB is at 9 P/E and was -2 a few months ago. None of that makes sense it’s purely speculation. I’ve seen stocks completely miss and fly off good guidance. And stocks beat by a lot and sell off because there is no volume.
Stocks are risk adjusted speculation, we want to think they are not, but it is simply not true.
>Because of something called P/E ratio
It is not.
It is about guidence for the next quater - Apple Posted Another Great Quarter. The Next One Might Not Be As Good. (apple themselves say)
supply chain issues
Net sales: $97 billion
Operating income: $30 billion
Net income: $25 billion
Net sales by category in millions -
iPhone : $50,570
Mac: $10,435
iPad: $7,646
Wearables, Home and Accessories: $8,806
Services: $19,821
Services at 40% of iPhone revenue is pretty amazing.
What !! Mac 20% of the iPhone cash cow, come on hire 20 more devs for macOS
I know m1 switch took some effort
"Apple Reports Second Quarter Results Revenue up 9 percent to new March quarter record
Services revenue reaches new all-time high"
For anyone like me who didn't want to actually have to go a read them :D
Revenue: B$97.3, up 9% EPS: $1.52 Operating Cashflow: B$28 Returned B$27 to shareholder (buybacks, dividends I assume?)
Ah:
Divided: $0.23/share Share pepurchase fund increase: B$90
These earnings are insane! Check out the P/E of the stock tomorrow even after it goes up at the open, the stock is still a steal at this price.
25-30x PE is not a steal lol. What kind of funny math is that?
I like to buy my companies at about 15x P/E.
> its fiscal 2022 second quarter ended March 26, 2022.
Apple's 2022Q1 is completely in 2021?
I'm not sure what I'm supposed to take away from that. I'm well aware a fiscal year doesn't need to match a calendar year, but I've never heard of a company starting prior to the calendar year, and usually it's at least month-aligned. (Almost sort of one of those "assumptions programmers make about time" article bullets…)
Like, given that the fiscal year doesn't have to match the calendar year, why not slip some leap days or not slip some leap days to at least align subsequent FYs to a month? (If not a quarter, since they seem pretty close but not quite.)
It’s actually very common among enterprise software companies
yes, I would expect many companies are based on june so Q1-Q2 are in year n-1.
I am simply amazed by how much money this company makes. Nice boost to Mac business with the new Macbook Pros selling like hotcakes and OOS constantly.
They are worth it. Nearly every complaint was addressed in the new MacBooks Pros and I feel like its a return to form for the company. The only downsides I can really see is that Wifi on the laptop should have been 6E and the SD Card should have been SD Express but it seems like it was that way due to the length it took being engineered (which isn't an excuse).
It's actually better than "return to form", for once Apple has embraced 'form follows function' with more ports (even 'legacy' HDMI), magsafe power, and a chunky body, rather than function fit into form.
My only gripe is the lack of USB-A to make it truly dongle free.
Just buy a USB-C to USB-A adapter and leave it permanently attached.
USB-A is a legacy connector and needs to just die already.
Like just constantly have a dongle hanging off the side of your laptop, waiting to get bent? Possibly damaging to port?
Then don't get the dongle. Just upgrade your accessory to use USB type C. Having a bulky USB A port just to appease the 1% of users who spend $2000 on a shiny new macbook but cheap out on a mouse they've been using from the 90s? I exaggerate, but if you really want to keep your old accessories then leave the dongle permanently attached to the accessory. You can get like a 10 pack for like $5 probably.
It isn't really a matter of cost, so much as the inconvenience of replacing all the peripherals I've accumulated over time (ignoring the fact that there isn't even a USB-C version of my favorite keyboard).
Yes adapters are possible, however an even better solution (in that it doesn't require remembering to bring an adapter everywhere) is just to buy a different brand of laptop.
Just buy a couple of these [1] (can probably find them cheaper even) and leave them attached to the peripheral (not your Mac)
- [1] https://satechi.net/products/aluminum-usb-c-to-usb-a-adapter...
It is clearly possible to find workaround, but it seems weird to need one on a $2000 laptop when other companies manage to fit it on cheaper, thinner laptops.
Your requirement of a USB Aport to satisfy an esoteric accessory is a niche use case. They are not going to include A USB A just like why they won’t add a firewire port to satisfy that 1%.
Pretty much all new keyboards, even niche ones, now come with Type C standard. Plus you are making a huge deal out of the graceful degradation of attaching an adapter to your keyboard. If we’re going to permanently retrofit something its going to be your keyboard—not the macbook.
I upgrade my gear regularly. And because of that I pretty much never use USB A. Apple designs their products for people who upgrade their gear. If they add a USB A to my shiny new laptop it’d be quite annoying because it is 1 extra port that I will never use that is probably there at the expense of another Type C port.
I think we might just be posting from different universes or something. Where I'm at USB-A is not really a niche interface. I don't know what to tell you.
If you upgrade the minor peripherals to the newest versions you’ll find USB A is not really used anymore.
Is this a subtle troll or something?
Yes obviously, if I get all new peripherals with USB-C compatibility (other than things like my keyboard and mouse, which don't have USB-C versions, and which are actually my favorite peripherals) then I won't encounter USB-A. Unless I leave my house, where the rest of the world hasn't upgraded to USB-C yet.
There are $3 versions of the adapter. Yeah this USB shit is annoying but I bought 10 of each. 2 sets in backpack, 2 in computer bag, 2 in desk and a few permanently attached where they’re used most often.
Annoying but fine. Don’t think about it much.
Edit: YMMV but Macbook is not the only offender. Comes up with random combinations of things because cars, desks, cafes, etc all have a mix of USB A/C charging ports. And so do my various devices. The adapters are useful all the time.
How many peripherals do you take with you when you leave the house?
I've found a single, compact USB-C hub does fine for me, but of course YMMV.
I mean it is unusual situations. And, I like my USB-C ports! But it isn't a mutually exclusive thing.
For example, I work at a university, in an office. If my laptop lacked the normal USB port, I'd probably have an adapter or hub in my backpack or at my desk. But if I'm in a rush to a meeting, I might just grab my laptop and not my backpack. So, if somebody needs to share a file using a bog standard USB drive, I'm out of luck.
I'm capable of adapting around this and it isn't a huge hassle really, but... my current laptop is cheaper than a... any Macbook, I think, and thinner than a Macbook pro, and still ASUS managed to fit in a USB-A (and even a legacy HDMI!) port. I dunno. It is ASUS, I don't think they've got any wild engineering talent that would blow Apple's mind... it just doesn't seem very hard.
Find a new wired mouse with a USB C connector. USB A isn't dead just yet. Also doesn't really help in the scenario where maybe you need to grab files off a client or colleague's flash drive...
https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/accessories-and-software/keyb...
They’re out there.
Would a USB A be nice? Probably.
They're out there but not commonplace. Walk into a Staples or Best Buy and they're either USB A corded or USB A wireless dongles with a dash of Bluetooth.
That's because no one even makes them anymore e.g. Logitech has ZERO normal wired mice.
So of course you're seeing USB-A mice because they are probably old models from the 2000s.
> That's because no one even makes them anymore e.g. Logitech has ZERO normal wired mice
They have two USB-A mice and one mouse that has USB-C, Bluetooth, and their own wireless interface. Depending on what you mean by "normal" that is either 3 or 2 normal wired mice.
https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/mice.html?filters=co...
I mean Razer released a new wired Deathadder in 2020 with USB A. All of Logitechs non-Bluetooth wireless mice come with receivers that use USB A. Logitech doesn't even sell a USB C wireless receiver yet as an option, just an adapter.
More like: constantly attached to the cable. Only USB-A device I use is a printer and I have an adapter permanently attached to the cable.
That's a solution I guess. It could result in an annoying edge case if you wanted to for example bring your laptop somewhere else, and borrow a peripheral there. (I'm sure someone will be along to correct me, with the information that using a laptop as a portable device is some niche use-case that Apple shouldn't care about).
I keep one of these in my laptop case: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07CVX3516/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_8Q...
It’s worked great for years.
Why does it need to die?
There is absolutely zero need for USB-A. None. It does nothing whatsoever that USB-C can't do, and there are ton of things that USB-C can do better. There is no need for two USB "mid sized" plug standards - and obviously USB-C is now the dominant. Almost every single peripheral, device, component, that can run on USB-A runs on USB-C. And there is a huge contingent of devices that could never run on USB-A. As soon as everyone has agreed that USB-A is dead, completely dead, people will cease manufacturing USB-A peripherals, which further enhances the value of a port that almost everyone is now using for everything.
Honestly - the USB-A port should have been wiped out a couple years ago - the only reason it didn't is that everyone has this massive legacy of USB-A ports (Hotels, Airports, Airplanes, etc...) that people plug into, which kept them holding onto those legacy peripherals longer than they should have. Also - some weird hardware dongles that haven't been upgraded to USB-C.
What we need to do is start seeing how quickly Hotels/Cars/Airplanes/Airports/... start switching over to USB-C. When that happens there will be this massive cascade effect - it will be exponential:
I'm guessing by 2032, nobody will be carrying legacy USB-A peripherals anymore. Only wildcard will be if there is a USB-next that will replace C. Please don't let that happen before USB-C takes over the world.2022 - ~0% of legacy is USB C 2023 - 1% legacy USB-C 2024 - 2% legacy USB-C 2025 - 4% legacy USB-C 2026 - 8% legacy USB-C 2027 - 16% legacy USB-C 2028 - 32% legacy USB-C 2029 - 64% legacy USB-C 2030 - 90% legacy USB-C 2031 - 95% legacy USB-C> There is absolutely zero need for USB-A. None. It does nothing whatsoever that USB-C can't do, and there are ton of things that USB-C can do better.
What's the USB-C story nowadays if you have N USB-C peripherals and M USB-C ports where N > M?
Most USB-C hubs seem to have one USB-C for connecting to the computer, one USB-C for connecting to a peripheral, and then a bunch of USB-A for connecting to more peripherals.
To get something that actually increases the number of USB-C peripherals, especially if more than one of your peripherals needs more than low power, and is reliable it appears that you have to get a Thunderbolt 3 or 4 dock and it is pretty pricey.
Until there are cheap reliable 1 to many USB-C hubs USB-A is not going to go away.
Also, it always takes three tries to get a USB-A plug into the socket.
I have a USB-A Yubikey and I prefer it to the crappy USB-C one that’s just too small.
The argument is that it's legacy and it will die because USB-C is better is a variety of ways. And in true Apple fashion, Apple is killing it somewhat aggressively. Though it's not just Apple. Something like a Google Pixelbook is USB-C only as well.
The same thing can be said for the unnecessary apple lightning plug - it serves no purpose other than apple selling adapters and blocking usb-c use. Yet it keeps being used. Lots of companies have things with only usb-c but the real problem is not new use, it's the billions of devices with usb-a plugs on them. In my house there are probably 10 usb-c plugs across several computers and 100 usb-a things to plug in.
The Lightning connector was introduced in 2012 while USB-C was introduced in 2014.
My theory is that Apple made commitments to keep supporting the Lightning connector on their phones for a number of years to get manufacturers to create devices with it.
Say whatever you want, when it was introduced it was clearly a big improvement over the micro USB connectors everyone else was using. By now it’s holding them back though.
The main purpose lightning serves is that it removes a barrier to Apple customers upgrading to the next iPhone. Apple will get to USB-C--probably sooner rather than later; I wouldn't bet against this year--but that's actually a case of getting onto a standard even though there's no real advantage right now for Apple customers and some pain.
Apple won't move to USB-C for the iPhone.
They are actively looking at how to transmit data over the Magsafe adapter. Once that happens there will be no ports.
because inferior tech that lasts a long time has a constant tax on productivity.
I think I’m less productive with a dongle to use a USB type A device on my laptop than I would be with a single port.
o-rly? Aside from my phone, every single thing I have in my home is using USB-A.
Exactly. USB A would be far more useful than the SD card slot for almost everyone.
MacBook Pro is not designed for everyone.
Content creators rely on SD cards everyday and cameras actively sold today use it.
Devices stopped being shipped with USB-A a long time ago now.
I have a hard time believing that people use SD cards more frequently than they do USB-A. Sure, photographers probably get good use out of it, but developers, students, content creators who aren't shooting with DSLR, animators, musicians, 3D artists, regular artists and video editors will probably never touch it.
There are plenty of fairly common USB-A peripherals still in use anyways. A lot of audio interfaces, mice, keyboards and webcams rely on low-bandwidth but ubiquitous ports like USB-A. Apple and their pride would never put one on a modern Mac, but we're really at an impasse: neither side will adopt either standard, so it's more likely that we'll simply see wireless peripherals gain popularity instead. Not exactly bad, but kinda an asinine take for a company that just released a professional desktop computer with USB-A, but refused to add it to their laptops.
How many of those devices have fixed cables? I bought a few USB-C to Mini-USB/Micro-USB/Micro-USB3/USB-B/Lightning cables and replaced all the cables on my devices.
Now if only my car had a USB-C plug…
Mice, keyboards and webcams are typically non-negotiable. Audio interfaces are pretty regularly replaceable, but it certainly doesn't improve the compatibility quotient by leaving the ports off it.
> Devices stopped being shipped with USB-A a long time ago now.
Are you talking about Macs or devices in general? My 2021 laptop has an SD card slot, x2 USB A and x2 USB C (well, Thunderbolt 4). Despite how much I like USB C (all the devices I take with me have it), USB A is still here and will be for quite a while.
Oh, I forgot to mention that my laptop also has (full-sized!) HDMI and a headphone jack.
> Devices stopped being shipped with USB-A a long time ago now.
I interpreted this to mean the male side. Sure you can still buy laptops that accept USB-A, but I haven't seen any peripheral that still uses USB-A in a long time. I'm sure you could still buy a thumb drive with USB-A, but I wouldn't.
>I haven't seen any peripheral that still uses USB-A in a long time.
Wired Mice, Wired Keyboards, Thumb drives, external hard drives, printers, webcams, external cd/dvd/bluray drives, etc..
What peripherals do you look at? Barely any of them use USB-C unless they're explicitly USB-C docks, or Thunderbolt peripherals.
This is all kind of old tech though. Mice, keyboards and printers have been wireless for ages. Yes, I realize there's a gamer population that prefers wired peripherals for the latency, but some gamers only play on CRT monitors for the same reason - it doesn't make them not outdated tech. If I started a new job and they gave me a wired mouse I'd think they hate me.
The storage solutions you listed (thumb drives, hard drives, optical drives) aren't used daily by most people, and are all widely available with USB-C.
I bought a brand new external hard drive last week and it comes with USB A. All of the competing products were the same.
USB C has replaced microUSB for most devices, but USB A still dominates by a long margin.
> Mice, keyboards and printers have been wireless for ages.
Doesn't necessarily mean they use USB-C though. Logitech's Unifying receivers are still (sadly) reliant upon USB-A, although someone modified one of them to use USB-C instead[0] :-)
Can you show me a decent optical drive with a USB-C cable? Because I can't find one.
Also, yes many mice and keyboards do come with Bluetooth. But all of the ones that require dongles for wireless are only USB-A. No USB-C Logitech Unifying/Bolt receivers.
Maybe you're just seeing older models.
But every new device today is overwhelmingly shipping with USB-C.
You've obviously never purchased anything from Logitech. Nor have you looked at external hard drives (not SSDs).
> Nor have you looked at external hard drives
All of my caddies use that weird micro-USB plug that can do USB-3, which is cool. In theory it'd be easy to convert that to USB-C... just change the plug on the end, or just make both ends USB-C. I typically find those cables to not lock into the port very well.
Photographers use SD Cards. Most Everyone uses keyboard, mice and plenty still have USB thumb drives.
The strongest argument for a built-in SD card slot is it can give you something like 1TB of cheap additional storage as well as serving as a backup when traveling. Probably not a super-common use case though.
(Yes, photographers use SD cards although they often connect cameras directly and USB SD readers are cheap.)
I use my sd card slot for additional storage by buying this: https://www.amazon.com/Transcend-JetDrive-Expansion-MacBook-...
I use it for noncritical data because the sd card is slow and it could fail. Mainly recent downloads or video files.
I'd need a hub in my office anyway. But when traveling it would be nice to have a USB-A so that I could mostly get by without plugging in a hub or at least a dongle.
I agree they are selling MBPs like hotcakes. M1 Max MBPs are no where to find and have been in backlog for months now.
Airs and 14" MBPs are 5-7 weeks out in Ireland. I've never seen delivery times like this since the bad old days when their supply chain sucked and they were nearly dead.
Much of it is demand side. People are replacing their Macbooks from 2013 and up. It’s saying a lot about Intel mobile chips as well as the new M1 chips that basically redefined how Macbooks can be used which is to say you don’t need to be near a power plug.
am I alone in appreciating the touch bar? I just love being able to press debug, step over and into code, switch to a different window and be able to quickly access context aware functionality. Oh and its so damn quiet and fast, I'm loving the M1 processor
downside are the two usb-c and the endless accessories that are quite expensive
I had a touchbar mac since it came out and i probably touched the touchbar around 3 times
I have it configured so that the touch bar just shows F keys at all times. It's a really technologically advanced row of F keys for me, only difference being this extra advancement has no tactile feedback.
really? I use it all the time
Any chance Apple will launch MacBooks with 5G chips? I'm hoping to get to a tether -free easy roaming setup in the next few years
I've ordered a new macbook 14" in early March, my delivery date slipped twice already, now it says it's going to be delivered in July. I wonder how much more money would they make if not for supply issues.
They mentioned in the conference call they anticipate $4 to $8 billion in supply chain related lost business in this quarter.
At 33% profit margin and using the mid-point of $6 billion that would cost them $2 billion in missed profit this quarter.
Well it’s stopped me from upgrading my maxed out 2015 mbp. I’m very impatient and the 2015 is still going strong so part of me doesn’t even want to spend the money on a new device and then wait months for it to arrive.
You've been waiting 7 years already, what is another couple of months?
Must just be the 14" models? Best buy near me has the 16" models available for pickup and they are on sale for $250 off right now, making them cheaper than the 14".
yeah I got a studio w/studio display+trade in, the studio itself arrive in a week or so I think? with a week available for the return. Then at the end of the delivery window for the display the silently bumped it to Aril 27. Yesterday they silently bumped it to May 27.
Fair depressing experience.
Ditto. At this point it’s easier just to drive to Chicago and pick one up.
Same issue with the Studio Display.
In most countries the backlog is 1-2 months away.
Likewise. I cancelled my order as a result.
I mean, you paid them already.
Apple doesn’t take the money until they ship it. People waiting on orders have not paid
Long lead times can make people hold off on the purchase. IME it’s pretty rare for someone to see an ETA of ~4+ weeks and still go ahead with a purchase.
The Watch, Mac and iPhone are doing great but the iPad lacks ambition and doesn't seem to have a direction. Who is in charge of the iPad division at Apple?
> Who is in charge of the iPad division at Apple
Apple isn't organized by product like other large tech companies, instead it's organized by function. E.g. no divisions like iPad, Mac, iPhone. It's divisions like hardware, software, RF, etc. Each division works on all products.
I use the iPad Mini for taking handwritten notes and it works beautifully for that use case.
I would use an iPad Pro as my "laptop" if Apple would let me run macOS. It's a Macbook Air but without a directly attached keyboard saddled with an inappropriate OS for the hardware.
What do you use for your notes? Is it crazy to just use the built in Notes app?
You didn't ask me but I use Nebo; I found out about it when investigating the file format used by the Kobo Elipsa. I like it because of its realtime handwriting conversion, no recurring fees, cloud sync and backup, and easy export to pdf with text conversion preservation.
My student son put me onto Notability yesterday (I got a new ipad pro). It's pretty cool. He swears by it for all his math and economics lectures.
I use Bear.
I remember headlines calling the iPad a big iPod touch when it came out.
…which is maybe kinda true? I have no idea if they want to make it a “Pro” device, despite the Pro moniker, because you still have such weird multitasking UI paradigms and so many limitations in terms of pro features. (Audio routing comes to mind. You can’t have Audio Hijack for iOS.)
And the value proposition of a fully loaded iPad with keyboard case is pretty dubious to me compared to just getting a MacBook Air. I know, I know, less apps, not a touch screen…but I can just do so much more with a Mac, and with the ARM transition, I also get the insane battery life of an iPad.
I think it's really just a limitation of the formfactor. It's first and foremost a touchscreen-centric device. Sure, you can clip a keyboard onto it to type easier and get a weird not-quite-cursor to interact with it, but at it's core, it will always be a touchscreen device, and as such can't expect users to keep peripherals on them at all times to make it more usable. So the OS will always be targeting the vast majority of its users, who are just poking at a touchscreen.
And touchscreen interfaces need to have all their points of interaction on them, or hidden behind non-obvious gestures which does not make for a very good power-user software interface. And iOS at its core (I know they call it iPadOS now, but let's be real, it's iOS with a half-hearted splitscreen/windowing system on top) is made to be a walled garden. A nice walled garden, sure. But not something for productivity, other than its own very specific scenarios, like digital art where you're only planning on drawing, and not going too far outside of the clean-cut path that it expects to be used in.
So for most people, it's just another screen to watch Netflix and YouTube. And it's pretty expensive for that.
I would argue that the typical reader at hacker news is not the target audience for iPad. Think young children and grandparents. My elderly mother loves her ipads. She has three of them. She can watch youtube on them, check email, chat apps, play music, control her TV. My preschool nieces and nephews love the iPad similarly for youtube and games. iPads are the easiest to use computers for people who are, for one reason or another, functionally computer-illiterate.
I like to consider myself computer literate but absolutely hate using a computer other than when somebody’s paying me to do it. At home it’s 100% iPad Pro or Kindle for my screen time.
Having an older iPad Pro has prevented me from buying a laptop. It’s just so easy to crack it open (with Brydge keyboard) and do whatever I need. Anything to prevent me from having to sit in front of my actual PC is good for me.
Sure for the iPad, but what about the iPad Pro? What's the point of that product when the iPad non-Pro easily fulfills the computer-illiterate sector.
One has to assume that the ultimate direction is for some sort of convergence of iPad and MacBook. But no one at Apple has figured a good way to do that which isn't a fatal compromise. I use my iPad but it's a pretty optional device for me and I mostly use it when traveling. (I admittedly can't draw to save my life and I really want to get back on a computer pretty quickly when I'm doing things like searching.
> one has to assume that the ultimate direction is for some sort of convergence of iPad and MacBook
Why?
Because, for example, I'd prefer to travel with a single device and the MacBook is better than the iPad at certain things and vice versa. It's not that big an imposition to take two devices to be sure--and I'm sure Apple doesn't mind the extra sales. And I can mostly sub my phone and maybe a Kindle if I'm trying to go light. But it feels as if there's the potential for a unified device someday there--if it can be without compromises.
Everyone knows two screens are better than one. So take both, and use the iPad as the second screen when using the laptop, and as a tablet when you’re not?
The trajectory is obvious, and includes iPhone. You don't need three different chips, just different interfaces. One unified computing and storage general purpose computer, available via mobile, audio (Airpods), visual (AR), large UI (Macbook / Mac), health (Watch), etc. They're already unifying under M1 / ARM.
> already unifying under M1 / ARM
It's far from obvious to me. Unifying back ends and unifying products are night and day propositions. Nothing Apple is doing points towards a thin-client strategy.
I mean, they are building their own processors now, and both the macbook and the iPad have the same processor. Why maintain two operating systems if one could work. I say that because obviously there are differences with iOS and MacOS, but apple controls both.
Because iOS was designed for touch and MacOS designed for mouse.
Very hard to unify completely different paradigms.
The problem with the iPad in my eyes isn't the mouse vs. touch issue. Yes, you want the UI to be designed for touch, on the other side the iPad now also supports a mouse.
The thing is a quite different point: the availability of software and the interactions. The iPad limits software to the App Store and its very restricted rules. Which makes the iPad nice for tasks which can be done completely inside one App, if that App exists in the first place. But it is really bad at any work flow which would involve multiple programs and a lot of programs aren't even allowed on the App Store.
On the Mac, one is free to run any software one wants, it is very easy to write your own. If it only is a quick shell script or python program. And it is trivial to combine multiple software in one project, just access the project directory from all involved programs.
There seems to be some capability of sharing file space between apps on the iPad, there is a great Git client called "Working Copy" which I can highly recomment which can interact with other apps, but that is quite an exception. In most cases, Apps on the iPad don't really support free data exchange with each other. My pet peeve: you cannot even add your own music to the music player on the iPad. It is sitting uselessly in Files and I can't access it.
It has the ambition, agree that they haven't figured it out yet. I think that it just might be a hard problem to figure out. I have an iPhone, an iPad, and a MacBook. I really understand when I want to use the phone or the notebook computer. The iPad is sort of in the middle.
I have made attempts at doing all my work stuff on it, but failed every time. Simple things like taking a screenshot over here and pasting it over there just feel harder on the iPad. I really want them to figure it out though!
I believe it is time for Apple to rethink iPad and MacBook. They both have the same chip now.
iPad should be a Macbook Air.
Apple already allows to run iPad applications on macOS. They should completely destroy iPadOS, and let macOS run on iPad. I would prefer to have powerful OS (macOS) with some glitches on iPad, than to have an iPad with limited OS (and still have glitches to be honest). I even ok to use similar to Windows 8 idea, you aren't plugged in to keyboard - it is going to look like an iPadOS (with different app launcher), and when you connect keyboard you can use macOS.
The only reason I am still own iPad (to be honest two of them), is because I cannot disconnect screen from my laptop, even that is not the biggest issue, but because there is no Netflix app, and I cannot download movies to watch in the plane.
>iPad should be a Macbook Air.
Isn’t there already a MacBook Air?
It just seems that trying to use the Mac UI purely by touch would be godawful. I mean how do you Command-click, or right-click a UI element with your finger? These are solvable, but only with horrible compromises. The iPad has a completely different interaction model to very good reasons, and this would utterly butcher it. Microsoft tried this approach and it was disastrous.
Yes the iPad has its limitations, but also incredible strengths. The new multitasking gesture system is a vast improvement.
> It just seems that trying to use the Mac UI purely by touch would be godawful. I mean how do you Command-click, or right-click a UI element with your finger?
That's already in iPad OS/iOS. It's the long touch.
>Microsoft tried this approach and it was disastrous.
Surface Pro/Go is a pretty successful product for Microsoft.
I got a Surface 7+ recently and really like it. I can put full desktop applications (firefox + ublock origin, pycharm) and have it better mirror my dev environment with WSL.
Windows 11 on a tablet is really not that bad.
(I also run linux on a desktop and have an iPhone and Apple Watch, so not a hater by any stretch of the imagination)
The Surface has come a long way. I had (and still have) a Surface Pro 3 that had pretty much everything going for it: excellent build quality, great high-res screen, nice optional keyboard and decent PC-grade specs. There were two major flaws, though:
1. Linux support was pretty bad. You needed a custom kernel for an enjoyable experience, and even that was pretty unusable on anything other than x11 GNOME.
2. The overheating was a dealbreaker. I presume this was either a driver issue or hardware failure, but the device would regularly hit 55c in normal workloads, which was a no-go for that sort of product.
It was so close to being the Linux iPad of my dreams, but fell just short. I might give one of the later models a shot someday, but I'm not really in a rush. Maybe once Alder Lake makes it's way into a decent Windows convertible, it will finally be The Year of the Linux Tablet.
I have a m3 Surface Go 2. It's making a fairly decent Linux tablet with Arch using Gnome 42 (Wayland) and the mainline kernel. The camera doesn't work well, but everything else does including LTE.
It's actually a ton faster in Linux, but with a bit worse battery life.
The biggest flaw with using Linux on the earlier Surface line was the shit Marvell Wifi. That would drop out all the time. So glad they switched to Intel for the later ones.
Hm, I think I'll still wait for the Alder Lake update, but it really does sound like a good setup. If I didn't disagree with the direction GNOME was going in this choice would be a lot easier...
When combined with Apple Pencil it’s the best digital note taking device. I hardly need to use pen and paper any more. Note taking, reading books and watching videos, playing board games makes it’s a fun and work device. YMMV.
Same. I have both an iPhone and a MacBook as well, but with the Pencil, I just want to do everything on the iPad. It’s become my single notebook and sketchbook—-this is saying a lot coming from someone who has gone through countless fancy notebooks and fountain pens. I still use traditional media for anything I want to last, but for ideation and sketching practice, it’s all iPad all the time for me now.
Yeah, maybe I'm doing it wrong. Don't try to do everything on it, just use it for when you would want to sketch things out and don't look back. This comment inspired me to plug in my pencil and try it out for that.
> I really understand when I want to use the phone or the notebook computer. The iPad is sort of in the middle.
I'd never seen it put that way before, but I think it hits the nail right on the head for me. I do like my 2020 iPad Air when I use it, and the pencil is great; however, I basically end up using it as easy scratch paper or when copy-pastable handwriting is useful. Plus when I need an extra screen to go with my laptop.
It definitely has nice features, but doesn't feel like a compelling use-case overall, yet.
The most compelling use case I've seen yet for the iPad is for regular people who don't want a desktop or laptop computer, but don't want to do everything on their phone. The iPad is just a really big smartphone that with a folio keyboard can become an impromptu laptop if needed. In my extended family I have a few people who are using it for this exact use case and love it. Only one of them even has the keyboard, and all of them do everything on their iPad they'd otherwise use a 'real' computer for.
Another great use for the iPad is for sheet music. IME it is better than paper and much, much, much better than trying to use an iPhone or PC (which I've done sporadically).
Niche use case, but totally agreed. I was holding onto paper sheet music for the longest time, but no desire to even look back after switching to iPad for that purpose.
It helps that the app I use easily integrates with any cloud storage you would want to use, so I can easily just get sheet music using any personal device and just drop it into my cloud folder. And the next time I sit down at the piano, all those sheets are already there.
Way back when the iPad first came out, I didn't get it. But I read a lot, got one, and rather liked it. My conclusion was it (especially pre-pencil) was a somewhat luxury and rather optional device that did some things quite well. But was rather unnecessary compared to a MacBook or iPhone (or substitute some generic equivalent). And even non-Max smartphones are much bigger than they used to be.
A while ago I had an iPad, didn’t like it because of its limitations, and sold it. Now I have an iPad and love it despite its limitations. I think iPadOS still has a way to go, but it’s definitely progressing for me.
iPad has so much potential with M1 now. They can make it a hybrid with iOS and MacOS for example. In fact, I’d be shocked if that’s not what they end up doing with the M2 line of iPad Pros.
Yea, what if one could instantly switch between macos and ios?
Imagine having a super powerful ipad pro running mac os for your work stuff, and when you are lying on the couch you detach the keyboard and any external monitors and switch to the more touch friendly ios.
I think that would be a much better approach than to try to merge the 2 OSes into one hybrid OS that can do neither this nor that very well.
I suspect the big issue here is that macOS has far fewer restrictions on its use than iOS does. So Apple would need to either lock down macOS, or open up iOS. They can't lock down macOS because of professionals, and they really don't want to open up iOS.
I don't think iPads would need to run "Mac OS", just quite a few artificial restrictions on iPadOS would need to be lifted. I need to be able to install software myself on the device - be it only a small shell script or python program - and most importantly, I need to be able to share files between programs in the sense that several programs need access to the same file and can interact with it.
I don't think Apple would ever bring full MacOS to the iPad. I could imagine them allowing M1 native Mac Apps to run on the iPad tho.
Since the iPad and the Mac use essentially the same CPU now, why not allow Apps to be cross platform between the two? I know you can run some iPad Apps on the Mac, but why not the other way?
If you could run Mac apps on the iPad, would that hurt mac sales? Possibly. Although, I could imagine many non-mac users would buy an iPad if it could run VS Code.
iPad is the best selling tablet in the world and steadily taking over more laptop functions.
Anecdotal but I am still fine with a 2013 iPad Air, just missing some features because of the non upgradable os. Not sure that the fact that sales are decreasing means that the iPad is doing bad
What an amazing company!