Vast majority of iPhone users I know dont pay for iCloud storage and run out pretty quickly. What to do when that happens is often a problem for the older generation.
Cloud storage is nice. I pay Apple money every month for a chunk of it. But it's no substitute for device storage. I don't always have connectivity when I want it. Yeah, I can leave my photos out there, and a lot of my less-used music. But documents, books, the music I listen to all the time...that's all on the device. The cloud is a place to put stuff, but only one of several, and not the main one.
Looks like the US is now experiencing what we in Europe have for the past year or so. Apple prices raised through the roof, I still can't stomach an entry-level macbook pro to cost 1600$ over here.
In Europe the prices have also (once again) increased tremendously, where I’m at the entry level iPad went from €389 to a whopping €589 over night, that’s nearly a 50% increase.
The Euro lost a lot of its value vs the USD and since we import all consumer tech products and they're all priced in USD, we get shafted. The ECB didn't raise rates as much as the US did to halt inflation so now we have this.
Perhaps, but those are made in China, with Taiwanese and Korean parts thrown in, anyway.
Did those raise compared to the Euro? Or it's just that Apple wants to get the same or more amounts of dollar coming in, and the change in Euro vs Dollar is a red herring?
I noticed this too and couldn’t believe it at first. It makes no sense at all. This renders the entry-level iPad essentially dead in the European market. It’s a pointless product for now, especially at 64 GB of storage.
I literally pulled the trigger and bought an M1 Macbook Pro last night because of this. I’d been holding out because they’re going to release the M2 MacBook Pros next month, but last night they put the iPad Air up by £100 and the iPad Mini up by £90 and they didn’t even have any new specs. Following the price increases for everything else the Pros are looking at around £300 to £500 on top of what they already are. And all the indications are that the only spec bump is going to be a minor processor increase. Amazon’s got £100 off the base spec atm so I took it. Got an iPad Air at the old price as well as Amazon hadn’t updated their pricing (and still hadn’t at the time of writing). Reminded me of this article I recently read about how Argentinians survive with near constant inflation https://amp.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2022/oct/08/argenti...
That is curious, I'd glanced at the iPad announcement but hadn't noticed the big price increase. I wonder what the cause is. Are any of the components radically more expensive? Is this the general trend of costs and the previous model was beginning to become uneconomic? Or is it purely a decision about margins?
I think it's a notable signal that Apple continues to sell the 9th-gen iPad at $329, and I don't see it going away in 2023. I believe what we're seeing is effectively Apple's "iPad SE" strategy.
> This new iPad is $700 — $450 plus the $250 keyboard (and $800 if you want the pencil).
This is a weird way to look at it. The attach rate for these Apple peripherals is far, far lower than the author believes. This is especially true for keyboards — a Logitech Bluetooth keyboard with touchpad is $30.
The thing that struck me the most when I saw the price increase was how much closer the entry-level iPad was getting to the iPad Air. My guess would be that they plan on killing the middle-tier Air and just have two tablet lines: entry level and pro, just like the laptops.
This has happened before, they don't end up killing the air. Often when the new "base" iPad has a significant improvement in some way it comes in at a higher price tier and the previous generation sticks around.
The new base iPad is just in a tax year as I like to think of it. If you really do want that better model but not the air you pay the tax. In 12 months or so I'll drop down to the existing previous generation price and that model will finally be phased out.
While on the other end of the spectrum is the new Apple TV 4k with A15 bionic and 128 GB storage for $149. How wrong am I thinking this is a steal? Especially if I want to play Arcade games on this. I wonder if this baby can be jailbroken at some point to run a full blown macos.
Can you explain to me what is the point of such powerful device to stream things? I don’t get the Apple TV. Every time I use it I can’t easily get to what I want and all the stuff that is offered I have to pay. I’ve been seeing it go discounted many times and I wonder if I should get it to replace my $25 Roku but I don’t know what problems it would fix
As mentioned by other commenters: the point is playing games on Apple Arcade. For $149 you get a pretty powerful game console, more powerful than the latest iPad for a fraction of the price. You need to get a controller though or use a PS4/xbox one if you have those.
Otherwise, yes, Apple TV is ridiculously overpowered for a streaming box. I actually don’t get why Apple is not promoting Arcade/gaming on this as the main use case. I was expecting that this would be the main marketing message. The remote should also be more geared towards gaming, initial reports suggested that it could’ve been the case.
Why get extra memory on an apple tv? What would that storage be used for?
The new Apple TV does have extra features at its higher price point (wired ethernet and matter/thread). But I've never understood why I would care how much storage is in a cloud device.
This is apple acting like a "computer" company (those windows laptops with a long lis of irrelevant stats), which they've elsewhere tried to get away from. What they've instead eliminated is any explanation of why you would care.
If you're using it as a pure streaming box, there's no point.
If you're running games, you might reasonably want more storage and Ethernet.
If you're traveling some place that connectivity might be poor (e.g., you have an RV and want the family to be able to watch movies while you drive across $BORING_SCENERY_STATE), you can store more videos on it.
It can download media. Especially useful for media of a higher quality than you can stream, otherwise high quality media wouldn’t even be accessible to many people.
Ofc installing Arcade games is another obvious use-case. I find it pretty trivial to fill up a 64gb and 128gb phone so I don’t see what’s so unbelievable about filling up an Apple TV with 4K media and games.
I agree the new products that Apple released yesterday are underwhelming but this author lost me with constantly saying "Plus the cost of the keyboard" or even rolling it's price into the iPad price to inflate it even further. It feels very dishonest.
So now we can just add all the accessories a device has to the price and pretend that's the price? I've owned multiple iPads (minis) and used many other iPads, I've never used a keyboard with them, I'd never consider the cost of an accessory like a keyboard when thinking about the iPad price itself. Like maybe factor in a case/cover but even that's a stretch since every tablet needs that, Apple or not.
The early framing of it was that they usually offer this as an alternative to a laptop for certain use cases. In that context including the price of the keyboard makes sense.
But they specifically refer to the price of the old model as $329 which doesn't include the keyboard. They are moving the goalposts to try to make this a story. It isn't a story, it's nonsense.
Then write about that - that's not the clickbait angle they have gone for.
A large chunk of that 36% can be explained by inflation - heck perhaps until now they have been artificially keeping the base price low to capture marketshare - who knows?
Full disclosure: I believe that the new price point makes iPad a much less compelling option. I also hate the way the article framed it. There was no need to construct a false reality when they could have simply run with 36% price increase - that's story enough.
They don't compare the old model price with the new plus keyboard and pencil.
What they do is compare the old model price with the new one, and then go on to say the total cost of the new unit to get it with full functionality as a desktop replacement.
So, they don't say: "old model was $329, new is close to $800".
They say: "old model was $329, new is $449. That's quite a lot to get one. Especially since, on top of the already high price, you'll have to fork $348 more if you want the full desktop replacement experience with the extra mouse and keyboard".
Not sure, but I feel you might not get the point the above commenter is saying.
The 9th gen iPad costs $329 , the 10th gen costs $449, and, while it's clear that is a considerable raise for a "budget" tablet (+36%), the author, added an extra $249+$99 (keyboard + pencil) to inflate the price of the iPad 10 up to $800, then compares the new price to iPad 9 price. Doing basic math here, we might be tricked that the new price is more than doubled. Which I consider it a logical fallacy, where you tweak one side of the equation to reach a desired result.
Well, the price might not have doubled for the new iPad alone, but Apple has doubled down on pushing the iPad as a desktop replacement and pushing the keyboard and pencil as much have accessories many new advertised iPad OS features are build for.
And yet they are not required to use the iPad unless you chose to adopt those keyboard centric use cases. It is valid to say that the price of the iPad is $449 + #350 for optional accessories but to just roll those prices into it is misleading to people who aren’t looking for the mythical laptop replacement.
The features Apple has been touting for the modern iPads are about how it can be "a computer" with a keyboard and everything (they have entire ads for the iPad mind you, not the keyboard, that show it used with the keyboard), and also the way it can be used for notetaking, marking annotations, text recognition, and so on with the pencil. Again those two are prominent in the ads and marketing for the iPad, not in separate ads for those alone.
So, both are things people would like to have, and some of the main points of getting an iPad. But they are sold separately, and in unreasonable cost for what they are (heck, the Pencil going for $99 is the 5+ years old one, not even the second gen - which the new iPad doesn't support anyway).
>So now we can just add all the accessories a device has to the price and pretend that's the price?
Why not? When I buy a printer I also check how much its ink sets cost. And if I buy something whose main marketing focus touted as a selling point to me is how great it is with some accessories, I check how much those cost too. Especially if otherwise it's a ho-hum update over previous generations.
An iPad works quite well without a keyboard and pen. It may not work as well for all use cases for all people but it works fully as a tablet without those things. Apple may show it being used in other ways but that doesn’t mean that those accessories are required. Folding those into the price will only scare off people who just want a basic tablet and screen.
The author is comparing the iPad as a laptop replacement, and therefore the price makes sense.
I'm not a fanboy, but I give Apple credit for knowing their market and how to direct their customers to what THEY want the customer to do.
They know that the number of people who use an iPad solely without a keyboard is probably small. Therefore they can up the price, have the accessories, and still make a good comparison to other laptops.
There's probably even a play here that none of us understand.
But we do know that large numbers of people use the low end iPad simply as a device to browse web pages sitting on the couch, browse their photo library, and play games. Those things do not require the accessories. They are only required if you assume that everyone must use the iPad as a laptop and this is more aspirational than reality.
I paid $350 for a refurbished 9th gen with 64GB storage and cellular connectivity and still felt a bit queasy about spending so much on a glorified e-reader/Trello client. Spending $599 for what is essentially the same thing today is ludicrous for my uses... even if I weren't a weirdo that uses a terminal on a daily basis I'm willing to bet I'd be frustrated by i[Pad?]OS's lack of robust multitasking.
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[ 1.9 ms ] story [ 97.7 ms ] threadMy mac has a local copy of all my photos but my ios devices do not. Not sure what else I might want to cache locally.
Perhaps, but those are made in China, with Taiwanese and Korean parts thrown in, anyway.
Did those raise compared to the Euro? Or it's just that Apple wants to get the same or more amounts of dollar coming in, and the change in Euro vs Dollar is a red herring?
> This new iPad is $700 — $450 plus the $250 keyboard (and $800 if you want the pencil).
This is a weird way to look at it. The attach rate for these Apple peripherals is far, far lower than the author believes. This is especially true for keyboards — a Logitech Bluetooth keyboard with touchpad is $30.
The new base iPad is just in a tax year as I like to think of it. If you really do want that better model but not the air you pay the tax. In 12 months or so I'll drop down to the existing previous generation price and that model will finally be phased out.
I just use it to watch streaming channels. It's a "nicer" experience than my FireTV.. the FireTV interface isn't great, and they have ads, etc.
And sure, most of the streaming services require payment.. that's no different than Roku or FireTV or alternatives.
The new Apple TV does have extra features at its higher price point (wired ethernet and matter/thread). But I've never understood why I would care how much storage is in a cloud device.
This is apple acting like a "computer" company (those windows laptops with a long lis of irrelevant stats), which they've elsewhere tried to get away from. What they've instead eliminated is any explanation of why you would care.
If you're running games, you might reasonably want more storage and Ethernet.
If you're traveling some place that connectivity might be poor (e.g., you have an RV and want the family to be able to watch movies while you drive across $BORING_SCENERY_STATE), you can store more videos on it.
I’ve got three of the ‘old’ base 4K models.
And they are constantly running out of space!
They never used to. But now they do.
OS updates are to blame maybe.
I’ve deleted as much as I can, and just have my core 4 streaming app. No games.
And yet still it is offloading things like YouTube and I have to reboot to have a chance of it reinstalling.
Ofc installing Arcade games is another obvious use-case. I find it pretty trivial to fill up a 64gb and 128gb phone so I don’t see what’s so unbelievable about filling up an Apple TV with 4K media and games.
So now we can just add all the accessories a device has to the price and pretend that's the price? I've owned multiple iPads (minis) and used many other iPads, I've never used a keyboard with them, I'd never consider the cost of an accessory like a keyboard when thinking about the iPad price itself. Like maybe factor in a case/cover but even that's a stretch since every tablet needs that, Apple or not.
A large chunk of that 36% can be explained by inflation - heck perhaps until now they have been artificially keeping the base price low to capture marketshare - who knows?
Full disclosure: I believe that the new price point makes iPad a much less compelling option. I also hate the way the article framed it. There was no need to construct a false reality when they could have simply run with 36% price increase - that's story enough.
What they do is compare the old model price with the new one, and then go on to say the total cost of the new unit to get it with full functionality as a desktop replacement.
So, they don't say: "old model was $329, new is close to $800".
They say: "old model was $329, new is $449. That's quite a lot to get one. Especially since, on top of the already high price, you'll have to fork $348 more if you want the full desktop replacement experience with the extra mouse and keyboard".
The 9th gen iPad costs $329 , the 10th gen costs $449, and, while it's clear that is a considerable raise for a "budget" tablet (+36%), the author, added an extra $249+$99 (keyboard + pencil) to inflate the price of the iPad 10 up to $800, then compares the new price to iPad 9 price. Doing basic math here, we might be tricked that the new price is more than doubled. Which I consider it a logical fallacy, where you tweak one side of the equation to reach a desired result.
Well, those are what's pushed in Apple's ads, and those are what the article checks for overall cost for: the desktop replacement case
Not that dishonest.
The features Apple has been touting for the modern iPads are about how it can be "a computer" with a keyboard and everything (they have entire ads for the iPad mind you, not the keyboard, that show it used with the keyboard), and also the way it can be used for notetaking, marking annotations, text recognition, and so on with the pencil. Again those two are prominent in the ads and marketing for the iPad, not in separate ads for those alone.
So, both are things people would like to have, and some of the main points of getting an iPad. But they are sold separately, and in unreasonable cost for what they are (heck, the Pencil going for $99 is the 5+ years old one, not even the second gen - which the new iPad doesn't support anyway).
>So now we can just add all the accessories a device has to the price and pretend that's the price?
Why not? When I buy a printer I also check how much its ink sets cost. And if I buy something whose main marketing focus touted as a selling point to me is how great it is with some accessories, I check how much those cost too. Especially if otherwise it's a ho-hum update over previous generations.
An iPad works quite well without a keyboard and pen. It may not work as well for all use cases for all people but it works fully as a tablet without those things. Apple may show it being used in other ways but that doesn’t mean that those accessories are required. Folding those into the price will only scare off people who just want a basic tablet and screen.
Why would a 10th gen iPad use the 1st gen laggy pencil? I think perhaps the bean counters are in charge now.
I'm not a fanboy, but I give Apple credit for knowing their market and how to direct their customers to what THEY want the customer to do.
They know that the number of people who use an iPad solely without a keyboard is probably small. Therefore they can up the price, have the accessories, and still make a good comparison to other laptops.
There's probably even a play here that none of us understand.