Apple sold 2.53 million laptops in the first quarter of 2016, a 40.4 percent quarterly decline, according to research firm TrendForce.
The first quarter of any given year is never great for laptop sellers, coming between the holiday shopping season and the launch of new products. Even in that context, this isn’t great news for Apple. The MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro combined to sell 3.4 million laptops in the first quarter of 2015, so this year’s Q1 tally represents decline of 870,000 units compared to last year, MacRumors is reporting.
For context, laptop shipments overall are down 7.3 percent over last year’s first quarter. This means Apple’s market share is down even as competitors also lose ground: Macs made up 7.1 percent of the notebook market in 2016’s first quarter, down from 8.8 percent last year.
Apple hasn’t done much to shake up its laptop lineup in recent years. The MacBook Air, for example, hasn’t seen a design overhaul since 2010. The MacBook Pro line has mostly seen hardware updates since 2012, leaving the chassis more-or-less identical.
For a long time the weight, display quality, and overall build of Apple laptops clearly put them ahead of the field, and made their high price point easy to justify. That’s no longer the case. Apple’s MacBook Air and Pro are too heavy, too thick, and have outdated displays compared to the competition, all at generally higher price points with lower specs.
The Mac makes up a tiny percentage of Apple’s overall business; the iPhone makes up the vast majority of Cupertino’s profits. Mac fans are used to being overlooked in Apple’s big announcements. Combine this with an overall decline of laptop sales, and Windows 10 slightly boosting sales of non-Apple laptops, and it’s easy to see how this down quarter happened.
But we can’t help but wonder: could a revamped MacBook line do better in the market? Are Apple fans putting off purchases, hoping for up-to-date processors and lighter laptops? We suppose we’ll find out if and when Apple revamps its laptop lineup.
The absolutely absurd idea of putting a touchscreen display on a mouse isn't exactly new. Turtle Beach already did it with its Command Series MC7, which features a 2.25-inch control screen. But apparently, even that wasn't ridiculous enough for Arctic Fox Technologies. Its new Super Mouse looks like someone took the chunky old Atari ST mouse, slapped a touchscreen and scroll wheel on it, and called it an upgrade.
The result is a rather unusual-looking mouse that is now on Kickstarter, starting at $199. And as ridiculous as it looks, some of its features are genuinely intriguing.
Apple is less than a day away from launching its highly anticipated OLED MacBook Pro with a touch-sensitive screen. But it appears that the upgrade is going to cost a pretty penny. According to a report by Bloomberg, Apple is reportedly eyeing a starting price of $2,899 for the 14-inch MacBook Pro, while the 16-inch version could start at $3,399 in the US.
"At $2,899, the 14-inch model would mark the highest starting price for a new MacBook Pro model, surpassing the $2,799 Apple charged for a 17-inch version introduced in 2006," says the report. The report claims that Apple is targeting a minimum price hike of $400 for its upcoming redesigned 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models.
I've spent a good amount of time digging into the spec sheet of the new M6 MacBook Pro (14-inch), and for all intents and purposes, this is a classic Apple "chip and connectivity" refresh. It's not a full redesign. The chassis, Liquid Retina XDR panel, speakers, ports, and battery, all of them carry over unchanged.
However, the M6 brings more cores, stronger on-device AI, higher memory bandwidth on the larger configs, and modern wireless. Here’s the practical rundown of what actually improved, and whether those gains are worth your money.