We believe in the long term value of Apple hardware. You should be able to use your Apple gear as long as it helps you remain productive and meets your needs, upgrading only as necessary. We want to help maximize the life of your Apple gear.
And as much as we love the Pismo here at Low End Mac, the WallStreet PowerBook was even
more expandable. And, of course, bigger and heavier.
The WallStreet, Lombard, and Pismo G3 PowerBooks
had a lot in common: G3 processors, 14.1" 1024 x 768 displays
(WallStreet had some other options), a 12.7" by 10.4" footprint, two
device bays for batteries and drives, and PC Card expansion. Lombard
and Pismo were 1.7" thick, weighed just over 6 lb., and had one PC Card
slot, while WallStreet was 2.0" thick, weighed over 7 lb., and had two
PC Card slots.
These were transitional machines: WallStreet has ADB, Apple serial,
and SCSI ports. Lombard replaced ADB and serial ports with USB. And
Pismo replaced SCSI with FireWire, making it the first PowerBook with
both USB and FireWire - ports that remain on Apple's pro 'Books to this
day, albeit in updated form.
Titanium PowerBook G4
Since Pismo was replaced by the 1" thin 15" Titanium PowerBook G4 in
January 2001, it's been a downhill slide in terms of expansion options.
Since Pismo, there have been no device bays, no way to add a second
battery, no simple way to swap out the optical drive.
The 15" and 17" PowerBooks retained the lone PC Card slot found in
Lombard and Pismo, but that gave way to an ExpressCard/34 slot when
Apple introduced the 15" MacBook Pro. It also appeared on the 17"
MacBook Pro, where it remains to this day, but in 2009, Apple dropped
the ExpressCard slot from the 15" MacBook Pro, replacing it with the
far less flexible SD Card slot. The Mid 2009 model also dispensed with
the removable battery.
From a peak number of expansion options in the 1998 WallStreet,
Apple has removed expansion options one by one - no more drive bays, no
more user replaceable batteries, no more PC Card or ExpressCard slots
except on the top-end 17" MacBook Pro.
Granted, the newer 'Books have also been more powerful, accepted
more memory, used higher capacity and often faster hard drives (and now
SSD), and greatly improved graphics, but the expansion options that
WallStreet, Lombard, and Pismo owners loved are long gone from Apple's
MacBook Pro line.
The Other Pro Macs
Sawtooth Power Mac G4
Apple's pro desktop line has gone just the opposite way. Early Power
Macs had three NuBus slots, the Beige G3 had three PCI slots,
and the Blue & White
G3 had four - three 64-bit 33 MHz slots and one 32-bit 66 MHz slot
used by the video card. It also added a second optical drive bay. The
Sawtooth Power Mac G4
retained the three 64-bit slots and moved to AGP for video. The
Digital Audio Power Mac
G4 improved that by adding a fourth PCI slot. (There were even some
Macs and clones with six PCI slots prior to the G3!)
With the Power Mac
G5, Apple introduced a whole new enclosure with a lot more internal
drive bays. While adopting SATA to replace parallel ATA, Apple also
reduced the number of optical drive bays to one and the number of
expansion slots by one. The Power Mac G5 had three PCI or PCI-X slots,
in addition to AGP for video.
Mac Pro
The last generation
Power Mac G5 moved to a new expansion bus, PCI Express, which has
also been used in the Mac Pro.
The Mac Pro brought back the second optical drive bay and has had more
build-to-order options than you can shake a stick at - everything from
two dual-core CPUs to two six-core processors, a variety of video card
options, a host of memory configurations, and so forth.
Today's Mac Pro is the most powerful computer Apple has ever sold
and also one of the most expandable.
Back to 'Books
But what of the MacBook Pro? While the Windows world has had
quad-core laptops for some time, that's not even an option on the
MacBook Pro. And while expandability is a key concept behind the
deskbound Mac Pro, it's barely an option for the "pro" MacBooks.
Are MacBook Pro users considered second class at Apple? Why can't
they have quad-core processors, drive bays, and, unless they choose the
17" model, expansions slots?
Conversely, we have the iMac and Mac mini, both desktops bereft of
expansion slots and drive bays.
Too Few Macs
Apple has a great business model, allowing it to sell a limited
number of models at premium prices, grow its market share, and remain
incredibly profitable.
Apple has focus. Unlike Dell and HP, it doesn't offer myriad
desktop, notebook, and netbook models.
Apple puts the focus on the
product, not on profits or market share. The focus is on the user
experience - nice look and feel, an interface that gets out of the way,
products with smooth edges, quality build, things that just work, and
great customer support.
Most of all, Apple doesn't sell itself short. It makes unique
products, sets trends for multiple industries, and sells a
non-commodity product at a non-commodity price.
However, it's possible that Apple has too much focus. I don't want
to see Apple go back to the bad old days of competing consumer,
education, and business brands for exactly the same machine, and I'm
glad it has moved beyond the "four box" model matrix (consumer and pro
desktop and notebook Macs) of the late 1990s.
Apple addressed consumer demand for a Mac netbook by designing a
real Mac in a netbook-sized case. The MacBook Air uses a full-fledged
dual-core Intel Core processor, not an underpowered Intel Atom CPU, and
it costs a lot more than the $260 to $375 netbooks that dominate the
market.
Apple addressed demand for a small desktop with the Mac mini, which was nearly
perfect when it was introduced in 2005 with a G4 CPU. It's the perfect
Mac to connect to your flat panel TV or your old PC monitor.
The polycarbonate
MacBook is nearly perfect as a consumer notebook, and the iMac
meets most users' needs for a desktop computer.
Two More Niches
But there are two holes in Apple's product line. It should offer at
least one pro notebook with a removable battery and an expansion bay
for those who travel a lot. This would not be a huge seller, but there
is a market for it.
Likewise, there is a market for a midrange modular Mac, something
more expandable and perhaps more powerful than the Mac mini but less
expandable and perhaps less powerful than the Mac Pro. Give us at least
one more drive bay and at least one expansion slot so we can add an
internal backup drive and that USB 3.0 port that Apple still doesn't
provide. Give us a chance to upgrade to new technologies without buying
a top-end Mac Pro or replacing the whole iMac or Mac mini.
I'm not asking Apple to fill every possible niche, which is the
Walmart, General Motors, Dell, and Nokia strategy, to name only a few
companies the subscribe to portfolio theory. Keep the focus, but focus
on those few niches that are important. Power users with notebooks.
Home and office users who need a little more expandability. People who
want something bigger than an iPhone but smaller than an iPad.
Focus. Do it right. And the profits will continue to grow.
Dan Knight has been using Macs since 1986,
sold Macs for several years, supported them for many more years, and
has been publishing Low End Mac since April 1997. If you find Dan's articles helpful, please consider making a donation to his tip jar.
Links for the Day
Mac of the Day: Performa 630, introduced 1994.07.01. The first desktop Mac with an IDE hard drive could accept a TV or radio tuner.
