back to article With users mostly happy to keep older kit, Macs just ain't selling like they used to

Owners of Apple Mac devices simply aren't buying new hardware as quickly as they used to.  Number crunchers at Chicago-based Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) said in a report that, as of March 2024, 68 percent of Mac owners had a device older than two years. Four years ago that number was just 59 percent. "The …

  1. Kevin McMurtrie Silver badge

    The no upgrade gamble

    The risks on the Apple gamble keep getting higher with the SoC architecture. You're at the "Buy" page and presented with different options for RAM and storage. Each increasing option adds $1000. If you select the correct option, you will have a highly performant computer for your work. If you select too high, it can be thousands of dollars wasted. If you select too low, all of the money is wasted.

    Place your $4000 - $10000 bet or keep using your old computer?

    1. Ace2 Silver badge

      Re: The no upgrade gamble

      The return policy is very good. If you aim low and it doesn’t meet your needs, take it back.

      Personally I’ve not regretted any upgrades… 6 years down the line the original upgrade often makes the difference between usable and unusable.

      1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

        Re: The no upgrade gamble

        Wouldn't it be nice if you could have done the upgrade after 6 years, rather than 6 years in advance?

        1. Ace2 Silver badge

          Re: The no upgrade gamble

          Do you have a laptop with an upgradable CPU and GPU?

          1. doublelayer Silver badge

            Re: The no upgrade gamble

            As it happens, I do. I can upgrade the RAM and storage as well, just as on many other laptops.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: The no upgrade gamble

              "We're currently not taking pre-orders in your country."

            2. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: The no upgrade gamble

              v nice tu

            3. An_Old_Dog Silver badge

              Re: The no upgrade gamble [Actually ...]

              ... it appears that you can upgrade the CPU, and possibly, the GPU, by replacing the entire motherboard. A semi-win there, vs replacing the entire laptop, but not an ulta-win.

              Worst thing: god-damned Apple-esque tiny function keys.

              Nice try, though.

              1. doublelayer Silver badge

                Re: The no upgrade gamble [Actually ...]

                I'm curious how else you thought that would work on a laptop. Doing that allows them to update CPUs even when sockets change, or to offer both Intel and AMD (and now RISC-V for some reason) options. Even if they had tried to have a socketed CPU on one board, you would have to change that board whenever the CPU manufacturer changed their socket design. It's not that different from a desktop. Sure, I can replace my AM4 CPU for another AM4 one, but if I buy a newer AMD chip, it won't fit in the AM4 socket, and I can't find any Intel chip at all that fits in that. I can still replace the CPU in it, though.

                As for GPUs, the larger version with dedicated GPUs have those as a separate unit, so they can be replaced without having to replace the motherboard. However, that version is quite new, so there aren't as many options as I might like.

      2. Sandgrounder

        Re: The no upgrade gamble

        Did you personally enjoy being shafted for spending $1000 for every $100 of cheap commodity memory and storage too?

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I thought you couldn't keep a Mac for more than 4 years before an OS update throttled it and then it self-destructed?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      You're thinking of Windows.

    2. Eclectic Man Silver badge

      I just checked my iMac (on which I a typing this), it is "late 2015". And it still works, and has had updates recently.

      1. Snapper

        I've just checked my Mac Pro (upgraded) and it's Early '2009' and running macOS 13 Ventura. It will probably outlast me!

        1. Richard 12 Silver badge

          Ventura doesn't support that hardware

          Oldest supported Mac Pro is 2019, oldest supported Mac of any kind is 2017.

          Ventura itself is expected to go out of support in 2026, so nine years of official support at best.

          - Except for iMac 2017 which gets Sonoma and possibly Sequoia. Why does that one get to live so much longer?

          1. X5-332960073452
            Headmaster

            Re: Ventura doesn't support that hardware

            Open Core Legacy Patcher - to the rescue !

      2. Eclectic Man Silver badge
        Facepalm

        D'Oh!

        Update - Just checked the Apple web site, and, well, let's just say that I have not got the most up to date OS in the Apple multiverse, and realised that the recent updates have ben for WhatsApp . So I probably deserve the downvotes for being a bit of a twit.

        Sorry.

    3. doublelayer Silver badge

      The throttling thing is for iPhones, not, as far as I know, Macs, and even on iPhones it tends not to be a significant decrease in CPU speed. They generally get about seven years of software support, which while worse than Windows or Linux, is significantly higher than your number. For now, OpenCore Patcher does a pretty good job of letting users ignore the cut in support, but that may not work as well for ARM devices and almost certainly will not be able to do a thing when the latest Intel models run out of OS support. I have a Mac that Apple decided to cut off at Mac OS 11. It's running Mac OS 14 fine, though the battery has seen better days.

      It is fair to say, however, that people who don't use OCLP to do what I've done see a significant degradation when their OS support lapses. It's not just not getting feature updates. It's not even the worsening record of security updates quantity or speed. Many applications drop support for Mac OS releases quickly, especially including anything that Apple wrote.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Too short support

        With my recent purchase I really considered buying a Mac mini. I like it has plenty of computing power in a small box and is near completely silent in most use cases.

        The reason I didn't was simple: only 5 years of upgrades and 2 years of supposed security updates that in fact are less good then during the first 5 years if you check the lists of past upgrade. And indeed, after the first 5 years it gets increasingly hard to find the right software. What's worse, those 5 years start to count from day 0 meaning release day or unobtanium day for most of the world. If you need to replace your computer today and want a Mac mini you have the M2 model, released in January 2023 as the latest option. That means that from the 5 years of "real, full" support only 3.5 are left if I buy their latest available Mac mini today. To me, that is ridiculously short and unacceptable for the price paid so my decision was to buy something else.

        Having no supported option to boot linux on it without heavy compromises (I know it is possible but tricky and you have to disable security measures with unknown impact to security) make it worth very few to me after those 3.5 years left. While they may gain some sales from artificial obsolescence, they lost other customers like me.

    4. Eecahmap

      OCLP

      If you rely solely on Apple, that's sort of true.

      The people who maintain the OpenCore Legacy Patcher are great.

      My mid-2012 non-Retina MacBook Pro is still running a current macOS release (Monterey), thanks to them. On an SSD, it's still usable. Forget using an old Mac with an HDD unless it's in a server role, where snappy interactive performance may not be needed/desired.

      I have another one running Windows 10, via Bootcamp drivers, which is, sadly, better-performing than any macOS release. It's even still usable as a light gaming rig.

      Once Windows 10 support goes away, I'll either let the old MBPs go or switch them to some Linux distro. Hopefully one of them gets the trackpad support right. So far I haven't found such a beast.

    5. gnasher729 Silver badge

      I actually have a 2006 MacBook stashed away somewhere that still works (battery is totally shot, so it needs to be permanently plugged in).

      I buy a new one every six years on average. M1 pro w/ 8 performance cores at the moment, will be replaced with a refurbished M7 Max when the time comes.

    6. katrinab Silver badge
      Gimp

      No, a MacBook will last about 10 years with a couple of battery replacements.

    7. bud-weis-er

      Honestly AC, if you think that you really need to try Macs. They are workhorses and last an incredibly long time, without slowing (unlike Windows), have great resale value (unlike Windows), and I've never had antivirus (unlike Windows).

      A 2015 one of mine is finally too slow and old for the latest OS, so I have just put Linux on it. It will last for another 10 years.

      1. X5-332960073452
        Megaphone

        They only command high resale prices, as cost so much in the first place.

        1. Joe Gurman

          Resale

          They command high resale prices, percentage-wise.

    8. grumpy-old-person

      Like my iPad2?

      Woke up one day and my iPad2 was no longer functional

      I suppose Apple expected me to purchase a much more expensive iPad but I hope they are disappointed I did not and will never do so (no much how much I loved it and the hardware is still perfect)

    9. An_Old_Dog Silver badge

      Been There, Had That Done to Me

      Running OpenBSD on my PPC G4. Sadly, no Firefox.

    10. timrowledge

      My iMac 2012 is still just fine. Like this ‘13 iPad. And iPhone 4. Just a little care and things can work for quite a while.

  3. Gareth Gouldstone

    Still using last gen Intel MacBook Pro

    No upgrade path for my usage. VirtualBox running several (Intel) OSes. Apple Silicon has left me seeing the end of the Apple trail…

    1. Gazman

      Re: Still using last gen Intel MacBook Pro

      Similar issue here - time to leave Apple.

    2. Ace2 Silver badge

      Re: Still using last gen Intel MacBook Pro

      Haven’t they added support for that? In Fusion at least. It’s technically plausible.

  4. DS999 Silver badge

    This isn't that surprising

    There was a huge surge in purchases when Apple released the ARM Macs in late 2020 and through 2021, those first generation M1 Macs while over the two year mark are not that old.

    1. Crypto Monad Silver badge

      Re: This isn't that surprising

      Exactly that. If you have any sort of ARM Mac, even an M1, you're likely to keep it for a long time.

      "as of March 2024, 68 percent of Mac owners had a device older than two years. Four years ago that number was just 59 percent"

      That figure really isn't very useful. Almost nobody upgrades their Mac within 2 years - or any other laptop for that matter. Hence all that it shows is how many people decided to upgrade(*) their laptop in the last two years - it doesn't tell you anything about how old their previous one was, nor how long they're likely to keep their current one.

      (*) Or bought their first Apple laptop, of course.

      1. Joe Gurman

        Re: This isn't that surprising

        And Apple knows that.

        There’s something odd about this report. Apple has known for years — since well before the introduction of the first Apple Silicon machines in late 2020 — that Mac users keep their machines well over three years. It’s one of the reasons they started offering AppleCare+ service plans not just for three years but indefinitely (defined as, “until we no longer stock parts except where required by law” [e.g. France]), on a monthly billing basis. Think that “service” income isn’t making up for at least some of the supposedly missed (and famously large) margin on hardware sales? Think again.

  5. TReko Silver badge

    Easy for Apple to fix

    They will just slow down the older Macs in the next MacOS update, just like they did with the iPhones.

  6. Glenn Amspaugh

    Feels the hot wind on the leg hairs

    [looks down at 2009 Mac Pro room heater]

    Might be time to upgrade, after next winter, of course.

    1. PhilipN Silver badge

      Re: Feels the hot wind on the leg hairs

      Two cheese graters here one at home one in the office mainly for backup but able to go live in no time at all if something happens to the main machine. I sometimes wish** to G*d that one of them would break down so I have an excuse to spring for a new one.

      [**Actually, no, I don't. It would be like losing a friend]

  7. GraXXoR Bronze badge

    The myth of infinite growth

    Where does it end? When every single company in 2024 appears to be seeking that elusive “infinite growth” to bolster their shareholders’ positions by squeezing customers for every single penny they can, in a world that most certainly is not showing “infinitely deep pockets” (on the contrary) surely there can ultimately only ever be disappointment.

    I clesrly do not know enough about economics to fathom how every company seems to expect their profits to increase in perpetuity while offering their customers increasingly cynical products.

    1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

      Re: The myth of infinite growth

      No-one believes in infinite growth for everyone. Everyone hopes for growth for their own bit for as long as they are taking pay cheques from that bit.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    iPhone 7 user here

    Out of update support.

    Otherwise:

    Everything works very well, very well indeed!

    Why spend $2000 (here) on effectively a newer camera?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: iPhone 7 user here

      You'll be fine until your banking app stops working, because your bank decided to drop support for older phones, because their IDE forced them to do it, because they had to recompile with a new IDE if they wanted it still to be listed in the app store. And then you won't be able to use your banking app until you upgrade the phone.

      Last time that happened to me it took me an absolute age to get to the bank to reissue a physical security key instead of relying on an app I could no longer run. Because they're all about getting everyone onto their app and not letting anyone get off, on the assumption that everybody can run it.

      Which basically means I'd have to let the bank tell me when it's time to upgrade my phone. But what if I don't want to let the bank tell me when it's time to upgrade my phone? I have to switch banks?

      And I'm on Android. iOS hardware lasts longer than Android hardware, so I'd imagine that situation could be worse....

  9. Bill Broadley

    I'm quite fond of Apple hardware, the m series CPUs are unique. They aren't killer fast, but plenty for the vast majority of uses. They are also power efficient, and in pleasing form factors that make the most of their power efficiency. Sure you can find a MBP competitor, with great battery life, but likely worse iGPU. Or a gaming laptop/desktop with a killer GPU, but MUCH more power hungry. Apple laptops are quiet, efficient, fast, and well designed. Sure some laptops have as nice screens, or as nice keyboards, or as nice touchpads ... but rarely match all the Apple features in the same laptop.

    I seriously lusted after a mac studio, but they haven't updated it for the M3 or M4. Even ignoring that, man are the upgrades steep. I almost talked myself into M2 max (base $2k ... without warranty). But 32GB ram standard, really? On a $2k desktop? 96GB brings it to $3k, which requires a CPU upgrade. 2TB of NVMe brings it up to $3,600.

    Sure it's beautiful, tiny, near silent, well engineered airflow, decent GPU performance without becoming huge and noisy. But $3,600 without warranty? Not being able to replace DIMMs and the proprietary storage (can't use normal NVMe) gave me serious concerns about repairs or expansion after the warranty is up.

    Ended up building a Ryzen 12 core desktop, 96GB ram, 4TB nvme, and Radeon 7800XT for about half as much. Wins benchmarks at most things, is near silent, repairable, upgradable (even to Zen 5 is I want), and should last 10 years or so. My last desktop (still running) is a Xeon E3 I bought 9 years ago. I tried really hard to justify the Apple premium, but failed. Having a professional targeted desktop without replaceable, repairable, and upgradable storage just seems insane to me.

    Sure my desktop is larger, takes more power, and is less elegant. But half the price and easier to repair/upgrade/keep for 10 years made it worth it.

    1. Zolko Silver badge

      the proprietary storage (can't use normal NVMe)

      this is the killer for me. I can understand – and live-with – fixed RAM on laptops, but non-replaceable HD is a no-go. I actually did that on an macMini but boy was that a nightmare : never again.

  10. Mishak Silver badge

    68 percent of Mac owners had a device older than two years

    Currently on a 6 year old MacBook Pro which replaced a 10 year old one.

    It's still more than capable enough for what I do, though I suspect this year will be the last for official OS upgrades.

    I'll then likely move on to a new machine and add OCLP to this one so that one of the kids can use it for another few years.

    Sure, Apple kit isn't cheap (but there is more expensive Windows kit out there these days if you compare like-for-like), but I don't mind paying for something that's going to have a 10 year service life.

  11. Sandgrounder

    Forced obsolesence

    Whilst mac hardware may continue to be perfectly functional, the lack of software support is going to force it to be junked.

    Whilst you may be happy running obsolete software with no security patches in your home basements, this is not an option in business. To keep ISO and cyber essentials certifications requires all equipment to be run on supported versions. Fail to do this and in addition to losing your certifications, you invalidate your cyber insurance cover. Lose your certifications and you can't get government contracts or work from many large companies.

    Whilst up till now this has been just a Mac issue due to Apple locking down updates on old gear, Microsoft seem set to follow suit with their hardware requirements for Windows 11.

    Then we get to the basic operational issues. If you use your Mac for nothing but basic web browsing and the odd document, it will probably still be useful after 7 years. So good for you if your 2010 Mac still runs. I've not been so lucky, funnily enough because I use mine for building stuff for Apple kit.

    I've already had to replace iMacs and iphones because Apple stopped allowing OS updates and iOS updates.

    1. The only thing I need a Mac for is building apps.

    2. To build apps, I need XCode.

    3. To upload apps to the store I need a current version of XCode.

    4.To install a current version of XCode requires a current OS.

    5. Despite being fully upgraded to 16GB ram and SSD drives, Apple blocked OS updates to my iMacs because the year of original purchase.

    Every singe statement above is a direct business decision and nothing to do with hardware or technical capability. The result - I'm forced to skip my old hardware on a 5/6 year schedule and buy new gear to keep in business.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Forced obsolesence

      This right here.

      There is no reason to keep forcing Xcode/OS updates. I had to go through the circle recently.

      The OS and Xcode version were working perfectly (it’s Xcode so make of that what you will) for my use case.

      On top of this you pay to be in the developer program, and it’s not as if Xcode is even a decent IDE.

  12. osxtra

    Fix What Ain't Broke

    My last Fruity purchase was a '12 Mini. Before that it was an '09 15" MBP. Both, while long in the tooth, still work.

    Noteable about these two pieces of hardware is that storage and memory were user-replaceable.

    Would I buy from theme these days? Sorry, not spending $2K+ on a machine I can't work on.

    My last "big" purchase was one of FrameWork's 13" Intel models. Cost around what the MBP had. Came with a screwdriver. It's my road machine, and a great tool.

    The daily driver is an OpenCore mutt with Gigabyte/Intel/Corsair/Samsung/nVidia parts, 128G of memory, 2TB of main nVME storage.

    That, combined with two 28" ASUS 4K screens, would cost an obscene amount of money if purchased through Apple. Assuming they even had such a configuration.

    And as things stand now with them, newer kit would never be upgradable.

    Am still on Ventura and know eventually I'll have to make a decision on getting away from the Fruity OS. (Them deciding to lock down my system files is just plain stupid, and almost enough reason to switch by itself. I shouldn't have to mount system dirs in my own user space, make changes, then bless a snapshot just to put the latest compiled version of bash in /bin. Sudo is there for a reason. Sure, they *say* it's for "user safety", but it's my machine, not theirs. What's the sense of becoming root if you don't have full control over the bits?)

    The Framework runs Fedora. Have a WinDoze machine, too, mostly just to keep a hand in for supprorting folks that use that OS. (The Framework has a W10 VM, but I hardly ever run it). The home NAS is Debian now that TrueNAS has switched away from BSD. There's a dev machine with no X still on CentOS that really needs to be swapped out for Rocky or Alma. Voluminous Free Time awaits that chore.

    Much though I don't like software subscriptions, Adobe's products have become even more amazing over the years. When they finally port to 'nix, my Mac days may be over. Out of nostalgia, the only thing I may come to miss is that old chestnut, AppleScript. I still use a bash script written years ago that tells it to talk to Adobe for some doc automation. Will need a new workflow.

    1. Bebu
      Windows

      Re: Fix What Ain't Broke

      My last Fruity purchase

      "Fruity" here I took as literally fruit-like but with a bit of the sense of barmy (nutty as a fruitcake.)

      On checking I find the word has six separate senses in british english alone with a few extra from north america.

      Oddly they all seem to have some applicability to this pomonal vendor if only guilt by association.

      I suspect the once fanatical Apple acolytes have experienced an epiphany* and in their apostasy are now saving their pennies to purchase Tesla fetishes. :)

      * they presumably saw the (head) light as they were being run down by a Damascus bound muskmobile.

    2. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: Fix What Ain't Broke

      "Would I buy from theme these days? Sorry, not spending $2K+ on a machine I can't work on."

      Even SSD's have a certain lifetime so it can be important that they are replaceable.

      The RAM and storage I need today might change considerably in the future and given how fast new models and OS's come out, buying a higher spec machine can be a losing proposition since it could be obsolete/unsupported by the time I need to make upgrades.

      Apple had an issue years ago of going their own way with interfaces that made drive, monitors and peripherals stoopid expensive. It became much easier to own and use a Mac when Apple started embracing things such as USB and DVI as standard. They seem now to be going back the other way where the hardware is fixed at purchase. That's kept me picking up older kit and using OCLP where needed, but many of my Macs are still running 10.15/Catalina and work just fine. My MacPro 4,1 (flashed to 5,1) is getting downgraded to 10.13 to run a version of iTunes I prefer and be my media server. My MacPro 5,1 that I've maxed out is a workhorse for photos and video. I just replaced the office duties 2012 MBP with a 2014 iMac Retina 27" I picked up for $25 (glass is broken, display is fine). I'd love a new MacPro, but I'd have to get a new circuit installed in my office or I'd be tripping the breaker. A Studio would have enough performance, but only if I could get one maxed out second hand.

  13. fitzpat

    Apple and El Reg

    ISTR The Register staff all being persona non grata with Apple. Are they still being that petty?

    1. MrMerrymaker

      Re: Apple and El Reg

      Who downvoted a mere question?

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Lost me as a customer

    While I'm not exactly Apple's target audience, I can see why sales are slowing.

    For me, the policy of forcing you to choose your over-priced RAM and storage at purchase time means I will probably never be buying another Apple laptop. Currently typing on a 2015 model - the last that had upgradable storage, and upgraded thanks to a third party adapter to allow an M2 SSD to fit their proprietary connector. In the past every machine I've had got upgraded incrementally as needed - had I had to choose up front then I'd have started over-specced and ended under specced.

    It's not just that, but OSX has gone more and more down the "if it doesn't fit how Apple think you should do something then it's hard or impossible to do" route.

    At some point it will be a non-Apple laptop, Debian, OS X running as a VM for stuff I haven't found an alternative for, and keep this laptop for anything I can't manage with that. Apple user for more than four decades (started with Apple ][) - it's not going to be an easy switch.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I buy Macs BECAUSE they last

    It's good hardware, that's why I like it. Buy a Mac today and the hardware is very likely still usable in 10 years plus. Sure the software support might last only 5 years of that before you have to take it offline or put Linux/BSD on it, but the hardware is good.

    My 2011 Mac is still going strong as the TV computer even now, and my main Macbook is 2019.

    That's how I can justify paying a higher price for a Mac instead of a basic PC. Divide the price you pay by the number of years you expect it to last.

    (Yes you can get Linux PCs to last a long time too, but I find it's not quite such an off-the-shelf deal)

    1. Kevin McMurtrie Silver badge

      Re: I buy Macs BECAUSE they last

      Yes you can get Linux PCs to last a long time too, but I find it's not quite such an off-the-shelf deal

      What? Most Linux boxes are literally boxes of off-the-shelf parts. Maybe you meant build-to-order? Shops do that too.

      How long does a Linux box last? They're modular and components be incrementally upgraded forever. I'm sitting next to two of them that are a mix of parts spanning 2017 to 2024. The software is up-to-date forever. They're always as powerful as I need them without regularly dumping $10k on a comparable Mac.

    2. I could be a dog really Silver badge

      Re: I buy Macs BECAUSE they last

      Been an Apple ][ user since back in the 80s, then a Mac user when I could afford to buy a second hand one.

      I've had quite a few laptops in that time, all bought 2nd hand. As I've posted elsewhere, I'm unlikely to buy another Apple one as they no longer support upgrades (and the stock configs are just too weak in at least one area (either not enough RAM, or not enough storage, or ...) And that's the key thing - bring back upgradable RAM and storage and I might just stay a Mac (laptop) user. But even the OS has gone a long way down the "we know best how you want to work" approach.

  16. DrBobK

    I have a 4 year old MacBook Pro (M1 Pro) as a work computer (and I do things that require decent CPU performance) and an 8 year old MacBook Pro (Intel something or other) as a home computer. Both are running the current version of MacOS. Both do everything I need from them. The only reason I'd replace either of them is if Apple come up with something transformational. I suppose by the time we get to M7 or M8 I might be tempted by the increase in performance. When I used to be a Windows person I had to replace computers much more often, mainly because performance degraded so much over time, and because things used to break.

  17. manders_ai

    Macs are built like tanks, but designed at software-level to become paperweights and keep users buying new (or newer). The built-in obsolescence in a Mac has for a long time been the way that it becomes impossible to upgrade any usable web browser (i.e, native Safari, Firefox). Without a functional browser, the Mac is a severely limited machine.

    Besides this, Apple ends support for each iteration of its OS far more quickly than Microsoft equivalents, while any Adobe products that can run in any particular Mac OS offer a very narrow window of opportunity.

    In the Catalina OS, for example, only specifically 2020 and 2021 Photoshop is supported. I know this, because I am yet again currently trying to help my 84 year-old Dad rescue his expensive and impeccably functional 2014 desktop Mac from paperweight status. Since the year 2000, this is about the fourth time I have had to remind him that advances in browsers eventually make upgrading the browser essential, and that Apple quickly drops Safari support (perhaps because it would extend the usable life of a Mac machine) for any particular Mac OS. Firefox supports these older OSes so little longer, it almost seems collusive. Likewise Chrome.

    So in the case of desktop Macs it's basically a racket: build quality helps sell the device to new and naive users, who are unaware that the software trap will tank the machine twenty years before any component entropy might have.

    1. Richard 12 Silver badge

      It's not collusion, it's explicitly Apple.

      You have to update xcode or your software won't run on latest macOS, and xcode drops support for older macOS on Apple's schedule.

      Apple change APIs regularly, often explicitly breaking the old method. Several companies have even had to do total ground-up rewrites of significant parts of their applications.

      This doesn't always mean the binaries won't still run on older macOS, but it's incredibly expensive to test and may be impossible to fix.

      So it's commercially impossible for many to support any more macOS than current, previous and maybe the one before that. 3-4 years at most.

      Of course, it might still work. But if it doesn't, you're on your own.

    2. CowHorseFrog Silver badge

      What you say about Safari could be true, but i have no idea why you are lumping Firefox i nthe same basket.

      Theres nothing stopping an old Mac downloading and using the latest FF.

  18. Grunchy Silver badge

    Bought 1800X in 2017

    I’ve done 3 upgrades since 2017. #1 bought a 4TB NVME when they got real cheap, #2 I built a 5900X system for a relative and the X570 motherboard absolutely needed a 3800X to do the BIOS update, so I bought a used 3800X cheap, which I subbed back into my B350 system, and #3 DDR4 ram got so cheap I maxed out to 128GB. Supposedly it is easy to spin up a Monterey VM, and I even did it one time, but I really have zero use for a Mac.

    (I stick with my B350 motherboard because it still has a single PCI slot, which I think I populated with something but I literally have no recollection of what that was. None of the modern devices suit my needs because they all lack PCI. My “update” regimen is that I forget all the stuff I packed in there, so I pull off the cover to take stock, then I notice the dust accumulation, after which I pull all the cords & redo the heat sink compound, etc. I see zero reason to do any actual “upgrade,” not in the next decade or ever again.)

  19. CowHorseFrog Silver badge

    Maybe apple should have an option like replacing parts of a computer, eg replace just the cpu or upgrade the ram.

    Kind of un-green to require customers to buy EVERYTHing (keyboard, screen, etc etc) again and again...

  20. TWB

    Using a 2013 MBP

    Still works fine for me - though I transcoded a video the other day and it took 7 hours - a colleagues M1 or M2 MBP took 20 mins....

  21. ICL1900-G3 Silver badge

    Not true!

    I recently bought a Mac Pro 5.1 and installed Mint on it. An excellent purchase.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Not true!

      Mint is free, you could have gotten a windows laptop of better spec for cheaper

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