Apple offends devs by asking for Developer Transition Kits back early, then offering them a measly $200 off an M1 Mac

Apple has provoked the ire of its Mac developer community by asking for the early return of its ARM-powered Developer Transition Kit loaner computers. Introduced last June, the DTK is a small-factor computer based on the same A12Z chip used in last year's iPad Pro. Unlike the M1 Mac Mini, this wasn't a commercial product. …

[Anonymous Coward]

Chip supper

Time for the classic ebay scam - just mail back the original packaging containing a carefully measured 1.16 kilo of potatoes.

[gnasher729]

Re: Chip supper

And get your developer account put on hold until you return the real thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Chip supper

You are assuming that Apple would actually open the box and check - my assumption is that they would arrive in a post room and get chucked into a skip unopened! What value do you think they have to Apple?

[hoola]

Re: Chip supper

Surely apples rather than potatoes.......

[Jason Hindle]

An M1 Mac Mini isn't going to break the bank

And is going to be somewhat more powerful than the loader it replaces (at a $200 discount). As always, happy to receive the downvotes for a contrarian stance.

[Dave 126]

Re: An M1 Mac Mini isn't going to break the bank

I'm not voting either way - it seems a dig into the agreement between the devs and Apple would be a prerequisite, along with a look at statutory rights in the relevant territories. Sales of Goods wouldn't cover a loaned device, and as I'm not a lawyer I don't know if the 500 dollar fee was for a service (which requires the device kit to actually work) or what.

I would imagine any serious Mac OS dev would want to have an M1 machine for testing, and this testing would be better on an actual Mac and not a dev kit.

[Martin M]

Re: An M1 Mac Mini isn't going to break the bank

Or just dispute the credit card payment, if you paid that way and Apple has sold a service that wasn't as described.

However - as suggested in the article - nasty things might happen to your developer account. So perhaps best to just let Apple have its wicked way ...

[DougMac]

Re: An M1 Mac Mini isn't going to break the bank

I'm not sure why people are complaining about a device that doesn't match what users have in their hands. Wouldn't you want to test your code against the hardware that has been shipping since last November?

I did think it was a weird move by apple to charge so much for a device rental, big enough to make people think they "bought it". I probably would have done something like rental of $100 month, and you get the first 4 months free. 4 months probably bridges you until the real units ship, but you'll still get plenty of hangers on that can't be bothered, so they'll just keep getting dinged until they've more than paid for a new one.

There's always going to be those that "lost them" as they put them into their collectables vault, and Apple can just keep dinging them until they find them.

[DS999]

Re: An M1 Mac Mini isn't going to break the bank

It won't break the bank, but if they've already bought an M1 Mac the only way they can use the discount is to buy another - and presumably sell one unless they have need/use for a second one.

[Anonymous Coward]

And this is why you always get your dev kit with a fake dev account set up by a shell company.

Those machines are going to be a lot more valuable on ebay than they ever were going to be returned to Apple.

[Anonymous Coward]

Given the relatively low costs of the actual M1 I doubt that to be true.

[karlkarl]

It is more the fact that they will become relatively rare and might one day even become a collectors edition. Especially once Apple landfills the other ones.

[Dave 126]

Any particular reason to use 'landfill' as a verb, instead of the more common 'scrap'?

[Doctor Syntax]

It's more pejorative.

[I am David Jones]

Because...

...it pejoratives the act of scrappaging.

[werdsmith]

Re: Because...

Old kit goes into a mighty chewing machine and gets ground up to sub 1cm bits. Smoke and sparks come out, it’s very entertaining.

[gnasher729]

Since Apple owns the kit, selling it on eBay would be criminal. And Apple can ask the buyer to return the kit.

[Falmari]

Looks a little mean of Apple

It does seem that Apple are being a little mean. The kit was only offered to certain developers presumably developers who are important to them in some way. It is in Apple’s interest that there is software targeted for the new hardware available as early as possible. So, you think that Apple would want to keep these developers sweet and reward their early support of the new hardware.

At the minimum I would have thought $500 (rental cost) off the price of the new M1 Mac. Redeemable for a period that will cover more than just the first-generation of Apple Silicon devices. Because these developers will have probably already purchased the first-generation by now.

[Claptrap314]

Swing low, sweet chariot.

Coming for to carry me home.