Has Apple Abandoned the Mac? Internal Conflicts and Tactless Decisions Suggest So

Has Apple Abandoned the Mac?
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Despite the company’s insistence that it remains fully devoted to the future of the Mac, a new Bloomberg report appears to reveal a myriad of internal conflicts of interest, last-minute decision flops, as well as an overall detailing of how Apple appears to have left the average Mac fanatic standing in the lurch.

In the report, which was titled “How Apple Alienated Mac Loyalists,” Bloomberg’s own Mark Gurman revealed a number of interesting bits of information, ultimately detailing how he believes that Apple’s “slowness to refresh its Mac line has led many Mac loyalists to jump ship for another manufacturer” — in part due to the sheer lack of excitement Apple has been bringing to the table recently.

First and foremost, the report revealed that Apple apparently had intentions of employing a larger battery pack in its 2016 MacBook Pro. Since battery life is often one of MacBook user’s most griped about issues, year-after-year, it would only make sense that Cupertino up the ante, right? Well, apparently Apple was all set and ready to go with a considerably larger battery packed into its latest machine — however, much to the company’s dismay, the upgraded battery “failed a key test” within the last few weeks leading up to the device’s October 27th unveiling. As a result of the failure, Apple decided to immediately revert to the original, previous-generation battery design, simply because the company didn’t want to miss the all-important holiday season shopping.

Unsurprisingly, this last-minute decision to change up the MacBook Pro’s battery stipulated that Apple call in a number of additional engineers, many of whom were already working on other products, to help re-design the 2016 MacBook Pro on such short notice — a confounding situation that Gurman believes could have, at least in part, contributed to a delayed iMac, which many of us are still eagerly waiting for.

Gurman also revealed that Apple wanted to release a Gold-colored variant of its 2016 MacBook Pro, however those plans, too, were axed at the last minute, when company executives decided that the color simply “didn’t look good on such a large product.”

In another unfortunate turn of events, Gurman revealed that Apple had initially planned to release its 12-inch MacBook back in early 2014 — as opposed to early 2015, when the machine was officially unveiled. However, due to the fact that Apple had been testing multiple prototypes of its 12-inch MacBook, the company’s engineers were essentially split down the middle in their efforts to create just one, fully-functional machine. This conundrum boils down to a simple matter of logical, mathematical reasoning — if a team is divided in its “common goal,” then that goal will all but certainly take twice as long to achieve, right?

The report also reveals that some internal conflicts emerged between Cupertino’s engineers and executives ahead of 2016’s 12-inch MacBook refresh, which took place earlier this year. As Gurman notes, some Apple engineers wanted to incorporate advanced features — like Touch ID and a second USB-C port, however, in the end, Apple’s top brass elected to push a device boasting modestly refreshed internal components, packed inside the same 12-inch package.

The report appears to confirm what several Mac analysts and industry insiders have been noting for years: the Mac simply isn’t a top priority up at One Infinite Loop anymore. And while Tim Cook has openly promised that some “great desktops” are in store for Apple’s future, he also all but confirmed, yet again, that 2017 will be another “incremental year” for refreshes to the company’s Mac line.

Do you think Apple has abandoned the Mac?
Let us know why or why not in the comments below!

Featured Image: Wired
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