MacBook Neo sells out for April as demand for Apple's $599 laptop outpaces supply
Posted by -protonsandneutrons-@reddit | hardware | View on Reddit | 175 comments
Only Apple has sold out of its supply.
Walmart has great supply, delivers in 2 days.
Best Buy has great supply, delivers in 2 days.
Amazon US has decent supply, delivers within 5-6 days.
Target has decent supply, delivers within 5-6 days.
However, some colors / NAND combinations are in higher demand and may take longer (e.g,. the 256GB pink model seems to be slowest, but still available).
Bderken@reddit
I don’t think I have ever seen a laptop this popular. I’m seeing it IN PERSON in people’s hands… it’s crazy.
I’m also seeing it in YouTubers videos on the side that have nothing to do with tech….
gokarrt@reddit
turns out making a good product at a fair price is a successful strategy.
the absolute irony that this is an apple product is not lost on me.
chandleya@reddit
It’s just a “cheap” gadget with moderate utility. It’s being used as an instrument of cool - great outcomes for the marketing department but lousy for r/hardware and I suspect even worse for demand on higher margin units.
Saneless@reddit
I mean, the iPhone is incredibly popular and most people probably never wanted a Mac because of the price. Now the price isn't as big a deal
Price might be the only reason these days people even buy consumer windows laptops at all. No one wants a Microsoft machine, for good reasons
GHz-Man@reddit
Apple's had a $499 desktop since 2005, and the MacBook Air has been $999 for a while.
Not sure that's really "expensive" given the specs and design, but a lot of people are fine with a $500 Windows laptop or Chromebook with a plastic shell and plastic screen, I guess.
tmchn@reddit
Yeah but the mac mini isn't portable and the 999$ air is still double the price of and edu discount neo
Most people i know bought windows laptops just because of the price and they always complained about the os, the subpar build quality and screen
The neo gives them a cheap option with good build and screen
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
Yes and its incredibly popular proving the point, its also terrible value if you start increasing it from base spec.
seatux@reddit
Its only slightly more money than a M4 Mini but includes everything needed to run it from the get go.
myloteller@reddit
In a sea of e-waste plastic frame budget laptops preloaded with bloatware. The neo is actually pretty good specs with an aluminum frame.
Bderken@reddit
As an engineer. Im genuinely curious what applications you use for work.
We have a lot of windows apps working on our Mac’s really well.
tmchn@reddit
Excel on macOs is gimped and they don't have ms access, just thinking of two of my most frequently used apps at work
hanotak@reddit
VisualStudio.exe
trololololo2137@reddit
for c# rider is way better than VS except if you need some crazy stuff like mixed mode debugging
hanotak@reddit
This is C++ for DX12- I could probably move to something else by this point, since I'm on CMake anyway, but I've gotten used to it. With ReSharper, it's not too bad.
trololololo2137@reddit
yeah directx is not a great idea on macOS (not impossible though).
I'm developing vulkan stuff via moltenvk and it actually works perfectly fine with good perf but I'm also using vs code for C/C++ stuff
System0verlord@reddit
F.
Beg them for a jetbrains license?
Bderken@reddit
Oh god I do not miss the days of using that heap
Lenoxx97@reddit
It's honestly not too bad nowadays. Or maybe I'm just telling myself that to not feel bad about having to use it every day.
JortsForSale@reddit
It still is that bad once you get used to something else
hanotak@reddit
It's somewhat better than it used to be, at least if you use CMake instead of MSbuild. It still does freeze sometimes, though, and the debug views are super laggy.
myloteller@reddit
Im in construction. Everyone uses Bluebeam Revu, they discontinued macOS support a few years ago. Im sure theres a work around but i have zero interest in fucking around with it. Revu already sucks ass as it is, freezes or crashes with every other windows update. Dont want to add fuel to the fire by trying to make it work on macOS
seatux@reddit
Revu any better than ACAD tho? If I recall ACAD maintained Apple Silicon compatibility and I see them on folks issued Macs for work.
frumply@reddit
Bluebeam is primarily for marking up PDF drawing sets. Designers may use acad/solidworks but as an engineer most likely you’ll be using bluebeam when reviewing their work and making redlines.
seatux@reddit
Thanks, the crowd in my country is extreme. Most only know how to comment on paper or willing to draw comment bubbles manually on ACAD. Some might figure out simple lines on normal PDF software like Foxit.
Bderken@reddit
Ah yeah that makes sense. I’ve never heard of that software but cool to learn about it!
Panzer22@reddit
Whats your method? I’ve tries running stuff on Parallels on M1 Pro, Windows itself runs fine but Altium Designer runs like dogshit. Not that it runs great on Windows either, but on Parallels was unusably slow
GHz-Man@reddit
Why? Sounds irrational.
NoPriorThreat@reddit
No copy on select.
Strange shortcut combinations. e.g. terminal use cmd+shift+T to open new tab, and other stuff instead of ctrl + keys but then to cancel a process, search in shell requires ctrl again.
Highlight does not respect whitespaces.
myloteller@reddit
100% irrational. Im just too lazy to learn it
GHz-Man@reddit
So you "hate" it because you don't want to learn it? lol
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
I recently found out I can do all my hobby stuff on a steam deck, FreeCAD, EasyEDA and OrcaSlicer all work just as well as they do on my desktop.
JamStan1978@reddit
Im the opposite. I dont like windows. Mac just feels smoother and is more consistent and cohesive. I really wish Microsoft would fix windows.
GHz-Man@reddit
Why? Is there something specific you like about Windows?
Choices exist for a reason.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
Adverts on the start menu, I paid for the OS why is it showing me adverts?
wankthisway@reddit
I mean, competition is always good. And as much as I really enjoy MacOS, I'd like to be able to use a Windows based machine without feeling like a pig being fattened for slaughter. But there's a lot of older games and apps I like to mess with that never had a MacOS equivalent.
Kyanche@reddit
Please don't take this as a personal attack, you can say it's due to the greatness of Windows, its superior compatibility, its enterprise-driven success. Whatever.
Compared to MacOS and modern Linux (Wayland) GUIs like KDE plasma and Gnome 50, The Windows 11 UI feels very choppy and laggy. I say that across a few different Windows machines, a few different Macs, and my gaming computer where I have windows 11 and fedora 43 and have run both gnome and kde extensively.
JJ3qnkpK@reddit
I wish they'd pick something and refine it. Feels like every big update brings some paradigm shifting change.
Meanwhile, with Apple, I could pluck an Apple user out of time from the early 90s, hand them modern MacOS, and they'd navigate it no problem. It's remarkable how long they've effectively kept the same UI.
DeliciousPangolin@reddit
If you put the Neo next to a current MBP and told someone that the Neo was last year's model of MBP, they'd probably believe you. Other laptops in that price bracket feel like they were built to a price. The Neo feels like a high-end laptop from a few years ago.
pmjm@reddit
I bought both the maxed out M5 Max for about $8K and the Neo at the same time. Believe it or not, I'm dailying the Neo.
Spez_is-a-nazi@reddit
Is it the weight?
pmjm@reddit
I'm a lot less worried about it getting stolen. Sure, it would still suck to lose, but you're a lot less of a target with a Neo than with a Pro.
I will still take my Macbook Pro out to professional jobs that need the power, but the Neo is a great daily driver.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
Thieves don't know the difference lol.
Shadow647@reddit
Having a $500 laptop stolen is much less of an issue for yourself though – even with insurance there's usually a deductible, and getting coverage for theft is quite difficult in some places.
pmjm@reddit
They don't, but I'm less paranoid about losing it and the peace of mind is worth it.
Stingray88@reddit
There are several YouTubers I know that hate Macs, and yet they’re gushing over the Neo.
The funny thing to me as a Mac user is that IMO the latest version of macOS is one of the worst we’ve ever gotten. I wish all these new converts had something better as their entry point.
GHz-Man@reddit
What's bad about MacOS?
Stingray88@reddit
Specifically with Tahoe, some of the design changes are really sloppy and inconsistent. It’s a big departure from previous versions which have been much more meticulously designed. Likewise it’s one of the buggiest versions I’ve seen in decades, although a lot of that has been fixed.
GHz-Man@reddit
Such as?
itsabearcannon@reddit
Visibility is a real issue. Too many inconsistently implemented layers of transparency can cause readability issues with things like app icons, menus, etc.
Also, all the transparency reduced UI smoothness. What used to be smooth 120FPS animations on my MacBook Pro on Sequoia became 50-70 FPS on Tahoe because of the sheer volume of transparency that has to be navigated every time a menu item moves.
And a lot of the really nagging bugs from previous macOS versions (like SMB shares refusing to stay mounted without third party apps like AutoMounter) still weren’t fixed in Tahoe.
So it came across as a very shiny update without a lot of thought put into the UI, and that UI dev time clearly came at the expense of performance optimization and bug fixes.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
None of this seems to be worse than adverts on the start menu.
schu2470@reddit
I'm a new MacOS user after 25+ years of Windows. Been using MacOS 26 Tahoe for a couple of months now and it's perfectly fine and, coming from the clusterfuck of Windows, is a breath of fresh air. A lot of the complaints I've seen are either issues I haven't experienced even when trying to set it up to fail OR are things that have been fixed with updates. I think the long time MacOS users who are complaining are just mad that things look different. Liquid Glass is fine and easy to turn down with accessibility tools if you don't like it, window management and Stage Manager are great, Spotlight actually works unlike the Start menu search on Windows post Windows 7, and the only stylistic inconsistency I've actually seen is from 3rd party apps. Actually picked up an M5 Pro MacBook Pro today after my introductory time on an M2 Mini and am thrilled with it.
Bderken@reddit
Every single thing someone has said it just parroted dumb stuff lol
Skellicious@reddit
It's very form over function.
Having used windows and Linux I was surprised how I needed a lot of third party software for what should be OS functionalities.
Some examples:
GHz-Man@reddit
What about it?
How?
chartriceratops@reddit
Built in display scaling options and display settings are quite limited. BetterDisplay exists for a reason.
I primarily use BetterDisplay to get my desk setup working with hiDPI on 1440p monitors or to have the internal display turn off when connecting to an external display.
There's a lot more settings in Betterdisplay which I've not needed to use yet.
Similarly I want natural scrolling (reverse scrolling) on the trackpad but regular scrolling on a mouse with a scroll wheel. MacOS links the two for some reason. LinearMouse fixes the issue along with adding better customisation for additional mouse buttons.
TBH, found the screenshot tool acceptable though I would have liked a markup option immediately after taking a screenshot.
kuddlesworth9419@reddit
I always found MacOS incredibly frustrating to use. I
InevitableSherbert36@reddit
r/redditsniper
an_angry_Moose@reddit
What's wrong with the built in screenshot tool? I use it pretty often, and combined with the fact that your iphone works seamlessly with the message app, I find it incredibly handy to take snippets off the net and message them to clients/friends.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
Gushing over the Mac Neo gets you views, need to check bias all the time.
liaminwales@reddit
Looks cool, good display, audio, battery life and build quality with a low price.
For 90% of people it's all they need & better than most PC options or chrome books, it's what id get my parents next time.
KillerDemonic83@reddit
i wouldve 100% bought my mom one if she wasn't so adamantly against learning a new operating system
YourVelourFog@reddit
If you have a Mac it’s trivially easy to remote into her device to help them fix whatever issues they’re having - even from halfway around the world. It’s even smarter that it immediately starts up a voice chat for when doing it, all you need is their iCloud email and they have to press yes when you try to connect.
I’ve saved my mom about 3 trips to the Apple Store with this.
liaminwales@reddit
Chrome is chrome, my mum will be asking the same things what ever device it is. I have to help with the TV remote some times, I suspect she just wants to chat relay.
Actually-Yo-Momma@reddit
I supported chromebooks for so long. Every year they got more expensive with terrible longevity
an_angry_Moose@reddit
If Neo has even remotely the longevity of their first gen M1 silicon laptops, it's going to be an incredibly good investment for a personal laptop.
Vodkanadian@reddit
Maybe by that time that Asahi Linux project will be far enough that it'll be supported.
tmanred@reddit
Still use my 8GB M1 Air to this day as a nice basic web browsing and other light task device with stupid gif battery life. Even to this day there doesn't seem to be any direct competition on the x86 side.
TradeSurplus@reddit
As a scholl tech I wanted to like Chromebooks so much. But just like netbooks of times gone by, they too seemed *mostly* to be made of parts bin components, min specs and awful build quality.
seatux@reddit
The Neo I can easily get, Chrome OS devices are rare in my country for some reason.
ProfessionalPrincipa@reddit
I can't believe the word Microsl*p is auto-blocked on this sub as if this were a Windows fan sub.
Remote-Combination28@reddit
Some tech YouTubers that I watch, that aren’t usually Apple fans at all are all saying it’s a game changing laptop.
Roldolor@reddit
I honestly wonder if apple will keep releasing more neos
As they keep using newer and more powerful and more capable iphone chips wouldn’t that kinda eat into the casual macbook air audience? Typically a macbook air buyer just wants something that can browse the web, watch movies, process documents and maybe do some light gaming or photoshop.
As time goes on the macbook air will feel like a strange middle child in the laptop lineup.
I guess apple can just lock out certain features for the air like OLED, bigger storage, future face ID etc..
Stilgar314@reddit
Yeah, this Neo seems a way to get rid of those A18 that couldn't sell anywhere else. Also I'm sure Apple knows there would be hungry for an affordable Apple laptop, but going the affordable way would undermine their decades old strategy of high "prestige" pricing to position Apple as a premium brand. So, makes perfect sense for them to simply ditch the Neo once its mission if selling all those A18 surplus is accomplished, and maybe, come up with a more expensive Neo 2.
Xelanders@reddit
The Air will probably be redesigned to be thinner and lighter, rather then simply being the entry level machine.
Life_Menu_4094@reddit
I think the iPad lineup is instructive. The iPad Air has been "pointless" for several years now. Apple still updates it regularly because it plays an important function for product segmentation and upselling.
-protonsandneutrons-@reddit (OP)
The Air is in the middle Goldilocks zone. The gap between $600 and $1700 is too big to ignore.
I agree some would-be MacBook Air owners will move down to the Neo, but that is still likely much more revenue for Apple because it brings in so many other buyers, some likely that would be never bought a Mac before.
Bureaucromancer@reddit
My guess is that they just keep going the way they have the last couple years... Airs get more pro like, Pro moves upmarket.
eugene00825@reddit
Yeah which is essentially who the neo is targeted for; The casual users where the macbook air would be overkill. I imagine they'll keep the air series as a middle ground between the neo and the pro, and if the demand isn't there they'll probably just discontinue it like they usually do.
QuadraKev_@reddit
Not surprising. It might be the best bang-for-buck laptop ever released.
trackdaybruh@reddit
Really is
A Chromebook that is used in K-12 school now costs around $350
GHz-Man@reddit
Yeah, but those will probably be broken within a year, if not less.
Gloomy_Necesary@reddit
Landfill material
Deep90@reddit
People kept telling me these are meant for schools, but I have no idea why/how they are selling them to schools at education pricing when there is no reason these would not fly off the shelves with retail buyers.
randomkidlol@reddit
because macos is the biggest crutch. apple's never been able to maintain binary backwards compatibility for more than 7ish years so any older software is guaranteed to not work.
bhop_monsterjam@reddit
Windows on ARM: $1200 best I can do
theother1there@reddit
Not sure how Apple could scale production while keeping cost down though.
The Neo was basically built as a spare parts laptop using A18 Pro chips that didn't meet standards (5 cores vs 6 cores normally).
Advanced_Concern7910@reddit
The chip cost for apple isn't significant. They could just switch to A19/A19 Pro chips.
It might cost them $50 in profit margin per computer, but I'm sure they can afford that.
Stilgar314@reddit
Bold to assume they don't want that $50 for themselves.
hackenclaw@reddit
why would you need that, I am doing fine with a 2020 Ryzen 6 core APU on my work laptop.
my old gaming PC is a i7-2600K quadcore that age all the way back in 2012. Most people dont need more powerful CPU that they already need in this price range.
Infact I think the biggest bottleneck of this laptop is their RAM size. So going forward for next generation I would prefer Apple increase the RAM to 12-16GB. This thing will smash even more when they upgrade the RAM foe next generation.
sussy_ball@reddit
A19 Pro seems to be the chip for next year's model according to reports
-protonsandneutrons-@reddit (OP)
Apple makes around ~100 million A18 Pro SoCs a year. Even 5% - 10% of defective GPU dies seems possible, judging by current estimates of 5-10 million total Neo sales.
https://www.reddit.com/r/hardware/comments/1ro70ly/comment/o9e4ycs/
Spez_is-a-nazi@reddit
It’s still last years chip. Yes new units will cost them more than the CPUs they were going to have to dispose of anyhow but it’s not like they have to design and tape out a new chip, they can order more(assuming TSMC has the spare capacity to make them…)
GHz-Man@reddit
They could just eat the extra cost and not raise prices, like they've been doing so far with tariffs and RAM prices.
avboden@reddit
And it’ll only get better with a chip upgrade every year or two. Once it gets up to 12Gb memory on the next chip there will be almost nothing for even the hardest haters to complain about. Apple has created the best gateway drug to the Apple ecosystem possible. All those kids with these will want an iPad and iPhone soon enough and the adults will start thinking about the various subscription services
clicky_fingers@reddit
Yup. If they release an A19 model next year in an orange colorway, I'm 100% buying it just so I can leave my regular laptop docked at home. Next year I'm planning to get a new phone, and possibly my first smartwatch; was planning on Android since I don't have any Apple devices, but if I'll be in the ecosystem anyway...
A $500 laptop suddenly turns into spending more than twice that.
GHz-Man@reddit
The iPhone 17e is $600 and has the same chip as their flagship phones, and camera aside from the different optical zooms.
kaden-99@reddit
17e's camera sensor is significantly smaller than the regular 17's and even older iPhones.
clicky_fingers@reddit
I was including the price of the Neo when I said 'more than twice'. The prices I was looking at were $200 for a refurbished iPhone SE 3rd gen, $250 for an Apple Watch SE 3, and $130 for Airpods 4. With the Neo (assuming the price stays the same for next year's model, which is a big assumption), that's $1,080.
I really wish they still made iPhone SE, it's hard to find a good compact phone.
herbert181@reddit
bro bought a laptop to keep it docked
clicky_fingers@reddit
lol four years of it knocking around in my backpack have me worried enough to baby it, and recently the hinge makes a weird noise.
It'd be nice to pull it from the field and put it on desk duty, and hopefully last long enough to outlive the bubble so I can build a real desktop PC at less-inflated prices 2-4 years from now.
wimpires@reddit
If a TSMC 3nm wafer costs Apple $15-20k then it's somewhere in the region of $30-40 per chip. A comparable Snapdragon or Intel/AMD chips is going to be $200-300. Just the vertical integration of the SOC alone gives Apple some $200+ headroom to outprice the competition.
Theoretically the only companies even capable of doing something similar are Huawei (banned) or Samsung (Exynos not good enough at those power level)
justice_for_lachesis@reddit
I believe they use binned versions, so these are basically free
Interdimension@reddit
And I believe the reports suggest that the reason why the Neo is in short supply is because Apple had to spin up production of the A18 Pro as they ran out of their stockpile of binned A18 Pro chips. What a good problem to have, lmao.
(The Neo’s A18 Pro has one less GPU core than the full A18 Pro that was in the iPhone 16 Pro lineup, so the Neo’s chip is the same as the one that was in the standard iPhone 16 and 16 Plus.)
seatux@reddit
Would be funny to see some come with fully OK SOC but lobbed off in software. Would be cool to unlock the extra cores like the old Athlon 64 X3.
jigsaw1024@reddit
They could sell it as a higher tier model. Just add $50 or so. Do a fall refresh with the new top end model.
I'm sure they could also find some other products to put full chips in: maybe a budget iPad? New iPhone SE?
The SoC isn't that old, and still has a large base of deployed products, so the only real impact would likely be having to support the SoC in their OS for maybe a few extra years.
I'm actually surprised Apple hasn't released more binned budget products as vector to get more people into their ecosystem.
Shadow647@reddit
They could also bundle the better chip with 512 GB versions as a 'free extra' as they already did on some MacBook Airs previously
itsabearcannon@reddit
I believe that was the Phenom II line, and I only remember that because I did it myself on my X3 720.
seatux@reddit
I stand corrected.
Or things could end up like those Intel Upgrade cards, that would be so on brand for Apple to offer tho.
Just_Maintenance@reddit
They will definitely just disable a core in firmware or software.
That’s not uncommon at all. AMD commonly does that with their cut down variants, and at least once they fucked up and left the extra hardware enabled on some samples (8 core Ryzen 1600s)
Now if Apple completely runs out of A18 Pro silicon in general, good and bad. They will either need to fire up production again or change the Neo.
GHz-Man@reddit
They're already absorbing the cost of tariffs and RAM prices, probably will do the same.
Ok_Fix3639@reddit
It probably will eat into margins but they are just going to bin everything to keep the spec the same I think.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
Its not free, Apple costed in all yields into the budgets, they still want a tidy profit back on these CPU's, and will be getting them as these devices are no where near as expensive to make as people think they are.
Just_Maintenance@reddit
They still pay for the wafer regardless of how many good or bad chips there are in it
They just get to sell some of the bad ones now.
justice_for_lachesis@reddit
you get them for free with the iphone chips
Just_Maintenance@reddit
Apple did pay for the entire wafers though. TSMC doesn't give them a discount for the flawed chips or anything.
The flawed chips are "free now" in the sense that they are a sunk cost. But that doesn't mean they were free, it just means Apple already paid and has them sitting around unsold.
With the Neo, Apple got to sell the some of the unsold samples they had, and thus got more value out of the same wafers they already paid for.
If Apple has to fire A18 Pro production back up then the new chips wont even be a sunk cost, they will just be cost.
justice_for_lachesis@reddit
As long as they make the iphone with that chip it's a sunk cost so it's always free. I assume they will just upgrade the chip instead of running an old design.
doscomputer@reddit
41 upvotes on a guy making the argument that OEMs pay consumer pricing for a chip, yeesh
Apple advertisers rule the internet.
raulgzz@reddit
It seems to be that way, the galaxy book pro cost a shit ton of money and it comes with a disgraceful 4 core intel graphics chip.
Front_Expression_367@reddit
I mean if you think the price problem comes from Intel and not from the fact that the laptop has "Pro" in its name then I don't know what to tell you. A Macbook Pro is pricier than the Macbook Air even if they sport the same Apple M5 because it is a Pro model. Similarly a Dell XPS 9315 having the same Core i7-1250U as the HP Envy x360 and still be $1500 rather than $1000 or $500 pricier because it is a Dell XPS.
dfv157@reddit
Sure, guy might be exaggerating a little bit, but you better believe QComm and Intel is going to want their margins. A chip of the same size and process will cost Apple less than Dell, no matter what.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
At least 3 big companies are all trying to make a profit out of a Windows laptop, there is simply no way for them to compete at this price point I actually expect them to just abandon this tier to Apple and focus on eWaste $400 laptops and > $1000 laptops.
avboden@reddit
Apple also doesn’t care about making money from the Neo itself. Its purpose is market share to get people into subscriptions or further Apple devices.
oddsnsodds@reddit
No, Apple never does that. You better believe that they are making Apple Margins™ on the Neo.
avboden@reddit
I'm sure they have margins on it, but a lot less margins than their other products is the point
oddsnsodds@reddit
In absolute terms, sure, a $600 product is going to make less than a $2400 product. In relative terms, no, Apple isn't going to bend on their percentage. Selling one product at 2400 or four at 600, they expect to net the same amount.
avboden@reddit
You really shouldn't speak in absolutes
raulgzz@reddit
If they drop their hardware profit margins, their stock price receives a big hit.
avboden@reddit
Not when service revenue skyrockets
oddsnsodds@reddit
True enough, but you could do better than vague notions of less and small. Neither of us is getting invited to Stratechery.
GHz-Man@reddit
I mean it's being reported that they aren't even manufacturing chips for these any more.
They're just re-using binned chips from the older iPhones that they would've normally thrown out, so the SoCs essentially cost them nothing.
shpongolian@reddit
They definitely have higher percentage margins some products, especially with upgrades. Someone buying a maxed out 512GB 8TB Mac Studio is less worried about budget vs somebody fretting over whether to get the $700 Neo or the $600 Neo, and they take advantage of that by having insane margins on the RAM & SSD upgrades which will bring the overall margin percentage way up.
But regardless their only other options here are to either raise the price, stop selling it until the next model, or release the next model right away with the A19 chips. I really don’t see them choosing one of those rather than taking the small hit on margins.
Some-Dog5000@reddit
Apple never, ever sells things at a loss. The reason why the Neo is so cheap is vertical integration and ridiculous supply chain optimization. It's the Tim Cook-iest product there is.
avboden@reddit
I never said at a loss. Just that the margins on it are likely pretty small and they're fine with that vs other products.
IgnoranceIndicatorMa@reddit
We don't know the margins or at what margin point it is not fine with them.
NeroClaudius199907@reddit
Other companies will improve their build qualities.
randomkidlol@reddit
the only reason why its cheap is because its a repurposed ipad motherboard on a repurposed macbook air chassis. the only upgrades its ever getting is whatever excess inventory they have from ipads and macbook airs.
avboden@reddit
Wow, literally everything you just said was wrong. Impressive!
randomkidlol@reddit
feel free to explain to me how apple spent 10s of millions engineering everything from scratch for the cheapest laptop in their lineup instead of putting that money into their other machines that sell for 3x as much.
77ilham77@reddit
Well, for starter, no iPad has ever use A18 Pro to begin with. Second, no Macbook Air has ever use that chassis, not to mention that it's thicker than Macbook Air and has different battery placement than the Air.
I think you're misunderstanding which part of the laptop that is "binned"
avboden@reddit
The ONLY thing parts-bin is the processor. It uses iphone chips. Everything else is new. Heck it even has a new, never used before track pad.
doscomputer@reddit
it would be a good product if it actually was a repurposed macbook air, 2 ports is still wack but not as bad as the 12 inch macbook with only 1
also if the sales are really this high all it means is the previous apple laptops were all selling bad lol
randomkidlol@reddit
yeah the IO is absolute garbage and its stuck on 8gb of ram because the base iphones and ipads were never engineered for any more than that.
apple's made it to 15% ish market share for personal computers after being stuck at like 5% for 20+ years, so theres something to be proud of i guess.
GHz-Man@reddit
You are correct they're using leftover binned chips (that they otherwise would have thrown out) from the iPhone (not iPad), but it's not a MacBook Air chassis, it's a completely new design.
Aside from the CPU itself, nothing else is re-used or a leftover from something else.
itx_atx@reddit
You genuinely have no idea what you're talking about
superkickstart@reddit
"apple ecosystem" is plenty of reasons to keep hating.
Plank_With_A_Nail_In@reddit
RAM prices mean the current NEO will be competing against 6GB windows laptops in a couple of months.
TradeSurplus@reddit
Needing a new laptop for uni, I was considering buying a used business class laptop from HP or Lenovo. And then Neo was released.
Yeah, sure - it's a bit lower specced but it still has awesome screen, better speakers than HP "Bang&Olufsen" stickers and battery life is amazing.
I'm now thinking about replacing my workstation PC with Mini but I still need to think about it some - Adobe Lightroom Classic manages to get slower with every update that claims they made it faster ... And after my phone dies, next one will be iPhone probably.
So the gateway drug is working well I guess.
dustarma@reddit
I feel like by the time they start releasing Neos with 12GB RAM then that's already going to be the absolute bare minimum for usability, much like 8GB is nowadays.
avboden@reddit
I mean, it's expected next year. Won't take long to be released
b_vitamin@reddit
Hardware sounds great but I can’t stand iOS on a non-cell phone.
Interdimension@reddit
Precisely this for me. From experience, the 8GB M1 MacBook Air that I had worked fine, but I’d prefer 12GB of RAM in 2026. If the 2nd generation Neo comes with a binned A19 Pro with 12GB of RAM? Man, that’s gonna be a solid laptop with minimal issues to complain about (assuming they don’t raise the price point, given the memory shortages).
GHz-Man@reddit
It's already nothing to complain about.
The people complaining about 8GB of RAM aren't in the target market for the Neo in the first place.
If you need more, that's what the MacBook Air and Pro are for.
8GB is perfectly fine for web browsing, email, Google Docs, etc.
It's really meant for students, seniors, etc.
crshbndct@reddit
Yeah modern operating systems don’t just grind to a halt and bluescreen when memory gets low, like windows does. It’s far more usable than people think
joe1134206@reddit
Windows side has been so stubbornly piss poor that I wonder if even this can affect meaningful software and hardware change in such a stagnant group of products.
seattlemusiclover@reddit
The problem is the software, not so much with the hardware. Power users either buy a windows laptop and install Linux or else they bite the bullet and pay the premium for a MacBook Pro
ProZoid_10@reddit
Whats a power user? Also doesn’t Linux have like 3% share
seattlemusiclover@reddit
People who actually need powerful laptops.
So here's the deal. Macbook Air is amazing and better than windows laptops at its range. BUT, power users or users who will be using resource intensive applications for prolonged periods of time, they need Macbook Pros as Air has a fanless design which leads to throttling (ie laptop slowing down to the heat generated in resource intensive workloads)
Spirited-Director891@reddit
Man its like sheep to the slaughter
Xelanders@reddit
It’s just a laptop.
sharkeymcsharkface@reddit
Maybe Samsung will copy them with Qualcomm ARM chips
ProZoid_10@reddit
Low margins, samsung should try to use their own cpus
holt2ic2@reddit
Yeah it’s essentially over for budget laptops. I think Neo 2 will be the laptop that solidifies Apple as a budget, mid tier, and high end laptop. macOS is going to be more widely accepted. As someone who builds PCs regularly, I’d honestly just recommend a Neo for anyone who wants a laptop to buy and forget afterwards. It will get all you need down while not feeling cheap as hell. It’s wild because most buyers of the Neo are people switching from windows or people who otherwise wouldn’t have bought one had it been more expensive. I think MacBook Air and pro buyers still are going to buy those like myself.
ProZoid_10@reddit
If windows oems improve build quality for higher models due to MacBook Air nd pro why wouldn’t they improve for lower? We can see they’re still shipping a lot of units
VideogamerDisliker@reddit
Guarantee a good chunk of these were scalpers
Marble_Wraith@reddit
People want something budget range, but doesn't feel like it'll break if you drop it, that enables day to day stuff (news, videos, banking, shopping, word processing, email, etc.).
Apple releases a product addressing that market segment and... wow! It sells like hot cakes. Go figure 😑
And to state it explicitly. Nobody is buying it because it has some magical AI capabilities that other machines don't, since AI dogshit is mostly service oriented anyway.
scuffling@reddit
Can't wait to run Linux on it
zopiac@reddit
I would have bought one already if I thought there was any good chance of that happening within five years or so. Here's to hoping, though!
GHz-Man@reddit
It runs VMs fine.
Frexxia@reddit
Fine is doing some heavy lifting here. You'll be pretty resource constrained in a VM on a device that only has 8 GB memory in the first place
zopiac@reddit
Ah, never thought about that. Just native installations/bare metal.
GHz-Man@reddit
Why is that needed?
zopiac@reddit
Needed? It isn't, and I never claimed it was. It's what I'd want though, ideally. Especially with 8GB RAM I'd rather not be running another OS in the background.
NeroClaudius199907@reddit
If apple ships \~6m silicon units quarterly. How many neo are they shipping?
BillySlang@reddit
They upped their projections from 5M to 10M this year alone. It’ll probably never stop selling well. In its own way, it’s as impressive as their top of the line offerings.
NeroClaudius199907@reddit
Crazy the neo will be 37% of Apple's mobile units this year already.