Even then, it's getting more and more difficult to justify the increasing gap between Apple pricing and say - Dell or Lenovo. Almost $1k in it now for equivalently spec'd non-base MBP vs XPS15/X1 Extreme, and the gap just gets higher as you need higher requirements.
Let's have a look at what Apple have done since 2012.
1) Inflate the base prices of the machines and attempt to justify it via non-optional "features" such as the touch bar, wide gamut displays, extra thunderbolt ports, obsessively thin designs, T2 chip.
2) Solder everything, requiring customers to buy the specs they think they'll need in ~3 years' time upfront, when prices are at their highest. Look how expensive 1TB of flash was 3 years ago vs today, for example. Heck, in 2008-2012, several Apple machines could be upgraded to beyond their original BTO capabilities thanks to technology advancements and firmware updates by Apple at the time.
3) Where they didn't solder storage in the 2012-2015 machines, they used several different proprietary form factors for blade card SSDs when standardised form factors have existed the whole time (mSATA, M.2 SATA/PCIe AHCI/NVMe).
4) Removed the ability for customers to restore machines to working state either in the field or in a timely manner, and pushing customers toward Apple service and AppleCare.
5) Literally glue in the one consumable item in the machine (battery) that is almost certainly going to fail before the usable lifespan of the machine, pushing the price of a battery service up dramatically, reducing the economical lifespan of the machines.
6) Reduce serviceability of other components likely to fail or get damaged over time such as the keyboard and trackpad by riveting, glueing, sandwiching etc to ensure older machines are uneconomical to repair as soon as they can be, pushing customers toward buying a new machine.
This is a company that is doing everything to take away your choice as a customer, trying to turn expensive computers into disposable appliances. Don't try to justify this crap - just say no.
All the above, combined with the design flaws almost every 2016+ MacBook has (butterfly keyboard, flexgate, staingate, display connector issues, T2 chip integration issues), the seriously declining quality of Apple's OSs, the removal of useful features (MagSafe!, sleep light, external battery status meter, IR remote, non-type C ports, SD reader), have me now in the position where I not only don't want to buy any of there new MacBooks, I'm actively encouraging others not to as well.
Me, a once huge Apple fan whose personal portable machines have been Apple almost exclusively since the 90s. Whose OS of choice has been OS X/macOS since Jaguar. Who used to go out of his way to explain why Apple machines were worth it.
I recently bought a Thinkpad P1 Gen 2 with i9 9880H, 64GB RAM, 2x 2TB NVME, 15” OLED, basically all the options ticked, including a 3 year warranty with equivalent properties to AppleCare+.
It ran about $4700 before tax but after one of those coupons which Lenovo is constantly running and which knocks 10-30% off the MSRP of the device. Given Apple is now pricing NVME at $300/TB for upgrade, this seems comparably priced for what is largely the same internals.
I’ve been a MacBook Pro aficionado for the last decade. I’ve tried other stuff like the Surface Pro, never kept it.
I guess my point is there’s a myth that Apple is significantly more expensive than others, which doesn’t feel like it’s borne out by the manufacturer configurators when you’re dealing with high-end configurations?
Obviously, and this is highly subjective, I personally ascribe significant value to what Apple does to enhance thermal management (vs. the P1, which has throttling issues), to enhancing security through stuff like T2, Touch ID, FileVault 2 being so seamless, etc.
I’ve got enough nagging concerns about the maxed-out P1 Gen 2 that I’ve just ordered the new 16” MBP to do another compare and contrast — we’ll see how it goes. Extra 4TB of NVME over the P1 certainly doesn’t hurt.
Where I agree is some of the integration/packaging compromises impacting repairability are a pain, AppleCare+ is a subpar experience to Lenovo who’ll have parts and a technician appear next business day to fix your laptop. Also the mistakes Apple made around keyboards were deeply unfortunate, I had to get mine repaired multiple times.
Even then, it's getting more and more difficult to justify the increasing gap between Apple pricing and say - Dell or Lenovo. Almost $1k in it now for equivalently spec'd non-base MBP vs XPS15/X1 Extreme, and the gap just gets higher as you need higher requirements.
Let's have a look at what Apple have done since 2012.
1) Inflate the base prices of the machines and attempt to justify it via non-optional "features" such as the touch bar, wide gamut displays, extra thunderbolt ports, obsessively thin designs, T2 chip.
2) Solder everything, requiring customers to buy the specs they think they'll need in ~3 years' time upfront, when prices are at their highest. Look how expensive 1TB of flash was 3 years ago vs today, for example. Heck, in 2008-2012, several Apple machines could be upgraded to beyond their original BTO capabilities thanks to technology advancements and firmware updates by Apple at the time.
3) Where they didn't solder storage in the 2012-2015 machines, they used several different proprietary form factors for blade card SSDs when standardised form factors have existed the whole time (mSATA, M.2 SATA/PCIe AHCI/NVMe).
4) Removed the ability for customers to restore machines to working state either in the field or in a timely manner, and pushing customers toward Apple service and AppleCare.
5) Literally glue in the one consumable item in the machine (battery) that is almost certainly going to fail before the usable lifespan of the machine, pushing the price of a battery service up dramatically, reducing the economical lifespan of the machines.
6) Reduce serviceability of other components likely to fail or get damaged over time such as the keyboard and trackpad by riveting, glueing, sandwiching etc to ensure older machines are uneconomical to repair as soon as they can be, pushing customers toward buying a new machine.
This is a company that is doing everything to take away your choice as a customer, trying to turn expensive computers into disposable appliances. Don't try to justify this crap - just say no.
All the above, combined with the design flaws almost every 2016+ MacBook has (butterfly keyboard, flexgate, staingate, display connector issues, T2 chip integration issues), the seriously declining quality of Apple's OSs, the removal of useful features (MagSafe!, sleep light, external battery status meter, IR remote, non-type C ports, SD reader), have me now in the position where I not only don't want to buy any of there new MacBooks, I'm actively encouraging others not to as well.
Me, a once huge Apple fan whose personal portable machines have been Apple almost exclusively since the 90s. Whose OS of choice has been OS X/macOS since Jaguar. Who used to go out of his way to explain why Apple machines were worth it.
Nope. No more.