Apple Mac : why it is going to be bad for pro sofwares soon

[minidog]

I found this very interesting post from "pipotron3000" on AudioZ.eu ( yes it's a pirate site!)



As you may have noticed, thing are changing fast on Apple side.
Coming from a computer making only status, now Apple is (almost) everywhere :
Computers (laptop, desktop, tower...cylinder sorry, mini-desktop), smartphones (almost 40% of them), tablets, Apple TV, vids, MP3, books,apps...

Apple changed from a very limited public to a very broad public. Almost everyone use or know someone using an iPhone.
Trust an old fart like me, it was not like that in the 90's with Apple computers :bleh:
Computers changed from their ONLY product status, to just ANOTHER product. I know it is shocking for early Mac users, but that's reality.

Apple sells much more iDevices than computers (around 6% computers market only, compared to 40% smartphones).
And they sell more laptops than desktops (recent change for less than 5 years). With an high margin. Computers are marginal in number, but not money

So Apple decided to make another step : why not using this large public audience (idevices and content) to sell more computers ?
After all, starting from only 6%, there is a lot to improve ?

That's when Apple started to provide FREE OSX updates (for the first time ever) with Mavericks. Combined with more iOS integration, cloud and mac store, Apple try to make Macs more "mainstream", using their already great iDevices and content market.

Until now, this is not so problematic for us, audio lovers :mates:
But it starts here

-First, they are trying to release OS updates more frequently, every year.Once again, to make Macs OS synced with iDevices iOS upgrades.

Each OS update mean more bugs to solve on the OS side, AND on the softwares/drivers side too.
Third party devs (drivers, softs, plugins) are NOT all going to follow Apple. You think they are obliged to ?
So read about Yosemite on Avid, Steinberg and Ableton (and more) forums. And audio hardware makers, too.
You think you just need to wait some months to iron out all bugs ? May be...but for now, Mavericks still get some unsolved bugs with common audio softs.

Rush is another problem.When ppl needed to buy updates, a lot less ppl upgraded on day one. But we seen what happened with Mavericks : a lot of ppl rushed...and posted all over the net to know how they could downgrade, just after they upgraded.
Downgrade is not something Apple provide as an easy solution. You made a full backup or you are (almost) dead.
Once again this year, with Yosemite, ppl are rushing and complaining their drivers, softwares, plugins are not working.
What will happen next year ? I let you wonder...

- Second point, even more problematic. Apple want their computers to be mainstream, like their iPhones.

And to reach this point, they "simplify" their softwares. That's why Logic X looks like Garageband 10...and so GB 10 looks like LX, too
But there is another new method : Apple mix their softwares and make them more "iOS like". That's what happened to Aperture/iPhoto (both gone) called now "Photos" (nice effort) with this "iOS like" feeling.
Who is next ? Logic/Garageband or Finalcut/iMovie ? I bet on Finalcut

Apple are doing that because PRO softwares dev cost them a lot of money, for few sells compared to less dev cost on simpler apps and so more money margin (even if they offer the soft, they get money back on hardware) because it is a mainstream public app.

Like it or not, Apple is dropping his pro software line.
Did you seen how many time it took to get Logic X ? Finalcut X release mess ? Even the most famous Finalcut tutorials maker is now offering Adobe Premiere tutorials, too

Between confidential pro software sells and massive mainstream adoption (even for free on the software side), Apple have made their choice. Byebye pro softwares line. The days when Apple was pushing professional usage to promote them are gone.
Apple don't care about pro audio, pro video or pro photo. Because even if you merge all those ppl, they represent pure nothing against iPhone users. And not so much among non-pro Mac users.That's the main problem we will face sooner than later.

So there still the amazing OSX (i love it, BTW) ?
Yes, but will third party devs follow that iOS-like path for their pro softwares and drivers ?
I'm not that sure about it. It costs a lot more money to debug Cubase or Protools than an iOS software.

The more i see Apple changes on the Mac side, the more i feel an era is gone for good...and nothing is coming to replace it.
And no, an overhyped iPad DAW running on ARM like CPU is not going to replace Logic on an octocore

Now, you can flame me :mates:

PS : don't take this too seriously, after all i'm not Nostradamus. Just an old fart with 25 years of computer tech on almost all platforms (even mainframe) :lmao: And i love OSX BTW (but not Apple merch) :dunno:


What's your opinion? Discuss please. Your Minidog

[Angstrom]

I don't see that as correct, it's a misreading of the situation.

Apple is an OS and hardware manufacturer who previously had to woo the creative types directly, this was because of Apple's small market share didn't provide third-party developers with enough profits to develop for the platform. This is why Apple bought Emagic Logic and subsidised it. Similarly they obtained Final Cut from Macromedia. At the time that made sound business sense, nobody else would invest that much effort into a small and closed market environment, other than the proprietors. At that time Apple's marketing strategy was to appeal to the creative sector so they would become the brand evangelists in order for Apple to crack the broader consumer market. In that sense the OP is correct.

Now, Apple have a more dominant market share they no longer need to appeal directly to niche creatives. Currently it could be argued that Apple hold an unfair monopoly on that corner of their ecosphere, subsidising LogicPro actually harms competition. I'm sure many potential Ableton Live users were put off by the relative RRP versus LogicPro.

If Logic and FinalCut were to disappear altogether the platform would remain as a fertile garden for 3rd party developers to move into. The market of digital professionals is stronger than ever. The platform is now stronger than ever. All that is happening is the lord of the manor no longer needs to sew and harvest the crops himself. Now the land is prepared, it's open to tenant farmers. More diversity, more people in the field

Whether you like the Fiefdom of Apple is another matter, but that hasn't changed.

[TomViolenz]

What will kill Apple for semi professionals is that they stopped letting you upgrade your RAM and HDD/SSD
(And that they sell RAM and SSDs themselves for an arm and a leg )

I got the Mid 2012 MBP a year after its release refurbished, because it was the last Mac laptop that allows this.
This year the iMac and the Mac Mini followed.

The computer as an appliance means the end of Apple for me.

I couldn't care less about Logic.

Nice plug for a pirate site btw...

[pinkpaint]

I disagree:

There brand new mac pro desktop is seemingly made for high end studios that need crazy processing power. (6 Thunderbolt ports, ps PCs still lack thunderbolt as far as im aware)

The retina laptops and retina imac are amazing for creative tasks. (Both have 2 Thunderbolt ports)

While apple may be adapting several of their products they have yet to do that with their pro software line. In fact they are doing more than Ableton imo, they bought redmatica and hired its CEO (this does not mean they are putting his ideas and his time in pro audio dev) but I think it means they are still hiring pro audio developers and still investing a lot of money to secure ideas. I love PC but quite frankly, I have to be honest there is nothing pro on the hardware side of things without thunderbolt at this point in time, regardless of how many OS updates they have. Its idiots faults for updating, honestly after this yosemite update if people don't learn to stop updating until their software companies tell them they are compatible then its their fault. I dont have issues when it comes to these updates because I usually wait 4-8 months to update.

I could care less about logic though. I could care less for apple in general. My hope for PCs is that they get their own version of thunderbolt soon. I would switch instantly.

[login]

The frequent upgrades that break compatibility and bring issues to some DAw's and plug ins are adding cost to developers, but which developer would be fool enough to drop support for OSX? There are just way to many users.

But In the long run it may make sense to apple to drop the pro market, would be very interesting to know the return investment they have on the resources they invest in pro software.

[Stromkraft]

Yeah, right,:

"Apple last quarter sold 5.5 million Macs, more than it's ever sold in any other quarter in company history.
Wait, what?
During the September quarter, Apple sold more Macs than ever before. Indeed, most analysts didn't even think Mac sales for the quarter would break the 5 million threshold. Even more impressive is that Apple last quarter didn't even release any new Mac models. And yet, Mac sales surged."
--"Long live the Mac! Apple posts all-time quarterly record in Mac sales" (TUAW)

From one experienced Mac user to another: While it's not all Pros buying new machines, Pros are the creators of content which the consumers want. Apple knows this.
Also you're forgetting the Prosumer and all audio creation tools on iOS.

So you're just wrong on this, plain and simple.
The future is bright for Apple, consumers and Pro users. Put on those shades, you're gonna need them!

[TomViolenz]

Sorry, I don't see myself buying another Mac if I can't even upgrade my own RAM and replace a broken hardrive.
In the laptops you can't even exchange the battery anymore.

If you are the target market for a Mac Pro, more power to you, but everyone else is getting a rotten deal

[Tarekith]

Pro users have (should have) accounts with Apples business team, they're not worried about swapping ram and HDs because they can get things fixed so quickly by Apple (and usually get a loaner while they wait). It's about reliability and fast repairs if you use a computer as the main tool in your profession, and that's something Apple still is way better at than anyone else. In that regard, Apple is actually doing a much better job at serving the professional content creators.

Just my $.02 though.

[Machinesworking]

Let's see? Since about 2001 Apple has introduced 10 updates to OS X. There is no new frequency of updates, Mr. Pirate is wrong about that, and developers who would have been put off by this are long gone.

Logic was bought to secure the "pro" platform for sure, but the reasons and evolution of Logic are not a linear path towards iGarageband Pro. The main reason I believe is that Cubase was becoming more Windows centric; Cubase had better features and use of resources on the Windows side in 2003. Along with a problematic flaw in VST cross platform; namely that coders would haphazardly leave some Windows code in their Mac version of their VSTs, crashing VST hosts, causing the general attitude that Windows was a more stable platform for DAWs. Audio Units, Core Audio and MIDI were all developed to combat this trend. Subsequently IMO Apple bought Emagic (Logic), because the Emagic team was truly excited to ditch VSTs, which had been a constant problem for their the support being that to host VSTs a DAW developer has to backwards engineer hosting ability as Steinberg are pretty much not that interested in keeping a huge journal of support available for this. Apple of course also wanted an in house AU host, and Logic was a good choice because of the Emagic teams willingness to reinvent support for plug ins. AU documentation is extensive both for hosing and plug in developing, which to this day has a handful of host and plug in developers being AU only.
That Logic is being dumbed down is debatable, it's certainly a bit less customizable than it was when Emagic owned it, in a simplicity is beauty way that Apple loves to do with it's UI's, but there are a massive amount of new features in Logic X Versus Logic 5, the first version after Apple bought them, to say otherwise is to be hiding your head in the sand.

Actually I don't see anything at all really changing with Apple in terms of it becoming less 'pro'. Hardware wise it's debatable whether it's a good idea to have an open system or closed, that's why there's a Windows and an OS X in terms of hardware it runs on. I agree it's more of a PITA. I bought a used retina because I wanted to get a maxed out machine, at 16GB RAM and a 512GB HD I'm not worried about upgrading, and BTW you can upgrade the HD, it's the RAM that is hardwired onto the motherboard. The battery thing is kind of annoying, and raises my traditional cost to replace a battery by $100.

TL;DR The guy is talking shit. Nothing is that different in the Mac world, in fact things are going quite well; Logic is ubiquitous, most audio software is cross platform, and people aren't abandoning the platform.

[Stromkraft]

Sorry, I don't see myself buying another Mac if I can't even upgrade my own RAM and replace a broken hardrive.
In the laptops you can't even exchange the battery anymore.

If you are the target market for a Mac Pro, more power to you, but everyone else is getting a rotten deal

Hopefully the RAM being part of the board is because of design reasons, but at any rate I'm just going to order the biggest RAM and SSD I can get. Why skimp?

Of course you will be able to replace drives anyway and if you can't do that, because you don't know how, people like me will do it for a small price on the second hand service market. If you weigh in Applecare, as I always do, you get service for 3 full years. Apple gives me very good service, with less than a week repair turnaround if I happen to need it.

I get all parts from places like ifixit.com, Ifixit also have instructionals for the rest of us.

[Tarekith]

The SSD drives are part of the main boards now and not removeable I thought? Either way, yes, just get what you need when you buy the thing.

I think people just forget that ALL Apple products are premiumly priced, pre-designed, self-contained products. They're not meant to be cheap, or serviceable, there are plenty of other options for that kind of thing.

[jlgrimes]

I found this very interesting post from "pipotron3000" on AudioZ.eu ( yes it's a pirate site!)



As you may have noticed, thing are changing fast on Apple side.
Coming from a computer making only status, now Apple is (almost) everywhere :
Computers (laptop, desktop, tower...cylinder sorry, mini-desktop), smartphones (almost 40% of them), tablets, Apple TV, vids, MP3, books,apps...

Apple changed from a very limited public to a very broad public. Almost everyone use or know someone using an iPhone.
Trust an old fart like me, it was not like that in the 90's with Apple computers :bleh:
Computers changed from their ONLY product status, to just ANOTHER product. I know it is shocking for early Mac users, but that's reality.

Apple sells much more iDevices than computers (around 6% computers market only, compared to 40% smartphones).
And they sell more laptops than desktops (recent change for less than 5 years). With an high margin. Computers are marginal in number, but not money

So Apple decided to make another step : why not using this large public audience (idevices and content) to sell more computers ?
After all, starting from only 6%, there is a lot to improve ?

That's when Apple started to provide FREE OSX updates (for the first time ever) with Mavericks. Combined with more iOS integration, cloud and mac store, Apple try to make Macs more "mainstream", using their already great iDevices and content market.

Until now, this is not so problematic for us, audio lovers :mates:
But it starts here

-First, they are trying to release OS updates more frequently, every year.Once again, to make Macs OS synced with iDevices iOS upgrades.

Each OS update mean more bugs to solve on the OS side, AND on the softwares/drivers side too.
Third party devs (drivers, softs, plugins) are NOT all going to follow Apple. You think they are obliged to ?
So read about Yosemite on Avid, Steinberg and Ableton (and more) forums. And audio hardware makers, too.
You think you just need to wait some months to iron out all bugs ? May be...but for now, Mavericks still get some unsolved bugs with common audio softs.

Rush is another problem.When ppl needed to buy updates, a lot less ppl upgraded on day one. But we seen what happened with Mavericks : a lot of ppl rushed...and posted all over the net to know how they could downgrade, just after they upgraded.
Downgrade is not something Apple provide as an easy solution. You made a full backup or you are (almost) dead.
Once again this year, with Yosemite, ppl are rushing and complaining their drivers, softwares, plugins are not working.
What will happen next year ? I let you wonder...

- Second point, even more problematic. Apple want their computers to be mainstream, like their iPhones.

And to reach this point, they "simplify" their softwares. That's why Logic X looks like Garageband 10...and so GB 10 looks like LX, too
But there is another new method : Apple mix their softwares and make them more "iOS like". That's what happened to Aperture/iPhoto (both gone) called now "Photos" (nice effort) with this "iOS like" feeling.
Who is next ? Logic/Garageband or Finalcut/iMovie ? I bet on Finalcut

Apple are doing that because PRO softwares dev cost them a lot of money, for few sells compared to less dev cost on simpler apps and so more money margin (even if they offer the soft, they get money back on hardware) because it is a mainstream public app.

Like it or not, Apple is dropping his pro software line.
Did you seen how many time it took to get Logic X ? Finalcut X release mess ? Even the most famous Finalcut tutorials maker is now offering Adobe Premiere tutorials, too

Between confidential pro software sells and massive mainstream adoption (even for free on the software side), Apple have made their choice. Byebye pro softwares line. The days when Apple was pushing professional usage to promote them are gone.
Apple don't care about pro audio, pro video or pro photo. Because even if you merge all those ppl, they represent pure nothing against iPhone users. And not so much among non-pro Mac users.That's the main problem we will face sooner than later.

So there still the amazing OSX (i love it, BTW) ?
Yes, but will third party devs follow that iOS-like path for their pro softwares and drivers ?
I'm not that sure about it. It costs a lot more money to debug Cubase or Protools than an iOS software.

The more i see Apple changes on the Mac side, the more i feel an era is gone for good...and nothing is coming to replace it.
And no, an overhyped iPad DAW running on ARM like CPU is not going to replace Logic on an octocore

Now, you can flame me :mates:

PS : don't take this too seriously, after all i'm not Nostradamus. Just an old fart with 25 years of computer tech on almost all platforms (even mainframe) :lmao: And i love OSX BTW (but not Apple merch) :dunno:


What's your opinion? Discuss please. Your Minidog

I think Microsoft don't seem to want the pro market as well though, so I dont think there will be much push.

I think the big thing though is that Personal computers (Macs and Windows) are slowly dying in general. Eventually, our phones will replace them but I think we have a while before that will happen.

Also I don't think Apple is really changing a whole lot on their OS upgrades, so I don't see the huge compatibility problems.

I upgraded from Mountain Lion to Mavericks after a 6 months or so and didn't have any issues.


At the same time as computers get faster and have more memory, managing Audio will become more easier and ultimately something like Midi, using little resources.

[Tarekith]

I update day one with my studio computer each time, and can't remember the last time it gave me any issues. Ditto iPad and iPhone, I hate waiting, too impatient

[login]

I think Microsoft don't seem to want the pro market as well though, so I dont think there will be much push.

I think the big thing though is that Personal computers (Macs and Windows) are slowly dying in general. Eventually, our phones will replace them but I think we have a while before that will happen.

Also I don't think Apple is really changing a whole lot on their OS upgrades, so I don't see the huge compatibility problems.

I upgraded from Mountain Lion to Mavericks after a 6 months or so and didn't have any issues.


At the same time as computers get faster and have more memory, managing Audio will become more easier and ultimately something like Midi, using little resources.

The PC wont die, but will be a niche of pro applications.

Microsoft is interested in keep serving pro users in the bussiness world, I am not sure they will turn to music professionals specially but well adobe is onboard and maybe that could drive things forward.

[kitekrazy]

I disagree:

There brand new mac pro desktop is seemingly made for high end studios that need crazy processing power. (6 Thunderbolt ports, ps PCs still lack thunderbolt as far as im aware)

The retina laptops and retina imac are amazing for creative tasks. (Both have 2 Thunderbolt ports)

While apple may be adapting several of their products they have yet to do that with their pro software line. In fact they are doing more than Ableton imo, they bought redmatica and hired its CEO (this does not mean they are putting his ideas and his time in pro audio dev) but I think it means they are still hiring pro audio developers and still investing a lot of money to secure ideas. I love PC but quite frankly, I have to be honest there is nothing pro on the hardware side of things without thunderbolt at this point in time, regardless of how many OS updates they have. Its idiots faults for updating, honestly after this yosemite update if people don't learn to stop updating until their software companies tell them they are compatible then its their fault. I dont have issues when it comes to these updates because I usually wait 4-8 months to update.

I could care less about logic though. I could care less for apple in general. My hope for PCs is that they get their own version of thunderbolt soon. I would switch instantly.

Higher end Intel PC boards have them. Thunderbolt isn't really catching on like wildfire. Look at the audio card vendors that have them. Few. I seen a Focusrite unit that claims Thunderbolt support but it's via an adapter. Some that are more dedicated to Apple hardware have those ports. I'm angry at Apple for moving the hardware industry away from 1394 or FW. A firewire port was standard on most Intel boards and many Asus. I have a Presonus 1394 and M-Audio FW410. These are great units that may eventually become doorstops. Most of my audio interfaces are now legacy products. If I had to do it again, I'd fork over a lot of money for RME devices because they are supported for a long time. I read on another forum a guy got a RME Babyface for under $600 with a Musicians Friend coupon. Right now USB is popular. They plug into everything and are backwards compatible.