this post was submitted on 18 Apr 2024
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[–] dinckelman@lemmy.world 73 points 7 months ago (14 children)

They'll continue selling these, purely because of two reasons:

  • On an Air, 8gb is the bare minimum that is realistically viable, for people who don't do anything than browse the web, who they can later upsell, when they get a new machine.
  • They can immediately upsell you for every extra memory tier you would need. This makes them a colossal amount of money.

Practically all of us know that the difference between these memory modules is pocket change, when mass produced like this, but for those extra couple cents, they get an extra 100$ from you

[–] golli@lemm.ee 14 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (3 children)

I think it's mostly to have a price tag that doesn't immediately turn off people.

Yes, Apple is expensive in general, however people are generally fine with paying a premium. But if they'd come at you immediately with the full price for a reasonably specced machine, it would still turn many people away.

Instead they fix you on with a high, but still somewhat reasonable price and then upsell you in steps for everything. Like sure you could buy the 128gb iPhone pro, but then the storage will fill up fast with photos and videos. A great camera system being the huge selling point of the device.


On a side note I actually find the 256gb non upgradeable/replaceable ssd much more egregious, than the 8gb RAM.

As you say, for people with basic needs (and that is actually a quite large group), it is enough for daily use. Those people just browse the Web, view photos and write short documents in word. However especially if they have an iPhone and take lots of picture/videos, they will still fill up that storage fast. And then it gets really frustrating, unless you maybe pay even more to outsource everything to the icloud and pay monthly.

[–] towerful@programming.dev 8 points 7 months ago (1 children)

The low ram and storage are to drive you up 2 tiers.
By the time you go "256gb isn't enough storage, so I'll pay 10% more for something useable", you are pretty much at the stage of "if I'm spending this much, I might as well get the ram upgrade as well". And suddenly you are paying $500 more.

[–] golli@lemm.ee 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Exactly my point. Not sure if there is a better term, but in some way it is a bait-and-switch tactic.

With the "starting at" sticker price of the lowest configuration they get you into the mindset of wanting (and being able to afford) their premium device. And then once you are mentally commited they it's the choice between spending even more or compromising on a premium device (where you really should have to).

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