It’s impossible to prove a negative, but ya’ gotta’ wonder (at least I do) how much better Apple’s market share performance could be yet with a profitably-priced netbook, because netbooks are the hottest selling computer category.

Charles

These costs effect every manufacturer selling every device. I fail to see how this explains Apple having a much higher markup than anyone else in the industry.

It’s there to project an illusion of “quality” so people can delude themselves into thinking they’ve got something “better” than the guy next to them.

Go ahead and find me some other computer/electronics manufacturers who need 50% profit margin to get by. Apple isn’t passing costs onto consumers, they’re scalping consumers, who are happy to pay for it to keep the veil of “my computer is FANCY!” up over their eyes.

So why are Apple notebooks sales still growing like crazy? Show us the facts that Apple’s Mac business is actually declining. Because all the evidence show Mac sales are growing as strong as ever, despite all the anecdotal assertions posted here.

The facts: Apple notebook sales are STILL up 35%+ after more than a full year of netbooks on the market.

Stop trying to confuse your own cheapness with what Apple should do. MacBooks are still selling like hotcakes, despite your assertions that Apple is doomed if it doesn’t crater its own profit and revenues by coming out with its own netbook.

I do know folks for example who were die-hard 12″ PowerBook fans and who absolutely refused to countenance going to a 13″ display laptop due to the larger footprint, who eventually lost patience and bought PC netbooks, most of them sticking with Windows or Linux rather than going hackintosh. Those are customers and sales Apple lost — at least temporarily.

Like you, I personally prefer a larger, full-featured notebook computer, although not that much larger. My 13″ MacBook suits me just fine.

CM

I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone, or heard of anyone who defected to Windows over the desire for a small, cheap portable computer. I know people who are Mac users, and who have bought netbooks to travel with only to resell the netbook later on when they realized that it really wasn’t very useful compared to their Mac. If there are people like this, they exist in a very small number. Why should Apple pursue these people? I think that the iPad will evolve into something with more features, and more power. Eventually, the iPad’s OS will be able to support all of the things that its critics want. If you have been an Apple fan for as long as I have, then you should remember that a lot of Apple’s greatest products started out simple, and then evolved over time into something much more than the original. Just look at the evolution of the iPod. Did you think in 2001 that the iPod would some day allow you to browse the web, and send/receive email?

Personally, I prefer a larger notebook computer. I’m not a “road warrior”, but even if I were, I would still want a full featured computer.

To cite one of many references to Steve jobs’ comments at the iPad launch:

“In the world of Apple, being a Netbook is a bad, bad thing. During Apple’s keynote for the newly announced iPad, the Netbook was called out by Steve Jobs, who said ‘they’re not better at laptops than anything, they’re just cheaper.’

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10443246-1.html

General;

Of course netbooks sell well because they’re inexpensive. That’s the point.

If Appple would make a polycarbonate plastic bodied small clamshell laptop with an 11 inch or 12 inch display, giving it a footprint similar to the erstwhile, widely-lamented 12″ PowerBook G4, with a good keyboard, a decent compliment of I/O ports (ie: better than the MacBook Air’s pathetic few) and a SD Card reader, running the full Mac OS, they could sell it for substantially less than the entry-level $999 MacBook, but it would not have to be as low as Steve Jobs $500 “junk” threshold to sell a ton of them, and perhaps even more importantly — shore up the dam breach of defection to PC space by Macheads fed up with Apple refusing to supply them with the computer product they want rather than what Apple thinks they should want.

CM

You think you are bring clever with your question but it’s clear you’ve never taken Business 101.

Assuming the $220 cost is correct (a big “if” since it’s only a hypothetical estimate), you clearly do not realize the cost is just for the parts. Costs not factored by simply adding up the price of individual components include:

- research development costs, which most likely are in the hundreds of millions of dollars

- cost of assembly (Apple had to pay a manufacturer to actually build these things)

- cost of shipping (not just from the factories in China to the warehouses, but from the warehouses to resellers and customers)

- cost of marketing and advertising (probably in the tens of millions of dollars, especially if you consider global marketing)

- cost of warranty (if you don’t set aside some of the margin you make to cover DOA or replacement costs, you’re setting yourself up for a fall)

- cost of taxes (since a significant chunk of the profit on each device will go to pay taxes, your margins aren’t as big as you think you are)

- cost of packaging (you epect to unbox the thing after you buy it, right?)

Now, since you seem to think $220 parts cost covers all the costs of rolling iPad out, I’d like you to itemize each of the above costs, add it all up, then divide the sum by, say the 5 million units analysts think Apple will sell this year.

Then we can begin to talk about margins.

the iPad is made for ~$220 worth of parts. It could easily be sold at $300, Apple just chooses a high markup on it. So considering it’s made at around the same cost, why is it less CHEAP than the non-Apple competition?

I will not be surprised when this comment gets 0 replies.