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Legacy MacPro Outsells MacMini 5% vs 2% of total Mac sales – survey says
Finally, though the Mac Pro has not been significantly updated in several years, it still accounts for 5% of total Mac sales, according to the survey — and is more popular than the Mac mini.
Apple does not break down sales by model, and though this data is from a survey and not company-provided, it gives some insight into the sales preferences of Apple’s customers.
I know, just a survey, but interesting nonetheless.
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6 Replies
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The Mac Mini has always been a strange fit in the lineup anyway from a consumer standpoint in my opinion, so that doesn’t surprise me. It’s almost the Mac Cube. 😉 Seeing as you still have to add keboard, mouse, and monitor it seems that is is much easier to either get a MacBook Pro or an iMac all in for the mass consumer market. And in some cases, even the iPad. And seeing as it is not really a replacement for the MacPro, those folks still buy MacPro.
Michael
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The Mac Mini needs to be a lot less expensive to make a good sell point, might as well buy the bottom of the line iMac. I’ve heard they make a decent Metadata controller though.
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The mini is indeed a niche machine in it’s own right. My understanding is that it’s found great success as a mini-server for small business and retail installations. I was at a Ski resort this winter, and noticed them strapped to the back of TVs hanging from the ceiling, driving the video content.
I think the MacPro and the MacMini will continue to be the oddballs in the Mac lineup.
But at the same time, over the next 5-10 years I see the Mac lineup shrinking as product lines can be consolidated. Right how we have
MacBook Air
MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro RetinaMacMini
iMac
MacProFor sure, the non-Retina MacBook Pros will be going away as soon as Apple can get the price premium for the screens down. Perhaps even this year with Haswell.
My question is when will the divide in performance/weight be such that there doesn’t’ need to an Air AND a Pro. Certainly laptops will only want to get SO thin before they become flimsy, so there is a conceivable bottom to the benefit of the Air, afterwhich people will will be more interested in battery life, which means you need to keep volume. And as internals keep shrinking, a machine the size of an Air will be faster and faster. So in 10 years, I could just see a single MacBook lineup.
On the desktop side, Apple has clearly made its case for external expansion. I’m not sure what Intel’s timeline is for 100Gbps Optical Thunderbolt, but I’d be surprised if its more than 5-7 years out. When you can literally hook up ANYTHING via TB expansion, including multiple high-end GPUs, then really all the “computer” is for is the CPU, RAM, and I/O. The only difference between a MacPro and an iMac will be what you can configure internally.
At that point, maybe it won’t make any sense to have both a MacMini and a MacPro, and it will just be a broader range of internal processor options from lower consumer end, to server-class Xeons. Leaving us with simply an all-in-one and a headless option on the desktop side.
Ramble ended.
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I think the Mni’s target had been “switchers” as a way to buy a Mac for someone with monitor, mouse, keyboard from their Windows computer.
Consider Quad Core i7 Mini is $799 (granted only integrated GPU) vs Quad Core i5 21″ iMac at $1299. Dual Core i5 Mini is $599 and with cheap peripherals is still significantly less than base iMac.
I wonder what the survey base was because i find the Mini percentage to be very low. That might not be unexpected from people who already own Macs.
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Mac Mini = Conference room Mac.
Get a refurb or an Ebay special.
Rich Rubasch
Tilt Media Inc.
Video Production, Post, Studio Sound Stage
Founder/President/Editor/Designer/Animator
https://www.tiltmedia.com -
[Craig Seeman] “I think the Mni’s target had been “switchers” as a way to buy a Mac for someone with monitor, mouse, keyboard from their Windows computer.”
That was the original concept, but for the last few years the MacBook Air has probably carried the flag as the most popular entry-point for new Mac users. The mini seems to be most popular as a hobbyist/utility/server/HTPC type thing lately.
Best,
Andy
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