On its 40th anniversary, things aren’t looking good for the Mac. While Apple managed to defy post-lockdown downward trends in the PC market in 2022, the company’s luck ran out in 2023, with Mac shipments down 22.4% per year. compared to the previous year, a steeper drop than even big Windows controllers, according to a study. firm IDC.) If we focus on Apple’s most recent quarterly report, Mac sales look truly abysmal, down 34% from the same period in 2022. And with the all-important first quarter report due next week, there’s suddenly a ton of pressure on the oldest member of the Apple family.
Like much of the company’s portfolio, the Mac has apparently suffered in recent years from the broader drain of resources from Apple Park, with money and employee time funneled into the all-consuming Vision Pro project. This may explain why radical redesigns that can generate customer excitement are rare and, therefore, why sales have been so poor. Even though the iPhone is doing pretty well, it’s hard to put all the blame on resources.
Either way, Apple hopes to revive the Mac’s fortunes in 2024, especially once the Vision Pro hits stores on February 2. And it’s not just a byproduct of all those designers and engineers breaking free from the launch treadmill and having time to redesign MacBook cases. The company hopes its mixed reality headset will one day become its flagship product, the center of an ecosystem as culturally important and financially lucrative as the iPhone is today: Tim Cook called it “the beginning of ‘a new era for computing’. But in the short term, this may have positive effects on older products in Apple’s lineup, and perhaps even save the Mac.
More than a display
Despite its high price, the Vision Pro is an accessory. Someone who decides to buy the $3,499 headset is going to use it as a companion to their other devices, and among the headset’s most work-relevant features is the ability to serve as a Mac display with a neat trick: just look in the direction of your Mac while wearing the headset and the two devices will connect wirelessly using AirPlay, and whatever is currently showing on the Mac will be swiped over the Vision Pro screen where it can be moved freely in this immense virtual area. In addition to having a much larger screen, you can work on macOS and visionOS applications simultaneously. Or work in reverse by mirroring your Vision Pro screen to a Mac to share your view with others.
Mac Virtual Display is limited to a single 4K display at launch, but it’s not a stretch to think it will support multiple displays and modular setups in the future. After all, Vision Pro has an M2 chip, so it’s not hard to imagine Apple adding features that match the Mac as VisionOS evolves.
The Vision Pro has the same M2 chip as the Mac.
Apple
This is an extremely attractive option. But chances are this feature is limited to newer Mac models: M1 and later would be a reasonable guess. Given how many Intel Macs are still available, this would provide a convenient prompt for owners to consider updating to something with a newer chipset. Some of the Mac regulars who have put off a purchase until 2023 might be tempted to return to the fold.
The key word here, of course, is “some.” Given that Apple is reportedly limiting its initial production of Vision Pro handsets to fewer than 100,000 units, no one should expect revenue to skyrocket because of Vision Pro owners missing out on updating their iMacs. (For comparison, Apple made about $29 billion from the Mac in fiscal 2023, which equates to about 29 million units. Another 100,000 units won’t move the dial much.) But as with so many other things. regarding Vision Pro, it is not at the moment. It’s about the future.
Experts have been saying for years that the days of desktops and laptops are numbered; indeed, it is somewhat surprising that their revenues have held up as well as they have. Larger-screen tablets and smartphones, cloud computing and 5G have all helped erode the need for the type of central work center that has been the basis of office life for decades. But spatial computing, which in the very long term could prove to be the last nail in the coffin of the traditional computer, could by then help to give it renewed relevance by making it a unique, useful and specialized element. in a more versatile computing configuration. And with Vision Pro poised to become the biggest name in spatial computing, that means the Mac is going to be pushed back into the spotlight.
Vision Pro could, however, turn out to be a failure. But Apple, make no mistake, is banking entirely on spatial computing and will not be discouraged by the poor sales of the first generation. And that’s good news for products like the Mac which should benefit from the halo effect and reap the benefits of the new platform. And after 40, she might need a little help.
