Apple's really gone downhill hard ever since Steve Jobs left, but even Jobs had some crazy ideas. He made fun of the idea of phones ever being larger than the first iPhone, saying they looked like skateboards, as the first five iPhones had 3.5" screens at a time when Androids were well into 4"+. The very first iPhone to come out after he croaked got a screen size upgrade. The 5 and 5S were pretty solid, but the 6 series really kicked off where Apple started going full rétard, with Apple scrambling to downplay bendgate on the 6 Plus. The headphone jack got the axe with the iPhone 7 series, and everything X and up has that retarded looking notch. Prices started skyrocketing, too - the iPhone 11 Pro Max with 512gb of storage is a $1500 phone. There's no stylus like the Galaxy Note, either.
Still though, iPhones from back then were stable and lasted a pretty long time, especially compared to Androids that were almost universally shitty and degraded hard after their first year. Just don't update their firmware. iPhones slow down and turn into dogshit with every major firmware update to try and push you into buying a new one as much as possible.
Their laptops from around 2010 were pretty nice, too. They had some of the best keyboards and trackpads I've ever used, though mine would start heating up to uncomfortable heights while even just watching YouTube through Firefox, so I had to use Safari and put up with ads, since that didn't heat up my laptop. Trying to run just about anything intensive seemed fruitless, with even lightweight Steam games heating it up to uncomfortable levels, and the piss poor ventilation didn't help matters at all. I even managed to kill my entire logic board after playing Borderlands for about 10 minutes. Fortunately I got it swapped out since I bought Applecare, but, still. Shit, man. Over the entire life of that laptop, I had to bring it into Apple three times, and that $350 warranty actually ended up paying for itself twice over. Not that Apple's "geniuses" are that bright, since I had to bring back the laptop once after they accidentally unplugged the keyboard's backlight. Much later on when I opened it up, I found that they broke off one of the battery tabs on the inside when swapping my battery. Classy.
These days, Macbook keyboards and trackpads just use haptics rather than actual mechanical clicks, and they feel like someone spilled soda in them. I'm not a fan at all. Pretty much every single piece of productivity software I ever use has a Windows equivalent that's either just as good or better, so I don't think I'll ever buy another Mac unless I can get a really, really good deal. They're lovely machines for shitposting and typing, but anything serious seems to catch the poor bastards on fire.
Oh, and there's a weird, consistent stuck-up attitude whenever you try to look up specific problems with Macs. If I could think of enough examples, it might be worth a thread here. Like, you'll encounter an error code, you'll search for it, and you'll find someone asking about it on a Mac forum, and get an answer from someone who has a haughty attitude, where they talk down to the OP like they're a complete idiot, unworthy of using the glorious machine that is a Macbook. Sometimes even with terrible advice, insisting the problem was with the actual user, only to find out that it's a glitch or some shit. I really wish I could remember a specific example, but I saw this often. Nothing else I've ever searched for, EVER, had this kind of haughty attitude. My God it was so fucking offputting. It's just a computer, you fucking losers. Literally anyone can own one if I gave them $2,000.
Macs are really losing their place these days. Android phones have gotten pretty remarkable, Surface tablets are steadily growing, Windows 10 laptops are solid and affordable, there are countless smartwatch brands, Apple TV is a joke compared to Roku and even Chromecast, and Amazon & Google are dominant in the smarthome business. Ten years ago today, the only two Android phones around were slow and shitty, while the iPhone, even the first one, was still a beast of a phone. Windows laptops still couldn't game at all and their battery life was measured in minutes, compared to a Macbook getting around 5 hours. And the iPad would launch the following year, becoming almost the only tablet in the whole game, because for whatever reason, nobody could ever create a competent Android tablet.
Apple's still going strong, though it's getting to be more and more a Boomer brand. Everything they make is pretty stodgy, with very bland designs and soulless interfaces, but if you're used to them, you're never gonna be surprised when a new one's released. Jobs croaked 8 years ago, and took with him all the inspiration and talent that made Apple worthwhile. By no means is Steve Jobs perfect, the guy was a lunatic who had some pretty bizarre concepts (apparently Apple TV as it is now was based on his ideas?), but his iron fist approach to running the company seemed to push a level of quality control that was practically unheard of. Under Gay Tim's administration, Apple seems to be moreso a fashion brand, appealing to those that care more about being seen wearing the latest Apple Watch and using the newest iPhone. That's the reason why I think Apple's sacrificed quality and longevity to make shit as thin as possible. You don't need to impress nerds ranting on forums when middle-age suburbanites living off of trust funds buy your things in droves because they don't wanna look poor.
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