There are few things quite as emblematic of late stage capitalism than the concept of “planned obsolescence”.
I have an 8 year old iPad that can still use Amazon video and can still run Netflix, and google drops support for these computers as early as 3 years. I’m not an Apple fanboy but that is absolutely ridiculous.
My 2nd gen Apple TV is garbage. Nearly all the apps fail to load now. 🤷♂️… I suppose I can try jailbreaking it but it sure feels like someone is trying to force me to upgrade my hardware.
I will give credit to Apple on that one because android phone manufacturers are now supporting their phone for longer because of how long Apple is supporting them.
But for their laptops the support has dropped to the lowest in years. Some intel MacBooks no longer get the latest version after 6 years.
I remember back in the day when I had apple devices where they would push updates for devices long past their capability to actually run the updated software. Rather than refuse the update or get a pruned patch with security fixes only, it would force updates and bloat your phone and grind it into unresponsive unusability after a few years.
I hear that’s not so much the case anymore, so that’s nice. But I remember. The main reason I upgraded my phone was because of that, the hardware was great, but I could hardly use the software anymore even after clean installs.
My point being, I guess, extended support is great if managed properly but it can also become a bludgeon with which to drive you toward the new generations of devices.
long past their capability to actually run the updated software
Well, Apple intentionally slowed those devices down to make the users update, instead of using an insecure device, that would’ve provided a good experience otherwise.
And these days Apple is retiring devices arbitrarily for profits too. For example this year they are retiring the Iphone 8, which has better hardware, than the ipad 2018 that is still being supported…
Huh? I have an ipad mini and since two-three years ago it’s as useful as a brick, Apple doesn’t allow me to install any app because they require a newer os version (that’s not available for the model)
By contrast my much older nexus 7 can still use most apps that I want
It can’t run everything obviously but the fact that my nearly 10 year old iPad can handle video streaming still and these schools have bricked laptops after 3 years is ridiculous.
Those Chromebooks aren’t bricked. They simply don’t get chrome updates anymore, even if it’s just Linux+Chrome and updates could continue forever without any real effort from Google
For security issues they can’t give to students unsupported hardware. The discontinued iPad would go in the same e-waste bin, because it’s not like android where browsers will continue to get updates for years and years
You’re also not a giant customer who needs security and it services like a school district. 3 years might be early, idk, but in plenty of enterprise or institutes replace their hardware every so often.
My 2012 laptop runs windows 10 perfectly fine and has the latest security updates. We’re way past the point of using hardware limitations as an excuse for companies to drop support early.
I don’t see why a school should have to replace their basic computers with an equally basic computer after 3 years unless it’s broken beyond repair. I don’t think the OS itself is doing much more than what an enterprise copy of windows does for security.
The only reason Windows 11 can’t run on super old hardware is because of the misleading decision to require secure boot (a feature of the motherboard that stops unsigned OSes from booting). The metaphor I use is that it is like a car radio manufacturer refusing to let a car radio work in cars that don’t have car alarms then calling the radio secure because of it.
Funny you should say this. I have a 2012 Retina Macbook Pro, and yes it is running Windows or Linux with all the latest updates. However, Apple stopped supporting it in 2020. It’s too old for MacOS updates.
I’ve even seen a guide that will allow me to hack past the normal BIOS restrictions/allow me to put Windows 11 on it.
I have a 15 year old laptop that can still browse the web and play YouTube videos just fine because PC is a standardized platform with an open standard bootloader and a BIOS/UEFI system designed to abstract the hardware so the OS doesn’t have to be tailor-made to the hardware. Mobile devices are absolute shit in this regard. Why does the OS have to be specifically built to target one particular device?
It shouldn’t. End of question. This applies to Android, ChromeOS, and Apple devices equally.
I’m glad mobile Linux is starting to take off and there seem to be some standards emerging around ARM booting, even if it is still an absolute shit show compared to the standardization of UEFI/BIOS on x86/x86-64. I know some ARM systems can UEFI boot but it’s few and far between still so most devices still need a tailored kernel at least. That said, ARM Linux doesn’t need the entire freaking stack tailored to a device like Android and iOS do.
What year is the mini from? I run a Plex server off a 2010 Mac mini.
Apple devices are serviceable for far longer after the OS stops updating than windows/android devices in my experience. But regardless, Apple doesn’t discontinue support as early as 3 or 4 years. Even you have to admit that is ridiculous of google.
