Regular readers know that I don’t routinely do product reviews or announcements here, but when something pops up that could have significant impacts to the tech industry and broader society I’ll explore those. And that’s what we’ve got now with Apple, and it really is quite stunning because it pretty much goes directly against the pattern we’ve come to expect from Apple over the many years.

I’ve never been an Apple fanboy, in fact I’ve generally avoided using Apple gear at all for a number of reasons. One is that their products have been widely viewed as overpriced for the value provided compared with products from other manufacturers. Even their accessories to their main products often seemed way too expensive. Remember Apple’s thousand dollar monitor stand? Another reason I’ve avoided Apple products is that they are single sourced. That is, if you want to buy a Windows PC or an Android phone or a Google Chromebook, you can get one from a wide variety of manufacturers with different feature sets and pricing. If you want a Mac computer or iOS iPhone, or an iPad, you get what Apple manufactures and that’s the whole enchilada.

So, what has Apple just now done to shake up the entire PC industry and trigger a flood of positive reactions across the world, even from usually critical reviewers? Very recently they released a new Mac laptop at a price point utterly uncharacteristic of Apple, so low that it’s caused a tsunami of interest from existing Windows and Chromebook users, among others. Apple calls this the MacBook Neo and priced the base model with 256 gig of storage at 599 dollars, and an upgraded version with 512 gig of storage and touch id capability for $100 more. For buyers with a qualified educational discount, both versions are reduced by $100.

By normal Apple standards pricing this low seems nuts. So what’s going on? The first reactions were that this must be a really stripped down laptop with quality corners cut here, there, and everywhere. But this appears not to be the case. People who got their hands on these — and they’re sold out at some suppliers — are praising the quality throughout. A completely aluminum case, with an excellent display, keyboard, trackpad and so on.

Two specs that caught a lot of attention were that the Neo doesn’t use the class of Apple CPU chip you’d normally expect in a Mac, but actually uses the Apple chip from a recent iPhone. And the Neo (both models) has a fixed and unexpandable RAM memory of 8 gig, seemingly small for a Mac.

So the assumption was that performance would be on par with sluggish, cheap Windows PCs or low end Chromebooks. But apparently not. Users have been throwing all sorts of tasks at the Neo, all the way up to 4K video editing and the like, and while they’re not getting the ultra performance you’d expect from a much more expensive computer model, there’s surprise and amazement at how capably the Neo is handling these tasks, far better than would be expected from a computer at this price point with these listed specs.

This appears to be a situation where Apple’s control of the entire manufacturing pipeline has really paid off for them, especially given RAM unavailability problems and sky high RAM prices triggered by AI data centers.

Apple’s strategy with the Neo seems both clear and unexpected. By releasing a highly capable Mac laptop at a price point significantly lower than Apple’s typical pricing model, they’re making the bet that they can bring many new users into the broader Apple ecosystem, both from the education sector where Chromebooks currently dominate, and from the broader universe of Windows and other non-Apple computer users. And judging from the enormously positive reaction to the Neo so far, this could very well be a bet that’s going to pay off enormously well for Apple, while creating serious headaches for Google and Microsoft, and for others in the PC industry as well. We shall see.

–Lauren–