How tied are you into the Apple ecosystem

[Cristim74]

Hi there friends,

I was wondering how tied are people into the Apple ecosystem.
What Apple hardware and services are you using?
How easy or difficult would it be for you to move to something else?

I'll start with our household setup. We were PC/Android users until 3-5 years ago, when we slowly started switching over. Why? Reliability and user friendliness. This is what we are currently using:

Me:
iPhone 8 Plus
iPad Air 2 cellular
AirPods
Watch Series 3 (non-LTE)
2017 MacBook Pro 15"

My wife:
iPhone 7
iPad mini (3 series I think)
2016 Macbook 12"

200Gb shared iCloud subscription
Apple Music Family subscription

We still have a PC in the living room and a Lenovo notebook, bust mostly for the kids.

We could move to something else if needed, but the convenience of the current ecosystem is there.
Apple makes it hard for other vendor's equipment to integrate into their ecosystem so you're mostly stuck to Apple for the hardware.

 

[drewsof07]

You would probably get more interest over in the Apple services subforum

 

[Tech198]

Very tied...

Macbook Pro
iPhone 6s+
iPad 16 Gig
Mac Mini

 

[AidenShaw]

Me: None
My husband: None

All Windows, Linux and Android.

 

[belvdr]

Me: None
My husband: None

All Windows, Linux and Android.

Headed that direction myself but will likely stay on iPhones.

 

[762999]

Untied! Only have a macbookpro 2013 and 2 ipads I don't really use. I wouldnt mind to be all in again if I felt respected.

I just feel that everything is way more overpriced that before and you also have less choice and less updates. Their total disrecpect of the non-IOS products is beyond me.

 

[mtasquared]

I'm old and so is some of my gear.

Watch: Movado Connect
Phone: Galaxy Note 5
Speaker(s): Google Home, Amazon Echo Dot
Laptop: Macbook Air
Tablet: iPad2 (too slow to be usable. my workflow doesn't really go with a tablet anyway)
Main Workstation: tuned Mac Pro 5,1 on OSX Mountain Lion
Wife/Office workstation: i5 self built custom pc on windows 7


addendum:
Just bought a Galaxy Note 8. I am totally tied into the Google ecosystem, but use a Mac.

 

[goslowjoe]

Totally, and it works perfectly for me:

Spread over two homes I own, thus two networks, as well as the office:
1 x Time Capsule
3 x Airport Extreme
1 x iMac, 2 x MacBook Pro, 2 x Mac Mini, 4 x iPhone, 1 x iPad

Apple Music, iCloud Drive, Plex running on one of the Mac Minis, - photos shared with the family, and I have access to my important information anywhere as well as at the office. Ditched the employer's stone age Windows PC (which they refuse to upgrade to something workable), put in my own Mac Mini with their permission, and it is flawless. No hanging, forced reboots, MS Office not responding, etc.

Cannot imagine going back to anything else.

 

[kazmac]

Completely...

iMac, iPad Pro, iP7+.

 

[Mefisto]

Just the right amount of tied.

Phone, laptop, aTV, Time Capsule. And an iPod Classic. And 50 gigs on iCloud.

 

[millerj123]

I've always used both, which is why so far I've always preferred Apple despite the sometimes hefty Apple tax. I don't know what I'll do when my 2011 Macbook pro no longer serves me. MacBook Pro, iPhone 6s, Series 2 Apple watch, multiple windows laptops, desktops and servers.

 

[TMRJIJ]

Very tied.

What I have:

• MacBook Pro (mid 2010)
• iPad Air 2
• iPhone 7
• AirPods
• MacBook (Early 2008) which I’ve just given to my mother
• iPad 2

My mother:

• iPad 2
• iPhone 7

Most of my extended family have iPhones either iPads.

 

[T'hain Esh Kelch]

We have the following:
iMac, 2xMBP, rMB, 1,5xiPad (One not being used, IOS9 killed it), 2xiPhones.

I don't feel tied into the ecosystem in any way really. I have a 200GB iCloud which could easily be moved to something else, and then all my Safari logins, but I consider that a minor hurdle. The 'worst' is probably all the metadata in Photos.

 

[Inked]

We have;

iMac
iPad Pro
iPad Air
iPad mini
2 x iPhone X
iPhone SE
HomePod
Apple Watch
AirPods
Apple TV 4K
Apple TV 3
200gb iCloud
Apple Music sub
CarPlay

As with the above poster, I don’t feel tied in. Most of my content has been purchased elsewhere, everything else can be transferred with only minor inconvenience if I ever decide to move away from Apple products.

 

[maflynn]

I'm very tied in, iphones, iPads, Macs, even a homepod.

I tried venturing out using windows the past couple of years however, my kids rebelled, they enjoy the OS X experience much more.

 

[artfossil]

I am 7 of 9.

 

[GoodHealthIT]

I was wondering how tied are people into the Apple ecosystem.

Extremely. For those that are in active duty:

1 x 2013 Mac Pro (server)
1 x 2010 Mac Mini (server)
1 x 2014 MBP (me)
1 x 2012 MBA (me)
1 x 2010 MBP (wife)
1 x 2013 iMac (kids)
1 x Time Capsule
1 x Airport Extreme
1 x Airport Express
1 x iPhone 6 Plus (me)
1 x iPhone 5C (wife)
1 x Apple Watch S0
1 x Apple TV 3
1 x Apple TV 4

I've also got a bunch of retired products dating back to the iMac G3 (Bondi Blue) that still work but only get used for novelty purposes.

I stopped updating in 2014 as you can tell because I haven't seen anything worth upgrading for since, and am starting to waiver and seriously consider alternatives. In fact, this week I'll be retiring the Apple Watch and replacing it with a Garmin Fenix 5.

 

[bbednarz]

Very happily tied in...

Apple Watch Series 3 LTE
iPhone 8+
Apple TV 4 x3
Apple TV 4K
2014 MacBook Pro
Head-unit with CarPlay
Apple Music
50GB iCloud storage

Wish they would make an Echo Dot competitor so I could go all Siri for home automation, but I cant even justify 1 HomePod let alone outfitting the whole home with them...

 

[AidenShaw]

I am 7 of 9.

Pleased to meet you - Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix Zero One .

 

[bluespark]

I fought against the ecosystem for a long time, even though most of my computers/devices were Apple products. My reasoning at that time was that I wanted to be able to switch platforms anytime I wanted. I finally gave up and embraced the Apple ecosystem, and I'm really glad I did. So much of my stuff works better and more easily now, which means I didn't really properly value what Apple's services add to the equation.

I had been particularly worried about having the Mac Photos app manage all my photos, but I actually very much like it. On the video side, being an Apple ecosystem user paid off in a big way when Apple upgraded many of my purchased movies to 4K for free -- that's something absolutely no one else was doing. Plus, there are now better tools out there for transitioning to other products, so if I ever change my mind, I think I'll be fine.

 

[mmomega]

My walled garden at home is extremely high.

I still dabble with many different brands but Apple is the majority for sure.
I am also one that won't completely go blindly with Apple just becaue of Apple. I run a few thoughts through my head and if that particular product makes sense for me personally for a particular purpose then that's what I go with.

For Apple things at home there is
the HomePod
5 AppleTVs
4 MacBooks/Pros
3 iPhone X's
3 sets of AirPods
3 sets of Beats Studio3
2 iPads, 1 Pro 12", 1 Air2
3 Apple Watches
1 iMac5K

 

[steve_man75]

I've grown quite weary of Apple. All of their gear is silly expensive (I own several Macs, iPhones, iPads, etc.) and used to be worth the upcharge. Not finding the "it just works" thing to really be that true anymore. I also don't like the fact that Apple will not let you really customize a lot of things to work for you.

I hate the way they charge you for EVERYTHING. Spend hundreds on music over the years through iTunes and want to take the music you purchased elsewhere? Fat chance. Want to replace the garbage charger for your Mac? Sure, that'll be $100. Want to use an actual pair of your own headphones? Sure, we'll sell you a $10 adapter every time you misplace the one we supplied. Would you like us to replace the 16 GB of storage in your phone for you with a larger unit? Sure, you can get upgraded flash memory anywhere else for $20, but we're gonna charge you $100-200 for that. No, sorry... you can't add the micro sd card you already own.

I could go on and on, but they are just about on my last nerve. The last blow for me was finding out that they are indeed throttling the speed of older phones. They can couch it however they want, but anyone with half a brain knows that they are doing it so that you will want to pay for a newer phone.

So, right now I am pretty tied to the ecosystem. However, as my next few devices need to be replaced, my ties with Apple will be lessened, for sure.

 

[762999]

I've grown quite weary of Apple. All of their gear is silly expensive (I own several Macs, iPhones, iPads, etc.) and used to be worth the upcharge. Not finding the "it just works" thing to really be that true anymore. I also don't like the fact that Apple will not let you really customize a lot of things to work for you.

I hate the way they charge you for EVERYTHING. Spend hundreds on music over the years through iTunes and want to take the music you purchased elsewhere? Fat chance. Want to replace the garbage charger for your Mac? Sure, that'll be $100. Want to use an actual pair of your own headphones? Sure, we'll sell you a $10 adapter every time you misplace the one we supplied. Would you like us to replace the 16 GB of storage in your phone for you with a larger unit? Sure, you can get upgraded flash memory anywhere else for $20, but we're gonna charge you $100-200 for that. No, sorry... you can't add the micro sd card you already own.

I could go on and on, but they are just about on my last nerve. The last blow for me was finding out that they are indeed throttling the speed of older phones. They can couch it however they want, but anyone with half a brain knows that they are doing it so that you will want to pay for a newer phone.

So, right now I am pretty tied to the ecosystem. However, as my next few devices need to be replaced, my ties with Apple will be lessened, for sure.

• 
  
• There is no DRM in iTunes music, you can take your music anywhere. If you're paying a fixed cost, then you're leasing the music, you're not buying it.
• I don't know any company that gives free adapter because you misplace them
• SD card? yeah. In most phones, it's not considered as the built-in memory. You can use it for photos and music but it they often forbid you from putting applications there. Many people had problem with that, if they buy faulty cards they blame the phone. It's better to have built-in larger capacity memory
• Many phones companies don't even have store to service their phones, I'm sure you'll complain with your next one

Note:
- I don't currently use iTunes or the Mac
- I don't have an iPhone
- I have a phone with a SD card , so yes, I'm aware of the issues

Cheers!

 

[960design]

I was wondering how tied are people into the Apple ecosystem.

None at all. I use products with the least interruption to my workflow. Currently and for the last 10 years that has been Apple. Before that it was OpenSolaris and before that it was Windows.

OpenSolaris opened me up to Unix backends and in my opinion a much better user experience. Windows10 has done some pretty impressive things and I have a high end Window10 machine for Edge browser testing. But, Windows10 still seems to 'bing' in the background and 'pop-up' messages while I'm coding and this distraction is unacceptable.

If Mac OS X goes away, I'd probably fall back to a high end Asus ZenBook Pro ( https://www.asus.com/News/0msjBXZWnW6X8b05 ) running some version of linux.

 

[JagdTiger]

Hi there friends,

I was wondering how tied are people into the Apple ecosystem.
What Apple hardware and services are you using?
How easy or difficult would it be for you to move to something else?

I'll start with our household setup. We were PC/Android users until 3-5 years ago, when we slowly started switching over. Why? Reliability and user friendliness. This is what we are currently using:

Me:
iPhone 8 Plus
iPad Air 2 cellular
AirPods
Watch Series 3 (non-LTE)
2017 MacBook Pro 15"

My wife:
iPhone 7
iPad mini (3 series I think)
2016 Macbook 12"

200Gb shared iCloud subscription
Apple Music Family subscription

We still have a PC in the living room and a Lenovo notebook, bust mostly for the kids.

We could move to something else if needed, but the convenience of the current ecosystem is there.
Apple makes it hard for other vendor's equipment to integrate into their ecosystem so you're mostly stuck to Apple for the hardware.

All I use now is a iPad, do not want a pc/desktop, its tethered and needs a monitor (laptop excluded) and two sockets for the plugs increasing electrical consumption...the portable tablets are the future of computer/entertainment systems.