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Solved - Why has Apple gone for this locked down approach?
- Thread starter Quackers
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Apple has very high profit margin on charges, but not nearly as high. Manufacturing and logistics expenses are probably closer to $7-10 per unit.
Apple iPhone charger teardown: quality in a tiny expensive package
This article is now available in Vietnamese Bộ sạc iPhone của Apple . Disassembling Apple's diminutive inch-cube iPhone charger reveals ...www.righto.com
Nice teardown.
I notice though that the author's cost estimate in footnote #14 totals $4.66 -- and that's with buying components in qty 1000 on the open market.
Presumably with Apple's buying power - both in terms of quantity and bundling other manufacturing orders - they could reduce that price somewhat. So maybe not down to $1 each, but still functionally a pittance.
The problem is, why is it only partially installing the OS? It puts all the folders there and fills System with 6 items. But it leaves the rest empty. If what I want is not implemented yet, why does it goes through the whole duration... just to fail? It's like someone saying it will take the entire day to fix your car... then SPEND the entire day on your car... but when you go to pick it up, they've only changed one tire. What the (!!!) were they doing the rest of that time?
This is just a guess, but it's likely because the system partition is missing on your external drive. Even though the installation process goes through as usual, it assumes a local system partition in the end. So your external drive only holds "data" per se, but none of the essential system stuffs to be able to properly boot.
And if that's the case, that sounds to me like an oversight on Apple's part. And it's also an indication that they may support something like this in the future.
I did notice, that, looking at the drives in Disk Utility, there is a small System partition (about 1Gb in size; bottom "drive") and then the internal SSD (however, the smaller System exists on the internal SSD, as I suspect that is the Recovery partition). Both have a System partition, whereas the external drive does not. But it creates all the folders and it puts 6 items in the System folder... but it leaves the others empty. What is being done (and/or how) differently with a Thunderbolt 3 drive, vs. a USB-C drive. If the USB-C (assuming it's different from USB-A) interface protocol is incomplete, I should think it couldn't do ANYTHING with that drive. Has anyone tried creating a bootable drive with a USB 3.0 (64-128GB) USB thumb drive? I returned mine... two thumb drives (USB installer and the empty one) won't fit, side-by side. Didn't want to invest in a 3.0 hub just for that...
Wouldn't such a system partition be created via Disk Utility? Unless it's created as part of the installation process, it would HAVE to be created via Disk Utility. But the system doesn't use the Disk Utility by itself. So, either the installer assumes it's only installing to the internal, which has a system partition (from the factory), or that function has been left out (intentionally or not). But that's an awefully big bug to be "oops!"ing on, if accidental.
There's this now, too...
support.apple.com
I'm not sure if "Full Security" will enforce the user to boot only from an internal drive, but that sounds like what it will do (how do you even "trust" the OS on an external drive?).
And if there's a "No Security" option, it means Apple may have to support booting an "untrusted" OS at some point. That sounds like a gateway to boot Linux or Windows on ARM or something else. Potentially off of an external drive. But... we don't know yet. As far as I know, the firmware for these M1 Macs is different from the Intel counterpart, and they may have a different bootloader process, so it may not be as simple as just loading system files on an external drive.
About Startup Security Utility on a Mac with the Apple T2 Security Chip - Apple Support
Use Startup Security Utility to make sure that your Mac always starts up from your designated startup disk, and always from a legitimate, trusted operating system.
I'm not sure if "Full Security" will enforce the user to boot only from an internal drive, but that sounds like what it will do (how do you even "trust" the OS on an external drive?).
And if there's a "No Security" option, it means Apple may have to support booting an "untrusted" OS at some point. That sounds like a gateway to boot Linux or Windows on ARM or something else. Potentially off of an external drive. But... we don't know yet. As far as I know, the firmware for these M1 Macs is different from the Intel counterpart, and they may have a different bootloader process, so it may not be as simple as just loading system files on an external drive.
The OS only has to verify that it's installing/booting a copy of macOS from Apple. That should be very easy. 3rd party macOS Big Sur installers don't exist. There are only two security options in M1 Mac Recovery mode right now. "Full" and "Reduced". "Reduced" is not "None", as there is on Intel Macs. Any reference to Intel Macs should be removed or disconsidered in threads within the "Apple Silicon (ARM) Macs" group.There's this now, too...
About Startup Security Utility on a Mac with the Apple T2 Security Chip - Apple Support
Use Startup Security Utility to make sure that your Mac always starts up from your designated startup disk, and always from a legitimate, trusted operating system.
I'm not sure if "Full Security" will enforce the user to boot only from an internal drive, but that sounds like what it will do (how do you even "trust" the OS on an external drive?).
And if there's a "No Security" option, it means Apple may have to support booting an "untrusted" OS at some point. That sounds like a gateway to boot Linux or Windows on ARM or something else. Potentially off of an external drive. But... we don't know yet. As far as I know, the firmware for these M1 Macs is different from the Intel counterpart, and they may have a different bootloader process, so it may not be as simple as just loading system files on an external drive.
I'm thinking it's a weird (but annoying) oversight on Apple's part. I'm pretty sure they'll get it worked out, with enough complaining from enough users. Until then, if there is enough consensus from enough Thunderbolt 3 SSD users, that installing Big Sur 11.1 to an external TB3 SSD always and absolutely works/boots 100% of the time, then I just need to hunker down and buy one... even if it's a slower model.
In reduced security the M1 firmware allows chainloading another bootloader. So native booting of third party operating systems certainly isn't the problem here. Apple Silicon is not really locked down that much. The major issue is the undocumented hardware which will make it really hard to develop drivers for Apple Silicon.
No argument here, but that is just the material bill — and that article was from 2012. I agree with you that Apple can get the components for cheaper, but there is also the case itself, assembly, logistics and other overheads. Thats why I am guessing that the total costs for Apple are a bit higher.
Right because everyone should just pay material cost. That means all employees at a company will be working for free. You wanna buy a book? Only pay for the cost of the paper. Wanna buy a Bluray? Only pay the price of the plastic. Eat at a restaurant? Only pay for the price of the raw food. lol.
Yet the functional if less complex/safe versions sell for 45 cents each in 1000 unit volumes - and that is sufficient to pay the employees, overhead, tooling, some % for alibaba, and profit for the owners.
What makes you think the non-material variable costs for the more complex Apple version are substantially more than say double that?
Apple has more stringent labor controls and requirements in place than Alibaba for starters.
Sure - so how much more do you think? I suggested 2x (doubled) just as a WAG. We're talking basic assembly line work here where labor's generally just not a big part of the cost structure. But just for grins, let's say labor *is* 2/3 of the cost -- even tripling the labor costs, they're still less than $1/unit.
I'm genuinely curious what you truly think the cost to Apple is to manufacture the 5W bricks and what citable data sources you're using to come to that conclusion.
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