I remember in 2007, buying my first MacBook. It came with an enormous 2gb of RAM. I asked about upgrading it. The guy leaned in conspiratorially and told me that Apple’s RAM upgrades were a rip-off, and that I’d be better of buying it elsewhere. So I did, for half of what Apple were asking.
This is a grift that Apple have had for far too long, and there’s a part of me that’s convinced that their move to soldered RAM was to stop people upgrading after the fact more than it was about SOC efficiencies.
FWIW, not all flash memory is created equal. Apple does tend to use premium chips with better error correction, etc. All that said, it’s still not worth it for most of us, most of the time.
I wouldn’t have thought Apple are using flash chips that are two or three times more expensive. They’re just price gouging at a point where consumers have literally no option.
Sure. But the price is maybe 2x. Apple wants you to pay almost 10x.