Here’s why he’s wrong:

Over on http://kottke.org/09/09/the-apple-upgrade-problem, Jason writes about how he got a new iPhone, a new MacBook and New Snow Leopard and doesn’t feel the newness “jolt”, because he brought his MacBook home, restored his files from Time Machine and Everything was the same as it was on his old Mac.

Similarly, when he moved from his First gen iPhone to the 3G iPhone, it felt the same.

Well it’s separate this into the two parts it is:

(a) indeed the iPhone 3G didn’t have a hugely significant hardware advantage over the first gen, in fact, bringing mine home from the store over a year ago, I compared their speeds and found maps, calendar and safari to load just as fast on the old as the new. What I personally bought it for was:

(1)To be up to date on the latest greatest hardware for my clients

(2)To have calls and be able to open up google maps at the same time (a benefit of 3G)

(3)To have better GPS

(4)It was a third the price of my original.

Now, the benefit of getting that new phone, getting all my contacts, calendar info and a year of old bookmarks was super easy, as kottke states, does it take away the jolt of the new hardware, not for me, because the impressivness of being handed the new phone, plugging in my mobileme account info and getting all my data back in minutes is mind blowing. It’s simply phenomenal, I’ve gone through many Palm Pilots, Nokias, and computers, and is the ceremony of deciding what to bring to the new hardware part of getting the new hardware? Yes for me and Yeas for Kottke, but would I give that up for the sake of slick easy upgrades?

In a minute.

Now, what value does someone get to upgrades their iPhone get then, if the don’t get that ceremony, well, for Kottke, who got the 3G, he gets the three features i mention above. And for me, when i get my 3GS as soon as my contract allows me too? Well, have you seen the 3G next to the 3GS? the calendar loads twice as fast. The maps load twice as fast. And it shoots video. And that Jason, is the value of the upgrade, three reasons plus a slick upgrade.

Now, regards the MacBook, it’s a very similar situation, your new MacBook does a few extra things. Four Finger Swipe. Stunning LED Screen. Longer Battery Life. And then the rest is similar to what i state about the iPhone above.

To wrap up. Let me tell you what I see as a Mac Consultant who meets hundreds of full time computer users a year. Average PC users are one of the slowest types of people to upgrade! It’s true.

I see it all the time.

And you know one of the reasons? Data migration from an old PC to a new PC sucks. Sucks hard. And so PC users will use their systems till they’re so sluggish that their friends tell them you must upgrade. And is one of those reasons cost of the system? Yes, but whether they tell you right away, or you have to talk to them for a while, many many PC users are just unsure of how to move all their files from their ’01 dell to their ’09 HP, and why wouldn’t they be, best buy don’t have signs up saying we’ll help you do it.

Meanwhile, you can pickup a new Mac and be up and running with all your files from your Time Machine backup in a few hours, and this, dear Jason, will continue to help Apple sell more Macs.

Power users like you can always do clean installs, you know you want to. It’ll give you that Jolt…