RSSI used to buy apple hardware (1), because the hardware usually ended up to be the most slick. Not only that, but apple is not scared to imposes changes when there's a clear to the user benefit instead of keeping legacy interface/ports for ages.
I never ended up using any Apple media, software, or even operating system. As an firm believer of opensource, and open specifications. However this is coming to an end.
As Apple move more and more in designing hardware that suit their needs, the ability to run opensource software on the hardware is proving more difficult. My own problem was with my last apple laptop, the macbook air version 2, that happens to fail in lots of various annoying way.
Most of the time, booting with the apple cdrom (which happens not to follow the USB spec regarding power usage), would lead to bricking the only usb port. The first time i sent the hardware back to warranty imagining a hw defect, however as the second model did exactly the same, the probability that it was hw defect as well, was quite low.
The only solution to unbrick the USB port, was to disconnect the internal battery. So fortunately its seems the brickage is software based, and can be reversed at the cost of loosing some stored values (the usb state seems to be stored close to lot of other states, like wifi passwords) and at the greater cost of the warranty going away as soon as you open the machine.
The iphone got the same characterics of closeness. Without itunes, there's no way to synchronize the device or even update it. itunes is closed software, but it doesn't even on linux, rendering the operation a macOsX or windows only operation.
And now, the iPad definitely got the same characteric that would make me stays away from it. First the Apple A4 chip, I can only imagine that the cpu will be fairly open beeing an ARM cpu, but the gpu part will probably stay so close, that even if someone get to boot the hardware, there's a good chance that having the gpu actually displaying anything would be a new challenge. and the synchronisation has probably the same story as the iphone.
While lots of people doesn't see it yet, but Apple is the wolf in the sheepfold. This is a threat to the opensource world.
So no, i won't be buying any apple hardware anymore; However I'll be on the market for new slick hardware: a new phone and a new laptop for a start.
(1): 1 ipod, 1 iphone, 1 ibook, 2 macbooks, 1 macbook air