Tim Cook just told the Wall Street Journal that Apple is raising prices. The cause is a memory chip shortage. “Unfortunately, price increases are unavoidable,” Cook said. He added that Apple has been trying to shield its customers, “but the situation has become unsustainable”.

So prices go up. The question is where.

My money is on the high end taking most of the hit. Apple has spent the last couple of years pulling people onto Apple silicon and into the idea that a Mac is a real machine for local AI. I expect they’ll keep the gas pedal firmly down on the MacBook Neo and protect that entry price, even if it means the maxed-out configurations carry the weight. The person shopping for a base laptop is exactly the person Apple least wants to scare off.

There’s another issue related to this shortage. It’s the actual shortage part.

A shortage doesn’t just raise prices. It limits what you can build. When the next Mac Studio shows up, will there still be a 512GB configuration on the menu? Apple clearly wants the Mac in the local AI conversation, and big, unified memory makes that possible. You need the room to load large models. Wanting to offer 512GB and being able to source the chips for it are two very different things.

And if they pull it off, what will it cost? My guess: a lot.

I’ll be watching the high end.