Last week Apple released iOS 7 and a pair of new iPhones, the iPhone 5c and the iPhone 5s. As impressive as the iPhone 5s is, the release of the iPhone 5c and the up coming refresh of Apple’s iPad line is what has been on my mind.

Why?

With the release of the iPhone 5c, Apple has finally brought parity to it’s primary product lines. When you talk to the average consumer, [1] they will relate to Apple’s products in general terms - iPod, iPhone, Mac. But when you start talking to those who are a little more tech savvy, you start seeing a stratification of similar product lines - iPhone 5s vs iPhone 5c or Mac Book Pro vs Mac Book Air. People in the second group start differentiating the benefits of Apple’s products based power vs weight, screen resolution, form factor, etc. So now there are two groups of buyers Apple has to contend with. Like any successful company, Apple is giving their buyers a choice, but a choice that will ideally still keep the buyer under Apple’s wing.

And this is where I believe Apple has made the right choice bringing the iPhone 5c to the mix. Apple now has a device for the general consumer and professional/power user in every major product category they currently offer. Here’s a breakdown comparison.

Device	Prosumer	Consumer
Desktop	Mac Pro	iMac
Laptop	Mac Book Pro	Mac Book Air
Tablet	iPad Retina	iPad Mini
Phone	iPhone 5s	iPhone 5c
Media Player	iPod Touch	iPod Nano

Yes, you can do Photoshop on a Mac Book Air and Editorial works just fine on the iPad mini, but looking at the features and capabilities of a prosumer vs consumer device, one can get a feel of how Apple is starting to offer a choice in each product line. It’s easy to see the differentiation in the product lines and by having a choice is a win-win for Apple. What will be interesting to see is how Apple intends to keep this differentiation going in the next iPad release.

Got any thoughts on this? Feel free to hit me up on Twitter at @MyGeekDaddy to continue the discussion.