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Better Business Bureau Targets Apple's G5 Ads
deathazre writes "The Council of Better Business Bureaus has suggested Apple Computer withdraw its claims of the world's fastest, and first 64-bit, PC after a complaint by Dell. However, even having one of their ads banned in the U.K. didn't stop them here in the States."
Now, to be fair, Apple's ads said that the G5 was the fastest and first 64-bit PC that wasn't made by a company that isn't Apple.
Or maybe I'm remembering it wrong.
Where'd I put my darn bong?
Oh, here it is, hidden behind my G5.
Hey, when did I get a G5?
Who am I, again?
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Apple has already stated the ad has run its course and it will be 'mindful' of the request in the future. Meaning we've already made out on that one, better luck next time :)
Now whay would Dell of all people make this claim? Dell doesn't even offer a 64 bit PC??
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
Yeah, because Intel's new chips really speed up your internet downloads...
Kip Hawley is an idiot.
My silly Alpha workstation from 1992 must not be 64 bit!
Maybe you can say it's a workstation and not a PC but later Alphas ran Windows NT which in my mind makes it a PC for sure.
Everyone that disagrees with me is a paid shill
While we're on the subject, how in the world did McDonald's get to have "America's Favorite Fries"?
America's Fries that Will Most Likely Give You a Coronary, more like it...
Hmmm... In the UK, TV regulators banned the ad. In the US, the Better Business Bureau could ban the ad. Apple should take their business to Russia. In Soviet Russia, the ad bans you.
Obviously slower! Or at least that's what Apple says...
Fastest at what? (No, seriously...)
Fastest selling? TRUE!
Fastest falling? Maybe (Looks aerodynamic...)
Fastest obsolescence?
Fastest at one particular kind of mathematical operation?
Fastest mobo latency?
Fastest design and fab process?
Fastest repairs? (Easy access panel...)
Heh. Who the hells knows what any ads are REALLY about these days. Lies, Damn Lies, and Advertising. I'm not a Mac-hater, writing this from my lovely 12" iBook G4.
While truthfulness in advertising is important, this is one of those times where an advertiser made a claim that is kind of hard to prove. A computer that is faster at one thing is not necessarily faster at another. Besides, when you hear "world's best hamburger," you don't automatically believe them solely based on the ads, do you?
I have never understood.....when companies lie (or make questionable claims) about "fastest" or "first" people get all up-in-arms. But when companies lie about quality or other things people don't care.
Case in point: I didn't see Apple (or anyone else) complaining that Dell was lying in ads where they implied that the night call center workers were actually in the US.
And Dell directly implies in their ads that if you're running Unix there are all sorts of negative things that will happen to you that are pretty much not true.
Whatever. The BBB is just another piece of the marketing machine I guess.
But Apple's right in this case, aren't they?
I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
I was wondering how Apple gets reprimanded for these claims, yet MS goes unheeded with all of its comparative TCO mumbo jumbo, and the fact that "exagerated advertising" is, well, normal. My only guess is that Apple was just too straightforward with its claims (gee, what a novel concept!), and didn't throw in enough technical buzzwords and marketing FUD to confuse everybody.
Apple's current stance: Our G5's are damn fast, faster than Wintel stuff, and we'll stand by that claim.
Average Consumer: Really? Wow.
Dell: Crap.
Apple's new stance: Our G5's have multi-threaded double buffered optimized 256 bit parallel pipelined 64 bit x-streaming architecture!
Average consumer:
Dell: much better.
ce n'est pas un Sig.
Do average consumers really care about the speed of a computer? most of them are more likely to be looking at the cost of a computer and what they can do with it.
Now a business is more likely to consider a fast computer if it increases productivity, but then a business is more likely to be clued up about hardware and not be believing the claims of an advert.
Ultimately the selection of a computer will be based on if it can do what you want for the right price, there are certain pieces of software that aren't available for non-Windows systems and so speed counts for nothing if you need that software.
Take 1100 dell'ss at 64 bits and make them into a "super computer" (quotes because the super part is arguable)
Take 1100 apple g5's and make them into a super computer.
Which one will be in the top 5?
Apple, the most powerful, lowest priced 64bit based PC available. That is true.
i thought he had the fastest computers, maybe DELL should go after him instead
A company making misleading claims? That's never happened before.
For every karma whore there are four more people with mod points to kill.
As the Apple Turns has an insightful take on the whole thing. I had never heard of the Dell cluster in Buffalo. Bummer for Buffalo.
Boom Shanka
I have never ever seen a benchmark that can truly give a consistent, unbiased speed comparison between 2 different architectures. Many benchmarks wil run at different speeds if run twice on the same system, and it's always possible to bias a benchmark towards a certain processor simply by choosing the operations that can be performed efficiently by that processor.
Given this, I tend to consider speed to be opinion rather than factual information. The fact that a factoid looks like a fact, doesn't make it one. Because of this, I don't see it as a great crime to make semi-substantiated claims iabout speed in the advertising.
And these the same bunch of no-hopers that gave SCO a clean bill of health? Why are we even taking any notice of what they have to say?
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
...is have a "Apple challenge" with the G5 and a P4. Show people both computers, have them use them, and see which one is faster, has the nicer interface, looks cooler, etc. (It would also be a good way for Apple to prove that there really is software on the Mac.) See what people would say is faster - I know what I'd say. Then they could say G5 is the fastest or whatever.
;-)
I'd be the first to admit that Apple was really lagging behind with the G4, but the G5 changed all that. Especcially since, come summer, I'll be able to buy a Dual 3 GHz (crosses fingers).
Actually, I'm waiting for a G5 Powerbook. No suprise there, but holy crap that'd be fast. (And hot...and big...but fast.)
If you want very specialized fast floating point performance for certain scientific applications, Itanium is where it's at.
If you want business performance, a multi-processor Opteron trumps them all.
If you want super fast video and audio encoding, a dual Xeon with hyperthreading will probably kill all of these.
If you want the fastest mobile processor with good battery life, Centrino is the way to go.
If you want the fastest computing cluster, you'd probably have to go with UVA's Mac cluster.
All of the above are probably temporarily in those positions and subject to considerable debate. I hate these "fastest computer ever" statements. Computing is far too dynamic and varied to put all-encompassing labels on. No one platform is ideally suited for all tasks. You make compromises and go from there.
Whatever gain/loss there was from the ad is water under the bridge. It's too late now, since it can't be taken back. Surely we don't have to remind...
:)
"Any publicity is good and good publicity is even better"
This news is just more publicity...and they didn't have to pay a dime to get it in front of you today. I'd call that making out
I find false marketing to be one of the more upsetting things that companies can do, and I find it a little disturbing that so many Slashdotters seem to feel that it's all right because *it's Apple*. Were it Dell or Compaq or God knows who, people would be up in arms.
It's pretty obvious that Apple's "fastest computer" claims aren't true and were intended to mislead consumers (even the most generous of readings would admit that they were valid for a very, very limited subset of carefully chosen tests for about a month, far less time than the compaign ran for, and only applied to single-processor computers). There may not be all that much damage caused (heck, the net effect may be positive), but there's little doubt in my mind that Apple was trying to implant fairly bogus information in people's heads.
The way I see it, even if someone's taking on Microsoft and we want them very much to do well, holding them to a lower standard of integrity (or anything else) is ultimately a losing strategy. Those people will ultimately take advantage of that leeway, and end up producing a worse product/service. If Red Hat puts out a crummy program or makes a decision that negatively impacts me, I will happily complain vocally and publically. Apple deserves to be held to no lesser of a standard.
May we never see th
Perhaps it was because " Bioinformatics star Jeffrey Skolnick said his Dell computer was prone to problems, including crashes "
Everytime I see their ad where the guy says, "Dude! You're getting a Dell!" I wait patiently by my door for the FedEx guy. He hasn't showed up yet! I'm awfully disappointed by their lack of honesty in their advertisements.
My favorite completely ridiculous advertising claim these days is Pentax' claim as the Official Digital Camera of the Internet.
These companies have gone completely nuts.
I know, the world would be a better place if everybody worked this hard to fight hunger.
Apple makes excellent computers.
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
Tim
As far as claims about 'Fastest'... people... please please please learn what marketing is. "Fastest" is a subjective term, becuase no reference is made to the scale of measurement. If I strap a TI-80 to the fuselage of the X-43 being tested today, then that TI-80 would be the worlds fastest computer.
Marketeers twist the english language more than any lawyer, and can say one thing, but cause you to think something entirely different. Need an example? You probably know someone who collects Beanie Babies as an "investment".Just as irrigation is the lifeblood of the Southwest, lifeblood is the soup of cannibals. -- Jack Handy
Trying to see whether an ad campaign has succeeded or failed based on the number of sales versus what was predicted in a given quarter is kind of like trying to infer causal effects for a graph showing correlation between two independently measured variables with no other data--a big mistake.
Whether an ad succeeds or fails often cannot be measured based on sales in a fluctuating economy with a variable product interest. The critical question is would they have sold 206k G5 computers if they had not run the ad campaign? There is also the corollary question of would they could have sold more with a different ad campaign?
The first of these questions is nontrivial to answer and requires good, well researched data on why your customers are buying the product. Apple may have that data--you most certainly do not. The latter is almost impossible to infer even with good data on people's purchasing.
Integrate Keynote and LaTeX
It's pretty funny to me how a computer maker with only 3% of the total computer market can garner so much attention over one little statement.
As others have pointed out there have been just as many other biased, false, and outright ridiculus claims such as faster inernet thanks to a processor, dancing flourescant colored clean room suits, and all sorts of stuff.
yet intel's marketing arm, er, Dell decides they need to file a complaint with the BBB over it and they hold the #1 spot for desktops?
Things that make you go hmmm.
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
Microsoft: Windows is the best operating system!
Microsoft: MS-Office is the best Office program!
Dell: We have the best deals on our computers!
Apple: We have the fastest computer!
BBB: Apple, you're not allowed to say that...
Fair?
Come on, why does everyone pick on Apple...
I'm sure that's it. That concern for the consumers' well-being would be why Dell advertises the Celeron 2.4GHz as only suitable for word processing and e-mail. ``Ooh, ma'am, if you're going to be surfing the 'web, you're going to need top-notch power for that kinda number-crunching!''
A number of years ago a friend of mine got ripped off renting a RV from a rather shady firm. The license tabs had expired, sticking her dad with a ticket. The RV was so poorly maintained, it broke down twice on their trip. Last but not least, the firm promised to take care of the ticket for the tabs and didn't, so the state threatened to take away her dad's license. A competitor confirmed to me that the firm had a long reputation for shoddy business practices.
Just the sort of thing the Better Business Bureau handles right? Think again. When I called the BBB to complain and see if others had similar problems I was told that my friend HAD TO PAY THE BBB to make a complaint. Pay to complain? That was adding insult to injury.
My conclusion at the time: The BBB isn't about better business. It's about collecting fees for services provided. Dell paid; Dell got the sort of "service" the BBB provides. End of story.
There's perhaps a reason for the long delay between the ads and this bit of publicity. Dell spends virtually nothing on research or innovation. It's almost totally dependent on what Microsoft and Intel do. With OS X and IBM's marvelous new chips, in the past few months it's becoming increasingly clear that Apple is a growing threat to Dell's core businesses, somewhat in schools and very definitely in the profitable server market.
You saw the extent of the challenge when Apple G5s beat out almost twice as many Intel boxes to become the world's third faster computer. And if I remember that story right, the Virginia team that built that computer concluded that Macs gave them more bang for the buck than Dell.
Someone might want to watch Dell and, when they have advertising that's dubious, complain to the BBB and see what happens. Then let us know.
Apple Manipulating the Results
From http://spl.haxial.net/apple-powermac-G5/
Before we examine the SPEC results that Apple/Veritest claims, it must be noted that Apple/Veritest have used a few "cheats" to make the G5 look better. So whenever you see a Apple/Veritest result in the following tables, be aware that it has been affected by the following "cheats".
Apple/Veritest used a special fast malloc library on the G5 benchmark, but did not use it on the Dell/Intel benchmark, thus giving the G5 an unfair advantage. Here is the relevant quote from the Veritest report:
"Installed a high performance, single threaded malloc library. This library implementation is geared for speed rather than memory efficiency and is single-threaded which makes it unsuitable for many uses. Special provisions are made for very small allocations (less than 4 bytes)."
(Page 5, also see Appendix E, Page 26, Veritest PDF)
For both the Dell Dimension 8300 and the Dell Precision 650, Apple/Veritest performed the multi-processor "Rate" benchmarks with hyperthreading DISABLED. They had hyperthreading ENABLED for the single-processor benchmarks, but DISABLED for the multi-processor benchmarks, despite the fact that hyperthreading would have improved the performance of the multi-processor "Rate" benchmarks, while having little or no effect on the single-processor benchmarks. In either case, this performance-enhancing feature of the Intel processors should not have been disabled. Here is the quote:
Dell Dimension 8300 Configuration for SPEC CPU2000 Rate Base Testing
[...]
Use the system setup utility to disable hyperthreading in the system.
[...]
Dell Precision 650 Configuration for SPEC CPU2000 Rate Base Testing
[...]
Use the system setup utility to disable hyperthreading in the system.
(Pages 7-8, Veritest PDF)
Apple/Veritest used a special fast "relaxed IEEE math operations" compiler option on the G5 benchmark, but did NOT use it on the Dell/Intel benchmark, thus giving the G5 an unfair advantage in floating-point operations. If you are going to use a performance-enhancing trick on one computer, then to be fair you must use it on the other computer as well. The equivalent option in GCC for the Dell/Intel computers is "-ffast-math", but Apple/Veritest did not use it. Here is the relevant quote from the Veritest report:
"Appendix E. Apple Power Mac G5 GCC 3.3 Compiler and Linking Option Descriptions
-fast [...] also enables the use of C99 aliasing rules and relaxed IEEE math operations.
-fastf [...] also enables the use of C99 aliasing rules and relaxed IEEE math operations."
(Page 26, Veritest PDF)
Attention consumers: The Better Business Bureau is not really real. It's actually just a scam to get consumers to think that a business is somehow a good business to do business with. I had a complaint about a business, and all the BBB did was to forward the complaint to the business. The BBB has no enforcement authority or power whatsoever. They also don't really advocate for the consumers like they say they do.
-- I am. Therefore, I think!
Is it just me, or did Dell change those ads? I could have sworn that origionally, the ad just had these disembodied voices calling out from a darkened cubicle farm. Then a modified version began airing. Same cubicle farm, however now there's these silhouettes that stand up waving their arms about in the background.
Odd.
The claim that they were the first however, well that is neither here nor there. It is all a matter of perspective I guess. I sure as shit wouldn't have considered anything that was available prior to the G5 (in the 64 bit PC market) a consumer product. But some would.
That really is my homepage, no kidding.
This is what the BBB is trying to prevent, a marketing staff twisting language and influencing consumers into making a decision based off of half-truths and/or lies. Duh.
I have a G5.
For my code, it's faster clock-for clock than a Xeon, and (usually) slower clock-for-clock than an opteron. Benchmarks can be made to say just about anything, but I bet the G5 is the fastest thing around for some people running their software.
To date, Apple has not released a 64-bit OS for the G5, and not only has not announced any intention to do so, but simply avoids admitting this to be the case. Think what you like, but even if you think "64-bit" doesn't mean "a single application can access more than 4 GB of RAM", you certainly have to be perplexed by the sense in which Apple claims to have "broken the 4 GB barrier", given that their latest OS provides your app access to the RAM just the way an Intel-based 32-bit system can.
Since there is not 64-bit OS for this machine (although Linux is very close), I cannot prove that my G5 has 64-bit hardware, tho I guess I believe it.
I will now accept my troll-mod, since I have posted this atrocity in an apple.stlashdot.org story.
Just for fun I installed Panther on a beige G3 300 box and it still boots faster than my faster 700 Mhz XP system. So... What about the GUI is slow?
.deviatefromtheabsolute.
I believe a stronger truth-in-advertising law is in order in the US. There are a disturbing number of adverts that tell you shockingly little about the product they're advertising. There is far too much emphasis on image.
We should disallow companies from advertising based on knowingly bogus research (read: research sponsored by THAT company), and force them to stick to the facts. There should be penalties for lying to people in order to sell a product. I also think political campaigns should be held most strictly to this policy.
Too many advertisements simply say "use X, and the Y in your life will become that much better!" or "X is the BEST Z product--EVER!" with absolutely no evidence. It's ridiculous.
And yet Americans don't have a problem with it. They're either too used to being lied to or just don't care. It has to stop. If the G5 isn't the first/fastest 64 bit CPU, well, Apple shouldn't be allowed to say that it is. Isn't there a law against lying to people for money? Don't they call that a SCAM?
Just wait until the BBB finds out that using a G5 will not blow you right through the wall onto your lawn.
At the time Apple started selling the G5, was anyone selling a 64 bit PC, and if so, was it faster than the G5?
There were plenty of 64 bit computers available.. but not really on the PC market...
B) You are not taking aerodynamics into account. Terminal volocity of a light, hairy tennis ball is almost certainly lower than that of a large chunk of metal.
Of course, the whole issue is quite expensive to test experically as you would end up requiring many many G5's and yet just one tennis ball.
This comment is guaranteed*
*not guaranteed
A PC is a computer marketed to consumers for personal use as opposed to
a Work Station which is generally marketed for professional use...but
the line is sort of getting blury now days...
*sigh* back to work...
You don't see anyone taking issue with that?
The real surprise is this getting modded insightful.
I don't know about you but is there bigger fish to fry out there when it comes to truth in advertising. If the BB wants to make a statement, why not go after all those diet pill advertisers who claim to help you lose wieght in 30 days without diet or exercise. Or make thousands of dollars working from home in 30 days. To my knowledge, the BB said nothing when movie studios put out raving reviews of their movie by non-existent movie critics.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Entirely fair.
Not sure what specific ads of MS's and Dell's you're referring to, but when you can specifically measure the claim and it's wrong then this is what happens. Apple has a history of knowlingly and specifically lying about the performance of their computers. They lie about ease of use as well, but that's harder to prove.
What ad are you specifically referring to? When did Dell ever advertise that "the Celeron 2.4GHz as only suitable for word processing and e-mail"?
I've never seen a workstation personally that didn't fit on a desk. Most are typical ATX-size or smaller. So what Apple really said is "We're the first 64-bit desktop...except for all the other ones." Or, since they don't sell for research purposes generally, maybe they're "the first 64-bit desktop marketed to idiots."
As far as claims about 'Fastest'... people... please please please learn what marketing is. "Fastest" is a subjective term, becuase no reference is made to the scale of measurement. If I strap a TI-80 to the fuselage of the X-43 being tested today, then that TI-80 would be the worlds fastest computer.
Legally, that's not even remotely true. That would never get past a judge.
to discredit our advert's claim...and buy a new pair of steel-toed boots, cause you never know when that pesky Mac v PC horse is gonna go all "Lazrus" on you.
Yes! Evil rules! Good can suck it! Suck it, good!
You know, I really *want* to say I agree with you, but I'm running into endless frustration with glitches in my PowerMac G5 dual 2Ghz tower at the moment.
In the world of PCs, Dell has pretty consistently come out at the top of the pack - so bashing their quality isn't really fair, IMHO. If you want to do that, there are SO many other PC vendors you could make a better case for. Try Gateway, or eMachines, or Sony's Vaio line of laptops maybe? But Dell? They're FAR from perfect, but better than most.
Back to my G5 woes for a minute, though.... My system constantly freezes up when running games. I suspect it will do the same for anything using openGL type graphics, actually - but games happen to be the easiest way to reproduce the issue for me right now. Anyway, because the system keeps passing all the hardware tests, and will sit and run for days on end when you're not launching a game like Halo, UT2003, Jedi Knight, NASCAR 2003, etc. -- Apple isn't being real helpful.
Under the circumstances, I'm 95% certain I'm just dealing with a faulty ATI Radeon 9600 Pro video card here - but I can't get a soul at Apple to mail me a replacement card to test out that theory. Instead, they charged me $49.95 just to talk to them on the phone about the issue and "troubleshoot". They didn't tell me anything I didn't already try, and basically made me feel "second rate" simply because I was talking about games freezing it up. "Well sir, GAMES are typically buggy and crash on ANY computer. Are you having any problems in any of our business applications?" (No, dumbass - Quickbooks for Mac just doesn't stress the G5's multimedia capabilities, ok?!)
After going through 2 different tech support people, I was more or less told there's no way Apple will EVER just ship me out a replacement card - and I have to drag the whole thing into my local Apple store and let them keep it for a while, to determine if a part like that is needed.
If you've ever lugged a G5 through a crowded shopping mall to the Apple store in the middle of the mall on the 2nd. floor - you'll know why this is less than convenient.
I have to say, if this was my old Dell, I might have to deal with some level 1 phone support moron for 20 or 30 minutes first, but they'd overnight me a new video card without nearly this much hassle, and even provide a postage paid return mailer for the old one.
Yeah, because Intel's new chips really speed up your internet downloads...
Well, Centrino chips do have built in Wifi now.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Wow, I think it's hilarious how all these apple zealots, after hearing this add campaign have suddenly started acting like there's a huge difference between a "PC" and a "Workstation". The terms are interchangeable, really, and most of the time the designation a machine goes by means nothing more then what target market the maker was going after. I do know lots of people who ran Windows NT 4 on their PCs (and lots of people who ran 2000/2003 server on their desktops).
Hell, an alpha muta is a lot smaller in physical size then a G5 tower.
And let's not forget Windows CE, and the 64 bit PDAs running on MIPS chips out there. Those are certanly "personal computers."
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I would assume then that all Microsoft ads as well as many of the ads from AMD, Intel, Dell, right down the the condom manufacturers must be banned too.
Since when did anyone assume that most ads don't stretch the truth to the breaking point (pun intended)?
He's also mad becuase HP went with Apple and not them and now HP will have it's own branded iPod.
Yeah...in a vacuum. Last time I checked Earth had an atmosphere.
Yo mama so fake, she failed the Turing Test.
They are now working to get 2 terabytes of IS.
This is about honesty. Just because you can cite examples of other people being dishonest doesn't mean Apple should be allowed to be dishonest as well. That's like saying that since your dad speeds and gets away with it, the police should have no right to pull you over. That's not a justification, that's an excuse. And as Trump says on his show, "I don't. like. excuses."
If Apple is dishonest, they should not be defended. You're not defending Apple, you're defending lying. If you are an Apple Zealot, you're not unbiased. Take a step back, find someone who is and let them look at the facts without your propaganda slipping in. If you're an Apple zealot, you're not acting in the best interests of society (or even yourself), you're acting in the best interests of Apple. The Better Business Bureau IS unbiased. If Microsoft makes claims like this, they will be censured as well. Overall, the system works. You have no problem when our enemies are caught and punished, but when we are caught and punished, we attack the system. That's what's happening here.
Everybody here is trying to defend Apple based on technicalities: they said "desktop", not "workstation"; other people lie too; the BBB is a corporate shill; this wouldn't happen if Clinton was in office; there's an anti-Apple conspiracy!
No matter how much you love Apple Corporation and want to promote their products, it is unethical and irresponsible to break the rules our society is based on. If you actively promote false advertising for your own selfish interests now, you have NO RIGHT to complain about others doing the same thing. What this means is that everybody will race to be the most dishonest, so that the right to complain about others' dishonesty will not matter, because you gain more from your dishonesty than you lose by allowing others' dishonesty. This is NOT where we want society to go.
If others are dishonest, call the BBB, don't join them in dishonesty. Apple loves their PR. They spend nearly as much on ads and promotions as on R&D. Lying should hurt their reputation. They should be punished for deceit. But there are people here acting as damage control to help Apple lie without being hurt by it. This is evil.
Dell are the good guys here. Apple is often right on the edge of deception with their ads; this time they went a bit too far and had their wrists slapped for it. I don't care about Dell computers, but I care about honesty in advertising. If Apple noticed Dell blatantly lying and called the BBB, we'd claim it as another example of Apple's glorious belief in truth and goodness. Because that's what we choose to believe. But the sword cuts both ways. It has to. If Apple lies, they should face consequences, just as Dell should when they lie. Someone's mom will see these ads and possibly get scammed into buying the wrong computer based on a lie. That's not good. Apple will lose in the long run, and the customer will lose as well. The best customer service I've ever seen is when an Apple sales guy told me to buy Windows XP because a Mac wouldn't work as well for what I wanted it to do. He was right, and he was honest. And it made me love Apple because they gave a damn about their customers and didn't want to screw me over just to make a quick sale. There are people on this board without that ethic; who cannot see the long-term problem of millions of angry customers who feel they've been lied to, badmouthing Apple to 20 people each and costing Apple many potential future sales. If the Apple guy had pushed me into the wrong solution just because he'd make a commission, I wouldn't have gone on to buy a half-dozen Macs, iPod, software, etc. and helping out on forums doing technical support for Mac newbies. Apple would have lost ME by lying.
And because they're lying now, they're losing someone else. Someone who cares about the truth is the best salesman you can have on your side. He will push you to be the best you can be when y
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
That skirts right around the edge of what you're allowed to do. Technically, there is some content on the web, like Shockwave, that can be processor dependant. If you have a faster processor, like a P4, it will make this faster. Thus the P4 does make the web faster, kinda.
So it's the sort of thing you can get away with. Other companies get away with similar ads that also kind of skirt around the truth. My favourite example from some time ago was Wesson that claimed their cooking oil didn't soak through food. Ok, that's true, at room temperature. However it is true of all OTHER cooking oils too. It's just a function of the oil, not something Wesson had special. Legal, but skirting the edge of the truth.
The problem with Apple's ads was that they came right out and claimed the fastest, most powerful computer. Not only that, the claim was qualified on their website by SPEC. Well Dell likes to play SPEC, there are tons of Dells in the database. It was easy to show, using their own tests, that the claim wasn't true. It stepped over the fine line, and thos Apple is being told to stop it.
Unfortunately the US does not have as strict truth in advertising laws as some other countries so it IS a very fine line that advertisers skirt around. The BBB decided that Apple stepped over the line but, thus far, has not decided that Intel has.
>they could have spent far less on AMD gear and attained the same level of performance.
From Confessions of the World's Largest Switcher:
He looked at various architecture options and was in the process of buying Dells when the deal fell through. He also worked with IBM and AMD and couldn't get the price to match. The budgets were coming in at $9 to $12 million dollars.
So, in fact AMD's best price was about twice as much as Apple's standard educational price.
I usually have been "Proud" to display the BBB logo at places I have worked, but like it has been pointed out several times here, the BBB is basically a joke of a company/organization.
And in this particular case, it's like one company wants to tattle on their competition, and nothing "legal" worked, so why not tattle to the BBB.
Sad, shows that not only can other companies not directly compete with the power of the G5 - but they are resorting to 6 year old mentality to try to save face.
So when will we see mainstream apps complied this way?? Adobe?? MS Office??
Or does it matter since Apple will have new 90nm G5's coming out shortly?
Yes, let's PlEASE not be naive or defend Apple here - their advertising is deceptive - the target audience is not very technically sophisticated (yes, they're discerning application users, that all, kudos, fine.) when it comes to operating platforms and nitty gritty details - and are likely to believe just about any untruth from a company they already trust.
On the other hand Microsoft users on the whole know a little more technically about their computers, and less about the applications they use. But they're less likely to fall prey to some deceptive statement about computer speed in a TV ad during the Super Bowl - they're more aware of the variables at work - but still not smart enough to reject the platform altogether for its shoddy architecture.
For those of you ladies harping about the Centrino, that is not at all a retail consumer product, as a matter of fact Intel needs not advertise at all, I don't know why they waste the money. Who in their right mind would interpret the Centrino ads as deceptive because the dude is floating on water at his desk?
Didn't Dell pull all of their AMD ads mysteriously? What exactly are they debating? Does Dell even sell 64bit Desktop systems?
Too many questions to be answered for me to take Dell or the BBB seriously..
The road between democracy and tyranny is paved with secrecy in the name of security.
I had similar problems with my Quicksilver (G4@800) tower, and my TiBook (550model). When trying to run "Tiger Woods 2003", the program constantly failed, crashing the whole system. I looked at the box for TW2003 and saw a "Designed for nVidia" logo.
:-)
When I got my G5 DP(1.8), things ran smootly. Of course.. that machine had a.... nVidia GFX..
I'd say get rid of ATI and get yourself a proper card
Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities.
Aristotele
I've found that cheap RAM can often adversely affect the stability of Apple's computers. In two instances I've used non-Apple RAM and found the system to crash randomly, and behave inconsistently on the whole, until the non-Apple RAM was removed and replaced with higher quality RAM.
In one instance, I just picked the wrong RAM, even though it said it was compatible with my computer, it wasn't. I got the manufacturer to send me a more expensive, higher quality chip instead. In the second instance (which was a 2 GHz G5, by the way), the retailer included a free GB of RAM with the purchase, but the RAM was cheap. In that case, they offered to exchange the RAM for the cost of the new RAM minus retail of what they gave us (which was a decent deal).
So, this may have nothing to do with your problem, since a lot of people have perfectly decent RAM. However, if you have purchased RAM from someone else, or had it included with your purchase, take it out and see if the problems disappear. The hardware test disk will not find problems in cheap RAM; it didn't in either of the cases above.
The price for the dell cluster was the price for the entire "center", of which the computers were only a small part. We're talking about the cost of the building, salaries for hundreds of people, etc. Hardly comparable.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
The complain by Dell and others is more a matter of semantics (as is the add itself).
Dell claims that the term PC can apply to a workstation as well, rather than simply being used (as in the Apple add) to indicate a personal computer.
I never hear the word PC and think workstation, so I don't find Apple's ads misleading.
It's like a color printer add from a couple of years ago that said, "somewhere between black and white is silver, which is just one of the colors between the colors that the color printer can print." Note that they never claim they can print silver, just that it's between two colors they CAN print. Misleading? Not if you actually pay attention to what they're saying.
That's what marketing is all about.
* As is generally the case, my opinions do not reflect those of my employer.
And again...
Just to exercise my fingers a little more I'll repeat myself. No individual customers complained to the BBB about Apple. Dell did. This is comparable to Ford making a tip to the BBB about Chevy's claim that their mid-sized SUV gets the best overall mileage of all other currently available mid-sized SUVs.
Mod down the BBB--that seems to be the standard response for many statements critical of Apple on /.
If we're talking about desktops here, not servers, what exactly does the average user crave all this speed for? Is it just for games? Most of my thirty-something friends use PCs primarily for playing games or net-surfing with crappy-non-standards-compliant Explorer.
With 15 years of print design under my belt, my G4s seem plenty fast for high-end Photoshop work and anything else I throw at it. How fast does the average "business" machine need to be? I'm all for speed increases, but the PC vs. Mac speed debate is so OLD! Dell must be a huge crybaby to call shenanigans on an ad that's already played out.
Mac users know our Macs aren't the fastest, and most of us (I'll wager) were skeptical about Apple's G5 claim. Fact is, we don't really care. I'm making a living with these so-called "slow" computers, not playing Jedi Academy. I'd never trade a slow G4 for a fast Dell, unless I really needed a better gaming machine.
BTW, I do play Jedi Academy, and it rocks! Don't tell my wife...
. . . . . . Intel rats out AMD to the BBB for misrepresenting processor speeds with PR ratings.
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
...Dell claiming that they were the first to ship integrated wireless and antennas in a laptop, even though Apple in fact did it more than a year earlier?
Maybe someone should "act on behalf of consumers" to notify them of these "inaccuracies".
So the Council of Better Business Bureaus goes after apple for running ads to promote there product.
I've seen car ads that imply that there car is the safest ("That's why I drive a Toyota."). I can't see any reason why one brand of car would be inherently safer than another. Do Toyota's fair better in a collision with an 18 wheeler?
Then there's the Microsoft ad that implies that they make software the make your children do better in school. It implies that your child will do better. But logically, If they are helping improve every child, then relatively speaking your child cannot do better than the other children who would have done better otherwise (since it improves everybody).
That's my $0.02
How do you measure the speed of a computer?
Is a 3 GHz P4 with 4 MB RAM faster than a 1.6 GHz G5 with 16 GB RAM? Not likely. So it's not [only] the clock frequency of the CPU that matters.
A fast computer is, IMHO, one which allows me to perform a certain task in a short time. Think about it - isn't this what _really_ matters? Can I write my essays in a shorter time on a 2 GHz G5 than an old iMac? Not really.
Comparing Macs and Windows machines, I'd say Macs have always been faster, and will likely be for quite some time. Since the G5 is the fastest Mac, I'd say it's the fastest computer.
My two cents.
Sig Nature
Slashdot | Apple Hardware VP Defends Benchmarks
spl is an idiot and known Mac community troll. Proof for the idiot part can be found here.
Oh, and here is what Luxology had to say benchmarkwise ...
I sure don't consider it a troll. I am talking about personal computers, just as the commercial is, which is thus faulty. As is stated in the ad: 'the world's fastest, most powerful personal computer'; that is a lie unless there was fine print giving some sort of explicit test or set of tests.
Notice I am not referring to 64 bit machines or workstations. They can claim if they want they had the first 64 bit personal computers, and I am not referring to that ad. Claiming the first 64 bit personal computer and claiming a fast computer are entirely different.
Now if you want to go run along and define a difference between a workstation and a personal computer for these kind folks, go ahead. I'm sure you'll include many computers used by gamers for games. Even baring those, the ad is still wrong.
"You've tried the 'rest.' Now try the 'best.'"
Shop as usual. And avoid panic buying.
For fuck sake we don't have to refute that crap over and over again. Try Google. Or just read the threads on /. from June 24 2003.
Given Apple's seminal position in the industry, they can define "personal computer" any way they please.
;)
That's just it though - it's one thing when you're bragging to your mates, but when you're advertising a commercial product, you *don't* get to define things how you like (that's why you sometimes get small print appearing at the bottom of the screen - though it'd make their claim rather amusing if they stuff "Where Personal Computer only includes those made by Apple" at the bottom..)
They chose to exclude "workstations" and "servers."
So we can now claim that yes, Apple have the first 64bit personal computer, but that Macs are no good for either work, or running a server?
(No, I don't believe that before you mod me down - the point is that isn't true because PC, server and workstation aren't mutually exclusive terms, and that also means you can't exclude the latter two from the former.)
"Dude, you're getting a cell!"
Men believe what they want. - Caesar
The "world's fastest" thing is just marketing hype. Who can't see that? It may or may not be true, but who really cares one way or the other? I never have. Is it really so hard to figure that out? Has there been a rash of people rushing out to get G5s only to find out they were sorely duped? This is such a non-issue.
Clearly, Dell is run by a bunch of whiners who would rather gripe and complain than come up with their own attention-grabbing ad campaigns. And it's so nice to see CNet letting themselves be used as Dell's little bitch--no surprise there given CNet's notorious history of Apple bashing.
I'd love to see how many folks at CNet have Dell and/or Microsoft stock. That would probably explain a few things.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
I'm very happy about this decision. Those ads always annoyed me.
I think that it'd be a nice waste of time to take some of Dell's claims under consideration and report any false information. After all, they've been "first" in so many things Apple actually beat them to, that it shouldn't be too hard to find something to report.
... Maybe we should be pleased that there's at least some regulation in place.
;-)
I'm not especially vexed by Dell's move, Apple's claim is dubious, although I personally think they make their point: they've got the fastest personal computer you can buy off the shelve. OK, maybe not anymore, next month maybe again, etc etc, who cares, they still make the most pleasing computer afaic, and I don't mind it being fast.
I am however surprised America reacts to this type of hyperbole. Your presidents get elected on this, all the goods you buy are sold on this, your news is full of it
Me, I'm still waiting for the "I can't believe it's not Windows" campaign for Linux
I think, therefore I am...I think.
"no, but he is criticizing someone's behavior while he is exhibiting most of those behaviors"
As the previous poster noted, I'm not displaying the bleeding heart here...
"and attacking a group of people commonly used as scapegoats, and for the most part not able to defend themselves from his attacks."
I never said a goddamned thing ABOUT the homeless and the hungry. My criticism was levled at the original dumb-ass parent poster.
My suggestion to you is that you, A- RTFA, and B- quit being such a cocksmoker. If you had actually bothered to DO A, you'd see my original point: want to help the hungry and homeless? Fine, good on you, but quit bitching about it (in unrelated subjects, like, oh, Apple and the BBB), AND GET OFF OF YOUR ANONYMOUS COWARD ASS AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. Don't fucking bug the rest of us about it if you wont turn off slashdot and do it yourself.
Which makes the AC a fuckin' loser.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
The G5 really is the fastest computer in the world. If you've used a 286 for the past ten years like I have, where GEM can barely run fast enough to appear responsive, then getting a G5 with dual processors and 10 gigs of RAM suddenly feels like going from an old bicycle to a Ferrari Testarossa. But that's just my take on it. Ooooooooh well.
I could be wrong, but haven't Sun, SGI and DEC all been making 64 bit workstations for like ... 10 or more years? That was my complaint with those Apple ads.
... compared to the standards based circa 1980. Moore tells us that you'd have to have 256 of those G3s to have a modern super computer in 1999 when those ads were run. Which incedently would have gotten them in the Top 500 in 1999.
The other ad I really hated was the original G3 ad that claimed, "Own a SuperComputer". Yeah, it's a super computer
(:
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
Apple could have used better lingo.
BBB is for customers who have nothing better to do after they get what they ordered and then change their mind.
Well, I don't see a problem with showing off the facts, if it's all true. And from what I've seen, through Apple's reports and such, it appears to be all true. Nonetheless though, the G5 is an amazing computer.
"Instant gratification takes too long." - Carrie Fisher
It's been posted over and over again, things like "PC" vs. "Workstation" classifications, processor speeds, etc.
But I bet one of the big things that make the G5 faster isn't the hardware, but the software. Which do you think would be a more efficient OS - bloated Windows XP, or OSX, based on BSD? And another thing, regarding the UI itself - isn't OSX's GUI fully 3D-accellerated? So the processor isn't having to spend near as much time handling the drawing of the GUI compared to either Windows or X11, leaving it free to work on other tasks.
Plus, a lot of it has to do with the UI design. Most slashdotters can probably accomplish most file-related tasks (copying, moving, deleting, etc.) faster using a CLI than GUI. And among different GUIs, some allow you to perform tasks quicker than others.
So I'm sure that if you ran a full set of benchmarks on a G5, it likely would rank lower than other top-of-the-line PCs. But as far as real usage instead of similated benchmarks, I'm certain the G5 is on top.
Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together.
Just FYI
They don't actually handle every single case that gets thrown at them. They pick and choose which to follow-up on. They probably chose to follow up on this one since it was brought up by Dell. I'm pretty sure that the government, that includes the BBB, has a contract with Dell to supply the government with Dell products. The BBB wouldn't like to loose their contract now, would they?
Much as I love nVidia and detest ATi(only for business reasons, not quality), this is an unfair statement. Better would be to say get a card with the chipset your games are designed for. Of course, games really should be designed for some standard like OpenGL or whatnot - and the cards should be able to handle them. I would contact ATi and ask if there is a known issue with that game(although good luck here - they may deny they ever made your card, happened to me).
Opera, Proxomitron-Grypen,GPG 0x0A1C6EE3
Dell are the good guys here.
No, they aren't. Dell only sells systems with Intel processors, and the Itanium is not a consumer processor by any stretch of the imagination. They have no basis to complain.
I don't care about Dell computers, but I care about honesty in advertising.
And how is Apple's advertizing dishonest? Who came out with a 64 bit personal computer before them?
...let's see, before Dell chooses to open it's mouth about their precious pieces of $#1T, they should remember that there is no such thing as a pure Dell...they outsource everything and glue their name on it. Let Dell actually build and test their "own" systems before they shoot their mouths off. BTW...notice no one else is making such a claim?