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Intel Flaunts Mac mini Knock-off
Rollie Hawk writes "Remember how the Mac mini was designed by Apple to steal PC customers? Now Intel wants to steal them back. Adopting a shockingly similar lunch box shape and light-weight design, Intel's upcoming Mini PC features all the sleekness and portability (physical, that is) of the Mac mini with none of the Mac benefits. Well, at least it will probably have a faster processor. Now if only someone would make a Cobalt Qube knock-off for me."
Now I remember why I buy AMD.
they haven't done anything but stick a clock on the face of an empty stylish plastic box yet.
apple is shipping....
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
From the second paragraph of the article: " It's unlikely that Intel itself would build such a device."
Then, the article clearly goes on to say that this is a empty plastic shell, designed merely to inspire Intel's partners, not an example of any upcoming Intel product. I guess that doesn't sound as exciting and inflamatory, though.
They always seem to want to copy what Apple does... but they muck it up and end up going nowhere with it. I would think that they would have learned after everyone and their mother tried to copy the iMac with no success.
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If Intel is truly the industrial leader (true)and innovator (questionable), then they should come up with a radically different concept PC to compete with Mac mini, and yet can target the same audience. Having a carbon-copy of Mac mini is the same as saying :
their design is superior, the only thing special about ours....we use a x86 cpu!!
Reminds me of Creative Zen looking awfully similar to the iPod mini, but much uglier colors.
Let me see if I have this right...
Apple creates something beautiful again, and everybody says "Wow, it's perfect, but it's an Apple".
Then within a few months {"Intel", "Dell", "Microsoft", "Compaq"} tells the rest of the world "it's alright, go ahead and start copying Apple".
So everybody does, and tells {"Intel", "Dell", "Microsoft", "Compaq"} how great they are.
again.
Never ask for directions from a two-headed tourist! -Big Bird
The whole poing of the Mac Mini is that it's a small affordable system that comes preinstalled with; an OS, a Photo Editor, Movie Editor, Music Player, DVD/VCD designer, and Music Composition software. Additionally most Macs comes pre-installed with Apple Works and World Book Encyclopedia.
Not to mention the splendor of no Adware or a major risk of viruses.
Heh, I think you hit on the biggest linux security threat there is: People who believe Linux's security to be infallible and thus do nothing to protect their machine. I wonder what it will take to knock the complacency out of people.
Monstar L
That seems to be more disturbing than Intel trying to get manufacturers to compete with a mini-esque PC.
is that the maketing position for the Mac Mini is to convert Windows iPod users who are sold on the Apple brand but think even the iMacs are too expensive.
Who, exactly, is the target market for the x86 Mini? PC's are already dirt cheap, and we know that shrinking down the form factor like that will only raise the price over existing desktop PC's. They aren't going to convert Mac users, because Mac users a) don't buy on price alone, and b) already have a Mac option in that category, so they will buy the Mac Mini.
Logically, for Intel to compete against the Mac Mini, they need to develop an iPod killer, not another desktop system.
Because the Mac mini shipped. It's why Doom 3 shipping is news, while the milestone of Duke Nukem Forever is not.
Mini ITX boards have been around for years; Mac minis are 1/3 the volume and 1/2 the size. Nano ITX has been announced many months before the Mac mini, but hasn't shipped yet, while the mini has. Even still, when someone took a prototype nano-itx board and tried to fit it into a Mac mini, it was discovered it didn't fit; they hat to saw down the heatsink AND they had to remove the optical drive, so the Mac mini is STILL smaller than nano-itx.
There's nothing revolutionary about the mini, other than it's size AND price; the only similar PC is the Cappuccino PCs, which are slightly smaller, but nearly twice as expensive. Even Shuttle based boxes, which can hold almost 3 Mac minis inside them, cost more.
GPL Deconstructed
1) Imitation the sencerest form of flattery.
9 78&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312/
2) Its not the power brick, powering this unit. But the cooling tower you also need to hang off of it! With the earplugs included in the box!
3) Intel been doing this "odd shape case thing" for years and no one has coppied them yet. Remember the Aztec pyrimid? Uggly shape and colors.
4) But Microsoft want to go to the "Teddybear" form factor case!
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=545
5) The "low heat" and also "low power" micro/Pico-ITX form factor MB are not made by Intel but are being driven by VIA CPU's and chipset!
6) And is this from the same Intel that was hyping so much bleeding edge stuff, over the last few years. That after X months usually said we can't do it?
I think that much of your issue with OS X is simply understand a new paradigm for using an OS.
A few comments make me think you have missed the point:
Finder is like "Explorer" for Windows - it allows you to navigate a file system, go in and out of folders, etc.
"Docking Station" (the Dock) is NOT like the Start menu in windows and NOT like the task bar ar the bottom either. It is a place where you can put applications you often run, so they are easily accessed, as well as applications that are running, to easily switch between, as well as open or closed documents you may be working on and even file folders and finally, the trash can. That's why they call it the Dock, you can just "dock" things there.
Another issue I think is confounding things is that to install an application in OS X, 9 times out of 10, you just copy one file from the CD to the hard drive. It can live in just about any directory and when you click it, it launches. This is WAY different than windows, but very nice because you don't end up with dozens of files everywhere for a single program (makes uninstalling clean too!) But I digress - you may find it helpful to drag your "Applications" folder to the dock (right side of the divider bar, near the trash can is where documents and folders go). When you want to launch an application, simply hold down your mouse click on that folder for about a second and the contents will pop up, allowing you to launch an application from there.
As for the keyboard shortcut things, I am surprised how much you feel they are necessary. I don't believe, but admit I could be wrong, there is anything that cannot be done with just the mouse that can with a keyboard shortcut.
I have two recommendations - if you are really worried about the way the OS works, go to a local Apple store or even CompUSA/other Apple retailer and ASK SOMEONE TO SHOW YOU AROUND IT. Yeah, it is a different experience, but I argue it would be easier to learn than Windows, had someone no experience with either OS. SECONDLY, there are great books at Amazon/etc for switching to OS X from XP. Here is just one.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
How much does design cost? Pulling a few numbers out of my ass, let's say that this took a team of 20 people to design, test, fabricate, etc. this design. Let's say it took them a year, at $100k. (Engineers make more, secretaries make less). That's two million bucks.
According to some news sources, Apple plans to sell around a million of the things. The cost of the design comes out to two bucks a unit.
Supposing I'm off by an order of magnitude, we're still talking about $20 per unit paid to the designers. So I really don't think that it's the design driving the price of the units.
I think that the price of Apple computers is generally driven by basic economics: how much are people willing to pay for them? If that number is greater than the cost to manufacture (including the $2 to $20 for the fancy design), then they do it; otherwise, they don't. The manufacturing cost only sets a lower limit on the price, but it doesn't set it.
People are willing to pay more for Apples, because they like the design and reliability. Some of that comes from spending more on designers; some comes from more expensive components (Apple for years insisted on using pricey SCSI before finally joining the rest of the world in IDE, for example).
A lot of it comes from the price of alternatives; Apple almost certainly looks at the price of a Dell marketed to the same audience and adds 20% or so. People are willing to pay a premium because they're getting a better piece of equipment. Apple has a tendency to tell people that they want a better computer than the one Dell is marketing to them.
Dell will happily sell you the cheapest machine they think you'll buy; Apple would rather sell you a computer that would make you happy. That gives them only a portion of the market, but it's a very cheerful market segment.
Design is the reason they can charge more, but it's not to pay the designers. Designers are cheap compared to the rest of the process. There might be some room for a competitor to Dell to arise with the same philosophy in the Wintel platform, but they'll be stuck with the same small market share Apple gets from seeking the high end, and they'll still be stuck with Windows as the OS, which will limit how much users like the product no matter how spiffy the physical design.
I'm a life-long Windows (since v. 1) user that switched to an iMac recently (Feb). I can tell you right now that I'm sold, and not going back to the PC!
To me, your rant sounds like you were looking for an imitation of Windows on the Mac.
The reason I like the Mac so much is because they did _not_ imitate Windows! Instead, they designed the OS from (almost) the ground and created something that was created with usability in mind, instead of creating something that need to be backwards compatible with MS-DOS.
For the past four weeks, I haven't booted in Windows once at home, and I now find Windows a pain to use at work.
My $0.02