Slashdot Mirror
Forbes Predicts 5% Desktop Share for Apple in 2005
sebFlyte writes "Spurred on by the iPod, Apple's share of the desktop computer market will grow to five percent (from three percent) this year, according to research from Morgan Stanley. Apparrently nearly 20% of iPod users surveyed are planning to switch to Macs, and the sales figures for the last few quarters are backing up the theory of the iPod Halo Effect. All this suggests the question ... how many iPod-touting Slashdotters are thinking of switching?"
I plan on getting my mac mini. I've been looking for a way to not have to use Microsoft anymore and a combination of a new mac mini and an old machine running fedora is how I'll do it.
I'm going to buy a Mac, but not attach a screen to it!
But not because of iPod. Really, a nice desktop, integrated desktop apps, plus the joy of a UNIX cli under it all. Beat the pants of Linux for me.
-- John
The time to buy Apple stock was 7 years ago at $12.00 before the split :P
Be True, Unbeliever
Well, not a total switch, I think only a few slashdot readers are capable of switching.
Did you mean, "Add to your collection?"
Because I had a Mac, I bought an iPod.
Kudos to Apple, though, for getting more market share.
What's interesting about this is that in some sense, an iPod user has the least reason to switch, as Apple has done such a good job of making iTunes work as well as it could possibly be expect to on both the Mac and the PC. Is it just a design thing?
I'm all for the trend, though, whatever the reason.
Uh, No. The time to buy Apple stock was last year before it went up over 500%.
I do not have an iPod (and probably won't buy one), but my next system will either be a G5 iMac or a Mac Mini. The irony is that an X-Box was the final factor in my decision, since I found myself spending most of my gameplaying time on the console, I do not need a PC around to run games.
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
More marketshare means more income to spend on R&D. With what Apple puts out already, I can only imagine what they'll start putting out with more marketshare (compare to Microsoft's $10 billion a year R&D, and all they can put out are picture-viewing smartphones and media center TVs). At some point, there's a threshold where growth begins to fuel itself through momentum (maybe ~10% or so). With Longhorn not due out until 2006, Apple has the opportunity to grow a few more points next year as well.
I used to hate Macs; pre-OSX I was convinced they were complete garbage. My next computer will probably be a Mac. I do own an iPod, but it wasn't the iPod that convinced me to switch; it was seeing that OS X is based on UNIX, and that it looks incredibly spiffy, and that it's stable, and....
Have you ever been face-to-face with their 30" Cinema? It's the most amazing thing I've ever seen.
________________________________________________
suwain_2
There are plenty of games, as I switched to a Mac, and have no problem getting the games I want, they may be a couple months behind the windows version but big-woop-dee-butt-$$%&%$ (tm) I can wait a couple months, if it means no windows email worms corrupting my system.
Open OS. Very open OS in fact.
Closed desktop environment. Free IDE.
Tell me why you're not happy about this again? You could always run X11 and use KDE or Gnome or whatever. I personally feel that Aqua is worth every penny.
Karma: Chameleon (mostly due to the fact that you come and go).
What was that? Rumors of Apple's imminent *survival*?
I give Apple six months before Jobs shuts the place down just to spite us all.
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
Apple makes a great product, but I seriously doubt it will see double-digit market share any time soon.
Go ahead Apple zealots, mod me into oblivion for speaking heresy.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
that is, of course, assuming, people only buy computers to play games.
whilst certainly a concearn to some, one could look at what is available, and determine if that will be enough to satiate their needs.
maybe though, the 20% have already taken the games and whatever into account, and still plan on switching, whereas the 80% decided they couldn't do without them, or the ones which are available.
of course its probably neither.
Live EVERY week... Like it's Shark Week
Yep, it's almost time to short Apple stock. Again.
Have you read my blog lately?
Is not the new MAC OS basicly Linux?
No. It's basically BSD, which is, of course, dying .
No. OS X is closed-source but it has an open-source BSD kernel. It is a unix-based OS but it has much more to it than Linux, which is only the kernel -- In a way, you could think of it as a BSD distribution, but there's a lot more to it than that.
I have an iPod, but when I got it I just used it under linux. To be honest, it worked great, and I could care less for iTunes or any of that crap. I "switched" much later on after being lent a 300Mhz powerbook by a friend... even though it was slow, I could do everything I needed in OSX that my craptacular 650Mhz acer laptop could do, and I got 4 hours of battery life.
OSX was the workhorse that sold me on Apple... the iPod's just a toy for long car trips and lugging data files around.
"Quoting famous computer scientists out of context is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming." - K
And besides, games are a good excuse to have at least two computers: one on which to get work done (Linux or Mac), and one on which to play games (Windows). That being said, there are an awful lot of games you can get for Macs or play the windows version on Linux via Cedega. (I've done a bit of both)
Transistors and Beer!!
I can't quote percentages, but a "large" portion of MacOS X is available in source form from Apple. So it's not as open as Linux, but it's far from Windows when it comes to proprietary.
I think you're asking the wrong crowd. What I mean is, for myself, I enjoy "building" computers. I do it at work, and I enjoy putting together slick systems for myself and others I know. If I could install Mac OS X on these machines, I would in a heartbeat. I do use Linux in some cases, but Windows ends up being the defacto standard because people know it more than Linux. I'm willing to bet many slashdotters, besides the current Apple users, probably like building computers as well. If I could get an IBM PPC chip on a stock motherboard I could buy online and build myself a Mac clone, I might do it.... but what I know for sure is that AMD 64 chips are amazingly fast, fairly cool, and cheaper than most alternatives on the market right now. So, what I REALLY want, is Mac OS X ported for x86. Then I would definitely switch, and possibly a large number of other slashdotters would give it a try as well. But, I know Apple makes cash off of very expensive hardware, and they would never give that up. So, what I'm trying to say is, it would take a hell of a lot more than a fancy MP3 player (that works fine with Windows BTW) to switch both software and hardware for me. I'm not saying I'm the average slashdotter, but I'm willing to bet many people share some of the same preferences I do (even though there is no question somebody will violently disagree with this post like always).
Looked into switching a bit more than a year ago for my last laptop purchase. For a best-monitor, 2GB RAM, 60 or 80GB disk configuration with as-comparable-as-possible other details, the Powerbook was $1100, or over a third again as expensive as the comparable Dell, and the Dell had, in some ways, a nicer display, higher-resolution although physically smaller. If it had been a few hundred, and I hadn't had to lose resolution, I might have gone through with it, but for me, last year, the Apple Premium was too high.
I'm a nature photographer.
Each of these possibilities are imaginable, so I think "Never happen" might be a little premature.
I have been consulting for a large Linux shop the last few months and was surprised at the number of people running Mac laptops. The company itself provides Linux desktops for everyone, and Windows laptops for the suits, but a lot of the developers and other IT people use Mac laptops for their personal computers. I have to say I have been pretty impressed with what I have seen in terms of performance. Besides Mac just give you that extra little "Wow!" factor. Of course it is BSD under the hood, so it is a real OS. They really are slick machines. I do not think that the Ipod is the influencing factor here though.
Insert Generic Sig Here:
http://developer.apple.com/darwin/
Next.
http://www.simplygames.com/mac.asp
:)
Im being given a mac myself (for web testing) and I was under the same impression until I saw the selection. WoW on a mac-mini? Going to have that thing plugged into my TV
Unfortunately we're late to that party. The time to get in was almost exactly a year ago -when AAPL was trading for $16 a share. The subsequent rise to ~$90, and split, has taken a bit of the potential out of the stock...
But who knows, it could still go up with increased market share (The holly grail for Apple folks).
-- As soon as I have an interesting sig, you'll be among the first to know!
Now I've started porting my commercail applications to OS-X.
I guess the ole' Reality Distortion Field really DOES work, eh? :D
The time to buy Apple stock was 7 years ago at $12.00 before the split :P
Apple stock has split three times total with the last two being last February 28th and June 21st 2000. The first split was back in 1987, so in terms of stock splits it has not been the best investment. However, I am quite happy with the investments and additional purchases I made a couple of years ago with Apple. The iPod and iTunes have certainly been a driving force for the increase in stock value as well as the halo effect that everybody is talking about. However, I see another big spike in the number of Mac users as they get out of universities. Specifically, Apple has been making huge strides in getting higher education users back into the Apple fold with many folks making the switch. From my perspective, I know that there have been at least a dozen folks who have started using Macintosh computers after coming through our lab in the last two years who previously were Windows users.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
We've got two switchers in our household. One was pre-ipod, one was post ipod.
Coming from a primarily Unix background, the switch for me was the appeal of nice hardware with the ability to get to all of my command line stuff while still having the slickness factor. I built white-box PC's for years, and was definitely 'anti-mac' for a long time. Using my g/f's powerbook was what got me to switch... "Hey look, you can use vi on it!"
On my g/f's side, the primary drive was being able to do what she does easier (desktop publishing, email, web, im,) and without as much worry about spyware, ads, etc.
We're now a 2 mac, 2 ipod household.
A few years ago everyone told me not to touch a mac. Then in 2004 I got a 20 GB ipod and realized the potential. I can listen to almost all my music in the car using an aux input on my deck and I can portably listen to music on my way to class or anywhere I feel like. I even sometimes carry around an RCA cable and jack to RCA convertor so I can use it on most people's stereos. At the time I still had a thinkpad which was running linux (I was switching distros often) and I was not satsified. Don't get me wrong, I love linux but I realized that until the wireless drivers are improved, its not a great laptop distribution (I had a discussion about this with one of the PHLAK developers who was also irritated about this situation). So what did I do? I bought a Powerbook G4. OH NO some people are thinking. Its memory is lower quality and its processor isn't 3 Ghz. Yet ultimately the processor is powerful enough to do everything that a laptop should do and the software is seemless. I can compile most programs I want from linux and it accomplishes my needs with perfect wireless support and allows me to still have an easy setup to use gcc during my Computer Science classes. It beats Windows and if you ever have doubts just run a PowerPC distro on it. Yet I think some people will be impressed with how far MacOS has gone in the last few years.
I think this is what Apple finally realized with the Mac Mini. They'll never get people en masse to go to the Mac cold turkey, but by giving them an affordable option, there's a lot of people who might try it since there's a way out (they can just write off the $500).
I guess the better question is - what percentage of Mac Mini purchasers continue to use it actively and don't eventually write it off as a bad investment? And how many of them swear off Windows?
Schnapple
I bought Apple stock a while ago at $14. I thought I was being smart by selling it at $30. I was wrong :(
Course we are only talking about five shares.
Finkployd
The iPod represents exactly what Apple is: an innovator. They release produts that innovate the market. The iPod and the iPod music store have revolutionized mp3 audio. While there were products before the iPod it was Apple's ingeniuos design that innovated the mp3 player boom. And thanks to the iPod music store we might soon see even cheaper than 99cent mp3s for download (see the slashdot article on 5 cent music).
The Mac OS is similar to the iPod. If you play around with it you will wonder why Windows hasn't picked up on some of the things. Expose, for example, will re-arrange the windows open or in a certain application so you can easily choose which one you want. Buttons such as "OK" and "Cancel" are all placed in the same exact spots (OK on the right, cancel on the left) in every application. Mac OS encourages their developers to stick to standards and for the most part, they do (ex: not having a 2 button mouse prevents developers from loading things into the right click menu, which many novice users do not know about). The design of the Powerbook alone blows my mind. For $1,000 cheaper than the PC counterpart I have a top of the line processor with a gorgeous screen, a large hard drive and plenty of RAM. But it doesn't stop there - the Powerbook has a light sensor that knows when to light up my keyboard (if it's too hard to see the letters on the keys) or turn it off if it gets light enough. I won't list all the wonderful features, you can go search google for that.
Conclusion: When I switched to Mac OS I was reluctant to give up on my PC. Now I find myself reluctant to use my PC even for the simplest of tasks.
Apple has a partical closed/partial open. Their foundation is actually opened based on BSD API. From there, they added in their old stuff with enhancements.
In addition, Apple does not typically use their system to try and lock out competitors. The IPOD is new behavior for them. Hopefully, they will consider how to approach things. The reason why OSS software is popping up around ipod is because Apple has not ported to Linux/BSD. Once they do (even closed), I suspect that we will see a lot fewer attempts to circumvent them.
OTH, MS uses their OS and Office as a way of controlling the end user WRT everything. If it was not for OSS, I have no doubt that MS would have been far worse than they are today.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
So how is that going to get more Macs into more homes? Apple wants to sell more Macs, not more copies of OSX.
If you think about it Apple recently dropped the prices of their computers a bit. iBook is again under 1K$, iPod-mini and iPod-Shuffle are quite cheap and very trendy, and finally a really low cost Mac: the Mac Mini IMHO is one of the best ideas to get more and more people to switch. I think iBook and Mac Mini really mean that Apple got what Average Joe wants from a home computer, that is to say ease-of-use and low maintenance cost. Ok, we can't compare 2.5 GHz G5 proc with a 1.25 GHz G4, but does your mom need all that power to read her mail or write a Word doc? :) Think different!
Me myself I have an iBook, and I couldn't be happier, as it does what I want the way I want. It doesn't really matter if I can't compile a Linux kernel in 2 minutes as long as the battery lasts 4 hours.
I've used only PCs for the past eight years. However, I bought my iPod in July 2003 and since then, I've purchased two Apple laptops -- an iBook and then a Powerbook. I love OS X so much that I've just purchased a Mac Mini for my parents. I think the iPod is a great segue into becoming a Mac user. My personal belief is that there are more applications for PC users, but the applications out for Mac users are of better quality.
The upgrade problem is especially acute with something like a mini-mac, where the software upgrade costs are going to far exceed the original purchase price.
No games, huh?
Quake 3
Doom 3
Black & White
The Sims
The Sims 2
SimCity 4
All the Myst games
All the Warcraft games
All the Diablo games
RTCW
All the Unreal Tournaments
I could go on and on here. Not to mention, I use emulators anyway, so there are all those games too.
...but it wasn't an iPod that convinced me, it was having a cheap 400mhz iMac to use as a server/living room stereo for a couple years.
Not only was it great for some simple hosting, utter silence and low power consumption, but I found that I even preferred to do casual browsing on it -- despite being so remarkably slow (OS X - Quartz Extreme = Windows on a 486). It's just so comfortable.
As others have pointed out in this thread, there won't be as many Slashdot "switchers" as there will be "adders," and that probably counts for the larger population as well (why throw out the old computer when you can keep it for the dog to use?). But I bet many will follow the cheap Mac they bought on a lark to a shiny new Powerbook, just like I did.
// I will show you fear in a handful of jellybeans.
I wanted iTMS before it was available on Windows, and I also wanted a lightweight laptop. So I bought an iBook. While I've been quite happy with iTMS and my iPod, the iBook was a horrendous piece of crap that broke *constantly*. I had to RMA it twice in the warranty period - once for memory, and again for the screen. Less than a month after the warranty expired, the screen died *again*. Goodbye, iBook.
By comparison, I had already bought a Dell Inspiron 8100 - *refurbed*. And it has lasted over 3 years and the only thing I ever RMA'd on it was the battery, and it has gotten a lot more travel and abuse than the iBook ever did.
On the upside, the RMA process for the iBook was certainly simple. I felt like, as a warranty caller, I was a second-class citizen calling their support people, but I'm sure lots of people with software problems probably would be leeching free support if they didn't do it how they do. But once we got through the process, the RMA was relatively fast and simple.
So yes, I was the first wave of halo buyers.. I bought a mac to GET iTunes. And I'm thankful it's available on Windows now so I can keep using it, because it wasn't worth the headache of dealing with the iBook's issues.
" As soon as that 20% realizes there's no games for that shiny Mac in the store window, they'll stay right where they are."
Maybe, maybe not. Around our house we realized that for the price of one good gaming PC system, you can pick up a trio of dedicated network-capable gaming consoles, each with their own small TV. Makes a fine gaming LAN.
So the Winboxen are in the process of being replaced by Web-surfing Macs, plus a Linux box running an glue layer for the odd Windows game.
And I'll be worrying a lot less about worms, viruses, malware, etc.
The irony is that an X-Box was the final factor in my decision, since I found myself spending most of my gameplaying time on the console, I do not need a PC around to run games.
I would go further and say that there may be a great deal of overlap between the people that switch to Macs and the people that primarily use consoles for gaming - total end users that like the simplicity of hooking a console to a TV, shoving in a game, and having it just work, and similarly like the simplicity of plopping down in front of their Mac and having it "just work."
The big question is whether the Mac's software library is up to the task. It has respectable Internet software available and there is Mac Office (IMHO the single most important application to the Mac platform).
The coolest voice ever.
Seemingly along with most of Higher Education. It used to be that when I went to Internet2 or Educause conferences there were about 90% thinkpads and 10% power/ibooks. Now it is usually around 60%-70% power/ibooks. and I have noticed a lot more Linux installs on the Thinkpads.
Apple seems to have made a massive dent in Universities.
Finkployd
...now 2% less beleaguered! Oh, woe is me. Do you have any idea what kinda' influence Apple could have on the world if they had 5% market share? A democrat might actually win an electoral race or something. Gah! The War on Tourism might be called off! What would I use my .50 cal for, then?
I drank what? -- Socrates
I switched last year. Bought a nice, shiny dual 1.8GHz G5 Powermac and have never been happier. Yeah, it's not perfect and I do keep my old secondary PC around for games (along with my XBox, PSX and Dreamcast) but the crap I no longer have to put up with is worth it.
For me it wasn't the iPod. It was iTunes. I was using iTuines for six months before I got my iPod and it was my experience with iTunes that made me look at the Mac for the first time in five years. I had not liked OS 9 and below and I used to consider Macs to be a joke back when they first came out.
And yes, I did give Linux a try. Several, as a matter of fact, starting with SLS 1.0 back in 1993/1994 and the last time with Suse 9 last year. I never got along with Linux very well. I figured that if I tried it out seven times in ten years and never got comfortable with it it probably wasn't for me. But I did give it an honest try.
The Mac, well, OS X, I got along with from Day One and am quite happy with. A++ Would do it again.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
I am calling Shenanigans!
Ipod sales are predicted at 13.3 millioin units for 2005, but I find it hard to believe that one out of five (2.66 million) will convert soley due to their experience with the ipod (sure there is windows based frustration).
It would make sense that many people would say they plan to switch to the platform, but how many really follow through with that is going to be lower once they find the sticker shock on their standard systems. If they can gain a market foothold with the mac mini will may work. There is also the question of being retrained on a new system. There certainly is something to be said for the status quo.
Victory is gained, not in knowing your opponents next move, but in preempting them.
I bought a mini for in the kitchen. It is hooked up to a 17" flat panel LCD TV. My wife would not have a PC case in th kitchen. This however is smaller than a toaster and looks way cooler. I hooked a wireless keyboard with one of those nipple mice up to it. Now my wife can quickly check email- look up a recipe etc...
I have an iPod (40G and a shuffle) and the Bose speakers as well.
I don't care about games and for the naysayers: OSX is a Unix my wife and children can actually use.
Hajo Monogamy: Belief so strong that millions of people end perfectly good relationships in order to start a new one.
My company recently made the decision that all new desktop computers purchased would be from Apple. Although the average Mac is more expensive than the average PC, the (current) lack of spyware and other PC related problems will probably pay for itself in the first few months.
I can say with 100% certainty that the switch to Apples was made because of the IPods. The IPods got the company owners into Apple's Pittsburgh store and the rest is history. Apple's retail employees do a very good job of introducing customers and potential customers to their other product lines. I've never been more impressed by floor-level retail salespeople... and apparently neither were the company owners.
I'd stuck it out with Linux since making the trek to my University with a bag full of floppies and downloading Slackware 0.97 or something like that, years and years ago. I trashed Windows to install a real operating system and scoffed at the Mac.
... oh ... 10 years in front of Gnome and 5 years ahead of KDE.
But recently, I got tired of Linux. The endless quest for a better desktop or a more compatible distribution. You've just upgraded? Congratulations, now go and recompile all your multi-media apps (like DVD playing). Want to plug in a device that's been on the market for a couple of years but no one in kernel land has? Good luck and plug it into your partner's mac to use instead.
For me the final straw was buying a G4 iPod, and deliberately setting up a Windows machine so that I could make sure it was formatted VFAT rather than HFS so that it would definitely be able to be used with my Linux system. And viola, it too didn't work! So, goodbye Linux, hello Mac. Sold my Linux custom-built workstation for $500 AU, bought an eMac, and have never looked back. I'm more productive, significantly more compatible with any device I want to buy and the interface is about
I still use Linux, I think it's a great server platform, but for the desktop, nah. I'm even going to be buying myself a bright shiny new 17" PowerBook soon out of my own money rather than continue to use Linux as my laptop OS for work.
Mac OS X - what Linux could have been, and what Solaris should have been.
I'm not paranoid - everyone really is out to get me.
That's why I have a Gamecube.
I hear PC gamers fretting all the time about whether their graphics cards are up to snuff, whether they're going to be able to run the hot new game coming out in two weeks... I never have to worry about any of that. My computer can't run any games at all (except World of Warcraft, which I don't really want), but I know I can go down to walmart and there's more games there than I've got money to buy or time to play, and all I have to do is put a disc in a machine and switch it on. I don't even have to sign off AIM or Skype.
Okay, if your conception of "games" is "first person shooters" then the PC is where it's at and what I'm saying is worthless, but as far as I'm concerned, my lifetime needs as far as first person shooters go was sated completely in 1998. And if first person shooters aren't your thing then commercial PC gaming probably isn't going to do much at all for you right now. There's some interesting stuff coming out of the PC shareware game community, but when was the last commercial PC gaming got a game like Katamari Damacy, or Wario Ware? There was a time in the past where the pc games lineup made being a mac user a bit depressing but at this point, pc gaming seems like it wouldn't be worth the bother even if my computer could run it. I've got all the games I want and then some.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
I switched 3 weeks ago and have been very, very happy
I added a 12" PowerBook in addition to my Athlon desktop last month, and I'll tell you why I did, and why I am glad I did
This laptop will probably convince me to buy a Mac desktop next. I keep trying to use Quicksilver on my Windows machine. I keep wishing the software I had on my Mac were available on my PC.
Yes, my iPod helped me become more comfortable with the Apple brand name before I bought my PowerBook. I used an old PowerBook at work before, and that got me hooked too.
I bought the laptop right before I left for the Middle East (Qatar to be specific) and wanted it to store images on. It cost a little bit more than a new, larger memory card. But it's been very, very worth it
I'm not an iPod user but I decided to replace an old Win98 machine that I used for mainly for photos with a Mac Mini. Even tho there are a few gotchas, I'm pretty happy so far. I've been learning to use the Gimp to replace Photoshop and so far I've been able to do everything I could before. 'course I'm no graphix artist... Besides that I use it for the web and email (Firefox and Thunderbird) and some office apps (NeoOffice/J). Eclipse works fine too. The only thing I really miss is Freecell. Have to move over to my Linux box for that, oh well, can't have everything.
After finally making the plunge last year to buy a Mac, I found myself giving more and more consideration to getting an ipod (something I'd previously wrote off as being overpriced, and unneccesary).
A year later, my ipod's with me daily, and serves up more than just music, via the amazing Pod2Go software. The only regret I have is not taking the plunge earlier than I did!
I went from hours and hours of tweaking, and modding my systems to behave in a somewhat intelligent manner, to just having a computer work the way I want it to. Someone in a different thread once put it best: "If I want to tweak and play, I can do so, but when I need to knuckle down and do real work, it just works, no tweaking needed". I couldn't have said it better myself.
I have 3 machines that I use, a PC with WIN XP, a PC with LINUX SUSE 9.1, and a laptop running FC3. And will be adding a MACmini. I've been a MAC user since day 1 back in 1984. Just gave my Imac to my brother in anticipation of getting a Mac mini.
So why can't you have all 3. or am I a heritic????
__________ Leave me alone I'm compiling a RPG II program on my S/36...Thanks to metamucil I'm a Regular Meta Moderator
OK. So where can I get the source code for aqua so I can compile it for x86, smart ass.
Vote for Pedro
Just getting people into an Apple store, be it to see an iPod or not, is often enough to make them want to switch. When I wanted to see the iPod Shuffle and Mac mini, I took my wife with me to the Apple store and she fell in love with OS X while we were there. She doesn't want a computer for gaming; she only needs web browsing, email, text-editing, iPod management, and basic digital photo editing abilities. Currently, she's doing this on a WinME desktop and WinXP laptop (she had them both before we got married, don't blame me). After about 10 minutes exploring OS X while I waited to play with the only iPod Shuffle in the store, she decided that our next computer will be a Mac. She'll get no protest from me; I love using my linux boxes and will keep using it but certainly won't mind adding a Mac to my collection.
I was a happy iPod owner for around a year.
I got a Mac Mini last week, and from my experiences so far - I'll never go back to Windows on my personal computer.
I've been thinking of getting myself a mac for ages, but after the mini came to the market it's a bit easier for me to do the switch due to it's low cost. Never had or have any plans of buying an ipod, but i think the ipod has put apple on the map for the average joe.
Bits of News Giving you the latest bits.
Bought an iPod July 2003. Bought an iMac February 2004. Bought two more iPods. Buying a Powerbook any week now.
So yes, it works.
--- witty signature
I had the opposite experience today. I installed an ADSL moden + router + two wireless cards in two Dells. After two hours it STILL wouldn't work as planned with WPA. I felt like I was a being from space, trying to use 30th centtury tools and know-how to fix mud huts on the Congo river in the year 890 AD.
The complexity of windows is baffeling. I was amazed that something that works so easely on Mac could be so incredibly complicated on another platform. The nearest thing I had to WiFi network problems befor was my GFs iBook that had to enter a WPA-PSK password on every boot, but it was solved after some consulting on the Apple site forum.
I sweated, wept and toiled and yet I had to leave the installation half finished because I only had two hours available. Depressed and alone i reached out to grab the Old Friend that never disappoints, Jack Daniels. Suddenly, a light came on in the corner. It was my alu PowerBook, that woke up upon registering that my Bluetooth cellphone was nearby. As it changed the "away" message in Aduim to At home and available, and automatically synced the phone with adressbook, I realized. I don't need booze to drown my Windows memories. I only need the comforting white light of an Apple.
Ok, so it wasn't that bad. But the installation didn't work as planned and I have to go back tomoroow and that sucks.
I agree with the "consoles are for games" sentiment a lot of the time, but any game with an FPS interface will, all else being equal, be vastly better on a pc due to control issues.
I remember when the quake3 online console version came out (dreamcast?) and someone found a way to let pc players connect to DC servers. It was fun for about 15 minutes, winning a map at like 93-4 or whatever, but watching those people struggle while you ran circles around them just made it that much clearer that you need a kb and mouse.
First, if a game is decent, chances are, it exists for the Mac. Nearly all major games (Warcraft (I-WoW), Call to Duty, NWN, SW KotOR, Sims, etc.) have Mac versions that equal their Windows counterparts (not emulation). Second, who is running away from Linux because of the lack of games?
In all fairness to people buying these computers, it is about user experience. If the Macintosh delivers a better user experience, people will switch. The halo effect of the iPod is to show people what a well-designed machine feels like. Since (IMHO) the Macintosh has a much better experience, along with all of the accoutrements of a *nix under the hood, I had very little heartburn over switching.
Incidentally, the main use of my Mac is collision modelling in FORTRAN. Thank goodness for gfortran. The POSIX-compliant version is much more stable than its Windows counterpart and neither it nor g95 require MinGW on Darwin (obviously).
Finally, Darwin has the ability to compile the *nix OSS that we have all come to love. I keep a recent build of Apple's X11 on my machine and have yet to run into a tgz that didn't compile cleanly or with minimum tweaking. For those who love their OSS but don't like to work their own code, there are a couple decent package managers for the Mac as well (i-Installer, Fink, etc).
I won't believe it until I hear it from Netcraft.
I'm not good in groups. It's difficult to work in a group when you're omnipotent. - Q
The word proprietary gets thrown around a lot in these conversations.
My problem, and one that I know others have experienced is this. I'm a PC user, and if my system needs XYZ functionality, I can get a (Sound|RAID|USB 4.0) card or a (RedRAY|Hard|Soft) drive.
Unless I am buying the big fancy dual processor G5, I don't get this expandability. PC users have become accustomed to this. This is one area that Apple could improve upon.
Just my 2 cents.
v4sw6PU$hw6ln6pr4F$ck 4/6$ma3+6u7LNS$w2m4l7U$i2e4+7en6a2X h
As for the price difference, the laptops are very competitively priced FOR THE QUALITY OF WHAT YOU GET. Sure, there is no cheap piece-of-crap-but-it-works Apple laptop equivalent to the Office Depot Compaq special you read about in slickdeals, but we're talking internal slot-loading dvd/cdrw or dvd burners in a 12" laptop. Find me a reasonably priced Dell or Sony with those specs. And there's no comment on the Mac mini, its price competition is obvious enough.
All that said, it's all about OS X for me. I think OS X is the best desktop OS ever. I'm on my first Mac (an original 12" powerbook), I've had it for over two years, reloaded it once, and this is by far the most reliable and most consistent operating environment I've ever used.
I always get my stock advice from Anonymous Cowards on Slashdot.
I got an iMac G5 20" last month and I am absolutely loving it. I do my coding at work, I want to turn on my computer, surf, do a little photo and music work at home. The iMac is great for that. And my wife hated our pc, she loves the mac. I used linux for a while but I got tired of having to spend hours recompiling software for smoother fonts etc. I'm getting old and tired of hacking at my computer, I want to turn it on, compute and thats it. If I want to game, I have my PS2. I loved the iMac and iTunes so much I just got an iPod shuffle. Great, simple piece of equipment. The wife wants one too. I guess the word is simplicity, with power still available. I'm not going back...
The mac mini is obsolete.
Your point of view is obsolete.
"can I run my tax software on it?" YES. "Can I run my office applications?" YES. "Can play a few commercial video games?" Depends on which ones specifically but the name games YES. "Will I be able to VPN to the office and back again?" Will your IT department actually support more than one VPN software if so then YES.
So far I haven't found a reason to use a Windows box in 10 years. I'm a geek but I'm not a tech head. I run M$ Office and I like it better than the Windows version.
The whole reason for a computer for me was a hobby and I'm interested in always having to upgrade the hardware whenever a new version of the OS comes out. Which is why I stopped working with Windows 10 years ago. I have yet to ever find a reason to want to. If I want to write a program I can - I have don't have to buy anything for my computer. With windows have you seen how much it costs to buy VB - and that's just Basic Programming.
Save Pangaea!! Stop Continental Drift!!
All this suggests the question ... how many iPod-touting Slashdotters are thinking of switching?
Switching? Slashdotters don't switch hardware. We aggregate and incorporate. Why would I ever dispose of anything that could generate a couple more SETI@home points per month, while also filling in as my firewall, e-mail, and/or MAME and streaming media server? And that's just my 8088! You hipsters with your disposable hardware. Makes me sick.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Darwin maintains BSD compatibility but impliments a number of different approachs to core systems. For instance, the driver subsystem in Darwin is IOKit, an object-oriented system that allows for dynamic loading and unloading of device drivers (indeed, whole classes of drivers). BSD currently lacks this ability. Try coding a new driver for BSD and you will find yourself re-coding whole sections of pre-existant code that must then be loaded into the kernel side-by-side, increasing memory usage unnecessarily.
Consider as well that Darwin is not a pure microkernel system. A number of subsystems are loaded into Mach, which allows for faster communication between the components.
I would not claim that one system is arbitrarily better than the other but to claim that they are the same is pure garbage. You appear to just be quoting some equally uninformed /. poster.
I bought at 18 before the two stock splits... Apple payed for a nice chunk of college :)
My broker advised against it, but I figured someone was going to buy Apple or Steve Jobs was going to make it profitable again. A company ain't going to drop off the face of the earth if it has tons of valuable intellectual property and a fanatic evangelistic install base.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
Can you point to any important research publications by Apple researchers in the last few years? I haven't seen any.
.4, .5...
Yes: It's called OSX 10.3,
The simple fact is that Apple R&D seems to be going into helping users. For instance, coming out in Tiger we actually have what WinFS was trying to accomplish in Spotlight. Not just the searching abilities, but also the searching API that developers could hook document creation into which was so important to WinFS.
So look at the Tiger design docs and say Apple has no R&D publications. They just happen to be practical and technically oriented. After all, a company the size of Apple can't afford to throw billions a year into a hole with nothing real to show from it like you have with MS.
As I've said before, Microsoft R&D is just a way to make sure there are a lot of smart people not producing things for other companies. It's basically a cushy prision for people Microsoft fears being in the wrong hands.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Well, every mac made since they got rid of the DIN-9 style serial ports has had at least one USB port. USB stands for Universal Serial Bus. It's a serial port!
If you need to interface with legacy serial ports using something like RS-232 with DB9 connectors, you can pick up a cheap Keyspan adapter. I use one of these things *all the time* with my Powerbook to console into routers, switches, and servers. Works like a charm!
Sure, call it legacy, if you want. But when I run a retail business, and my receipt printers are all parallel port, and my credit card swipes and UPC scanners are all PS/2 port, I wouldn't exactly call them "legacy", except in the strictly technical sense of the word. Most small businesses can't afford to throw out perfectly good hardware just because something prettier came down the pike. All of my "legacy" equipment will be used until it fails (including my PC's), and not a second earlier, unless there is a massive gain in productivity to offset the price and headache of new equipment.
I don't respond to AC's.
I don't push paper but i'm in a decently big company.
I've been in smaller companies and really cant think of why you'd need serial or parallel ports.
- Printing is all either ethernet or usb.
- Scanning is usually usb.
- PIM synchronization is usually usb or bluetooth.
Nowadays i only see serial and parallel ports used for things like
- interfacing with lab/cam equipment
- programming door security systems and standalone card-readers
- interfacing with hardware products that are in the process of being developed
Excluding people who do this kind of technical work, who really needs parallel or serial ports?!
I purchased my first iPod about a year and a half ago. After the terrible experience of MusicMatch & the iPod on Windows, I longed for the Mac iPod experience. I also lusted after OS X and the Dock - which works the way I like my computer to work.
A few months later, my web-surfing laptop died on me. In looking for a new laptop, the iBooks definitely stood out to me, and I went for it. Safari is good, Firefox works well, and most other things that I really wanted on my web laptop were available.
It's worked out for me. I've even replaced my desktop with a 20" iMac G5, and I don't miss my noisy, tons-of-compatibility-problems PC.
Now that I have a Mac Mini my AMD 2800 at 2gz and a gig of ram just sits, turned off except for an occasional game.
My Mini is 1.25 gz and 512 megs ram, Superdrive and external USB 160 gig hard drive.
I'm happy. iBook is next. Gave my Thinkpad to my daughter.
I like the look of OSX. No, I LOVE the look. Everything is so refreshingly appealing to the eye. I like the built-in capability of 128px icons. I like the dock. However, I can get icon sets and other nice, colorful, appeasing items for XP Prof. Hell, I can get OSX imitation themes for it.
I work with a bunch of designers (I'm a devloper), and I am on a Mac probably 2 times a week for a few hours. I don't feel overwhelmed enough by OSX to actually switch to Apple. I use an XP Prof. machine, and I NEVER have any problems with it. It has failed on me maybe 1 time in the past 6 months. Maybe. My coworker has a Mac, and it freezes on him probably 2 times a week. Freezes in a manner than doesn't allow him to do anything besides restart. I just sorta laugh to myself, and continue working.
Maybe I'll switch in the future, but I just couldn't bring myself to spend 2500 on a 15" Powerbook when the only thing that I admire about OSX is the "prettiness". I spent 1700 on a HP zt3000, and got pretty much all of the same features for, oh, about 800 less.
Just my 2 cents. I really don't have anything against Apple, and I'm glad that they're taking market share from Microsoft. But when I have a perfectly good AND CLEAN XP OS, I can't bring myself to fork over the extra "style" money required to use an Apple.
I've been using Athlons for me and all the people I've been building custom Linux PCs for. I remeber a few years ago when AMD had one socket and Intel had 7. That was a major reason to use AMD.
Now AMD has something like 3 (or more) adding up to 9 or 10 different PC CPU sockets. Add in the bazillion variants of RAM clockings, HDD (SATA, EIDE (3 different speeds), SCSI (god know how many different types, etc.) conection standards etc. and even for a hardwarefreak like me things are getting very confusing.
I don't have the time for this anymore. And since configuring a PC with good hardware and a good OS (Linux) takes lots of time, in the end a Mac is cheaper. Much cheaper.
Linux will be the future workhorse OS, OS X will be the appliance OS.
Apple has gotten things just right for quite some time now, they deserve the market share they are just gaining.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
If you're interested in purchasing a Mac, I suggest you look at Apple's web site... there is a lot of information there on the PowerPC G5 (the CPU), the Power Mac G5 (the whole computer), Mac OS X, development, etc.
I don't know if a third party monitor will work with an Apple-approved video card; this is probably something to ask your local Apple dealer. The Apple web site does describe the ATI and nvidia video card options for each model of G5, and the prices for them. As for software, if you look in the "Store" you'll find a tab that lists various software available for purchase directly from Apple, including games. I believe WoW is available, along with Doom 3. Finally, Apple includes Xcode as an optional install with OS X. This is Apple's IDE for C, C++, Objective-C, Objective-C++, and Java development. These languages can target the Cocoa, Carbon, and Java frameworks. And, of course, you'll have gcc and the various Unix APIs available to you.
9/10 of most machines you'll find in modern factories these days are run by old PC's with serial/parallel connections. Most retail setups need serial/parallel in some way. Tons and tons and tons of businesses have hardware that a Mac wouldn't even begin to know what to do with. Again, you're assuming that everybody works in an office with shiny new computers, PIMs, scanners, card readers, etc., etc.. Most of the world doesn't. Imagine a factory. Imagine a grocery store. Imagine a warehouse. Imagine a gas station......
I don't respond to AC's.
Apple dies and then Linux takes desktop share away from a slowly dying Windows...
What happened? Everything was going to plan two years ago?
Damn you iPod! Damn you and your white plastic earbuds!
Every mac user should submit a bug into the apple bug tracking system that says something like "the finder still sucks". They should do this once a quarter till apple gets the message.
evil is as evil does
"
Well I don't own an iPod, however almost 1 year ago I purchased a Powerbook over a new IBM or Dell laptop. You know why? The local retailer near me who I purchase my laptops from just got an Apple section infront of the IBM section so I decided to have a look, I tried to be a smartarse and quiz him about how I would buy one but program a, b and x were not on a Mac that I needed.
None the less, I walked out with a Powerbook and the exact software that I needed, hell, I even walked out with Office for Mac.
One year later, I now have 2 Powerbooks (1 for work and personal) and 2 Mac Desktops - I love them, and I am even going as far as trying to fix a PowerMac into a normal desktop case as to look like a normal IBM computer - why? Our business sells and repairs IBM computers and it would look a little silly trying to sell IBM type PC's when the computer I am using myself is an Apple.
I have not walked into the store since I will know I will walk out with an iPod.
As soon as the Mini came out, I predicted Apple could go as high as 10-15% by Summer 2006. To everyone who asks my advice on what kind of new computer to get, I recommend a Mini so they can avoid spyware. To everyone who has a PC and is sick of spyware, I recommend a Mini. (My mom wanted to replace her aging PII/266 but she didn't listen to me--she got an iMac instead.)
Now that spyware is such a huge honking problem and people are buying new PCs just to get away from it, I imagine it'll drive a bunch of people to switch. Honestly, if it weren't for spyware, I'd still go either way. All else being equal, PCs are still cheaper for low-end use. But with spyware being as bad as it is, I think Apple can really make a dent.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
Well,
if the idea of having a computer for you is to tweak it and play with it then a Mac isn't for you. If you just want it to "work" and don't have to worry about, then I really suggest you get one.
If you want to e-mail me, use my PGP Key.
Ya, I've been down this path. iPod Jul 2003, PowerBook Jul 2004.
I used to build PC's and it was fun and you'd get more bang for the buck, but I got ever sick of dealing with flaky drivers and Windows problems. But until the Mac Mini there wasn't an affordable Mac for most people.
I do almost all work and personal stuff on the Mac now. Only time I tend to go back to WinXP is for Visio (which doesn't seem to quite work right under VirtualPC). I'm hopeful that one-day Visio will be produced for the Mac.
Fedora Core is also used, but primarily as a server platform in my small business.
We've got a number of Toshiba WinXP laptops and all of my users have trouble every single day with Windows Wireless networking. They have to repair their connections 2-3 times a day. My PowerBook has no troubles at all with connections. Hibernation of laptops is another - try going a week with hibernating Windows - it becomes so flakey. Now the PowerBook only gets a reboot when an OS update needs it. Otherwise hibernation just works - currently at 24 days with hibernation only - no reboots! All off my work colleagues reboot their WinXP laptop daily.
I have been providing tech support for family and friends in the past, but now with the Mac Mini I'm going to provide them with a subtle and a not-so-subtle hint - "Check out the Mac Mini!" and I'm no longer providing support for Windows.
The Mac operating system and application platform is great. iLife (haven't touched Garageband) is a really great suite of software and the integration works really well. I'm going to be suggesting to family that they should switch just because of the improvements they will have in being able to manage their digital photos etc. And having it all on *nix underpinning is nice - its great for me being able to crank open terminal.
I had an Apple ][ many years ago - ah Castle Wolfenstein ;) but hardly touched pre-OSX because it was and still is crap. I did get a dual-CPU Mac once but promptly installed BeOS instead.
Sure, call it legacy, if you want. But when I run a retail business, and my receipt printers are all parallel port, and my credit card swipes and UPC scanners are all PS/2 port
All of which are available in USB. I can understand not wanting to replace functioning equipment, but saying a PC isn't suitable because it doesn't support your legacy equipment is ridiculous. Having said that, the Mini isn't a great solution for POS anyway.
BTW, you might want to check and make sure your 'UPC scanners' can support the new 'UPC' codes. Jan 1 2005 was the Sunrise date for UCC-12 (UPC), so you need to have support for EAN-8 and EAN-13.
It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit. -- Harry Truman
I got a mini to start using OSX and to have a portable media server. I was originally going to buy a windows notebook for that purpose, but I decided on the mini because it just looked too intriguing.
However, I also upgraded my desktop system the same week, it's now an overclocked Athlon64 system with an SLI motherboard and a GF6800 (only one for now). It runs windows XP. So I certainly didn't "switch" to the mac.
I use the Athlon box for games, and as a digital audio workstation. But now with the mini I only turn on that box when I'm doing games or DAW work... everything else, the day to day stuff, I use the mac for because it's just a refreshing change and OSX is a lot more pleasant to use.
Could I have a mac as my only system? Sure, if somebody GAVE me a dual G5 perhaps. I'm not sure which one is my "main" computer now, because I use the mac most of the time, but I use the Athlon rig for the really heavy duty stuff.
After using OSX for a while, I'm starting to think that my 3rd computer would be a mac too. Funny how that works. I've read that the mac mini is the gateway drug...
-CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
I don't know if a third party monitor will work with an Apple-approved video card
It will. Any VGA or DVI monitor will work fine.
The Apple web site does describe the ATI and nvidia video card options for each model of G5, and the prices for them.
Also ATI sells Mac 9800 and X800XT cards as upgrades.
How to solve most of our problems: 1.Lots of nuclear plants. 2.Cure aging.
don't know if a third party monitor will work with an Apple-approved video card; this is probably something to ask your local Apple dealer.
If said 3rd party monitor has a standard VGA or DVI connector then it will work. This is just another one of many misconceptions about apple products. Same goes for any keyboard and mouse. Plug it in and it will work *Disclaimer: If you have some mutil-button/multi-function keyboard or mouse their may not be a driver that will work with apple.
But any Standard monitor/keyboard/mouse will work.
Rather than sell at a certain price I've decided to sell when Newsweek runs a cover article about the "Unstopple Apple Juggernaut" or something like that. I figure when Newsweek clues in the party is about over.
Actually, I was trying to be Insightful, not Funny.
Apple has this wonderful mode you can use your mac in called FireWire target disk mode. Simply start up the machine while holding down the T key and your mac's internal hard drive(s) become firewire disks. Essentially your mac becomes a very expensive firewire enclosure. Has saved me much time backing up, makes me love my Powerbook like the child I'll never have :)
Rule of the open mind
People who are resistant to change cannot resist change for the worst.
I bought my mum an iBook recently. I've always been a fan of the Mac to a certain degree. Never owned one though. I'll be getting a Mac Mini in the not too distant future (after Tiger is released probably) to use as a media center. And yes I do own an iPod.
I'll still do all my work on my Linux laptop though.
-- Oliver Jones - Deeper Design Limited
get real. MacOS X needs 512MB minimum if you plan on running anything other than your desktop. Your disk will be swapping significantly with anything under 512MB in os X by default, even with just browsing the web and using iTunes...
Dont spread lies to newbies. While YOU may think 256MB is good enough for most users, you should let people who actually know what they are talking about and deal with everyday problems of users to give advice to new users who are looking to buy a new computer system. I deal with hundreds of mac users on a weekly basis. I *KNOW* that 512MB is the minimum that 90% of those users need. And they aren't doing _ANYTHING_ special with them.
(To the parent. Don't buy the special configured mac's... they are non-returnable if there is a problem with them. Instead install it yourself or buy the default bundle from a store and have them install it for you.)
Your ignorance is infinitely greater than you realize.
I bought a 15" powerbook. With after market addition of a 1GB DIMM raising the price to $2100,
I just bought a 15" x86-based laptop for under $1500 (80G, 1G, SuperDrive, 1280x800), and I was already paying a premium for a nice-looking design.
it does everything a $2500 windows machine does with much less worries regarding a virus,
I don't worry about viruses either--I run Linux on it.
That's funny, I absolutely loved Giants, and I was playing it on my old G4/733 a few years ago just fine ;) It was actually one of the very first OS X-only games.
I'm thinking of doing that in the future. But I'm not planning to swith to OS X.
About a week ago I got my Mac Mini (my first Mac!). And for the last week I have been using it as my primary desktop (I even unplugged my main machine, so I would me more or less forced to use and learn OS X). During that week I have made the following observations:
- I absolutely love the hardware! The Mini is sexy, cool and quiet. No cheap-looking plastic or abundance of LED's. Just toned-down coolness.
- OS X looks very good. It has lots of eye-candy and chrome.
- iLife-apps are very good.
- Stability of the system is good
- Installation of apps is very easy!
- I still like my Linux/KDE-combo more
Yes, I can see why some people think OS X is the greatest thing out there. The OS is very good and it looks gorgerous. But in the end, I noticed that I still missed using KDE. While OS X was good, it simply didn't do it for me.
I can see myself buying a PowerMac sometime in the future, and I can see myself running Linux on it (Well, I would propably use Mac-On-Linux as well).
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
I'm a paying Apple Associate. Beta tested OS X. So, of course anything I say is suspect.
Yes, Virginia you CAN get by with 256 Meg. Yes, you will have swapping. No, unless you are a power user, you will not notice.
I was under the impression my dear sweet wife had 512 Meg until one day I was updating her machine, got bored, and looked. I was horrified and amazed at the same time. She had been using the machine for close to two years, ripping with iTunes, etc. etc.
I still got her a gig (hey, it's cheap).
My advice, based on years of use of the OS X is to get 512Meg. It will help, but it is no panacea.
The big lie here is that you need gobs of RAM. That is not true. You can get by with the minimum. 512 is only the minimum if you are a geek.
IANAL, but I've seen actors play them on TV