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'Perfect Storm' of Mac Sales on the Horizon?
fkx writes to mention an eWeek article suggesting that, finally, the PC-using public is going to 'get' the Mac. According to the article, the new advertising, increased functionality of OSX, and Intel-based machines are all raising the profile of Apple's machines to new heights. From the article: "However, this cycle isn't your usual processor upgrade cycle that comes every time Intel or Advanced Micro Devices tweaks a process. This is a major shift that affects all parts of the Mac customer-developer-vendor ecology. Longtime Apple watchers can count two earlier events of similar magnitude. The first such transition occurred in March 1994 with the arrival of the PowerPC architecture. The Motorola 680x0 architecture that had served the Mac platform for a decade was quickly supplanted by a set of new, more powerful machines. "
I'm waiting with baited breath for the release of the Intel PowerMac. I've never, ever, ever owned a Mac in any form. I've got a ton of Windows workstations and Linux servers, but never a Mac. This will change in August. I'm tired of ridiculous Windows behaviors (disk defrag inadvertantly deletes required system DLLs...nice), and ready for new ridiculous Mac behaviors, knowing I'm not giving dollars direct to Microsoft ever again.
RW
At least in my college-age demographic it is. I'm seeing a HUGE desertion of PC's in favor of the MacBooks (the MBPs are a little bit out of the range of the average college student). It's going to be a good year for Apple.
Well count me in. After a few years of wavering I'm buying a MacBook. Apple has dealt with almost all my objections and done enough to get my money.
Sig is on vacation
basically getting a mac now means being able to do all the stuff you've always done on your pc - plus all the stuff a mac can do. in the past there was always what you were 'giving up' - now that's gone. it is now the windows machine that runs less software.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Isn't everyone tired of the phrase "perfect storm" yet? Why do people keep using it?
... if only because that's how long it takes them to graduate and get lives.
Seriously, though, College is where the main 'adoption' of new systems takes place, so it makes sense that colleges would get it first. Mac and Linux are used there much more than in the 'mainstream' world.
Sorry to rain on anyone's parade, but Apple has always been more monopolizing and litigous, if not as predatory and successful businesswise, as Microsoft.
... 4 ... 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...
Exactly--what the Mac fanbois don't want to admit to themselves much less anyone else is that Apple is just like Microsoft, only not nearly as successful at it.
Stand by for Apple apologist fanboi negative moderation in 5
I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
bow to our new ov;lkj aw forget it.
Apple does seem to be getting 'up in our faces' alot more lately. Their new tv ads are a huge slap in the face to Microsoft, and may actually be the thing to get people wondering. Their only downfall is their prices, you see a Macbook, who's behind it, some clean cut suited up fellow sipping latte at starbucks.
Check out the cave on the east side of lake Hylia. Strange and wonderful things live in it.
Windows now has about 95% of the desktop market. Nobody is suggesting that will drop to 5% overnight.
Yes, the vast majority, of windows users will stay with windows, no question. But there is always that segment of the market which will be shopping for a new PC soon, and may consider a Mac.
How large could that segment be? 5% would be huge. If Apple could get another 2% - 3% of upcoming PC sale, Apple's sales would double. Clearly that is very significant.
At least not with the current pricing.
MacIntels are horribly overpriced*. I mean I appreciate OSX and stuff, but every single Mac is overpriced by at least 20-30% compared to similar pile of MSRP PC hardware. More if you hunt for discounts and/or use white box systems as comparison. Mac Mini is the only system that is anywhere close to sane price considering the contents of the box, and it's bit too entry level for my use. Every other model so far is priced silly. I keep looking at those shiny things, but every time I take the price, and look up what I could buy for that on the Windows side, the result is not pretty for the Mac - even if I do price in some software to match the pile Macs come with.
20-30% pricecut across the line and I might belive that they can dent the Windows PC marketshare.
I mean MacBook Pros are 'competing' in price/features with Thinkpads, and those are one of the most expensive PC laptops. Yet MacBooks seem to be built to similar quality as low end crap laptops you can get considerably cheaper (Acer, HP etc massmarket low end crap pushers).
They either have to come down in price, or start putting out stuff that has the quality that the pricetag implies. This means dumping bottom-of-the-barrel taiwanese contract builders, and not skimping on parts costs at the expense of quality. Plus better warranty terms. Similarily priced Thinkpads come with 3 year warranty out of the box. Macs come with 90 day phone support and 1 year warranty. For a 2.5keuro+ laptop. Getting that 3 years is over 300 euros extra for AppleCare plan...
Shiny, average-quality manufacturing, overpriced. Nice OS and application bundle tho.
*I'm comparing prices in europe. If US prices are bit more sane, more power to you. Doesn't change my opinion.
The reason I have not bought a Mac is the same reason I have not ever bought a whole system: I don't want to plunk down over a grand for a new computer. For the last two decades I've always upgraded my machine by piece-mail. A new case, a new HD, a new mobo, a new video card.... So at every purchases it's only been a few hundred at most.
My old laptop is aging and I want something new. The Macbooks look good, feel good, seem to be so much more secure, and, in general, have only one drawback which is price. That's a one-time thing and I'm at the point where I'm ready to suck it up and spend it. This after twenty years of PC use. I can't be the only one drooling over these things.
More than that, the next iteration of OSX promises to be more efficient while Vista is likely to be far less effecient, need way more resources, and still suffer the same fates as my previous Windows machines.
Beyond all that, have you seen the Mac stuff? It's so cool looking!
Yeah, I'm as old as my UID would suggest.
Linux adoption numbers by ordinary joe-users will increase because of this phenomenon. Two factors:
1. Money. More than any other platform, on the Mac, money makes the world go 'round. People will switch from the Windows PC, realize that they have to pay for constant upgrades and all the latest n' greatest doodads. Macs are marketed as a fashion statement. How do you feel when you are wearing unfashionable clothes? Your Mac friends start saying, "hey, I got the model up from that one, when are you going to be cool like me?" But when you start spending tons of money for everything, you tend to really think about your priorities: "Do I need to be completely pampered, or will a basic system that works do it for me?" To say nothing of the *advantages* there might be to switching to Linux.
2. Already switched once, not going back. With the momentum gained by switching platforms, people are less likely to fear another switch, and the chances they'll go back to the Windows PC (oh darn, where'd my spyware go?) are very slim.
I'm excited to see what the hordes of new users we see in the Linux world will do for the overall "Linux experience." The rising tide, I think, will raise all the little penguin boats.
In the article author writes mostly about "content creating customers" on Mac, which, true enough, can eat up as much CPU as available. Those users will easily buy new two dual-core CPU pro version of Mac -- they don't pay for it themselves, or write it off as business expense. Other users (Computer Klutz kind) don't care about speed and paying premium for Apple Pixie Dust, that gets sprinkled on top of new stuff. They swallowed transition from the "superior platform" to something that was boo-booed by them for years, because it got magic sauce of apple logo on it. They run old applications on old machine because it's "good enough" (and it's true, word processing on G3 is fast enough). And they won't upgrade until their old computer dies or they suddenly get a thousand bucks gift from Santa they can throw at new machine. Question is what is the ratio of klutzes to pros. All pros will upgrade to new platform when applications are there. Will all klutzes upgrade? I doubt it.
Magical Torrent of Upgrades in this case is solely rests on new Intel platform's shoulders, that should invite "switchers" (I keep seeing ads for Mac with big "NOW RUNS WINDOWS!" stickers on top), which makes me think it won't be a "torrent", it will be a stream. And Vista and Mac OS X mean very little for this stream
Hyperom.com
I think you're wrong. If Sprint is buying 10,000 computers for a new office, then yes they'll go for the beige box. But if, ahem, "Joe Average" is buying a computer for his house then he's going to get the "coolest" one he can afford. Or that he can't afford, and will charge it. He may not appreciate the possibilities as much as a Slashdot Linux geek but don't tell me computers are an afterthough to the general public. It's at least as important (and heavily used) item as a TV or stereo... Really, you completely underestimate the importance of computers to, well, just about everyone. The days of computers being of ineterest only to the elite few have long passed-- and just about every house with a child over six has an expert who cares which brand they use.
In fact, a case could be made that you're wrong simply for the fact that you cannot buy an actual beige box any more, at least not from a major manufacturer. Even the cheapest Dell, Compaq or eMachine is in a designed case.
The unfortunate truth is that many people don't have the guts to try a Mac. Yes, that's really where it comes from.
:) But I've never been in a position where I was using Windows regularly, so a "PC user" should tell us what this switch is really like. But I think it takes guts.
Microsoft should be punished for its shoddy products and its business practices. But suppose you believe that, what is the price of your moral fiber? Well, you sure can't play a lot of PC games. And hell, you can't even view certain web sites! Chances are there are clueless I.T. staff at your workplace who have either managed to standardize on software that runs only on Windows, or they only "officially support" the PC and give you a download link to the crappiest Mac software you've ever seen. The list goes on.
It's tough to change. Just as most people won't stand up for their beliefs when it can get them fired, or choose more convenient products instead of being steadfast environmentalists, etc., the average shmuck will not throw Windows away.
I am a Mac user. I'm not an environmentalist.
"Microsoft killed my company, I hold a personal grudge. I don't use Microsoft products and neither should you."-JWZ
MSFT is strongly pushing DRM for video content whereas Apple so far has been silent on the matter. I do not foresee Apple making a sharp about face and forcing HDMI down our throats at this stage in the game. If you value your freedom of fair use, I would suggest looking at Apple.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
Hi, my name is Brent, and I've got a problem.
Oh, wait, wrong meeting.
I made the switch a couple of weeks ago, but the interesting thing I'm noticing is that the tech community, the network admins and programmers, are going to be the last ones to make the switch, and that's why it's going to catch us geeks off-guard.
In my day job, I'm a SQL Server administrator. I rely on MS tools to get my job done, and I can't do my job on OSX - or at least, I couldn't until Parallels came along. Boot Camp is a nice idea, but since I have to have SQL Server Management Studio running all day, dual-booting would mean I'd have a shiny laptop running Windows. Big flippin' deal.
Most of the guys around me said, "Why make the 'switch' when all you're doing is running Windows AND Mac OSX all the time? How can that possibly save you time or energy?" Well, it doesn't - it involves more work - but I'm having a great time doing it. As I write this, my keyboard is glowing. That's coolness.
All of us network admins and infrastructure managers rely on more Windows-centric tools than we'd like, more stuff tying us down to Windows longer than our end users. The end users seem to use more generic applications like Office, and they're able to make the switch even faster than the supposedly high-tech guys.
Normally, when a Big New Thing comes out, the geeks are the first one to make the jump. Apple's making it so easy to make the switch that the push is coming up from the end users. Attention, Windows network admins: there are probably people right now in your organization thinking about making their next computer an Apple. Be prepared when they start asking support questions like, "Which of our applications don't run on a Mac, and why?"
What's your damage, Heather?
Hell yeah! I've been using FreeBSD as both a desktop OS and a server OS for years. Converted over from Linux and never looked back. Switched to XFCE a while back because of various issues (kde wasn't responsive enough on the hardware, and I've never liked gnome). Picked up a new machine about a year ago, and KDE + FreeBSD since then. So, I gotta say I agree - KDE on FreeBSD is the bestest game around!
--
I work with Windows and Linux systems at work. When I come home, I do my computing on a Mac. I think Applie finally has a winning combo with OS X, an Intel-based platform that will also boot Windows, and peoples' change in computing habits. Some of the things Apple got right in OS X that they haven't done so well on in the past are going to help the transition. First, you've got the interoperability thing, which keeps getting better as versions of OS X increase. You have a powerful OS underneath a bulletproof wall of GUI eye candy. If you want the command prompt and unix-like functionality, it's there. Otherwise, you don't have to see it.
One other thing Apple seems to be doing is reducing the importance of a structured filesystem. If you open iPhoto, you see a set of photos, not a list of filenames. Same with iTunes. Something that I think computer people forget is that "normals" don't care about computers. Business users want to do their jobs and leave. Home users want to fill their iPods, and send pictures of the kids to Grandma. Making it so users don't have to remember how to navigate through a folder structure or other "computer stuff" really makes it easier to use.
I don't know what will make it into the final version of Vista, but I'm sure they're going to take a stab at this too. Now all Apple has to work on is convincing people that the Mac is worth the premium price they get for it. That seems to be the #1 argument I hear about why someone would choose a Windows box over a Mac.
for most of the geeks :-) Before being bashed by FOSS gurus, let me show my example.
:-) (just remember that IBM and BEA's VM's performs better than Sun's)
...), and it can become a pain to get things working. On Linux, things are far better than Windows. You have almost the same tools, but its far easier to get things working: just apt-get / emerge / whatever and you are ready to go. In a Mac, just "port install" what you need, just like linux. The difference between Mac and Linux is in the tools. The same ones + a fantastic editor (and cheap for some, expensive for others). Ok, its not that smart to left an inexpensive OS to go to an "expensive" one just because of an editor. But trust me, it worth.
:-)
:-(
I'm a Java and Ruby (on rails) programmer. I've dropped windows about 2 years ago, and used various flavors of linux in this meantime (debian, ubuntu, gentoo and ubuntu again). Less than one year ago I bought my first mac (mac mini).
Java development in Windows is "standard", in linux is good and in Mac it is great. You have the same tools as Windows or Linux and, since java is "portable", all other tools (frameworks) works fine. The difference between Windows and Linux/Mac is that Windows restricts you *a lot*. Ex.: I put all my libs in just one place, and make sym links to them in the projects I need. In Windows, its not possible (afaik) (yes, a simple example, but try to keep the libs updated on a windows box...) . And the difference between Linux and Mac is performance. *Usually*, a Java application runs faster on Mac than on Linux, because the Java VM in Mac is done by Apple, meaning that its built by the ones who knows the OS. In Linux, as you certainly know, is a certain pain to install Java (you need to follow one or another howto to get things working), and the performance is *usually* worse than in a Mac, because the VM is done by Sun, which is concerned mainly in getting things working. Yes, they care about performance, but not that much
When programming with Ruby, Mac is really awesome. Again, Windows looses here. In Windows, you have a set of tools (editors/IDE's) that also exists in other platforms, but its performance is poor (afaik). Also, some Ruby libs requires some sort of compilation (mysql, rmagick,
Besides these work-related details, you also get an OS that just works, with enough applications to do what you usually do on a PC, a good terminal (I definitely cannot use the "cmd" anymore), a more than nice UI and so on... And for people who asks me "why use a mac", I just ask the same: "why use a Windows". There is no reason to use Windows. I can't find something that Windows does better than Mac (ok, I left an space here for some +5 Funny comments).
But yes, there *are* reasons to use Linux instead of Mac. Specially if you want "all the freedom you can get", if you don't want to spend a penny in software or simply don't care about the UI.
Of course, I talked about just the OS itself. The hardware *is* more expensive, specially here in Brazil (macs comes from US, which means they are taxed in *only* 100%). But if you think a bit better, it probably worth. In my case, I spend more than 10 hours/day looking at a computer, so, it certainly worth for me
And I'm sorry, this would be a single-line comment, but it simply grows
ilex paraguariensis for all
When a mac app is ever-so-slightly needlessly-different in its user-interface, the Mac community gets up in arms. The fact that you have Gnome *and* KDE in that sentence is indicative of competing (and hence different) styles.
The mac has a long and established history of well-behaved apps, inter-operating via the OS. Nothing else comes close to the level of standardisation for all the commonplace things (cut/paste, print, preferences, user-customisable toolbars, menu layout, window management, etc. etc. etc.) It's a far more stable (as in: unvarying) environment for apps to co-exist.
Hell, you can run the whole thing with a mouse with only one button.. Twice as easy as anything else [grin]
I think though, it comes down to the well-behaved nature of the apps/developers, and the level of thought that has gone into how to make apps useful - have you seen the *size* of the Apple human-interface guidelines book ?
Take the menubar being always at the top of the screen - not everyone likes that (personally it bugs me to have to traverse two wide-screen displays to get to the File menu), but it means it's "infinitely deep". You can slam the mouse as fast as you like to the top of the screen and it'll still hit the menubar on a mac. Now I've seen people do the same thing on a PC (video-editing app), but they made it 1-pixel-in (presumably the border for a full-screen window took 1 pixel or something). Now it's nowhere near as easy to use... There are a myriad of little things like that, where it's been thought about on the Mac, and the lesson doesn't seem to have been transferred to any of the competitors.
Or hell, I could be wrong.
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
I take stock in the article; I'm about to switch, yet many would peg me as an unlikely candidate.
;)
You see, I'm a contractor who specializes in Windows solutions. Microsoft technologies are my livelihood. Microsoft is all over my resume: MCAD certified, a member of BaltoMSDN, etc... I attended a few DevDays and even spent the money for a Universal MSDN subscription back in 2004. But tell me I'd be a PC guy 15 years ago, and I would have said you were crazy.
Not until late 1991 did I change my plan of tossing out my Apple ][e for a Macintosh and instead went with a 386dx-40. Maybe it was the stack of VGA games, or Deluxe Paint Animation's power, but after seeing a 386 run... I knew it was where I wanted to geek out. And I think that for awhile it was the right choice. But no longer...
Despite the programs and speed for my AMD64 it's still not as "cool" as the Mac's I use at my church every Sunday. I don't know how to quantify what this "cool" is, but I'm sure the fact the GUI paradigm is both simple & slick, and I can drop down into a Unix Shell feeds the geek in me. The fact Parallels exists for Mac is what has convinced the "IT consultant" within me (who needs Microsoft tools to pay the mortgage) that a not-too-painful transition path is possible.
Last year I bought a mini-mac for my TV. I love that machine.
After WWDC I plan to purchase a 17" Mac laptop pimped out with a lot of RAM and Parallels.
Hopefully in two years I can be adding insightful posts about being a Mac Developer using XCode.
Digital and MS-DOS use CR-LF, UNIX uses LF, and Apple, bless it's heart, uses CR.
DEC operating systems for the most part use variable-record files with one record per line and either a 1 or 2 byte count plus an optional carriage control word per record.
CP/M and MS-DOS used CR/LF, but that was kind of an accident caused by the fact that every program was implementing its own I/O.
Apple and OS/9 and most mainframes that didn't used record-oriented files used CR, because that matched how FORTRAN behaved.
UNIX uses LF, because that's what the ANSI standard specified, but that was an "obscure standard that nobody else picked". I think they did the right thing because it happens to be very useful for a number of other reasons... but if it wasn't for UNIX gaining popularity it'd have gotten nowhere.
I have been doing Mac consulting for over a decade, and at my current company for more than five years. Apple's resurgence is no BS-- it has built slowly since I took this job in 2001 at the dawn of the OS X era, but in the last year and a half I have been dramatically, ridiculously busier than before. Small and medium sized businesses are getting very interested in Macs these days, and plenty of them are doing more than just looking. The Intel switch has already done amazing things for Apple, particularly in the quarter just past. Also, Microsoft's serious ineptitude w/r/t getting Vista out the door has only helped Apple in the last couple of years-- people are sick of XP and all its problems, and have grown tired of waiting for the Next Big Thing out of Redmond.
What has begun is only going to pick up steam, as the article said, once the Intel CPUs come to the pro towers and Xserves at WWDC in a week and a half. Plenty of my clients are still on viable-but-aging G4s and are licking their chops in anticipation of upgrading to the latest and greatest. We may not see a real surge from them, though, until the next version of Adobe Creative Suite drops in early 2007.
It's a great time to be a Mac guy-- the demand for my skills is only going to keep growing, and unlike dime-a-dozen MCSEs, the relative scarcity of Apple Certified System Administrators (I'm currently one of only four in my entire state) should prove rather lucrative in the next few years.
For the last two decades I've always upgraded my machine by piece-mail. A new case, a new HD, a new mobo, a new video card.... So at every purchases it's only been a few hundred at most.
And how do you upgrade just the cpu/mobo without upgrading ram or the hd? I've got an old HP I'd like to upgrade but when I upgrade my cpu/mobo I'll hav to upgrade my ram and more than likely my hd as well as both the bus and the hd interface will be different. As my graphics card may not be compatible with a new mobo I may have to upgrade it as well. I don't see how over a preiod of more than several years you can upgrade a piece at a tyme.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Every desktop computer I've had since my old Tandy 1000 has been a custom-built clone, excepting my stint with an Amiga 500. I've done the piecemeal upgrade thing. Here's my take on it: it's not worth it unless you're really broke, and if you're doing it often, you're probably wasting your time on your tools instead of what you do with them. Hence, two out of my three laptops have been Macs, and I like them a great deal.
There's another thing. If you want a second machine to your desktop, a laptop doesn't need to be a screamer to be very useful, nor does it need to run the same operating system. In fact, having two different kinds of machines can be pretty darn cool. So, try some old iBook or something; that's my advice if you want to sample the world of OSX. As long as you have over 512MB, even an old 600MHz iBook G3 machine is plenty for the basic browsing and email.
1) To eject a CD-ROM, USB-key, or external storage, I drag it to the trash. That seems illogical to me.
/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app
/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app
That's illogical to me also considering you could just click the little eject button next to the item's name in a Finder window. To eject a CD, you could have hit the eject button on the keyboard if you had the correct hardware. You dragging icons to the trash indicates it's been years since you've been on a Mac before this experience.
2) To install a program, I "click-and-drag" it to my "hard drive". I had to google how to install something in OSX. Double-clicking the downloaded file yielded some puzzling prompt I can't recall.
You had to Google to find out how to drag an icon from point A to point B?
3) Driver management is a nightmare. Sure, it works great with Mac hardware, but who wants to be locked into one brand? Oh wait, Mac-happy fan-boys do.
echo 'it works great with Mac hardware'
4) OSX feels like an OS that is 50 feet thick. And by that I mean it feels like there's layer upon layer of abstraction, as if it were trying to protect me from seeing how a computer really works.
Knock yourself out:
5) OSX is not very business friendly. It doesn't fit business-logic.
You'll have to elaborate on this, because it makes no sense.
6) The bundled applications were inferior. Give me Outlook Express over Apples default mail application any day. That thing was an utter, illogical, painful experience to configure.
Now you're just...nevermind.
7) OSX is slow. Seriosuly, it's just not as snappy as winXP. Granted, I was running OSx86 on a Dell laptop, but I've used OSX on a mac before, and it really is a little laggy from all the superflorous garbage it distracts you with. "Ooooh, dancing icon. Thor like!"
Knock yourself out:
To anyone who is considering buying a Mac: Try using OSX first!
Your advice should read: Try learning OSX first!
In my honest opinion, I think Windows Vista will pave over OSX when it's released.
I wish this were the first line in your post.
This is my signature. soid st egr.hyTa rsiugm usnin Any questions?
Almost everything he had problems with were trying to not overcomplicate things. He wanted to installs stuff and I told him to drag it to the application folder. Wouldn't belive me. Where is the uninstall control panel??? You throw it away.
Two things:
a) Neither of those is a matter of one method being complicated and the other not.
and
b) One of your examples doesn't actually work exactly the way you're explaining it there.
Mac people spend a lot of time talking about how intuitive their machines are compared to PC's. Well, I use both at work, with the Mac being my primary by default because it has a better monitor (a 23" Cinema Display HD, vs. an old NEC CRT for my PC). But I curse that thing every single day because stuff just does not work the way I expect it to work, even after using it for going on two years now. The bottom line is Macs take getting used to just like PC's do. They just work differently, not better.
I mean really, is mounting a dmg file (which shows up as a drive on your Mac), then opening your application folder and dragging an icon into it really simpler than just double-clicking an executable to install it? What are you supposed to do after you're done with the dmg? I've still got three dmg's mounted on my machine that complain whenever I try to unmount them. This is a serious question - I don't know how to get rid of these things. And I'm an experienced computer user - I've got four home-built PC's and my first computer was an Apple II. But I can't figure out how to close out these installers on my Mac at work. I eject them. I drag them to the trash. They complain every time about stuff not working if I go through with either action.
And to uninstall a program, while it might seem like a no-brainer to drag an application to the trash to uninstall it, that does not get rid of it if you've added it to the dock. For more advanced users that's not a big deal, but it's certainly not more "intuitive" than using an uninstall applet that gets rid of everything - start menu shortcuts and all - in one swat.
How about this one: let's try renaming a file under OSX. How do you do it? Click the file name, then click it *again* (but not too fast, mind you, or you'll open it!) and hold for 2 seconds. Now you can rename the file. Alternative, you can click and hold the icon (or right-click) and select "get info", then type a new name in the file name box. How do you do the same thing in Windows? Right click and select "Rename file". Which is easier? Which is a "bad habit"? (As anyone who works on the web will tell you, renaming files is something that has to be done over and over every day as you get files from various departments to post up that don't follow standard web naming conventions. So this is really a huge annoyance for me on Mac.)
Or this one: yesterday, I had to select about 50 QuickTime files, then un-select about 10 of them peppered throughout the list. I have my command key mapped to control (to stay consistent between my Mac and PC), so I did a shift-select, then a ctrl-select to de-select the files I didn't want. Easy on Windows. Of course, try this on Mac and if you click the wrong place on the filename, you end up trying to simultaneously open 50 different QuickTime files. Not something most computers like to do. This happened to me three separate times in succession at different points in the process yesterday.
People have been saying for a long time - since a lot earlier than this eWeek article - that any day now all these PC users would wake up and smell the coffee about OSX. My thinking is there's no great ignorance about OSX among PC users - I don't really know anyone who hasn't at least tried it. I think the fact is most people just don't see it as necessarily better. It is a different operating system with its own way of doing things, its own learning curve and its own annoyances. Some people can get past those annoyances and some can't, as with any other OS. But the en
Out of curiousity, which of the two companies is actively selling DRM encumbered video? I agree, HDMI is a terrible thing, another opportunity to charge people more in exchange for hardware that does less and in the process help stamp out fair use. But Apple's no more our friend in this than Microsoft.
Search 2010 Gen Con events
So you base purchasing decisions on marketing campaigns instead of your estimation of how useful/fun/productive something will be?
So Apple marketing has a few putzes. Their computers and software are still pretty sweet.
E pluribus unum
Then you are a lucky man. I have had over 20 OptiPlex SX model computers fail over the last couple of years because of bad capacitor's on the motherboard. At this point, its very easy to call Dell and order a new board, but when it first started happening, boy were they bitches. It took me two weeks of running diagnostics and resotring software before they believed my assessment that it was a bad board. Now, it takes me one call and a ten minute discussion before I get a board shipped out overnight.
My point, is that Apple, just like Dell, and other manufacturers, refuse to acknowledge problems early on. It's common. I have found Dell and HP to be worse than Apple on acknowledging a given defect or problem exists, only to read about it a week later, with mfr's stating that they would be repairing the given problem at no cost. Over the years I have found Apple customer support to be very good. Dell used to be up there as well, but I don't think they seem to care about customers anymore.
At most conferences I go to, you can always rely on one or two others to have a DVI to SVGA cable handy if you forget it, but usually you're SOL if you need the latest version of Keynote. I feel superior at these conferences.
Not at OSCON. At my two talks, I had about 90% Macs in the audience. The amount in the hallways was a bit higher. I bet in the unlikely case that my Mac died, I could have asked for a replacement laptop with the latest Keynote and got more than one offer in either talk. Obviously, I was not as l33t as normal, and this is unacceptable. Maybe a nice black MacBook Pro would be a good choice for fashion victims like me. Apple, you listening? 15" Aluminum Powerbooks are too plebian!
Short story, though - In the highly desirable "O'Reilly geek" segment, Apple has won. Yay!
Andrew
Andrew van der Stock
Where I work (a big investment bank in London), nearly all the techies in my project and another down the corridor have switched to macs. There are a few die-hard games players that want toys but they are in the minority. A lot of the techies I know outside work are also mac users. This has all happened over the last 2 years.
...
Most of these techies are really tired of putting up with the pathetic development environment that windows offers. Unfortunately we are forced to use windows in our day jobs. Of course, we have to switch off half the anti-virus software just so that we can compile code and work with our IDE's. We also need to reboot our machines regularly - although mostly done for us when emergency patches are applied overnight.
The fact is that there is nothing I do in my day job that wouldn't be improved by switching to a mac. It would certainly reduce the mismatch between dev and production environments which are all linux. But, I'm sure my employer got a great deal with M$
... history tells us over and over again that the masses would prefer to buy a broken dysfunctional Windows system, even knowing it to be so, over ANY clearly superior product, so long as they can get the Windows system cheaper.
And think about the likelihood that Microsoft, if it were actually faced with sales defections, would not sell Vista below cost in order to retain market share -- and then consider your answer in the light of what they have done with the Xbox (and will do with Zune).
Look back at the demise of OS/2, which had only a modest price premium over Windows 95 or Windows 3.1, and was snuffed into oblivion largely by the disdain of the consumer -- both public and corporate. While factors like Microsoft's forcing Windows to be the default install and squeezing the competition off the store shelves was a big factor, those things did not prevent users from purchasing a copy of OS/2 and installing it. The herd mentality was what killed OS/2.
Same thing with the promise of Linux taking the corporate world by storm. Here we have a situation where companies could skip a hardware upgrade, saving millions just by that alone, and avoid forever the annual or biannual Windows refresh and site licensing fees, which is an even larger amount over the long haul -- and how many have done just that?
For Macs to be successful in this devoutly desired "perfect storm" of sales, a large chunk of the herd will have to convert both hardware and software to something different and unfamiliar to them, forsaking the familiar comfort of viruses, worms and malware for clean simple straightforward apps that operate a bit differently.
How many corporations are capable of changing to a Mac platform, even one that runs Windows via either Boot Camp or Parallels, when they have entire support organizations dedicated to the premise of a seamless Windows world as far as the eye can see?
They will cheerfully pony up the ginormous amounts of cash to replace their entire hardware install bases in order to upgrade to Vista, based on the premise that they are "saving money" by not having to purchase 3rd-party anti-virus programs, or some other similarly vacuous concept. And John and Jane Publicus will merrily follow in kind with their home systems, because "that's what they run at work". The notion of needing only software that can read and write the same format documents is just beyond them.
I say this as a long-time Mac owner, so I know whereof I speak. A "Perfect Storm" of Mac sales is a marketing fantasy, nothing more. Ripples in the sales picture between 3% and 6% (or 8% or 9%) are just that -- ripples in the sales picture. For Macs to re-gain a market share in the double digits would require a substantial fraction of the herd to break away, and for herd animals, that just doesn't happen. They get concerned and agitated at the thought of leaving the herd, and most that do will eventually return to it.
Free will and rational thought are illusory concepts that have no place in human societies. Just take a look at the front pages (via pixels or atoms) of any major newspaper and ask if this is the logical, rational way in which the world seems to work.
Beam me up Scotty -- there's no intelligent life on this world.
The idea behind the Mac is that you're not supposed to have to worry about that stuff. You're supposed to be too busy actually getting work done with your computing appliance. When it gets long in the tooth, you sell it used (Apple machines have a ridiculously high resale value) and upgrade to a new one.
Personally, as someone who grew up with PCs in the 90s and has fixed too many computers to count, I find the idea today of dealing with the innards of a PC as archaic and obsolete an idea as having to turn a crank to start your car.
"Sufferin' succotash."
> Get real, some people simply cannot afford an $1100.00 computer and make do with whatever
> they can find on Dell.com.
That's a completely bullshit argument.
In the first place, you can do a Mac mini for $500-$700 and it comes with lots of valuable, full-license software that the $500-$700 Dell doesn't have. There are also used Macs for sale on eBay and they are easy to buy because if you add a retail Mac OS X Tiger you can very easily figure out the exact capabilities that a particular used system will have once you're running it. An iMac from 2003 running Mac OS X Tiger is a known quantity. Yes, you have to add RAM just like every single time you buy a computer from anyone, whether it is new or used.
Second, it is common for an Apple customer to buy a Mac for about $1000 and use it for 3 or more years very productively, without spending a single penny more. On the other hand, it is common for a Dell customer to buy two $500 systems over that same time period and they have to buy software or hardware accessories to do anything but the most basic stuff, AND they are probably dealing with MS Windows.
Apple is selling systems with Intel's latest Core CPU's for $500 and they are fully loaded with hundreds of dollars worth of real software as well as niceties such as an Apple Remote and ultra-compact design. Get over the Macs cost too much and Macs cost more arguments. People are pouring their money down the drain with Microsoft and Dell et al and you're counting pennies on a thick, robust, full-featured entry-level Mac?