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Can Apple Take Microsoft on the Desktop?
An anonymous reader writes "RDM asks Can Apple Take Microsoft on the Desktop?, a comparison of recent sales and profits and the future outlook for Macs and PCs. It's the opinion of the article's author that Apple doesn't have to take a majority share of the desktop market to win. The key is to take the most valuable segments of the market. They show via a few quick financial numbers that even though Apple is selling fewer machines, they're making more money per machine than your Dells or your Gateways. Not being beholden to Microsoft gives them a big advantage when competing with traditional PC sellers. Once Apple is positioned, Microsoft will be forced to choose whether it wants to battle Mac OS X for control of the slick consumer desktop, or repurpose Windows as a cheaper, mass market alternative to Linux in corporate sales. If it doesn't make a choice, the company will face difficult battles on two fronts.""
RDM asks Can Apple Take Microsoft on the Desktop? ... They show via a few quick financial numbers that even though Apple is selling fewer machines, they're making more money per machine than your Dells or your Gateways.
So then the proper title should be "Can Apple take Dell or Gateway on the Desktop". With the release of bootcamp, Apple's competing against Dell and Gateway in the Premium consumer hardware space (which Dell/Gateway suck at anyway) so it's no wonder Apple's winning.
The flip side of that is that as commodity beigeboxes, Dell and Gateway do great in the corporate world, which is a space Apple has yet to penetrate to any large degree, because the customer doesn't fit their product space.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
they need to fix this real fast! the mini has laptop parts, is not that easy to open and has POS gma 950.
The Mac pro is nice but the cost is high apple could add quad-core cpus at the top end and drop the price of the low end dual-cores as well as lower the video card prices.
The I-macs have laptop parts and don't work that well for people that have good screens. Also they force you to get a bigger screen if you want a better video, faster cpu, or bigger HD.
So the article is saying that because Apple charges more for their computers, resulting in higher profit margins, MS is doomed? The article tries to make it sound like Apple is making more because they arent paying license fees to MS, but in reality they are charging a HUGE premium for their operating system. Compare the price differential of a mac with an equivalent hardware dell, its quite large.
There are so many things in this article that make no sense.
The author claims that the ipod and iphone are going to be major factors in killing the windows monopoly.
The author actually claims that consumers are willing to pay more for laptops because of resale value. I reread that like 5 times to make sure I wasnt reading it wrong.
This sounds like just another fanboy who wants to see Apple win and is grasping at straws for reasons why it will happen.
First of all, Apple is in the entertainment business as well, so the profits need to be spread over more than just computers; although they do make more per machine than most PC manufacturers.
But even if Vista stumbles - as the author points out - users stay with an existing MS OS rather than dump MS altogether as Apple owners did when the ][ line dies (I was one to the bitter end) or when Apple failed to keep pace. What Apple has to overcome (as does Linux) is the huge installed base and apps that run on it. The switch to x86 architecture made it even tougher to move to the Mac given the lack of native binary apps for it; such as Photoshop whose CS2 is a bit slow on the newer Macs (CS3 is nice but not yet out).
iPhone - that looks to be a questionable product; given Apple has apparently hobbled it from the get go.
And this is my perspective as a Mac (and Windows) user.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Actually, no, this article drives home the point that from Apple's point of view, they SHOULDNT release Osx86. They are making more per box then Dell. If they came out with OSX86, most of the people that would buy it would probably be people that would buy Apple hardware anyway. I'm sure there are a small percentage of people that refuse to buy Apple hardware, but the losses in profits in other areas would dwarf this small gain. So really they would be losing a ton of money for a small increase in market share. They went through this before with the clones. I hate to break it to you, but Apple exists to make a profit. They do that by making things people want to buy at prices that people are willing to pay. I'm sure they have thought about doing so, and came to the conclusion that it would be folly. Apple isn't exactly bleeding cash if you noticed....
Monstar L
I think Apple's in a good position for the next generation of end-user computing. Once all the "fat client" applications migrate fully online, it won't matter what the user interface on the desktop is like. As long as a web browser is there, it shouldn't matter. Right now, they have a lot of work to do. There's a whole generation of software developers who are used to the Windows platform, and the majority of businesses use Windows as their core desktop computing environment.
Once people sit down and poke around with a Mac, they're usually happy with it. The interface isn't as much of a stretch from Windows, and the OS is designed to keep the user unaware of what's going on under the hood.
Desktop PCs are going away, and eventually full laptops might follow. The only things that remain to be solved are: (1) Web applications need a user interface that's as fast as a desktop one, and (2) Either people have to give up their privacy and let third parties hold all their data, or local storage needs to be merged with these connected apps.
I'd love to use Macs at work, but our industry uses custom Windows applications that won't be ported in the near future. Getting people to develop for MacOS would be a big step toward business acceptance. Virtualization is great, but it needs to be simple. MacOS did this by placing "Classic" (Mac OS 9) apps in a seamless virtual environment. Users didn't even need to think about it, and that was important. There were _a lot_ of classic apps that needed to be emulated. It would be cool to do that for Windows apps, but I doubt it's ever going to happen.
Linux requires less support from people with more knowledge. Which is more expensive, I do not know.
The problem I see is that people think that all companies buy top-of-line PCs. A Decked-out MacBook Pro? I don't think so.
I have a feeling that a lot of companies are like the one I work for. We don't have a huge I.T. budget, so we have to be creative with our computer purchases (ie, eBay). This also means we are n-1 to n-2 generations or more on hardware, and n-1 on the operating system. Though, I should note that I work at a factory where we still have production PCs running DOS. (If it ain't broke, don't rewrite it.)
If Apple brought their system prices down to that of the common beige box, then and only then could they hope to truly capture the corporate market at large. But, that would mean less profit per box. And, in the end, Apple doesn't seem to really be suffering, so why would they want to hamstring their bottom line? The last time I read about Apple's bottom line, it was very healthy.
Thus, I does it really matter that Apple only has 5% (or whatever it is) of system sales?
Bearded Dragon
Are you high? From your link:
0 06/1115_lt1100.html
http://www.systemshootouts.org/shootouts/laptop/2
The Dell has TWICE the RAM of the Apple laptop. I wouldn't want to use OS X or Windows with 512 MB of RAM, which is what the Macbook comes with. Oh yeah, the 60Gb hard drive in the Macbook is also pathetic. The Dell has twice that. As well as twice the number of USB ports (I routinely use all 4 of mine so that's a requirement) and a bigger screen. The flash memory slot is also very useful for anyone with a digicam.
All the other piddling differences are inconsequential. I don't give a crap about the webcam and the 6 pin firewire. The software differences that the author says are the Mac's advantage are a matter of preference. Although I'm not a Windows fan, you can't just declare a winner between the two OS's as easily as saying that a faster processor is better than a slower one.
"If the Mac reached a 20% market share, that could be the critical mass. It would make more developers make apps for it, which would make even more people get Macs, which would make more developers make apps for it, which... well, you get the idea." ...but none of that will help Apple penetrate a huge portion of the overall market--the corporate desktop. Large businesses and government frequently will not accept sole source suppliers, so until Apple opens up the platform to others it will be locked out. Apple accepts this, at least publicly.
Don't know what all this talk is about anyway. There's an assumption that Aple's grand strategy is to undermine the Windows monopoly and I don't see that as being the case. The author says "Apple doesn't have to take a majority share of the desktop market to win, it only needs to take the most valuable segments of the market." but the question is "win what?" Apple, by his own arguments, is already winning. It is maintaining its brand image, it has a number of successful products, it is very profitable, and its stock is highly valued.
The article is written with the characteristic Apple slant. The history told is incomplete and overinflates Apple's relevance in the PC world while ignoring the fact that Microsoft had significant competitors. It denigrates PCs, calling them "e-waste" and claiming there's no innovation in them while ignoring that all the R&D that produces them is what makes Mac hardware today. It claims that Macs, though lower volume, represent the cream of the crop even though the true "cream of the crop" is the business PC that Apple doesn't produce. It consistently confuses Apple's competitors and uses improper metrics to argue that Apple is "large enough". All in all, it's an Apple-centric view of the world and history---not especially accurate, not offering any new or interesting insight, and not built on a sound premise in the first place. A worthless waste of time.
Grandparent is an insightful troll.
Apple controls the hardware, and prevents anyone from making other hardware on which to run Mac OS X. It's not just a matter of saying it's "unsupported", they actually go out of their way to make sure it does not happen.
You'll also notice many of the same strange practices as Microsoft, only moreso. Where is the option to set the default web browser? Why, it's in the Safari control panel! Just like similar options -- email client, HTML editor, etc -- are on the "Internet Options" control panel on Windows -- but that is actually in Control Panel, not just in IE.
Upgrades are more frequent and cost more, and are less compatible with previous versions than any Microsoft OS -- except Vista, maybe, but that seems likely to change.
And look at how they are handling the iPhone. NO third-party apps, the end. I don't like Windows Mobile either -- I'd prefer a nice Linux handheld (and these do exist) -- but at least Windows Mobile encourages third-party development. Even my cell phone, a Java piece of shit, allows me to download third-party apps to it.
And as much as I wanted to thank Apple for supporting standards (Safari passes Acid2) and open source (they sent patches back to Konqueror), I've found that I actually have more freedom on Windows than I do on OS X.
I still run Linux as my main desktop, and I might even still use OS X on my Powerbook (if I got it fixed), but that's because OS X is a good OS, not because I like Apple or wish them to take over the world. They strike me as somewhat less evil than Microsoft (their stuff actually works, and they do actually innovate), but far, far more proprietary.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Terminal Server/Citrix solves the problem of having to run Windows apps. Just get a beast Dell server and give everyone a login. Problem solved... :-)
It's so difficult for me to understand why people are still making this argument. It's as if they lack even a basic understanding of how computer manufacturers work.
CASE: I worked for a major computer manufacturer (HP). They have basically two lines of notebooks, each with several options: Consumer grade and Business Class. Consumer grade notebooks come with all the bells and whistles - built in cameras - extra media controlling buttons, glossy screens, etc. etc. etc. These were your run of the mill $500-$1500 computers. The business class machines had far fewer features. They were very basic in nature, lacked what HP deemed as modern styling, and only had basic hardware. Yet the business class machines were much more expensive.
How could this be? The same is true of Dell, by the way, and any manufacturer that makes both grades of notebooks. Do you really think there is no difference between a $500 notebook and a $2000 notebook that have the same amount of ram and the same size hard drive? You would have to be mentally handicapped to think that your $600 Acer even compares in terms of quality to any machine that costs 3x as much. Sure, it had all the specs that make it sound great, but the fact is it's a piece of shit.
You see manufacturers use whatever hardware is available for the cheapest price THAT DAY when making consumer grade laptops. That's why they are much less reliable and prone to problems. The quality control that goes into them is limited compared to what goes into a business class machine. You could buy two of the same model Acer computer, and find they have different internal components. One is a lemon, and one works great. With a business class HP, Dell, or Apple computer (yes, Apple's would be compared to a business class machine - not your shitty $600 computer) a run of computers all use the best hardware they were designed for and are the same across the line. Businesses are willing to pay more for the reliability and the ability to use one disk image across all the machines. You can't get that with your $600 notebook.
The bottom line is this: You get what you pay for. There are $50k cars with smaller engines than $20k cars, but do you really think they compare? If you're a naive consumer you'll buy whatever is sold to you. You'll shop based on price and always end up with shit. If you're a discerning consumer you'll make decisions based on things that actually matter and end up getting what you paid for.
Apples, Sonys, and other high end laptops are not overpriced. They simply lack all the cut corners that make your piece of shit $600 acer possible.
or else!
What's to win? The objective of a business is to turn a profit for the stockholders. Apple is doing that, and has been doing that for some time. The only time that gaining market share is really relevant is if it contributes to the bottom line. It does not always do so. In Microsoft's case, having a large market share seems to work for them. In the case of General Motors, for example, it does not. The company has a huge (if shrinking) market share, but has not reliably turned a profit for some time.
Thinking that gaining broad market share is the goal shows a general misunderstanding of the function of a business.
In any case, if Apple really wanted to take on Microsoft, they already have everything they need. All they would have to do is drop the idea of insisting on the customer using their own hardware. If people were allowed to buy a copy of OS X to run on generic Intel or AMD hardware, I wouldn't be surprised if people flocked to it.
There are enough people out there who groan at the constant necessity to prop up a sagging defective-by-design OS, who aren't ready to try Linux, but who have seen enough exposure to Macs to accept them as an alternative. Although I'm not a Mac fanboy, this is a situation I'd be very happy to see.
iWork is great the way it is. I don't want another overblown, feature-creeping, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink gargantuan application suite when all I need to do is write a letter or make a few slides.
There's a place for multiple sulutions on the market. I have NeoOffice for when I need all the crap, and the more I use iWork the more I realize that I don't, most of the time.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Either most posters here have missed the point of the article, or didn't bother to read it.
He's not saying Apple will win larger market share than Microsoft.
He's saying that Apple could capture the most valuable part of it, those willing to pay a high-end premium for their machines.
The premise of the article is that Dell and other pc makers would be left selling very, very low-profit computers. (which from a business stand-point, is not a good business to be in)
This has nothing to do with game computers or those willing to build their own boxes.
It's a business story.
- dj