Vista Taking a Nibble Out of Apple in OS Wars?

PetManimal writes "Despite all of the positive buzz about the Mac operating system and the 'halo effect' of iPod sales, Mac OS X market share actually dropped last month, reports Computerworld: 'The share of PowerPC-based Macs fell ... from 4.29% in February to 3.94% in March. That dip was not fully offset by an increase in Intel-based Mac hardware, leading to a overall net decline in Mac share of 0.3%, to 6.08% in March.' Meanwhile, Vista is rising, the article says, with just over 2% of computers connected to the Internet using the new Windows OS. The figures are from a company called Net Applications, which collects its data from the browsers of visitors to its network of 40,000+ Web sites."

Comments

pfft

[djupedal]

One word - 'LEOPARD'

If there is a down blip, it's due to people waiting for Leopard, not because of vista, and ho boy...wait 'till you see her hit the track :)

Re:pfft

[Overly Critical Guy]

Not to mention the unreliability of relying on web browser stats to determine OS market share. How about we go by, I don't know, actual sales figures to determine market share? Call me crazy.

Re:pfft

[BKX]

You're forgetting that the total number of computers is rising. If Apple sales were to stagnate, their overall market share (as a percentage) would drop even if no Apple users switched to something else. Under the GP's analysis, we would expect that the market share (again, as a percentage) would drop while people wait for Leopard.

Re:pfft

[Anonymous Coward]

The stats come from website logs, which is basically snake oil as far as accurate numbers goes. The decline could be something as simple as Apple developers tweaking Safari's caching parameters. Since Intel Macs already have the latest version of Safari, if the latest version is more efficient at caching resources, that means that HTTP traffic from PPC Safari users will slowly decline as they upgrade to the latest version of Safari, while Intel users are already at that level.

Or it could be something completely different - HTTP traffic analysis is useless for determining browser/os market share and the littlest thing can skew the numbers wildly.

Re:pfft

[HairyCanary]

Sales figures don't tell you the whole story either, so keep looking. If Mac users keep their machines for five years on average, versus say two and a half years average for Windows PC users, then Macs could have half the sales rate of PC's and still be staying even with market share. What you want to reliably assess is installed base.

Re:pfft

[syphax]

The criticism about sales vs. avg. machine lifetime is valid.

In the auto industry we look at UIOs- "units in operation" - that is available via state vehicle registration records. On the whole, the data is pretty good.

Of course, we don't need to register our computers (yet), so we don't have that option.

Assuming the data isn't crap, I noticed that Apple has been gaining market share at an average of 0.34% a month since last September, until the 0.3% dip this past month. They went from 4.3% to 6.4% pretty quick, and it's notable b/c that's switching vendors (unlike Vista, which is mostly same vendor, different product). What will be interesting is the next couple of months- was this just a blip? What happens when Leopard comes out?

I'd put my money on 'blip'. I hereby forecast continued growth for Apple, though maybe averaging 0.1-0.2% per month unless they come out with some kickass hardware soon.

And no, I'm not a fanboy.

Re:pfft

[diamondsw]

And you really should be comparing market segments. After all, every Windows-based cash register, eTicket terminal, etc counts towards its market share. I'd rather see market share in segments - home, education, enterprise, utility, etc.

Very misleading

[apachetoolbox]

The tone of this article is very misleading.

I do a lot of consulting work and it's very hard to get a new PC for someone that doesn't come with Vista. They don't want Vista but they have no choice. Then we get to deal with figuring out what software they need works and what needs patches and what just plain doesn't work and never will.

0.3% well within margin of error....

[topham]

The actual decline they have reported is 0.3%; which I'm sure is well within there margin of error.

Which means, Apple's share hasn't changed. Despite the fact there are less PowerPC machines than before.

Re:2%? Seems high.

[stratjakt]

One corporate copy could easily account for thousands of machines.

Oh please

[MBCook]

Can we get real? Apple's market share dropped for one month? Let's see what could cause that:

1. People waiting for Leopard
2. People waiting for CS 3 to come out (this was February after all)
3. Vista's sales jump (in both hardware and software) from heavy promotion and tons of news coverage

There. That took about 3 seconds to think up. When Vista has displaced Apple for 3 months in a row, we can talk. Until then this is stupid hype designed to make Vista look like it isn't a dog sales wise (when from MS you would think it would have started selling like Windows 95 did). Plus, this is the PowerPC share that dropped. They are old and slow as hell (I'm using one). Now that CS3 is out (and was about to come out by the time they did this survey) you'd be an IDIOT to buy one. So the Intel side didn't jump up. People are probably waiting for CS3 (to put their requisitions in at work), or for Leopard (coming any time now, June 21st at the latest).

Non-story.

Statistics 101

[Nasarius]

A drop in overall percentage doesn't necessarily mean a drop in users. It could easily mean that Windows is growing, and the Mac market is stagnating before a new release.

Bogus data

[geekwithsoul]

FTA:

"Net Applications collects its data from the browsers of visitors to its network of more than 40,000 Web sites."

Any statistics that purport to show "usage" based on browser hits is inherently suspect, especially if the stats are used to imply they have some larger meaning. If they can answer these questions, I'll believe them:

- How are the servers of these "40,000 webs sites" identifying unique users? (server logs, scripts, or both? How long are the sessions they are looking at?)
- Are they looking at number of hits, unique user views, or what?
- How well can they ensure that machines are not being counted multiple times?
- Which sites are included? Are both microsoft.com and apple.com sites included? What about msn.com or mac.com? How many tech-savy sites are included and how many might-as-well-be-AOL newbie sites?
- Are the results from some sites weighted above or below other sites?

I'm not saying they haven't taken all these things into account, but publishing them (or referencing them by a third-party) without including how the data was gathered makes this all just so much noise.

Yep...

[pb]

Even if we do assume that their figures are incredibly accurate, this is how it shakes out:

Windows: +0.20
Linux: +0.15
Mac: -0.30

Not a huge deal, although I think the Linux uptick is a bit of an unreported story here. Also, what's with the share of Windows NT growing from 0.71% to 0.80% (the only other MicroSoft OS showing growth)? That's like a 12.7% increase for an ancient OS! So, yeah, given that anomaly, I'm somewhat disinclined to give their figures that much weight.

Apple has to offer a decent mid tower.

[guidryp]

I never contend that apple has to sell OSX for any old box, as that would be business mistake for them, but if they aren't going to sell OSX, then they need to offer more hardware choices.

Mac market share is stable at about the 6% mark. These are the people who like integrated monitors or the toy mini. Pro just won't matter for market share as it is ultra high end.

If Apple actually has the slightest interest in increasing market share beyond the current they have to offer what mainstream buyers want and are used to. A decent mid size tower at an affordable price.

I actually want to buy a Mac. I use Linux/Solar/Windows at work and would like a decent Unix workstation at home, but don't find Linux polished enough (my desktop at work runs Redhat).

What is stopping me is the lack of decent midrange hardware without integrated monitor. This gap has to be obvious to Apple execs, perhaps they are moving the company in the direction of devices and away from computer and don't care about computer market share.

I will buy a new computer in the next 6 months. No midrange tower or equivalent and it will be another PC and that will be my computer for the next 4 or 5 years.

Re:ATTN: SWITCHEURS!

[kinabrew]

I use Firefox on OS X, and my main issue is that it doesn't feel like a "proper Mac application". Certain things don't work like every other program.

For example, on single-line text input boxes, a Mac user should be able to hit the up arrow or down arrow to go to the beginning or end of the line. Firefox doesn't behave correctly.

Widgets don't just look wrong; they look like they were pulled off of a Windows machine. And submit buttons are a different size than regular buttons.

In the OS X version of Firefox, the menus aren't Mac-like at all.

• The "Tools" menu is a hold-over from Windows. Mac applications have a "Window" menu where you can select from open windows and commonly-used windows. In Firefox, this menu is wasted. The "Tools" menu should be completely removed, and its contents should be moved. Items like "Downloads" and "Error Console" belong in the "Window" menu. Items like "Page Info" belong in the "File" menu(or in the "View" menu, next to "Page Source").
• "Check for Updates" should be moved from the "Help" menu to the "Firefox" menu.

Don't get me wrong; I actually prefer Firefox to other browsers. But Firefox has been on the Mac platform since 2003. Within the last four years, the theme has changed several times. Heck, the toolbar icons have changed at least once under each incarnation(Phoenix, Firebird, and Firefox). Within those four years, I would have expected an attempt at making the browser act and look like a proper Mac application, rather than a port from Windows.