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Apple Now Selling Better Than One Laptop In Six

Lucas123 writes "Apple's share of the laptop market has grown over the past few years and the company is now beating Gateway in sales, according research firm NPD Group Inc. in Port Washington, NY. 'Their sales are continuing to grow faster than the rest of the marketplace,' the firm stated. In June Apple was responsible for 17.6% of laptops sold (at retail) in the US and is now in third place behind HP and Toshiba."

8 of 767 comments (clear)

  1. Re:College kids by Vancorps · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    I'm not saying no one has convinced their boss of this. Honestly only an idiot would buy a MacBook and run Windows instead of OS X. The build quality despite what you seem to say is identical. I've had to service both PC and Mac laptops for quite a while. All of our HP laptops were good to go out of the box and have been running solid for a year now. Conversely a few of the Macbooks purchased have had to be sent away. What does this mean? Absolutely nothing because manufacturing isn't where the problems lay. I'll never understand the mentality of buying a Mac and running Windows on it. If you're going to pay 10 grand for your graphics workstation you run it with software built specifically for it. That is how much our Mac Pro rig is going to cost which is ridiculous but it's what our designers are comfortable with.

    Look at Dell's new commercials to see the real issue with them advertising their new product as containing no trialware which makes a lot of sense if you're a business. That extra crap is what was hurting PCs.

    Windows despite what you seem to think doesn't suck, honestly I don't believe you really believe it does given how much of the world runs Windows without a problem. Vista, sure lots of issues surrounding that but Windows in general is all over the place and working just fine.

    A pointless argument anyways. Apple has the cool effect and that is really the reason people are buying. As much as I personally don't like Apple's offerings their products do look professionally put together like someone actually took some time and thought the thing out unlike the i.Beat Blaxx mp3 player out there. That's the reason you see Apple gaining ground. OS X really sucks for kids as my boss has just discovered. He wanted to run some spyware software to monitor his 13 year old daughter. She has a MacBook and the software really is crap. The Windows version has network offloading and a billion other nifty features that consistently work. OS X really doesn't offer people anymore than Windows does, the software packaged with it Apple has done a nice job with. I've seen some HP in particular media center rigs that did it just as elegantly though.

    The power is in the package, Apple has one hell of a package right now so their success makes sense.

  2. Re:College kids by kkwst2 · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    My Thinkpad barely made it through 2 years,
    If anything, I suspect that's much more of a comment on you than your Thinkpad. The Thinkpads of 6 years ago were far superior to the iBook. I think even most Mac fans would agree.

    You can at least make an argument about MacBook Pros, but I still disagree. The MacBook is designed to be thin and stylish and excels in both categories. However, the Thinkpad is designed to be a workhorse. They're both nice. The ThinkPad has certainly cut some corners after Lenovo took over, but it's still a very solid machine and has multiple distinct advantages over the Mac.

    From a productivity standpoint, it's just stupid to get a MacBook over a Thinkpad if you're primarily using Windows. You have to use an external mouse, since the single button thing just doesn't cut it. And the keyboard shortcuts don't map perfectly. Meanwhile the Thinkpad still has the best mobile pointing device ever invented. I challenge you to spend two months using the Trackpoint device and go back to using a touch pad. You won't be able to.

    The Thinkpads offer much higher screen resolutions, allowing anyone doing serious graphical work (graphic designers, CAD, CFD, etc.) a huge advantage. I just don't get how anyone doing anything graphical would find the 15" Macbook Pro resolution acceptable. This always surprised me.

    Perhaps the MacBook Pro is best for you, but I believe from a productivity standpoint most people primarily running Windows you be much better served with a Thinkpad.
  3. Re:College kids by loganrapp · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    Most college kids who buy Macs do so because their college is a Mac campus and they either get it cheaper or require Mac-proprietary programs (Final Cut Pro, for my major).


    Either that, or they're hippies.

  4. Computers should last for more than a year. by twitter · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    don't act like security is the reason you're not on Windows and that you have to keep it separate from the net; I've had the same Windows XP install running for over a year and it runs as well as when I installed it, and there's no spyware.

    It's sad that you would think a year is something to brag about. Having worked retail repair within the last three years, I can safely say you are a liar. People got creamed way faster than that and things have only gotten worse. Having to go through the pain of a Winblows reinstall every year is not acceptable for most people. Computers are a durable good and people expect them to last longer than a pair of flip flops.

    Vista is no better and people are bolting for the exits labled "Linux" and "Mac".

    --

    Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

    1. Re:Computers should last for more than a year. by dedazo · · Score: 1, Flamebait

      It's sad that you would think a year is something to brag about.

      That's an interesting assertion. Let's see, I have here an old Dell Inspiron 2500 which has had the same install of Windows 2000 (or "Winblows", that's hilarious) for almost eight years. My PC at work has had the same XP install going on three years now, and the one PC at home that doesn't have Vista installed has had XP for close to five years. None of them has any problems whatsoever, probably because I take care of them by not installing every crap program I find on the interwebs. I don't reinstall "Winblows" every year, and neither do most people.

      Having worked retail repair within the last three years

      Oh, so you you fix PCs used by stupid people. I guess it's OK if you generalize that to everyone.

      I can safely say you are a liar.

      Oooh, I guess I must be lying, too.

      Vista is no better

      Oh, your journal. A lot of people are familiar with it, now.

      So let me ask you something twitter. You claim to "advocate" free software, here on Slashdot. I guess elsewhere. What possible value did the free software movement just realize from your infantile ad hominem and exaggeration-for-mod-points post here?

      --
      Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
  5. Ah, the real M$ shines through. by twitter · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Minor irritant, dedazo claims:

    Oh, so you you fix PCs used by stupid people. I guess it's OK if you generalize that to everyone.

    No, the hundreds of people with broken windoze I saw were not stupid, their software was. Anyone who works retail is quickly freed from the M$ elitism you suffer from.

    Care to tell me why Mac stores are not crowded with all sorts of the same? No, it's not the popularity of Windoze, or that the Mac crowd is really smart somehow. Mac's core market is people who don't want to know about the workings of their computer, they just want it to work and amazingly enough, it does. Macs run for years without problems much like gnu/linux and other sane systems.

    Oooh, I guess I must be lying, too.

    Why yes, dedazo, you are! The posting history cited above shows both dishonesty and malice.

    --

    Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

    1. Re:Ah, the real M$ shines through. by dedazo · · Score: 0, Flamebait
      twitter, who likes to shill Slashdot for fun and profit with lies and FUD asks:

      No, the hundreds of people with broken windoze I saw were not stupid, their software was.

      Please enlighten us then, why exactly were these "windoze" computers broken? Surely there must be a reason other than your claims that "Windoze" sucks? Simple empirical evidence is enough to disprove that, as if it was necessary to begin with. So why were these computers giving your PC monkey repair shop headaches?

      Anyone who works retail is quickly freed from the M$ elitism you suffer from.

      Can you explain what this means?

      Care to tell me why Mac stores are not crowded with all sorts of the same? No, it's not the popularity of Windoze

      Probably because there's no BonzyBuddy for OS X yet. Just give it time. Or is Apple planning on not allowing people to install stuff on their own computers? Or is it that if I buy a Mac I magically become a computer expert?

      The posting history cited above shows both dishonesty and malice.

      Speaking of posting histories, a fellow /.'er who recognizes what you are just posted one of my favorites. Enjoy!

      --
      Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
    2. Re:Ah, the real M$ shines through. by JohnFrum · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      I work with a Mac guy and I have a USB hard drive in my desk drawer that he hates. Each time he gets on his high horse I threaten to attach it to his system. Let me explain... it's just a HID USB hard drive. Works great on all of my XP/Vista systems. I attach it to his system and it "kernel panics". Started happening sometime after 10.2ish, he keeps saying they should have the issue fixed soon and he keeps upgrading. Nope. He's running a build of leopard and it still crashes. Thanks crApple for all the fun! Please don't fix your shitty HID implementation!