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Vizio Plans To Undercut The Market For All-In-One PCs
TV maker Vizio is famous for undercutting competitors' prices on LCD TVs; now, the company has released word that it will introduce a new line of budget computers, and next week will be showing them off at CES. Bloomberg reports that the company won't yet disclose actual prices (the kind with numbers), but says instead only that they will be at a "price that just doesn’t seem possible." As the article mentions, the all-in-one desktop machines shown look a lot like Apple products; BetaNews has pictures, and ominously mentions Apple's tendency to sue over similar-looking products.
Aside from rounded rectangles, is there anything else that looks similar to an Apple product in the picture? Has Apple been marketing truncated-pyramid shaped computers lately?
Palm trees and 8
Am I the only one thinking that this might be driven by some cheap ARM hardware? Only way I can think of to achieve "a price that just doesn't seem possible" in an all-in-one computer.
Vizio products are terribly built. They're fine under perfect circumstances, but the insides are like a freshman EE student built them. Accidentally plug a USB drive into the firmware update port (which accepts a USB form factor)? New motherboard time. Live in a house built before 1978 and took an electrical surge? New motherboard time. And none of it is under warranty. All you can do is plead ignorance and hope for the best.
They agreed to every non disclosure clause from Microsoft, accepted tainted money to keep Microsoft's competitors out, missed every opportunity to set themselves apart from their competition by something other than price. Did any of these geniuses think, "What is the major complaint about the PCs? Lack of security. Let me pitch a line of PCs with Firefox front and center, with NoScript pre loaded. Throw in some OpenOffice free too" when it would have mattered, may be five years ago? Nah, they obediently kow-towed every line drawn by Microsoft and reduced themselves to mere purveyors of commodity boxes. When there is no difference between the brands qualitatively what happens? Price war, gimmicky sales tactics, pre-loading of crapware and nagware. Good riddance. Go die in a price war somewhere clueless idiots.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
This is just more of the same. I was really hoping that, with Vizio being a big flatscreen maker, they'd just be slapping a PC on the back of them.
Many big LCD TV's these days have built in network media stuff (netflix, hulu plus, pandora, and loads of more minor players), so they've got some computing guts in them already. I was hoping they'd just up the power a little and bring out an integrated webtv type thing on 55"+ screens, and include a keyboard. If it ran like a real PC, they could even skirt the hulu plus issues (and similar from other providers) since it could be considered a PC. Toss in external storage device support (USB3 + gigabit network) and it'd be a winner.
But no... it's just another all-in-one monitor and another (likely underpowered) laptop. I wonder if the 27" model will at least have more than 1920x1280 resolution (ie. 2560x1600)?
Samsung also introduced the SwipeIt a competitor to Apple AirPlay and probably the best name for a Samsung product ever.
There are still people out there that do more with their computer than surf the web and consume digital media.
Sure, but nowhere near enough to sustain an industry just for that. There are still people using Symbolics LISP machines too, but you don't see a vibrant industry producing new ones.
Just look at the decline in desktop sales and the rise of the mobile platform. You think that trend isn't going to continue? Desktops will be effectively dead within 20 years, 30 tops.
While some people just can't catch a break, or have suffered from lack of opportunity... people who are poor long term often have related poor decision making skills. Whether that's genetic or due to poor parents teaching them the wrong things, I'll leave to the social scientists.
You'll see a surprising number of fairly wealthy people play the lottery - one ticket here and there. You'll see an equally surprising number of poor people play the lottery, dozens of tickets at a time. You'll also see them maxing out credit cards and going to paycheque cashing stores, seemingly without realizing that if they'd just hold off for ONE paycheque, they'd have 10-20% more money to spend. I know a guy with a bottom-end job who is very modest in his purchases, and keeps socking most of his money away. 20 years later, he's a freakin' LANDLORD to some of his former coworkers, and he built it all on a minimum wage job. It can be done.
Seeing a poor person get taking isn't surprising, but when they're fleecing themselves and the person profiting *isn't* trying to take advantage of them, what do you do? Give up on the adults and hope for the best for the kids.
I say this as someone whose extended family has both middle and lower income families in it.
This is ultimitley why PC sales are down. Good enough old systems coupled with a broke populace = no new sales. Take it from someone who fixes computers for a living. My sales are way up as more people are getting older systems upgraded or repaired because they're still fast enough, and cheaper than a new machine. Ultrabooks aren't going to do dick to spur sales, as they are too expensive (even at price points like 649 usd) and most customers I talk to plan to spend less than 500 when they absolutely need a new machine. Apple is running out of people that can afford their product, and with food and fuel expected to surge next year I am fairly sure they have peaked. If people have to choose between an idevice or food and a non idevice I think we all know which one wins.
"Science is the power of man"
It's hilarious that Apple is being demonised in this thread for something they haven't actually done. They haven't said word one about the iMac-inspired design (Vizio's CEO quote: [we have] worked on [our] computer designs for two years in attempts to offer an aesthetic that competes with Apple Inc.'s popular products but at a lower price ), but everyone is quick to jump on it.
They're certainly not the first company to make an All-in-one that was clearly a response to the iMac, and thus far none of those other (and there have been several) designs have faced lawsuits.
In my opinion it looks ok - I'm not sold on the slender neck, since it feels like the screen might wobble around (although I'm sure it's actually solid).
Not necessarily true, but I don't think they'll make much of a difference. They might affect Apple sales because some people will look at iMac (or, more likely, have one recommended) but then see this and think "hey, it looks similar enough, I don't care about that extra gloss -- I think I'll get this and save $500". Those people would have bought a Mac, but are either a bit too price sensitive or just not that in to Apple to care that it's not the same thing, and they're going to get a poorer experience as a result.
That in itself is fine, but it kind of tarnishes the Apple brand by association. That's why Apple are suing Samsung -- not because of rounded corners and whatnot, but because if you look at it superficially, it appears to be 'a cheaper version of the same thing'. Apple don't want to get lumped in with everyone else, that's way they create individual products and so carefully build and protect their brand.
What a surprise. Yet another company subsidized by the Chinese Government undercutting prices to harm US businesses and workers.
When is the US Government going to step up and do its job to protect US workers and citizens from these unfair and illegal trade practices that are designed for the express purpose of harming the United States?
We've seen it for decades with the European government subsidizing Airbus to compete unfairly with Boeing, yet the US Government refuses to fight those subsidies, instead expending its effort to support the unions destroying Boeing from the inside.
It's no wonder the United States is in decline, just like Rome.
Not necessarily true, but I don't think they'll make much of a difference. They might affect Apple sales because some people will look at iMac (or, more likely, have one recommended) but then see this and think "hey, it looks similar enough, I don't care about that extra gloss -- I think I'll get this and save $500". Those people would have bought a Mac, but are either a bit too price sensitive or just not that in to Apple to care that it's not the same thing, and they're going to get a poorer experience as a result.
When a user has already the disposition to spend the extra amount of money on a mac, there are very little aesthetic replacements that will convince him to do otherwise. You are talking about someone that already decided to spend that money on an iMac. If he hasn't, he was never an Apple prospect to begin with, and was going to go to Best Buy to look at their all-in-one desktop offerings.
This is like saying that Toyota can introduce a cheap Ferrari knockoff tomorrow, and prospect Ferrari buyers forego the Ferrari in favor of the cheap knock off. Again: thinking about buying a pretty mac is not the same as having ever accepted to pay the price, meaning you were never a potential customer.
That in itself is fine, but it kind of tarnishes the Apple brand by association. That's why Apple are suing Samsung -- not because of rounded corners and whatnot, but because if you look at it superficially, it appears to be 'a cheaper version of the same thing'. Apple don't want to get lumped in with everyone else, that's way they create individual products and so carefully build and protect their brand.
Apple is going after Samsung not for just one copy. They are going after them because Samsung is overdoing it. They make some of their products not only look like Apple products, but they make the friging box and even the frigging charging cable look like the Apple equivalent!
I'm sure you must have seen this image before:
http://cdn.iphonehacks.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/applesamsungsimilar.jpg
Mind you, I think Apple is taking the case too far into too many product lines. Not all Samsung products are Apple knockoffs, but it does seem they have a department dedicated to produce just knockoffs.
This is typical Samsung behavior and they have done it over the years to any dominant force in the market. Apple is not the first one to sue them over it. The Samsung BlackJack was just a copy of a Blackberry (and got sued by RIM over it's name) and same goes for the Samsung SYNC vz Motorola RAZR. It's Samsung's DNA to just copy design. I am not too familiar with Android Phones (too many of them) but I'm sure you will find an EVO ripoff somewhere in the Samsung lineup.