Slashdot Mirror
Chromebooks Outsell Macs For the First Time In the US (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report on The Verge: Google's low-cost Chromebooks outsold Apple's range of Macs for the first time in the U.S. recently. IDC analyst Linn Huang confirmed the milestone to The Verge. "Chrome OS overtook Mac OS in the US in terms of shipments for the first time in 1Q16," says Huang. "Chromebooks are still largely a US K-12 story." IDC estimates Apple's U.S. Mac shipments to be around 1.76 million in the latest quarter, meaning Dell, HP, and Lenovo sold nearly 2 million Chromebooks in Q1 combined. Chromebooks have been extremely popular in US schools, and it's clear from IDC's comments the demand is driving US shipments. Outside of the US, it's still unclear exactly how well Google's low-cost laptops are doing. Most data from market research firms like IDC and Gartner focuses solely on Google's wins in the US.
If all one needs to do is surf the Web, handle minor photo and video editing, then a Chromebook is ideal. A full-blown Mac is a complete waste of money. I'm in IT and manage everything from email servers to Wi-Fi, and now, thanks to modern computing and VPNs, can do everything from a Chromebook or actually, just any browser.
I like Chromebook because they are simple, inexpensive, and are harbingers of what's to come--namely, all of our comings and goings will be on the Web.
Prices of products from large corporations that know what they are doing are not set based on cost+. They're set based on Willingness to Pay. Cost is only used to determine whether a market is viable for a product.
Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
They are cheap as hell, last forever on their batteries, and for end-users are effectively immune to malware, adware, and all the other horrible shit that makes your grandmother unable that piece of shit windows laptop. (And it's always a piece of shit windows laptop. What is it about grandmothers and their abilty to buy the very worst laptop ever made?)
And when you have physical access it's easy to put them in developer mode (Which will securely wipe any existing userdata, by design). Then you can get a root shell and install whatever OSS toys you want.
I don't know if you're old enough to remember when Apple ruled the education market at all levels. I had the CFO of Apple tell me straight to my face that the "bite" out of the Apple logo represented their undying commitment to education.
Now, they're committed to the hipster-at-Starbucks market who will soon run out of their parents' money to buy new Apple products.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I have spent several years as an IT guy in school districts. Chromebooks make sense for IT for several reasons:
1. Replacing a Chromebook is trivial and inexpensive; there is no loss of data or backup worries.
2. The malware worry is not there.
3. Everything in modern schools is largely Web-based instruction or taught on SMART boards.
4. Kids like them and are already Google savvy.
Being someone who deploys chrome books daily I can tell you that you are dead wrong. They systems were designed for different use cases- if you want one OS on all devices go with windows 10- remind me again how well that is working out.
Its not a fondleslab, its a laptop with a simple OS that is virus free, malware free and constantly up to date.
Pointer devices need a high density UI, touch devices need a low density UI.... CompSci101
The comparison should be to iOS tablets, not Mac. And outsold Mac's in units? Dollars? Please. This means nothing. Isolate the Mac business from Apple, and the Chromebook business from Google, which business would you rather own? Apple has yet to release a single Mac with Thunderbolt3, and they JUST released the first MacBook with Skylake. Clearly they are either so focused internally on another big project (like the 10 year anniversary iPhone or project Titan, or their mega-campus), or the macs we are going to see at WWDC2016 are going to be a major refresh for the entire line. If it's the latter, the sales are typical of Apple's sales cycle when a refresh is imminent. Having a small number of options (just as Apple products do) makes consumers very aware of the time in the cycle of their product, so wait for release before buying. You can go buy a recently released Chromebook from SOMEBODY, almost always. There are so many options. Don't get me wrong, Chromebooks are great. They serve a wide market and for those who need a basic computer and would rather have a laptop form factor vs a tablet or iPad, but comparing sales to a Mac is completely irrelevant. Do iPhones outsell Windows? Yes but who cares? It's just as irrelevant when Lenovo sells more 2U servers than Apple do Macs.
Intel didn't kill of the entire Atom line - just the low end (low margin) chips designed to go in phones.