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iMac II to have LCD/Firewire/DVD/AirPort/new color
Cheeseman writes "The usually very reliable Japan Apple Watch quotes South Korean sources saying that the iMac II will be launched at the Paris Apple Expo in a couple of weeks. What's interesting about this is that one of the new colors will be the 'graphite and white' as seen on the G4. I suspect that this means that Apple will use the iMac II to get apple back into the business market and sell one G4 together with 10-30 iMacs IIs for about 10 to 25 grand. With AirPort this means that you've got an instant LAN that works out of the box with no cabling. " And the rumours are that the new machine will be less then 1000$US-though I would suspect that's a stripped down machine.
Rage 128 is contemporary; you're confusing it with the Rage Pro.
They don't use TNT because there are no Mac TNT cards, and as for Voodoo3... well, I don't know. It matters little; Rage 128 can keep up with the other cards if they all render in 16-bit mode. Voodoo3 can't even do 32-bit, and all reviews I've ever seen of the TNT series' renderers states that they look comparatively terrible in 32-bit mode. And by the way, I've read that bit that the person from 3Dfx wrote trying to excuse^H^H^H^H^H^Hexplain why they don't use 32-bit; I've seen a Voodoo3 and Rage128 back to back and I don't buy the article for a second.
So yeah, you sacrifice 4 or 5 FPS max (most humans can't percieve the difference between 60 and 55 FPS anyway) but in return you get much better-looking graphics. I'll make that trade any day.
Having to slap in a primo expensive G4 to play nurse maid to all the wireless Iwhacks.
A low-end G4 will cost under $2000. A fully decked-out one will set you back $4000. That's pretty trivial to acompany that's going to be serving a dozen NetBoot iMacs, when you consider the money saved on administration. Plus there's no reason that I can see that another iMac couldn't serve as the server for a small office. Hard drive space might be tight, but that's upgradable.
The learning curve associated with making these 'alien' machines behave on a traditional UNIX/NT network.
This depends on the company. An engineering firm that has a lot of specialized apps on their NT or Unix machines might not do this too well, but for companies that do web browsing, email, database, graphics, and other more standard apps, this is not a big deal. Plus you can get Office 98 for the Mac, so that'll help the transition. And OS X is a real Unix, and as far as I know all of its networking can be done with TCP/IP. So once that's out, this will be less of an issue.
The high-price as compared to a traditional x86 PC.
If they can get a 350 MHz machine for $1000, that's not much of a price savings. If you include the value of a name-brand PC (in terms of support and quality) and the various TCO advantages of the Mac in general, this really isn't that much of a problem. And if NetBoot over AirPort works as advertised, that'll mean no one will have to worry about stringing wires around the office. Just set up the G4, configure it for NetBoot, and the iMac won't need anything but a power cord.
The cost of training and new Apple-knowledgable IT/IS staff.
This is an issue, although some aspects of Mac networking (like file sharing) are so simple that literally anyone can be trained to do it in an hour or two. It's certainly true that this would be an expense, but I'm not sure it's all that big a deal.
Software development costs. You can't chuck a working bit of in-house software because Marketing wants Iwhacks..
No one is suggesting that this is the right solution for every company, nor that they should immediately throw out all their PC's. But I suspect there are a lot of companies that run 90% standard apps like office and Netscape, and those work cross-platform just fine. Those companies should be able to make the switch with minimal pain.
The centerpiece is the SPECfp95 comparison. At the top of the three lines we have:
There are a few caveats about these numbers, most notably are the fact that the faster systems aren't currently shipping.
Honestly, I expected the Athlon to beat the G4. But even an extra 150MHz didn't do the trick.
Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1992-1951
As cool as the G4's and the iMacs are, I still believe the AirPort wireless networking is the real coup for Apple. Too many people are focusing on the color and design aspects of the latest offerings and forgetting the breakthrough that Airport affords the SOHO and business project group people.
People... we're talking about wireless networking at Ethernet speeds. Dosen't anyone else see the implications of this, or is everyone still trying to focus on industrial design and color? Tell me of a competing product that can match this, and forget the whiney assed complaints about the OS.
Give them a year and M$ will claim that they invented AirPort instead of Lucent and Apple.
'nuff said.
The Paris date has been suggested by several Mac rumor sites, but the LCD part is way off base. Apple just poured US$100 million into Samsung to help ramp up production of the iBook (IIRC, one of the reasons the iBook sells for US$1599 was because of unexpected increases in the costs of flat-panel screens). It's very unlikely that in the middle of a screen shortage now expected to last until 2001 they would add one to their best-selling machine.
:-]
Besides, adding an LCD would pretty much necessitate a total redesign of the machine; after all, what's the point of having a giant empty shell around where the monitor used to be? Again, doubtful in the short term.
Now, once they've got enough iBooks floating around, and the Cinema Display is unbundled from the G4 machines, then perhaps it will be time to look at this issue again.
Wouldn't mind upgrading my rev. B to a G4, though, I can tell you that.
I use Macs for work, Linux for education, and Windows for cardplaying.
iMac IIc
iMac IIx
iMac IIvx
iMac IIfx
iMac LC
Welcome to the world of the average personal computer user. The person who never upgrades, not even RAM. PCI? What's that mean? The person who isn't going to _ever_ fill up a 10GB hard drive with their Word files and recipe database. The person who doesn't do anything that an iMac can't do in under a second. The person who doesn't do anything that an iMac can't do in under a second. Multitasking? Many of them don't even understand how to use more than one program at once. They don't know what a Zip drive is, and don't know why they'd want one.
This is the target market for the iMac. This is also the majority of users. They don't want to have to know anything about their computers, and it's easier for them to buy a new computer every 3 years that for them to learn about them to the extent they can upgrade. It's not that they're dumb. It's that they don't care. They want to use their computer like a toaster.
Upgradability is not something these people are ever likely to care about, and it makes the initial purchase price of the computer higher. Which is something they will care about.
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Has anyone noticed that Apple seems to be "listening" these days? Seems to me that now, whenever a great number of people want a certain thing, Apple responds. Examples:
Build a cheap Mac for once: iMac
Build a cheep notebook for once: iBook
You're not an open source company!: Darwin
Your OS isn't "modern": OS X
Man, flat panel displays are cool: Cinema Display
I wanna network my house, but I don't want cords everywhere!: Airport
Beige is boring: iMac colors
Those iMac colors are too fruity! I want graphite!: Graphite G4 and iMac II
When I look back just a couple years, it's amazing how far this company has come. I think it's response to the current state of computing in all areas of society (and clever marketing) has really been what's turned Apple around. I just hope they stay with this mindset...
This post is not a knock against Apple. Only an observation.
:) I fall prey to this myself.
What I find most remarkable about the new genesis of Mac's is not the hardware, which is undeniably exciting, but the influence the color seems to have. The poster of this article is probably right - their silver/shimmery grey new color combo is almost certainly aimed towards people who want to believe they have "serious" work to do, much as the bubbly tangerine, etc. hues were directed toward people intimidated by beige. What PHB will feel quite confident in his image with a "lime" ball on his desktop?
Nearly 40 years along in the development of computer technology and we have arrived at a point where the most potent selling point of a new machine is the way it makes you feel psychologically to have it on your desk.
May marketing live forever!
Not that this is very different from what has driven computers in the past few years, namely geeks who believe that there is some sort of ratio between the MHz on their chip and the power in their pants...
The most peculiar thing about humans is the divergance between what they claim is important to them and what evidence demonstrates they actually care about.
-konstant
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!