Hand-balling security to the end user, when 90% of end users are muppets will not work, as demonstrated by the malware success on the Windows platform. Android is the Windows XP of smartphones. The rest of the world has tried that approach for the past 30 years, seen that it is not viable, and moved on. End users are not, and will not ever be, or care to be security experts. Apple gets that. Microsoft is beginning to get that. Android fans who say that leaving security stuff to the end user do not get that. Yet. It will come.
Yes, if people haven't watched the keynote, you need to take Cook's comments in context. It was a light dig, said with a humorous tone whilst discussing sales numbers, os upgrade numbers and customer satisfaction survey results.
Exactly. In fact I'm pretty sure I recall Steve mentioning in an interview that he was lucky to have been there with Apple for 2 revolutionary products - the Apple II and the iPod - and that most companies are extremely lucky to ever see one revolutionary product get to market. Building your business model around reliably releasing revolutionary products year after year is setting yourself up for failure.
Not every release has to be a revolution. Simply making things better than the rest of the market, and selling them for a price those who want decent hardware will pay for has proven to be reasonably profitable.
No. Apple's business model is "don't build bargain basement crap". It just so happens that now and again, those "not bargain basement crap" items end up being groundbreaking, because plenty of other companies get to market first with garbage, or don't see the market at all.
Apple's prices haven't been high for a good 6-7 years or more now. Yes, i'm aware you can buy a laptop for $250. It's garbage. The trackpad will suck, the screen will suck, the OS will suck, etc. I've yet to use a PC laptop (and being the person who evaluates PC hardware purchase for my company, I see a lot) that feels as well engineered as a functional product as my 2011 Macbook Pro, at any price.
And this is where I am sure somebody will pull out some paper specs (which are largely irrelevant) claiming PC hardware superiority. Missing the point entirely.
So, now i've seen the keynote.... how does a new programming language, automatically synced application state between devices and seamless use of mobile network for calling from your mac strike you? Does any other company offer anything similar? No, thought not.
Why is this allegation constantly leveled at Apple? What have Samsung done? What has Google done? Fact is, revolutionary hardware or software doesn't come around very often. If Apple are doing such a poor job, what is your suggestion?
The mac mini is plenty for enterprise use, as is the MBA. The hardware is not the problem. It's the immaturity of enterprise management tools. No, macs don't need anywhere near as much IT management, but the enterprise will be slow to acknowledge that, and without proper enterprise management, they will not be readily accepted.
Yup. Guaranteed quality digital content (no crapshoot with downloading torrents), its relatively cheap ($2-$4 = not worth my time screwing around with dodgy rips), and if your internet connection is say 6-8 megabit or faster streaming is no problem at all.
I really believe that decent broadband will have a signifnicant impact on consumer storage. I would bet that most people with multiple tb of storage at home (note, not all - i'm sure there are exceptions, so don't both saying "i have a heap of legitimate content") are using it purely to store ripped or illegally downloaded media. Convenient, cheap streaming = bottom will drop out of the storage market.
I can buy content from itunes for similar price, not have to leave my home, and play it as many times as I want. I will never scratch the non-existent media, never lose it, and it will play on all of my devices. Sure if Apple goes broke i lose access to my media, but the chances of that happening are probably smaller than WW3 starting and us all being nuked back into the stone age.
Yup. The appletv is crying out for a controller - there are millions of iOS developers who would love to break into the home console market. The hardware is capable enough, it just needs the relevant gaming APIs. The fact that apple have recently done the game-related kits for iOS IMHO strongly suggests that gaming is definitely going to be more of a focus in future. A controller enabled AppleTV makes sense.
Also... to clarify, the resolution scaling I *have* seen "function" in windows 8.1 tends to make widgets and fonts clearly look like they are not rendered in native resolution. They look "off"... somewhat smudged/blurred. The worst is when you have two monitors, same pixel resolution but different physical size (e.g., my laptop's internal 15" 1920x1080 display, and a 22" 1920x1080 monitor). Windows insists on DPI scaling my laptop display, making text render badly, and windows re-size in relation to the portion of the screen they take up as i move them from monitor to monitor. I have tried to turn it off, this does not fix the problem.
Calling the resolution independence in Windows 8.1 "half baked" would be kind. I'm calling it crap.
I agree. For what I want to actually use a tablet for, I find the limitations of the iPad acceptable. This is the thing the android developers - mostly Samsung (and Microsoft) it appears, don't quite seem to get. Making something actually good doesn't just mean adding features. It can/does often mean stripping away extraneous crap that just gets in the way.
The latest smartwatch fad is a prime example. No, i don't want a camera on my watch. No, i don't want a web browser on my watch. No, i don't want the ability to send SMS from my watch. That is all bullshit stuff that I can already do far more easily on the phone or tablet that I already own.
Already happens... plenty of companies run Microsoft Online Protection for exchange (or whatever they call it this week) which scans all inbound and outbound mail for their domain. Oh, what you never consented to microsoft getting a copy of your files? Too bad...
Well, yes, a 4-5 year old machine is good enough for most people power wise, but it is 4-5 year old hardware with a shagged battery, hard drive, and old standards for RAM, etc.
The surface is aimed at exactly the market you describe: those who want a laptop for running WIndows, that they can also carry around easily and use in situations where a machine with a keyboard is just a pain in the arse. E.g.. walking around with it, on a plane, etc.
It doesn't really suit the home user market at all, but i don't think it is aimed at that so much. The enterprise is crying out for a decent machine that can run Windows on the move and is still touch friendly for the tablet-y type stuff an iPad is good at. The surface is almost there in my opinion, but Windows 8 misses the mark.
Re:Linux really does have serious issues
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Linux Sucks (Video)
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And in the last 20 years that I have you know... actually been running Linux, I still can't actually reliably decide to install Linux on a machine and have it work. I still can't reliably upgrade my kernel, and have X functionality survive the reboot. Yes, I can fix it. The fact that I have to, in 20-fucking-14 is a joke.
This is not intended to be primarily a content consumption device. If you want maximum screen real estate for running applications in minimum physical dimensions, you run close to square. Yes, it is not ideal from an aesthetics perspective or for running high definition media. Those are the trade-offs you make to get more usable screen area. By "content" i was not referring to multimedia.
It doesn't compare at all. I am a die hard apple fanboy myself, but they are two entirely different products. The MacBook air has a crappy resolution screen, no touch interface, and no win32 application compatibility.
You may not value those things, but those who the Surface Pro is aimed at, do. Some of those things can be added to an MBA at extra cost (e.g., a VM running Windows for Win32 apps), some of them put you in MBP-R territory (e.g., the high DPI screen) which is a larger, more expensive device) and some of them are simply not available in the one device.
And if you can't tell the difference between 1366x768 and 2160x1440 (or whatever the res is, i can't be arsed checking right now), you need to see an optometrist. Seriously. Text in particular is SO much more readable. 1024x768 on a 7" iPad mini screen is bad enough (and yes, I have one).
Same reason they don't have an Office Suite that actually works for mouse + keyboard reliably. Last version i tried, fired up base, create a new blank DB, create table, add field, primary key. Crash.
That's why. Clean install of Debian stable (i.e., presumably the version you would want to run in production, as recommended by the Debian team) from last year.
So you're saying that when I am running a classic app, I should bring up the virtual keyboard, hit windows key and... oh wait, that's the button on the front which brings up the start screen (there's no windows key on the virtual keyboard)...
You don't know what you're talking about and clearly haven't actually used a Surface Pro to do any work, as a touch-only device.
$300 android or even $1000 android tablet does not/can not compete in this space because it doesn't run x86/x64 based Windows. That's the Surface Pro's party trick - it runs Win32, whilst still offering the other tablet benefits. win32 compatibility for this box is everything. Without win32 compatibility, you have the Surface RT. Just look how well that sold.
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Hand-balling security to the end user, when 90% of end users are muppets will not work, as demonstrated by the malware success on the Windows platform. Android is the Windows XP of smartphones. The rest of the world has tried that approach for the past 30 years, seen that it is not viable, and moved on. End users are not, and will not ever be, or care to be security experts. Apple gets that. Microsoft is beginning to get that. Android fans who say that leaving security stuff to the end user do not get that. Yet. It will come.
Yes, if people haven't watched the keynote, you need to take Cook's comments in context. It was a light dig, said with a humorous tone whilst discussing sales numbers, os upgrade numbers and customer satisfaction survey results.
Exactly. In fact I'm pretty sure I recall Steve mentioning in an interview that he was lucky to have been there with Apple for 2 revolutionary products - the Apple II and the iPod - and that most companies are extremely lucky to ever see one revolutionary product get to market. Building your business model around reliably releasing revolutionary products year after year is setting yourself up for failure.
Not every release has to be a revolution. Simply making things better than the rest of the market, and selling them for a price those who want decent hardware will pay for has proven to be reasonably profitable.
No. Apple's business model is "don't build bargain basement crap". It just so happens that now and again, those "not bargain basement crap" items end up being groundbreaking, because plenty of other companies get to market first with garbage, or don't see the market at all.
Apple's prices haven't been high for a good 6-7 years or more now. Yes, i'm aware you can buy a laptop for $250. It's garbage. The trackpad will suck, the screen will suck, the OS will suck, etc. I've yet to use a PC laptop (and being the person who evaluates PC hardware purchase for my company, I see a lot) that feels as well engineered as a functional product as my 2011 Macbook Pro, at any price.
And this is where I am sure somebody will pull out some paper specs (which are largely irrelevant) claiming PC hardware superiority. Missing the point entirely.
So, now i've seen the keynote.... how does a new programming language, automatically synced application state between devices and seamless use of mobile network for calling from your mac strike you? Does any other company offer anything similar? No, thought not.
Why is this allegation constantly leveled at Apple? What have Samsung done? What has Google done? Fact is, revolutionary hardware or software doesn't come around very often. If Apple are doing such a poor job, what is your suggestion?
The mac mini is plenty for enterprise use, as is the MBA. The hardware is not the problem. It's the immaturity of enterprise management tools. No, macs don't need anywhere near as much IT management, but the enterprise will be slow to acknowledge that, and without proper enterprise management, they will not be readily accepted.
Yup. Guaranteed quality digital content (no crapshoot with downloading torrents), its relatively cheap ($2-$4 = not worth my time screwing around with dodgy rips), and if your internet connection is say 6-8 megabit or faster streaming is no problem at all.
I really believe that decent broadband will have a signifnicant impact on consumer storage. I would bet that most people with multiple tb of storage at home (note, not all - i'm sure there are exceptions, so don't both saying "i have a heap of legitimate content") are using it purely to store ripped or illegally downloaded media. Convenient, cheap streaming = bottom will drop out of the storage market.
I can buy content from itunes for similar price, not have to leave my home, and play it as many times as I want. I will never scratch the non-existent media, never lose it, and it will play on all of my devices. Sure if Apple goes broke i lose access to my media, but the chances of that happening are probably smaller than WW3 starting and us all being nuked back into the stone age.
Yup. The appletv is crying out for a controller - there are millions of iOS developers who would love to break into the home console market. The hardware is capable enough, it just needs the relevant gaming APIs. The fact that apple have recently done the game-related kits for iOS IMHO strongly suggests that gaming is definitely going to be more of a focus in future. A controller enabled AppleTV makes sense.
Also... to clarify, the resolution scaling I *have* seen "function" in windows 8.1 tends to make widgets and fonts clearly look like they are not rendered in native resolution. They look "off" ... somewhat smudged/blurred. The worst is when you have two monitors, same pixel resolution but different physical size (e.g., my laptop's internal 15" 1920x1080 display, and a 22" 1920x1080 monitor). Windows insists on DPI scaling my laptop display, making text render badly, and windows re-size in relation to the portion of the screen they take up as i move them from monitor to monitor. I have tried to turn it off, this does not fix the problem.
Calling the resolution independence in Windows 8.1 "half baked" would be kind. I'm calling it crap.
... without needing a physical keyboard (type/touch cover), i might add.
I agree. For what I want to actually use a tablet for, I find the limitations of the iPad acceptable. This is the thing the android developers - mostly Samsung (and Microsoft) it appears, don't quite seem to get. Making something actually good doesn't just mean adding features. It can/does often mean stripping away extraneous crap that just gets in the way.
The latest smartwatch fad is a prime example. No, i don't want a camera on my watch. No, i don't want a web browser on my watch. No, i don't want the ability to send SMS from my watch. That is all bullshit stuff that I can already do far more easily on the phone or tablet that I already own.
Windows 8.1, 2 months ago.
Sounds so much easier and comparable to pinching out...
Yeah because winkey + is SO much easier than pinching.
Already happens... plenty of companies run Microsoft Online Protection for exchange (or whatever they call it this week) which scans all inbound and outbound mail for their domain. Oh, what you never consented to microsoft getting a copy of your files? Too bad...
Nobody's making ME do it, but if i send any of the content i generate to others, there's nothing stopping them uploading my content, is there?
Well, yes, a 4-5 year old machine is good enough for most people power wise, but it is 4-5 year old hardware with a shagged battery, hard drive, and old standards for RAM, etc.
The surface is aimed at exactly the market you describe: those who want a laptop for running WIndows, that they can also carry around easily and use in situations where a machine with a keyboard is just a pain in the arse. E.g.. walking around with it, on a plane, etc.
It doesn't really suit the home user market at all, but i don't think it is aimed at that so much. The enterprise is crying out for a decent machine that can run Windows on the move and is still touch friendly for the tablet-y type stuff an iPad is good at. The surface is almost there in my opinion, but Windows 8 misses the mark.
And in the last 20 years that I have you know... actually been running Linux, I still can't actually reliably decide to install Linux on a machine and have it work. I still can't reliably upgrade my kernel, and have X functionality survive the reboot. Yes, I can fix it. The fact that I have to, in 20-fucking-14 is a joke.
This is not intended to be primarily a content consumption device. If you want maximum screen real estate for running applications in minimum physical dimensions, you run close to square. Yes, it is not ideal from an aesthetics perspective or for running high definition media. Those are the trade-offs you make to get more usable screen area. By "content" i was not referring to multimedia.
It doesn't compare at all. I am a die hard apple fanboy myself, but they are two entirely different products. The MacBook air has a crappy resolution screen, no touch interface, and no win32 application compatibility.
You may not value those things, but those who the Surface Pro is aimed at, do. Some of those things can be added to an MBA at extra cost (e.g., a VM running Windows for Win32 apps), some of them put you in MBP-R territory (e.g., the high DPI screen) which is a larger, more expensive device) and some of them are simply not available in the one device.
And if you can't tell the difference between 1366x768 and 2160x1440 (or whatever the res is, i can't be arsed checking right now), you need to see an optometrist. Seriously. Text in particular is SO much more readable. 1024x768 on a 7" iPad mini screen is bad enough (and yes, I have one).
Same reason they don't have an Office Suite that actually works for mouse + keyboard reliably. Last version i tried, fired up base, create a new blank DB, create table, add field, primary key. Crash.
That's why. Clean install of Debian stable (i.e., presumably the version you would want to run in production, as recommended by the Debian team) from last year.
So you're saying that when I am running a classic app, I should bring up the virtual keyboard, hit windows key and ... oh wait, that's the button on the front which brings up the start screen (there's no windows key on the virtual keyboard)...
You don't know what you're talking about and clearly haven't actually used a Surface Pro to do any work, as a touch-only device.
$300 android or even $1000 android tablet does not/can not compete in this space because it doesn't run x86/x64 based Windows. That's the Surface Pro's party trick - it runs Win32, whilst still offering the other tablet benefits. win32 compatibility for this box is everything. Without win32 compatibility, you have the Surface RT. Just look how well that sold.