As I've commented elsewhere in this thread, the eMac is mainly meant as a cheap Mac that can be sold to schools, as in K-12 schools, not colleges or universities. The eMac will do just fine for almost anything you need in that setting or situation. Websurfing, basic digital imaging, paper-writing, etc... It's not meant to be a game box or anything else. I am guessing that any eMac Apple sells to home users or businesses is just gravy and not expected.
Compared to a similarly-equipped PC, the eMac isn't a bad deal. Comparing it to your $400 stripped-down box isn't fair, as a stripped down Mac is not the same animal is your typical integrated-everything cheap DOS box.
While I don't necessarily agree with Apples overall product/pricing strategy, it's obvious that they aim the iMacs at general home users and the PowerMacs at power users and businesses. And it's also obvious that Apple either doesn't give a rip about, or has decided to not really compete in the gaming market.
The G4 chip *may* be inadequate for high-end video games and heavy-duty digital imaging, etc. However, saying that a 1.25 Ghz chip is outdated may come as a surprise to Linux/BSD/*nix users all around the globe. Sure, an Intel CPU at that speed may groan while trying to run XP and modern games, but that is more an indictment of the OS than the CPU.
Value means different things to different people. For some it's money-related, for others it's ease-of-use/quality-of-life types of things. Neither view is right or wrong. It's a matter of personal perspective to me. The hardcore gamer has a different idea of what value is compared to a person who's into graphics, movie editing, etc.
The eMac is what it is. If you pump enough RAM into it it will run OSX 10.3 just fine. You may not be able to play games and encode DVD's at the same time, but how many people really do those things at the same time anyway? For what you get, I think the eMac is reasonably priced. Not uber-cheap like the Dells and othe boxen people like to trot out, but for a low-end UNIX workstation (which is what it really is at this point) it's fine.
As others have commented, Apple is a hardware company at it's heart. Ipod discussions aside, they live and die by hardware sales, so they have no incentive to enter the bottom tier of the PC market where they can't compete with Dell et al. They offer what they and a fair number of other people consider to be an improved computer-using experience over what you may get with a low-end Windows box, and they charge a premium for it. Either you agree or you don't and you buy accordingly.
Re:The first ever "bargain" Mac
on
Apple Revises eMac
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Another thing for people to keep in mind is that this is the 'e'Mac.... as in educational. This box is not designed for power users or even 'prosumer' high-end home users. It's designed to be a relatively cheap computer that Apple can sell in bulk to school districts.
I'm a GenX-er, comfortably in my mid-30's, and i've bene playing computer games since the early 80's when my Apple II+ was da bomb. I don't care to watch TV, so playing games on my PC is my preferred way of unwinding after work, or entertaining myself while the wife is watching the tube or doing something else I'm not interested in.
Calling video games artistic expression might be a bit much, though. The main type of expression I see when walking through a LAN full of CS-ers is hardly what I'd call 'artistic'... more like 'profane'.:-)
Nothing is preventing smart game writers from creating games that include every possible package you could need....
Right... assuming that time, money and any sort of cost-based justification don't count.
I agree with the article. Until it becomes easy to set up and install 3D hardware acceleration for most video cards (speaking as a disgruntled ATI 9500 Pro owner), you haven't got a prayer of seeing too many games on Linux that aren't ports of games released earlier on other platforms.
Whether people like to hear it or not, successful games cost money and time, and making a living beats altruism 99 times out of 100 for most people... games developers included.
I have a friend that is in low-level management in their Sioux Falls complex, and his opinion is that the Gateway Country stores will close and that at least some Gateway-branded items will start working their way into Best Buy and other similar chains.
The Gateway stores were trying to be be what the Apple stores are. The intent was to be the point of Sale, but also to act as a repair drop-off site and as a training center. The training aspect never really took off, from what I'm told, and Gateway figures that they can save some major cash by closing down the stores and letting the big box stores do the selling for them.
That's all well and good, but somewhat beside the point. I am guessing though that you possess above-average computer skills like most/. readers, so someone such as yourself isn't the focus of what Raymond's article was addressing.
The average end-user still isn't willing to jump through the hoops necessary to get everything working fine with Linux. When my mom goes computer shopping, she could care less about computer mainboard chipsets, or even the brand/capabilities of the video card. As long as she would be forced to know all of that stuff (which she considers trivial at best), she will never adopt Linux as a computing platform no matter the other benefits she could gain from it. If I handed her the ATI Radeon Linux HOWTO, she would look at the first paragraph or two before her eyes glazed over, and then go to Best Buy and get a copy of Windows XP.
The majority of the consumer-oriented PCs sold today have a few technical selling points, CPU speed and RAM, usually. The percentage of people who care about the nuts and bolts of the inner workings of a PC are realtively small. I think that/. readers sometimes forget this here, since everyone who reads these pages probably has advanced computer knowledge of one sort or another.
If I was going to buy a new box specifically for Linux, I would have two lists: one for things I want, and one for specific pieces of hardware to avoid. Until Linux can clear the hump with this, which probably requires more buy-in and support from HW vendors, it will stay primarily in the domain of the computer enthusiast.
Please note that I'm not trying to bash Linux in general. I think it has great potential on the desktop once more of these issues are resolved.
Mandrake is easy to set up, yes. I would agree that it's one of the easiest Linux distros to set up. However, it has it's own foibles just like all the others, even though most of them are still based on the underlying OS and apps.
As long as Linux forces you to download kernel sources and recompile your kernel for specific pieces of hardware (Nforce2 and ATI video cards, anyone?), it will never expand much beyond the realm of computer geeks or those who have geeks as close friends/family.
I agree with the sentiments of others that have posted on this subject. I work at IT for my job, and I have no problems taing the time needed to configure hardware of software to operate just right. When I'm home, though, I have limited time to do computer-related things what with the wife, kids and other outside responsibilities. While Linux is fun to play with, between the configuration issues and random lockups I am not ready to switch over to it as my primary desktop at home.
I want my home desktops to just work so I can concentrate on programming, games, or whatever. Time I spend on configuring and troublshooting things eats into my productivity.
What I meant was that the beer was brewed with reaching/maintaining that alcohol content across multiple large batches, versus trying to brew anything that actually tasted like decent (IMO) beer.
And in Bud's view, if you have to pound 6 or 8 of their beers to get loaded due to the low alocohol volume, that just translates into more sales.
Indeed. Bud and it's ilk are brewed for alcohol content, not taste. That's why you have to drink it ice-cold, as it tends to taste like piss when it's warm.
I was shocked when I was in London a few years back and found out that Bud is a popular choice for young, trendy Londoners, and that they would actually pay a premium for that over the superior domestic beers that were available.
There are many better choices out there, both domestic (for Americans, at least) and imported.
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As I've commented elsewhere in this thread, the eMac is mainly meant as a cheap Mac that can be sold to schools, as in K-12 schools, not colleges or universities. The eMac will do just fine for almost anything you need in that setting or situation. Websurfing, basic digital imaging, paper-writing, etc... It's not meant to be a game box or anything else. I am guessing that any eMac Apple sells to home users or businesses is just gravy and not expected.
Compared to a similarly-equipped PC, the eMac isn't a bad deal. Comparing it to your $400 stripped-down box isn't fair, as a stripped down Mac is not the same animal is your typical integrated-everything cheap DOS box.
While I don't necessarily agree with Apples overall product/pricing strategy, it's obvious that they aim the iMacs at general home users and the PowerMacs at power users and businesses. And it's also obvious that Apple either doesn't give a rip about, or has decided to not really compete in the gaming market.
The G4 chip *may* be inadequate for high-end video games and heavy-duty digital imaging, etc. However, saying that a 1.25 Ghz chip is outdated may come as a surprise to Linux/BSD/*nix users all around the globe. Sure, an Intel CPU at that speed may groan while trying to run XP and modern games, but that is more an indictment of the OS than the CPU.
Value means different things to different people. For some it's money-related, for others it's ease-of-use/quality-of-life types of things. Neither view is right or wrong. It's a matter of personal perspective to me. The hardcore gamer has a different idea of what value is compared to a person who's into graphics, movie editing, etc.
The eMac is what it is. If you pump enough RAM into it it will run OSX 10.3 just fine. You may not be able to play games and encode DVD's at the same time, but how many people really do those things at the same time anyway? For what you get, I think the eMac is reasonably priced. Not uber-cheap like the Dells and othe boxen people like to trot out, but for a low-end UNIX workstation (which is what it really is at this point) it's fine.
As others have commented, Apple is a hardware company at it's heart. Ipod discussions aside, they live and die by hardware sales, so they have no incentive to enter the bottom tier of the PC market where they can't compete with Dell et al. They offer what they and a fair number of other people consider to be an improved computer-using experience over what you may get with a low-end Windows box, and they charge a premium for it. Either you agree or you don't and you buy accordingly.
Another thing for people to keep in mind is that this is the 'e'Mac.... as in educational. This box is not designed for power users or even 'prosumer' high-end home users. It's designed to be a relatively cheap computer that Apple can sell in bulk to school districts.
Since when did GenX become the establishment???
:-)
I'm a GenX-er, comfortably in my mid-30's, and i've bene playing computer games since the early 80's when my Apple II+ was da bomb. I don't care to watch TV, so playing games on my PC is my preferred way of unwinding after work, or entertaining myself while the wife is watching the tube or doing something else I'm not interested in.
Calling video games artistic expression might be a bit much, though. The main type of expression I see when walking through a LAN full of CS-ers is hardly what I'd call 'artistic'... more like 'profane'.
Right... assuming that time, money and any sort of cost-based justification don't count.
I agree with the article. Until it becomes easy to set up and install 3D hardware acceleration for most video cards (speaking as a disgruntled ATI 9500 Pro owner), you haven't got a prayer of seeing too many games on Linux that aren't ports of games released earlier on other platforms.
Whether people like to hear it or not, successful games cost money and time, and making a living beats altruism 99 times out of 100 for most people... games developers included.
That stuff's funny as hell, and if it got a late enough time slot it could easily be a winner on Tech TV or Spike TV or something like that.
Just don't put it on too late or your prospective audience will be too busy playing HALO to watch.
I have a friend that is in low-level management in their Sioux Falls complex, and his opinion is that the Gateway Country stores will close and that at least some Gateway-branded items will start working their way into Best Buy and other similar chains. The Gateway stores were trying to be be what the Apple stores are. The intent was to be the point of Sale, but also to act as a repair drop-off site and as a training center. The training aspect never really took off, from what I'm told, and Gateway figures that they can save some major cash by closing down the stores and letting the big box stores do the selling for them.
That's all well and good, but somewhat beside the point. I am guessing though that you possess above-average computer skills like most /. readers, so someone such as yourself isn't the focus of what Raymond's article was addressing.
/. readers sometimes forget this here, since everyone who reads these pages probably has advanced computer knowledge of one sort or another.
The average end-user still isn't willing to jump through the hoops necessary to get everything working fine with Linux. When my mom goes computer shopping, she could care less about computer mainboard chipsets, or even the brand/capabilities of the video card. As long as she would be forced to know all of that stuff (which she considers trivial at best), she will never adopt Linux as a computing platform no matter the other benefits she could gain from it. If I handed her the ATI Radeon Linux HOWTO, she would look at the first paragraph or two before her eyes glazed over, and then go to Best Buy and get a copy of Windows XP.
The majority of the consumer-oriented PCs sold today have a few technical selling points, CPU speed and RAM, usually. The percentage of people who care about the nuts and bolts of the inner workings of a PC are realtively small. I think that
If I was going to buy a new box specifically for Linux, I would have two lists: one for things I want, and one for specific pieces of hardware to avoid. Until Linux can clear the hump with this, which probably requires more buy-in and support from HW vendors, it will stay primarily in the domain of the computer enthusiast.
Please note that I'm not trying to bash Linux in general. I think it has great potential on the desktop once more of these issues are resolved.
Mandrake is easy to set up, yes. I would agree that it's one of the easiest Linux distros to set up. However, it has it's own foibles just like all the others, even though most of them are still based on the underlying OS and apps.
As long as Linux forces you to download kernel sources and recompile your kernel for specific pieces of hardware (Nforce2 and ATI video cards, anyone?), it will never expand much beyond the realm of computer geeks or those who have geeks as close friends/family.
I agree with the sentiments of others that have posted on this subject. I work at IT for my job, and I have no problems taing the time needed to configure hardware of software to operate just right. When I'm home, though, I have limited time to do computer-related things what with the wife, kids and other outside responsibilities. While Linux is fun to play with, between the configuration issues and random lockups I am not ready to switch over to it as my primary desktop at home.
I want my home desktops to just work so I can concentrate on programming, games, or whatever. Time I spend on configuring and troublshooting things eats into my productivity.
What I meant was that the beer was brewed with reaching/maintaining that alcohol content across multiple large batches, versus trying to brew anything that actually tasted like decent (IMO) beer. And in Bud's view, if you have to pound 6 or 8 of their beers to get loaded due to the low alocohol volume, that just translates into more sales.
Indeed. Bud and it's ilk are brewed for alcohol content, not taste. That's why you have to drink it ice-cold, as it tends to taste like piss when it's warm. I was shocked when I was in London a few years back and found out that Bud is a popular choice for young, trendy Londoners, and that they would actually pay a premium for that over the superior domestic beers that were available. There are many better choices out there, both domestic (for Americans, at least) and imported.
I guess this explains why RMS has more doctorates than I do.