Apple was only expected to roll out an Intel laptop, but Steve Jobs stunned the audience with a new desktop machine. “running 2-3 times faster than a G5.” AS the comapny chnges to Intel we’ll discover that all the claims for the superiority of the PowerPC will wane fast.
Complete report to follow.
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Dead expensive as ever.
I agree, thought the new macs would be revolutionary in the most important aspect, cost. Although 4 x power is a decent and well needed step up, for all the hype surrounding it this seems a little dissapointing.
I just got modded down 2 times for saying that the iMac design sucks since I can’t use the monitor for anything else but _THAT_ computer. I can’t use it on other computer nor I can use it to play XBox 360.
But hell it’s t3h c00l d3sign!
Although, business kudos for them. They found out a way to not only roll out a new processor, but not cannibalize their low end immediately. However, after researching the site, there are more programs that Rosetta (the emulation) does not support than previously expected.
Basically, they made a pro laptop that you’ve gotta go get new software if you’re a pro to use (from them). We just did the calculations and it would cost a bucket of money for us to upgrade to that laptop, and although faster, it’s not worth it, until it’s time to upgrade all our software and we’re not at the end of that use cycle.
If they had, as some had predicted, done the low end, they woulda totally killed their sales curve, but I can’t see huge, microsoft-threatening demand for a $2000 laptop. I love ’em, but to seriously compete with Microsoft they’re going to have to offer the laptops at a lower price point. But, they may never want to compete.
Interesting, but disappointing.
As much as some bit-heads like the “superior architecture” of the PowerPC, it is not hard to see why Apple finally switched – when the new dual-core chips are running faster than the single-core chips they are replacing.
Of course it also doesn’t hurt the perception of increased speed when the new iMacs have a ATI Radeon X1600 PCI Express-based graphics with 128MB GDDR3 memory. – which should help it “kick sand in the face” of my 2004-vintage iMac with an Nvidia 5200 w/64MB of ram. 🙂
I guess you better stick with Acer or eMachines
Good for them, now if only the price will come down….
Jeremiah — I’m curious about what Apple software you need to buy? I made the transition to OS X, last year, and most of what I’d been using [Adobe products as an example] had OS X versions on the CD.
Since I’d already dumped Office for OpenOffice, I only needed to move to NeoOffice. iLife was in the box and iWorks was $79. I spent another whole $40 on additional stuff.
I think it’s good stuff. Look at the laptop and what comes with it, and compare it to a similarly equipped model from anyone else. Given the spot in the CPU offerings from Intel right now, I think it’s a good deal. I’d buy one of these before anything from Dell or HP, and especially Alienware. And if I can dual-boot it… score.
I meant to go from the powerpc to the intel mac version of the software. I wouldn’t expect the windows version to just “work,” but I could be wrong.
http://www.apple.com/rosetta/
I’m straggling I’m sure abit, as I’m an Final Cut Express (non-HD) user, but I can’t even consider these apps until March 31st. And it basically means, as there is much omitted information, I need to buy Final Cut Studio.
“To get these deals, come back to Apple.com after February 1, 2006. Apple expects Universal application availability by March 31, 2006.”
And, if I spend $1299 today, I have to spend $49 when the upgrade comes out.
Someone dropped the rock. Make a pro laptop and not have the pro apps (that you make yourself) available. This reads to me like a pro using apples’ software can’t consider this laptop until March 31st.
Adobe may have stuff available, but it’s not on their site yet with that new “universal” icon (another bonehead move); I’m willing to bet anything that needs processing power or real-time output will need to be re-bought, probably for an upgrade fee (and I don’t always upgrade to the newest thing right away, and here’s where I’m gonna pay for it).
It would of been nice if Apple made a comprehensive list of what’s good to go today and what’s not, instead of just “check third party sites.”
Jeremiah did say “if you’re a pro”. Depending on what you’re a “pro” at, you could need to buy a new copy of Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Maya, ProTools, Framemaker, or whatever other expensive program you use in your business that also has a Mac port. (Did Adobe even port Audition to the Mac after buying it? I know of a couple smaller studios that used Cool Edit Pro and continued using it when it became Audition.)
More typical business users will have trouble replacing the random little vertical-market apps that people have written in VB (or better yet, Java but only released a Windows version anyway.) That’s where Rosetta comes in, hopefully… but it’d still be a couple years before I recommended any of my clients buy Macs, if ever.
Isn’t this a lot of ado about a little bit?
I use WordPress and it does exactly what I need. iWeb? Notice that it is tied to .Mac? I don’t have an .Mac account because I don’t think it is a good buy.
I think that Apple will have a difficult time selling MacBook Pro computers when Dell starts selling machines with the same parts. I’m betting that Dell comes in at under 70% of Apple’s price. It will look like a 50% price bump to buy the Apple. While the Apple will win on industrial design, I think it will not be a big seller outside of core Apple users.
The Apple applications that were being shown today don’t seem like a good deal for the cost.
It looks like a lot of Apple stuff is designed to tie people more closely to Apple and I think that strategy will backfire in the future. Some people are stone Apple fanatics and will buy anything with an Apple logo on it. There are others, like me, who have had Apples since the first Mac and try to buy judiciously.
I think that Apple will have a difficult time selling MacBook Pro computers when Dell starts selling machines with the same parts.
But, Apple could have an opportunity when XP users have to start migrating to Vista on any new PC they buy. If the transition from XP to Vista is not painless or cheap [software upgrade fees] people will have some incentive to at least consider Apple.
Of course, Apple probably won’t be in the computer business much longer – once the majority of their income is from selling songs, TV shows, and movies for download. 🙂
Mike Voice.
What incentive is there to move from Windows to OSX? I price PCs for people and they all use macs. Most of them are Mac OS9. I tell them it’s no problem to get a iMac or Mac mini for $1500 bucks or less… It’s cheap. But once you start buying the applications you need to reliably work in the new environment, plus factoring all the costs of me to test and UAT the environments before the actual switch, it’s comes to thousands more… PER PC…
So, why go from XP to OSX and rebuy everything you have when you can just buy a PC and install the apps you already have? PC’s are cheap… 500 bucks here and there difference… big deal. Software costs multiples more…
And if it’s industrial design you need… simple. Buy a Sony. Apple has tried to be Sony since it’s start…
I just got modded down 2 times for saying that the iMac design sucks since I can’t use the monitor for anything else but _THAT_ computer. I can’t use it on other computer nor I can use it to play XBox 360.
But hell it’s t3h c00l d3sign!
Comment by Luís Camacho
I should like to point out that Mac designs work for the mainstream. Their monitors (24-inch and 30-inch) are supported by other machines. You just need a card that support Dual Link TDMS. I have one of the newer Geforce 7800 series and those have DL standard. If you think its expensive to get a graphic card just so you can run a 30-inch/24-inch Apple display, well, if you can afford the display($2500/$1300 respectively), the card will be nothing.
Though, I think I might get one of those MacBook Pro (with Core Duo).
How long before X86 Windows is ported to the MAC now? It would be a swift (and easy) move by MS – fundementally turning Apple hardware into a commodity that is functionally identical to a Dell.
For the Apple user it would open up huge options in application choices and cause application developers to choose between focusing on Apple’s reletively small following, or targeting a much larger market.
What incentive is there to move from Windows to OSX?
No idea. I’ve just read about how some users are discouraged by the requirement to continually-upgrade their anti-virus software. Having seen how many software upgrades [and paying for new versions] have been required for osX, I had imagined there would also be some required for Vista – since it is a major upgrade.
But once you start buying the applications you need to reliably work in the new environment, plus factoring all the costs of me to test and UAT the environments before the actual switch, it’s comes to thousands more… PER PC…
Ahhh, now I see. I’m talking as a home user who has gotten along fine with buying iLife ’05 and Photoshop Elements 3. [and Photoshop, FinalCut Express, and DVD Studio Pro – before the annual upgrade-fee cycles wore me down].
A laptop user in a corporate networking environment would be more complicated – but I am amazed that it would be “thousands more”. [not that I doubt your statement – I have no reason to]
PC and reliable should not be used in the same sentence. Name, a 4 word reason to use a MAC, No Blue Screen of Death. I have a iMac and iBook and have not had to reboot either one due to “blue screen” like issues…EVER.
SL
I have three servers and laptop running Windows 2000, Windows 2003 and XP and have never had a BSOD. Whoopie! If you use good hardware and don’t stack them full of junk software and drivers you won’t get BSODs.
I have not seen a blue screen since I went with XP
Mike…
Yes, thousands… Quark, Photoshop, Filemaker, and Office are just four of the major components required for them. Not cheap either. I had to rebuild a PC for them and I asked for a list of the software they used daily. It was two pages long! I told them to screw any upgrade ideas and just let me fix the OS 9 on the dead PC and budget for an upgrade two years ahead. And I always give them a discount on my services cause they work with the art community and are always trying to get resources to just pay the bills.
SL…
MACS don’t get BSOD, but they DO get a funky multi-lingual GSOD, and I’ve seen it plenty of times. In our corp environment, on one day alone we had to rebuild 10 Mini macs. And these are single app PC’s! MAC’s look good, but software is universally shitty whichever side of the pond you’re throwing rocks from. Oh, and we only have a few dozens macs, so the percentage of failure for them is very high… greater than 15%.
In case you’d rather watch the keynote instead of our comments about it — it’s up at http://macworld.apple.com.edgesuite.net/mw/index.html
Oh, and Paul — I didn’t notice Jobs using “stunning” especially. Any soccer fan who watches Steven and Nick on FFF will, however, twinge every time he says, “Boom!”.
Mike…
Yes, thousands… Quark, Photoshop, Filemaker, and Office are just four of the major components required for them.
Understood. I only had to think about the price for Adobe’s CS2 to have a better understanding of why some people would be foolish to “change horses in the middle of the stream”.
No matter which horse they are currently riding. 🙂
The new iMac seems to be a great bargin… No need for Universal Binary Pro apps on the consumer iMac.. Huge upgrade from x600 to x1600 graphics… Impressive..
Of the 2 Intel Macs introduced, the iMac is the one that for me, wasn’t *downgraded*…
The Intel PowerBook (who’s the idiot that decided to do away with millions of $$$ of marketing and brand awareness and came up with MacBook Pro?) is missing so many things that as a laptop user I *NEED* that it is a significant *DOWNGRADE* from the PowerBook G4…
oooo it’s faster.. Great, about damn time, but what about features road warriors *need*?
No Firewire 800… The lack of Firewire 800 is disappointing.. So, I buy the new IntelBook and see *less* performance with my ext. drives? I could go out and buy a Firewire 800 PC Card… Oh..
No Cardbus support… If they had kept the PC Card/Cardbus standard, I could add a Firewire 800 card, but, no. The ExpressCard size they offer support for is the smaller of 2 card sizes… If the larger format card had been supported, we’d have S-ATA and Firewire cards already available.. Searching the ExpressCard site, reveals many interesting ExpressCard/54 cards, but none will work with this new “Pro” Mac laptop… So now what? We buy the latest, greatest Apple “Pro” machine and not use our “Pro” accessories to their specs?
Downgraded Superdrive? The new Powe.. MacBook Pro no longer offers a high speed dual-layer SuperDrive? Again, I thought this was supposed to be an *upgrade*???
No modem? Um, great… I guess Jobs never travels outside a WiFi cloud, but for the majority of road warriors, that just isn’t the case! Now when I and my belongings are being strip searched by TSA, I have to worry about the small white piece of plastic (Apple’s $49 usb modem) getting lost? Who’s the brainiac that came up with this one?
No S-Video out? Great, so now I can’t connect the laptop to my clients TVs they have in their conference rooms without *gasp* some kind of 3rd party adaptor I’ll need to lug around? Again, isn’t this supposed to be Apple’s latest and *GREATEST* “PRO” laptop??? And they’re *removing* features? This isn’t the iBook Steve, it’s the *POWERBOOK*! Apple’s *PRO* laptop!!!
While this laptop may be faster than stink, in all other ways, it just plain stinks. The lack of attention to the *needs* of the potential users of this product is the kind of thing I’d expect from Micro$oft, or Dell.. Not Apple.
ok. it´s an old thread, but I just have to say this:
I´ve alway been amazed by the PC vs. Apple paradox.
The mac should be the perfect “home” computer, given the ease of use. but it´s more expensive than the PC bit by bit.
The PC is still a bit like a “Popular Mechanics” kind of machine, so it would only appeal to enthusiasts or Pros…
The paradox here is that “home” users, that need simple to use machines, buy PC because they are affordable and because all their friends have PC and therefore can share easily (tips, mostly…).
The Pros, who have the resources and should have the skill to use the machine better suited to the task, buy Macs because they are cooler, not because they are better.
The bottom line is: with this move of Apple (intel inside) the only argument it has to sell boxes is quality (OS and Machine, both).
So, I guess the average employee of any other big company will still be using that Dell or HP machine, because he couldn´t care less and the company does the buying…
every designer, musician or video pro (media pros in general) will still be buying Macs because they look nice, and are more easy on these less “techie” minds.
And the rest will still be buying PC because, let´s face it, are enthusiasts and are into games and the PC still has the “tinkering” advantage.
So, the world will spin and this will be a hiccup on history.
Apple still has the same cards that used to have, and PC will be sold by the millions to fill the desktops of corporations…
Or, in other words:
Everything has to change so that everything stays the same.
PS. Ask yourself: do I really need to “crossgrade” to the same platform?
And ask again: A Dell is it really cheaper than a Mac?
I think “just me” hit it. It’s designed for a pro market, but doesn’t have the features pros have come to know. I didn’t even see the lack of dual-layer support, or thought about the fact I use that s-video out quite a bit like you do. I just assumed it would be there.
Upon closer inspection, this laptop should be called the “macbook pro-sumer.” Some cool stuff, but not really all you would want. And not worth $2,000, considering other options out there. If I want rediculous speed and need to render two hours of footage from DV to H.264, that’s what I have a tower for. If I’m on the road, using a laptop, I want functionality and flexibility, and am willing to give up some speed for it. “Chickens on the land, fish in the sea, not chickens in the sea” as Seinfeld would say.
I’m a big mac fan, my experience is they do cost less in the long run, and I think they dropped the ball on this one. You won’t see me “upgrading” till they get this right.
I was just thinking about how I haven’t read the term “Osborne Effect” in awhile.
Last June it was the “conventional wisdom” that Apple was hurting itself by announcing the Intel-based macs 1-year ahead of delivery – since it would devastate sales of their PowerPC-based computers. Apple was supposed to be in danger of financial ruin. 🙂
I don’t really understand the explicit devotion of the Apple crowd except as a response to M$. Apple deserves praise over M$ but with all it’s consistent attempts to proprietorize it’s stuff, it really is nothing more than a more reliable mini-Microsoft. It overcharges and tries to force you into proprietary formats just like the “evil” empire of M$. It has never and will increasingly do less to improve interaction among differing devices that it doesn’t have a patent on or it’s name so why isn’t there more support for Linux from these Apple “heads”? Do they like spending more money or think that Apple, Inc is a more customer oriented company than M$? I understand the application investment point but this seems to be a fight over which Dictator is better while ignoring the fact that a strong “freedom” movement is at hand and needs supporters and allies to build more momentum and strength. Because, no matter how good Apple is, an equally good Linux will beat it hands down every time because of the Open format. My point is to look towards a better future rather than arguing who’s Master is better. Be a part of the Linux “Underground Railroad” rather than a member yelling from the “cattle cars”.