R.I.P., Macintosh?

[penguinfromdeep]

What a load of bull .. only baseless speculation, it doesn't make any sense, for the reasons Zerocrossing mentioned (was just going to post about the same thing)

[UltraJv]

Steve hasnt said "Dont panic, despite rumours the Mac range is safe" He basically said "The PC era of mouse/keyboard is over and theres no money in it for Apple" - why hasnt he re-assured Mac owners?

[ZenPunkHippy]

Of course my question was "loaded" ... because development is the one area that most obviously requires a "real Mac' and not some iTouch thing. Laptops might be "OK" but I think build times would become uncomfortable enough for devs to start whining, including those that work for Apple directly.

His "end of PC era" statement ... IMO, pure hyperbole - a dig at MS, and a marketing ploy designed to rev up sales for the latest iPad / iPhone.

Peace,
Andy.

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

why hasnt he re-assured Mac owners?

read through the thread again....do mac owners seem to need reassurance ???

as justin3am said, it will be quite a quick changeover if it does go breasts-up...the only thing i use, music wise, that doesn't have a pc version is logic pro...

maybe there is a fully working pc boot of logic, just waiting to be unlocked...it has been recoded since 5.5.1 and is at the same stage as on the mac.....this might explain why logic updates seem to take so long and some devs think it is so bloated

[headquest]

Steve hasnt said "Dont panic, despite rumours the Mac range is safe" He basically said "The PC era of mouse/keyboard is over and theres no money in it for Apple" - why hasnt he re-assured Mac owners?

I think hs'e jumped the gun anyway... sure, in ten years we might have moved away from desktop computers, but I suspect that transition would take a very long time. There are lots of issues to address (e.g. the perception of users "owning" their material rather than Apple/etc owning it). More importantly, it will be a time before iPad/etc can genuinely replace a proper computer.

For example, recording studios have taken years to move away from hardware based solutions to computer based ones; I don't think they would now jump to a "cloud" based solution, and certainly not until the technology is a lot more capable and compelling.

It may be great to be first out of the door with tomorrow's technology, but there are requirements that most customers have for TODAY. It's the same with Flash for example - yes it may eventually be replaced by HTML5, but FOR NOW it's a "must have", and no amount of grandstanding will alter that.

So the real question is this: what will Apple do in the meantime? Either they have a great new disign around the corner, with multitouch support/etc to compete with the rest of the market, or they are going to look increasingly old fashioned.

Apple's computer range is no longer as state of the art as it was three years ago, the basic design hasn't changed for some years and looks like "yesterday's machines" on the shelves next to newer all-in-one PCs, Windows 7 machines are starting to get far more Product Placement like Apple used to get three years ago, and sales figures reveal that Apple's market-share in home computers is now in decline. Upgrading the processor in yesterday's model is fair enough, but it still looks as old as it did last week and last year.

Just at the moment then, the impression I get is that they want to stay in the market, but are seriously overestimating the speed with which we will ditch home computing. I think competition is a good thing, and I hope Apple come back in terms of computers, or else the other manufacturers will have less incentive to improve.

[Compyfox]

Seriously... do I get an answer now or not?

Will I get OSX natively on my i7 PC, or do I still need to hax0r it?

Everything else is rejectable.

[kilon]

This whole "Mac is dead because of ipad" thread, makes no sense because iPad

IS NOT

a) a desktop computer. See macpro

b) a compact desktop computer. See iMAC / mac min

b) a laptop computer. See macbook / macbook pro

c) not even a netbook (no available mac product, maybe macair)

d) a smart phone . See iphone

e) a pda. See ipod touch.

So I fail to see how its capable to kill anything that Apple makes. Actually Steve Jobs himslef in the ipad Keynote specific told that this a completely new category of device. According to Jobs is something between a pda and a netbook. So according to Jobs its not even a netbook, so who will dare to compare it with a mac ?

In the end macs offer two huge advantages over ipad. Processing power which is nigh and day compared to ipad or pc netbooks. And complete OS , which ipad does not have.

So its pretty hard for the ipad to steal macs thunder , maybe in worst case scenario, take away some users. But those users wanting such a limited tool as ipad, are probably users that upgrade and buying mac once a decade.

I still find ipad lovely tool, that can be extrmely useful depending on the situation, but calling it "mac killer" or anything similar , is abit... cookoo!!!

And ipads success does not kill mac, on the contrary makes the most popular computers in the world even more popular.

[egbert]

maybe there is a fully working pc boot of logic, just waiting to be unlocked...it has been recoded since 5.5.1 and is at the same stage as on the mac.....this might explain why logic updates seem to take so long and some devs think it is so bloated

The devs who worked on the PC version were let go after Steve hit the fan and some went to work on Samplitude. Now that the program runs on Intel hardware it could be that porting is not such a big deal but I doubt that resources have been expended on a hidden version.

Steve is like a kid in some ways - he's only interested in his very latest toys - and they become the focus of all the love. When Apple released their $350 plastic speakers for iPods a while back Steve (you know, a billionaire who likes gizmos) said he liked them more than his stereo (cough). If the lion's share of Apple's income comes from the iThings division then the business case for the PC division becomes a little tenuous. If IBM can walk away from selling PCs surely Apple can (and the Mac is manifestly a Personal Computer so don't nobody get cute). I think the thing is to work out which markets are going to be commodity markets in the near future. It is often said that iPods are going to be nowhere pretty soon in a world full of phones and other devices with the same capabilities and a lot more. The profitability of phones and pads looks better.

[whyterabbyt]

This whole "Mac is dead because of ipad" thread, makes no sense because iPad

IS NOT

a) a desktop computer. See macpro

b) a compact desktop computer. See iMAC / mac min

b) a laptop computer. See macbook / macbook pro

c) not even a netbook (no available mac product, maybe macair)

d) a smart phone . See iphone

e) a pda. See ipod touch.

So? PCs werent mainframes or minicomputers. And yet...

Not that its about some sort of direct one-for-one replacement in the first place. Its about Apple's intent, ie what they will do, not what they could do

[jupiter8]

Seriously... do I get an answer now or not?

Will I get OSX natively on my i7 PC

As i already mentioned,they did that in the past and it nearly destroyed the company. The first thing Steve Jobs did was to kill the clones. No one knows for sure. What do you think ? Seems like a pretty safe bet that they won't,to me but then i'm special.

or do I still need to hax0r it?

I'm not sure i'm allowed to say. Forum rules and whatnot.

[kilon]

This whole "Mac is dead because of ipad" thread, makes no sense because iPad

IS NOT

a) a desktop computer. See macpro

b) a compact desktop computer. See iMAC / mac min

b) a laptop computer. See macbook / macbook pro

c) not even a netbook (no available mac product, maybe macair)

d) a smart phone . See iphone

e) a pda. See ipod touch.

So? PCs werent mainframes or minicomputers. And yet...

So how can it replace something it cant even compete with ?

its too weak to be a macpro/imac/macmini/macbook/macbook pro and too big to be a pda/iphone/ipod.

How can it kill a MAC ?

[jonnyG]

How can it kill a MAC ?

Cloud computing. Not yet, but one day maybe. That is if you are happy having your personal data and your processing ability on some remote server.

[whyterabbyt]

So how can it replace something it cant even compete with ?

its too weak to be a macpro/imac/macmini/macbook/macbook pro and too big to be a pda/iphone/ipod.

How can it kill a MAC ?

is it that you can't extrapolate what Im talking about from what happened with mainframes and minicomputers when PCs started coming out, or that you just dont want to?

[kilon]

So how can it replace something it cant even compete with ?

its too weak to be a macpro/imac/macmini/macbook/macbook pro and too big to be a pda/iphone/ipod.

How can it kill a MAC ?

is it that you can't extrapolate what Im talking about from what happened with mainframes and minicomputers when PCs started coming out, or that you just dont want to?

no I cant , cause at that time I started on computers , I was deep into home computers like Amiga 500 and my Amstrad CPC 6128 so I never really followed the pc evolution before 286 models , my first pc was 486 dx at 60 hz. And I never really followed the mainframe and minicomputer thingy. So you will need to use another example to explain yourself properly.

[eduardo_b]

Scanned the dozen pages and wondered if anyone noted that Apple gets about 20 percent of its revenue from desktop sales, the rest from everything else. Of course, that 20 percent is still a nice number and justifies the continued development and sale of these systems. Nothing else Apple makes does what they can do.