Where No Mac Has Gone Before

Three months ago it looked like a risky move: the iMac would use the universal serial bus (USB), but not ADB, SCSI, or a standard Mac serial port.

Although Microsoft and Intel have promoted USB, and the vast army of cloners have been building USB into their computers, I don't know of one computer that dropped the standard serial and parallel ports every Wintel user expects.

Which means that despite the widespread presence of USB on modern Wintel boxes, and OS support in Windows, there hasn't been a whole lot of USB hardware.

So what does Apple do? It forces the issue.

With the same chutzpah seen in leaving out the floppy drive, Apple has gone where no computer has gone before: into the land of USB only.

Despite the efforts of Microsoft, Intel, and others, it was tiny, innovative, thinking different Apple that forced the peripheral industry to move into USB country.

After all, if Apple sells a half-million (or even a million) iMacs this year, that's a lot of people who won't be able to buy your printer, scanner, trackball, or drive -- unless you adopt USB.

Apple at first pushed USB as an industry standard, but the iMac will do more to create a USB market and allow USB to become the perceived standard than all the Wintel boxes with USB ports combined.

Even thought the Windows world will be the primary beneficiary of USB in the long run, little old Apple's the one pushing the envelope.

Ironic, isn't it, that a company with less than 10% market share carries this much weight.

Dan Knight , webmaster
the iMac channel

Related reading

• FireWire: connection of the (near) future, MacTimes
• USB, good enough for the low end, Online Tech Journal
• USB and the OfficeJet, the iMac channel
• Why USB is a good thing, the iMac channel

Recent Content on Low End Mac

• OS X More Efficient than Linux, Snow Leopard and PowerPC Macs, and Eudora Woes, Charles W. Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 12.03. A user reports both Panther and Leopard run more smoothly and use memory more efficiently than Linux. Also thoughts on PowerPC abandonment in Snow Leopard and replacing Eudora in Leopard.
• The Leopard Experience at 867 MHz, Simon Royal, Mac Spectrum, 12.02. Mac OS X 10.5 requires an 867 MHz G4 with 512 MB of memory, but is performance really acceptable on a minimum spec system?
• A Used 17" PowerBook as a Budget Notebook Alternative, Charles W. Moore, 'Book Value, 12.02. Sure, you can buy a refurbished 13.3" MacBook for under $900, but you could also have an expansive, feature laden 17" PowerBook in the same price range.

Latest Deals on Low End Mac

• More links in our archive.

Go to the iMac channel home page.

Low End Mac was started on 1997.04.07. The iMac Channel est'd 1998.06.06. This page and the entire Low End Mac site copyright ©1997-2004 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. Copyright for individual articles resides with the author. All rights reserved.

Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Computers are like that. Please report errors to Dan Knight .

Letters sent to Low End Mac may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Email addresses will not be published unless the sender specifically requests it. If you prefer that your message not be published on Low End Mac, clearly mark your message "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.

LINK POLICY: This site allows and encourages links to any public page, so long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking the linked page.

PRIVACY POLICY: In brief, we don't collect any personal information unless you subscribe to one of our email lists, in which case you have to give us your email address.

Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Computer, Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iMac, and iBook are registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of the individual companies and are hereby acknowledged.