Low End Mac Reader Specials

TypeStyler For Mac OS X is Now Shipping! Download The Free Fully Functional 60 Day Tryout at www.typestyler.com

Don't install Parallels to play poker online! Poker Mac will show you how to download and install a native Mac poker application such as Full Tilt Poker Mac.

Laptop Hardware Provided by TechRestore - Overnight Mac & iPod Repairs.

Compare products like desktop computers, apple laptops, apple macs, and LCD Monitors side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for new mobile phones, sat nav systems, or MP3 players. The Ciao online shopping community makes searching products easy for you.

Mac Musings

Is Apple Really Back?

Dan Knight - 22 May 1998 - Tip Jar

In his article, Apple Offers Sizzle in Forbes Digital, Michael Noer asks, "Is Apple really back?"

Despite claims by Steve Jobs and the fact that Apple Computer is the sweetheart stock of 1998, Noer maintains that Apple is not back. Instead, he claims it is dying.

Noer notes that Apple's sales peaked at $11 billion in 1995, the year after it began licensing clones and Power Computing started selling them. Since then, in no small part due to the clone market (sometimes estimated at up to 30% of all Mac OS sales), Apple's sales dropped.

Realizing it had shot itself in the foot, Apple under Steve Jobs bought out the Power Computing license. Motorola pulled out of the Mac OS market. Only Umax remained, and their license expires this summer.

In addition to the cost of buying our Power Computing, Apple had to contend with fire sales on Power Computing and Motorola clones, plus the low priced line of Umax computers. No wonder Apple's market share fell - but can anyone tell me what the Mac OS market share was for 4th quarter 1997?

Noer grudgingly concedes that Apple's market share grew from 3.6% to 4.0%, calling a 10% improvement, "a tiny bump." With only one competitor and most of the Power Computing and Motorola clones out of the distribution chain, Apple is finally able to increase its own market share.

But what Noer and most nay-sayers ignore is the longevity of Macintosh computers. Even if Apple isn't selling as many as they'd like, a lot of us are still using our three, five, and even ten year old Macs, still buying software, and still hoping to someday buy a G3. Even if current sales are only 4% of the market, the installed base puts Mac software somewhere in the range of 20%.

On top of that, the #1 software product last summer (and possibly for all of 1997) was Mac OS 8, a fact conveniently ignored in Noer's article.

Noer then goes on to compare Apple's profits for the past two quarters with those of Dell (which sells directly to users, not through retail stores) and Microsoft (which really isn't in the hardware business, except for mice). What of beleaguered hardware companies like Compaq and Intel?

Next Noer goes off on an obscure tangent: the ability to play Ultima Online. Sorry, but I don't see the connection. Besides, people who really need or want to run Windows and DOS (and even OS/2 and Intel-specific versions of unix) software on the Mac have the options of Virtual PC, SoftWindows, and full-blown PC-on-a-card DOS cards.

Then he notes that Dragon NaturallySpeaking won't run on a Mac, nor will IBM's speech recognition software. Excuse me, Mr. Noer, but Apple pioneered speech recognition with the Centris 660av and Quadra 840av back in 1993. Granted, Apple didn't market it well, nor did it catch on as a very practical feature.

"Fact is, if you want to use your computer for much of anything beyond word processing, number crunching or surfing the web, having an Apple computer is an enormous liability. And getting worse."

Odd, most people don't perceive the Mac as a great number crunching machine (although it is - just look at those Byte scores). However, they all note that it is #1 in the graphics world, the publishing industry, and for internet development. It still dominates in schools.

So what if Adobe is making more money selling Windows product than Mac product. Considering that perhaps 80% of the computers out there run Windows, we'd expect that. What's amazing is that such a huge chunk of Adobe profits come from the less popular computing platform.

And the Mac OS is easier to develop for and more user friendly - as Mac lovers noted after watching Bill Gates grimace at the Windows 98 Plug-N-Play demo a few weeks ago.

At the core, Michael Noer simply misunderstands the nature of the Macintosh. There is real value in controlling both the hardware and the operating system, as Microsoft's hordes of programmers have realized for years. There is something special about a computer that sees and mounts a floppy disk or CD-ROM all by itself, that gives disks names instead of letters, that allows you to do something as simple as customize the icon for a folder, that doesn't make you go to a Start menu when you want to shut down the computer.

The Mac has always been the computer of choice for those who want the easiest, more friendly, best finessed operating system on a personal computer. Without the clever integration of software and hardware, the Mac would be just another box and the Mac OS just another operating system.

Instead, they remain a goal Microsoft can only dream of matching with the next version of Windows - maybe.

And, by the way, Apple never left.

Dan Knight has been using Macs since 1986, sold Macs for several years, supported them for many more years, and has been publishing Low End Mac since April 1997. If you find Dan's articles helpful, please consider making a donation to his tip jar.

Recent Mac Musings

Why Is Apple Ditching Netbook Support Now?, 11.16. Mac OS X 10.6.2 deliberately removes Atom support. What does Apple have to gain by doing so?
IDE Is Dead; Long Live SATA!, 11.04. SATA has displaced parallel ATA. While IDE hard drives haven't disappeared, the best deals are in SATA hard drives.
The Future of Personal Computing: Personal Servers and Low Cost Portables, 11.02. With WiFi everywhere, virtual network computing, and remote access, your iPhone, iTouch, iTablet, or MacBook Air becomes a gateway to your home or office computer.
The Late 2009 Mac mini Value Equation, 10.21. We called the Mac mini 'the best value in desktop Macs' two months ago, and the refreshed Mac mini only improves that value.
More in the Mac Musings index.

Links for the Day

Mac of the Day: 17" MacBook Pro Core Duo, Apr. 2006 - The top-end MacBook Pro includes a 1680 x 1050, 2.16 GHz Core Duo CPU, and supports Apple 30" Cinema Display.
Group of the Day: G4 List is for those using Power Mac G4s or G4 upgrades.
Support Low End Mac

Recent Deals

Best iPod nano Deals, 11.25. Refurb 8 GB 4G nano, $99; new, $126; refurb 16 GB, $129; new, $150; new 5G/8 GB, $134.60; 16 GB, $161.12. Shipping included.
Best Classic Mac OS Deals, 11.25. System 6.0.8 floppies, $10; 7.1, $12; 7.5, $20; 7.6 $13; 8.1, $11; 8.5, $20; 8.6, $90; 9.0, $20; 9.2.2, $30.
Best 15" PowerBook G4 Deals, 11.25. Used 1 GHz Combo, $400; 1.5 GHz SuperDrive, $449; 1.67 GHz hi-res, $600.
Best G4 iMac Deals, 11.24. Used 15" 700 MHz CD-RW, $150; 800 MHz Combo, $229; 1 GHz, $289; 17" 1.25 GHz, $200; 20" 1.25 GHz, $509.
Best MacBook Air Deals, 11.24. Used from $899; refurb from $1,099; new 1.6 GHz/120 HD, $1,150 after rebate; 1.8/64 SSD, $1,150 a/r; 1.86/128 SSD, $1,350 a/r; 2.13/128 SSD, $1,694 a/r.
Best PowerBook G3 Deals, 11.24. Used 233 MHz WallStreet, $75; 266 MHz, $160; 400 MHz Lombard, $199; 400 MHz Pismo, $289; 500 MHz, $350.
Best 12" PowerBook G4 Deals, 11.23. Used 867 MHz SuperDrive, $348; 1 GHz Combo, $379; SD, $519; 1.33 GHz, $529; 1.5 GHz Combo, $549; SuperDrive, $609.
Best Mac Pro Deals, 11.23. Used 2.66 GHz 4-core, $1,300; 3.0 4-core. $1,919; refurb 2.66 4-core Nehalem, $2,149; 2.93, $2,549; 2.93 8-core, $4,999; new 2.26 8-core, $2,290.
Best Time Capsule and AirPort Deals, 11.23. Used 802.11g AirPort Extreme, $49; 500 GB Time Capsule, $150; new, $190; 1 TB dual-band, $280; 2 TB, $469; 802.11n AirPort Extreme, $170.
More deals in our archive.

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2009 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, iPhone, PowerBook, MacBook, MagSafe, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.