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Tangerine Fusion

Cease and Desist, Apple-Palm Fans!

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Download Typestyler, still the Ultimate Styling Tool for Internet, Print and Video Graphics. Works great in Classic with a Native OS X Version on the way. Free Tryout: www.typestyler.com

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OWC: NewerTech miniStack FireWire/USB 2.0 HD & Hub Up to 1.0TB of Performance Storage + FW/USB2 Powered Hubs - convenient & sleek 6.5" x 6.5" x 1.5" Featured: 500GB $169.99; 750GB $209.99; 1.0TB $339.99

Mac users can finally play Party Poker for Mac. Not only that, they can also learn how to play PokerStars for Mac.

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

Compare products like desktop computers, laptops, and LCD TVs side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for a new cell phone GPS products or MP3 players. The Ciao network makes searching products easy for you.

MacBook/MacBook Pro / MacMini / iMac Intel Core2 DUO DDR2 667Mhz 4GB Kit $84, 3GB Kit $60, 2GB Kit $40 1GB $20. Click to Maximize your Macs...

- 2000.06.20

We all know that the Newton, once Apple got all the kinks out, was a fantastic platform. And we all know that Palm, despite it's numerous former Apple developers, doesn't have such great Mac support. And we know that the Palm OS allows for competitive models from other manufacturers - the Handspring Visor is living proof of that.

You can't wait for Apple and Palm's new PDA, can you?

Dream on! It ain't gonna happen. Phil Schiller said so himself at WWDC 2000. But Apple doesn't ever comment about future products, even when there aren't necessarily plans to make them, right? Why was Phil so upfront?

Simple. The Apple-Palm PDA rumor hurt Palm and Handspring sales. Notice I said rumor, but it wasn't even a rumor at all! According to David Pogue, in his February 2000 Desktop Critic column, the Apple palmtop started as an April Fool's joke! But the big rumor sites like Mac OS Rumors and Go2Mac turned it into a forthcoming product, to boost visitors, and, thus, ad revenue.

The Apple PDA rumor hurt sales of other PDAs considerably, because most Mac-using prospective PDA buyers chose to wait for the Apple model rather than springing for a Palm or Handspring. Apple doesn't want to hurt PDA sales, because then Palm and Handspring would be less enthusiastic about supporting the Mac. Microsoft has a similar issue with its competing PocketPC line, although Windows users account for the vast majority of Palm and Handspring sales, so the two companies surely wouldn't want to drop Microsoft OS support.

Why isn't Apple making a PDA?

First, many of Palm and Handspring's models are fantastic products, and Apple would be competing with them and with PocketPCs. Second, the Newton was a commercial flop. Although this was mainly attributed to Apple's terrible marketing and releasing the MessagePad long before it was actually finished, Apple is still sour about the PDA, (whose P in the acronym stood for "Pioneering") and doesn't want to make the same mistakes twice. Third, such a unit would completely disagree with Apple's marketing strategies. Due to its size and component limitations, it would require its own OS, which does not fit Apple's one-OS strategy. Also, it doesn't fall into Apple's four-box scheme, not even in the Beyond-the-Box zone. (See Beyond The Box? for more info.) It's simply too much of a niche product to benefit Apple.

So if you want an Apple-branded PDA (and you have big pockets,) got find yourself a used Newton MessagePad. They're fantastic products.

If you want something smaller and more organizer-y, go buy a Palm organizer or a Handspring Visor.

If you still believe in rumors, by all means, wait until January for the forthcoming iPalm, with a semi-reflective and sub-pixel rendering LED screen with standard XGA resolution, Mac OS X Lite, the Transmeta-designed G4ex running at 900 MHz, a small nuclear fission cell that lasts for 10,000+ hours, and a backup BayGen Freeplay generator in case the fission cell melts down. All for the fantastic price of $69!

Kinda makes you feel ripped off paying that much for a USB hub, doesn't it?

Recent Content on Low End Mac

  • Mac Pro overclocking, Windependence with Darwine, Blu-ray for Macs, and more, Mac News Review, 07.04. Also more on running Leopard on non-Apple hardware, Ubuntu on a Mac mini, the first autofocus webcam with Zeiss optics for Macs, and more.
  • Wouldn't life be great with an iSlate?, John Hatchett, Recycled Computing, 07.04. PDAs and smartphones are too small for some tasks, full-fledged Tablet PCs are overkill, and ebook readers are too limited. Apple has the tech to own this niche.
  • Mac of the Day: Blue & White Power Mac G3, Jan. 1999 - The most colorful Power Mac introduced an innovative 'drawbridge' enclosure.
  • List of the Day: SuperMacs is for those using Umax SuperMac clones.
  • July 5 in LEM history: 98: The iMac: First of a family? - iMac Perfect for schools - 00: Apple is not your friend - 01: 75 Mac Advantages - Do you trust me? - 02: The joy of X with Classic - The good, the bad, and the intrusive - 05: No Quartz Extreme for Pismo - A brief history of NeXT - 06: Education iMac - iTunes and the French interoperability law - TopXNotes - Apple's secret battery reset utility - Misleading hard drive capacity
  • The Macintosh Portable started a notebook revolution, Carl Nygren, Classic Macs in the Intel Age, 07.03. Before Apple introduced the Mac Portable, notebook computers were text-based and ran MS-DOS. Ever since, graphical interfaces have been the norm for laptops.
  • More links in our archive.

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