...given up for dead only a decade ago...

Until Bill Gates invested heavily. Now he's twice as rich. Warren Buffet is proud of his protege'.

I'll be damned, Gates did invest in Apple. I thought you were nuts when you posted that.

given up for dead a decade

Until steve jobs came back if iirc.

they re-invented their image,brought computer marketing into the modern age, and consistently made better products then their rivals for over a decade.

and consistently made better products then their rivals for over a decade.

In terms of computing, there would be many that disagree with this statement.

The expense of apple machines is too great for me.

^^^
i dont know about that. reliability and cost is one issue but get behind one of their titanium laptops at your local office depot and you know PC dosnt have anything that looks and feels like that

Never bother with that overpriced Fru-Fru crap, I buy the cheapest computer that will do the job, never had any problems. Apple is about 3x as expensive as the cheap boxes I throw together.

Microsoft could never and may never successfully develop hardware. I mean, other than XBOX. Zune? Loser. Anything else they've ever made? That's what makes Apple successful. They sell over-priced crap, but they make it.

"The expense of apple machines is too great for me."

But then you pay extra for things like a wireless card.

But then you pay extra for things like a wireless card.

All laptops come with built in wireless now. Even if not, the USB card is $25.

I've known IT guys who say they'll never work in a PC environment. I've known IT guys who say they'll never work in a Mac environment. The IT guy I know best is in the former camp, based in some very serious experience. That said, and all things considered, I think that any variations in quality or any real reason for preference result from the purpose to which you will put your computer.

That said, Macs generally don't crash. The oft-repeated "they're immune to viruses" wisdom is bullshit, though. They aren't targeted for viruses 'cause they represent such a small minority of the marketplace. (I haven't checked stats lately, but not so long ago, it was something like 15%.)

Btw, I'm writing on a MacBook, a machine which has served me well for two years. For whatever that may be worth.

I'm sure if Microsoft seriously decided to get into making kids toys and phones and other gimmicks as well as software they would do quite well in that market.

The first big Mac virus will hit the news like WWIII.

Apple computers and their customer service are absolutely superior to the Microsoft machines.

Being PC isn't so smart.

True on so many levels.

"All laptops come with built in wireless now. Even if not, the USB card is $25."

You won't find a laptop without wireless at any retail outlet. Maybe at an antique shop.

"Apple computers and their customer service are absolutely superior to the Microsoft machines."

Microsoft does not make computers. They make software.

Shit software at that.

Shit software at that.

Troll

"Industry Standard Shit software at that."

FTFY.

:-)

If Apple decided to sell its OS, it would take the home PC market.

All laptops come with built in wireless now. Even if not, the USB card is $25.

#9 | POSTED BY GOATMAN

The important word her is "now". Apple has it always early on and the other follow.

The first big Mac virus will hit the news like WWIII

~Redial

Wonder if the headline that day will read "Big Mac Attack!".

Be Well.

Sore subject with me. Small incident involving a mountain road, cup of coffee, and my G4 Powerbook. Thought briefly of buying a PC, decided against it and went shopping for a Mac. Discovered the cheapest plastic Macbook is four times the machine that the old one was.

Now if there was a machine that would type 400 wpm...

I remember about 15 years ago when Apple was about to tank. BIll Gates did give Apple a hand.... and why not? Apple computers have always been able to run Windoze... not vice versa... and they were a computer that ran its own system... Bill Gates designed a generic system to run on generic computers... you really can't compare the two companies.

I admire how Bill Gates changed the world... I just think windoze is a cumbersome neurotic bloatware OS that is mostly an Apple wannabe. That being said it is inexpensive and it puts computers in the hands of a lot of people.

Widoze is your basic numbers crunching knuckle cracking arena for hackers... Apple has always been strong in the creative arts... in fact all avenues of the arts. They are the eye candy of the computer field. Its paid off.

Computers that operate the Windoze system look and feel cheap by comparison... a Mac feels like a BMW whereas a Dull or Compaq... HP...feels like Yugo with a fancy paint job.

Their new iMac lines are really nice... $1150 and you got a loaded machine the size of a 21" monitor.... sa-weet.

In the end, music is more important than porn, just not when you're a sixteen year old male.

or was it

and in the end, the love you make is equal to the love you take

For those of you hacker types that want to use the Apple OS in your Yugo...

Apple is great for dicking around on the Internet, but I haven't heard of an office that runs it's business on Macintosh, or allow their servers in their datacenters.

#25 Correct.

"but I haven't heard of an office that runs it's business on Macintosh"

Check ad agencies, production houses, or graphics places. You won't find a PC in sight.

Been on a mac for over 15 years and swear by the product. A little pricier, but the performance and "all-included" aspect of the portables is hard to beat. And the design, well...

Check ad agencies, production houses, or graphics places. You won't find a PC in sight.

#27 | Posted by Danforth

Sure for creative (used to be necessary), but not in their accounting office, or on the CEO's desk

"Sure for creative (used to be necessary), but not in their accounting office, or on the CEO's desk"

All that means is folks who "haven't heard of an office that runs it's business on Macintosh" just haven't gotten out enough.

I don't think desk top or even lap top computers are what put Apple back on top....everyone I know (except myself) now carries an iPhone. My youngest daughter went with me last night to a band concert my grandson was in, she never stopped playing with her iPhone once on the trip there or back. It's become an addiction for most of the folks that have them.

Actually it was the iPod that got the kids hooked... now they'll line up to buy the new iWhatever as soon as they make one.

Yep, it's the accessories, not the desktop. I love the design of their products. Very modern.

Check ad agencies, production houses, or graphics places. You won't find a PC in sight.

#27 | Posted by Danforth

apply is making bank due to their hardware.

microsoft is making bank due to their software.

when i see macs start replacing the pc's at companies than we'll talk.

as of now macs aren't biz ready machines.
mac os server is too limited to be enterprise level.

and if you want unix... you go sun not mac.

you can't beat active directory.

thats a microsoft software to the guy who said they build shitty software.

sure the pc side is shitty but ultra powerful especially from a business developers point of view but the server side owns due to the domain control software.

"How much processing power/speed do you need to batch edit photos and layout magazine and newspaper pages?"

dude trust me at the enterprise level where microseconds matter the computers at the desktop level are just not there yet.

shit is still slow from a calculation standpoint.

I'll be damned, Gates did invest in Apple. I thought you were nuts when you posted that.
news.cnet.com
Still, ingenuity of Apple has to be commended. They are like a phoenix rising.
#2 | Posted by butthole_surfer at 2010-05-26 10:42 PM

That 150 million will ensure Macs are released with Windows applications. Until Unity.

I have a Dell desktop and an HP laptop at work, and a Mac laptop at home. They each have their advantages.

as of now macs aren't biz ready machines.
mac os server is too limited to be enterprise level.

and if you want unix... you go sun not mac.

#35 | Posted by klifferd

I'm not sure why we are even talking about traditional computers. Apple is making most of their profit from their iPod/iPhone and everything around it. The iPad is very promising to become a productive tool, but I'm very sure that Google will trump that move.

However, growth has been seen in the Desktop and Laptop devices too (the Mac). To give you an idea, in 1994, the Mac had 12% of the desktop market, PC (Dos) had probably 70% and the balance was other OS's. In 2000, Mac had roughly 2% of the desktop OS market, Windows had 95%. In the last decade, Mac has more than doubled it's mrket share and is up to 5%!

I don't know what Microsoft is going to do. Soon, the smart part of the OS will be located on isolated servers. All data and all programs will be stored on the server. The user device will be extremely thin and will be nothing more than a display and input device.

" Soon, the smart part of the OS will be located on isolated servers. "

microsoft already does this with terminal services.

mac is far behind on that as well.

all mac has is the ipod and iphone. The ipad isn't for the avg person yet.

so why are they being compared to microsoft and not htc or lg?

"Soon, the smart part of the OS will be located on isolated servers"

by the way before the pc... this is how the world was.

mainframe with the guts and a dumb (thin) terminal.

In the last decade, Mac has more than doubled it's mrket share and is up to 5%!
I don't know what Microsoft is going to do.
#40 | POSTED BY EDDIE

With those %'s I don't think they are too worried.

Soon, the smart part of the OS will be located on isolated servers. All data and all programs will be stored on the server. The user device will be extremely thin and will be nothing more than a display and input device.
#40 | Posted by Eddie

Global free wifi will have to come first.

I gave up PC's for my personal use and my business.

It was one of the best decisions I've made. Costs more up front, but the cost savings is realized in product longevity, OS upgrade costs and reduced tech support.

Apple and Microsoft barely exist in the same market spaces these days.

Microsoft's "decline" is because of the Internet that Ballmer and Gates didn't see coming.

Likewise, Apple's rise is due to the Internet. After Napster and LimeWire and Gnutella put the record labels in a panic, Steve Jobs came in all cool in his black mock-neck and said "You know guys, I can fix your problem. I'll make the player, you just keep cranking out what passes for music these days, and I'll sell it at my online store. Some revenue is better than none, amirite?"

And the record labels were both so terrified and so technologically backward they said "Okay, please Mr. Jobs, find a way to sell our stuff on the Internet, we're too stupid to do that on our own, the clocks on our VCRs all blink 12:00, and even if we could figure out how to work a computer, we're all so fat and greedy we'd never settle on a single format."

AAPL eclipsed MSFT market cap selling other people's shit. It's quite hilarious, considering MSFT made their money selling knock-offs of AAPL.

I'll be damned, Gates did invest in Apple. I thought you were nuts when you posted that.

MSFT invested in AAPL for two reasons:
1. If AAPL died the anti-trust case (which happened anyway, but then got de-fanged) would have been a no-brainer.
2. To settle long-standing disputes over Windows copying Mac OS.

MSFT basically just gave them cash, $200M as I recall. In return they got non-voting stock. It was a bailout (benfitted AAPL) and turned the page on some ugly lawsuits (benefitted MSFT). Win-win.

the only thing thats a knock of apple from microsoft is the gui.

the architecture of msft is based on the 8086 file structure which is completely different than the mac os.

so other than the icon and window idea nothing else is similar in msft and aapl.

yea its a big deal.. but really guys.. today everyone uses the icon and window idea.

even unix and linux jacked those ideas.
cell phones.
car stereos.

Of course it has. The iWhore thing has given them locked in customers.

i love my 4th generation ipod video.

i don't have an iphone and don't want one
i don't have an ipad and don't want one

i do want a Mac Pro Tower of some sort for music editing.

and i do want a bad ass PC for everything else.

Apple is only successful because of Dell Computers. Why you ask? Well, simply put, Dell's business model is based on 'lowest cost to deliver' and that really appealed to price conscience consumers when an entry level desktop PC was $1,000. What happened next is a herd mentality of the CEO's leading the other companies (moron Carli Fiorina comes to mind) that decided the only way they could compete is if they cut costs. The costs that they chose was the R&D that formerly lead to new features being implemented. That R&D role fell increasing on Intel and the Taiwanese ODM's that designed a vast majority of the computers. Basically, you have a large ODM producing laptops and they invite in all the big PC companies to come and choose which models they would like to resell.

This process greatly increased the rate of commoditization and a race to the bottom that every US PC company was running. Other than the Japanese, who valued quality and innovation, APPL was the only company that actually did inhouse R&D. As a result, AAPL actually had and R&D team to think up products like the iPhone and iPod while companies like Dell can only resell others' products. The reality is, AAPL uses all the same standard components as everyone else: from the harddrive to the Intel processor in the computers. It is there inhouse R&D that enabled them to take those same components and offer something slightly different that makes them successful. CEO's should take note of this when they gut their inhouse R&D capabilities.