Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

idea_hamster

macrumors 65816
Jul 11, 2003
1,096
1
NYC, or thereabouts
If I were an MS shareholder, I would be OUTRAGED.

How much did they pay for that? To be fair, I don't recall if MS bought just VPC or all of Connectix, but it hardly matters!

That's got to be a giant pile of shareholder wealth pissed away in a half-assed attempt at being part of (read: smothering) the increasing popularity and utility of Apple.

I would really love to see the numbers on that boondogle.

:rolleyes:

Additionally:
bluarash said:
Yes, Parallels and VMware are better products, but that is not the point. Has no one else noticed the number of products Microsoft is canceling for the Mac. I do not believe that Microsoft sees a market for the Macintosh. This of course is purely a business perspective.

I for one think Apple will be taught a lesson in respect. The only logical solution is to kill off Mac Office universal binary support. If they want to run on the Intel platform, they can run on emulation.

It would not be much of a loss if Microsoft decided to pull the plug. Don't think they haven't taught about it. A three percent market share or 19 million desktop users does not even come close to the numbers that still use Windows 2000, never mind Windows 98. I of course don't wish this to happen, but it is one logical outcome.
I actually think that MS will eventually be taught the lesson. Unfortunately for MS, federal antitrust law states that you can't use your power in one market to gain power in a different market.

At first glance to me, killing Office for Mac is probably a violation, since I think that the operation is, in itself, profitable. After all, the "at cost" price for Mac Office that MS charges its employees (yes, they can buy it!) is $50.
 

longofest

Editor emeritus
Jul 10, 2003
2,924
1,682
Falls Church, VA
Thataboy said:
Microsoft is not developing Virtual Basic in the Univeral Mac Office suite, so some people are already claiming that cross-compatibility is officially dead. Unless someone comes up with a Rosetta-like translator between VB and AppleScript/Automator, I don't see how script-filled Office files will be able to leave a Mac-only or Windows-only environment.

I noticed that too... I have no idea why they are going to be killing off VB support, but say good-bye to being able to have compatability with any documents with Macros.
 

balamw

Moderator emeritus
Aug 16, 2005
19,366
979
New England
idea_hamster said:
I would really love to see the numbers on that boondogle.
They got their value out of Connectix in Virtual Server. Like it or not the Mac stuff was just the tip of the iceberg.

After reading the Wiki article I linked to I am also not sure how much of Connectix was bought by MS.

B
 

Thataboy

macrumors regular
Dec 31, 2004
219
0
New York, NY
longofest said:
I noticed that too... I have no idea why they are going to be killing off VB support, but say good-bye to being able to have compatability with any documents with Macros.

I think we need to lean on the MS Mac BU to reverse this decision, and we need to make it VERY CLEAR TO APPLE that this will have major ramifications to the use of Macs in the corporate environment. Maybe Apple can lean on them (with what leverage, I don't know).

Of course, Microsoft can just turn around and say "Well, you want VB so badly? Buy Parallels, Windows, and MS Office 2007. Sure, it's $700, but you Apple users are used to getting fleeced."
 

Object-X

macrumors 6502a
Aug 3, 2004
633
142
Face the truth

Let's face it, Microsoft can't compete. It won't be long before they kill off their whole mac unit. Who needs their crappy software anyway? When some little known Russian software company can do in months what Micrsoft can't do in years it's obvious where this is going. VMWare will come out with a better virtualization technology and Windows will continue to become irrelevant. iWork needs a spreadsheet and you'll be hard pressed to find a reason to run anything Microsoft on your mac.

I said it before on these posts and got laughed to scorn, Microsoft is dead. Everyone knows it. Even die hard Windows fanboys are starting to have doubts. Vista will fail miserably and the company will be broken up. Why anyone would use something second rate, more expensive, less secure, and of inferior quality in the light of such a polished and mature operating system is beyond comprehension.
 

BoyBach

macrumors 68040
Feb 24, 2006
3,031
13
bluarash said:
It would not be much of a loss if Microsoft decided to pull the plug. Don't think they haven't taught about it. A three percent market share or 19 million desktop users does not even come close to the numbers that still use Windows 2000, never mind Windows 98. I of course don't wish this to happen, but it is one logical outcome.

Maybe so, but there are millions of Mac being sold every year, and there will always be percentage of these users who are perfectly willing to buy Virtual PC, Mac Office, Windows XP, and eventually Windows Vista when it's released, to use on their Mac's. Remember, that's a lot of money, and would Microsoft really not want to have their share of the pie?
 

IJ Reilly

macrumors P6
Jul 16, 2002
17,909
1,496
Palookaville
I seriously don't understand why anyone is surprised, or concerned. Some of us predicted the demise of VPC when Apple announced the Intel transition. This product is obsolete, now that Parallels can do the job better and Boot Camp enables complete Windows installs.
 

nagromme

macrumors G5
May 2, 2002
12,546
1,196
I'm sorry to see it go, since it's something I think they could do a good job with--and likely have offered bundled with a Windows license for a decent price.

But at the end of the day, it's not a product that's needed. There are other choices now.
 

BlueRevolution

macrumors 603
Jul 26, 2004
6,054
2
Montreal, QC
And good riddance. VPC, Office Mac and Macromedia Studio 8 under Rosetta are the only apps I've found that can do an accurate job of emulating OS X running as sluggish as Windows.
 

Some_Big_Spoon

macrumors 6502a
Jun 17, 2003
855
0
New York, NY
Wasn't a rumor, and it wasn't the PPC/Mac version.

yg17 said:
Wasn't there a rumor going around a couple months back about M$ making VPC free? That would make sense now if they're going to discontinue it, and let us PPC users have it for free. Who wants to pay for a product that won't receive any updates?
 

Hemingray

macrumors 68030
Jan 9, 2002
2,926
37
Ha ha haaa!
Good riddance! :rolleyes:

Bloatware, unusable since like what, version 3? 4?

What with all the new emulators coming out (and being a fairly happy user of Parallels, although I wish they'd keep us more informed about updates, but that's another subject!) I won't miss VPC one bit.

RIP.
 

bryanc

macrumors 6502
Feb 12, 2003
335
0
Fredericton, NB Canada
This brings to mind an old quote:

Windows: a 32 bit shell running on a 16 bit extension of an 8 bit OS designed for a 4 bit CPU, made by a 2 bit company that can't stand one bit of competition.

Cheers
 

BoyBach

macrumors 68040
Feb 24, 2006
3,031
13
joeboy_45101 said:
I just hope that iWork is mature enough by then to handle the office needs of some users.


I'm sure that it will be. Remember that Microsoft has recently signed a contract to continue developing Mac Office for the next five years, and that maybe part of the agreement was that Apple would keep iWorks 'underpowered.' But with the 'Numbers' and 'Charts' trademarks, do you not think that maybe iWorks '07 might replace Appleworks, which is no longer supplied with new Macs? A more mature Pages and Keynote plus some kind of spreadsheet app would be fine for the majority of users.
 

idea_hamster

macrumors 65816
Jul 11, 2003
1,096
1
NYC, or thereabouts
Object-X said:
Let's face it, Microsoft can't compete. ... I said it before on these posts and got laughed to scorn, Microsoft is dead.
Really? Who laughed? I wouldn't have. I've been predicting the slow collapse from internal rot ever since Word started .rtf format.

But you're right -- the process of moving from arbitrary, proprietary formats to generally accepted standards will be painful sometimes, but it will happen.
 

ImAlwaysRight

macrumors 6502a
Well, glad I just sold my copy of Virtual PC for $130 yesterday. :cool: :)

On another note, the AI article adds this:

Sometime later this year, Microsoft said it will release its first Universal application, Messenger for Mac 6.0.

Now that's just sad that MS can't get Office universal before 2007. Bet they are pretty sore about Apple's latest cracks against Vista. :(
 

dswoodley

macrumors 6502a
Jul 18, 2002
538
1
DJMastaWes said:
Cry babies.

They can't take away office... They signed a 5 year contract to continue makeing Office for mac at MWSF 2006.

That doesn't mean they have to make the best product they can or the one users want! All the macros I make for use on PC and mac are now going to be useless soon. Of course, MS corporate is well aware of this. This totally sucks for macro users.
 

MikeAtari

macrumors regular
Nov 17, 2003
126
0
Philly
More True then you know...

Object-X said:
Let's face it, Microsoft can't compete.

See, here's the problem.
They really can't compete. Microsoft's best guys are on the XBox project.
They are screwing up ACROSS THE BOARD.
- Their newest release of Exchange is a CRASH Nightmare.
- IIS 6.0 can be crashed with a Large Sql Query to a DataGrid.
- Their development staff couldn't handle "Checked Exceptions".
( Too lazy for Error Handling? )
- So, with something as Complex as Virtual Pc,
you have to wonder, how deep is the bench?
Not Deep Enough.

Microsoft, soon to be the: "Microsoft Game Company".
In games they're fairly competent.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.