$499 Headless iMac?

[Chomolungma]

Although I wear Apple-tinted glasses to the point that my pupils are actually shaped liked the logo, I hear what your saying and agree.

But I still would exchange the sluggishness of the Mac for the overall reliability, which Redmond fails on every level. Fast ... sure .... but the only time I ever want to rapidly swing a fire-axe into the desk monitor is when I'm using Windows. Never happens with OSX ... and I'm borderline psychotic ...

I would also add, that I'm using OSX instead of Windows because I don't want to deal with spywares, worms and viruses. i even wrote on other threads that i have and will pay a premium for an Apple computer to avoid these problems.

BTW, remember OS 9.2, I love the quick feel of it. I just wish OSX can be the same. Am I asking too much here?

-chomo

 

[JerseyMike73]

I'm running Panther at work on an CRT iMac w/ 512 MB. The beachball sh*t happens all the time, and quite frankly, I'm tire of it.

For me and I'm sure most will feel the same, the biggest problem with Apple computer now is it OSX sluggishness.
-Chomo

It's not that 512 MB is not enough RAM to run OS X efficiently, it's that you are running the most current iteration of OS X on a G3 machine. (no CRT iMac was ever made with a G4) Without the advances that the G4 offers, such as altivec, even maxing out the RAM will not conquer the sluggishness.

I have 512 MB in an 800mhz G4 iMac and the only times it feels sluggish are when I'm opening a huge application, such as Photoshop, or when I'm trying to do several processes simultaneously, such as exporting from iPhoto while downloading songs and browsing the web.

 

[Chomolungma]

It's not that 512 MB is not enough RAM to run OS X efficiently, it's that you are running the most current iteration of OS X on a G3 machine. (no CRT iMac was ever made with a G4) Without the advances that the G4 offers, such as altivec, even maxing out the RAM will not conquer the sluggishness.

I have 512 MB in an 800mhz G4 iMac and the only times it feels sluggish are when I'm opening a huge application, such as Photoshop, or when I'm trying to do several processes simultaneously, such as exporting from iPhoto while downloading songs and browsing the web.

Okay, sure, I'll give you the CRT iMac G3 excuse, but I've tried the G4 iMac at the store typically w/ 512, and the beachball still comes on when iMovie or iPhoto launches among others. What I hate more is when any Adobe application launches, they make a point of showing you all the frivolous patents they filed. And what up with line of text on Acrobat reader window that changes rapidly (impossible to read). why are they keep annoying us with that sh*t.

I used to advise people in getting a mac over a PC, but now I disclose this slugish disclaimer. However, I also points out a lack of spywares etc. They usually go away neutral.

I can't stress this problem enough. The slowness of OSX is a major problem. It is a tiny problem, but has a profound and magnify end result. Although, I've read a lot of comments in the site to suggest otherwise, my response to those who says OSX is fast, check the Kool Aid that you've been drinking

-chomo

 

[asif786]

I hope the sub-$500 mac doesn't lower the tone of the whole mac platform..

..I dont mean to sound snobby or anything, but as a Mac user, I've generally come to believe that my fellow mac users and other people that i meet on forums such as these are generally nice, good people. we dont see any major spamming, or flaming or any other silly behaviour on here.

if i was to go to one of the large windows forums though, they're full off people doing the above mentioned things - i'm not trying to stereotype people, i just hope that MR and the mac community in general does not turn into a standard/non-caring type of thing.

i happen to like the cult of mac

 

[JerseyMike73]

...when any Adobe application launches, they make a point of showing you all the frivolous patents they filed. And what up with line of text on Acrobat reader window that changes rapidly (impossible to read). why are they keep annoying us with that...-chomo

These are your issues with Adobe. Apple does not have any control over this. They flash their patents on windows too.

 

[Chomolungma]

I've gone looney..but this is funny

So i have iTunes (but not playing anything) and Safari running, the only two things that is on except for the finder. I open Adobe Acrobat, and counted the number of time the Avatar bounces. 34 times

-chomo

 

[Photorun]

Okay, sure, I'll give you the CRT iMac G3 excuse, but I've tried the G4 iMac at the store typically w/ 512, and the beachball still comes on when iMovie or iPhoto launches among others. What I hate more is when any Adobe application launches, they make a point of showing you all the frivolous patents they filed. And what up with line of text on Acrobat reader window that changes rapidly (impossible to read). why are they keep annoying us with that sh*t.

I used to advise people in getting a mac over a PC, but now I disclose this slugish disclaimer. However, I also points out a lack of spywares etc. They usually go away neutral.

I can't stress this problem enough. The slowness of OSX is a major problem. It is a tiny problem, but has a profound and magnify end result. Although, I've read a lot of comments in the site to suggest otherwise, my response to those who says OSX is fast, check the Kool Aid that you've been drinking

-chomo

Slowness/slugishness is a bit of an issue but easily overcome by RAM. When I got my G5 2.0 DP it had a stock 512, and yeah, it did seem sluggish, OS X is a RAM hog, as are Adobe apps. After dropping another 2 GBs of RAM into it I get one hop for just about everything except Adobe apps... but that's not Apple's fault. I can launch Adobe apps just as fast as most peecees can as I've witnessed. There was a world of difference on my girlfriend's iMac too when it went from 512 to just over a gig, it's a RAM thing. I'm not saying it's right OS X is this much of a RAM hog, it still boggles my mind Apple ships ANY of their line-up with 256, I'm not sure how well they run, probably more like crawl.

And your beefs about Adobe's splash screen you need to take up with Adobe, while you're at it, some of the sluggishness too in their apps as their code is full of bizarre garbage, they seem to have some lazy engineers and/or not so hot QC leads.

 

[Photorun]

So i have iTunes (but not playing anything) and Safari running, the only two things that is on except for the finder. I open Adobe Acrobat, and counted the number of time the Avatar bounces. 34 times

-chomo

Not to keep this thread OT but I did some tests, out of curiousity, with my G5 2.0 DP machine with 2.5 GB RAM and, with just about all Adobe apps, Dreamweaver, iTunes, Safari, and Mail open I too got 34 bounces, just like you. I then killed everyting and made sure there was no RAM leaks (using the excellent Memory Usage Getter, http://homepage.mac.com/simx/) and did the same test... 34 bounces. As a person that has worked with software and hardware 20+ years it would be my assessment that, in fact, Acrobat's sluggishness isn't based on OS X but it's coding in general... craptacular coding, parts left from Acrobat 4 even (Carbon). The blame lies on Adobe for Acrobat, not OS X.

Then again there's a really good solution that works 80%+ of the time for PDFs, forgo it and use Apple's neat app Preview which renders just as good if not better than Adobe's bloatward and, at least on my machine, barely even hops once launching.

 

[Chomolungma]

Slowness/slugishness is a bit of an issue but easily overcome by RAM. When I got my G5 2.0 DP it had a stock 512, and yeah, it did seem sluggish, OS X is a RAM hog, as are Adobe apps. After dropping another 2 GBs of RAM into it I get one hop for just about everything except Adobe apps... but that's not Apple's fault. I can launch Adobe apps just as fast as most peecees can as I've witnessed. There was a world of difference on my girlfriend's iMac too when it went from 512 to just over a gig, it's a RAM thing. I'm not saying it's right OS X is this much of a RAM hog, it still boggles my mind Apple ships ANY of their line-up with 256, I'm not sure how well they run, probably more like crawl.

And your beefs about Adobe's splash screen you need to take up with Adobe, while you're at it, some of the sluggishness too in their apps as their code is full of bizarre garbage, they seem to have some lazy engineers and/or not so hot QC leads.

I understand. Okay, ignore my problem with Adobe, for it seems to divert the blame to Adobe. Focus on iMovie and iPhoto instead.

So you a telling me a DP 2.0 PowerMac with 2 GB will solve this problem. And a DP 2.0 PowerMac with 512 MB won't do, nevermind a 1Ghz iBook w/ 256 MB. I see


-chomo

 

[paulsecic]

IMHO I'm doubting it. Could be wrong but... First off the TV market is still in flux. In the next 4-5 years you are going to see a total transition over to HDTV. At this point its still in the movement stages. Apple almost never moves into a market before its ready. Do you really think Apple would pounce on the set top market before the infrastructure is in place? HDTVs are finally starting to come down in price and are finally starting to really make inroads in replacing those outdated TVs sitting in people's homes. But there is still another couple of years before it hits critical mass.
Secondly in regards to DVR there is no set standard for how a show is recorded, how its played back, how and if it can be exported, etc. Consequently you have content providers getting their panties in a bunch over things like commercial skipping. Exporting of movies in HDTV format. With potential solutions from the US government in the next 5 years. (e.g. flags being embedded into programs that says what content can be recorded, what content can't, and what content has a time delay feature where after X time it can no longer be played.)
Again all of this is in flux. Apple may very well start the set top revolution like they did with the iPod however they aren't going to do it before all the pieces on the board are positioned just right.

Not enough HD content. People arn't buying them. I was at Circut City the other day and I asked him how HD sets were selling. He said their warehouses are chuck full. He also said people just walk over to the CRTS and buy one.

 

[hcuar]

I hope the sub-$500 mac doesn't lower the tone of the whole mac platform..

..I dont mean to sound snobby or anything, but as a Mac user, I've generally come to believe that my fellow mac users and other people that i meet on forums such as these are generally nice, good people. we dont see any major spamming, or flaming or any other silly behaviour on here.

if i was to go to one of the large windows forums though, they're full off people doing the above mentioned things - i'm not trying to stereotype people, i just hope that MR and the mac community in general does not turn into a standard/non-caring type of thing.

i happen to like the cut of mac

I can't agree with you more. I try to read sites like Slashdot or Osnews, and I can barely stand to read the first comment or two. Too many script kiddies lurking around.

 

[Kagetenshi]

Although, I've read a lot of comments in the site to suggest otherwise, my response to those who says OSX is fast, check the Kool Aid that you've been drinking

As it turns out my kool-aid is poisoned (thanks for alerting me), but I've always found OS X to be just dandy in the speed department. Certainly better than my 2.2GHz P4 laptop with 512 megs RAM and XP.

~J

 

[pigwin32]

I hope the sub-$500 mac doesn't lower the tone of the whole mac platform..

..I dont mean to sound snobby or anything, but as a Mac user, I've generally come to believe that my fellow mac users and other people that i meet on forums such as these are generally nice, good people. we dont see any major spamming, or flaming or any other silly behaviour on here.

if i was to go to one of the large windows forums though, they're full off people doing the above mentioned things - i'm not trying to stereotype people, i just hope that MR and the mac community in general does not turn into a standard/non-caring type of thing.

i happen to like the cut of mac

You do know this is a moderated forum right? I think you may find your feelings of well being are due largely to the efforts of our caring moderators. There is definitely a firm hand on the tiller round here, any discussion rising above room temperature tends to be quashed. The difference with Windows' forums may be the sheer volume of posting swamping any attempt at moderation. From my limited exposure to MR, there are plenty of clueless posters WHO JUST WON'T ACCEPT THEY ARE WRONG!

I get a little tired of the pro-Mac hubris and elitism. Personally I like Apple products, they're pretty, reasonably solid, and suffer few of the security issues of Windows or the usability issues of Linux and I'm really hanging out for the *new* PowerBook. Of course there's nothing worse than the riff-raff discovering your favourite secluded holiday destination and invading with boom-boxen and six-packs. If you would still like to feel better than everyone else you could ditch OSX and install the most secure operating system on the planet. At least then you might have good reason to feel smug.

 

[BillD222]

I can't stress this problem enough. The slowness of OSX is a major problem. It is a tiny problem, but has a profound and magnify end result. Although, I've read a lot of comments in the site to suggest otherwise, my response to those who says OSX is fast, check the Kool Aid that you've been drinking

-chomo

I'll admit that Macs are anemic when it comes to RAM. My 512 stick only cost me $90 to upgrade my iMac G5 1.8. In bulk it would probably only cost Apple $25 -$50 a stick. It is well worth a miniscule loss of profit on increasing the out of box experience for users, especially with the "computers even Grandma can use". OK maybe for Grandmas like my mom, who can do a RAM upgrade, but not for most. However, I'd still never buy anything else.

OS slugishness is BS. Yes , there are occasions that I have to wait with my iBook g3 800, but I expect it. Its a portabel G3 800 push an awesome graphic intense OS. Try running XP (a sad looking ok os) P3 800. It's terrible on my sister-in-laws 1 yr. old dell laptop. I use have PCs in my classroom (not by my request) 20 p2 500 and 5 p4 2.8. The P2 s are dogs with Win 2k (even compared against my original blueberry iBook which I got the same year - now running 10.3), I couldn't imagine trying to run XP on them. Naturally my iBook is slower than the P4s, but it doesn't feel "drastic" , but my iMac G5 is definitely faster (especially with system software), and as G5 optimized software gets more common it'll be WAY faster on all fronts.

The best iMac G3 you could be running it on would be the iMac G3 700 which only had 16 MB of VRAM. What do you expect?

BTW my iPhoto and iMovie opens on my iBook are only around 5-7 sec. I don't think that's terrible considering what I'm able to do on this machine.
And, OS X is a major OS transition, still in progress, to mention it wasn't an evolutionary one. Let's see waht Longhorne will run like on P3s, whenever it comes out.

PS If it is REALLY sluggish and you're not just being a baby, maybe you should try to check your disk, repair your permissions optimize, maybe even reinstall the OS. If you don't maintain your car it won't perform that well either (not even if it's a Porsche). Even a resatrt with a Mac can do wonders (flushing the RAM, check the disk, etc.)

If a PC makes you happy, go for it!

 

[BillHarrison]

Ack, the time is getting closer, my excitement is building!

Soon soon!!!!!!!!

Its at 9am PST right? come on!

 

[mattmack]

Ack, the time is getting closer, my excitement is building!

Soon soon!!!!!!!!

Its at 9am PST right? come on!

Yeah but on Tuesday

 

[Yvan256]

These are your issues with Adobe. Apple does not have any control over this. They flash their patents on windows too.

And it's not like Adobe's applications are fast on Windows either... Athlon XP 2400+, 512MB DDR400, and ImageReady still takes about 14 seconds to load up.

And I always go nuts every time I click on a web link and it starts up Acrobat Reader... (yes, there's still morons that don't put the little icon next to their links/documents to warn they're not links to other pages).

 

[BillHarrison]

And it's not like Adobe's applications are fast on Windows either... Athlon XP 2400+, 512MB DDR400, and ImageReady still takes about 14 seconds to load up.

And I always go nuts every time I click on a web link and it starts up Acrobat Reader... (yes, there's still morons that don't put the little icon next to their links/documents to warn they're not links to other pages).

Definitely, i would not blame a mac for slow adobe anything, they are the kings of bloatware!

And I double the hating clicking on an acrobat link, I would rather read anything in html than that!

ack!

 

[Xgreed]

headless mac = set-top-box? no way

I heavily doubt that Apple will ever bring a set-top-box.
But whats a set-top-box anyway? I see at least three kind of 'sub'-boxes:

1.) the tuner box which has RF/Cable/Satelite in and converts that to a MPEG-2/MPEG-4 stream.

2.) an optional HardDisk box which records the MPEG stream on a HardDisk for later playback.

3.) the converter box which converts the MPEG stream to an uncompressed digital output (or analog output for SD).

As Apple I would not like to go into 1.) as this is so diversified: different bearers, different coding schemes etc. resulting in many different variants of this box.

Next, the Hard-Disk box really has to be combined with the tuner box as you would like to record a specific program which needs to be tuned in at recording time. The two boxes could be separate if ther would be a control protocol between them - but there is no standard here.

This leaves 3.) and I believe this will be the step Apple will take. Think about it as the next version of Airport express which has an additional video output besides the current audio and usb outputs.

This Airport express will be capable of decoding h.264 which is streamed to it via 801.11g and put out the decoded signal via DVI (or HDMI) and S-Video (for supporting SD monitors).

Besides streaming MPEG4-10 video, pictures availabe via DPAP could also be rendered to DVI.

To manage the media-transfers Airport express would have an on-screen-display functionality controlled by an ip-based remote-control protocol. Every wifi enabled gadget (any ideas? ;-) which runs this protocol could be a remote-control-unit for this Airpor-express then.

cheers

 

[pubwvj]

OSX may be the best os in the world, but if this machine is underpower i.e. not enough RAM, the computer will feel slow. I think this is one of the most annoying thing with the current Apple computers. Take for example the iBook (possibly the most popular (volume) Apple model), it comes with 256 MB of RAM hardly sufficient to run OSX.

I agree with you, that for my needs the amount of memory that the machines ship with is insufficient. This has always been the case and when I buy a Mac I max the memory immediately because it is one of the cheapest ways to get speed. When buying any other type of computer I also max the RAM and hard drive so the Mac is no different in that regard.

It may be that Apple is making the right choice by not maxing the memory from the onset. Many people are happy with the stock shipped amount of memory. My father has an iBook as do several friends and other relatives which just have the stock base memory configurations. They are perfectly happy with the machines. Most of all they like the stability and ease of use. To them the machine goes so fast they don't worry about a few extra bounces in the dock.

By shipping an expandable machine at the lowest price they can reasonably do so and still make a healthy profit to promote future research Apple may be doing the best thing for everyone. Most users have enough capability. Power users upgrade the machine with extra RAM, faster larger hard drives, etc.

-Walter
in Vermont

 

[mattmack]

I agree with you, that for my needs the amount of memory that the machines ship with is insufficient. This has always been the case and when I buy a Mac I max the memory immediately because it is one of the cheapest ways to get speed. When buying any other type of computer I also max the RAM and hard drive so the Mac is no different in that regard.

It may be that Apple is making the right choice by not maxing the memory from the onset. Many people are happy with the stock shipped amount of memory. My father has an iBook as do several friends and other relatives which just have the stock base memory configurations. They are perfectly happy with the machines. Most of all they like the stability and ease of use. To them the machine goes so fast they don't worry about a few extra bounces in the dock.

By shipping an expandable machine at the lowest price they can reasonably do so and still make a healthy profit to promote future research Apple may be doing the best thing for everyone. Most users have enough capability. Power users upgrade the machine with extra RAM, faster larger hard drives, etc.

-Walter
in Vermont

Just don't buy the overpriced Apple memory

 

[MacG]

Pardon me for suggesting something crazy (maybe someone already has), but hasn't Apple been perfecting OS X on PC hardware for years now? It's been a "black ops" project, but I believe it's true.

Could the headless Mac be a PC? Would Apple ever dare to challenge Microsoft in America's homes?

OS X ran on PC's before it ran on Mac's - that is the guts of OS X did. Its guts are NeXTStep/OpenStep and it ran on NeXT, x86 and Solaris. If Apple wanted to distribute a port of OS X for PC they could have done it years before.

The elegance of Mac/Mac OS X is that the OS maker is also the hardware maker. Apple has full control over BIOS, firmwares and device drivers. It makes the platform so much more reliable and dependable.

 

[Photorun]

I understand. Okay, ignore my problem with Adobe, for it seems to divert the blame to Adobe. Focus on iMovie and iPhoto instead.

So you a telling me a DP 2.0 PowerMac with 2 GB will solve this problem. And a DP 2.0 PowerMac with 512 MB won't do, nevermind a 1Ghz iBook w/ 256 MB. I see

-chomo

OH MY GOD THE SKY IS FALLING!!! Not.

Be constructive chomo, you're trying to blame Apple for Adobe, basically you just seem to have a beef with Apple and/or OS X and you're taking swings at air to vent your beef. That's fine, but start a new thread in a new forum, this isn't the "I hate OS X forum," it's the $499 forum.

iPhoto and iMovie launch with less than a bounce on my machine, yes I have and can afford RAM. Guess what, peecees with XP, one of which I deal with every day, is as slow at Adobe as the Mac, I checked. So your beefs aren't holding much water. I own an ancient iBook G3 500, it has it's max RAM of 768 and it's slow as heck, but it's not a power machine so I understand there's compromise, run any power app on an eMachine Centron and you think you'll be dusting OS X you clearly haven't dealt with many computers in your life. "Koolaid?" My machine rocks OS X, "snappy" as we like to say in these forums, everything I do happens instantly as far as operations in OS X that rely on it's protocol actions. Even if it weren't as fast, faster than the XP machine I work with (it is, but bear with me) my Mac has locked up only once in over a year of service, the peecee running XP goes down three times a week. So there you go, stable, and fast.

Please kindly stop bellyaching, at least in this forum thread.

Thanks.

 

[easymac800g4]

what i am hoping is that this is just a seed that apple has planted to get the rumors going about a product that they dont intend to produce. so they can make a major change where we dont expect it. or make major changes across the board. pmacs, emacs, pbooks, & ipods are all due for updates. they could really slam us with an across the board announcement

 

[m0rbid2696]

macworld expo starts tomorrow... so excited!!! i really hope they come out with this headless mac. i've been saving to get one and this would be perfect for me as long as the ram is upgradable. i understand why they wouldn't include a superdrive but i can dream can't i. so getting one the day the come out.