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Best Buy Mac Mini Followup

Unfortunately, I think most of the sales people at Best Buy stores won't be selling Macs the way they should. I fear that they will shove customers away from it because they're brainwashed fools who think Winblows is the end-all, be-all solution for the world. While not all of them will act like this, I bet a good percentage will be. Apple should hire undercover shoppers to ferret these sales people out so that formal complaints can be reported to Best Buy Corporate.


Another thing, I'm willing to bet this "3%" market share is a very low estimate. They probably only account for Large Corporations. What they don't account for are all of the home and small business users.

It's funny, I was just talking to my boss and telling him where the computer industry will go. I told him that Apple will soon take the place, in many ways of MicroSoft, because people are so fed up with maintaining their machines. I told him how cost effective a Mac is to a PC. And how as soon as these undereducated IT grads learn that UNIX is forever more stable than a DOS-based OS, that you will start seeing large corporations switch.

Mark my words... M$ is going down.
 
Wrong

lollipop-harold said:
Am i right in thinking that other retail shops in the u.s do not stock ipods.. is this best buy the first chain in america to stock ipods!? In england ipods have been avaliable from virgin megastores for allmost a year now :confused:
weird. s'all good.​
Click to expand...

Actually, Target stores and online sell iPods.
I've also seen them at Radio Shack stores.
 
Onizuka said:
Unfortunately, I think most of the sales people at Best Buy stores won't be selling Macs the way they should. I fear that they will shove customers away from it because they're brainwashed fools who think Winblows is the end-all, be-all solution for the world. While not all of them will act like this, I bet a good percentage will be. Apple should hire undercover shoppers to ferret these sales people out so that formal complaints can be reported to Best Buy Corporate.


Another thing, I'm willing to bet this "3%" market share is a very low estimate. They probably only account for Large Corporations. What they don't account for are all of the home and small business users.

It's funny, I was just talking to my boss and telling him where the computer industry will go. I told him that Apple will soon take the place, in many ways of MicroSoft, because people are so fed up with maintaining their machines. I told him how cost effective a Mac is to a PC. And how as soon as these undereducated IT grads learn that UNIX is forever more stable than a DOS-based OS, that you will start seeing large corporations switch.

Mark my words... M$ is going down.
Click to expand...

I don't agree with your assessment; however, it remains to be seen. Keeping up with new technology is one thing when it's built upon your current investment of equipment, but business leaders aren't going to "throw the baby out with the bath-water" just for the sake of a promised stable OS.
 
Perhaps not all of them, but when they're sick of constantly buying licenses of the OS, plus licenses to every piece of crucial software FOR their business because it doesn't support the old software, the money adds up to WAY TO MUCH over-spending. Getting one good Unix Admin ontop of an Xserve/Unix server connected to hundreds of Mac mini's would be more than cost efficient.
 
Onizuka said:
Perhaps not all of them, but when they're sick of constantly buying licenses of the OS, plus licenses to every piece of crucial software FOR their business because it doesn't support the old software, the money adds up to WAY TO MUCH over-spending. Getting one good Unix Admin ontop of an Xserve/Unix server connected to hundreds of Mac mini's would be more than cost efficient.
Click to expand...

That sounds kinda kewl!!

All I need now is a business!!
 
Spotted a Mac Mini at my local Best Buy during a brief visit today. First time I got to see one in person, nice little machine, but I would be a downgrade from my FP G4 iMac. :rolleyes: I am trying to talk my wife into one though. I was impressed with the new Apple keyboard, much better typing feel than the Pro Keyboard. On the plus side, the Mini was completely covered in finger prints, so at least many people seem to be checking it out!

As to the in store setup, the Mini was on the same counters as the laptop computers, with a sign that said "Small Miracle". Unfortunately, they had it set up in a small laptop size space, with a USB Apple keyboard and mouse, so there were wires looped all over the place; plus a small stack of Apple keyboard and mouse boxes that took up much of the space on the counter. It was also hooked to a generic (I didn't recognize the model) 15" square VGA display, which didn't quite bring out the Quartz splendor. It didn't help that whoever set it up had the dock at maximum size with no magnification. It looked like the screen size was set to a non-native resolution too! :rolleyes: I was going to 'fix' it for them, but I was in a hurry, and there was something funky going on with the mouse. I tried to use the screen settings, and also change the background, but whenever I went into a system settings window, the pointer would develop significant lag, to the point of rendering the mouse useless. :confused:

In reference to previous posts on whether the sales staff could sell the mini, I was looking for something in particular (a Serial ATA data cable) and was pressed for time and didn't get to talk about the mini. Between the two sales people I did talk to, one didn't know what a Serial ATA cable was, and the other said "if it's not in the cable isle, we don't carry one", pointing to the isle with the USB and FW cables in it. :eek:
 
iPoster said:
It didn't help that whoever set it up had the dock at maximum size with no magnification. It looked like the screen size was set to a non-native resolution too! :rolleyes: I was going to 'fix' it for them, but I was in a hurry, and there was something funky going on with the mouse. I tried to use the screen settings, and also change the background, but whenever I went into a system settings window, the pointer would develop significant lag, to the point of rendering the mouse useless.
Click to expand...

Let's all make it a point to stop in at the nearest Best Buy this weekend and fix the settings on the display models. Seriously. We owe it to Apple. We owe it to our fellow Americans. Stop the abuse. I'm going right now. Won't you?
 
They are already there. I've been to three Best Buys in the Minneapolis area and I can tell you that 2 of the stores had the 1.25 and 1.4 systems on display one with speakers attached. The third only had the 1.25 system with speakers. They were sitting there along side the other computers. No different the rest of the systems there. Only complaint I have is that every model had 256MB of RAM and it felt like it. Each system had just about every app open and it was beachballing alot. They should have stuck 512MB of RAM in the things. :rolleyes:
 
Rootman said:
Let's all make it a point to stop in at the nearest Best Buy this weekend and fix the settings on the display models. Seriously. We owe it to Apple. We owe it to our fellow Americans. Stop the abuse. I'm going right now. Won't you?
Click to expand...


Yah please for the love of god think of the computers. Think of the computers. :rolleyes: You guy act like these people should be babying these systems. I can tell you right now that they do no such thing on the PC's in store.
 
Mac Mini at Best Buy...

Just wanted to verify...Yes Mac Minis at Best Buy in Allentown Pa.

They are located in the laptop kiosk section(!) On the other side not facing the entrance.

They had the 1.25 model with apple keyboard and mouse, hooked up to a Samsung 17" monitor with JBL speakers.

I opened Garageband and cranked up the volume so everyone could hear.

Didn't studder that much with 256 RAM.

My only problem is I wish they were on the other side of the kiosk so you could see it when you first walk in.


Both 1.25 and 1.42 STOCK models were for sale


I.
 
Best Buy Mac Mini Followup

I have to say this is my first post but I have been an apple person all my life and I've been working at Best Buy for about 10 months and we will of couse get the mini mac's meaning both model. But like a lot of posts here said that all the computer guys (I work in appliances because I hate pcs so much I can't said spreading the Bill Gates' disease) dislike macs and that is a completely true statement for the store I work at. A few reasons: 1.They try to compare the processing power of a mac mini to a 64-bit pc with 256mb video card and they say it runs faster beacuse macs suck (I hate that). 2.They never really tried using a mac the only things they remember is when they crash. (Yet I have a B&W G3 that has a 12 Gb harddrive that I have never had to reformat, and here the tech guys are formatting pcs in the front of the store daily just to get it back to the customer.) 3.Lastly they try to think that the ipod is a good indicator of how bad the mac mini's and all apple products are (the reason they don't like the ipod is because every day they sell one they get one back in a return because nobody in the store knew how to reset an ipod or do any ipod maintanence until I came along; I fixed two ipod photos one day within 10 minutes just by reseting them). The bad part about it is, I work in the appliances (the least common department in best buy and I'm doing a guys job who is getting paid $5/hour more than me. The only reason I don't want to work in the front with the tech guys is the frustration of trying to troubleshoot a pc all day long.) I can't wait unitl the mac mini comes to my store though; I'm in panama city, florida and the closest apple store is about 250 miles away and I am very happy we may be able to bring OSX into people's lives. We will be selling Office for OSX and, iwork and ilife. I'm still a student in college so I have yet to buy anything apple from our store because I say more off apple than my discounts.

Thank you for letting me vent out my frustrations of my pc-loving coworkers they really love getting crashes (the Blue screen of death is mesmerizing I guess). I hope the launch of the mac mini will get people to look at apple in a different way other than behind the curve and more like beyond the curve.
 
MacGuyAtBestBuy said:
I have to say this is my first post but I have been an apple person all my life and I've been working at Best Buy for about 10 months and we will of couse get the mini mac's meaning both model. But like a lot of posts here said that all the computer guys (I work in appliances because I hate pcs so much I can't said spreading the Bill Gates' disease) dislike macs and that is a completely true statement for the store I work at. A few reasons: 1.They try to compare the processing power of a mac mini to a 64-bit pc with 256mb video card and they say it runs faster beacuse macs suck (I hate that). 2.They never really tried using a mac the only things they remember is when they crash. (Yet I have a B&W G3 that has a 12 Gb harddrive that I have never had to reformat, and here the tech guys are formatting pcs in the front of the store daily just to get it back to the customer.) 3.Lastly they try to think that the ipod is a good indicator of how bad the mac mini's and all apple products are (the reason they don't like the ipod is because every day they sell one they get one back in a return because nobody in the store knew how to reset an ipod or do any ipod maintanence until I came along; I fixed two ipod photos one day within 10 minutes just by reseting them). The bad part about it is, I work in the appliances (the least common department in best buy and I'm doing a guys job who is getting paid $5/hour more than me. The only reason I don't want to work in the front with the tech guys is the frustration of trying to troubleshoot a pc all day long.) I can't wait unitl the mac mini comes to my store though; I'm in panama city, florida and the closest apple store is about 250 miles away and I am very happy we may be able to bring OSX into people's lives. We will be selling Office for OSX and, iwork and ilife. I'm still a student in college so I have yet to buy anything apple from our store because I say more off apple than my discounts.

Thank you for letting me vent out my frustrations of my pc-loving coworkers they really love getting crashes (the Blue screen of death is mesmerizing I guess). I hope the launch of the mac mini will get people to look at apple in a different way other than behind the curve and more like beyond the curve.
Click to expand...

I hope your store will properly display the mini on it's own with a good Sony, NEC or Samsung display AND hook one up with a KVM switch to show how you can ADD A MINI to your PC uber gaming system as well.
 
Mac people at Best Buy...

MacGuyAtBestBuy said:
I have to say this is my first post but I have been an apple person all my life and I've been working at Best Buy for about 10 months and we will of couse get the mini mac's meaning both model. But like a lot of posts here said that all the computer guys (I work in appliances because I hate pcs so much I can't said spreading the Bill Gates' disease) dislike macs and that is a completely true statement for the store I work at. A few reasons: 1.They try to compare the processing power of a mac mini to a 64-bit pc with 256mb video card and they say it runs faster beacuse macs suck (I hate that). 2.They never really tried using a mac the only things they remember is when they crash. (Yet I have a B&W G3 that has a 12 Gb harddrive that I have never had to reformat, and here the tech guys are formatting pcs in the front of the store daily just to get it back to the customer.) 3.Lastly they try to think that the ipod is a good indicator of how bad the mac mini's and all apple products are (the reason they don't like the ipod is because every day they sell one they get one back in a return because nobody in the store knew how to reset an ipod or do any ipod maintanence until I came along; I fixed two ipod photos one day within 10 minutes just by reseting them). The bad part about it is, I work in the appliances (the least common department in best buy and I'm doing a guys job who is getting paid $5/hour more than me. The only reason I don't want to work in the front with the tech guys is the frustration of trying to troubleshoot a pc all day long.) I can't wait unitl the mac mini comes to my store though; I'm in panama city, florida and the closest apple store is about 250 miles away and I am very happy we may be able to bring OSX into people's lives. We will be selling Office for OSX and, iwork and ilife. I'm still a student in college so I have yet to buy anything apple from our store because I say more off apple than my discounts.

Thank you for letting me vent out my frustrations of my pc-loving coworkers they really love getting crashes (the Blue screen of death is mesmerizing I guess). I hope the launch of the mac mini will get people to look at apple in a different way other than behind the curve and more like beyond the curve.
Click to expand...


I just wanted to add that the first guy that came up to me said he didn't know about macs BUT the other guys all had them(!)

I also asked if they had the Superdrive option. They did not, only stock machines.

I just wish there was a sign or SOMETHING saying "hey look at me!" I hope they don't continue to hide it. Put it in the front where that 17" notebook is when you walk into the Computer section. Apple should make it's own little Mac mini kiosk, then it would stand out. Anyway I'm finished ranting.

Don't blow it!


I.
 
I work at a Best Buy store in Mount Laurel, NJ in the computer department. For the most part my coworkers no absolutely nothing about macs and pretty much anything that is asked they redirect to me which I don't mind because I enjoy talking about a computer and operating system that doesnt require a few hundred dollars in software to just work consistantly. As for the way those computers are set up, that is a design that Best Buy corporate designed and there is nothing we can change. That Westinghouse monitor thats running on it does the mini no justice. I actually got in trouble for just trying the 19" Sony monitor on it. Also it isn't possible to stock all the options that are available in the minis because there are so many. The only thing we can do is upgrade the ram which really slows down that machine. Anyway it is my personal goal to get all of my coworkers to just try the mini and the Mac OS and then tell me that those peice of **** eMachines we sell are better or for that matter the Sonys.

-Andy
 
Andy, your store manager is a fool! You may quote me!

If Best Buy wants to make a good profit from selling the Mac Mini,
then they need to show customers how great it will work with the other products they sell.

Printers, KVM switches, monitors, cables, games, Logitech Keyboards and Meeces etc.

Many Windows users may not be ready or able to fully switch to Mac OSX, so you must show the mini running along side a good PC, using a KVM
switch to show how easy it will be for them the take advantage of what the mini has to offer.
 
Doesn't Best Buy have a fairly liberal return policy? Like I can buy a mini today and return/exchange it in 30 or 60 days if an improved model comes out (or even just a Tiger-loaded model)?
 
Our local Sunday newspaper has a Best Buy brochure, advertising the Mini in a full page ad. They're offering a LCD monitor (Westinghouse 17" LCD, normally $250) $50 off when bundled with the Mini, and a $15 iTunes card if you also get an iPod mini with it.

However, they don't say that any USB keyboard and mouse will work with it, and are advertising the Apple Pro keyboard and mouse for $30 each with it. Probably a lot of people reading that will think they need to buy the Apple keyboard and mouse.
 
drewyboy said:
The point we are missing is Best Buy sucks cuz they know jack about Apple. They will have some sucky monitor, if one at all, hooked up to it with some piece of sh*( keyboard and mouse. And of course, since their "computer experts" already have a hard enough time knowing anything about Winblows, i hardly think sales will boost at all when they sell them in their stores. Mac needs to send its own ppl there and have it's own lil display with mac things, and also should have fliers on their iMacs,PowerMacs and laptops, so at least they could get info on it. APPLE.. PLEASE SEND YOUR OWN PPL!!!
Click to expand...

I had a sales dude at Best Buy tell me that I'd have to come back another day if I wanted to buy the iBook that was sitting right there on the shelf because there was nobody available that knew anything about them. This was after I had already explained that all he would have to do is swipe my Mastercard and fish the box out from the warehouse.

I was in there on Friday and they had a Mac Mini sitting on the shelf, not connected to a monitor, none of the laptops were turned on and a guy was trying to work an eMac - didn't know they were still in the product line - but there was nobody around to help him.

I've written to Best Buy explaining what a lame crew they have in the local Best Buy, but I doubt they care.

They seem to take pleasure in offending me when I mention that I have a Mac. What the forget is that I also buy cameras and TVs and VCRs and GameBoys and microwaves, and DVDs and printers and PDAs............and if they think Apple stuff is too expensive, knowing that I'm willing to fork over the extra cash for it, should tell them that I'm not someone they should offend.

Margaret
 
My two cents -

I went to Best Buy's Computers "Desktops" homepage this morning and found the Mac Mini being advertised above all else in it's glory.

On Best Buy - you can't fault the sales people because they don't know any better. Customer service has plunged over the years everywhere, but Best Buy is one place I have always been able to go to get great service. I recently bought my camcorder there. They don't work on commission so they actually tell you what product they think is best instead of which one they will make the most money from. I am excited they are carrying them, but it will take a little while for them to get familiar with the mac and start believing in it, therefore selling and promoting it. I am a recent switcher, and didn't know what I was missing until I bought my pb.

On life - Start looking at the glass as being half full instead of half empty, some of you sound as if Best Buy starting to carry mac is a bad thing. It is a great start to the rest of the world getting to experience what I have experienced recently, my first mac.
 
If I was selling sacks of potatoes off the back of a truck parked beside the highway, I would spend my down time finding out all I could about potatoes so that I could answer the customers questions.

I most certainly do fault the employees of Best Buy for not knowing about the products. If they want to be gainfully employed in a place where people come to buy computers, they should take a bit of interest in the products that are on the shelf - that goes whether they are getting paid commission or not.

That philosophy is true in every other field - imagine if hair stylists didn't keep up with the current fashions, or car salesmen working in a Ford lot had a secret preference for Toyotas and didn't bother to learn about their current employers product (ok car salesmen are on commission) but the analogy applies.

Right next door to Best Buy is a small drug store chain that also stocks a few Apple products along side the many PC products they sell. ALL of the guys in the computer department of that store are as knowledgeable about the Macs on the shelf as they are about the PCs even though in private most of them prefer or own PCs as their primary computer. And if any of they were ever caught dissing a customers choice of computer, they would be out the door before they drew their next breath.

And yes, the way Best Buy handles Macs DOES hurt Apple. I don't know how many Best Buy stores there are, but on any given day let's just say there are 500 customers in the computer department of the local Best Buy. If even half of them take note of the poor display of Macs, and of them, 100 actually make an inquiry and get the message to stay away from Macs, all those people are going to carry that message to their family and friends.

Of the 100 about 10 of them will actually have enough smarts to realize that the self-proclaimed "computer expert" doesn't know squat about what he's saying, the rest will take it all as gospel and based on that faulty information they become "experts" too - and so it goes.

In the entertainment industry, even bad publicity is better than no publicity; that isn't true when you're selling complex and confusing commodities like computers.

Take care, Margaret
 
Just thought I'd mention that I went to the BestBuy on the east side of Cincinnati. They too had the Mac Mini on display with the laptops, hooked up to a bundle LCD. I adjusted settings and turned on dock magnification so that people could see the neat GUI effects and not be stuck with the defaults. There was an iLife '05 demo DVD on top of the mini with all kinds of content for showing off iPhoto, iMovie, however, no music was provided for iTunes. None of this was copied to the Mini of course, so I decided to do it for them. About the same time, an employee stopped by, noticed I was "checking out the neat features" and then went on to tell me that "it sure is more complicated than XP, isn't it?" :rolleyes: I decided to enlighted the guy and ask him how much he knows about Macs. When he said "just what I've done on this [Mini]", I showed him how things were just as easy, if not easier than on XP. The lack of internet to these Mini's makes it hard to show off iTunes MS or iChat. The employee said it was too dangerous giving people internet in the store, but we all know that the built in firewall could easily restrict access to only iTunes. I really hope they sell Mac Mini's, but with what I saw, people will have to want to see it before they walk in...the computer staff does not seem to have their act together about the Mini at all.
 
I think a lot of people are unnecessarily railing against Best Buy workers.

Case in point: I used to work at CompUSA. I knew systems up and down, and could rattle off just about any spec you wanted.

"Does this work with that?"
"What do I need to upgrade my ________?"
And on, and on, and on, the customers went.

I could answer their questions, and so could anyone else in the store. And I didn't mind that I was only getting $8 as a cashier.

See... the thing is... that was twelve years ago.

Yes, twelve years ago, I made more as a lowly cashier at CompUSA than cashiers make there now.

So while many of you are hoping upon hope that Best Buy employees will schlep Minis on people, you're not really considering that a lot of those people aren't well compensated and have no vested interest in pushing anything that isn't a service plan.

Honestly... why would they bother? It's not like they have any incentive to do so. And if your local Best Buy is anything like the ones around here, you know just by looking at the employees that they're not planning on making a career out of retail. They're not looking to further their "careers", because for the vast majority of them, Best Buy isn't a career. If the store goes under, they'll just go next door to OfficeMax, or Petco, or whoever else is paying the same wage for the same work.
 
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