Macbook Released

[davidmt]

What Apple Store? Any reason you didn't want to say which store? Service quality varies radically from store to store. Who had a free printer offer? Amazon or Apple?

It was the Salem New Hampshire store. And the free printer offer is at the Apple Store, not Amazon. Sorry for not being specific.

 

[netdog]

someone needs to stickie this:

you can do anything you like to your mac as long as it does not do damage and even then it only voids the warranty of that part

I am an apple certified technician, sales people dont know jack about the warranty they just want to make the sale thus encourage you to upgrade it with apple and will use FUD to do it.

So we can change the drive without breaking our warranty and AppleCare agreement? Tech support told me no.

 

[nem3015]

What Apple Store? Any reason you didn't want to say which store? Service quality varies radically from store to store. Who had a free printer offer? Amazon or Apple?

Just checked online and MacMall and ClubMac already have the $100 rebate and Free printer offer... so after rebate we are down to $1515 (the strange number is because on those places they already have an extra $5 drop from the retail price) for the MacBook 2.0 with 2Gb and 120 disk... of course plus taxes and various shipping costs.

This is getting better by the minute...

 

[netdog]

Does anyone happen to know how much hard drive space windows xp takes up?

I am getting my beautiful white macbook on wednesday after MONTHS of waiting...the day they came out I went to the local apple store three times to play with them.

Surprisingly little. If I remember correctly something under 600 MBs.

 

[Gatezone]

Tapping left clicks. What more do you want?

What everyone wants: everything , but I'd settle for tap select

I'm not a party line guy. It's rather irksome that people make that conclusion just because this is an Apple forum...I've made hundreds of posts (literally) pointing out problems with Apple, just as I have supporting them.

Noted.

The problem is that they can't become a Windows OEM. Yes, they would sell more units, but that's not the issue. They need to sell OS X in order to maintain distinction as a company, not just sneak it in under the radar. If market share shrinks of OS X, it poses a substantial financial threat to Apple. Without going into the long and boring details, it comes to this: market share of Apple is measured by OS X, not by the number of Macs...they can't improve their market share by selling Windows-running Macs.

There seem to be some sprockets missing in this 'logic' and that which followed it. It can't pose a substantial financial threat if for every Mac that is sold OS X is also sold at the same profit ratio that Apple is currently happily pocketing (more power to them). Of course, OS market share can be seen in terms of units shipped/sold and usage which are not always the same although except in this hybrid situation they genearlly are the same. Linux and the new Intel Macs are sort of clouding this issue. I don't think you can put it back in the bottle, although we've seen Apple yank the rug in the past.

It's not that direct. If people don't run OS X, Apple doesn't gain anything. As a boutique PC manufacturer only differing in design from other PC vendors, they're doomed as a company. Just look at the market. Not one PC manufacturer is profitable, aside from Dell, and they've recently admitted that they're missing their growth targets. Apple's the only one not breaking even or in the red, and it's because of OS X.

Again sprockets are snapping off and there is whirring of belts slipping. Yes of course they could be mine , but maybe not.

What we are seeing with Boot Camp and the revolutionary realization that you can have the best OS and the most popular on the same system is not really what we've seen in the past. I've lived through many attempts at dual boot systems and NONE of them have had the potential for fulfilling users, managers, and purchasing office requirements like what Apple has sitting in front of them right now. Your points may make sense in a Gartner study but I don't think they've really come up with a way to accurately analyze this one yet.

This isn't a difficult math problem. Apple doesn't discount their systems, neither do their supply chains, not really. Selling Windows already on them doesn't take a fracking dime out of their pockets and since their market share is so small anyway common sense, based on watching the trends, would say that there is a far greater potential for people to move to OS X than for fewer people to use Windows over OS X. Value added, dollars added, OS X stats are higher. Walk me through the down side big threat to Apple and its share-holders. They are still in a niche of premium hardware and the cache of their hip/cool image brand.

If you are saying that if their market share grows too much they are in danger of becoming less cool you may have a point, but if they don't blink and hold to their pricing strategies (with marginal drops that reflect the same margins... or higher) it is doubtful they are going to go down in revenue or profits.

An erroneous and dangerous assertion, and I'm not saying that because Apple is involved. It's happened with other companies in similar situations, and it's never worked for them, and they weren't tackling a 90% market share giant with their strategy.

Can you provide some examples of this situation with 'other' companies?

Apple has the 'survivor' mentality and so do a lot of its fans. They are also the dominant market leader in other areas like the iPod. Does it really cut into their music player business that I can play music from other sources on my iPod? No. I wouldn't buy one without being able to play music and audio from other sources.

 

[Jschultz]

Does anyone know when the macbook will cheapen up? even my so called 'student discount' is only 50 bucks lower than the full cost. I know Amazon has a $100 rebate that puts it at $999...but how long till its $949?

 

[Cybergypsy]

Tell me about it - mine finally shipped from China this afternoon, and I can't help but check the fed ex page every so often, even though I know the damn thing is on a massive cargo plane across the pacific ocean, and more than likely will be for the next several hours.

But hey, can't complain, it's on its way

took mine 2.5 days from china got it today!

 

[Frozone]

Look at me! I'm exploited!

Look at me! I'm exploited!

I am exploited because I traded in my white MB for a black one. Some posters here would insist that Apple has ripped me off.

Truth be told, I loved the white one, but I looked at my white Bose remote and pictured how stained and discolored my white MB keyboard/mousepad would be in two years and headed back down to Regent Street.

So I guess I have been ripped off!!!!!

...

Your review was also well done. My (white) MacBook will arrive on Tuesday.

For the record, I find it interesting that you and I argued for some time about this issue, with you basically saying $150 was a ripoff just for a new color and me saying that it was fair.

Yet, when purchasing our MacBooks, I bought the white one (I just didn't think it was worth $150 to make it look like a Gateway or Dell) and you bought the black one (for also valid reasons.)

Makes you wonder what the point of these forums is at all, doesn't it?

Thanks.

It is hilarious and oddly satisfying that we went in different directions. Only now I'm envious (only sort of kidding) I had a white one on reserve, I really did. I loved the price as it covered part of the upgrades I will do if I keep the thing. I've just never seen a white ibook that fully retained it's pristine pure coloring. It could be that the black will flake all to hell and look worse. Let's compare notes later on.

If I could I would 'sharpie' the big freaking logo on the lid. If it were white it would just be that much more obvious. That ought to piss some people off but I am in and out of a variety of client sites every day and I like to be 'invisible.' The logos are as much for product placementss in TV shows and movies than regular designer labeling. I'd sort of like my iPod to look like one of those creative pieces of crap too I can't even tell if I'm serious or not.

Different perspectives and questioning the obvious makes dialogue interesting. Besides sheer entertainment, I felt as well informed as possible within 48 hours of a new product release. In the old days we knew zippity zero when we walked into a store right after the release. Now we not only know what we want to know we might even have had our assumptions and fill-in the blank projections questioned to the point of waking up to something that we would have missed entirely on our own. I know it was a somewhat rhetorical question but it's a good one to ponder.

Perhaps SideTrack would alleviate some of these issues. A new version that supports the MacBook has just been released. See http://www.ragingmenace.com/software/sidetrack/ for details

Thanks I'll check it out.

 

[Bolgard]

took mine 2.5 days from china got it today!

Ooh, good to know. Here's a silly question - I'm not too up on shipping details... does Saturday count as a "business day"?

 

[Gatezone]

I am exploited because I traded in my white MB for a black one. Some posters here would insist that Apple has ripped me off.

Truth be told, I loved the white one, but I looked at my white Bose remote and pictured how stained and discolored my white MB keyboard/mousepad would be in two years and headed back down to Regent Street.

So I guess I have been ripped off!!!!!

Go man go... Doesn't it feel good? I speak from experience. You have to be fully conscious of the exploitation to really savor it.

Where's that sound track about 'pleasure spiked with pain...."

Okay.. I tried to look elsewhere and bit back and didnt see anything about this but it seems MacBook has serious heat problems like MBP. I find this really sad and MacBook service manual makes me cry... seriously...

i give ye links: (clicky me) and then read the bottom part where is the heat issue from here: (clicky me) Sorry.. but.. what is wrong with apple with that thermal paste? and seriously... to cool off at wall ac, is bit EXTREME, I did that last time when I was taking motherboard off from HP laptop and testing overclocking at extreme

Ok, I'll bite, does this have any grounding in reality for the MB (not the MBP)? Or is this like the metal case under the black?

 

[Cybergypsy]

Ooh, good to know. Here's a silly question - I'm not too up on shipping details... does Saturday count as a "business day"?

No....sorry

 

[matticus008]

What everyone wants: everything , but I'd settle for tap select

What does that mean? If a left click selects, a tap selects.

There seem to be some sprockets missing in this 'logic' and that which followed it. It can't pose a substantial financial threat if for every Mac that is sold OS X is also sold at the same profit ratio that Apple is currently happily pocketing (more power to them).

There's nothing missing; you're just not looking at the larger picture. It's not that it would affect the profitability of each machine, it's that it would affect the profitability and longevity of the brand. The investment and development curve is dependent on Apple selling OS X and people using it. They cannot start selling Windows, because it inevitably leads to "why should I switch to OS X at all if I can just keep on using everything from my last PC?" and it alerts stockholders to an admission of competency. If Apple is willing to sell (Edit: WINDOWS, not OS X), that means it's an acceptable alternative to Apple's own product and if the manufacturer isn't willing to stick to its own products, the media picks up on the signal and it comes across as weakness. The downstream effect is the unraveling of OS X.

Of course, OS market share can be seen in terms of units shipped/sold and usage which are not always the same although except in this hybrid situation they genearlly are the same.

No, it can't. Market share is not the same as units shipped, and never has been--that's a number best described as units shipped. If OS X is not being used, it doesn't affect market share one iota.

What we are seeing with Boot Camp and the revolutionary realization that you can have the best OS and the most popular on the same system is not really what we've seen in the past. I've lived through many attempts at dual boot systems and NONE of them have had the potential for fulfilling users, managers, and purchasing office requirements like what Apple has sitting in front of them right now.

I don't see why not. GRUB or graphical Lilo do pretty much what Boot Camp does for Windows. There's nothing radical about the solution that Apple has offered other than a step by step setup process.

Selling Windows already on them doesn't take a fracking dime out of their pockets and since their market share is so small anyway common sense, based on watching the trends, would say that there is a far greater potential for people to move to OS X than for fewer people to use Windows over OS X.

It's not about the day of sale or the price of the unit...it's about the back channel effects on the company, which are very real. Business and professional politics follow a set of responses which are not immediately obvious or directly calculable. You can't sacrifice your own brand for someone else, because as soon as you do, all you've accomplished is increasing the force of the other guy. If you've already got 90% of people behind you, and someone else has 5%...once that 5% guy agrees with you, he's done in politics or business, at least on that issue. (On the flip side, if the 90% heavyweight decides to agree with the little guy, there's a huge boost for the 5% guy--see below for the iPod comparison). There really are reasons why lawyers and politicians aren't random people off the street, and I'm not just trying to defend what I do.

Value added, dollars added, OS X stats are higher. Walk me through the down side big threat to Apple and its share-holders.

I already have. It's an admission that Windows is good enough for Mac users, and a media play that Apple can't sell its own OS, so it's going for the cheap path and trying to glean from the Windows herd. The thing holding Apple back in terms of market share isn't anything other than that their market share is low...and selling Windows-loaded Macs doesn't encourage development or growth that would prompt businesses to switch or result in positive market share advances. Without corporate muscle, Apple can't hope to grow too much more. Businesses aren't going to buy Macs when Dells are cheaper and they're tied to Windows software.

Can you provide some examples of this situation with 'other' companies?

IBM's OS/2 developed Windows compatibility. They'd hope to ride on Windows' coat tails and gradually pull off customers, but what actually happened is that Windows developers kept developing for Windows, and OS/2 became pointless. NextStep offered its own hardware and its own OS, and while meeting with critical success, the public reception was lukewarm. They were never able to recover and had to switch to commodity hardware to stay afloat, which in turn flopped because they didn't have the developer muscle to prop them up. There are lots of non-industry examples here, too. A company built on the distinctiveness of its products cannot marginalize that distinctiveness.

Does it really cut into their music player business that I can play music from other sources on my iPod? No. I wouldn't buy one without being able to play music and audio from other sources.

The Windows-OS X issue isn't the same as iTunes-MSN Music-everyone else. The market share war is over, and Apple lost. Music isn't an entrenched issue--you can keep your music from any vendor as long as you retain the player. If Apple started shipping iPods with MSN Music, it would reduce iTunes' market share...because this relationship only works one way.

If Microsoft created OS X compatibility, it would help OS X grow. A small company aligning with a dominant company really only leads it into obscurity. It's not a two-way street, even if it might logically seem to be.

 

[gmanrique]

Well, it seems the MB might be your "HOT" date also

Wow best B`day gift you could ever get.(xcept for a really really HOT date)

 

[Totalshock]

Safe Sleep and Civ

Late to the party, but considering buying, and wanted to clarify on a couple of questions.

1) I assume SafeSleep is supported by default, should I be in a situation down the road where I need to get an extra battery for travel time?

Don't currently have SafeSleep enabled on my 12" 867, but it would have been great to have all the times that this thing went to sleep from lack of power while playing Civ III on a plane, and wouldn't boot back up after switching batteries. What is up with that anyway? But I digress, although it is a good seque into...

2) Will it play Civ IV? I know that Civ IV specs for Mac haven't been published as of the last time I checked... but I'm not sure about the graphics requirement of that game. On the one hand, it's still a world map scenario. On the other hand, there's a lot more going on there....

Oh, and a third that came up out of confusion over DVD a couple of pages ago:

3) Will a homemade (case... meet burner... burner... meet case) DVD burner work with iDVD and the other iApps, or does one have to have an internal SuperDrive, or some sort of Apple-supported DVD burner? (And if the latter, where does one find a list of external burners that get the thumbs up?

Any help would be most appreciated. Thanks!

 

[mrichmon]

IBM's OS/2 developed Windows compatibility. They'd hope to ride on Windows' coat tails and gradually pull off customers, but what actually happened is that Windows developers kept developing for Windows, and OS/2 became pointless.

Interesting post, but this section on OS/2 mischaracterizes what happened with OS/2 since many Windows technologies were originally developed for OS/2 (e.g. DSOM was developed in OS/2 and then became COM and then DCOM under Windows). OS/2 preceeded Windows 3.0 and arguably the family tree for XP is OS/2 -> Windows NT 3.0 -> Windows NT 4.0 ->Windows 2000 -> Windows XP.

OS/2 was originally jointly developed by Microsoft and IBM as the next step in operating systems. When OS/2 was announced (1987) it was intended to be the successor to MS-DOS and Windows 2.0. For various political reasons MS decided to shift away from this OS/2 strategy and ended up releasing Windows 3.0 in 1990. Microsoft then recast much of their work for OS/2 3.0 as Windows NT and split away from any further OS/2 work leaving OS/2 development to IBM.

From the beginning OS/2 was compatible with Windows win16 programs. Win32 compatiblility was built into the early versions of OS/2 3.0 but with with Microsoft spliting away from OS/2 and the reworking of OS/2 3.0 to produce Windows NT 3.0 this compatibility was broken. (Some would say intentionally broken.)

Ultimately Windows won in the marketplace for various reasons which may or may not been influenced by behaviour by MS that lead to an antitrust suit which MS settled for $775M in cash and $75M in software credit. OS/2 continued to be used until the late 1990s in embedded systems such as ATMs and in thousands of ticket machines for the French national railway.

 

[Multimedia]

Steve Jobs on NBC Nightly News with Brian Willams Inside The Store

Here is a video of Steve talking with Brian Williams on NBC Nightly News this evening from inside the store.

Brian explains Brian explains "next week here we will be hearing more about his latest work and creations". I guess this marks the official end of the NBC-Microsoft alliance.

 

[Bolgard]

No....sorry

Bugger. Ah well

 

[matticus008]

Interesting post, but this section on OS/2 mischaracterizes what happened with OS/2 since many Windows technologies were originally developed for OS/2 (e.g. DSOM was developed in OS/2 and then became COM and then DCOM under Windows). OS/2 preceeded Windows 3.0 and arguably the family tree for XP is OS/2 -> Windows NT 3.0 -> Windows NT 4.0 ->Windows 2000 -> Windows XP...

You're right of course. I was going for brevity in a marathon post and skipped the before and after. (There are many nuanced details to the NeXtStep case as well). For a non-computer instance, one can look to Lockheed Martin's attempt at commercial aviation with its L1011...pitted unsuccessfully as it was against the DC-10, it was an attempt to make an inroads into the market which at the time was dominated by the somewhat nightmarish service requirements of the more popular DC-10. No one has heard from Lockheed since (in the commercial aviation field), though arguably it did help pluck the threads that unraveled declining giant McDonnell-Douglas. Boeing's 747 didn't help, either.

So if Apple wants to commit suicide to topple Microsoft, maybe they've got a shot. But it won't be Apple reaping the benefits. We can certainly learn from historical missteps, but you can't turn a lead strategy into gold.

 

[Gatezone]

What does that mean? If a left click selects, a tap selects.

I'll get off the desktop here in a few minutes and try it out again but I have been unsuccessful in getting the track pad to recognize a tap as a select on an item. Like having the cursor on a button and taping the pad to do the same thing that a click would do. I haven't looked up the add-on product somone else mentioned.

There's nothing missing; ...............alerts stockholders to an admission of competency. If Apple is willing to sell (Edit: WINDOWS, not OS X), that means it's an acceptable alternative to Apple's own product and if the manufacturer isn't willing to stick to its own products, the media picks up on the signal and it comes across as weakness. The downstream effect is the unraveling of OS X.

I understand what you are saying and if this was 15 or even 10 years ago I would see your position on this being stronger than it is today with Apple's and macintosh brand being what it is. They are doing some pretty common sense things to shore up their "Mac" branding with their new products: Power what? Macbook, Macbook Pro... duh now there's a branding decision. Apple has matured a lot from a brand perspective, not only in this specific way.

Back to the point though. I see the fear of the brand weakening or being over-run by windows users, but I think there comes a point where you have greater confidence in your brand, product, service.... and hardware than that.

No, it can't. Market share is not the same as units shipped, and never has been--that's a number best described as units shipped. If OS X is not being used, it doesn't affect market share one iota.

My underlying point is really that at 10% (and I'll bet that is optimistic or units shipped) there is more potential for growth than the fearful brand approach would have you believe. People might even tell the pollsters that they are using Mac OS X when they aren't just to appear more cool (now that the crack Apple advertising campaign has been so suckessful).

Both of us are speculating and there is no hard and fast rule about what would absolutely happen. Hey, I have no illusions about Apple's predictability. I worked for Apple when they had an Gil what's-his-name, for a hot minute, at the helm.

I don't see why not. GRUB or graphical Lilo do pretty much what Boot Camp does for Windows. There's nothing radical about the solution that Apple has offered other than a step by step setup process.

Matticus you have shown your true techie colors... all talk of business politics is out the window now. The dead give-away is "nothing... other than a step by step setup process" this is huge in it's simplicity, but it doesn't even compare to pre-installed optional Windows. You can't compare these other forms to something I can teach my ten year old, or more importantly a non-techy client to do. It is radical. See I can make definitive proclamations too .

...You can't sacrifice your own brand for someone else, because as soon as you do, all you've accomplished is increasing the force of the other guy. If you've already got 90% of people behind you, and someone else has 5%...once that 5% guy agrees with you, he's done in politics or business, at least on that issue. (On the flip side, if the 90% heavyweight decides to agree with the little guy, there's a huge boost for the 5% guy--see below for the iPod comparison). There really are reasons why lawyers and politicians aren't random people off the street, and I'm not just trying to defend what I do.

I do appreciate your perspectives on the corporate political long-term effects, or at least the fears of effects. I'd be happy to jump to the side of letting Mac OS run on generic boxes but that has fallen on deaf ears since the PowerPC debacle, no?

There are multiple strategies for increasing Apple's or OS X market share and I don't think they would have adopted Boot Camp (unless they just plan to try to kill it off) like they have if they were as frightened, as you portray them, of the dynamics you describe.

There are times when a minority can deeply effect a majority if the majority representatives are further imersed into the minority experience and survive to tell about the benefits and spread the meme of something 'hot' that the minority has.

The iPod example may not seem related but I think it is. Apple is making money on the hardware, is it not? Plus on services related to the hardware and music distribution and advertising. It is a fascinating situation where the established software is all proprietary (in the sense that it is only created by the artist) and it is completely compatible with all hardware so it is also non-proprietary. I think the dream of many people is that computer operatingn systems would become far less visible, more like the iPod's embedded and flash system. The fear is that apple would some how lose the lost OS wars? That it can't make money on hardware alone? Can it make it on software alone? Is that why it never licenses it's software? I would say the latter sort of shows a lot less confidence in the OS brand than letting Windows run on an iPod, oops, I mean on a Macbook.

It's an admission that Windows is good enough for Mac users, and a media play that Apple can't sell its own OS, so it's going for the cheap path and trying to glean from the Windows herd. The thing holding Apple back in terms of market share isn't anything other than that their market share is low...and selling Windows-loaded Macs doesn't encourage development or growth that would prompt businesses to switch or result in positive market share advances. Without corporate muscle, Apple can't hope to grow too much more. Businesses aren't going to buy Macs when Dells are cheaper and they're tied to Windows software.

It isn't that Apple *can't* sell it's own OS, it is that it *won't* sell it's own OS... Branding has a lot to do with positioning and spinning (see Apple's failed attempts at spinning in the direction you describe). Dell would sell cheap laptops with OS X on them. But a software company that doesn't sell hardware would go broke, right? Oops, what about Microsoft? I also have to say that when a company like Apple throws beautifully designed monkey wrenches into it's developer and business partner community with major processor shifts and emulation processes it hurts their growth. But they have to and I applaud them doing it.

So to get this straight, Apple doesn't want to sell Windows with it's hardware but will give away a product and the tools to do it on your own. It also doesn't want to sell you their own dog food to run on your XYZ Intel/AMD computer. It wants you to buy their hardware and their OS with fewer build to order options than other major computer manufacturers. It wants to grow it's market share based on the ***public's*** perception of OS X...?

IBM's OS/2 developed Windows compatibility. ...There are lots of non-industry examples here, too. A company built on the distinctiveness of its products cannot marginalize that distinctiveness.

Interesting and good examples, thank you. I don't see them quite in the same league or with the same user base or specialized developer community as OS X and Apple. Apple's distinctiveness is it's OS or its hardware? Both? hardware is really not as distinctive as it once was is it? I mean it's good and it might be the best PC hardware in some ways, but it is just like another PC hardware commodity because Apple had to eat crow and turn to Intel. So the software and interface is the heart of the distinctiveness or unique selling point. But they don't want to separate it from their marginally distinctive hardware, and it would signal, according to you, Apple raising a white flag if they offered windows dual boot as a bto option.

Hey I'm learning in this dialogue but there are circles that still don't make sense politically or logically.

The Windows-OS X issue isn't the same as iTunes-MSN Music-everyone else. The market share war is over, and Apple lost. Music isn't an entrenched issue--you can keep your music from any vendor as long as you retain the player. If Apple started shipping iPods with MSN Music, it would reduce iTunes' market share...because this relationship only works one way.

If Microsoft created OS X compatibility, it would help OS X grow. A small company aligning with a dominant company really only leads it into obscurity. It's not a two-way street, even if it might logically seem to be.

If the ipod went out with both on it do you really think that given the choice people would choose MSN? I mean you can't force people to buy one experience over another if they really like it. People really like the iPod and iTunes experience. While WWI, WWII, Vietnam, and the Desert Storm OS wars are over and Apple lost, I think given the choice of OS and the applications, (your good points about developers insert here) more than 10% of the market would choose OS X.

 

[matticus008]

Like having the cursor on a button and taping the pad to do the same thing that a click would do. I haven't looked up the add-on product somone else mentioned.

Unless there's something wrong with yours, it should work just fine. It does on my PowerBook and on the MBP I tried, at least.

I understand what you are saying and if this was 15 or even 10 years ago I would see your position on this being stronger than it is today with Apple's and macintosh brand being what it is.

It's not time dependent. Apple, if it's going to continue to develop both hardware and software, cannot compromise the software, because it's OS X that makes them distinctive.

I think there comes a point where you have greater confidence in your brand, product, service.... and hardware than that.

You've obviously never done a press conference or an investor conference . It's not your own confidence in your products that's the issue, its shareholder and media confidence, and I assure you that's not an unpredictable response in the slightest.

My underlying point is really that at 10% (and I'll bet that is optimistic or units shipped) there is more potential for growth than the fearful brand approach would have you believe.

The thing is, that's not growth. It's more sales, but it's not a market share expansion. For Apple, they have to tie their hardware sales to OS X, because they're not willing to license the OS, so the only way to increase market share and therefore investment and further cyclical growth is to make sure that people who buy Macs primarily use OS X. If they are only shipping Windows boxes, they get to make more money in the short term, but it's not sustainable growth and it's not at all a prudent business move.

Both of us are speculating and there is no hard and fast rule about what would absolutely happen.

I'm afraid that's not accurate. There's no saying for sure what Apple will and won't do, but there absolutely is a predictable response and consequence if they were to start providing Windows, and historical precedent that such a move is not "survivable."

You can't compare these other forms to something I can teach my ten year old, or more importantly a non-techy client to do. It is radical. See I can make definitive proclamations too .

Yes I can...Lilo and GRUB offer graphical OS selection just like the Boot Camp boot process. A four year old could use it. What Apple has done is provide step by step instructions on the computer itself...but even a 10 year old could follow any of the dozens of install guides on the Internet for dual booting. With the right instructions, anyone can dual boot on any computer.

I do appreciate your perspectives on the corporate political long-term effects, or at least the fears of effects. I'd be happy to jump to the side of letting Mac OS run on generic boxes but that has fallen on deaf ears since the PowerPC debacle, no?

That's an entirely different discussion, my friend.

There are multiple strategies for increasing Apple's or OS X market share and I don't think they would have adopted Boot Camp (unless they just plan to try to kill it off) like they have if they were as frightened, as you portray them, of the dynamics you describe.

The cause-effect scenario I'm talking about applies to Apple offering Windows as a BTO option. The existence of Boot Camp is completely separate from that. There is a difference between permitting and encouraging, and Apple is right at that line, positioned exactly where they should be from a corporate-political perspective.

There are times when a minority can deeply effect a majority if the majority representatives are further imersed into the minority experience and survive to tell about the benefits and spread the meme of something 'hot' that the minority has.

Yes, but you're not talking about that. You're talking about increasing Apple sales via selling Windows PCs...so the "minority experience" isn't relevant beyond an idle curiosity.

The iPod example may not seem related but I think it is. Apple is making money on the hardware, is it not? [...] That it can't make money on hardware alone? Can it make it on software alone? Is that why it never licenses it's software? I would say the latter sort of shows a lot less confidence in the OS brand than letting Windows run on an iPod, oops, I mean on a Macbook.

Apple can't really survive without one or the other. People love the integration of hardware and software that Apple provides, and concurrently, Apple's existence relies on that synergy. The iPod is the exact opposite of the Mac. The iPod is both the most populare hardware and uses the most popular software. The Macintosh is neither the best-selling computer line nor is it the best-selling OS. Again, Apple's confidence in their own brand is not at stake.

Dell would sell cheap laptops with OS X on them.

We're not talking about that here. There are different forces discouraging that behavior (namely, Apple's software is funded directly by its hardware sales, so expanding the software scope would require a reworking of their finances).

But a software company that doesn't sell hardware would go broke, right? Oops, what about Microsoft?

Microsoft has a 90% market share. Apple has about 4%. There's no competitive commercial OS to fight Windows. It's not that software companies or hardware companies can't be profitable; it's that Apple is BOTH, and they can't abandon that on a whim because they've got nothing to fall back on. Their ongoing stabilitiy is dependent on the synergy of both halves.

So to get this straight, Apple doesn't want to sell Windows with it's hardware but will give away a product and the tools to do it on your own.

Precisely. That's the confidence in their brand. They will sell you a computer. Once it's in your hands, they're okay with you doing whatever you want with it, because they're confident you'll like OS X and stick with it. But that's a totally different beast from them selling you Windows from the factory. You're talking about Microsoft selling and supporting Linux as an optional add-on to Windows (of their own free will and not because they're forced to in order to avoid legal entanglement) versus Microsoft having tools to allow you to prepare to dual-boot your computer with Linux.

It wants you to buy their hardware and their OS with fewer build to order options than other major computer manufacturers. It wants to grow it's market share based on the ***public's*** perception of OS X...?

Why knock the hardware's limited configurations? Aren't you the one who wants to buy the Mac hardware to run Windows? If configurability is a problem, wouldn't you rather have a Dell?

Apple's distinctiveness is it's OS or its hardware? Both? hardware is really not as distinctive as it once was is it? I mean it's good and it might be the best PC hardware in some ways, but it is just like another PC hardware commodity because Apple had to eat crow and turn to Intel. So the software and interface is the heart of the distinctiveness or unique selling point.

It's both, because the hardware pays for the software. The software is the heart of that distinctiveness, yes. But the software cannot survive independent of the hardware, both in terms of finances and of support and development.

If the ipod went out with both on it do you really think that given the choice people would choose MSN? I mean you can't force people to buy one experience over another if they really like it. People really like the iPod and iTunes experience.

Yes, people do. But diffusion of customers goes from the dominant outward, not the other way when the dominant player introduces a minority. The iPod situation is the exact opposite of the Mac situation (iPod=Apple dominance in hardware/software versus Mac=Apple lightweight in both sides). iTunes has a tremendous volume, and MSN Music is constantly improving to try to catch it. There's a far higher statistical risk that iTunes customers will switch away from it than will switch to iTunes, because chances are they're already using iTunes. This is exactly why Microsoft doesn't bundle OS X or Linux and why it refuses to port certain key technologies to those platforms, and exactly why MSN Music is NOT offered for iPods.

 

[bloodycape]

No, you cannot. There is no "graphics chip" on the motherboard to swap out. It's built directly into the Intel chipset.

I guess the guy swapped something out but I could have sworn it was the GFX he did on his intel laptop.

 

[Gatezone]

Unless there's something wrong with yours, it should work just fine. It does on my PowerBook and on the MBP I tried, at least.

While it would be nice if it did, I cannot make my macbook do the following:

move the cursor to an icon and then tap one or two fingers on the touch pad and have the icon open without further action. I can put the cursor over an icon, press with two fingers AND click and get a context drop down (control click) menu. Wouldn't work on the powebook 15, doesn't work on the Macbook. A utility or 3rd party might enable it to do this, or if you point me to a system setting I'd be most happy to enable it.

As for the rest, Matticus, you seem to have the answers you need and I respectfully disagree with any number of your opinions you present as definitive answers.

Foolishly, I'm more interested in exploratory dialogue not "this is the way it is" and if you don't see it that way then obviously you've never done X. That's a show stopper. If you know exactly what will happen, why, and probably when -- then ok you're all set then. It isn't a dialogue. Letting the thread die will, I am sure, will be a relief to many who have to skip over our lengthy dialogues to get to the next macbook post.

I've been around on the front lines long enough to know that things don't always go by the MBA, accountants, lawyers, or certified technicians book of rules, predictions, and indicators.

Just to wrap up my portion of the show, I don't have any big push to have Windows take over the Mac hardware platform. Hardly. I simply see it as another opportunity to increase exposure of OS X and Apple hardware to a greater number of people who know they can live without a Mac, but who feel that their current 9-5 professional life demands that they work or live in a PC dominant work culture.

I experience your positions as well written yet they come across to me as: "No, it's corporate politics, no it's hardware, no it's software, no there is no money in hardware, no hardware supports the software, no it's not sales it's marketshare, etc...." and they need to be read carefully to determine if they really add up to a cogent whole, they don't for me.

Off to a weekend of sorts.

 

[daneoni]

Well, I don't know for sure, but you're right. They can't tell if you replace the disk and when it came time to send it in for service you switched back. I think the problem is that Apple has not communicated down to the retail store level an official decision on the MacBook hard disk.

RAM replacement has never voided your warranty in the past, and even hard disk replacement doesn't on a desktop. Apple employees are probably quoting the MacBook Pro/old iBook policy on hard disks; I'm pretty sure Apple would not void your warranty for a HD replacement as easily as it is done on the MacBook. (And as you say they couldn't even tell if they wanted to!)

You might wanna be careful they CAN tell if you've upgraded your Hard Drive or Optical Drive because the ones that come with the system originally, have a "Manufactured for Apple...with the Apple logo" label attached to the them

 

[daneoni]

There is an L-bracket that covers the hard drive/RAM openings from the battery. I imagine that could be referred to as a "RAM door." It requires the use of a Phillips screwdriver -- size 0 worked well for me.


I have not seen an external FW 2.5" enclosure for SATA drives. Have you? If so, please post a link, as I was the first to say the 160GB doesn't come in SATA flavor yet but someone replied "yes, they are out."



I doubt Apple will make it immediately available. They are not shipping 500GB HD's in desktops, are they? It took Apple some time to make 400GB a BTO option. It could take quite a few months before they make the 160GB available, and that's after they actually start to ship.

They are, the iMacs have a 500GB HD option as do the PowerMacs but i agree it will take a while before we see 160GB HDs

 

[matticus008]

While it would be nice if it did, I cannot make my macbook do the following:

move the cursor to an icon and then tap one or two fingers on the touch pad and have the icon open without further action.

Okay, I see what you're saying. That's not select, though, that's open or double-click. Third-party utilities can do that for you if that's your goal.

I respectfully disagree with any number of your opinions you present as definitive answers.

And you're entitled to, but I would press you for which "definitive answers" are opinion in nature.

Foolishly, I'm more interested in exploratory dialogue not "this is the way it is"

It's been an exploratory dialogue in that you pose "what if" scenarios which do have answers and consequences. That conversation has been exhausted, however, as you suggest.

I've been around on the front lines long enough to know that things don't always go by the MBA, accountants, lawyers, or certified technicians book of rules, predictions, and indicators.

And I've been around law, politics, engineering, and marketing long enough to know that some actions have direct consequences. Media and stockholder response is not a random bag.

I simply see it as another opportunity to increase exposure of OS X and Apple hardware to a greater number of people who know they can live without a Mac, but who feel that their current 9-5 professional life demands that they work or live in a PC dominant work culture.

And Boot Camp does exactly that. Preinstalling Windows doesn't increase exposure. The genius of boot camp is that in order to get Windows working, you've got to use OS X for a few minutes. If you never have to, you lose that exposure.

I experience your positions as well written yet they come across to me as: "No, it's corporate politics, no it's hardware, no it's software, no there is no money in hardware, no hardware supports the software, no it's not sales it's marketshare, etc...." and they need to be read carefully to determine if they really add up to a cogent whole, they don't for me.

That's only because you keep moving the goal post. The answer to which of your questions should add up to a cogent whole? I never said that there was no money in hardware, and the sales v. market share thing is a misunderstanding on your part that undermines your hypothetical suggestions, as does what appears to be a lack of consideration for what finances the whole Apple operation, which is as concrete an indicator as any.