Microsoft Releases Second 'Laptop Hunters' Commercial

[-hh]

See, that's the thing: any machine from the last 7 or 8 years will be fine for 90% of the users out there looking to use their iPod, surf the net, and do Office-type stuff. That's why netbooks have gotten so popular. A Pentium M from 5 years ago benchmarks faster, but for many things, it doesn't matter.

Agreed, although personally, I just wouldn't necessarily reach back that many years, particularly for laptops (as they get physically beaten up).

That's why people looking at Macs as being a rip-off because they don't have the raw power (be it CPU or GPU) as a similarly priced PC don't get it.

The paradigm is that they've been eating hamburger for so long, they have no concept that there's any other cut of beef...they simply say "Hamburger is Hamburger" and buy it as a commodity (price).

Precisely what the MS Ad's G-guy did...and thus, tried to reenforce this product perception.

Many people don't want a Mac for those reasons, they want it for the experience. They want to have everything work together, with a minimal amount of hassle. They want the experience.

They like the way OS X works, plain and simple. And if that's what they like, then let them like it. It's their choice if they want to overpay for a Mac. It's not up to any one like Mosx and PR5Owner to tell them they're "wrong" or are getting "ripped off".

You mean there's cuts of beef besides hamburger? No, that can't be right.

I still have my 400mhz G4 TiBook. It runs Entourage, Word, Excel, and Firefox all while playing a DVD full screen without a single stutter.

I suspect that more and more users are starting to catch on too...hence the rise of Netbooks...and on a slightly different angle, its also partly why an old G4 Mac Cube still sells for $150.

Somewhere i read that the majority of MS's profits are from oem installs.

Not to contest this, but to redirect: its not only about where MS is making money, but also where their lost moneymaking opportunities are. Thus, one major competitor to selling another copy of Windows is the pirated copy of Windows...that's clearly a lost revenue opportunity for MS.

And thus, what makes this MS Advertising campaign particularly interesting is that they're now actually making the effort to focus on Apple...does this perhaps suggest that the Mac OS market share is now threatening to become larger than the pirated Windows OS market share?


-hh

 

[KnightWRX]

Hmm the consoles are kids toys? Well, I hate to break it to you but the average "kid" playing an Xbox360 or PS3 is the 18-35 year old male. Even better is the fact that the average age is getting older because they're not stopping their gaming as they get older.

Don't forget the fact that theres more console gamers out there than there are Mac users total

In fact, the average age is now 35 http://www.dmwmedia.com/news/2008/07/17/survey:-average-u.s.-gamer-age-35;-40%-are-women

You don't have to lecture me on who buys console. I'm an avid console gamer and over 30 myself. Guess what, it's still a Kid's toy. Us people over 30 don't mind saying so. It's not as if being kids for a few hours while playing a game is a very bad thing.

 

[Sehnsucht]

They're nice, but the Apple tax soars to 50% on the Pros. I'd be OK with 15-20% Apple tax for the ability to run an extra OS, but 50%? Come on. I still think I'm getting an MBP, but the MP deal is sooooo off.

I know. I really want to set up a graphic design studio with at least one MP, but it looks like the only way I'm getting the money is to sue someone for a million bucks and win. Or win the lottery.

 

[-hh]

not really, becuase part overclocking is ensuring the CPU is cooled properly (not using stock heatsink) my e8400 has a tuniq tower HSF (the HSF is so big it can cool the e8400 passively)

Ummm...and how do I get that heatsink into a laptop?
Thanks, but no thanks.

...i have yet to see a computer die from overclocking. the only CPU that did die that ive seen is my friend tightening a water block on too tight and cracking the die. that is only a result of stupidity not heat.

Sorry, but that's incorrect. Logically, all tasks that are required to implement overclocking (and I'm assuming that this one was) are part of the cumulative 'risk of loss', which feed into the final Risk:Benefit assessment. Thus, your friend's error counts, as well as the cost of whatever had to be replaced, plus all that downtime while awaiting replacement parts, etc, etc.


-hh

 

[-hh]

It's not about power users at all. It's about giving people CHOICE. THe CHOICE to buy what THEY want and use it how THEY want. Not at all about catering to the "power users".

The whole argument here and with these Microsoft ads is that you simply have NO choice with Apple. You either have to buy what they tell you you need or want or nothing at all. Thats the problem.

Bogus alert.

Every consumer has a choice: the choice to buy any Windows machine, or to buy any Apple machine.

The lack of thousands of permutations for hardware is a limitation when making the Mac OS choice, but that's merely part of the trade-off. You get that hardware gradation feature on HP, Dell, etc...but then you have no choice to run (legally) anything other than Windows OS.

Thus, name your poison: choice in hardware but not OS, or choice in OS but not in hardware. Life isn't fair...suck it up and move on.

I also want to say one last thing..

People tend to claim that Apple uses high end hardware thats better than PCs. Well, thats kind of funny to me. In my MacBook I have a Hitachi HDD, LG DVD writer, LG screen, Intel processor, and nvidia chipset. in my HP I have a Fujitsu HDD, LG DVD writer, LG screen, Intel processor, Intel chipset, and nvidia GPU. In the Dell Studio XPS 13 you'll find one of the same screens by the same manufacturers used as Apple, same DVD writers (Panasonic and LG), same HDDs, same nvidia chipset, same Intel processor.. need I go on?

Don't bother. What's missing from your list is that you don't know where the OEM has additional contract terms for those components. It may or may not relate to hardware features, for it can simply be ISO-9001 requirements.

And if you don't want to believe this, have a knowledgeable friend take you to your local Home Depot and then to Lowes or another similar supplier: when you know where to look, you'll find examples where the same exact Brand & Model # is sold at two different outlets, but when you actually dig into the details, you'll find that they're actually different items under the skin and label. Two examples that I'm personally familiar with are Timberline brand roofing shingles (measure the difference in height of the package ... they're using different weight felts) and some power tools (one has bushings where another has bearings).

Macs are the exact same hardware put in a prettier yet more poorly built enclosure.

Yet the key product differentiation for the consumer isn't the hardware, but the OS.

That's what the MS Advertisement is trying to obfuscate: they're trying to ignore the software and make it into a simple hardware 'commodity' comparison. And there's a large segment who will buy that hook, line and sinker ...which IMO appears to even includes you.



-hh

 

[-hh]

In that case, according to your "risk assessment", don't turn on your macbook. This is because turning it on will cause the micro-processor to heat up and could shorten the life of the processor. It also counts towards the "risk of loss".

Yes, you're correct that that is an objective risk. And to be pedantically balanced, there's even an objective risk incurred when one installs aftermarket RAM.

Some risks (such as turning the machine on to use it) are effectively unavoidable, since there would otherwise be no utility from the tool.

In the case of overclocking, the question isn't the normal 'unavoidable' risks, but what additional risks were being introduced by the decision to modify the hardware.

The corollary observation from this which people often overlook is that if there was no objective Benefit that resulted, then incurring any risk (no matter how small) would be divided by zero Benefit, which results in an 'infinite' unfavorable ratio condition.


-hh

 

[LagunaSol]

CNET on why this ad campaign fails:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10216245-37.html?tag=mncol;title

Ultimately the message is: "We know you really want a Mac, but you're just too poor/cheap. So how about this sticker-covered plastic brick instead with that unnamed OS that everyone hates? Did we mention it's cheap???"

A big problem with this campaign is this: most consumers out there are already familiar with cheap PCs and the pain of Microsoft Windows. They're buying Macs because they're tired of the Windows gauntlet of doom. All these ads are saying to them is "we know we suck, but at least it's an inexpensive kind of suck."

The Apple ads, on the other hand, tell people what most of them don't know: that they don't have to live with the Hell of Windows anymore.

 

[Goona]

Sorry, but that doesn't add ANY credibility (cnet is a joke). If you look at the history of the poster, you can see he is clearly an apple fanboi. The apple ads are nothing more than lies and vista bashing. In fact, I did not see a single apple commercial where they explain the useful features of OSX. Instead, they resort to barbaric lies. Apple is worse than Microsoft. In fact, this whole Microsoft commercials must be a way of "Microsoft making joke commercials just so it can laugh at Apple".

Most uninformed technically challenged consumers who are very cheap are familiar with the pain of Microsoft Windows DUE to bloatware and poor install/configuration. These are the same consumers who would never buy Apple.

So Apple couldn't bash Vista like the mainstream press and users who gave Vista the lowest satisfaction rating were doing?

 

[DMann]

LOL at this dude. So now you want to insult people because they had problems with Vista, I mean they were just deluded, there was nothing wrong it. I mean from the mainstream press to bloggers on the net, to users giving it a bad reviews and low satisfaction ratings, they were all deluded, Vista was really good, there was nothing wrong with it. It was all in their imagination and also due to Apple's lies.

Seems that the percentage of users satisfied with Vista has been undeniably low in 2008. For corporations, it's worse, with 8% of corporate users satisfied with Vista:

http://vista.blorge.com/2008/03/31/only-8-of-corporate-users-satisfied-with-vista/

This speaks volumes about Vista's reception, considering the alleged massive volumes of Vista distributed.

 

[Goona]

Seems that the percentage of users satisfied with Vista has been undeniably low in 2008. For corporations, it's worse, with 8% of corporate users satisfied with Vista:

http://vista.blorge.com/2008/03/31/only-8-of-corporate-users-satisfied-with-vista/

This speaks volumes about Vista's reception, considering the alleged massive volumes of Vista distributed.

Dude you don't know there's nothing wrong with Vista, it's all due to Apple's lies about it and it's in everyone's imagination.

 

[KnightWRX]

Hate to tell you this but 90-99% of windows problems link to those same things.... Very little is the OS itself. If you are going to using that argument for OSX then you have to accept it for windows as well.

I've never seen OS X having a problem where it takes forever to copy a file from a hard drive to the same hard drive. That was one of Vista's shipping bugs that didn't get addressed until SP1.

Pretty major if you ask me.

 

[DMann]

Dude you don't know there's nothing wrong with Vista, it's all due to Apple's lies about it and it's in everyone's imagination.

Please, say it isn't so...

http://blip.tv/file/340692/

 

[AidenShaw]

I've never seen OS X having a problem where it takes forever to copy a file from a hard drive to the same hard drive. That was one of Vista's shipping bugs that didn't get addressed until SP1.

Pretty major if you ask me.

And I've never had a Windows upgrade reformat any attached external drives on me.

(It's pointless to start a tit-for-tat about serious (or other) bugs, both sides have huge databases of examples of things that *should* have been caught.)

ps: I've never experienced the "infinite copy" bug, although it obviously happened.

 

[Goona]

Please, say it isn't so...

http://blip.tv/file/340692/

Goddamn this is some hilarious *****.

"The company who taught their users how to turn off their computers by pressing start."

 

[DMann]

Goddamn this is some hilarious *****.

"The company who taught their users how to turn off their computers by pressing start."

This was done, however inadvertently, to reflexively train them how to re-START.

 

[AidenShaw]

"The company who taught their users how to turn off their computers by pressing start."

On Windows, you go to the "Start" menu to initiate tasks and applications.

It makes perfect sense to "start" the task of shutting down the computer.

In any event, that's ancient history. Vista and Windows 7 just have the logo on the button, the five letters "S t a r t" are no longer present.

For me, it's always seemed ludricous that on Mac OS dragging a floppy into the "Trash" bin didn't delete the files on the floppy, but instead ejected it. Makes no sense at all....

 

[-hh]

It has to do with simplifying things as plainlanguage.gov explains.

So let's see you step up to the challenge of paraphrasing it accurately, but shorter, in the style you're suggesting to use.

Restated, in 5th Grader terms: "Put up or shut up".

This is what his trying to do http://plainlanguage.gov/examples/humor/9easysteps.cfm, it's obvious. It wasn't an insult, it was a recommendation.

Please. Risk Assessment methodologies are quite easy to expound on; this could easily be 3x the length simply by mentioning the RA dimensions of Probability and Consequence.

It wasn't an insult, it was a recommendation.

Sure it wasn't. Attacking the messenger instead of the message.

*sigh*, we sure were better off when you were on time-out.

But not yet: the ball is now in his court to show that what I wrote could be written shorter while still encompassing the same statements. I suspect that his challenge will be in trying to avoid also adding a condescending tone.


-hh

 

[wesk702]

For me, it's always seemed ludricous that on Mac OS dragging a floppy into the "Trash" bin didn't delete the files on the floppy, but instead ejected it. Makes no sense at all....

Just curious if you have even used a mac recently, because as soon as you hold down the left click on a cd, the 'trash' bin immediately turns into an 'eject' icon. You aren't dragging the cd to the trash at all. I'd see it as 'luDIcrous?' too, if it occurred the way you imagined.

and no... it does not make perfect sense to hit 'start' to initiate the task of shutting down. which vista forum did you get this off of?

 

[LagunaSol]

If you look at the history of the poster, you can see he is clearly an apple fanboi.

Of course. Anyone who doesn't wear a jeweled vial of Ballmer sweat around his neck is an Apple "fanboi," right? (Which you're probably clutching desperately right now)

The apple ads are nothing more than lies and vista bashing.

The only liar I see here is you. Tell me where the ads lie. UAC is intrusive: TRUE. Consumer PCs come loaded with crapware: TRUE. Consumer PCs needed hardware upgrades to run Vista sufficiently: TRUE. Macs come with better digital media software out of the box: TRUE. Apple Stores have a Genius Bar to help you out: TRUE. Vista comes in a baffling number of versions: TRUE. College students prefer Apple notebooks: TRUE. I could go on. And on. And on.

Just because you wish them to be untrue doesn't make it so. No matter how many tears you shed on your Ballmer pillow at night.

For me, it's always seemed ludricous that on Mac OS dragging a floppy into the "Trash" bin didn't delete the files on the floppy, but instead ejected it.)

wesk702 pointed out your obvious ignorance regarding OS X, but even funnier is your reference to floppy discs, which is so relevant to the topic at hand.

Oh wait, PC users still use floppy discs...

 

[jbernie]

Seems that the percentage of users satisfied with Vista has been undeniably low in 2008. For corporations, it's worse, with 8% of corporate users satisfied with Vista:

This speaks volumes about Vista's reception, considering the alleged massive volumes of Vista distributed.

With all due respect the average training provided to any user regardless of ability at most companies is likely to be:
1) desk
2) chair
3) phone
4) computer
5) this is your login
6) login to anything else

I think if you put any very average corporate Windows user in front of a machine with OSX they would struggle just as much, and you could get the same results.

 

[DMann]

Just because you wish them to be untrue doesn't make it so. No matter how many tears you shed on your Ballmer pillow at night.

What a ghastly image! The pillow would need to be fully laminated to keep the moisture in.

Troll Different.

great sig!

 

[jbernie]

wesk702 pointed out your obvious ignorance regarding OS X, but even funnier is your reference to floppy discs, which is so relevant to the topic at hand.

Oh wait, PC users still use floppy discs...

really? I would need to go buy a USB floppy drive for my laptop if i did. and the point was relevant, you can't delete the content of most CDs or DVDs.

 

[LagunaSol]

And users who gave Vista bad reviews are technology inept (also proved by the mojave experiment by Microsoft).

Ah, so Vista really is "amazing." Which explains why Microsoft is scrambling to get its successor out the door, right?

Apparently an integral part of Microsoft's new marketing campaign is activating its Winbot sleeper cells on every Mac-related website and forum to start spouting their juvenile LAN-boy gibberish.

SMELL THE DESPERATION!

 

[DMann]

With all due respect the average training provided to any user regardless of ability at most companies is likely to be:
1) desk
2) chair
3) phone
4) computer
5) this is your login
6) login to anything else

I think if you put any very average corporate Windows user in front of a machine with OSX they would struggle just as much, and you could get the same results.

Perhaps, but for many corporate workers I speak with, after the purgatory they've suffered through with Windows for the past 14 years, OS X has become quite the respite.

 

[Eidorian]

Just curious if you have even used a mac recently, because as soon as you hold down the left click on a cd, the 'trash' bin immediately turns into an 'eject' icon. You aren't dragging the cd to the trash at all. I'd see it as 'luDIcrous?' too, if it occurred the way you imagined.

and no... it does not make perfect sense to hit 'start' to initiate the task of shutting down. which vista forum did you get this off of?

wesk702 pointed out your obvious ignorance regarding OS X, but even funnier is your reference to floppy discs, which is so relevant to the topic at hand.

Oh wait, PC users still use floppy discs...

Take a trip down memory lane with Mac OS. X doesn't always mark the spot.