And Ballmer usually gets it right, right?
Actually, he does. Firing Johnson is a very good move.
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Microsoft's Shifting Strategy in Response to Apple
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Actually, he does. Firing Johnson is a very good move.
Dell comes pretty close to barebones on their workstation configurations. CD-ROM drives until Vista was out, 1 GB of RAM, and 80 GB SATA drives.
Funny to see Ballmer using the same words
Not to me. The man isn't exactly an original thinker. I more wonder if Ballmer has finally realized that Microsoft's success with the "component model" market can't be duplicated.
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Steve B, you don't sell PC's, so how are you outselling Apple 30-1?
Steve B, you don't sell PC's, so how are you outselling Apple 30-1?
True.
Yes it is.
If you want a dedicated GPU, you can get a MBP.
Wouldn't that be 25-1? What am I missing?
MS was able to feed people their poorly made copycat because people don't know any better 10-20 years ago. Some people today still don't know the difference, but more and more people are beginning to know there are actually options on the market that perform a better job than MS products.
Now people have smarten up, for example over the past decade, people recognized how crappy MS's "Plays for Sure", etc files are (that's why MS couldn't make any progress into the media player market despite giving their codes to all the audio players), more recently people realized how crappy Microsoft's Zune are (even the MS advocate who got 3 Zune Tattoos is switching to another player https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=5890154), and people are starting to realize the what a poor experience Windows provides.
They tried to make an end to end system. It's called the Zune. MS can't even get a music player right.
Now people have smarten up, for example over the past decade, people recognized how crappy MS's "Plays for Sure", etc files are (that's why MS couldn't make any progress into the media player market despite giving their codes to all the audio players), more recently people realized how crappy Microsoft's Zune are (even the MS advocate who got 3 Zune Tattoos is switching to another player https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=5890154), and people are starting to realize the what a poor experience Windows provides.
They tried to make an end to end system. It's called the Zune. MS can't even get a music player right.
Plus Monkey Boy is talking about operating systems. Microsoft isn't outselling Apple with *their* hardware. It's not really fare to compare companies this way (who's outselling whom), since the companies' models are not exactly equivalent.
Selling PCs vice selling an OS is completely different IMHO.
On a side note, Microsoft does make some great keyboards and mice.
Competition is good.
I hope they do a better job than Zune vs. iPod.
Lately, Microsoft seems like a giant, uncontrollable flock of birds that keeps changing leaders and directions. Just flying around in circles.
I hope they do a better job than Zune vs. iPod.
Lately, Microsoft seems like a giant, uncontrollable flock of birds that keeps changing leaders and directions. Just flying around in circles.
Exactly so. The Microsoft we know today was the product of an historical quirk, an accident, which made them think that this so-called "component" model was a work of their genius and could be implemented in other markets. Now after literally decades of trying, they appear to be giving up and accepting that they have to design products more like Apple does. Good luck with that, is all I can say.
There's your answer for why the XBOX is so popular and accessible. It's one of the first "IT Just Works" products MS has ever released. There's nothing wrong with the closed experience, to a point. The iPhone's lock in, and lack of open software is really pushing it, though. Once you cross the line into the iPhone becoming a computer, which I think we have, the artificial limitations become harder to swallow.
I believe Apple only have a 3.5% worldwide share at the moment. Linux has about a 0.5-1% non-server share. And the server market is worth only about 3% so Microsoft have at least a 92.5% share, probably at least 93.5% including Windows server. Which is 27-1.
If you ignore the server market Apple has a 3.6% share, Linux has a still has between 0.5 and 1% of the market, giving Microsoft 95.4% of the market, but that still is only 26 or 27-1.
I know other Unix OS's do have users but the numbers are so small outside of servers they aren't worth including.
The thing is is that its only ahead overall of the PS3 in the US, and is currently being outsold everywhere by the PS3, not to mention the Wii.
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Oh please, be real. Apple will never "take over" anything but a small (but nonetheless sizeable) portion of the industry. They'll be big in homes and small biz, but they'll never be more than a fringe in the corporate world, which is a HUGE segment of the market.
Dustman said:
Apple is doing the best they've ever done. Other than MobileMe, they're rock solid and let us remember that the 1% failure rate for MobileMe is hardly a disaster. Competition is always good though, but it seems like Apple's on their way to taking over the computer industry to me?
Oh please, be real. Apple will never "take over" anything but a small (but nonetheless sizeable) portion of the industry. They'll be big in homes and small biz, but they'll never be more than a fringe in the corporate world, which is a HUGE segment of the market.
Microsoft cannot move to an "end-to-end" process with any level of seriousness since it is that component model that keeps hundreds of millions of Windows license fees flowing into Microsoft's coffers. Plus I don't believe Microsoft can even if they wanted to and could generate a schema that would make them as much or more money. The Windows codebase is too scattered to allow it, I expect.
But if companies are willing to work very closely with Microsoft to create a version of Windows that is "fully certified" to work with some of their hardware in a coherent and optimized way likely would have value - especially with corporate/enterprise/public sector companies who currently spend significant amounts of money on in-house support staff to keep their Windows installations working.
But if companies are willing to work very closely with Microsoft to create a version of Windows that is "fully certified" to work with some of their hardware in a coherent and optimized way likely would have value - especially with corporate/enterprise/public sector companies who currently spend significant amounts of money on in-house support staff to keep their Windows installations working.
Which isn't true anyway.
The average consumer will only buy a computer at the most every few years, hence why Apple's marketshare is still low. However if you actually look at the amount of units being sold, Apple are the second or third largest OEM in the world, with about a 30% share in the consumer market, note I said consumer market.
Two things are interesting about this to me:
The first is that Balmer pretty much states flat out that they are working on a phone product, when previously, MS had categorically denied that they were working on a phone, or had any intentions of working on a phone, multiple times.
The second is that this is not Balmers "voice." The man can hardly talk intelligible sentences in real life, no way he wrote this thing himself. So it's kind of funny that the big man has his secretary or whatever help him with his emails.
The first is that Balmer pretty much states flat out that they are working on a phone product, when previously, MS had categorically denied that they were working on a phone, or had any intentions of working on a phone, multiple times.
The second is that this is not Balmers "voice." The man can hardly talk intelligible sentences in real life, no way he wrote this thing himself. So it's kind of funny that the big man has his secretary or whatever help him with his emails.
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Well to be fair, Netscape was a much smaller company than Apple, with no real income stream, and a product that can be given away for free with very little cost to the distributor. MS can't exactly give Windows away. And even if they did, Apple still makes hardware people want.
diamond.g said:
Well to be fair, Netscape was a much smaller company than Apple, with no real income stream, and a product that can be given away for free with very little cost to the distributor. MS can't exactly give Windows away. And even if they did, Apple still makes hardware people want.
If their End-to-End Zune model is indicative of their direction on the personal computer then they are sunk. They are just too large and unfocused to make Apple's model work for themselves. Zune has stagnated and the end user has been ignored.
Actually, I can't. It's beyond my price range, too big of a screen, a way faster processor than I want, ect. ect. ect.
I really DO need a Macbook with dedicated graphics.