Computer for my grandson

[Brian Elfert]

The Macintosh is still pretty popular for creative stuff. Places like ad agencies, magazines, and newspapers still use Macs for some of their work. Photoshop was originally Mac only, but now many folks run it on Windows. final Cut Pro is a popular video editing tool that is by Apple and of course for Mac only. Certainly, the market share of Macs in the corporate world is measured in a few percent of the market.

I know folks who work at companies that develop products that work exclusively with Windows, but some of them use Macbook Air notebooks because they are a really good product and the company has virtual Windows desktops for employees to use that can be accessed from a Mac.

[David Weaver]

You're right about that, Brian. Most of the photo, video and journalistic production types favor the macs. Mac has been catering to that crowd for as long as I can remember, and maybe things are different now, but back in the mid 1990s, windows offerings were pretty weak for the less technical and more artistic stuff.

[Jerome Stanek]

Place I worked for use Apples for rendering trade show booths but when they really have an intense drawing to work on the design guys use their personal desktops. They are very high end machines and showed me a comparison of one of their drawings. It took 30 minutes on the Mac and 10 on the PC and these macs are the newest and greatest from Apple.

[Scott Shepherd]

Place I worked for use Apples for rendering trade show booths but when they really have an intense drawing to work on the design guys use their personal desktops. They are very high end machines and showed me a comparison of one of their drawings. It took 30 minutes on the Mac and 10 on the PC and these macs are the newest and greatest from Apple.

What's your point? If you've watched a movie in the last decade, it was probably edited and put together using a Mac. I'd say that's about as high end of video processing as you'll get. If it wasn't for Apple messing up Final Cut Pro on the last release, they'd still be in 95 out of 100 places that do that.

It's all relative. Stating personal experiences doesn't mean anything. You might have a car that has lasted you 500,000 miles. I might have the same car that was a lemon. It's relative to your situation, but one's own situation doesn't make a trend. The "mac's are overpriced toys" argument has been around for decades. Last time I checked, Apple was one of the most successful companies in the world, much less the USA. You don't get to the top of the entire world market by producing junk that doesn't work.

In the last few quarters, PC makers have taken a beating because sales are flat or down. Apple sales on computers (and everything else) has been up. So when everyone else is going down, Apple's sales and marketshare are going up. Again, I'd hardly link that to a company that is just flat out "fooling" so many people, so often.

A PC might be perfect for you, but a Mac might be perfect for the next person. It's personal preference, just like tools, machinery, cars, restaurants, and everything else in life. If it works for you and makes you happy, then use whatever you want.

[Matt Meiser]

Apple sales on computers (and everything else) has been up. So when everyone else is going down, Apple's sales and marketshare are going up.

Might want to check again. Mac sales are down the last 2 quarters on the last chart I saw. Other than a few spikes they are basically flat over the last couple years. They are getting beaten up pretty bad on smart phones lately. And their stock is down over 40% since fall. Good company, but you are painting a pretty rosy picture. However, I'm getting another iPhone in 1 month and 2 days and I came close to buying a Mac instead of my Dell. In the end I couldn't justify over double the price for the same hardware specs. And i would have still had to run Windows on it for a couple things.

[David Weaver]

I don't know, I think they're flat out fooling people on PCs. It's not like it's the only place in the world where people overpay for something comparable because of marketing and brand loyalty.

On the rest of the gadgets where they've innovated, so be it. You get paid for innovating. But you can get paid for creating a loyal following and throwing in nonspectacular items with the innovative items, too. Especially if you can scare inexperienced users into thinking something else is immensely complex, dangerous and risky.

I watched my BIL throw away a 3 year old $2200 computer that turned itself into a paperweight, and while he was doing it tell me how much better apple gear is than a PC. That was 4 years ago, and he replaced it with a $3000 mac machine. I still am using the $650 notebook computer that I was on then, though I did add another $675 PC last year to ditch a 12 year-old PC that was still operating in the guest room of our house. The old notebook is now the guest room PC. You really have to work hard to create that kind of brand loyalty, but apple has done it. To be fair, I have spent about $125 on replacement batteries over the last 7 years. I can't comprehend the roughly $4000 difference between his two purchases and mine.

That's the kind of stuff a lot of us just don't "get". Microsoft made the PC platform fairly difficult to profit on from a hardware perspective. That's to my benefit, I'm glad they did.

[Scott Shepherd]

Might want to check again. Mac sales are down the last 2 quarters on the last chart I saw. Other than a few spikes they are basically flat over the last couple years. They are getting beaten up pretty bad on smart phones lately. And their stock is down over 40% since fall. Good company, but you are painting a pretty rosy picture. However, I'm getting another iPhone in 1 month and 2 days and I came close to buying a Mac instead of my Dell. In the end I couldn't justify over double the price for the same hardware specs. And i would have still had to run Windows on it for a couple things.

I guess we're looking at different charts. Also, last time I checked, it's still bigger than Dell, Microsoft, HP, or anyone else in the business.... I'll take the trend line on growth over anyone else in the market. Let's look at growth on Dell, Microsoft, HP, or anyone else.

Screen Shot 2013-04-26 at 2.16.37 PM.pngScreen Shot 2013-04-26 at 2.16.48 PM.png

David, do you own a new Mac? I find that 99% of the time, people that have a lot to say about them don't own one. It's always "I owned one 10 years ago". Last time I checked, there were more app's I could download on a Mac to do just about anything I ever wanted to do. I'm still waiting for people to tell me what is it, that's so mission critical to their personal life, that can't be done on a Mac. The "it doesn't have software" issue stopped about 10 years ago.

[David Weaver]

No, scott, it's not a matter of what PCs do that macs don't, it's a matter of other than some proprietary print layout software and video editing stuff, they do the same thing and it costs 2-3 times as much to get the same capability without any better hardware life. And now that a lot of the hardware bits in them are the same as PCs so it makes even less sense to me. I can buy a budget HP or toshiba PC with most of the same components for a fraction, or I can get the apple label on the computer and basically pay several thousand extra dollars each decade to get it. Their business model is designed to squeeze maximum dollars out of their marketing strategy and out of users in add-ons or current fees (like they charge for free items in their TV device or itunes). HP and toshiba make some lame attempts to do that by trying to grab your rear if you need a replacement power cord or something, but that's easily avoided by not buying their branded accessories at department stores.

Good for Apple. I'd rather own their stock and buy PCs. I don't know that I'd rather own their stock any longer at its levels, but you know what I mean by that statement. You, me and everyone else own a bunch of it just because it's part of every index we'd invest in. But the argument that their hardware and operating system are the same on a value comparison..dollar for dollar (meaning they'd have to be twice+ as functional, twice+ as long lasting, twice+ as enjoyable to use...)...well, i just don't buy into their marketing.

And on the smaller devices, neither does the rest of the world, where they don't enjoy as much ability to convince people that they should spend lots more for the same thing (vs. android, etc).

[Darius Ferlas]

If you've watched a movie in the last decade, it was probably edited and put together using a Mac. I'd say that's about as high end of video processing as you'll get.

Actually, that is not entirely true. Apple was "better" when they used the 64 bit CISC while most of the rest of the main stream was 32 bit RISC. That changed when Apple went Intel.

Sure, some studios still use Macs to make movies though, ironically, Apple Inc. is among the largest suppliers of Linux and Linux based software to make those movies. Many studios use their own proprietary software as none off the shelf titles is really up to the task in the computer farm environment. Computers used to make commercial movies are not even available in your average store as they are computer farms consisting of hundreds, sometimes thousands of computers working in parallel.

For instance Weta Digital (did District9, Day the Earth Stood Still, Jumper, King Kong, Lord of the Rings, Fantastic Four, Eragon, X-Men, i-Robot) uses 4,000 blade servers with 35,000 cores running Linux, with 90% of their desktops running Ubuntu Linux. When you consider the cost of hardware and software licensing then choosing Apple would be pretty much an expensive frivolity.

These are some of the movies made with Linux in the last 10 years:

Avatar
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Shrek the Third
X-Men The Last Stand
King Kong
Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
The Matrix Reloaded
2 Fast 2 Furious
Junglebook 2
Incredible Hulk
Pirates of the Caribbean
Sinbad

[Matt Meiser]

http://www.zdnet.com/apple-q2-2013-h...rs-7000014459/

Apple is selling around 4M macs a quarter. Yes they are gaining some market share because PC sales are down because people are moving to tablets and companies are doing longer refesh cycles and moving to virtual environments. Extending refresh cycles one year (3 to 4) cuts PC purchases pretty dramatically and frankly there's not a lot of reasons for a 3-year refresh right now. A major food company I know is deploying thin clients to office users and I'm sure they aren't the only ones. Those people are all still Windows users, just not on a PC. They are a terminal services license on Windows Server.

On the phones, the news is everywhere that Samsung pretty much trounced Apple last quarter. Some will say thats because Android is better, I'd guess the fact you can get a Galaxy S3 for 1/3 or less the cost of an iPhone 5 is what's really driving it.

[Scott Shepherd]

No, scott, it's not a matter of what PCs do that macs don't, it's a matter of other than some proprietary print layout software and video editing stuff, they do the same thing and it costs 2-3 times as much to get the same capability without any better hardware life. And now that a lot of the hardware bits in them are the same as PCs so it makes even less sense to me. I can buy a budget HP or toshiba PC with most of the same components for a fraction, or I can get the apple label on the computer and basically pay several thousand extra dollars each decade to get it. Their business model is designed to squeeze maximum dollars out of their marketing strategy and out of users in add-ons or current fees (like they charge for free items in their TV device or itunes). HP and toshiba make some lame attempts to do that by trying to grab your rear if you need a replacement power cord or something, but that's easily avoided by not buying their branded accessories at department stores.

Good for Apple. I'd rather own their stock and buy PCs. I don't know that I'd rather own their stock any longer at its levels, but you know what I mean by that statement. You, me and everyone else own a bunch of it just because it's part of every index we'd invest in. But the argument that their hardware and operating system are the same on a value comparison..dollar for dollar (meaning they'd have to be twice+ as functional, twice+ as long lasting, twice+ as enjoyable to use...)...well, i just don't buy into their marketing.

And on the smaller devices, neither does the rest of the world, where they don't enjoy as much ability to convince people that they should spend lots more for the same thing (vs. android, etc).

So the answer is no, you don't have one and haven't used one recently. So you're telling me something you've never owned or never seen isn't as good or cheap as something you do own and have seen.

That's exactly my point. I was a die hard PC guy since PC's came out. I've been using computers since 197something. 2 years ago I bought a used mac laptop. Now, there's a Mac on my desk at work, and I own a Mac laptop. I can assure you, the difference is far from a "feeling" or "hype". There's a real user interface difference that I prefer. I'm willing to pay a premium to not have my computers irritate me all day long, which is what all the remaining PC's we use do.

If anyone can, with a straight face, say that the Windows user experience is better than OSX, from the end user standpoint, I'd stand corrected.

[David Weaver]

I have been forced to use a mac a few times in the last 15 years. Whatever was so great about it didn't jump out at me, but if the price equation was the other way around, I would use it.

I use a PC all day every day for work, then I use a PC at night. I can't remember the last time a PC "irritated", let alone "all day". I would suspect that a lot of the other people who have used apple products (my wife likes the devices) also have no clue what's so great about them. I don't. I won't buy my wife an apple notebook, even though she has three apple devices, and that's the only thing she doesn't give me grief about because even though she's at the lowest end of the user scale in power, she does get "irritated" by our PCs, either.

BIL (not the one mentioned above) does all of the stuff for the school district he works for. Means he gets whatever he wants for free as his personal user. Of course, he's got macs floating around for testing this or that, the SD buys tons of them, but despite having a M.S. in the field, he's using an android phone and a PC.

Not everyone buys into it. If mac could make their stuff cheaper than PC without cutting reliabilty or usability, then I would. I see they are still shipping about 10% of the PC market. Despite all of the dominance that I hear about from apple users, I seem to remember that they've always been about 10% of the PC market, and I can't believe that a lot of that isn't school purchases where it's easier to spend someone else's money, even at the discounted rates not available to us.

Last year, my PC with Win 7, 8 gigs of ram, a terabyte HDD and a quad core I7 was something like $680 off of ebay. Mac can't compete- note the common theme that you still haven't addressed...where the value is with such disparity in cost.

[Darius Ferlas]

If anyone can, with a straight face, say that the Windows user experience is better than OSX, from the end user standpoint, I'd stand corrected.

I went the opposite route from yours in late 1990's - I switched from Macs to Win and to Linux.
Macs made me feel too constrained and suffocating. On occasion I have a chance to work briefly with a Mac, mostly laptops that people bring to work because they cannot figure something out and they need help. The machines surely look sharp but... with the same specs as my Win7 Lenovo W520, why the heck are they so sloooow?

When it comes to the user interface, it is a very personal thing (are brunettes prettier than blondes?), Linux is your best bet as you can make it look and work pretty much any imaginable way, including the confusing and jumpy Mac interface.

[Joe Angrisani]

I guess we're looking at different charts....

Who's "Gartner"?

[David Weaver]

Who's "Gartman"?

Looks like a guy who shows Lenovo's growth dominance over Apple.