Ah but it's shiny and has an Apple logo on the back Plus it looks great in Starbucks and even better if the user has a smug face while they're using it
They practice that face in those courses in Apple stores, I saw it myself :eek: Well it's better than bursting into crying when one remembers how much they paid for it
Having just recently made the jump from Windows to OSX after many, many years of DOS and Windows usage I'm completely amazed at how good OSX and Apple hardware actually is.
My initial plan was to jump to the Macbook Pro and install Windows 7 on it using Bootcamp so I could still rely on Windows for certain tasks and software. However, since moving across I have found absolutely no need for Windows whatsoever, nor have I missed it in the slightest. As such my Windows 7 disk has now been placed in a drawer to gather dust.
The MacBook Pro is a joy to use and OSX feels like an operating system that works perfectly and reliably. Little perks here and there make it fun and easy to use and the transition between the two was also easy.
The only downside to all of this was the price. My MacBook Pro is the base model which normally retails at £999.99 (I didn't pay that thanks to some discounts etc.). For a laptop with similar spec running Windows I could have paid much less and had a lot of change to spend on other things. Having said that, I wouldn't now be enjoying the quality of the MacBook Pro.
It got me thinking, if Apple were to slash their hardware prices by about half it would seriously cause Microsoft some trouble. If you could head out and pick up a MacBook Pro for £500 say, instead of just under £1k I think there'd quickly be a shortage of them while at the same time places like PC World would be wondering why their Windows 8 laptops are sat on the shelves.
I don't want to start a Windows vs Mac war and in the past I'll admit I've sat using Windows and laughed at the thought of using OSX, but the whole Mac hardware and operating system is a joy to use and make me quickly forget about cheap off the shelf Windows laptops with a less enjoyable or stable operating system running on them.
I doubt it will ever happen because Apple know people want their kit and that they'll pay for it, but it makes you think. They could pretty much take over the home user market in one move.
Its a nice idea, but it does seem a little unreasonable to expect Apple to sell a laptop of the quality of a MBP for the same price as existing £500 laptops, which really aren't going to be as good quality.
You say it yourself - you'd lose the quality of the MBP. I would argue that that quality is part of the spec.
Most Apple stuff is sold at twice its actual cost to manufacture which allows a lot of profit to be spent on the Apple stores and what is seen as being generous in fixing/replacing faulty stuff at no cost
Apple will never really get very far in the corporate market and it doesn't want to enter the enterprise sector at all as who cares what platform the email server is and stuff like sql server is a competitive area where looks count for very little but the numbers do
Apple's got its sector nicely sewn up graphics designers/hipsters/people with more money than sense
I recently bought a Mac Mini, at £499 it's the cheapest computer I've ever bought. I was after a small form factor off the shelf machine with a bit of oomph and the Mini's price point was spot on for what I need it to do, it's the one area where Apple's prices don't seem to be too bad.
And here we go again. Anyone who buys a Mac is an idiot.
Nope, Apple stuff is nice and i've had the fun over the years to support it but for me its not my cup of tea (or coffee for the starbucks users) but generally Apple are not known for their value for money so those wanting to get their max value per cpu cycle then apple is not your first choice
I thought you just said that people who buy Macs have more money than sense? People buying things because they have more money than sense sound like idiots to me.
I thought you just said that people who buy Macs have more money than sense? People buying things because they have more money than sense sound like idiots to me.
For some reason i get the feeling that i'm basically being trapped into saying that Apple customers are idiots [Full stop]
But let us get back to facts and my old friend Z language so "for all people there will exist a subset of people who's financial ability will be greater than their mental ability and of that subset there will be another subset of people who prefer apple products" so we can determine that some people will buy apple stuff who could be classed as idiots
Sadly I don't have more money than sense. I am quite wealthy in sense, but not money. If I had more money than sense I'd be very rich financially. And yet I've got a Mac.
People tend to buy what they want. Yes some purchases are made with a lack of sense, but others are made because of needs, requirements or simply desires.
I bought a Mac because I needed a new laptop. I wanted a reliable machine and I wasn't happy with the quality of what was on offer on the Windows side of the market. There were other formats to consider and I felt that Apple's OSX best fit my needs. I also desired their well built machines and realised that it would tie in nicely with other Apple products that we have in the house without the need for 3rd party add-ons that we sometimes have to use in Windows reducing reliability.
I think anyone buys a Mac based on their own needs and desires. I also think more people would buy them if they were cheaper.
If you look at my post on page one, maybe you could tell me which one of your categories I fall into.
You could have bought a laptop of a slightly better spec for the same money.
What category would you say you fall into, as however you dress it up, you pay a premium for apple. Clearly some people feel the premium is worth it and put a value on the build quality.
You could have bought a laptop of a slightly better spec for the same money.
What category would you say you fall into, as however you dress it up, you pay a premium for apple. Clearly some people feel the premium is worth it and put a value on the build quality.
If you were comparing a Sony vaio to a cheapy Toshiba laptop, of the same spec and running the same OS such as windows 7 I'd agree. However Apple's OSX has to be factored in here too, it's not just hardware people pay extra for. The whole package includes the hardware, OS and the way it's designed to work.
Although from my point of view I enjoy it simply because it has SSH built in to terminal. Handy for me and I SSH into web servers a lot.
No, no, no you'll have to do better than that.
How is it more competent (whatever that means), reliable, and secure? A couple of examples of how the Unix base helps OSX achieve this over NT based versions of Windows would be helpful. Thanks.
You could have bought a laptop of a slightly better spec for the same money.
What category would you say you fall into, as however you dress it up, you pay a premium for apple. Clearly some people feel the premium is worth it and put a value on the build quality.
But the bottom line spec isn't the be all and end all, especially when real world differences are so marginal.
If someone had bought that laptop, someone else could say that for the same money they could have bought a Mac, more than likely with a better build quality, and an OS they might prefer.
Different people will have different preferences, and different priorities when buying a computer. This idea that people who buy Macs do so because they have more money than sense gets really boring.
You could have bought a laptop of a slightly better spec for the same money.
What category would you say you fall into, as however you dress it up, you pay a premium for apple. Clearly some people feel the premium is worth it and put a value on the build quality.
No I couldn't , if you read the post you quoted I didn't want a Laptop, I wanted a small form factor computer.
Macs can be more reliable because apple control the hardware and the os.
Would anyone want to live in a world where everyone used a Mac ? Mac owners used to love being niche ..... The slightly geeky alternative. I'm guessing even Mac lovers wouldn't want it to go the same way as the iPhone where they can be found just as much in local council estates as in London offices. The iPhone has (IMHO) gone all chavvy.
It got me thinking, if Apple were to slash their hardware prices by about half it would seriously cause Microsoft some trouble.
Applications are more important than the OS. In the business market at least MS is very difficult to dislodge because of the integrated nature of the applications.
Also, if you take a product such as MS Office, it's faced free competition for what - a decade or so, but it's had no effect on MS's profitability. Office remains as 1/3 of its revenue and about half its profits. Ditto Windows, which of course has also had free alternatives. What is more of a threat to MS is a change of paradigm, i.e., mobile, cloud apps rather than a desktop competitor.
I doubt it will ever happen because Apple know people want their kit and that they'll pay for it, but it makes you think. They could pretty much take over the home user market in one move.
Profitability is what it's all about for Apple. Today I read the following stats.
"Though it shipped only about 6 percent of the industry’s smartphones and tablets in the second quarter, Apple captured about 43 percent of the industry’s revenue, according to Raymond James analyst Tavis McCourt. And it generated an astonishing 77 percent of the industry’s operating profits. This, even in a seasonally weak period for iPhone sales."
If you were comparing a Sony vaio to a cheapy Toshiba laptop, of the same spec and running the same OS such as windows 7 I'd agree. However Apple's OSX has to be factored in here too, it's not just hardware people pay extra for. The whole package includes the hardware, OS and the way it's designed to work.
Lol. You would have to take money off it to have OSX on it too for me!!
This is subjective, but it is a negative for some, not a positive!
Macs can be more reliable because apple control the hardware and the os.
Would anyone want to live in a world where everyone used a Mac ? Mac owners used to love being niche ..... The slightly geeky alternative. I'm guessing even Mac lovers wouldn't want it to go the same way as the iPhone where they can be found just as much in local council estates as in London offices. The iPhone has (IMHO) gone all chavvy.
Mac owners ..... Be careful what you wish for !
(Happy windows/android user - isn't choice great)
I wouldn't say the iPhone has become chavvy, its just became very popular. It seems to be the phone of choice for non techy people but then Samsung seems to have done this too with the S3.
I rather like OSX on my mac but then I like Windows 7 just as much, I wouldnt say one is better than the other, just different.
I wouldn't say the iPhone has become chavvy, its just became very popular. It seems to be the phone of choice for non techy people but then Samsung seems to have done this too with the S3.
Yeah, iPhone has just become a standard phone, anyone willing to get a contract can get, rather than the premium show off product only the wealthy could afford before.
They practice that face in those courses in Apple stores, I saw it myself :eek: Well it's better than bursting into crying when one remembers how much they paid for it
Which courses? The workshops where a group of people sit around a table or the One to One classes where it's just the customer and the trainer (obviously )? I'm sure that's what they learn in the first One to One session - how to become a smug Mac user And it costs £79 for the privilege
Comments
They practice that face in those courses in Apple stores, I saw it myself :eek: Well it's better than bursting into crying when one remembers how much they paid for it
Its a nice idea, but it does seem a little unreasonable to expect Apple to sell a laptop of the quality of a MBP for the same price as existing £500 laptops, which really aren't going to be as good quality.
You say it yourself - you'd lose the quality of the MBP. I would argue that that quality is part of the spec.
How?
Dave
More secure, reliable, yada, yada, yada.
Although from my point of view I enjoy it simply because it has SSH built in to terminal. Handy for me and I SSH into web servers a lot.
Apple will never really get very far in the corporate market and it doesn't want to enter the enterprise sector at all as who cares what platform the email server is and stuff like sql server is a competitive area where looks count for very little but the numbers do
Apple's got its sector nicely sewn up graphics designers/hipsters/people with more money than sense
And here we go again.
If you look at my post on page one, maybe you could tell me which one of your categories I fall into.
Nope, Apple stuff is nice and i've had the fun over the years to support it but for me its not my cup of tea (or coffee for the starbucks users) but generally Apple are not known for their value for money so those wanting to get their max value per cpu cycle then apple is not your first choice
For some reason i get the feeling that i'm basically being trapped into saying that Apple customers are idiots [Full stop]
But let us get back to facts and my old friend Z language so "for all people there will exist a subset of people who's financial ability will be greater than their mental ability and of that subset there will be another subset of people who prefer apple products" so we can determine that some people will buy apple stuff who could be classed as idiots
You seemed to be saying that people who buy Macs are almost exclusively people with more money than sense, and therefore idiots.
If all you're saying is that there is a subset of a subset of people who are idiots, who happen to buy Macs, then that's quite different.
And seems odd that Apple's market is made up of just that subset of a subset. Surely its made up of their whole market.
People tend to buy what they want. Yes some purchases are made with a lack of sense, but others are made because of needs, requirements or simply desires.
I bought a Mac because I needed a new laptop. I wanted a reliable machine and I wasn't happy with the quality of what was on offer on the Windows side of the market. There were other formats to consider and I felt that Apple's OSX best fit my needs. I also desired their well built machines and realised that it would tie in nicely with other Apple products that we have in the house without the need for 3rd party add-ons that we sometimes have to use in Windows reducing reliability.
I think anyone buys a Mac based on their own needs and desires. I also think more people would buy them if they were cheaper.
What category would you say you fall into, as however you dress it up, you pay a premium for apple. Clearly some people feel the premium is worth it and put a value on the build quality.
If you were comparing a Sony vaio to a cheapy Toshiba laptop, of the same spec and running the same OS such as windows 7 I'd agree. However Apple's OSX has to be factored in here too, it's not just hardware people pay extra for. The whole package includes the hardware, OS and the way it's designed to work.
No, no, no you'll have to do better than that.
How is it more competent (whatever that means), reliable, and secure? A couple of examples of how the Unix base helps OSX achieve this over NT based versions of Windows would be helpful. Thanks.
Dave
But the bottom line spec isn't the be all and end all, especially when real world differences are so marginal.
If someone had bought that laptop, someone else could say that for the same money they could have bought a Mac, more than likely with a better build quality, and an OS they might prefer.
Different people will have different preferences, and different priorities when buying a computer. This idea that people who buy Macs do so because they have more money than sense gets really boring.
Maybe, just maybe, they just prefer Macs.
No I couldn't , if you read the post you quoted I didn't want a Laptop, I wanted a small form factor computer.
Would anyone want to live in a world where everyone used a Mac ? Mac owners used to love being niche ..... The slightly geeky alternative. I'm guessing even Mac lovers wouldn't want it to go the same way as the iPhone where they can be found just as much in local council estates as in London offices. The iPhone has (IMHO) gone all chavvy.
Mac owners ..... Be careful what you wish for !
(Happy windows/android user - isn't choice great)
Applications are more important than the OS. In the business market at least MS is very difficult to dislodge because of the integrated nature of the applications.
Also, if you take a product such as MS Office, it's faced free competition for what - a decade or so, but it's had no effect on MS's profitability. Office remains as 1/3 of its revenue and about half its profits. Ditto Windows, which of course has also had free alternatives. What is more of a threat to MS is a change of paradigm, i.e., mobile, cloud apps rather than a desktop competitor.
Profitability is what it's all about for Apple. Today I read the following stats.
"Though it shipped only about 6 percent of the industry’s smartphones and tablets in the second quarter, Apple captured about 43 percent of the industry’s revenue, according to Raymond James analyst Tavis McCourt. And it generated an astonishing 77 percent of the industry’s operating profits. This, even in a seasonally weak period for iPhone sales."
Apple Gorging on Mobile Industry Revenue
Lol. You would have to take money off it to have OSX on it too for me!!
This is subjective, but it is a negative for some, not a positive!
I wouldn't say the iPhone has become chavvy, its just became very popular. It seems to be the phone of choice for non techy people but then Samsung seems to have done this too with the S3.
I rather like OSX on my mac but then I like Windows 7 just as much, I wouldnt say one is better than the other, just different.
Yeah, iPhone has just become a standard phone, anyone willing to get a contract can get, rather than the premium show off product only the wealthy could afford before.
what non apple hardware are you comparing it to?
Which courses? The workshops where a group of people sit around a table or the One to One classes where it's just the customer and the trainer (obviously