Apple's share of U.S. PC market slips on sales decline

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  • Reply 21 of 168
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by tt92618 View Post


    I understand where you are coming from, but I think the economics of it stack up better if you want flexibility and performance. To be blunt, the base iMac running OS X performs way better than a similarly equipped PC and isn't significantly more expensive. Mac OS is just a better performer; there is less memory utilization, better CPU handling, etc. In addition, with the Mac you can use something like VMWare Fusion and run windows, too... at the same time as OSX. My experience is that Vista performs so well running in a VM that most users are not likely to notice the difference.



    I used to be a die-hard PC user and have developed on PC's for years. However, I really think the Mac is a superior machine, and the OS is *certainly* superior.



    i like both a lot. however ive been leaning Mac for a while now. one thing is for sure though, when im spending $1800-$2200 on a computer, the Mac better not be more than $300 for a comparitivally priced machine... also doesnt help that just about every PC (we are talking All-in-Ones) at that price including more ram/blue-ray/quad cores, so where OSX might be better on less fast machines, that advantage is pretty much lost when its lacking a lot in those areas... and in some cases still costs more...
  • Reply 22 of 168
    As in share of total revenue.



    With the netbooks and the big race to the OEM margin-bottom and certain doom, I would not be surprised to see Apple at 30%+ marketshare...
  • Reply 23 of 168
    The drop in marketshare is due to explosive netbooks growth. That's it.

    Apple shouldn't be worried. Let other companies build crappy pcs for very low prices.
  • Reply 24 of 168
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by tt92618 View Post


    I understand where you are coming from, but I think the economics of it stack up better if you want flexibility and performance. To be blunt, the base iMac running OS X performs way better than a similarly equipped PC and isn't significantly more expensive. Mac OS is just a better performer; there is less memory utilization, better CPU handling, etc. In addition, with the Mac you can use something like VMWare Fusion and run windows, too... at the same time as OSX. My experience is that Vista performs so well running in a VM that most users are not likely to notice the difference.



    I used to be a die-hard PC user and have developed on PC's for years. However, I really think the Mac is a superior machine, and the OS is *certainly* superior.



    Yes, I agree with tt92618 (such a poetic name!). If you're unwilling to pay a bit more for a Mac, that suggests you don't really appreciate OS X and perhaps it'd be best if you stick with Windows. It's okay to stay on that side of the fence if that's where you belong.
  • Reply 25 of 168
    jwdavjwdav Posts: 36member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by solipsism View Post


    How do netbook's hurt Apple's profit, which is the only think worth considering?



    I agree - netbooks don't hurt Apple's profit at all.



    They do affect these marketshare reports that count "units" instead of revenue. A $300 NetBook is a "unit", just like a $4000 Mac Pro is a "unit".



    I'd like to see market share numbers include both revenue and profit.
  • Reply 26 of 168
    bloggerblogbloggerblog Posts: 2,462member
    For the 1,000,000th time already, MID SIZE TOWER... sub $1,000
  • Reply 27 of 168
    elliots11elliots11 Posts: 290member
    This price subject comes up at least once a week, and the reason why is....



    It's time for Apple to introduce a lower priced product.



    My friend bought a PPC white iMac a few years back, and now he's due for a new computer as it's dying. He's just out of college and got a new job the other day, but he still can't reasonably expect to afford a real Apple computer, so he's looking into making a hackintosh out of a low end notebook pc or a netbook.



    Now that Apple's on nearly the same hardware as everyone else, it's time to realize that people will take the other option of making their own, especially in a down economy. Or they'll get their sympathetic techy friends to do it. Sure he's not a premium customer (neither am I, I bought my MBP with student loan $), but he's got money that he'd love to give to Apple if they'd just take it and give him something reasonable.



    People talk about marketshare and this and that, but if Apple could just make one affordable product and sell it a bunch of times (like they did with ipod/iphone) it would boost their user base even more and when the economy recovered those same people would be back with even more money for a Macbook or MBP.
  • Reply 28 of 168
    tt92618tt92618 Posts: 444member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by SmilinGoat View Post


    i like both a lot. however ive been leaning Mac for a while now. one thing is for sure though, when im spending $1800-$2200 on a computer, the Mac better not be more than $300 for a comparitivally priced machine... also doesnt help that just about every PC (we are talking All-in-Ones) at that price including more ram/blue-ray/quad cores, so where OSX might be better on less fast machines, that advantage is pretty much lost when its lacking a lot in those areas... and in some cases still costs more...



    Sorry, I just disagree. I've used both PCs and Macs in abundance, and Apple's hardware and OS is just better, in my opinion. Most PC's do ship with more RAM, but they need it because windows memory utilization is so bad.



    But even so, let's compare. HP touchPro, with a 22 inch display, 4GB Ram, 880MHZ bus, 500GB HD, and 2.0ghz duo intros at $1299. iMac with 4GB ram, 1066MHZ bus, 640GB HD, and 2.66GHZ duo is $1499. You get a larger display, faster bus, bigger hard drive, and faster CPU for $200. In fact, the iMac most comparable is the 20 inch model, which still has a faster CPU and a faster bus, but is $100 less.



    And, these are just hardware comparisons - they say nothing about performance, which is just much better on the mac.
  • Reply 29 of 168
    tenobelltenobell Posts: 7,014member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Mister Snitch View Post


    Simple: The overall PC market is shrinking right now, while the market for netbooks is expanding. That is the reality, right now.



    The PC market is growing just much slower than last year. Notebooks are projected to sell 140 million units while netbooks are projected at 20 million.





    Quote:

    SInce Apple has nothing to offer in the netbook space, it's getting squeezed a bit right now. (The general public overall does not consider the iPhone the equivalent of a netbook, even if some do.)



    Netbooks aren't squeezing anything. Smartphones are projected to sell 192 millions units this year.
  • Reply 30 of 168
    sidstesidste Posts: 25member
    How did Acer do it? What happened to Gateway? Oh, yea! Acer bought Gateway! I have never seen in one of these article the authors talk about acquisitions. Apple could pay cash for Dell and jump to the top of this chart.



    Where is the discussion of margins?

    Sales of HP and Dell total over $160B and flat. They have a combined market cap of $103B.

    Sales of Apple (all products) are around $35B. They have a market cap of $104B.
  • Reply 31 of 168
    tt92618tt92618 Posts: 444member
    The whole net-book thing sortof irritates me, to be honest. I understand very well why Jobs has been so against net-books; they are mostly underpowered junk destined for landfills after a very short usable life.



    What gets me about net-books is that many of them are selling at price points where, a year or two ago, you could have gotten a real laptop, and for that matter one with at least the same performance, if not better. What net-books represent is a very smart move on the part of manufacturers, but a very bad move for consumers. With net-books, manufacturers have managed to convince consumers that they are getting a deal because the sub-$500 price point makes them seem insanely cheap. But what has also happened is that the manufacturers get to deliver less performance, smaller displays, less memory, etc... than they were previously doing at nearly the same price point. It's a margin win for manufacturers, or perhaps a margin reprieve... but it is no good for consumers.



    One interesting point to note in this is that for HP, a net-book probably reduces margin pressures because they get to sell underpowered junk at near the same price point as a bare bones laptop before... which likely reduces pressure on their margins. But for Apple, this would be a move backwards, since they would have to seriously cut into margins to deliver anything in that space that wasn't pyre junk like the rest of the net-books are.



    I have to admit, I have a bad attitude about net-books and think most of the people who buy them got suckered. Most of the people that I know who actually bought them think much the same.
  • Reply 32 of 168
    walshbjwalshbj Posts: 864member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Mister Snitch View Post




    ...BTW, telling the world you're a stockholder is NOT the equivalent of actually understanding the marketplace. There's a vast distance between your inflated estimation of your own knowledge and a competent, functional and practical understanding of the dynamics of consumer behavior. And - I own stocks, too.



    In fact, I make my living as an investor. I can do that because not only are many stockholders clueless, but they have egos to maintain that are the size of aircraft carriers. They will make the same arrogant assumptions over and over again until their money's gone... into my pocket. (Thanks!)



    We are all so impressed ! Your parents must be very proud !
  • Reply 33 of 168
    As long as they sell enough to keep their current level of innovation, but not enough to attain critical mass to catch the attention of virus writers works the best for all of us Mac users!
  • Reply 34 of 168
    ltmpltmp Posts: 204member
    I'd love to know what Apples share of revenue was, or even better, their share of profit from hardware.

    Revenue wise, I'll bet they're in third place in the US. In terms of profit, maybe even second place.
  • Reply 35 of 168
    dreyfus2dreyfus2 Posts: 1,072member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by elliots11 View Post


    Now that Apple's on nearly the same hardware as everyone else, it's time to realize that people will take the other option of making their own, especially in a down economy. Or they'll get their sympathetic techy friends to do it.

    ...

    People talk about marketshare and this and that, but if Apple could just make one affordable product and sell it a bunch of times (like they did with ipod/iphone) it would boost their user base even more and when the economy recovered those same people would be back with even more money for a Macbook or MBP.



    There are some mistakes in that picture:

    - The iPhone is "affordable" only because of a huge subsidy; subtract that from any Mac (even if this makes no sense) and their price is great.

    - If your friend builds a hackintosh, Apple does get 129 USD for a copy of OS X and does not even need to support it, nearly all of that is profit. Acer/Dell/Whoever will maybe make a 40-50 USD profit out of that cheap PC he wants (and zero profit if it has one single repair), MS may get 35 bucks for the included OEM version of Vista Home crap. So, even in this picture: the biggest profit goes to Apple... why should they bother?



    I do understand that people want something, and I certainly wish everybody that they can afford whatever they desire. But using such a need to make a business case is not working out. Apple does need the premium customers (even the few morons that really only buy it for the logo), a company that caters for every need will loose it's premium customers. To bring a stupid car analogy: since Mercedes and BMW started to offer cheaper models, other premium brands like Porsche and Jaguar have more customers...
  • Reply 36 of 168
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by tt92618 View Post


    Sorry, I just disagree. I've used both PCs and Macs in abundance, and Apple's hardware and OS is just better, in my opinion. Most PC's do ship with more RAM, but they need it because windows memory utilization is so bad.



    But even so, let's compare. HP touchPro, with a 22 inch display, 4GB Ram, 880MHZ bus, 500GB HD, and 2.0ghz duo intros at $1299. iMac with 4GB ram, 1066MHZ bus, 640GB HD, and 2.66GHZ duo is $1499. You get a larger display, faster bus, bigger hard drive, and faster CPU for $200. In fact, the iMac most comparable is the 20 inch model, which still has a faster CPU and a faster bus, but is $100 less.



    And, these are just hardware comparisons - they say nothing about performance, which is just much better on the mac.



    can agree to disagree. ive not developed for either, however i have used both for years (Which is why my Mac needs replacing, its just too old!) i do look at the high end of the all-in-one market, and quad core/twice the ram alone (along with normally a better graphics card) really make it so no matter how much more efficient the OS is, its brought back by the lack of hardware, which is almost 100% the same as a PC counterpart these days (except for casing, even the RAM isnt any faster than what you get with most PCs)



    i just gotta compare the computers at the price point im paying, $1800-$2200, at that point the margin only grows. and it sadly doesnt help me that the lower end models are more closely matched...



    Edit: the ram is the same now, sorry. but quad core is a pretty big difference, along with more storage, and blu-ray.
  • Reply 37 of 168
    kreshkresh Posts: 379member
    I think the practice of including these $299 netbooks with their whopping 6GB drives and limited functionality (not all of them just the really cheap ones stacked by the hundreds at Wal-Mart) into the PC shipment market share numbers is suspect. If these netbooks are being counted as PC's then the iPod Touch should as well.



    edit: (further thoughts) Windows Based cash registers/sales terminals and ATM machines are not counted in the PC shipments market share calculations and some of them have more functionality than these ultra cheap netbooks. iPod Touches, iPhones, other smart phones and netbooks should be counted in their own category as they are blurring into many categories but they are not traditional PCs.
  • Reply 38 of 168
    teckstudteckstud Posts: 6,476member
    Many of us predicted that throwing Macs under the bus (changing from Apple Computer to Apple Inc) and devoting all its R&D efforts, etc on the iPhone would eventually hurt Apple's Mac sales.

    The super glossy screens and lack of a new iMac haven't helped either. And I won't even mention the MacBook Air and lack of netBook or smaller MacBook Pro.
  • Reply 39 of 168
    mdriftmeyermdriftmeyer Posts: 7,503member
    The 1st Quarter is always the lowest of the year. What's more interesting is the year over year same quarter and how the rest of the industry is doing compared to their year over year with the current economy.
  • Reply 40 of 168
    teckstudteckstud Posts: 6,476member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by kresh View Post


    I think the practice of including these $299 netbooks with their whopping 6GB drives and limited functionality (not all of them just the really cheap ones stacked by the hundreds at Wal-Mart) into the PC shipment market share numbers is suspect. If these netbooks are being counted as PC's then the iPod Touch should as well.



    I've always heard the iPod Touch and iPhone counted as part of OS percentages so I really don't understand the gripe.

    Also, while netbooks may be considered a PC remember the iPhone itself was touted as the best iPod ever made- remember? Part of the confusion stems from Apple itself.
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