3M machines in a huge global recession says they aren't making many mistakes or leaving a lot of money on the table. 42% YOY growth. And this with a bunch of folks waiting for the new iMacs and MBPs
Gee, I wonder what's going to happen in PC land now that Apple doesn't have their favorite whipping boy Vista to use as a selling point. I think MS coming out with a compelling and positively reviewed OS may take some of that growth back. I'm betting that there are still a LOT of folks that were fence sitters and wanted to hear both sides. Now that 7 is out, we can make a choice with two better matched OS options, and like a gazillion hardware options.
Quote:
Folks that claim that Apple would do better with an xMac in the lineup has the burden of proof before tinkering with a hugely successful lineup.
Vinea, Your statement is a non sequitur, since to prove that Apple could do better with an xMac, they would have to, you know, offer one.
Folks that claim that Apple would do better with an xMac in the lineup has the burden of proof before tinkering with a hugely successful lineup.
Your statement, Vin', is a half truth.
The laptops are. But the desktops aren't. And there is more to it than people waiting for the latest iMac. There's a whole bunch of people who like towers and for whom Apple's tower policy doesn't make sense. And the size of the PC tower market far exceeds the sale of Apple's AIO iMac market sales with or without update.
The laptops are hugely successful. But the desktops aren't. Skimping on latest parts, taking ages to update and then charging more than a premium for that? New iMacs? Nice. But why no i5 as standard? Why no i7 as standard on the higher end iMacs? Lose the monitor and offer an i7 tower at a much cheaper price. Apple can't offer a Mac Pro for £1300-£1500?
The iMac is a great machine...but for many people used to towers? A tower market beginning at nearly £2000(!!!) must look insane to them...especially when they can get a processor that performs the same and with a far better gpu for over a grand less.
'Those people' who make up the gaming pc, artists and 'pros' who don't have money to burn on the Apple 'badge'/tax, those who want the flexibility of a tower and the economy of model they are used to? Why would they switch to the Mac?
I still think Apple can offer a better deal.
They were using premium laptop parts before in the iMac. Now they're saving some dough by finally (common sense prevails...) desktop parts. But do they pass on these savings to the consumer?
The more I think about this whole thing and read some of the comments from Apple diehards about how the desktop is dead and implying I an outdated moron for wanting one, the more of a turn-off the whole lack of choice is and turns me away form considering Apple. Just in time for Windows 7
Anyone who says the "desktop is dead" is being a little over dramatic. The desktop is not even dying. However the desktop market IS shrinking. You don't have to be an Apple "diehard" to see that. You just have to be a realist and look at the WHOLE market, not just the little bit of the market that you are interested in.
I don't anyone thinks you are a moron but you do appear to be wearing the xMac blinkers, that allow you to disregard the economic realities of the computer market.
Anyone who says the "desktop is dead" is being a little over dramatic. The desktop is not even dying. However the desktop market IS shrinking. You don't have to be an Apple "diehard" to see that. You just have to be a realist and look at the WHOLE market, not just the little bit of the market that you are interested in.
That's fair comment. And that sums it up. Apple may ignore the mainstream tower market...but it exists, has a massive installed base and sell millions of towers! It's a fact that millions of things get sold world wide. Not just a couple of hundred thousand.
I'd like to see the Apple that pioneered the cube mini-tower bring innovation back to the tower market. The recent iMac is a good machine. A good update that 'could have' been great if they'd have gone quad across the board.
There's always going to be cheaper, more powerful desktop performing parts for the foreseeable future. There's millions of machines being sold with more power and at a cheaper price. That's a big market with an established core of Windows users that may not fancy an iMac. If they can make the niche 'Air' for the laptop, can we have our far less 'niche' mid-tower?
The answer isn't to go to Windows 7 or whatever they are calling that crap. That is simply supporting a company that has a hostile attitude towards Apple. Further I think MS is more hostile to it's user and developer base than Apple.
Instead I see two options here. #1. Take a suitable PC and make yourself a hackintosh. Get it up and running and then take a few pictures and send them to Steve Jobs at Apple. They need to know their products are being rejected by their customer base. #2. Switch to Linux or FreeBSD and like wise send Stevo a few pictures.
I'm just not convinced that Windows 7 is in the end going to be a great user experience. We don't know about long term reliability, resistance to viruses or how well some of Windows long standing problems have been addressed. Yeah I realize that Linux and BSD are a little difficult to install but they are snappy OSes with all the basic software you need. Of course a hackentosh is a more Apple software focused solution.
In any event I fully understand where you are coming from. The new iMacs are really awesome machines and it is great that Apple did a revision that should of happened a year ago. Much as I admire the value and good engineering in these machine, they are not what I want. Just to be clear my desire for an XMac revolves squarely around the desire to have multiple internal storage modules. A slot wouldn't hurt either.
Further I reject the ideas expressed here that an XMac isn't economically justifiable. It is far easier to justify than AIR. Nor does XMac have to look like a plain old PC box. As much as Apple would want it to be true the new Mini server isn't the box to serve up your media collection on. Like wise Mini is not the box for demanding apps. In any event I still maintain that Apple is without a main stream midrange machine.
On a side note I've been looking for an answer to Apples poor choices and actually been considering a storage Array. This still sucks because Apples low end machines only come with one Ethernet port. This seems to be a big oversight on their part and should be obvious that a limited storage space machine would have a high speed port to connect to external storage. Maybe they are waiting on Light Peak, whatever is up though the current lineup sucks if you need lots of disk space.
In the end the only thing you can do is to strive to make your voice heard.
Dave
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aflaaak
Sadly, you hit the nail on the head for me.
Yes, I like the fact that Macs aren't as susceptible to viruses as PCs, thought I wonder if their market share gets big enough as Stevie would want, more virus writers will take a hard look at OSX.
Yes, I like the fact that Macs do things a little more intuitively. But for what I plan on doing with my computer, good third party software will do all that, and I don't know of much software that I can't get for a PC.
But the whole idea of choice is the sticking point. With Apple, there are only three. A Mac Pro really isn't a choice (for may people) given it's price, and I don't need the portability of a Macbook Pro.
That leaves the iMac, a seal-a-meal, all-in-one, dead end. I can't add anything without a UBS leash, I can't get a better or cheaper screen If I choose. I can't upgrade the GPU in a couple years, if I choose. If the screen developers a problem, I have to bring the whole thing into Apple. I can't hook up the computer part to another monitor if I choose without having TWO monitors taking up space on my desk.
The more I think about this whole thing and read some of the comments from Apple diehards about how the desktop is dead and implying I an outdated moron for wanting one, the more of a turn-off the whole lack of choice is and turns me away form considering Apple. Just in time for Windows 7
That's fair comment. And that sums it up. Apple may ignore the mainstream tower market...but it exists, has a massive installed base and sell millions of towers! It's a fact that millions of things get sold world wide. Not just a couple of hundred thousand.
Installed base is irrelevant. It's what people will buy tomorrow that counts.
Yes, it sounds pretty big when you call it 'mainstream' but what is the "mainstream tower market" ?
Does it include all the mainstream towers that are being sold to the Windows dominated enterprise?
Does it include all the mainstream towers that cost around 400-600 dollars?
Does it include all the mainstream towers that are priced similarly to the Mac Pro?
Does it include all the PC AIOs that are not mainstream towers
Out of the millions that are left..... how many people actually want to use the Mac OS?
Gee, I wonder what's going to happen in PC land now that Apple doesn't have their favorite whipping boy Vista to use as a selling point. I think MS coming out with a compelling and positively reviewed OS may take some of that growth back. I'm betting that there are still a LOT of folks that were fence sitters and wanted to hear both sides. Now that 7 is out, we can make a choice with two better matched OS options, and like a gazillion hardware options.
I like win7. The new multitouch SDK seems nice (haven't played much with it) and works with XNA.
Vista was never as terrible as some folks made it out to be and Win7 is a bit better and leaner. But it's not much more than SL is as an upgrade from a user perspective IMHO.
Quote:
Vinea, Your statement is a non sequitur, since to prove that Apple could do better with an xMac, they would have to, you know, offer one.
You just got done saying how there are a gazillion hardware options out there. So it should be "simple" to show a premium desktop maker moving more than 1M desktops with higher ASPs and margins than the iMac.
Desktops enjoy high ASPs and margins and they sold 700,000 of the suckers despite a bunch of folks waiting for new Nehalem based iMacs.
Quote:
And there is more to it than people waiting for the latest iMac. There's a whole bunch of people who like towers and for whom Apple's tower policy doesn't make sense. And the size of the PC tower market far exceeds the sale of Apple's AIO iMac market sales with or without update.
So show me a tower maker that sold more than 700K units of high margin, high ASP towers and I might agree.
Answer: The boutique tower makers with high margins and high ASPs are no longer making towers. You can't sell high margin towers vs HP and Acer pricing. I doubt you can even with OSX.
Quote:
Apple can't offer a Mac Pro for £1300-£1500?
It's not that they can't. What you need to do is show that they will make more money than their current line up and that people will pay an obvious Apple tax of several hundred dollars. Apple AIOs are price competitive vs other AIO offerings. Likewise the Mini is price competitive with other SFF offerings. These niche products still command good margins.
Quote:
The iMac is a great machine...but for many people used to towers? A tower market beginning at nearly £2000(!!!) must look insane to them...especially when they can get a processor that performs the same and with a far better gpu for over a grand less.
So what? Mac was never about bang for the bug spec wise. At best you can argue a lower TCO. Maybe.
Quote:
'Those people' who make up the gaming pc, artists and 'pros' who don't have money to burn on the Apple 'badge'/tax, those who want the flexibility of a tower and the economy of model they are used to? Why would they switch to the Mac?
They won't. And Apple doesn't care. Why should it?
Quote:
I still think Apple can offer a better deal.
Sure. So what?
Quote:
They were using premium laptop parts before in the iMac. Now they're saving some dough by finally (common sense prevails...) desktop parts. But do they pass on these savings to the consumer?
I too think it would be really cool if Apple would release a beautiful product that would fit between the mini and the pro. Of course, knowing Apple, it would not be like anything else available on the market, meaning that they would do something different and cool of course! On top of that, they could do what they just did with the mini, release a (home) server version that would have some 4-5 hot-swap bays etc....well, one can dream, right
Vista was never as terrible as some folks made it out to be and Win7 is a bit better and leaner.
I have a laptop that came with XP installed, but the option to "upgrade" to Vista. I heard mixed thoughts from friends. Some hated it, some said that the latest Service Pack helped make it much better. I decided in the end to avoid the hassles and wait for 7 to upgrade, so I have zero experience with Vista..
What I was referring to was Apple's use of Vista's early widespread negative press to base its ad campaign. Now that Windows 7 is being reviewed favorably it will be interesting to see what tactic they take. Probably just a plain old extolling of the new iMac features I would guess.
Quote:
You just got done saying how there are a gazillion hardware options out there. So it should be "simple" to show a premium desktop maker moving more than 1M desktops with higher ASPs and margins than the iMac.
I bet Dell won't drop the Studio XPS 8000/9000 line though because they don't have high enough margins. I admit I haven't researched the numbers out there for "premium" tower makers to know. However, the idea that a good, fast, flexible design has to have higher margins than an iMac is silly. We all agree Apple gets away with charging steep margins for their hardware is because they can. There is no other option (other than the Hackentosh idea). Competition makes products more affordable, and Apple not licensing OSX has made sure there is none, while PC makers have plenty.
Not every product a company makes is going to have the same margin. That's not to say that a publicly traded company should mess around with a product that doesn't make money, but there should be room for a not-so-high-margin-product too. Besides, Apple has shown it is open to lowering it's margin (I'm assuming) with the introducing of the word value to its marketing.
The idea that Apple couldn't make good money with an xMac alongside the iMac is just people's guess, since it's a moot point. They may have done extensive marketing research to find out, I don't know. And, I don't really care
Desktops enjoy high ASPs and margins and they sold 700,000 of the suckers despite a bunch of folks waiting for new Nehalem based iMacs.
Quote:
And there is more to it than people waiting for the latest iMac. There's a whole bunch of people who like towers and for whom Apple's tower policy doesn't make sense. And the size of the PC tower market far exceeds the sale of Apple's AIO iMac market sales with or without update.
So show me a tower maker that sold more than 700K units of high margin, high ASP towers and I might agree.
Answer: The boutique tower makers with high margins and high ASPs are no longer making towers. You can't sell high margin towers vs HP and Acer pricing. I doubt you can even with OSX.
Quote:
Apple can't offer a Mac Pro for £1300-£1500?
It's not that they can't. What you need to do is show that they will make more money than their current line up and that people will pay an obvious Apple tax of several hundred dollars. Apple AIOs are price competitive vs other AIO offerings. Likewise the Mini is price competitive with other SFF offerings. These niche products still command good margins.
Quote:
The iMac is a great machine...but for many people used to towers? A tower market beginning at nearly £2000(!!!) must look insane to them...especially when they can get a processor that performs the same and with a far better gpu for over a grand less.
So what? Mac was never about bang for the bug spec wise. At best you can argue a lower TCO. Maybe.
Quote:
'Those people' who make up the gaming pc, artists and 'pros' who don't have money to burn on the Apple 'badge'/tax, those who want the flexibility of a tower and the economy of model they are used to? Why would they switch to the Mac?
They won't. And Apple doesn't care. Why should it?
Quote:
I still think Apple can offer a better deal.
Sure. So what?
Quote:
They were using premium laptop parts before in the iMac. Now they're saving some dough by finally (common sense prevails...) desktop parts. But do they pass on these savings to the consumer?
I'm tired of the only argument against Apple selling an xMac is to justify Apple's huge gross margins, let alone the fact that no one can actually tell what the gross margins are for any one individual product...aka iMac.
edit: just for the record, I am an AAPL stockholder and have been for a looooong long time.
I'm tired of the only argument against Apple selling an xMac is to justify Apple's huge gross margins, let alone the fact that no one can actually tell what the gross margins are for any one individual product...aka iMac.
edit: just for the record, I am an AAPL stockholder and have been for a looooong long time.
An interesting point, Rickag on the profit margins. And it's an intangible to argue on that basis. But we know i7 processors are dirt cheap...and that the Xeons aren't that pricey? So why not offer a much cheaper Mac Pro. Historically, they have been much cheaper. To slot in a different motherboard with desktop quad i7 on it is peanuts for Apple. Makes a big difference to us wannabee customers. Towers only being for 'Pro' people? I think that's nonsense. Look at the Macbook Pro entry price. Historically? An all time low to get on the ladder. Desktop parts are much cheaper. So it's nonsense to have the Mac Pro so expensive. Gpus, memory, hd and cpus are at historical all time lows. Ironically, Apple's tower prices are at an all time high. That's 'price gauge'. It will be interesting to see if Apple pushes up Tower prices again or cuts them in the next update.
But clearly Apple are doing well with their margins so far in terms of profits and they are selling more laptops, certainly. Desktop sales were poor to 'less than ok'. I'd expect the iMac sales to bounce with the update. I still think they'd bounce more with a 'mid-tower' in the mix. ie it would add to desktop sales in my view.
But with a £1000 '30' inch monitor attached to a £700 'Nehalem' '2-inch' 'box', it's hard to argue for a mid-tower in that context. But I feel they could at least re-align 'Pro' prices to reality. Because a quad-core tower for £2000 isn't that. Not with a crap gpu as standard. Cut it by £400-500 and we can start to get near reality again.
It really doesn't make sense when you can buy an Apple iMac i7 with a '30' inch monitor for the same price but £200 cheaper!
I'm tired of the only argument against Apple selling an xMac is to justify Apple's huge gross margins, let alone the fact that no one can actually tell what the gross margins are for any one individual product...aka iMac.
edit: just for the record, I am an AAPL stockholder and have been for a looooong long time.
Don't need to tell you for any individual product. You know the average margins and average sale prices.
If you're going to replace the iMacs then you need to show either that it has equal or better margins and ASPs (on average) at comparable volumes (850k) or vastly increased volumes at lower margins or ASPs than average.
But the primary test that everyone continues to fail at is to show a competitor that is doing just that. High margin and high ASP towers at decent volume. Namely more than 850K units per quarter. Yes, it is "replace" and not "augment".
Towers are much better values than AIOs and putting in a low end Mac Pro would kill high and mid range iMac sales. That might be okay at a $2K price range but most xMac proponents are aiming for a much lower price.
And I argue that a $2K Core i7 tower wouldn't sell that well since the Apple tax would be too high. There are too many low end i7 towers out there. I doubt you'd move 850K units even if they are better value than iMacs because the perception is that they are poor values.
Whereas a $2K Core i5 AIO is competitively priced vs other AIOs. These are good value purchases vs the competition. Unless, of course, there's a $1600 i7 tower running OSX next to it.
People say that but show me a competitor with more than 850K sales per qtr with equal ASPs and margins. Dell's Q2 Desktop Revenue was $3.3B vs Apple's Q3 $1.13B. So poor poor Apple with only a third of Dell's revenue on desktops built nearly completely on consumer sales. Why Apple's desktop line up suxxors.
Wanna bet Dell would trade consumer desktop markets with Apple in a heartbeat? Heck, they'd probably trade total desktop sales with Apple if it didn't hurt any server sales.
Comments
3M machines in a huge global recession says they aren't making many mistakes or leaving a lot of money on the table. 42% YOY growth. And this with a bunch of folks waiting for the new iMacs and MBPs
Gee, I wonder what's going to happen in PC land now that Apple doesn't have their favorite whipping boy Vista to use as a selling point. I think MS coming out with a compelling and positively reviewed OS may take some of that growth back. I'm betting that there are still a LOT of folks that were fence sitters and wanted to hear both sides. Now that 7 is out, we can make a choice with two better matched OS options, and like a gazillion hardware options.
Folks that claim that Apple would do better with an xMac in the lineup has the burden of proof before tinkering with a hugely successful lineup.
Vinea, Your statement is a non sequitur, since to prove that Apple could do better with an xMac, they would have to, you know, offer one.
Folks that claim that Apple would do better with an xMac in the lineup has the burden of proof before tinkering with a hugely successful lineup.
Your statement, Vin', is a half truth.
The laptops are. But the desktops aren't. And there is more to it than people waiting for the latest iMac. There's a whole bunch of people who like towers and for whom Apple's tower policy doesn't make sense. And the size of the PC tower market far exceeds the sale of Apple's AIO iMac market sales with or without update.
The laptops are hugely successful. But the desktops aren't. Skimping on latest parts, taking ages to update and then charging more than a premium for that? New iMacs? Nice. But why no i5 as standard? Why no i7 as standard on the higher end iMacs? Lose the monitor and offer an i7 tower at a much cheaper price. Apple can't offer a Mac Pro for £1300-£1500?
The iMac is a great machine...but for many people used to towers? A tower market beginning at nearly £2000(!!!) must look insane to them...especially when they can get a processor that performs the same and with a far better gpu for over a grand less.
'Those people' who make up the gaming pc, artists and 'pros' who don't have money to burn on the Apple 'badge'/tax, those who want the flexibility of a tower and the economy of model they are used to? Why would they switch to the Mac?
I still think Apple can offer a better deal.
They were using premium laptop parts before in the iMac. Now they're saving some dough by finally (common sense prevails...) desktop parts. But do they pass on these savings to the consumer?
Nope.
Lemon Bon Bon.
The more I think about this whole thing and read some of the comments from Apple diehards about how the desktop is dead and implying I an outdated moron for wanting one, the more of a turn-off the whole lack of choice is and turns me away form considering Apple. Just in time for Windows 7
Anyone who says the "desktop is dead" is being a little over dramatic. The desktop is not even dying. However the desktop market IS shrinking. You don't have to be an Apple "diehard" to see that. You just have to be a realist and look at the WHOLE market, not just the little bit of the market that you are interested in.
I don't anyone thinks you are a moron but you do appear to be wearing the xMac blinkers, that allow you to disregard the economic realities of the computer market.
Anyone who says the "desktop is dead" is being a little over dramatic. The desktop is not even dying. However the desktop market IS shrinking. You don't have to be an Apple "diehard" to see that. You just have to be a realist and look at the WHOLE market, not just the little bit of the market that you are interested in.
That's fair comment. And that sums it up. Apple may ignore the mainstream tower market...but it exists, has a massive installed base and sell millions of towers! It's a fact that millions of things get sold world wide. Not just a couple of hundred thousand.
I'd like to see the Apple that pioneered the cube mini-tower bring innovation back to the tower market. The recent iMac is a good machine. A good update that 'could have' been great if they'd have gone quad across the board.
There's always going to be cheaper, more powerful desktop performing parts for the foreseeable future. There's millions of machines being sold with more power and at a cheaper price. That's a big market with an established core of Windows users that may not fancy an iMac. If they can make the niche 'Air' for the laptop, can we have our far less 'niche' mid-tower?
Dead horse, anyone?
Lemon Bon Bon.
Instead I see two options here. #1. Take a suitable PC and make yourself a hackintosh. Get it up and running and then take a few pictures and send them to Steve Jobs at Apple. They need to know their products are being rejected by their customer base. #2. Switch to Linux or FreeBSD and like wise send Stevo a few pictures.
I'm just not convinced that Windows 7 is in the end going to be a great user experience. We don't know about long term reliability, resistance to viruses or how well some of Windows long standing problems have been addressed. Yeah I realize that Linux and BSD are a little difficult to install but they are snappy OSes with all the basic software you need. Of course a hackentosh is a more Apple software focused solution.
In any event I fully understand where you are coming from. The new iMacs are really awesome machines and it is great that Apple did a revision that should of happened a year ago. Much as I admire the value and good engineering in these machine, they are not what I want. Just to be clear my desire for an XMac revolves squarely around the desire to have multiple internal storage modules. A slot wouldn't hurt either.
Further I reject the ideas expressed here that an XMac isn't economically justifiable. It is far easier to justify than AIR. Nor does XMac have to look like a plain old PC box. As much as Apple would want it to be true the new Mini server isn't the box to serve up your media collection on. Like wise Mini is not the box for demanding apps. In any event I still maintain that Apple is without a main stream midrange machine.
On a side note I've been looking for an answer to Apples poor choices and actually been considering a storage Array. This still sucks because Apples low end machines only come with one Ethernet port. This seems to be a big oversight on their part and should be obvious that a limited storage space machine would have a high speed port to connect to external storage. Maybe they are waiting on Light Peak, whatever is up though the current lineup sucks if you need lots of disk space.
In the end the only thing you can do is to strive to make your voice heard.
Dave
Sadly, you hit the nail on the head for me.
Yes, I like the fact that Macs aren't as susceptible to viruses as PCs, thought I wonder if their market share gets big enough as Stevie would want, more virus writers will take a hard look at OSX.
Yes, I like the fact that Macs do things a little more intuitively. But for what I plan on doing with my computer, good third party software will do all that, and I don't know of much software that I can't get for a PC.
But the whole idea of choice is the sticking point. With Apple, there are only three. A Mac Pro really isn't a choice (for may people) given it's price, and I don't need the portability of a Macbook Pro.
That leaves the iMac, a seal-a-meal, all-in-one, dead end. I can't add anything without a UBS leash, I can't get a better or cheaper screen If I choose. I can't upgrade the GPU in a couple years, if I choose. If the screen developers a problem, I have to bring the whole thing into Apple. I can't hook up the computer part to another monitor if I choose without having TWO monitors taking up space on my desk.
The more I think about this whole thing and read some of the comments from Apple diehards about how the desktop is dead and implying I an outdated moron for wanting one, the more of a turn-off the whole lack of choice is and turns me away form considering Apple. Just in time for Windows 7
That's fair comment. And that sums it up. Apple may ignore the mainstream tower market...but it exists, has a massive installed base and sell millions of towers! It's a fact that millions of things get sold world wide. Not just a couple of hundred thousand.
Installed base is irrelevant. It's what people will buy tomorrow that counts.
Yes, it sounds pretty big when you call it 'mainstream' but what is the "mainstream tower market" ?
Does it include all the mainstream towers that are being sold to the Windows dominated enterprise?
Does it include all the mainstream towers that cost around 400-600 dollars?
Does it include all the mainstream towers that are priced similarly to the Mac Pro?
Does it include all the PC AIOs that are not mainstream towers
Out of the millions that are left..... how many people actually want to use the Mac OS?
Gee, I wonder what's going to happen in PC land now that Apple doesn't have their favorite whipping boy Vista to use as a selling point. I think MS coming out with a compelling and positively reviewed OS may take some of that growth back. I'm betting that there are still a LOT of folks that were fence sitters and wanted to hear both sides. Now that 7 is out, we can make a choice with two better matched OS options, and like a gazillion hardware options.
I like win7. The new multitouch SDK seems nice (haven't played much with it) and works with XNA.
Vista was never as terrible as some folks made it out to be and Win7 is a bit better and leaner. But it's not much more than SL is as an upgrade from a user perspective IMHO.
Vinea, Your statement is a non sequitur, since to prove that Apple could do better with an xMac, they would have to, you know, offer one.
You just got done saying how there are a gazillion hardware options out there. So it should be "simple" to show a premium desktop maker moving more than 1M desktops with higher ASPs and margins than the iMac.
Your statement, Vin', is a half truth.
The laptops are. But the desktops aren't.
Desktops enjoy high ASPs and margins and they sold 700,000 of the suckers despite a bunch of folks waiting for new Nehalem based iMacs.
And there is more to it than people waiting for the latest iMac. There's a whole bunch of people who like towers and for whom Apple's tower policy doesn't make sense. And the size of the PC tower market far exceeds the sale of Apple's AIO iMac market sales with or without update.
So show me a tower maker that sold more than 700K units of high margin, high ASP towers and I might agree.
Answer: The boutique tower makers with high margins and high ASPs are no longer making towers. You can't sell high margin towers vs HP and Acer pricing. I doubt you can even with OSX.
Apple can't offer a Mac Pro for £1300-£1500?
It's not that they can't. What you need to do is show that they will make more money than their current line up and that people will pay an obvious Apple tax of several hundred dollars. Apple AIOs are price competitive vs other AIO offerings. Likewise the Mini is price competitive with other SFF offerings. These niche products still command good margins.
The iMac is a great machine...but for many people used to towers? A tower market beginning at nearly £2000(!!!) must look insane to them...especially when they can get a processor that performs the same and with a far better gpu for over a grand less.
So what? Mac was never about bang for the bug spec wise. At best you can argue a lower TCO. Maybe.
'Those people' who make up the gaming pc, artists and 'pros' who don't have money to burn on the Apple 'badge'/tax, those who want the flexibility of a tower and the economy of model they are used to? Why would they switch to the Mac?
They won't. And Apple doesn't care. Why should it?
I still think Apple can offer a better deal.
Sure. So what?
They were using premium laptop parts before in the iMac. Now they're saving some dough by finally (common sense prevails...) desktop parts. But do they pass on these savings to the consumer?
Nope.
What desktop parts did the iMac gain in this rev?
Vista was never as terrible as some folks made it out to be and Win7 is a bit better and leaner.
I have a laptop that came with XP installed, but the option to "upgrade" to Vista. I heard mixed thoughts from friends. Some hated it, some said that the latest Service Pack helped make it much better. I decided in the end to avoid the hassles and wait for 7 to upgrade, so I have zero experience with Vista..
What I was referring to was Apple's use of Vista's early widespread negative press to base its ad campaign. Now that Windows 7 is being reviewed favorably it will be interesting to see what tactic they take. Probably just a plain old extolling of the new iMac features I would guess.
You just got done saying how there are a gazillion hardware options out there. So it should be "simple" to show a premium desktop maker moving more than 1M desktops with higher ASPs and margins than the iMac.
I bet Dell won't drop the Studio XPS 8000/9000 line though because they don't have high enough margins. I admit I haven't researched the numbers out there for "premium" tower makers to know. However, the idea that a good, fast, flexible design has to have higher margins than an iMac is silly. We all agree Apple gets away with charging steep margins for their hardware is because they can. There is no other option (other than the Hackentosh idea). Competition makes products more affordable, and Apple not licensing OSX has made sure there is none, while PC makers have plenty.
Not every product a company makes is going to have the same margin. That's not to say that a publicly traded company should mess around with a product that doesn't make money, but there should be room for a not-so-high-margin-product too. Besides, Apple has shown it is open to lowering it's margin (I'm assuming) with the introducing of the word value to its marketing.
The idea that Apple couldn't make good money with an xMac alongside the iMac is just people's guess, since it's a moot point. They may have done extensive marketing research to find out, I don't know. And, I don't really care
Vista was never as terrible as some folks made it out to be and Win7 is a bit better and leaner.
Sure. So what?
Lemon Bon Bon.
Desktops enjoy high ASPs and margins and they sold 700,000 of the suckers despite a bunch of folks waiting for new Nehalem based iMacs.
Quote:
And there is more to it than people waiting for the latest iMac. There's a whole bunch of people who like towers and for whom Apple's tower policy doesn't make sense. And the size of the PC tower market far exceeds the sale of Apple's AIO iMac market sales with or without update.
So show me a tower maker that sold more than 700K units of high margin, high ASP towers and I might agree.
Answer: The boutique tower makers with high margins and high ASPs are no longer making towers. You can't sell high margin towers vs HP and Acer pricing. I doubt you can even with OSX.
Quote:
Apple can't offer a Mac Pro for £1300-£1500?
It's not that they can't. What you need to do is show that they will make more money than their current line up and that people will pay an obvious Apple tax of several hundred dollars. Apple AIOs are price competitive vs other AIO offerings. Likewise the Mini is price competitive with other SFF offerings. These niche products still command good margins.
Quote:
The iMac is a great machine...but for many people used to towers? A tower market beginning at nearly £2000(!!!) must look insane to them...especially when they can get a processor that performs the same and with a far better gpu for over a grand less.
So what? Mac was never about bang for the bug spec wise. At best you can argue a lower TCO. Maybe.
Quote:
'Those people' who make up the gaming pc, artists and 'pros' who don't have money to burn on the Apple 'badge'/tax, those who want the flexibility of a tower and the economy of model they are used to? Why would they switch to the Mac?
They won't. And Apple doesn't care. Why should it?
Quote:
I still think Apple can offer a better deal.
Sure. So what?
Quote:
They were using premium laptop parts before in the iMac. Now they're saving some dough by finally (common sense prevails...) desktop parts. But do they pass on these savings to the consumer?
Nope.
What desktop parts did the iMac gain in this rev?
So what?
Lemon Bon Bon.
So what?
Lemon Bon Bon.
Agreed.
I'm tired of the only argument against Apple selling an xMac is to justify Apple's huge gross margins, let alone the fact that no one can actually tell what the gross margins are for any one individual product...aka iMac.
edit: just for the record, I am an AAPL stockholder and have been for a looooong long time.
Agreed.
I'm tired of the only argument against Apple selling an xMac is to justify Apple's huge gross margins, let alone the fact that no one can actually tell what the gross margins are for any one individual product...aka iMac.
edit: just for the record, I am an AAPL stockholder and have been for a looooong long time.
An interesting point, Rickag on the profit margins. And it's an intangible to argue on that basis. But we know i7 processors are dirt cheap...and that the Xeons aren't that pricey? So why not offer a much cheaper Mac Pro. Historically, they have been much cheaper. To slot in a different motherboard with desktop quad i7 on it is peanuts for Apple. Makes a big difference to us wannabee customers. Towers only being for 'Pro' people? I think that's nonsense. Look at the Macbook Pro entry price. Historically? An all time low to get on the ladder. Desktop parts are much cheaper. So it's nonsense to have the Mac Pro so expensive. Gpus, memory, hd and cpus are at historical all time lows. Ironically, Apple's tower prices are at an all time high. That's 'price gauge'. It will be interesting to see if Apple pushes up Tower prices again or cuts them in the next update.
But clearly Apple are doing well with their margins so far in terms of profits and they are selling more laptops, certainly. Desktop sales were poor to 'less than ok'. I'd expect the iMac sales to bounce with the update. I still think they'd bounce more with a 'mid-tower' in the mix. ie it would add to desktop sales in my view.
But with a £1000 '30' inch monitor attached to a £700 'Nehalem' '2-inch' 'box', it's hard to argue for a mid-tower in that context. But I feel they could at least re-align 'Pro' prices to reality. Because a quad-core tower for £2000 isn't that. Not with a crap gpu as standard. Cut it by £400-500 and we can start to get near reality again.
It really doesn't make sense when you can buy an Apple iMac i7 with a '30' inch monitor for the same price but £200 cheaper!
Lemon Bon Bon.
Looks like next year to me. Jan-ish-April seems to be the new tradition?
Lemon Bon Bon.
So what?
Lemon Bon Bon.
The difference was I actually answered your points other than you wanted Steve Jobs to give you a pony.
But hey, you're the one pining away for something and unhappily stamping your feet and throwing a tantrum.
An interesting point, Rickag on the profit margins. And it's an intangible to argue on that basis.
Intangible does not equal "I don't care about it so it doesn't count"...
Agreed.
I'm tired of the only argument against Apple selling an xMac is to justify Apple's huge gross margins, let alone the fact that no one can actually tell what the gross margins are for any one individual product...aka iMac.
edit: just for the record, I am an AAPL stockholder and have been for a looooong long time.
Don't need to tell you for any individual product. You know the average margins and average sale prices.
If you're going to replace the iMacs then you need to show either that it has equal or better margins and ASPs (on average) at comparable volumes (850k) or vastly increased volumes at lower margins or ASPs than average.
But the primary test that everyone continues to fail at is to show a competitor that is doing just that. High margin and high ASP towers at decent volume. Namely more than 850K units per quarter. Yes, it is "replace" and not "augment".
Towers are much better values than AIOs and putting in a low end Mac Pro would kill high and mid range iMac sales. That might be okay at a $2K price range but most xMac proponents are aiming for a much lower price.
And I argue that a $2K Core i7 tower wouldn't sell that well since the Apple tax would be too high. There are too many low end i7 towers out there. I doubt you'd move 850K units even if they are better value than iMacs because the perception is that they are poor values.
Whereas a $2K Core i5 AIO is competitively priced vs other AIOs. These are good value purchases vs the competition. Unless, of course, there's a $1600 i7 tower running OSX next to it.
Desktop sales were poor to 'less than ok'.
People say that but show me a competitor with more than 850K sales per qtr with equal ASPs and margins. Dell's Q2 Desktop Revenue was $3.3B vs Apple's Q3 $1.13B. So poor poor Apple with only a third of Dell's revenue on desktops built nearly completely on consumer sales. Why Apple's desktop line up suxxors.
Wanna bet Dell would trade consumer desktop markets with Apple in a heartbeat? Heck, they'd probably trade total desktop sales with Apple if it didn't hurt any server sales.
Oh for the Mac Pro update?
Looks like next year to me. Jan-ish-April seems to be the new tradition?
Lemon Bon Bon.
The "tradition" is tied to whenever Intel starts selling new Xeons for the year, I think. First quarter of next year.