You're thinking software emulator like virtualPC. The item being discussed is a a hardware part of of a PC processor that translates the x86 instructions to RISCish commands that can be executed very quickly. All current X86 PC processors use these "code translators" and of course they are much slower than our "native" PPC design.
*Note the PPC is more efficient I believe in how it handles commands (=less silicon to do the same job). But raw clock speed covers a multitude of sins.</strong><hr></blockquote>
thanks Bob, i was thinking of something else... definitely not the micro-ops level...
Hey how do you get funny 'u + y' character used for 'micro'. --> '_'ops
Ruhx, I can accept that. Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.
What they can control are prices. Take the 800Mhz SOI G4. Cost: $125. Note that for every single computer they sell except the top powermacs (933 and DP 1Ghz) they use some thing of the same price or substantially cheaper.
The pricing of the Powermac is a travesty, as is that of the iMacG3. The eMac is acceptable, and the iMacLCD was more acceptable before the highly specious price bump. Please note, that LCD and RAM prices stablized very quickly, and once again began to creep downwards, so that the proposed LCD component cost growth just never happened. Yet Apple still happily charges $100 more in an sort of demand control model. It's been a good while since the price bump. Everyone cried that other manufacturers would raise prices. Some indicated that new models would come to market at slightly higher costs. Apple was perfectly justified, you'd see. Well, enough time has passed that product in the retail channel was undoubtedly manufactured after the 'dramatic' LCD cost spike. Guess what? I can still buy the same selection of 15" LCD's for 499-549 CANADIAN! and 17" displays have actually creeped DOWNWARDS! The best deals I could find at around price bump time were for 1000-1100 Canadian on VGA or DVI panels (not dual) As of today, I can get a DVI 17" panel for 900 (899) CANADIAN. That is not only substantially cheaper than Apple's offerings, it shows a DOWNWARD price trend. But Job's insists that COSTS are so high. I'm willing to spot Apple a few extra dollars for a higher quality display and the ADC connector, but NOT 50% + for essentially the same component. The same: the 17" TFT I spec'd is a Samsung unit (recognize that supplier anyone?)
And do I really have to get into RAM prices? Any local retailer is essentially selling RAM for the same prices they were selling around price bump time. What gives?
Or for that matter another pet-peeve of mine, the over adjustment for exchange rate that Apple likes to apply here in Canada (and elsewhere). The Can$ is trading at .65US not .60.
I can buy a PC video card and flash it for 50% the cost of the mac version. If a card maker can afford to retail box a card a half the mac cost, then what does Apple pay for bare OEM versions? sorry but an ADC port and Apple driver don't magically double the cost of a card. What gives? And don't say quality, the 4MX has been far from perfect.
The point is that (especially in the PowerMacs) nothing, no component, costs so much -- with the exception of the superdrive -- that it justifies the prices of the powermacs. Higher-end machine should carry a premium, but the SP powermacs, iMacG3, and iMacLCD are all over priced to different degrees.
Someone called for us to focus on the original topic of PPC's, so that's what I did, relative to my general disdain for blind apology. I realize that the PPC is largely out of their hands, but they are not doing the best they can (hardware-wise) with what they've got. They're pricing machines (even iMacs) neck and neck with much more advanced (and expensive) hardware.
I would still consider a mac (even at the current spec) for some tasks/uses. At the current spec, would that those macs were a realistic 20% cheaper, I would not even question. Mac, no contest. Still over-priced, but not so much that I'd really care. Like Lemon Bon Bon mentioned, I'd rather not be ripped off (or forced to buy more than I need, which to me is a form of rip-off), And I am willing to pay more for a better product, even if it's a little slower and a little pricier. The key is 'a little'
<strong>Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I thought AIM was no more...? The threesome's relationship hasn't gone from Constitution to Articles of Confederation?
<strong>Ruhx, I can accept that. Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.
What they can control are prices. Take the 800Mhz SOI G4. Cost: $125. Note that for every single computer they sell except the top powermacs (933 and DP 1Ghz) they use some thing of the same price or substantially cheaper.
The pricing of the Powermac is a travesty, as is that of the iMacG3. The eMac is acceptable, and the iMacLCD was more acceptable before the highly specious price bump. Please note, that LCD and RAM prices stablized very quickly, and once again began to creep downwards, so that the proposed LCD component cost growth just never happened. Yet Apple still happily charges $100 more in an sort of demand control model. It's been a good while since the price bump. Everyone cried that other manufacturers would raise prices. Some indicated that new models would come to market at slightly higher costs. Apple was perfectly justified, you'd see. Well, enough time has passed that product in the retail channel was undoubtedly manufactured after the 'dramatic' LCD cost spike. Guess what? I can still buy the same selection of 15" LCD's for 499-549 CANADIAN! and 17" displays have actually creeped DOWNWARDS! The best deals I could find at around price bump time were for 1000-1100 Canadian on VGA or DVI panels (not dual) As of today, I can get a DVI 17" panel for 900 (899) CANADIAN. That is not only substantially cheaper than Apple's offerings, it shows a DOWNWARD price trend. But Job's insists that COSTS are so high. I'm willing to spot Apple a few extra dollars for a higher quality display and the ADC connector, but NOT 50% + for essentially the same component. The same: the 17" TFT I spec'd is a Samsung unit (recognize that supplier anyone?)
And do I really have to get into RAM prices? Any local retailer is essentially selling RAM for the same prices they were selling around price bump time. What gives?
Or for that matter another pet-peeve of mine, the over adjustment for exchange rate that Apple likes to apply here in Canada (and elsewhere). The Can$ is trading at .65US not .60.
I can buy a PC video card and flash it for 50% the cost of the mac version. If a card maker can afford to retail box a card a half the mac cost, then what does Apple pay for bare OEM versions? sorry but an ADC port and Apple driver don't magically double the cost of a card. What gives? And don't say quality, the 4MX has been far from perfect.
The point is that (especially in the PowerMacs) nothing, no component, costs so much -- with the exception of the superdrive -- that it justifies the prices of the powermacs. Higher-end machine should carry a premium, but the SP powermacs, iMacG3, and iMacLCD are all over priced to different degrees.
Someone called for us to focus on the original topic of PPC's, so that's what I did, relative to my general disdain for blind apology. I realize that the PPC is largely out of their hands, but they are not doing the best they can (hardware-wise) with what they've got. They're pricing machines (even iMacs) neck and neck with much more advanced (and expensive) hardware.
I would still consider a mac (even at the current spec) for some tasks/uses. At the current spec, would that those macs were a realistic 20% cheaper, I would not even question. Mac, no contest. Still over-priced, but not so much that I'd really care. Like Lemon Bon Bon mentioned, I'd rather not be ripped off (or forced to buy more than I need, which to me is a form of rip-off), And I am willing to pay more for a better product, even if it's a little slower and a little pricier. The key is 'a little'
so what your saying is that Apple shouldn't be making so much profit on their equipment. They're in business to make money . If I don't like someone making too much money off of a product or a service: I buy someones elses project: or a I do the work myself/get osmeone else to do the work.
Apple doesn't make the processors they use and there's nothing they can do about it except make the best product they can with what they have to work with. Which they do an excellent job at.
I also want a fast G5 with all of the latest stuff, but I ain't gonna b!tch at apple over things they have no control over
Why doesn't someone start a Motorola Sucks thread and everyone can whine in there.
<strong>Ruhx, I can accept that. Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.
What they can control are prices. Take the 800Mhz SOI G4. Cost: $125. Note that for every single computer they sell except the top powermacs (933 and DP 1Ghz) they use some thing of the same price or substantially cheaper.
The pricing of the Powermac is a travesty, as is that of the iMacG3. The eMac is acceptable, and the iMacLCD was more acceptable before the highly specious price bump. Please note, that LCD and RAM prices stablized very quickly, and once again began to creep downwards, so that the proposed LCD component cost growth just never happened. Yet Apple still happily charges $100 more in an sort of demand control model. It's been a good while since the price bump. Everyone cried that other manufacturers would raise prices. Some indicated that new models would come to market at slightly higher costs. Apple was perfectly justified, you'd see. Well, enough time has passed that product in the retail channel was undoubtedly manufactured after the 'dramatic' LCD cost spike. Guess what? I can still buy the same selection of 15" LCD's for 499-549 CANADIAN! and 17" displays have actually creeped DOWNWARDS! The best deals I could find at around price bump time were for 1000-1100 Canadian on VGA or DVI panels (not dual) As of today, I can get a DVI 17" panel for 900 (899) CANADIAN. That is not only substantially cheaper than Apple's offerings, it shows a DOWNWARD price trend. But Job's insists that COSTS are so high. I'm willing to spot Apple a few extra dollars for a higher quality display and the ADC connector, but NOT 50% + for essentially the same component. The same: the 17" TFT I spec'd is a Samsung unit (recognize that supplier anyone?)
And do I really have to get into RAM prices? Any local retailer is essentially selling RAM for the same prices they were selling around price bump time. What gives?
Or for that matter another pet-peeve of mine, the over adjustment for exchange rate that Apple likes to apply here in Canada (and elsewhere). The Can$ is trading at .65US not .60.
I can buy a PC video card and flash it for 50% the cost of the mac version. If a card maker can afford to retail box a card a half the mac cost, then what does Apple pay for bare OEM versions? sorry but an ADC port and Apple driver don't magically double the cost of a card. What gives? And don't say quality, the 4MX has been far from perfect.
The point is that (especially in the PowerMacs) nothing, no component, costs so much -- with the exception of the superdrive -- that it justifies the prices of the powermacs. Higher-end machine should carry a premium, but the SP powermacs, iMacG3, and iMacLCD are all over priced to different degrees.
Someone called for us to focus on the original topic of PPC's, so that's what I did, relative to my general disdain for blind apology. I realize that the PPC is largely out of their hands, but they are not doing the best they can (hardware-wise) with what they've got. They're pricing machines (even iMacs) neck and neck with much more advanced (and expensive) hardware.
I would still consider a mac (even at the current spec) for some tasks/uses. At the current spec, would that those macs were a realistic 20% cheaper, I would not even question. Mac, no contest. Still over-priced, but not so much that I'd really care. Like Lemon Bon Bon mentioned, I'd rather not be ripped off (or forced to buy more than I need, which to me is a form of rip-off), And I am willing to pay more for a better product, even if it's a little slower and a little pricier. The key is 'a little'
The price of Powermacs is not a travesty, but the way Apple is attempting to stay in business. Or, they could be like all the other computer makers and risk going out of business by competing on price.
Apple does what it thinks it needs to do to stay alive.
[quote]Don't like it don't buy it.<hr></blockquote>
This is exactly the wrong way to take his arguments. Everyone here cares about Apple, and wants to see them improve and give PC's a seriuose run for their money. In order to do that we need to open our eyes and see the real situation at hand. Hiding behind the RDF, trying to get the mods to delete/move posts that explain this situation that you seem to be ignoring, and calling these people names, and accusing of them being whinners, is going to go nowhere.
The desktop PowerMacs are indeed horrifing in their price/performance deficiantcy. Ignoring this, and trying to cover up discussion of it is not going to help. I'm against all the 'Apple is doomed' people. Becuase I believe that Apple, more than any other computer maker, is capibull of throwing curve balls that we never suspect, and innovating is areas that we didnt know existed. But this PowerMac problem is not something that they are going to be able to innovate and trick their way through. They must increase performace of the PowerMacs dramatically immediatly. Or Apple will die. It will be a very slow death, but a death nonetheless. And the industry will be out of a great innovator and pioneer. I never want to see that day, and to that end I hope Apple can get the picture: that iApps wont double their marketshare. Price and Performance will. The computing masses are waiting to give Apple their money, if they would just give them a reason.
This is exactly the wrong way to take his arguments. Everyone here cares about Apple, and wants to see them improve and give PC's a seriuose run for their money. In order to do that we need to open our eyes and see the real situation at hand. Hiding behind the RDF, trying to get the mods to delete/move posts that explain this situation that you seem to be ignoring, and calling these people names, and accusing of them being whinners, is going to go nowhere.
The desktop PowerMacs are indeed horrifing in their price/performance deficiantcy. Ignoring this, and trying to cover up discussion of it is not going to help. I'm against all the 'Apple is doomed' people. Becuase I believe that Apple, more than any other computer maker, is capibull of throwing curve balls that we never suspect, and innovating is areas that we didnt know existed. But this PowerMac problem is not something that they are going to be able to innovate and trick their way through. They must increase performace of the PowerMacs dramatically immediatly. Or Apple will die. It will be a very slow death, but a death nonetheless. And the industry will be out of a great innovator and pioneer. I never want to see that day, and to that end I hope Apple can get the picture: that iApps wont double their marketshare. Price and Performance will. The computing masses are waiting to give Apple their money, if they would just give them a reason.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Apple doesn't make the slow processor, Motorola does. Apple's done a good job with what they have to use- period.
Life is a b!tch when you build a Ferrari and all you got is a Briggs and Stratton motor to put in it. You can put a 10-speed trans and gear it real low to get up to 20 mph as fast as possible, but you can't make it go 160 mph. But the Ferrari is still beautiful and comfortable to drive in. Hopefully some new motors will show up soon. We already know that a new frame had been made to hold the motor.
Time will tell and it's a good thing Sculley saved all that cash for weak times.
Apple can also make a lot of profit on their machines by selling VERY expensive machines to very small specialized markets (where they design and support virtually every aspect of the applications and hardware) think $20,000 dollar SGI machines -- Which is where they're headed if market share continues to shrink. The Apple of home/edu/creative/pro users would effectively die, it would become an Apple of industrial graphics/visualization/broadcasting machines that none of us could afford.
Or Apple could finally get serious about the other 95% and make less money per machine, but sell a whole lot more machines in the process.
One avenue I advocate is more flexible BTO, especially for RAM, storage, HDD's and opticals. This way Apple can continue to offer the fastest machines but at lower prices because they don't NEED to spec the costliest upgradeable parts. The final retail price is lower, but also (and importantly for 'margins') so is the manufacturer's cost. Leave alone portables for now (which I think are decent enough compared to X86) and look at all desktops:
Powermacs are easily expanded. If you sell me a machine with minimal RAM, HDD, and optical, it's cheaper for me, but it's also cheaper to make for you. I might buy all those things from a 3rd party later on, but at least you get the box portion of the sale. Forcing me to take a much higher initial machine could (and has) cost you sales. On the PC side, this is extremely common, to spec a fast CPU/Mobo with less RAM/storage/HDD capacity, and let users add those things on their own. You at least get the box sale, and you make a decent profit on it too, 'cause you didn't spend as much on it's components. Sell them what they want now and let them buy what they need later.
This should work for iMacs/eMacs too. It's a bit counter intuitive for A-I-O but you don't need to have everything in the box, the whole point of firewire was to have EASY expansion, so why spec huge HDD's and expensive opticals. Why not sell an iMac with a small (20GB HDD), and read-only drive (DVD) and let me add huge HDD's or superdrives via firewire. Still sell the fully loaded machines, but make the BTO into something meaningful. For that matter I take issue with some of the design decisions, particularly the RAM arrangement of the iMac. WHY, oh why, couldn't they put two regular dimm slots in a user accessible position? First you make adding RAM and airport easy, via the base, and then you shoot yourselves in the foot by requiring the use of EXPENSIVE SO-DIMMS and 'factory installed only' INNER SLOTS.
Dropping the optical to read-only, the HDD to 20GB, and the RAM to a minimum of 128 would surely take the 15" LCD iMac to 999 or thereabouts. A LOT of people would buy it. They'd all add firewire burners, and HDDs, and more RAM later-on, or even immeadiately, but the point is that they would get more units into people's homes. Not just a reason to try, but a price that give the opportunity to try.
It's a model that works very well for the PC industry. Don't kid yourselves that Dell, or IBM, or Gateway are losing huge scads of money doing it, they aren't. They're moving product. Even Gateway, had it not been for the disasterous deployment of their retail strategy, would have been in the black. They move a lot of product in N.A., as do the others all over the world. Let's not take the thing PC vendors do best and say that it can't work, 95% says it works quite well thank-you very much. It behooves Apple to make it work for them too.
Saying that machines can't be any cheaper to maintain a healthy profit level, is as meaningless as saying that cheaper machines need to be made for Apple to compete. Look instead to how they can be made and yet profits maintained. A little bit of both. There's that notion again, a little, incremental improvements for your products/selection/customer options, some example from what the other's are doing right. Growth, not just in market share, but in business philosophy.
[quote]Why not sell an iMac with a small (20GB HDD), and read-only drive (DVD) and let me add huge HDD's or superdrives via firewire<hr></blockquote>
External firewire drives are stillprohibitously expensive, take up desk space, power and a 20GB hard drives is only ~$10 less epensive than a 40GB one. Also, OS X really needs 256MB+. Still a reasonable idea though.
[quote]WHY, oh why, couldn't they put two regular dimm slots in a user accessible position?<hr></blockquote>
Yes, and if Apple wants to remain highly viable--even without increasing market share--it must address not so much PRICE as PERFORMANCE. The professional user will pay, and pay handsomely, provided that s/he is getting a machine that puts others to shame, from the chrome to the gears. As many have pointed out, to make a great go of it, Apple doesn't necessarily need a killer chip alone but a genuinely imaginative solution to the widening speed problem.
I'd be curious to see the hard numbers on sales in the PowerMac line since January's "Way Beyond the Rumor Sites" titillation. Three years down the road, someone will write the history of the recent Apple period (500mhz to the present), and the great software successes will stand out. From now on, though, Apple must leave a fruitful processor/motherboard legacy or else the coming history will be dark.
Man, I came in here, saw the number of new posts on this thread and thought, "Holy crap, someone's come in with a nice juicy rumor to get the discussion going"
Instead I find the same argument that half the threads in here wind up becoming.... <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />
Why do people try to convince themselves and others they know the industry and their suppliers better then the industry makers and thier suppliers.
If you don't like the prices, don't buy it. At this point it has no monoply-like power to dwindle choices. That's your choice as a consumer.
As for the heath of Apple, their earnings/results/ forcasts look positive. And we have to assume their employies took bussiness/ecconomics/accounting. So you're not above them in any terms with less information to boot.
If you want cheaper prices I can't in any reason believe you're arguing this for the good of Apple.
With that done, The need for power gap is shrinking in the consumer market. People see to want a lot more "fringe" items these days. Powermacs seems to be heading that direction in respect to powerusers.
Finally, there are some unaccounted benifits of macs againist PCs. My athlon 1.2ghz has been overheating way too much for my liking, to the point of turning on the AC when there isn't any need to.(It is going to be summer). My G4 on the other hand hasn't blinked in 3 months non stop use with OSX.
<strong>With no need for L3 cache, the processor can once again be fitted into a ZIF type socket with normal socket heatsinks and fans. The DIMM slots can be placed much closer to the processor and it may even be possible to have 4 slots if designed correctly.</strong><hr></blockquote>
ZIF can kiss my hairy ass.
Sawtooth and the other assorted CPU independant sockets are a technological ADVANCE. It means that manufactures like Apple don't have to worry about form factors and pin numbers anymore.
Wouldn't adding an on-chip memory controller and putting the 4 DIMM slots on the daughtercard itself make more sense?
[quote] If you want cheaper prices I can't in any reason believe you're arguing this for the good of Apple.
<hr></blockquote>
I hate when people whine about those who want Apple to thrive...yeah, this means you.
The reason many of us would like to see lower prices and better value on Mac hardware is because we want Apple's market share to grow. With a larger market share, Apple will have more money to sink into R&D, which will translate into even better products. And of course, larger market share directly leads to greater interest from developers, better software products, and more feature parity with Windows versions of apps.
I personally think Apple is doing all that they can to lower prices, but that they are limited in what they can do because of the small volume they move. As long as Apple is selling relatively low numbers of computers, they will never be able to compete with the likes of Dell on price alone. What Apple CAN do is compete on the basis of value, and I think they are improving the value of their offerings in the consumer space. The eMac, G4 iMac, and iBooks all are excellent values for their price range in terms of software and hardware design, although their motherboard/cpu and performance is simply not competitive. Unfortunately, I don't think Apple offers much value at all in their pro lines, definitely not in the Powermacs and very little in the Titanium Powerbooks.
But what you need to do is understand that most of the time when people here at AI complain about the price and/or performance of Macs, they are doing so for two reasons, one, because they want as good a Mac as possible for themselves, and two, because they want to see Apple thrive in the marketplace. Of course, the better Apple does, the greater their capacity to design and build competitive computers, so ultimately both points lead to the availability of better Macs for us.
I hate it so much when AppleZombies apologize for virtually everything Apple does, and then go on to whine about it whenever someone points out an area where Apple could improve. I'd hate to see the children of AppleZombies, without a doubt they are all spoiled brats who've never been asked to meet any expectations whatsoever...probably they are all little monsters who will grow up to be total losers because they never learned to identify their shortcomings and improve upon them.
Finally, there are some unaccounted benifits of macs againist PCs. My athlon 1.2ghz has been overheating way too much for my liking, to the point of turning on the AC when there isn't any need to.(It is going to be summer). My G4 on the other hand hasn't blinked in 3 months non stop use with OSX.
<hr></blockquote>
Heat dissipation is a valid concern for many consumers, but for the towers it's not as important. For many professionals the primary concern is how long it takes to do something with their computer. If they can create an animation sequence from start to finish in 4 hours on a Wintel, and it takes 6 hours to do on a Powermac, then they will choose the Wintel, because time is money. Yes the superiority of OS X shortens the time it takes to accomplish certain tasks, but it can only make up for so much when it comes to performance. If Macs were closer to Wintels in terms of hardware performance, then OS X would probably tip the scales in Apple's direction for many more users than it currently does.
My Powermac is so LOUD and NOISY that it may as well be cooling a 50 W CPU as the tiny 10 W G4 it currently houses. Would I care very much about that extra 40 W of power consumption? Not if it meant superior performance.
If Apple is going to increase their market share, they've got to come up with something better than "Macs use less power and run cooler than Wintels, because their CPUs aren't as powerful".
Comments
<strong>
You're thinking software emulator like virtualPC. The item being discussed is a a hardware part of of a PC processor that translates the x86 instructions to RISCish commands that can be executed very quickly. All current X86 PC processors use these "code translators" and of course they are much slower than our "native" PPC design.
*Note the PPC is more efficient I believe in how it handles commands (=less silicon to do the same job). But raw clock speed covers a multitude of sins.</strong><hr></blockquote>
thanks Bob, i was thinking of something else... definitely not the micro-ops level...
Hey how do you get funny 'u + y' character used for 'micro'. --> '_'ops
What they can control are prices. Take the 800Mhz SOI G4. Cost: $125. Note that for every single computer they sell except the top powermacs (933 and DP 1Ghz) they use some thing of the same price or substantially cheaper.
The pricing of the Powermac is a travesty, as is that of the iMacG3. The eMac is acceptable, and the iMacLCD was more acceptable before the highly specious price bump. Please note, that LCD and RAM prices stablized very quickly, and once again began to creep downwards, so that the proposed LCD component cost growth just never happened. Yet Apple still happily charges $100 more in an sort of demand control model. It's been a good while since the price bump. Everyone cried that other manufacturers would raise prices. Some indicated that new models would come to market at slightly higher costs. Apple was perfectly justified, you'd see. Well, enough time has passed that product in the retail channel was undoubtedly manufactured after the 'dramatic' LCD cost spike. Guess what? I can still buy the same selection of 15" LCD's for 499-549 CANADIAN! and 17" displays have actually creeped DOWNWARDS! The best deals I could find at around price bump time were for 1000-1100 Canadian on VGA or DVI panels (not dual) As of today, I can get a DVI 17" panel for 900 (899) CANADIAN. That is not only substantially cheaper than Apple's offerings, it shows a DOWNWARD price trend. But Job's insists that COSTS are so high. I'm willing to spot Apple a few extra dollars for a higher quality display and the ADC connector, but NOT 50% + for essentially the same component. The same: the 17" TFT I spec'd is a Samsung unit (recognize that supplier anyone?)
And do I really have to get into RAM prices? Any local retailer is essentially selling RAM for the same prices they were selling around price bump time. What gives?
Or for that matter another pet-peeve of mine, the over adjustment for exchange rate that Apple likes to apply here in Canada (and elsewhere). The Can$ is trading at .65US not .60.
I can buy a PC video card and flash it for 50% the cost of the mac version. If a card maker can afford to retail box a card a half the mac cost, then what does Apple pay for bare OEM versions? sorry but an ADC port and Apple driver don't magically double the cost of a card. What gives? And don't say quality, the 4MX has been far from perfect.
The point is that (especially in the PowerMacs) nothing, no component, costs so much -- with the exception of the superdrive -- that it justifies the prices of the powermacs. Higher-end machine should carry a premium, but the SP powermacs, iMacG3, and iMacLCD are all over priced to different degrees.
Someone called for us to focus on the original topic of PPC's, so that's what I did, relative to my general disdain for blind apology. I realize that the PPC is largely out of their hands, but they are not doing the best they can (hardware-wise) with what they've got. They're pricing machines (even iMacs) neck and neck with much more advanced (and expensive) hardware.
I would still consider a mac (even at the current spec) for some tasks/uses. At the current spec, would that those macs were a realistic 20% cheaper, I would not even question. Mac, no contest. Still over-priced, but not so much that I'd really care. Like Lemon Bon Bon mentioned, I'd rather not be ripped off (or forced to buy more than I need, which to me is a form of rip-off), And I am willing to pay more for a better product, even if it's a little slower and a little pricier. The key is 'a little'
[ 06-05-2002: Message edited by: Matsu ]</p>
<strong>Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I thought AIM was no more...? The threesome's relationship hasn't gone from Constitution to Articles of Confederation?
<strong>Ruhx, I can accept that. Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.
What they can control are prices. Take the 800Mhz SOI G4. Cost: $125. Note that for every single computer they sell except the top powermacs (933 and DP 1Ghz) they use some thing of the same price or substantially cheaper.
The pricing of the Powermac is a travesty, as is that of the iMacG3. The eMac is acceptable, and the iMacLCD was more acceptable before the highly specious price bump. Please note, that LCD and RAM prices stablized very quickly, and once again began to creep downwards, so that the proposed LCD component cost growth just never happened. Yet Apple still happily charges $100 more in an sort of demand control model. It's been a good while since the price bump. Everyone cried that other manufacturers would raise prices. Some indicated that new models would come to market at slightly higher costs. Apple was perfectly justified, you'd see. Well, enough time has passed that product in the retail channel was undoubtedly manufactured after the 'dramatic' LCD cost spike. Guess what? I can still buy the same selection of 15" LCD's for 499-549 CANADIAN! and 17" displays have actually creeped DOWNWARDS! The best deals I could find at around price bump time were for 1000-1100 Canadian on VGA or DVI panels (not dual) As of today, I can get a DVI 17" panel for 900 (899) CANADIAN. That is not only substantially cheaper than Apple's offerings, it shows a DOWNWARD price trend. But Job's insists that COSTS are so high. I'm willing to spot Apple a few extra dollars for a higher quality display and the ADC connector, but NOT 50% + for essentially the same component. The same: the 17" TFT I spec'd is a Samsung unit (recognize that supplier anyone?)
And do I really have to get into RAM prices? Any local retailer is essentially selling RAM for the same prices they were selling around price bump time. What gives?
Or for that matter another pet-peeve of mine, the over adjustment for exchange rate that Apple likes to apply here in Canada (and elsewhere). The Can$ is trading at .65US not .60.
I can buy a PC video card and flash it for 50% the cost of the mac version. If a card maker can afford to retail box a card a half the mac cost, then what does Apple pay for bare OEM versions? sorry but an ADC port and Apple driver don't magically double the cost of a card. What gives? And don't say quality, the 4MX has been far from perfect.
The point is that (especially in the PowerMacs) nothing, no component, costs so much -- with the exception of the superdrive -- that it justifies the prices of the powermacs. Higher-end machine should carry a premium, but the SP powermacs, iMacG3, and iMacLCD are all over priced to different degrees.
Someone called for us to focus on the original topic of PPC's, so that's what I did, relative to my general disdain for blind apology. I realize that the PPC is largely out of their hands, but they are not doing the best they can (hardware-wise) with what they've got. They're pricing machines (even iMacs) neck and neck with much more advanced (and expensive) hardware.
I would still consider a mac (even at the current spec) for some tasks/uses. At the current spec, would that those macs were a realistic 20% cheaper, I would not even question. Mac, no contest. Still over-priced, but not so much that I'd really care. Like Lemon Bon Bon mentioned, I'd rather not be ripped off (or forced to buy more than I need, which to me is a form of rip-off), And I am willing to pay more for a better product, even if it's a little slower and a little pricier. The key is 'a little'
[ 06-05-2002: Message edited by: Matsu ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
so what your saying is that Apple shouldn't be making so much profit on their equipment. They're in business to make money . If I don't like someone making too much money off of a product or a service: I buy someones elses project: or a I do the work myself/get osmeone else to do the work.
Apple doesn't make the processors they use and there's nothing they can do about it except make the best product they can with what they have to work with. Which they do an excellent job at.
I also want a fast G5 with all of the latest stuff, but I ain't gonna b!tch at apple over things they have no control over
Why doesn't someone start a Motorola Sucks thread and everyone can whine in there.
<strong>Ruhx, I can accept that. Apple is supposed to be part of AIM, it may be time for a more active role in chip design, but that requires a lot of expertise which cupertino may not have, or be able to buy without huge expense.
What they can control are prices. Take the 800Mhz SOI G4. Cost: $125. Note that for every single computer they sell except the top powermacs (933 and DP 1Ghz) they use some thing of the same price or substantially cheaper.
The pricing of the Powermac is a travesty, as is that of the iMacG3. The eMac is acceptable, and the iMacLCD was more acceptable before the highly specious price bump. Please note, that LCD and RAM prices stablized very quickly, and once again began to creep downwards, so that the proposed LCD component cost growth just never happened. Yet Apple still happily charges $100 more in an sort of demand control model. It's been a good while since the price bump. Everyone cried that other manufacturers would raise prices. Some indicated that new models would come to market at slightly higher costs. Apple was perfectly justified, you'd see. Well, enough time has passed that product in the retail channel was undoubtedly manufactured after the 'dramatic' LCD cost spike. Guess what? I can still buy the same selection of 15" LCD's for 499-549 CANADIAN! and 17" displays have actually creeped DOWNWARDS! The best deals I could find at around price bump time were for 1000-1100 Canadian on VGA or DVI panels (not dual) As of today, I can get a DVI 17" panel for 900 (899) CANADIAN. That is not only substantially cheaper than Apple's offerings, it shows a DOWNWARD price trend. But Job's insists that COSTS are so high. I'm willing to spot Apple a few extra dollars for a higher quality display and the ADC connector, but NOT 50% + for essentially the same component. The same: the 17" TFT I spec'd is a Samsung unit (recognize that supplier anyone?)
And do I really have to get into RAM prices? Any local retailer is essentially selling RAM for the same prices they were selling around price bump time. What gives?
Or for that matter another pet-peeve of mine, the over adjustment for exchange rate that Apple likes to apply here in Canada (and elsewhere). The Can$ is trading at .65US not .60.
I can buy a PC video card and flash it for 50% the cost of the mac version. If a card maker can afford to retail box a card a half the mac cost, then what does Apple pay for bare OEM versions? sorry but an ADC port and Apple driver don't magically double the cost of a card. What gives? And don't say quality, the 4MX has been far from perfect.
The point is that (especially in the PowerMacs) nothing, no component, costs so much -- with the exception of the superdrive -- that it justifies the prices of the powermacs. Higher-end machine should carry a premium, but the SP powermacs, iMacG3, and iMacLCD are all over priced to different degrees.
Someone called for us to focus on the original topic of PPC's, so that's what I did, relative to my general disdain for blind apology. I realize that the PPC is largely out of their hands, but they are not doing the best they can (hardware-wise) with what they've got. They're pricing machines (even iMacs) neck and neck with much more advanced (and expensive) hardware.
I would still consider a mac (even at the current spec) for some tasks/uses. At the current spec, would that those macs were a realistic 20% cheaper, I would not even question. Mac, no contest. Still over-priced, but not so much that I'd really care. Like Lemon Bon Bon mentioned, I'd rather not be ripped off (or forced to buy more than I need, which to me is a form of rip-off), And I am willing to pay more for a better product, even if it's a little slower and a little pricier. The key is 'a little'
[ 06-05-2002: Message edited by: Matsu ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
The price of Powermacs is not a travesty, but the way Apple is attempting to stay in business. Or, they could be like all the other computer makers and risk going out of business by competing on price.
Apple does what it thinks it needs to do to stay alive.
This is exactly the wrong way to take his arguments. Everyone here cares about Apple, and wants to see them improve and give PC's a seriuose run for their money. In order to do that we need to open our eyes and see the real situation at hand. Hiding behind the RDF, trying to get the mods to delete/move posts that explain this situation that you seem to be ignoring, and calling these people names, and accusing of them being whinners, is going to go nowhere.
The desktop PowerMacs are indeed horrifing in their price/performance deficiantcy. Ignoring this, and trying to cover up discussion of it is not going to help. I'm against all the 'Apple is doomed' people. Becuase I believe that Apple, more than any other computer maker, is capibull of throwing curve balls that we never suspect, and innovating is areas that we didnt know existed. But this PowerMac problem is not something that they are going to be able to innovate and trick their way through. They must increase performace of the PowerMacs dramatically immediatly. Or Apple will die. It will be a very slow death, but a death nonetheless. And the industry will be out of a great innovator and pioneer. I never want to see that day, and to that end I hope Apple can get the picture: that iApps wont double their marketshare. Price and Performance will. The computing masses are waiting to give Apple their money, if they would just give them a reason.
<strong>
thanks Bob, i was thinking of something else... definitely not the micro-ops level...
Hey how do you get funny 'u + y' character used for 'micro'. --> '_'ops</strong><hr></blockquote>
option-m
<strong>
This is exactly the wrong way to take his arguments. Everyone here cares about Apple, and wants to see them improve and give PC's a seriuose run for their money. In order to do that we need to open our eyes and see the real situation at hand. Hiding behind the RDF, trying to get the mods to delete/move posts that explain this situation that you seem to be ignoring, and calling these people names, and accusing of them being whinners, is going to go nowhere.
The desktop PowerMacs are indeed horrifing in their price/performance deficiantcy. Ignoring this, and trying to cover up discussion of it is not going to help. I'm against all the 'Apple is doomed' people. Becuase I believe that Apple, more than any other computer maker, is capibull of throwing curve balls that we never suspect, and innovating is areas that we didnt know existed. But this PowerMac problem is not something that they are going to be able to innovate and trick their way through. They must increase performace of the PowerMacs dramatically immediatly. Or Apple will die. It will be a very slow death, but a death nonetheless. And the industry will be out of a great innovator and pioneer. I never want to see that day, and to that end I hope Apple can get the picture: that iApps wont double their marketshare. Price and Performance will. The computing masses are waiting to give Apple their money, if they would just give them a reason.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Apple doesn't make the slow processor, Motorola does. Apple's done a good job with what they have to use- period.
Life is a b!tch when you build a Ferrari and all you got is a Briggs and Stratton motor to put in it. You can put a 10-speed trans and gear it real low to get up to 20 mph as fast as possible, but you can't make it go 160 mph. But the Ferrari is still beautiful and comfortable to drive in. Hopefully some new motors will show up soon. We already know that a new frame had been made to hold the motor.
Time will tell and it's a good thing Sculley saved all that cash for weak times.
Or Apple could finally get serious about the other 95% and make less money per machine, but sell a whole lot more machines in the process.
One avenue I advocate is more flexible BTO, especially for RAM, storage, HDD's and opticals. This way Apple can continue to offer the fastest machines but at lower prices because they don't NEED to spec the costliest upgradeable parts. The final retail price is lower, but also (and importantly for 'margins') so is the manufacturer's cost. Leave alone portables for now (which I think are decent enough compared to X86) and look at all desktops:
Powermacs are easily expanded. If you sell me a machine with minimal RAM, HDD, and optical, it's cheaper for me, but it's also cheaper to make for you. I might buy all those things from a 3rd party later on, but at least you get the box portion of the sale. Forcing me to take a much higher initial machine could (and has) cost you sales. On the PC side, this is extremely common, to spec a fast CPU/Mobo with less RAM/storage/HDD capacity, and let users add those things on their own. You at least get the box sale, and you make a decent profit on it too, 'cause you didn't spend as much on it's components. Sell them what they want now and let them buy what they need later.
This should work for iMacs/eMacs too. It's a bit counter intuitive for A-I-O but you don't need to have everything in the box, the whole point of firewire was to have EASY expansion, so why spec huge HDD's and expensive opticals. Why not sell an iMac with a small (20GB HDD), and read-only drive (DVD) and let me add huge HDD's or superdrives via firewire. Still sell the fully loaded machines, but make the BTO into something meaningful. For that matter I take issue with some of the design decisions, particularly the RAM arrangement of the iMac. WHY, oh why, couldn't they put two regular dimm slots in a user accessible position? First you make adding RAM and airport easy, via the base, and then you shoot yourselves in the foot by requiring the use of EXPENSIVE SO-DIMMS and 'factory installed only' INNER SLOTS.
Dropping the optical to read-only, the HDD to 20GB, and the RAM to a minimum of 128 would surely take the 15" LCD iMac to 999 or thereabouts. A LOT of people would buy it. They'd all add firewire burners, and HDDs, and more RAM later-on, or even immeadiately, but the point is that they would get more units into people's homes. Not just a reason to try, but a price that give the opportunity to try.
It's a model that works very well for the PC industry. Don't kid yourselves that Dell, or IBM, or Gateway are losing huge scads of money doing it, they aren't. They're moving product. Even Gateway, had it not been for the disasterous deployment of their retail strategy, would have been in the black. They move a lot of product in N.A., as do the others all over the world. Let's not take the thing PC vendors do best and say that it can't work, 95% says it works quite well thank-you very much. It behooves Apple to make it work for them too.
Saying that machines can't be any cheaper to maintain a healthy profit level, is as meaningless as saying that cheaper machines need to be made for Apple to compete. Look instead to how they can be made and yet profits maintained. A little bit of both. There's that notion again, a little, incremental improvements for your products/selection/customer options, some example from what the other's are doing right. Growth, not just in market share, but in business philosophy.
External firewire drives are stillprohibitously expensive, take up desk space, power and a 20GB hard drives is only ~$10 less epensive than a 40GB one. Also, OS X really needs 256MB+. Still a reasonable idea though.
[quote]WHY, oh why, couldn't they put two regular dimm slots in a user accessible position?<hr></blockquote>
That would be too useful...
Yes, and if Apple wants to remain highly viable--even without increasing market share--it must address not so much PRICE as PERFORMANCE. The professional user will pay, and pay handsomely, provided that s/he is getting a machine that puts others to shame, from the chrome to the gears. As many have pointed out, to make a great go of it, Apple doesn't necessarily need a killer chip alone but a genuinely imaginative solution to the widening speed problem.
I'd be curious to see the hard numbers on sales in the PowerMac line since January's "Way Beyond the Rumor Sites" titillation. Three years down the road, someone will write the history of the recent Apple period (500mhz to the present), and the great software successes will stand out. From now on, though, Apple must leave a fruitful processor/motherboard legacy or else the coming history will be dark.
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"Why Not Now?" in Nashvegas
Instead I find the same argument that half the threads in here wind up becoming.... <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />
[ 06-06-2002: Message edited by: Flounder ]</p>
<strong>
I've been more than happy to help them amass their cash and will continue.
Don't like it don't buy it.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Will do. I ordered my new p4 rig yesterday.
If you don't like the prices, don't buy it. At this point it has no monoply-like power to dwindle choices. That's your choice as a consumer.
As for the heath of Apple, their earnings/results/ forcasts look positive. And we have to assume their employies took bussiness/ecconomics/accounting. So you're not above them in any terms with less information to boot.
If you want cheaper prices I can't in any reason believe you're arguing this for the good of Apple.
With that done, The need for power gap is shrinking in the consumer market. People see to want a lot more "fringe" items these days. Powermacs seems to be heading that direction in respect to powerusers.
Finally, there are some unaccounted benifits of macs againist PCs. My athlon 1.2ghz has been overheating way too much for my liking, to the point of turning on the AC when there isn't any need to.(It is going to be summer). My G4 on the other hand hasn't blinked in 3 months non stop use with OSX.
~Kuku
Rants belong in General Discussion, no matter how right you think you are.
Posts about the future of the PowerMac, and whether it is closer than you think, belong in this thread. Period.
<strong>With no need for L3 cache, the processor can once again be fitted into a ZIF type socket with normal socket heatsinks and fans. The DIMM slots can be placed much closer to the processor and it may even be possible to have 4 slots if designed correctly.</strong><hr></blockquote>
ZIF can kiss my hairy ass.
Sawtooth and the other assorted CPU independant sockets are a technological ADVANCE. It means that manufactures like Apple don't have to worry about form factors and pin numbers anymore.
Wouldn't adding an on-chip memory controller and putting the 4 DIMM slots on the daughtercard itself make more sense?
Barto
<hr></blockquote>
I hate when people whine about those who want Apple to thrive...yeah, this means you.
The reason many of us would like to see lower prices and better value on Mac hardware is because we want Apple's market share to grow. With a larger market share, Apple will have more money to sink into R&D, which will translate into even better products. And of course, larger market share directly leads to greater interest from developers, better software products, and more feature parity with Windows versions of apps.
I personally think Apple is doing all that they can to lower prices, but that they are limited in what they can do because of the small volume they move. As long as Apple is selling relatively low numbers of computers, they will never be able to compete with the likes of Dell on price alone. What Apple CAN do is compete on the basis of value, and I think they are improving the value of their offerings in the consumer space. The eMac, G4 iMac, and iBooks all are excellent values for their price range in terms of software and hardware design, although their motherboard/cpu and performance is simply not competitive. Unfortunately, I don't think Apple offers much value at all in their pro lines, definitely not in the Powermacs and very little in the Titanium Powerbooks.
But what you need to do is understand that most of the time when people here at AI complain about the price and/or performance of Macs, they are doing so for two reasons, one, because they want as good a Mac as possible for themselves, and two, because they want to see Apple thrive in the marketplace. Of course, the better Apple does, the greater their capacity to design and build competitive computers, so ultimately both points lead to the availability of better Macs for us.
I hate it so much when AppleZombies apologize for virtually everything Apple does, and then go on to whine about it whenever someone points out an area where Apple could improve. I'd hate to see the children of AppleZombies, without a doubt they are all spoiled brats who've never been asked to meet any expectations whatsoever...probably they are all little monsters who will grow up to be total losers because they never learned to identify their shortcomings and improve upon them.
Finally, there are some unaccounted benifits of macs againist PCs. My athlon 1.2ghz has been overheating way too much for my liking, to the point of turning on the AC when there isn't any need to.(It is going to be summer). My G4 on the other hand hasn't blinked in 3 months non stop use with OSX.
<hr></blockquote>
Heat dissipation is a valid concern for many consumers, but for the towers it's not as important. For many professionals the primary concern is how long it takes to do something with their computer. If they can create an animation sequence from start to finish in 4 hours on a Wintel, and it takes 6 hours to do on a Powermac, then they will choose the Wintel, because time is money. Yes the superiority of OS X shortens the time it takes to accomplish certain tasks, but it can only make up for so much when it comes to performance. If Macs were closer to Wintels in terms of hardware performance, then OS X would probably tip the scales in Apple's direction for many more users than it currently does.
My Powermac is so LOUD and NOISY that it may as well be cooling a 50 W CPU as the tiny 10 W G4 it currently houses. Would I care very much about that extra 40 W of power consumption? Not if it meant superior performance.
If Apple is going to increase their market share, they've got to come up with something better than "Macs use less power and run cooler than Wintels, because their CPUs aren't as powerful".