My friends at work already mock me bad enough for wanting to spend $2500 for a PMac vs $1000 for a homebrew PC
It's this myopia that irks me about PC bigots. You cannot build a equivalent PC to a Dual PM for $1000. Yes you can build a nice fast single processor computer for that but once you add the extra processor you have additional motherboard and CPU costs that many so easily seem to forget.
I think @homenow is correct. I could actually see Apple moving to 4 PM configs before jacking up the lowend.
2Ghz PM -$1599
Dual 2.2- $2399
Dual 2.6= $2999
Dual 3.0- $3499 this would have Quadro or FireGL card standard. 1GB memory and possibly over features.
I don't mind Apple having a $3500 configuration. This is a workstation and $3500 for a workstation isn't huge money by any stretch of the imagination. What this computer needs is a beefy configuration so that 3D, Audio and Video pros know they're getting the fastest speeds possible. The sales numbers would be low but margin high.
Hell I can buy a hopped up Dual Xeon system from Alienware for $4600. When I hear people talk about Apple needing to keep the PMs under $3k I realize this isn't a person that needs to make money with their computer. This is a consumer lusting after the top end but stuck with a modest budget.
Hell I can buy a hopped up Dual Xeon system from Alienware for $4600. When I hear people talk about Apple needing to keep the PMs under $3k I realize this isn't a person that needs to make money with their computer. This is a consumer lusting after the top end but stuck with a modest budget.
And that's exactly the point. I use a mac for video editing. It's the center of my business. I'm currently running a dual 1.3 G4 and I have a basic rule - don't drop more money until you can get at least 2x, preferably 3x the power. That usually works out to around 3 years - about the time the IRS lets me depreciate it over.
Would I buy a dual 3Gig G5 for $3499 - probably $4500 once I pack it with more RAM and more disk (please, oh please 4 internal drives) - Absolutely. I can make that much back in about a year because I can turn jobs around faster.
So many here don't really "need" the power of dual 3G machines. Heck, I don't "need" it either, my business runs fine with what I have, but I sure would like the extra productivity - another $15K made over a couple of years is a nice return.
If I was just buying it for myself, I'd still have the old PM7200 I had several years ago because my wife wouldn't let me buy any more toys - seems she wants a new house
Dual 3.0- $3499 this would have Quadro or FireGL card standard. 1GB memory and possibly over features.
It wouldn't bother me that their top config would be 3500... if you could build to order it close to the top mid model. Lets say you just want the processor speed but don't want the graphics card... to me that graphics card is worth 500 dollars... drop it and drop the price down to 3150 or so. That works out fine.
I would be very disapppointed if they forced you to buy the graphics card if you didn't want it in order to get the high end model.
The low-end G5 config should be $999. Mid-range and High-end models should be $1,599 and $1,999 respectively. This would be competitive. Anything else above that would be gravy.
The low-end G5 config should be $999. Mid-range and High-end models should be $1,599 and $1,999 respectively. This would be competitive. Anything else above that would be gravy.
What would you put in the lowend G5? $999 doesn't leave any room on you have the goods and then the 3x-5x markup. Apple would have to have a parts bill of less than $450. No way you're keeping an Aluminum case and decent HD and RAM at that level.
This is a bit mis guided but you can get awfully close for $1000 if not a bit less. That is a system without a monitor just like the PowerMac. Go the opteron route and you will get very similar performance to Apples top end model for a little extra.
This isn't the rambling of a PC bigot, it just being observant and watching prices. An agressive local vendor helps a bit two!
Ever since OS/X came out I've had a desire to get back into a Mac. The problem with getting there is two fold. One is the rather high cost to get contemporary performance. The other is software which in my case is Linux. It would be nice to be able to run things like EMC on a PowerMac, but I'm not even sure if the OS/X kernel has the realtime capability to do it.
Off the desktop Apple use to do much better price performance wise. That is quickly becoming an issue now with Dothan and all the round better hardware from the PC vendors.
Thanks
dave
Quote:
Originally posted by hmurchison
It's this myopia that irks me about PC bigots. You cannot build a equivalent PC to a Dual PM for $1000.
One can only build a PC that competes with Apples top PM in single processor apps.
I could easily build a nice system based on an Athlon 64 3000+ processor. And yes it would compete favorably against Apples Dual 2Ghz but the bottleneck really isn't the hardware but the software.
Reminds of Adobe's "PC Preferred" advertising. No one ever questions application performance. Once people hacked After Effects to enable the second processor things changed really fast.
Dual processors work. Apples biggest issue right now is getting lazy developers like Adobe to actually utilize Apple hardware tech right. Hell we could have Dual 4Ghz but if developers won't optimize their apps then it's all for naught.
I noticed that Word 2004 is not any faster either scroll.
My recommendation is for Apple to continue to do what they have been doing. Using Apple Pro apps to show the power of the PM G5s and generate excitement on the platform. You know screw After Effects Adobe doesn't get off their azzes until competition is beating down their door. Maybe we need a Motion Pro in a year or two.
I have to wonder how much you think Apple is paying for the hardware now? You do realize that Apple has some of the highest gross margins in the industry.
Further Apple isn't really doing very well on the HD or delivered RAM departments anyway. In fact RAM has been a big failing at Apple for years, they got away with it in the days of OS-9 because of the limited capacity to use that RAM. Now that they have a real OS that can effectively make use of the installed RAM, they still ship systems with 1/4 to 1/2 what is the norm in the PC world. Please don't try to sell me any whining stories about the quality of Apples RAM or any of the other common sob stories that are used to justify the great Apple RAM ripoff. This stuff is built to standards; the same standards used in the PC world.
Delivering a low end G5 is simply an engineering execise. If Apple isn't willing to play in this market segment then eventually they will go the same way as Apollo and some of the other once great UNIX vendors.
I have nothing agianst Apple playing in the high end of the market but one has to realize that the G5 Tower would not be clasified as a high end work station by many. It is simply misisng to many features in the price segment it occupies. So what we have in the G5 Tower is a machine that wants to think that it is a high end machine and is priced accordingly but in reality only has the processor of a high end machine. For some markets that is fine, but it certianly is not the case for all.
At the very least to justify the price, the Tower needs hardware that is common in that price range. To start more internal HD space with the ability to run hardware RAID would help.
What it comes down to, is that history has shown us that computer companies that concentrate on high end workstations don't stay around long. Niether do companies that engage in over pricing their hardware. The sales figures for the Tower pretty much show where Apple is going.
Dave
Quote:
Originally posted by hmurchison
What would you put in the lowend G5? $999 doesn't leave any room on you have the goods and then the 3x-5x markup. Apple would have to have a parts bill of less than $450. No way you're keeping an Aluminum case and decent HD and RAM at that level.
What are you talking about here? You can build quad systems if you have the paycheck to pay for it.
Dual Opteron is possible, yes the base system may be slightly over the $1000 limit but you will still have a system that is as fast as anything Apple offers and in some ways faster. If one looks around the 242 opeteron can be had for under $300, get two in a set with a motherboard and you are in nice shape to hit your price point.
Opteron has some very unique features, it is possibly the closest competitor to the 970, that currently exist and has been successful sales wise. Intels move to Dothan in my mind is a very obvious move to compete with these processors.
Now I'm not about to say that a PC built with bottom of the barrel components will have the overall quality of a PowerMac. What I will say is that it will have comparable performance for many usages, and will last long enough that it will be very outdated when it comes time to replace it. Besides Apple is using AMD technology as it is, the difference is not all that great.
Thanks
Dave
Quote:
Originally posted by hmurchison
One can only build a PC that competes with Apples top PM in single processor apps.
It's this myopia that irks me about PC bigots. You cannot build a equivalent PC to a Dual PM for $1000. Yes you can build a nice fast single processor computer for that but once you add the extra processor you have additional motherboard and CPU costs that many so easily seem to forget.
I think @homenow is correct. I could actually see Apple moving to 4 PM configs before jacking up the lowend.
2Ghz PM -$1599
Dual 2.2- $2399
Dual 2.6= $2999
Dual 3.0- $3499 this would have Quadro or FireGL card standard. 1GB memory and possibly over features.
I don't mind Apple having a $3500 configuration. This is a workstation and $3500 for a workstation isn't huge money by any stretch of the imagination. What this computer needs is a beefy configuration so that 3D, Audio and Video pros know they're getting the fastest speeds possible. The sales numbers would be low but margin high.
Hell I can buy a hopped up Dual Xeon system from Alienware for $4600. When I hear people talk about Apple needing to keep the PMs under $3k I realize this isn't a person that needs to make money with their computer. This is a consumer lusting after the top end but stuck with a modest budget.
I have a few things to state.
I'll believe that Mac exists when I see it.
Alienware is a bad example because they make the most expensive systems with equal components vs. other PC systems out of anybody. Configure that same setup at BOXXTECH, and you'll drop $1,500.00 off the price, plus get more features.
If Apple gets PCIe before anybody I'd spit a twinkie out of my eye socket.
Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.
I could easily build a nice system based on an Athlon 64 3000+ processor. And yes it would compete favorably against Apples Dual 2Ghz but the bottleneck really isn't the hardware but the software.
Sadly, we will only see a real push towards multithreaded apps when it is dictated by the PC industry. And that won't begin happen until next year and 2006 with Intel and AMD going multicore themselves. That assumes, of course, that apps ported over to the Mac maintain their "multithreadedness"... I really hope that Apple doesn't price their machines even more out of touch with the rest of the industry (on a price/performance scale). Not unless they can offer something in the hardware department that can truly generate some excitement in the industry.
Quote:
My recommendation is for Apple to continue to do what they have been doing. Using Apple Pro apps to show the power of the PM G5s and generate excitement on the platform.
It's not enough - they need to do more. They need *something* to get people excited about their machines again. For the last 8 years or so we've watched Apple sell fewer and fewer computers. Sales have been flat the last couple of years even with the introduction of the G5 and an increasingly solid OS:X.
Reminds of Adobe's "PC Preferred" advertising. No one ever questions application performance. Once people hacked After Effects to enable the second processor things changed really fast.
Dual processors work. Apples biggest issue right now is getting lazy developers like Adobe to actually utilize Apple hardware tech right. Hell we could have Dual 4Ghz but if developers won't optimize their apps then it's all for naught.
On this note, I saw a recent review of Apple's G5 vs. the others using After effects mostly. Lot's of Benchmarks and prices for those who are interested.
"Since most of our benchmarks involve Adobe After Effects, the most widely used processor-intensive application used by digital video editors and compositors, there's a speedup in the offing there, too, where we noticed faster render times using a beta copy of After Effects 6.5 for the Mac (see table below comparing AE 6.0 times with AE 6.5). Apparently Adobe has been doing some optimization of its own, goosing the performance of After Effects on the Mac."
Bottom line: Apple doesn't always win, but "Apple has decided to competitively price the G5, where it's much less expansive than its similarly-configured PC competitors, which beat it by only slight margins in the benchmarks yet some cost over $1000 more than a comparably-equipped $4398 G5."
Well it's not that I don't recognize the tech that X86 world is bringing it's just that PCs are overhyped and Macs are downplayed.
Powermac G5s have had for 9 shipping months
An 8 layer PCB motherboard with Dual Procs, 16 and 8 bit Hypertransport links. Gigabit Ethernet. FW 400/800, PCI-X and yet some PC yokel is trying to tell me Apple's hardware sucks??
Todays pricing buys me a Dual Opteron system minus the FW and PCI-X for roughly $1350 with me providing the sweat equity. With that in mind I think Apple should move all dual for the PM lineup starting at $1599(I know i'm dreaming) and going up to 3499 for a firebreather.
Apple does need to lower pricing but I don't think this will happen until they can exceed 10 Billion in revenue. They gotta generate more money.
Concord So true. Consumers are very happy with the current sub $1k offerings and see no reason to spend more money. Apple cannot force people to the Powermacs. They have to "innovate". I feel for our favorite fruit company. I can only imagine the "Boardroom Brawls" they must have over the future direction of the company.
Quote:
Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.
<Drool> Hell if i'm spending $5k make my DVD Burner 12 or 16x. Onlooker I know you're a CG Junkie. What are your thoughts about Apple creating a 3D app? I must admit I was suprised about hearing no rumors about Apple being interested in Maya. Could they have something being worked on now? I tend to doubt it because Apple doesn't seem to have many 3D experienced programmers unless they nabbed some from Discreet(which I doubt I believe they were combustion programmers). I thought Apple could slide here but Avid has nice bundle with ProTools 6.4 and a 3D app that could prove to be competitive with Final Cut Pro.
I have a few things to state.I'll believe that Mac exists when I see it.
Apples in a position where they have to deliver big time. They can't release an update at WWDC without PCI-Express and then wait another year to deliver. That simply won't work.
Quote:
Alienware is a bad example because they make the most expensive systems with equal components vs. other PC systems out of anybody. Configure that same setup at BOXXTECH, and you'll drop $1,500.00 off the price, plus get more features.
I've found the best way to buy PC hardware is to go to the local PC store and have them make one up. We are talking local independant operators here.
Even without that advantage the Apple hardware just doesn't look all that good if you concentrate on price/performance.
Quote:
If Apple gets PCIe before anybody I'd spit a twinkie out of my eye socket.
It will probally be a bit of a shock if they make it to me also, but they really have no choice. If they release hardware now without PCI-Exprees you have to figure that the next rev form Apple would be 6 months at best to more than a year. With the PC vendors getting ready to go on this very soon this simply is not acceptable if Steve is concerned about Apples sales and its standing as an innovator.
They may not beat everybody with shipping product, but they can't be far behind if the company expects to stay with the pack.
Quote:
Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.
If Apple tried to sell those for that sum it would be like the Lisa all over again. They will be lucky to move this product at the current price much less increase the price.
Remember PC hardware will be improving at the same time. Further the value of some of that stuff is highly suspect, 2GB off ram for example is no big deal anymore.
What are you talking about here? You can build quad systems if you have the paycheck to pay for it.
Dual Opteron is possible, yes the base system may be slightly over the $1000 limit but you will still have a system that is as fast as anything Apple offers and in some ways faster. If one looks around the 242 opeteron can be had for under $300, get two in a set with a motherboard and you are in nice shape to hit your price point.
Opteron has some very unique features, it is possibly the closest competitor to the 970, that currently exist and has been successful sales wise. Intels move to Dothan in my mind is a very obvious move to compete with these processors.
Now I'm not about to say that a PC built with bottom of the barrel components will have the overall quality of a PowerMac. What I will say is that it will have comparable performance for many usages, and will last long enough that it will be very outdated when it comes time to replace it. Besides Apple is using AMD technology as it is, the difference is not all that great.
Thanks
Dave
YOu get quality for that extra money dave. OS X is so much nicer then any os out there... and I don't mean that from a gui perspective. I mean that from a compatibility, stability, and performance perspective. Who cares if the hardware is more expensive. As long as its as competitive whats it matter. YOu're paying for the OS IMO.
I'm dying to get a new g5... I'm so sick of windows and Suse/Mandrake/RH/Debian and Gentoo... They aren't fast OS's... and they aren't as stable as OS X. I have yet to see a linux box be as stable. There is a reason for this... it's not because apple has really good programmers... its because they have standardized hardware. The problem with the PC world is there are too many different vendors... Personally I dont' see how any OS is stable on a pc. Take my work box for example.
Biostar MCNPro NForce2 mobo, 2800+ Thoro, Mushkin Ram, Apollo gf fx 5200, etc etc etc... its a MUTT!!
How can anything be stable on it? Well amazingly Mandrake 10 and XP are fairly stable... my point is... Apple knows whats going into their machines... everything from the rom to the silicon it was put on. Makes that much easier to program for.
I'd definitely pay 2000+ dollars just to use OS X over XP any time... assuming that the hardware is comparable.
Well it's not that I don't recognize the tech that X86 world is bringing it's just that PCs are overhyped and Macs are downplayed.
I don't believe this is the case. Many people recognixe the performance of the PowerMac for certian applications. They also recognize that here is no low cost alternative PowerMac Tower. Apples Tower line starts expensive and just gets worst.
So lets say you have a need for a PC with a expansion slot, the platform doesn't matter but cost do. This is where Macs simply can't compete. And lets be honest the performance isn't tha earth shaking for the single processor machine.
Quote:
Powermac G5s have had for 9 shipping months
An 8 layer PCB motherboard with Dual Procs, 16 and 8 bit Hypertransport links. Gigabit Ethernet. FW 400/800, PCI-X and yet some PC yokel is trying to tell me Apple's hardware sucks??
It sucks because in many cases you are paying for the wrong technology. Apple would do its customers a big favor if it would simply addressed the base memory and storage issues. To much of Apples efforts seemed to be centered around making the tower look nice instead of being practical. They already have a cute computer, which is fine if a little slow, they don't have practical tower.
They seemed to miss the whole point of a tower. What you describe above is good technology for a iMac not a tower.
Quote:
Todays pricing buys me a Dual Opteron system minus the FW and PCI-X for roughly $1350 with me providing the sweat equity. With that in mind I think Apple should move all dual for the PM lineup starting at $1599(I know i'm dreaming) and going up to 3499 for a firebreather.
Your Dual Opteron seems to be abotu right maybe just slightly high, but that doesn't really matter. Apple might as well go all dual it is pretty obvious that the people who do buy towers are also the people that make use of duals. Beyond that the world is quickly becoming multithreaded.
Unless Apple drastically changes the towers design, the prices you suggest are just crazy. Apple can't even sell the current models in any volume at todays prices. A price increase won't help. What Apple needs to do is to lower prices across the board aobut a thousand dollars when the improve processor come out.
It is clear what has happened with Apple up to this point. Excessively high prices and poor hardware configurations have driven their sales into the ground. In the end they may need to offer two different towers to address this issue, one high performance the other agressive in the cost parammeter.
Either way Apple needs to deal with the perception that their machines screw the user by offering to little for the money. Actually it isn't so much a perception as it is a fact. Is it to much ot ask for (in the age of OS/X) to have a machine with a reasonable amount of RAM and disk storage. These are professional machines we are talking about here. The people they are bien marketed to are not complete dummys, even if that is the perception of the Mac market, they don't want to be taken to the cleaners for last years technology.
Thanks
Dave
Quote:
Apple does need to lower pricing but I don't think this will happen until they can exceed 10 Billion in revenue. They gotta generate more money.
Concord So true. Consumers are very happy with the current sub $1k offerings and see no reason to spend more money. Apple cannot force people to the Powermacs. They have to "innovate". I feel for our favorite fruit company. I can only imagine the "Boardroom Brawls" they must have over the future direction of the company.
<Drool> Hell if i'm spending $5k make my DVD Burner 12 or 16x. Onlooker I know you're a CG Junkie. What are your thoughts about Apple creating a 3D app? I must admit I was suprised about hearing no rumors about Apple being interested in Maya. Could they have something being worked on now? I tend to doubt it because Apple doesn't seem to have many 3D experienced programmers unless they nabbed some from Discreet(which I doubt I believe they were combustion programmers). I thought Apple could slide here but Avid has nice bundle with ProTools 6.4 and a 3D app that could prove to be competitive with Final Cut Pro.
Well I tend to frequent Audio Production and Video Production boards and I don't really get that they are unhappy with the speed unless we're talking Powerbooks(G5 needed their and quick).
Frankly I don't think any of us thought it would take almost a year for RevB PMs to hit. The only people buying right now are those in a pinch. Hell Motion alone may get some people to upgrade their computers. What it takes is a new killer feature that is worth opening up the bank again. Apple could sell Powermacs up to 5k easily. There is someone at every level that needs the power.
I'm disappointed that it's taken this long but I think Apple must have made the decision to skip a small refresh and hit with something big. WWDC has me very excited. I think things are just getting started. I never really expected gonzo PM sales. Creatives are willing to spend the money but the typical consumer is going to be cool with something a little less beefy.
My guess is that PMs hit 3Ghz by late summer. Apple will have 4 Drive Bays and a beefier audio specification. Another Pro App is coming down the pipe as well. People have the money...you just gotta make them dig deeeeeeep.
Well that is where we may have an issue in communicaitons here. You get the same quality in PC hardware for alot less. There was a time when I honestly believed that Apple had better hardware but that time has passed.
AS to OS/X, yes it is very nice. One of the reasons I left the Mac world was the state of Apples old OS, which caused me to move briefly to NT. But to be honest with you most of my OS issue went away with the transition to Redhat and now Fedora. I like the idea that OS/X offer similar power but am put off buy the platform needed to run it as well as Linux.
As to Apples hardware being competitive that simply is not the case. Every platoform they have you imemdiately have to go out and upgrade to make best use of the machine. Oftne that means buying RAM and harddisk just to bring the machine up to the same values avaliable form the mainline PC vendors. Is a machine that comes with far to little RAM to run its own OS a good bargin?
As to the OS - its mostly BSD with a different graphical environment. While Apple has done a nice job with it, it certainly isn't light years ahead of any other BSD distribution. Let me tell you though, Linux is moving along at a rather impressive clip. Sure it is not perfect, no OS is, but it is far more stable than some of the old MS OS'es.
So agian where is the money going, into quality -nope-, into nice hardware -nope-, into the highest margins in the industry -yep-.
Your argument comes down to the idea that the OS is worth $2000. Well I do know that some could easly justify spending $2000 on an OS but the vast majority of the people out there see it as an expense. An expense that can be reduced or eliminated by choosing a different path. That path may not involve MS, Linux offers an environment that is very similar to OS/X in capabilities at a greatly reduced cost and on hardware that is far cheaper.
So I'm sitting here and I see OS/X as it is now. It is not bad but it is not pulling me off the hardware I'm on now. When it coems right down to it that is Apples problem, there are a lot of us that have no interest in MS OS'es but on the other hand are not willing to pay Apples tax. When it comes right down to it that is really what is happening, your being taxed for a name, because that extra money you are spending isn't going into either hardware or software. Sometimes I have to laugh when I hear about the RDF, but apparently it still works on people. The thing is they would even need the RDF if they just would attempt to meet customer needs on the simplest things.
Thanks
Dave
Quote:
Originally posted by emig647
YOu get quality for that extra money dave. OS X is so much nicer then any os out there... and I don't mean that from a gui perspective. I mean that from a compatibility, stability, and performance perspective. Who cares if the hardware is more expensive. As long as its as competitive whats it matter. YOu're paying for the OS IMO.
I'm dying to get a new g5... I'm so sick of windows and Suse/Mandrake/RH/Debian and Gentoo... They aren't fast OS's... and they aren't as stable as OS X. I have yet to see a linux box be as stable. There is a reason for this... it's not because apple has really good programmers... its because they have standardized hardware. The problem with the PC world is there are too many different vendors... Personally I dont' see how any OS is stable on a pc. Take my work box for example.
Biostar MCNPro NForce2 mobo, 2800+ Thoro, Mushkin Ram, Apollo gf fx 5200, etc etc etc... its a MUTT!!
How can anything be stable on it? Well amazingly Mandrake 10 and XP are fairly stable... my point is... Apple knows whats going into their machines... everything from the rom to the silicon it was put on. Makes that much easier to program for.
I'd definitely pay 2000+ dollars just to use OS X over XP any time... assuming that the hardware is comparable.
Comments
My friends at work already mock me bad enough for wanting to spend $2500 for a PMac vs $1000 for a homebrew PC
It's this myopia that irks me about PC bigots. You cannot build a equivalent PC to a Dual PM for $1000. Yes you can build a nice fast single processor computer for that but once you add the extra processor you have additional motherboard and CPU costs that many so easily seem to forget.
I think @homenow is correct. I could actually see Apple moving to 4 PM configs before jacking up the lowend.
2Ghz PM -$1599
Dual 2.2- $2399
Dual 2.6= $2999
Dual 3.0- $3499 this would have Quadro or FireGL card standard. 1GB memory and possibly over features.
I don't mind Apple having a $3500 configuration. This is a workstation and $3500 for a workstation isn't huge money by any stretch of the imagination. What this computer needs is a beefy configuration so that 3D, Audio and Video pros know they're getting the fastest speeds possible. The sales numbers would be low but margin high.
Hell I can buy a hopped up Dual Xeon system from Alienware for $4600. When I hear people talk about Apple needing to keep the PMs under $3k I realize this isn't a person that needs to make money with their computer. This is a consumer lusting after the top end but stuck with a modest budget.
Originally posted by hmurchison
Hell I can buy a hopped up Dual Xeon system from Alienware for $4600. When I hear people talk about Apple needing to keep the PMs under $3k I realize this isn't a person that needs to make money with their computer. This is a consumer lusting after the top end but stuck with a modest budget.
And that's exactly the point. I use a mac for video editing. It's the center of my business. I'm currently running a dual 1.3 G4 and I have a basic rule - don't drop more money until you can get at least 2x, preferably 3x the power. That usually works out to around 3 years - about the time the IRS lets me depreciate it over.
Would I buy a dual 3Gig G5 for $3499 - probably $4500 once I pack it with more RAM and more disk (please, oh please 4 internal drives) - Absolutely. I can make that much back in about a year because I can turn jobs around faster.
So many here don't really "need" the power of dual 3G machines. Heck, I don't "need" it either, my business runs fine with what I have, but I sure would like the extra productivity - another $15K made over a couple of years is a nice return.
If I was just buying it for myself, I'd still have the old PM7200 I had several years ago because my wife wouldn't let me buy any more toys - seems she wants a new house
Originally posted by hmurchison
2Ghz PM -$1599
Dual 2.2- $2399
Dual 2.6= $2999
Dual 3.0- $3499 this would have Quadro or FireGL card standard. 1GB memory and possibly over features.
It wouldn't bother me that their top config would be 3500... if you could build to order it close to the top mid model. Lets say you just want the processor speed but don't want the graphics card... to me that graphics card is worth 500 dollars... drop it and drop the price down to 3150 or so. That works out fine.
I would be very disapppointed if they forced you to buy the graphics card if you didn't want it in order to get the high end model.
Originally posted by DHagan4755
The low-end G5 config should be $999. Mid-range and High-end models should be $1,599 and $1,999 respectively. This would be competitive. Anything else above that would be gravy.
What would you put in the lowend G5? $999 doesn't leave any room on you have the goods and then the 3x-5x markup. Apple would have to have a parts bill of less than $450. No way you're keeping an Aluminum case and decent HD and RAM at that level.
This isn't the rambling of a PC bigot, it just being observant and watching prices. An agressive local vendor helps a bit two!
Ever since OS/X came out I've had a desire to get back into a Mac. The problem with getting there is two fold. One is the rather high cost to get contemporary performance. The other is software which in my case is Linux. It would be nice to be able to run things like EMC on a PowerMac, but I'm not even sure if the OS/X kernel has the realtime capability to do it.
Off the desktop Apple use to do much better price performance wise. That is quickly becoming an issue now with Dothan and all the round better hardware from the PC vendors.
Thanks
dave
Originally posted by hmurchison
It's this myopia that irks me about PC bigots. You cannot build a equivalent PC to a Dual PM for $1000.
I could easily build a nice system based on an Athlon 64 3000+ processor. And yes it would compete favorably against Apples Dual 2Ghz but the bottleneck really isn't the hardware but the software.
Reminds of Adobe's "PC Preferred" advertising. No one ever questions application performance. Once people hacked After Effects to enable the second processor things changed really fast.
Dual processors work. Apples biggest issue right now is getting lazy developers like Adobe to actually utilize Apple hardware tech right. Hell we could have Dual 4Ghz but if developers won't optimize their apps then it's all for naught.
I noticed that Word 2004 is not any faster either scroll.
My recommendation is for Apple to continue to do what they have been doing. Using Apple Pro apps to show the power of the PM G5s and generate excitement on the platform. You know screw After Effects Adobe doesn't get off their azzes until competition is beating down their door. Maybe we need a Motion Pro in a year or two.
Further Apple isn't really doing very well on the HD or delivered RAM departments anyway. In fact RAM has been a big failing at Apple for years, they got away with it in the days of OS-9 because of the limited capacity to use that RAM. Now that they have a real OS that can effectively make use of the installed RAM, they still ship systems with 1/4 to 1/2 what is the norm in the PC world. Please don't try to sell me any whining stories about the quality of Apples RAM or any of the other common sob stories that are used to justify the great Apple RAM ripoff. This stuff is built to standards; the same standards used in the PC world.
Delivering a low end G5 is simply an engineering execise. If Apple isn't willing to play in this market segment then eventually they will go the same way as Apollo and some of the other once great UNIX vendors.
I have nothing agianst Apple playing in the high end of the market but one has to realize that the G5 Tower would not be clasified as a high end work station by many. It is simply misisng to many features in the price segment it occupies. So what we have in the G5 Tower is a machine that wants to think that it is a high end machine and is priced accordingly but in reality only has the processor of a high end machine. For some markets that is fine, but it certianly is not the case for all.
At the very least to justify the price, the Tower needs hardware that is common in that price range. To start more internal HD space with the ability to run hardware RAID would help.
What it comes down to, is that history has shown us that computer companies that concentrate on high end workstations don't stay around long. Niether do companies that engage in over pricing their hardware. The sales figures for the Tower pretty much show where Apple is going.
Dave
Originally posted by hmurchison
What would you put in the lowend G5? $999 doesn't leave any room on you have the goods and then the 3x-5x markup. Apple would have to have a parts bill of less than $450. No way you're keeping an Aluminum case and decent HD and RAM at that level.
i think they should make a single 2.5, Dual 2.5, and a single 3, dual 3. Single 3 should be about the same price as dual 2.5, or maybe 100 cheaper
Dual Opteron is possible, yes the base system may be slightly over the $1000 limit but you will still have a system that is as fast as anything Apple offers and in some ways faster. If one looks around the 242 opeteron can be had for under $300, get two in a set with a motherboard and you are in nice shape to hit your price point.
Opteron has some very unique features, it is possibly the closest competitor to the 970, that currently exist and has been successful sales wise. Intels move to Dothan in my mind is a very obvious move to compete with these processors.
Now I'm not about to say that a PC built with bottom of the barrel components will have the overall quality of a PowerMac. What I will say is that it will have comparable performance for many usages, and will last long enough that it will be very outdated when it comes time to replace it. Besides Apple is using AMD technology as it is, the difference is not all that great.
Thanks
Dave
Originally posted by hmurchison
One can only build a PC that competes with Apples top PM in single processor apps.
Originally posted by hmurchison
It's this myopia that irks me about PC bigots. You cannot build a equivalent PC to a Dual PM for $1000. Yes you can build a nice fast single processor computer for that but once you add the extra processor you have additional motherboard and CPU costs that many so easily seem to forget.
I think @homenow is correct. I could actually see Apple moving to 4 PM configs before jacking up the lowend.
2Ghz PM -$1599
Dual 2.2- $2399
Dual 2.6= $2999
Dual 3.0- $3499 this would have Quadro or FireGL card standard. 1GB memory and possibly over features.
I don't mind Apple having a $3500 configuration. This is a workstation and $3500 for a workstation isn't huge money by any stretch of the imagination. What this computer needs is a beefy configuration so that 3D, Audio and Video pros know they're getting the fastest speeds possible. The sales numbers would be low but margin high.
Hell I can buy a hopped up Dual Xeon system from Alienware for $4600. When I hear people talk about Apple needing to keep the PMs under $3k I realize this isn't a person that needs to make money with their computer. This is a consumer lusting after the top end but stuck with a modest budget.
I have a few things to state.
- I'll believe that Mac exists when I see it.
- Alienware is a bad example because they make the most expensive systems with equal components vs. other PC systems out of anybody. Configure that same setup at BOXXTECH, and you'll drop $1,500.00 off the price, plus get more features.
- If Apple gets PCIe before anybody I'd spit a twinkie out of my eye socket.
- Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.
What are the chances of that?Originally posted by hmurchison:
I could easily build a nice system based on an Athlon 64 3000+ processor. And yes it would compete favorably against Apples Dual 2Ghz but the bottleneck really isn't the hardware but the software.
Sadly, we will only see a real push towards multithreaded apps when it is dictated by the PC industry. And that won't begin happen until next year and 2006 with Intel and AMD going multicore themselves. That assumes, of course, that apps ported over to the Mac maintain their "multithreadedness"... I really hope that Apple doesn't price their machines even more out of touch with the rest of the industry (on a price/performance scale). Not unless they can offer something in the hardware department that can truly generate some excitement in the industry.
My recommendation is for Apple to continue to do what they have been doing. Using Apple Pro apps to show the power of the PM G5s and generate excitement on the platform.
It's not enough - they need to do more. They need *something* to get people excited about their machines again. For the last 8 years or so we've watched Apple sell fewer and fewer computers. Sales have been flat the last couple of years even with the introduction of the G5 and an increasingly solid OS:X.
C.
Originally posted by emig647
Think about the ratio... if it goes dual 2.2, dual 2.6, dual 3.0... the ratio's are completely wrong...
The ratio's what are completely wrong?
Oh, and there's no chance in Hell the low end G5 will be dual.
Originally posted by hmurchison
Reminds of Adobe's "PC Preferred" advertising. No one ever questions application performance. Once people hacked After Effects to enable the second processor things changed really fast.
Dual processors work. Apples biggest issue right now is getting lazy developers like Adobe to actually utilize Apple hardware tech right. Hell we could have Dual 4Ghz but if developers won't optimize their apps then it's all for naught.
On this note, I saw a recent review of Apple's G5 vs. the others using After effects mostly. Lot's of Benchmarks and prices for those who are interested.
"Since most of our benchmarks involve Adobe After Effects, the most widely used processor-intensive application used by digital video editors and compositors, there's a speedup in the offing there, too, where we noticed faster render times using a beta copy of After Effects 6.5 for the Mac (see table below comparing AE 6.0 times with AE 6.5). Apparently Adobe has been doing some optimization of its own, goosing the performance of After Effects on the Mac."
Bottom line: Apple doesn't always win, but "Apple has decided to competitively price the G5, where it's much less expansive than its similarly-configured PC competitors, which beat it by only slight margins in the benchmarks yet some cost over $1000 more than a comparably-equipped $4398 G5."
http://www.creativemac.com/articles/...e.jsp?id=25633
Powermac G5s have had for 9 shipping months
An 8 layer PCB motherboard with Dual Procs, 16 and 8 bit Hypertransport links. Gigabit Ethernet. FW 400/800, PCI-X and yet some PC yokel is trying to tell me Apple's hardware sucks??
Todays pricing buys me a Dual Opteron system minus the FW and PCI-X for roughly $1350 with me providing the sweat equity. With that in mind I think Apple should move all dual for the PM lineup starting at $1599(I know i'm dreaming) and going up to 3499 for a firebreather.
Apple does need to lower pricing but I don't think this will happen until they can exceed 10 Billion in revenue. They gotta generate more money.
Concord So true. Consumers are very happy with the current sub $1k offerings and see no reason to spend more money. Apple cannot force people to the Powermacs. They have to "innovate". I feel for our favorite fruit company. I can only imagine the "Boardroom Brawls" they must have over the future direction of the company.
Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.
<Drool> Hell if i'm spending $5k make my DVD Burner 12 or 16x. Onlooker I know you're a CG Junkie. What are your thoughts about Apple creating a 3D app? I must admit I was suprised about hearing no rumors about Apple being interested in Maya. Could they have something being worked on now? I tend to doubt it because Apple doesn't seem to have many 3D experienced programmers unless they nabbed some from Discreet(which I doubt I believe they were combustion programmers). I thought Apple could slide here but Avid has nice bundle with ProTools 6.4 and a 3D app that could prove to be competitive with Final Cut Pro.
Originally posted by onlooker
I have a few things to state.I'll believe that Mac exists when I see it.
Apples in a position where they have to deliver big time. They can't release an update at WWDC without PCI-Express and then wait another year to deliver. That simply won't work.
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Alienware is a bad example because they make the most expensive systems with equal components vs. other PC systems out of anybody. Configure that same setup at BOXXTECH, and you'll drop $1,500.00 off the price, plus get more features.
I've found the best way to buy PC hardware is to go to the local PC store and have them make one up. We are talking local independant operators here.
Even without that advantage the Apple hardware just doesn't look all that good if you concentrate on price/performance.
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If Apple gets PCIe before anybody I'd spit a twinkie out of my eye socket.
It will probally be a bit of a shock if they make it to me also, but they really have no choice. If they release hardware now without PCI-Exprees you have to figure that the next rev form Apple would be 6 months at best to more than a year. With the PC vendors getting ready to go on this very soon this simply is not acceptable if Steve is concerned about Apples sales and its standing as an innovator.
They may not beat everybody with shipping product, but they can't be far behind if the company expects to stay with the pack.
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Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.
If Apple tried to sell those for that sum it would be like the Lisa all over again. They will be lucky to move this product at the current price much less increase the price.
Remember PC hardware will be improving at the same time. Further the value of some of that stuff is highly suspect, 2GB off ram for example is no big deal anymore.
Thanks
Dave
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What are the chances of that?
Originally posted by wizard69
What are you talking about here? You can build quad systems if you have the paycheck to pay for it.
Dual Opteron is possible, yes the base system may be slightly over the $1000 limit but you will still have a system that is as fast as anything Apple offers and in some ways faster. If one looks around the 242 opeteron can be had for under $300, get two in a set with a motherboard and you are in nice shape to hit your price point.
Opteron has some very unique features, it is possibly the closest competitor to the 970, that currently exist and has been successful sales wise. Intels move to Dothan in my mind is a very obvious move to compete with these processors.
Now I'm not about to say that a PC built with bottom of the barrel components will have the overall quality of a PowerMac. What I will say is that it will have comparable performance for many usages, and will last long enough that it will be very outdated when it comes time to replace it. Besides Apple is using AMD technology as it is, the difference is not all that great.
Thanks
Dave
YOu get quality for that extra money dave. OS X is so much nicer then any os out there... and I don't mean that from a gui perspective. I mean that from a compatibility, stability, and performance perspective. Who cares if the hardware is more expensive. As long as its as competitive whats it matter. YOu're paying for the OS IMO.
I'm dying to get a new g5... I'm so sick of windows and Suse/Mandrake/RH/Debian and Gentoo... They aren't fast OS's... and they aren't as stable as OS X. I have yet to see a linux box be as stable. There is a reason for this... it's not because apple has really good programmers... its because they have standardized hardware. The problem with the PC world is there are too many different vendors... Personally I dont' see how any OS is stable on a pc. Take my work box for example.
Biostar MCNPro NForce2 mobo, 2800+ Thoro, Mushkin Ram, Apollo gf fx 5200, etc etc etc... its a MUTT!!
How can anything be stable on it? Well amazingly Mandrake 10 and XP are fairly stable... my point is... Apple knows whats going into their machines... everything from the rom to the silicon it was put on. Makes that much easier to program for.
I'd definitely pay 2000+ dollars just to use OS X over XP any time... assuming that the hardware is comparable.
Originally posted by hmurchison
Well it's not that I don't recognize the tech that X86 world is bringing it's just that PCs are overhyped and Macs are downplayed.
I don't believe this is the case. Many people recognixe the performance of the PowerMac for certian applications. They also recognize that here is no low cost alternative PowerMac Tower. Apples Tower line starts expensive and just gets worst.
So lets say you have a need for a PC with a expansion slot, the platform doesn't matter but cost do. This is where Macs simply can't compete. And lets be honest the performance isn't tha earth shaking for the single processor machine.
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Powermac G5s have had for 9 shipping months
An 8 layer PCB motherboard with Dual Procs, 16 and 8 bit Hypertransport links. Gigabit Ethernet. FW 400/800, PCI-X and yet some PC yokel is trying to tell me Apple's hardware sucks??
It sucks because in many cases you are paying for the wrong technology. Apple would do its customers a big favor if it would simply addressed the base memory and storage issues. To much of Apples efforts seemed to be centered around making the tower look nice instead of being practical. They already have a cute computer, which is fine if a little slow, they don't have practical tower.
They seemed to miss the whole point of a tower. What you describe above is good technology for a iMac not a tower.
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Todays pricing buys me a Dual Opteron system minus the FW and PCI-X for roughly $1350 with me providing the sweat equity. With that in mind I think Apple should move all dual for the PM lineup starting at $1599(I know i'm dreaming) and going up to 3499 for a firebreather.
Your Dual Opteron seems to be abotu right maybe just slightly high, but that doesn't really matter. Apple might as well go all dual it is pretty obvious that the people who do buy towers are also the people that make use of duals. Beyond that the world is quickly becoming multithreaded.
Unless Apple drastically changes the towers design, the prices you suggest are just crazy. Apple can't even sell the current models in any volume at todays prices. A price increase won't help. What Apple needs to do is to lower prices across the board aobut a thousand dollars when the improve processor come out.
It is clear what has happened with Apple up to this point. Excessively high prices and poor hardware configurations have driven their sales into the ground. In the end they may need to offer two different towers to address this issue, one high performance the other agressive in the cost parammeter.
Either way Apple needs to deal with the perception that their machines screw the user by offering to little for the money. Actually it isn't so much a perception as it is a fact. Is it to much ot ask for (in the age of OS/X) to have a machine with a reasonable amount of RAM and disk storage. These are professional machines we are talking about here. The people they are bien marketed to are not complete dummys, even if that is the perception of the Mac market, they don't want to be taken to the cleaners for last years technology.
Thanks
Dave
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Apple does need to lower pricing but I don't think this will happen until they can exceed 10 Billion in revenue. They gotta generate more money.
Concord So true. Consumers are very happy with the current sub $1k offerings and see no reason to spend more money. Apple cannot force people to the Powermacs. They have to "innovate". I feel for our favorite fruit company. I can only imagine the "Boardroom Brawls" they must have over the future direction of the company.
<Drool> Hell if i'm spending $5k make my DVD Burner 12 or 16x. Onlooker I know you're a CG Junkie. What are your thoughts about Apple creating a 3D app? I must admit I was suprised about hearing no rumors about Apple being interested in Maya. Could they have something being worked on now? I tend to doubt it because Apple doesn't seem to have many 3D experienced programmers unless they nabbed some from Discreet(which I doubt I believe they were combustion programmers). I thought Apple could slide here but Avid has nice bundle with ProTools 6.4 and a 3D app that could prove to be competitive with Final Cut Pro.
Frankly I don't think any of us thought it would take almost a year for RevB PMs to hit. The only people buying right now are those in a pinch. Hell Motion alone may get some people to upgrade their computers. What it takes is a new killer feature that is worth opening up the bank again. Apple could sell Powermacs up to 5k easily. There is someone at every level that needs the power.
I'm disappointed that it's taken this long but I think Apple must have made the decision to skip a small refresh and hit with something big. WWDC has me very excited. I think things are just getting started. I never really expected gonzo PM sales. Creatives are willing to spend the money but the typical consumer is going to be cool with something a little less beefy.
My guess is that PMs hit 3Ghz by late summer. Apple will have 4 Drive Bays and a beefier audio specification. Another Pro App is coming down the pipe as well. People have the money...you just gotta make them dig deeeeeeep.
Well that is where we may have an issue in communicaitons here. You get the same quality in PC hardware for alot less. There was a time when I honestly believed that Apple had better hardware but that time has passed.
AS to OS/X, yes it is very nice. One of the reasons I left the Mac world was the state of Apples old OS, which caused me to move briefly to NT. But to be honest with you most of my OS issue went away with the transition to Redhat and now Fedora. I like the idea that OS/X offer similar power but am put off buy the platform needed to run it as well as Linux.
As to Apples hardware being competitive that simply is not the case. Every platoform they have you imemdiately have to go out and upgrade to make best use of the machine. Oftne that means buying RAM and harddisk just to bring the machine up to the same values avaliable form the mainline PC vendors. Is a machine that comes with far to little RAM to run its own OS a good bargin?
As to the OS - its mostly BSD with a different graphical environment. While Apple has done a nice job with it, it certainly isn't light years ahead of any other BSD distribution. Let me tell you though, Linux is moving along at a rather impressive clip. Sure it is not perfect, no OS is, but it is far more stable than some of the old MS OS'es.
So agian where is the money going, into quality -nope-, into nice hardware -nope-, into the highest margins in the industry -yep-.
Your argument comes down to the idea that the OS is worth $2000. Well I do know that some could easly justify spending $2000 on an OS but the vast majority of the people out there see it as an expense. An expense that can be reduced or eliminated by choosing a different path. That path may not involve MS, Linux offers an environment that is very similar to OS/X in capabilities at a greatly reduced cost and on hardware that is far cheaper.
So I'm sitting here and I see OS/X as it is now. It is not bad but it is not pulling me off the hardware I'm on now. When it coems right down to it that is Apples problem, there are a lot of us that have no interest in MS OS'es but on the other hand are not willing to pay Apples tax. When it comes right down to it that is really what is happening, your being taxed for a name, because that extra money you are spending isn't going into either hardware or software. Sometimes I have to laugh when I hear about the RDF, but apparently it still works on people. The thing is they would even need the RDF if they just would attempt to meet customer needs on the simplest things.
Thanks
Dave
Originally posted by emig647
YOu get quality for that extra money dave. OS X is so much nicer then any os out there... and I don't mean that from a gui perspective. I mean that from a compatibility, stability, and performance perspective. Who cares if the hardware is more expensive. As long as its as competitive whats it matter. YOu're paying for the OS IMO.
I'm dying to get a new g5... I'm so sick of windows and Suse/Mandrake/RH/Debian and Gentoo... They aren't fast OS's... and they aren't as stable as OS X. I have yet to see a linux box be as stable. There is a reason for this... it's not because apple has really good programmers... its because they have standardized hardware. The problem with the PC world is there are too many different vendors... Personally I dont' see how any OS is stable on a pc. Take my work box for example.
Biostar MCNPro NForce2 mobo, 2800+ Thoro, Mushkin Ram, Apollo gf fx 5200, etc etc etc... its a MUTT!!
How can anything be stable on it? Well amazingly Mandrake 10 and XP are fairly stable... my point is... Apple knows whats going into their machines... everything from the rom to the silicon it was put on. Makes that much easier to program for.
I'd definitely pay 2000+ dollars just to use OS X over XP any time... assuming that the hardware is comparable.