I think there might be a good chance of a mixed line-up in the eMac revision. Following the information in this article there might be a G4 eMac but will it make traditional markets? Could there be a low-end G5 eMac + a G4 eMac that will clear remaining chip stocks.
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Cheap Macs from govt
Published on Oct 6, 2004
The ICT Ministry has tied up with Apple Computer (Thailand) to launch a cheap Macintosh computer project.
Information and Communications Technology Minister Surapong Suebwonglee said yesterday that the computer would be a Macintosh G4 and it would be sold under the market price.
An IT source said the model would probably be the eMac G4, which goes for about Bt40,000 in stores.
A briefing on the Mac Up Your Life project is set for tomorrow, but Surapong said it would start in the middle of this month.
The first group of buyers would get free printers but supply was limited.
Apple will provide training to new users, many of whom need to handle graphic design work. One graphic designer said Macintoshes in general are still very expensive.
This might suggest that Apple has a good supply of G4 chips but is already finding other agencies to sell to. This still leaves the door open for both the G4 and G5 CPU's in the edu market. I'm picking there might be a G5 emac superdrive on offer in this next revision (if not all G5 CPU's). The last of the G4 chips in desktops will go out in the eMac but a G5 eMac is needed to keep labs ticking over.
A G5 eMac would provide real bang-for-the-buck at this end of the market!
(I tire of these "Apple's machine do or don't meet this or that market segment's needs" arguments, but I'm stuck in a boring meeting so I'll throw two cents out.)
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Originally posted by wizard69
The PowerMacs for the low end are simply overpriced.
Agreed. They aren't targeted there.
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For the middle end they lack what many now precieve to be required feature.
Such as?
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At the high end they simply don't deliver the expandability that is expected of a workstation.
Again, such as? Granted, PCI-Express on the GPU side is sadly missing, but I believe (hope) that is an artifact of the CPU supply issue and will soon be fixed. Are you saying there's just not enough Mac specific products to fill up the slots available?
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Accept? No I'm specifically saying that the PowerMac does not meet market requirements.
Again, it depends what markets you choose. In high end 3D, Macs are suffering due to lack of hard core, professional 3D cards. However, in the video editing, DVD producing, and 2D graphics segments I think the Mac is pretty well positioned due to the great software available.
There are many other markets, too. Scientific engineering, medical visualization, page layout, and on and on. Virginia Tech and others are building super-computing clusters of PowerMacs because they meet their requirements.
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The obvious deduction one can make from the position is that Apple either needs reconfigured PowerMacs or a supplemental machine for the desktop.
To broaden their appeal to more markets, I agree (i.e. increase market share). But if Apple is happy with the narrow segments they are currently selling to, then no. Now if Apple is delusionally thinking their machines appeal to a broad spectrum of markets then I don't think we armchair pundits can change their mind.
As many have said, Apple's been going out of business for twenty years and have remained profitable while many other computer makers (Sun, SGI) have struggled and fallen. They may not be doing what we think is right, but they must be doing something right.
The iMac is already dead, there is little that Apple could do with the eMac that would change that! The iMac3 will go through the initial sales bubble that the previous iMac3 went through then its numbers will slip down faster than a down hill skier on ice.
Frankly Apple needs to have something in place that will upgrade the eMac in a manner that the market see as significant. That is not to say a G5 is required, its not but any G4 would have to have a big boost to clock rate.
Frankly, I am having a hard time envisioning where the eMac goes from here. A G5 machine permanently married to a CRT is a joke of an anachronism. If they give it a G5 and a monitor upgrade, that is just an iMac. What's the point? Finally they could leave it as a G4 but upgrade the monitor. Then you would have a G4 iMac and a G5 iMac. Since I doubt the price of the processor and MB are all that different, I don't see the point in that either. Perhaps my assumptions are wrong and I am willing to consider that. But right now, I just don't see a 1.6 eMac G5 priced significantly less the the low end iMac that makes any sense. The eMac does have a couple more update cycles left in it via a bump to 1.33 and 1.42 and maybe even 1.5. They can do this for a while without changing anything else including price and I believe this is what they will do.
You really seem to be having a hard time with this. Apple has done well with the portables and the eMac because they meet market needs. For the eMac it may be the fact that it is a rugged all in one. The portables have their own attractivness. On the otherhand the PowerMacs barely lite a fire in any market - high, middle or low end desktop.
You think I'm having a hard time understanding this because you're breaking the market down in ways that I'm not.
The PowerMac does not address a "desktop" market. It addresses the market for PCI expansion, monitor choice, and (in the DP models) all-out power. The fact that it's a desktop tower is simply a consequence forced by the size of the box required to meet those requirements. The number of people who need these machines is indisputably and inevitably shrinking. The newest, cheapest PM will encourage upselling to the DP 1.8, yes, but it also addresses the needs of people who need the expansion and the monitor choice but not the raw power. That addresses a different segment of the pro market, so it'll boost sales somewhat, but the sorts of features the PowerMac offers are still increasingly niche. They'll never go away completely, but I remember when my first DSL modem shipped with a PCI Ethernet card. Now? None of them do. PCI has left the mainstream, and so has the need for a machine for PCI expansion.
A lot of people are replacing PowerMacs with PowerBooks, proving that they are not two different markets. Apple knows this, and they've said they don't care. They're both high-margin lines. If the same people who shelled out big bucks for the Quadra 840av and a huge CRT can now do their work on a PowerBook, or an iMac, the needs of the market have shifted across Apple's quadrant.
In other words, Apple's quadrant doesn't define markets.
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Accept? No I'm specifically saying that the PowerMac does not meet market requirements.
I'm agreeing. The difference is that I'm saying the very nature of the PowerMac is what isn't meeting what the market requires. The people who need what it requires are fewer and farther between. It's the same thing that happened to the market for true workstations.
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Now I want it to be know that I'd love to be shown that I'm wrong here. I honestly believe that the engineering displayed in Apple hardware is top notch for what is delivered. It is simply a matter of Apple working with the market to produce a machine that the market wants.
Again, I agree, except that I think that they're actually doing that. They might not be producing a machine that you want, but you are not the market.
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Agian you miss the point of the discussion. The problem with the PowerMac is that is a solution for problems nobody has.
Exactly. PCI is increasingly irrelevant. Laptops are increasingly powerful, and built-in or bundled monitors have pushed dedicated monitors to the upper fringes of the market. Not everyone needs the power of two G5s. Etc.
The people who do need these things are generally migrating from Sun or SGI or Avid workstations, which make the PowerMac's prices look ridiculously low. The people who bought Quadras and PowerMac 8600s and Smurf G3s have generally migrated to AIOs and laptops.
The market is shifting, and Apple's sales reflect that.
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That is the biggest bunch of baloney I've heard recently. there isn't even a clean way to install a card reader on the iMac. That has got to be extremely short sightedness on Apples part. Sure one can throw on a USB tied device but that sort of does away with the clean desktop this machine exemplifies.
But bundling every one of those things stock will clutter up the machine, too, and push the price up, and freeze out peripherals makers, and thus restrict customer choice.
My point was that an iMac with a card reader dangling off it (with the cord run through the hole in the stand) will still be much, much more tidy and more clean looking than a conventional PC with a card reader dangling off it (or built in, for that matter). I don't think that's baloney, I think it's 'world of duh', to quote BadAndy@Ars.
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A USB reader is only one of a number of items that a iMac user might want to use with his machine. Dangling them all off the machine with USB cored isn't going to look to sweet.
You can say "might" all you want, but in fact the number of wireless consumer peripherals is going steadily up now that Apple has pushed AirPort and Bluetooth into the limelight. Your printer can be hanging off your Base Station, or it can be wireless. Etc. And what matters is the number of peripherals that are hanging off the iMac. I'd wager that hardly any are.
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What you are missing here is those that don't like to do an upgrade themselve often take their PC to a dealer or have a friend install said upgrade.
Which is a tremendous amount of hassle relative to plugging something in, which is why I've heard a lot of people talk about it, and talk about it, and talk about it, until they just broke down and bought a whole new machine.
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I'm still of the opinion that they build desktop machines that have as little hardware as possible in them, with the goal of selling the hardware at the highest possible prices they can get. What the user needs or wants has little to do with this process.
Actually, I'd argue that's the case with PC desktops: There's no design involved at all, therefore no effort to accommodate the consumer. Any research results might point them away from their safe reliance on commodity parts for everything.
I see Apple's actual designing of their hardware as evidence that they're just about the only PC maker in any way concerned about their customers. After all, it's much cheaper and easier to just throw some white box together and kick it out the door, and let the customer make of it what they may.
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The iMac3 has some of the same historical problems as the old MacPlus. One of these was an extremely limited memory expansion capability given the addressing range of the processor in the unit.
The PowerMac has the same limitation. In fact, every 64 bit machine in existence has that limitation. It's so esoteric as to be irrelevant, not just in the consumer market but generally. What matters is whether there's enough RAM to accommodate the way the machine is used. I think the iMac and eMac both can be expanded more than adequately over their useful lifetimes. (They don't ship with enough RAM, especially above the low end, but that's another complaint.)
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Another is nothing in the way of an externally accessible expansion bay of any size. Lets not forget limited graphics capability for its time. It didn't take long for the MacPlus to push the artificial addressing limits of the machine and it won't take long on the iMac3.
Yeah, because the world needs 4TB of RAM (before it runs into the 42-bit addressing limit on the bus - OMG, that's restricted relative to the CPU's capabilities too!).
Frankly, I am having a hard time envisioning where the eMac goes from here. A G5 machine permanently married to a CRT is a joke of an anachronism.
Sorry, I fail to understand this dismissal of CRTs as display devices. It has been pointed out many times that CRTs and LCDs have different benefits and liabilities. In a case where cost is more important than size/thinness, CRTs win. And from a manufacturing point of view, I have to believe it's easier/cheaper to fit the guts of the computer in a CRT case than in an LCD case.
I will never, ever buy a CRT based machine. Nor would I recommend them to anyone based on anything other than an up front cost consideration.
They are completely inferior as concerns health and safety, and take up way too much desk space.
There may be certain display advantages still (for people working with stills and video) but even that is really just a cost concern -- plenty of slightly more expensive LCDs are well suited to color and viceo work.
Ruggedness IS NOT A CRT strength. If by rugged, on means more difficult to knock over, yes, they are in fact heavier and fatter, but they're not intrinsically more durable. They fail all the time, their guns get shifty, color calibration doesn't hold, they get soft, and the geometry gets less precise. Nor are they really better for a lab, where if you've ever seen someone set a can of pop beside one or actually on! one, you'd realize how fragile a CRT actually is.
A generic LCD of standard/analogue quality, in a bulkier case with a decent stand is just as durable. We have hundreds of them, people are always poking at them, moving them about, bumping them, getting prints and grease all over them -- they still work perfectly.
The continued use of a CRT for reasons of durability) borders on the absurd.
The iMac is a perfect Example here, does it make sense to limit a 64 bit processor to 2GB or RAM?
It is fine that Apple wants to exploit the stupid but that really shouldn't keep them from producing hardware the mainstream user would want.
Okay, first, 90% of iMac customers won't understand a 64-bit processor limited to 2gb of ram. Most consumers just don't know what ram is!! Get out of the computer lab and meet some real people.
And I take real offense at your "exploit the stupid" remark. I work in an academic setting, and there are people in my department who are world-class scientists, experts in their field, and don't know firewire from USB. To them, a computer is a tool. They use Macs because they don't have to learn how to work on a computer. Hasn't this always been Apple's plug? "Macs are easy and fun to use." That ain't exactly geek speak. Didn't you see any of the "Switch" campaign ads? Common people who wanted a computer to USE, not work on.
Big corporations, the ones that buy 10's of thousands of computers at a time, don't upgrade. Can you imagine how much it would cost to pay a man to go around and upgrade EVERY machine? Plus, HD failures go up, monitor failures go up, etc, as machines age. Hence the purge of computers ("off-lease") every three years.
Cost may not be a factor for you when considering which computer to purchase, but for ALOT of people it is.
I about fell off my chair laughing when I saw that. Thanks for the comic relief. You will soon discover that Matsu is the patron saint of the techno-cheapskate. He is the voice of the common man on a budget crying in the Apple wilderness. Welcome to AI.
Okay, first, 90% of iMac customers won't understand a 64-bit processor limited to 2gb of ram. Most consumers just don't know what ram is!! Get out of the computer lab and meet some real people.
Last I knew I was a real person. As to RAM I think you are over generalizing far to much. In any event consumers do care about speed and long term value.
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And I take real offense at your "exploit the stupid" remark. I work in an academic setting, and there are people in my department who are world-class scientists, experts in their field, and don't know firewire from USB.
I really hate to say what I'm about to say but I think the point is valid. A tool to be fully utilized must be understood by the user to the extent that they can exploit that tool in their craft. It really doesn't impress me at all that a "world-class scientists" would not no how to best exploit a tool he has.
This can be compared to a cabinet maker who doesn't know how to sharpen his chisels. He doesn't need to know how the tool came ito being but he should understand how to adapt it to the task at hand. A scientist certainly should be able to adapt his tools to the task at hand.
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To them, a computer is a tool. They use Macs because they don't have to learn how to work on a computer. Hasn't this always been Apple's plug? "Macs are easy and fun to use." That ain't exactly geek speak. Didn't you see any of the "Switch" campaign ads? Common people who wanted a computer to USE, not work on.
Oh come on now, how much of a success where the Switch commercials? Common people might have been searching for a computer to work on but most people purchase computers to solve problems. When used as a tool there is a requirement that the user engage the machine in non trivial ways to fully exploit the machines potential.
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Big corporations, the ones that buy 10's of thousands of computers at a time, don't upgrade. Can you imagine how much it would cost to pay a man to go around and upgrade EVERY machine?
It is funny you are both right and wrong at the same time. Large corporations do upgrade hardware. Since I work for a large corporation there is no sense in arguing this point. These upgrades however are not done on a wide scale basis but on reasonable need.
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Plus, HD failures go up, monitor failures go up, etc, as machines age. Hence the purge of computers ("off-lease") every three years.
I really hope that you are trying to imply that corporations end up replacing whole computer due to a monitor failure. This certainly isn't the case at all. Even a harddrive failure doesn't force a computer replacement automatically. Sure there is normally an evaluation made based on the age of the machine and application but to suggest that every coroporation purges its computers every three years is a bit of a stretch. Maybe some do but it certianly isn't common practice.
I really hate to say what I'm about to say but I think the point is valid. A tool to be fully utilized must be understood by the user to the extent that they can exploit that tool in their craft. It really doesn't impress me at all that a "world-class scientists" would not no how to best exploit a tool he has.
This can be compared to a cabinet maker who doesn't know how to sharpen his chisels. He doesn't need to know how the tool came ito being but he should understand how to adapt it to the task at hand. A scientist certainly should be able to adapt his tools to the task at hand.
I would like to add to this point as it is a drum I have beaten before. Computers are not for the intellectually lazy. Apple is guilty of dummying down computers far too much. The one button mouse is an example of this. Rather than teaching people the efficient two button approach, they pretend that it is too complicated and as a result, functionality is lost.
As far as pros are concerned, if a scientist does not learn how to use a mass spectrameter, then he is not worth his salt as a scientist. Doctors have to learn how to use specialized equipment. Most skill trades have specialized tools that the artisan must master. Computer aided drafting requires the understanding of COMPUTERS! Print work, video production, engineering, you name it, all heavily utilize and require an extensive knowledge of COMPUTERS!
If there is a way to make a task more efficient, I am all for it. But the attempt to make computers brain dead simple for the intellectually lazy is misguided at best, and self destructive at worst. If ma and pa don't want to learn how to use a computer for day to day tasks, they don't have to. There is already a simpler way to write letters. It is called pen and paper. They can send mail the same way as their forefathers. They don't need a computer to play checkers. And if they want information they can still go to the library. If, however, they want to use a highly technical piece of electronics to perform day to day tasks, they have the responsibility to at least crack open a "For Dummies" book and educate themselves.
We still have to learn to drive cars. An automobile is not brain dead simple to operate. Yet we take a few weeks or months to figure it out so we can do it well. We also need to know something of maintenance. Pumping gas, changing the oil, and fixing or changing a flat are just a few examples. Average consumers learn to do these things and it does not overly tax them too much to gain the knowledge. Why should computers be any different.
I'm tired of debating this with you. I have worked at multi-national companies, and I know how they have operated. I now work in academia, and I know how they operate. I'm sorry, but judging by what I see and have seen every day, you guys are wrong. The populous just doesn't care about what's in that box on their desk. They just want it to work.
Been fun, off to find someplace else to waste my time.
Comments
Cheap Macs from govt
Published on Oct 6, 2004
The ICT Ministry has tied up with Apple Computer (Thailand) to launch a cheap Macintosh computer project.
Information and Communications Technology Minister Surapong Suebwonglee said yesterday that the computer would be a Macintosh G4 and it would be sold under the market price.
An IT source said the model would probably be the eMac G4, which goes for about Bt40,000 in stores.
A briefing on the Mac Up Your Life project is set for tomorrow, but Surapong said it would start in the middle of this month.
The first group of buyers would get free printers but supply was limited.
Apple will provide training to new users, many of whom need to handle graphic design work. One graphic designer said Macintoshes in general are still very expensive.
Telecom Reporters, The Nation
source
This might suggest that Apple has a good supply of G4 chips but is already finding other agencies to sell to. This still leaves the door open for both the G4 and G5 CPU's in the edu market. I'm picking there might be a G5 emac superdrive on offer in this next revision (if not all G5 CPU's). The last of the G4 chips in desktops will go out in the eMac but a G5 eMac is needed to keep labs ticking over.
A G5 eMac would provide real bang-for-the-buck at this end of the market!
Originally posted by bicubic
A G5 eMac would provide real bang-for-the-buck at this end of the market!
And successfully kill the iMac.
Bad marketing move.
Originally posted by wizard69
The PowerMacs for the low end are simply overpriced.
Agreed. They aren't targeted there.
For the middle end they lack what many now precieve to be required feature.
Such as?
At the high end they simply don't deliver the expandability that is expected of a workstation.
Again, such as? Granted, PCI-Express on the GPU side is sadly missing, but I believe (hope) that is an artifact of the CPU supply issue and will soon be fixed. Are you saying there's just not enough Mac specific products to fill up the slots available?
Accept? No I'm specifically saying that the PowerMac does not meet market requirements.
Again, it depends what markets you choose. In high end 3D, Macs are suffering due to lack of hard core, professional 3D cards. However, in the video editing, DVD producing, and 2D graphics segments I think the Mac is pretty well positioned due to the great software available.
There are many other markets, too. Scientific engineering, medical visualization, page layout, and on and on. Virginia Tech and others are building super-computing clusters of PowerMacs because they meet their requirements.
The obvious deduction one can make from the position is that Apple either needs reconfigured PowerMacs or a supplemental machine for the desktop.
To broaden their appeal to more markets, I agree (i.e. increase market share). But if Apple is happy with the narrow segments they are currently selling to, then no. Now if Apple is delusionally thinking their machines appeal to a broad spectrum of markets then I don't think we armchair pundits can change their mind.
As many have said, Apple's been going out of business for twenty years and have remained profitable while many other computer makers (Sun, SGI) have struggled and fallen. They may not be doing what we think is right, but they must be doing something right.
- Jasen.
Frankly Apple needs to have something in place that will upgrade the eMac in a manner that the market see as significant. That is not to say a G5 is required, its not but any G4 would have to have a big boost to clock rate.
dave
Originally posted by emig647
And successfully kill the iMac.
Bad marketing move.
Originally posted by wizard69
You really seem to be having a hard time with this. Apple has done well with the portables and the eMac because they meet market needs. For the eMac it may be the fact that it is a rugged all in one. The portables have their own attractivness. On the otherhand the PowerMacs barely lite a fire in any market - high, middle or low end desktop.
You think I'm having a hard time understanding this because you're breaking the market down in ways that I'm not.
The PowerMac does not address a "desktop" market. It addresses the market for PCI expansion, monitor choice, and (in the DP models) all-out power. The fact that it's a desktop tower is simply a consequence forced by the size of the box required to meet those requirements. The number of people who need these machines is indisputably and inevitably shrinking. The newest, cheapest PM will encourage upselling to the DP 1.8, yes, but it also addresses the needs of people who need the expansion and the monitor choice but not the raw power. That addresses a different segment of the pro market, so it'll boost sales somewhat, but the sorts of features the PowerMac offers are still increasingly niche. They'll never go away completely, but I remember when my first DSL modem shipped with a PCI Ethernet card. Now? None of them do. PCI has left the mainstream, and so has the need for a machine for PCI expansion.
A lot of people are replacing PowerMacs with PowerBooks, proving that they are not two different markets. Apple knows this, and they've said they don't care. They're both high-margin lines. If the same people who shelled out big bucks for the Quadra 840av and a huge CRT can now do their work on a PowerBook, or an iMac, the needs of the market have shifted across Apple's quadrant.
In other words, Apple's quadrant doesn't define markets.
Accept? No I'm specifically saying that the PowerMac does not meet market requirements.
I'm agreeing. The difference is that I'm saying the very nature of the PowerMac is what isn't meeting what the market requires. The people who need what it requires are fewer and farther between. It's the same thing that happened to the market for true workstations.
Now I want it to be know that I'd love to be shown that I'm wrong here. I honestly believe that the engineering displayed in Apple hardware is top notch for what is delivered. It is simply a matter of Apple working with the market to produce a machine that the market wants.
Again, I agree, except that I think that they're actually doing that. They might not be producing a machine that you want, but you are not the market.
Agian you miss the point of the discussion. The problem with the PowerMac is that is a solution for problems nobody has.
Exactly. PCI is increasingly irrelevant. Laptops are increasingly powerful, and built-in or bundled monitors have pushed dedicated monitors to the upper fringes of the market. Not everyone needs the power of two G5s. Etc.
The people who do need these things are generally migrating from Sun or SGI or Avid workstations, which make the PowerMac's prices look ridiculously low. The people who bought Quadras and PowerMac 8600s and Smurf G3s have generally migrated to AIOs and laptops.
The market is shifting, and Apple's sales reflect that.
That is the biggest bunch of baloney I've heard recently. there isn't even a clean way to install a card reader on the iMac. That has got to be extremely short sightedness on Apples part. Sure one can throw on a USB tied device but that sort of does away with the clean desktop this machine exemplifies.
But bundling every one of those things stock will clutter up the machine, too, and push the price up, and freeze out peripherals makers, and thus restrict customer choice.
My point was that an iMac with a card reader dangling off it (with the cord run through the hole in the stand) will still be much, much more tidy and more clean looking than a conventional PC with a card reader dangling off it (or built in, for that matter). I don't think that's baloney, I think it's 'world of duh', to quote BadAndy@Ars.
A USB reader is only one of a number of items that a iMac user might want to use with his machine. Dangling them all off the machine with USB cored isn't going to look to sweet.
You can say "might" all you want, but in fact the number of wireless consumer peripherals is going steadily up now that Apple has pushed AirPort and Bluetooth into the limelight. Your printer can be hanging off your Base Station, or it can be wireless. Etc. And what matters is the number of peripherals that are hanging off the iMac. I'd wager that hardly any are.
What you are missing here is those that don't like to do an upgrade themselve often take their PC to a dealer or have a friend install said upgrade.
Which is a tremendous amount of hassle relative to plugging something in, which is why I've heard a lot of people talk about it, and talk about it, and talk about it, until they just broke down and bought a whole new machine.
I'm still of the opinion that they build desktop machines that have as little hardware as possible in them, with the goal of selling the hardware at the highest possible prices they can get. What the user needs or wants has little to do with this process.
Actually, I'd argue that's the case with PC desktops: There's no design involved at all, therefore no effort to accommodate the consumer. Any research results might point them away from their safe reliance on commodity parts for everything.
I see Apple's actual designing of their hardware as evidence that they're just about the only PC maker in any way concerned about their customers. After all, it's much cheaper and easier to just throw some white box together and kick it out the door, and let the customer make of it what they may.
The iMac3 has some of the same historical problems as the old MacPlus. One of these was an extremely limited memory expansion capability given the addressing range of the processor in the unit.
The PowerMac has the same limitation. In fact, every 64 bit machine in existence has that limitation. It's so esoteric as to be irrelevant, not just in the consumer market but generally. What matters is whether there's enough RAM to accommodate the way the machine is used. I think the iMac and eMac both can be expanded more than adequately over their useful lifetimes. (They don't ship with enough RAM, especially above the low end, but that's another complaint.)
Another is nothing in the way of an externally accessible expansion bay of any size. Lets not forget limited graphics capability for its time. It didn't take long for the MacPlus to push the artificial addressing limits of the machine and it won't take long on the iMac3.
Yeah, because the world needs 4TB of RAM (before it runs into the 42-bit addressing limit on the bus - OMG, that's restricted relative to the CPU's capabilities too!).
Originally posted by Mac Voyer
Frankly, I am having a hard time envisioning where the eMac goes from here. A G5 machine permanently married to a CRT is a joke of an anachronism.
Sorry, I fail to understand this dismissal of CRTs as display devices. It has been pointed out many times that CRTs and LCDs have different benefits and liabilities. In a case where cost is more important than size/thinness, CRTs win. And from a manufacturing point of view, I have to believe it's easier/cheaper to fit the guts of the computer in a CRT case than in an LCD case.
- Jasen.
They are completely inferior as concerns health and safety, and take up way too much desk space.
There may be certain display advantages still (for people working with stills and video) but even that is really just a cost concern -- plenty of slightly more expensive LCDs are well suited to color and viceo work.
Ruggedness IS NOT A CRT strength. If by rugged, on means more difficult to knock over, yes, they are in fact heavier and fatter, but they're not intrinsically more durable. They fail all the time, their guns get shifty, color calibration doesn't hold, they get soft, and the geometry gets less precise. Nor are they really better for a lab, where if you've ever seen someone set a can of pop beside one or actually on! one, you'd realize how fragile a CRT actually is.
A generic LCD of standard/analogue quality, in a bulkier case with a decent stand is just as durable. We have hundreds of them, people are always poking at them, moving them about, bumping them, getting prints and grease all over them -- they still work perfectly.
The continued use of a CRT for reasons of durability) borders on the absurd.
Originally posted by xflare
Cost may not be a factor for you when considering which computer to purchase, but for ALOT of people it is.
It's only your 4th post, but perhaps you better brush up on your AI history.
Originally posted by wizard69
The iMac is a perfect Example here, does it make sense to limit a 64 bit processor to 2GB or RAM?
It is fine that Apple wants to exploit the stupid but that really shouldn't keep them from producing hardware the mainstream user would want.
Okay, first, 90% of iMac customers won't understand a 64-bit processor limited to 2gb of ram. Most consumers just don't know what ram is!! Get out of the computer lab and meet some real people.
And I take real offense at your "exploit the stupid" remark. I work in an academic setting, and there are people in my department who are world-class scientists, experts in their field, and don't know firewire from USB. To them, a computer is a tool. They use Macs because they don't have to learn how to work on a computer. Hasn't this always been Apple's plug? "Macs are easy and fun to use." That ain't exactly geek speak. Didn't you see any of the "Switch" campaign ads? Common people who wanted a computer to USE, not work on.
Big corporations, the ones that buy 10's of thousands of computers at a time, don't upgrade. Can you imagine how much it would cost to pay a man to go around and upgrade EVERY machine? Plus, HD failures go up, monitor failures go up, etc, as machines age. Hence the purge of computers ("off-lease") every three years.
Originally posted by xflare
Cost may not be a factor for you when considering which computer to purchase, but for ALOT of people it is.
I about fell off my chair laughing when I saw that. Thanks for the comic relief. You will soon discover that Matsu is the patron saint of the techno-cheapskate. He is the voice of the common man on a budget crying in the Apple wilderness. Welcome to AI.
and back on topic, what happened to the eMac rumours, we've heard nothing new
For its speculated price point it would turn a lot of heads...
Originally posted by Uberspleef
Okay, first, 90% of iMac customers won't understand a 64-bit processor limited to 2gb of ram. Most consumers just don't know what ram is!! Get out of the computer lab and meet some real people.
Last I knew I was a real person. As to RAM I think you are over generalizing far to much. In any event consumers do care about speed and long term value.
And I take real offense at your "exploit the stupid" remark. I work in an academic setting, and there are people in my department who are world-class scientists, experts in their field, and don't know firewire from USB.
I really hate to say what I'm about to say but I think the point is valid. A tool to be fully utilized must be understood by the user to the extent that they can exploit that tool in their craft. It really doesn't impress me at all that a "world-class scientists" would not no how to best exploit a tool he has.
This can be compared to a cabinet maker who doesn't know how to sharpen his chisels. He doesn't need to know how the tool came ito being but he should understand how to adapt it to the task at hand. A scientist certainly should be able to adapt his tools to the task at hand.
To them, a computer is a tool. They use Macs because they don't have to learn how to work on a computer. Hasn't this always been Apple's plug? "Macs are easy and fun to use." That ain't exactly geek speak. Didn't you see any of the "Switch" campaign ads? Common people who wanted a computer to USE, not work on.
Oh come on now, how much of a success where the Switch commercials? Common people might have been searching for a computer to work on but most people purchase computers to solve problems. When used as a tool there is a requirement that the user engage the machine in non trivial ways to fully exploit the machines potential.
Big corporations, the ones that buy 10's of thousands of computers at a time, don't upgrade. Can you imagine how much it would cost to pay a man to go around and upgrade EVERY machine?
It is funny you are both right and wrong at the same time. Large corporations do upgrade hardware. Since I work for a large corporation there is no sense in arguing this point. These upgrades however are not done on a wide scale basis but on reasonable need.
Plus, HD failures go up, monitor failures go up, etc, as machines age. Hence the purge of computers ("off-lease") every three years.
I really hope that you are trying to imply that corporations end up replacing whole computer due to a monitor failure. This certainly isn't the case at all. Even a harddrive failure doesn't force a computer replacement automatically. Sure there is normally an evaluation made based on the age of the machine and application but to suggest that every coroporation purges its computers every three years is a bit of a stretch. Maybe some do but it certianly isn't common practice.
Dave
Originally posted by wizard69
I really hate to say what I'm about to say but I think the point is valid. A tool to be fully utilized must be understood by the user to the extent that they can exploit that tool in their craft. It really doesn't impress me at all that a "world-class scientists" would not no how to best exploit a tool he has.
This can be compared to a cabinet maker who doesn't know how to sharpen his chisels. He doesn't need to know how the tool came ito being but he should understand how to adapt it to the task at hand. A scientist certainly should be able to adapt his tools to the task at hand.
I would like to add to this point as it is a drum I have beaten before. Computers are not for the intellectually lazy. Apple is guilty of dummying down computers far too much. The one button mouse is an example of this. Rather than teaching people the efficient two button approach, they pretend that it is too complicated and as a result, functionality is lost.
As far as pros are concerned, if a scientist does not learn how to use a mass spectrameter, then he is not worth his salt as a scientist. Doctors have to learn how to use specialized equipment. Most skill trades have specialized tools that the artisan must master. Computer aided drafting requires the understanding of COMPUTERS! Print work, video production, engineering, you name it, all heavily utilize and require an extensive knowledge of COMPUTERS!
If there is a way to make a task more efficient, I am all for it. But the attempt to make computers brain dead simple for the intellectually lazy is misguided at best, and self destructive at worst. If ma and pa don't want to learn how to use a computer for day to day tasks, they don't have to. There is already a simpler way to write letters. It is called pen and paper. They can send mail the same way as their forefathers. They don't need a computer to play checkers. And if they want information they can still go to the library. If, however, they want to use a highly technical piece of electronics to perform day to day tasks, they have the responsibility to at least crack open a "For Dummies" book and educate themselves.
We still have to learn to drive cars. An automobile is not brain dead simple to operate. Yet we take a few weeks or months to figure it out so we can do it well. We also need to know something of maintenance. Pumping gas, changing the oil, and fixing or changing a flat are just a few examples. Average consumers learn to do these things and it does not overly tax them too much to gain the knowledge. Why should computers be any different.
Been fun, off to find someplace else to waste my time.