Marklar
- Thread starter hazmat
- Start date
I'd love to buy the package. Whether it would be usable on any of the PCs that serve as TVs or typewriters here (the PII is my TV box, the VAIO my typewriter) or plainly fail to install, I wouldn't care. My original Rhapsody DR2 for Intel CD/floppy set is a sanctuary (but won't install on either, sadly).
I just hope that someone will come up with a nicer project name. can't we just rename it 'Voyager'?
(Star Trek was Apple's project to bring System 7 to PC hardware, Star Trek Next Generation was Rhapsody PC project name... Voyager for Marklar would make more sense and sound cooler.)
I just hope that someone will come up with a nicer project name. can't we just rename it 'Voyager'?
(Star Trek was Apple's project to bring System 7 to PC hardware, Star Trek Next Generation was Rhapsody PC project name... Voyager for Marklar would make more sense and sound cooler.)
Marklar,
You're missing the whole Marklar of Marklar. The Marklar of Marklar is that nobody should Marklar about Marklar. Or at least nobody wants to Marklar about Marklar. Think about it, how many iFanatics want to Marklar about Markar, or even Marklar?
Marklar?
PS. (Marklar is so Marklar...)
hulkaros
The Incredible...
Why Apple would want to move to x86 while Wintel platform tries to move on with IA64 and other similar platforms?
What about developers? Do they want to write Apps for x86/IA64/Carbon/Cocoa/etc? At least the Mac developers so far are slow in embracing Cocoa and insist on Carbon... Heck, even Apple have MANY carbonized apps!
What about NextStep/BeOS/et al? Do you remember that when they chose to go x86 they rolled over and died? Do you people think that Apple will succeed by going face to face with the M$ on their ground? Methinks that they will lose the fight in the first round only with a couple punches!
Why Apple would want to compromise their hardware business while they killed the Mac clones (back then) in the first place because the clones were killing their business?
Does actually Apple want to invite Dell in the game too? Isn't Dell supposedly already kicking their ass?
Heck, what about the OEMs? Would they want another player in town? They cannot keep up with 2 or 3 guys now why would they accept another one?
What about the resellers? Why would one accept selling an Apple machine which he/she accused for problems in the past while praysing the Wintel guys?
What about the end users? Would they care more about a computer which doesn't even run Windows? Which needs its own apps, etc.?
Why, what, how, if? Many questions which NEED many REAL answers and NOT just what-if scenarios... Methinks that Apple should better stay with Motorola/IBM for at least 2-3 years if not forever... After all if they REALLY want to compete with Wintel all they have to do is:
-Lower the prices MORE
-Full Windows compatibility (networks, documents, etc.)
-More customised hardware (I like that new Dual PowerMac but I want that Plextor CD-RW included and NOT the Superthing or the Combothing...)
-More games (Fifa, NBA, etc. anyone?)
-More apps (Quark for X, AutoCAD, etc. anyone?)
-Bring back the multi-colored Macs!
-More upgradeability for the ALL-IN-ONE Macs
-And many other similar details that would let Apple achieve its increase in market share... EASILY! And all this without sucumbing into the Dark Side of the Force!
You said that we can see how NeXT and BeOS failed. But they were missing one important thing Apple has: Impact. Apple has been a strong voice in the computer industry since its very beginnings. Almost everyone I talk to that uses a PC says they _would_ switch to Mac OS X if they didn't have to leave the hardware platform. With Microsoft growing strange feelings towards DRM and yearly licensing of software, the sentiment pro Apple and pro Linux will be growing. There will be a time when there's actually a good chance that Apple might just come, deliver and take some 10 or 20 percent of the PC market (with software, not hardware). The only question would be whether that'll be enough to survive as a company. But I guess it would. It's not exactly a SMALL market.
RacerX
Old Rhapsody User
Well, if NeXT and Be aren't good examples, how about Apple and Sun?
When Apple was calling Rhapsody the next generation of Apple OS and told developers coming soon to a PC near you, what sort of response did they get? Rhapsody for Intel died because developers, who only needed to compile for Intel, didn't. The kicker was that many of the developers for Rhapsody were former OPENSTEP developers with state-of-the-art PCs. Within the two developer releases most of them moved to Mac hardware and left their PCs behind (or reinstalled OPENSTEP on them).
And you can't tell me that Sun doesn't have a strong voice in the industry. They have had an Intel version of Solaris out for years and it has seen no acceptance from the PC market. The main users of Solaris for Intel are Solaris for SPARC users who want a Laptop solution! When Solaris for Intel was free and StarOffice was free, people still shelled out big bucks for Windows and MS Office.
There just is no success story for platforms moving to x86. Even SGI dropped their x86 systems after only a few years. There is nothing but failure in the history of this type of move.
And why would Jobs, who was part of two failed moves to PCs, try a third time?
Besides, when did a huge market share become equivalent to surviving? Apple only needs a large enough user base to make development (or porting) worth the time and energy. No one should have to have Microsoft type numbers to make it. Look at cars, TVs, stereos, calculators, the Microsoft/Dell market dominance model is just bad for everyone, substituting Apples name would not change that. There should be a ton of platforms each working to do their best, not starve out the others with proprietary stone walls.
Microsoft knew that when platform choice had no negative consequences, they would lose complete dominance. Why do you think they were working so hard to kill Java from the start. Why rewrite HTML to work better with their browsers. Proprietary application environments and file types that restrict you to Windows has been the number one tool of Microsoft. The only true way to survive for everyone is for all of us to reject Microsofts restrictive application environments and file types in favor of cross-platform/open standards that make computer choice consequence free. Processor type and hardware is not going to have an effect on this. Otherwise everyone would have dropped Windows and started using Rhapsody downloaded from some warez some place.
A consequence-free environment for choosing whatever platform you wish is the only real solution.
Aren't we talking about consumer platforms here?
Enterprise migration to x86 didn't work because it didn't have to. Servers are a specialist/relationship industry.
Consumers are now aware of the speedwars because of Apple's own Burn Baby Burn ads. Why does everyone know Intel is inside?
No matter what, what's under the hood in a computer has been positioned in the consumers mind to be important. Furthermore, the current G4 chips are slow in comparison to the latest x86 offerings. Even if the 970 can bring us up to spec, x86 has legacy support and will continue to dominate the market. It's not going anywhere.
If Apple goes with the 970, then trying to push it as a fast processor to gain market will be tough work. The industry was burned once by Intel. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. The market will wait to see what Intel has to offer. Meanwhile, IBM may not scale the 970 to the consumer market as quickly as Apple needs it to, no matter how many servers they sell. Two different markets.
Also, are you suggesting in the end we should not have an OS at all? I like that idea. Frankly I'm sick of only having two consumer operating systems to choose from.
:banana: <--- one day that will do something.
BONUS QUESTION TO EVERYONE: It's funny, but all over the internet I've yet to see someone mention the #1 reason why Apple will stick it out with IBM. The first person to figure it out gets a kiss from Ed. Or Tormente. Or Itanium. Maybe Fryke.
D'OH!
Enterprise migration to x86 didn't work because it didn't have to. Servers are a specialist/relationship industry.
Consumers are now aware of the speedwars because of Apple's own Burn Baby Burn ads. Why does everyone know Intel is inside?
No matter what, what's under the hood in a computer has been positioned in the consumers mind to be important. Furthermore, the current G4 chips are slow in comparison to the latest x86 offerings. Even if the 970 can bring us up to spec, x86 has legacy support and will continue to dominate the market. It's not going anywhere.
If Apple goes with the 970, then trying to push it as a fast processor to gain market will be tough work. The industry was burned once by Intel. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. The market will wait to see what Intel has to offer. Meanwhile, IBM may not scale the 970 to the consumer market as quickly as Apple needs it to, no matter how many servers they sell. Two different markets.
Also, are you suggesting in the end we should not have an OS at all? I like that idea. Frankly I'm sick of only having two consumer operating systems to choose from.
:banana: <--- one day that will do something.
BONUS QUESTION TO EVERYONE: It's funny, but all over the internet I've yet to see someone mention the #1 reason why Apple will stick it out with IBM. The first person to figure it out gets a kiss from Ed. Or Tormente. Or Itanium. Maybe Fryke.
D'OH!
Natobasso
Tech-Bot 5000
I think the root of all this is that people are so entrenched with what they know (Microsoft) that they are afraid to spend the money to go with what many call a "better solution" (Apple). It is human nature to remain comfortable with the known, hence yearly software registrations, et al.
The IT guy here at work would love to switch to OSX but says it would take too much effort to change our whole infrastructure to do it. A valid point when many companies are struggling to turn a profit.
Cheers
The IT guy here at work would love to switch to OSX but says it would take too much effort to change our whole infrastructure to do it. A valid point when many companies are struggling to turn a profit.
Cheers
well, for one the PowerPC 970 won't 'save us', as it's still almost a year away, and while its specs would be cool for MWSF PowerMacs, they will be outdated when the processor finally arrives. Then again, we've been living against Moore's Law for quite some time on the Mac platform, so why care...
I was mentioning market share only because Apple today makes its money in hardware. If they would want to switch to being a software only company (I don't say they _do_ want that, just if), they'd have to gain some market share to make enough money to survive - or cut down most of their financial plans, which of course isn't much of a strategy...
About your examples, RacerX...
sgi: They tried to go Intel, yes. But they didn't only fail because of a lack of developer support. They had a different problem altogether, they are in a dying market. With 3D cards coming out for GAMING every two months that put their expensive hardware to dust, they didn't have much of a market. I still don't know why exactly they went Intel, but it just seems (looking back) like they just had to do _something_.
Sun: Never was in the market for a desktop system (well, maybe now with their Linux effort, but not then...)
Apple: They were a dying company when the Rhapsody plans were first announced. And remember why Mac OS X (with Carbon) came up? Because the developers wouldn't want to port to Cocoa - period. Not much to do with X86 or not, although I agree that there was more interest in the PPC version back then.
I'm only trying to figure out what would/could/should happen if those rumours are in fact true and Apple plans to do that step and release Voyager as a software product (operating system, iApps, their apps...).
And my personal guess would be that companies like Adobe would basically welcome the move, if they could really just recompile their Carbon apps. (But that's not exactly defined, isn't it...)
But what about viral marketing? Apple could release Voyager with only Cocoa support plus the iApps and their apps (Final Cut Pro mainly, DVD Studio Pro maybe...), along with the development tools and Darwin's source code. And before long, we would see some development that could also help the Mac (PPC) platform, because Apple would of course make sure that apps developed on Voyager would easily compile for the PPC platform, too.
Heck, *if* Apple has an almost ready version of Voyager and they _don't_ think developers will jump on _that_ bandwaggon, they could even release the baby for free, because, as you say, no apps for the platform and no developer interest would not harm Macintosh sales much. But if you were a PC user and got OS X for free, you'd certainly see how good it was, and because the apps would only be out for PowerPC versions of X, you would maybe buy an iBook or two (j/k about the 2).
My main point however is that Microsoft is losing ground. Although nobody ever really liked them, they were sometimes respected as a good developer for business operating systems. Businesses choose Microsoft. They have things like site-licenses. They're not cheap, but if a business asks Apple about something like that, an Apple rep (just my impression) would likely say something like: "No, but you get a free iPod if you order 10 iMacs." Well, Microsoft is losing image. Again and again. And at some point, the time has come to make another attack. Linux will do it anyway. See like RedHat, SuSE, IBM, Sun, Xandros, Lindows and basically just everyone in the _business_ of Linux is pushing Linux to the corporate desktop? And they have a _case_! If you have to support 300 desktops with Office, ZERO is a nice figure for the price of operating system plus office applications. At least compared to what Microsoft is offering. Of course, other stuff costs money, too. But budgets are tight these years. We're not in the 'I need a website' age any longer. Linux has a case and will take a piece of that cake. And I sure hope that Apple will be ready to have some, too.
(Wow, sorry for the somewhat longish post...)
I was mentioning market share only because Apple today makes its money in hardware. If they would want to switch to being a software only company (I don't say they _do_ want that, just if), they'd have to gain some market share to make enough money to survive - or cut down most of their financial plans, which of course isn't much of a strategy...
About your examples, RacerX...
sgi: They tried to go Intel, yes. But they didn't only fail because of a lack of developer support. They had a different problem altogether, they are in a dying market. With 3D cards coming out for GAMING every two months that put their expensive hardware to dust, they didn't have much of a market. I still don't know why exactly they went Intel, but it just seems (looking back) like they just had to do _something_.
Sun: Never was in the market for a desktop system (well, maybe now with their Linux effort, but not then...)
Apple: They were a dying company when the Rhapsody plans were first announced. And remember why Mac OS X (with Carbon) came up? Because the developers wouldn't want to port to Cocoa - period. Not much to do with X86 or not, although I agree that there was more interest in the PPC version back then.
I'm only trying to figure out what would/could/should happen if those rumours are in fact true and Apple plans to do that step and release Voyager as a software product (operating system, iApps, their apps...).
And my personal guess would be that companies like Adobe would basically welcome the move, if they could really just recompile their Carbon apps. (But that's not exactly defined, isn't it...)
But what about viral marketing? Apple could release Voyager with only Cocoa support plus the iApps and their apps (Final Cut Pro mainly, DVD Studio Pro maybe...), along with the development tools and Darwin's source code. And before long, we would see some development that could also help the Mac (PPC) platform, because Apple would of course make sure that apps developed on Voyager would easily compile for the PPC platform, too.
Heck, *if* Apple has an almost ready version of Voyager and they _don't_ think developers will jump on _that_ bandwaggon, they could even release the baby for free, because, as you say, no apps for the platform and no developer interest would not harm Macintosh sales much. But if you were a PC user and got OS X for free, you'd certainly see how good it was, and because the apps would only be out for PowerPC versions of X, you would maybe buy an iBook or two (j/k about the 2).
My main point however is that Microsoft is losing ground. Although nobody ever really liked them, they were sometimes respected as a good developer for business operating systems. Businesses choose Microsoft. They have things like site-licenses. They're not cheap, but if a business asks Apple about something like that, an Apple rep (just my impression) would likely say something like: "No, but you get a free iPod if you order 10 iMacs." Well, Microsoft is losing image. Again and again. And at some point, the time has come to make another attack. Linux will do it anyway. See like RedHat, SuSE, IBM, Sun, Xandros, Lindows and basically just everyone in the _business_ of Linux is pushing Linux to the corporate desktop? And they have a _case_! If you have to support 300 desktops with Office, ZERO is a nice figure for the price of operating system plus office applications. At least compared to what Microsoft is offering. Of course, other stuff costs money, too. But budgets are tight these years. We're not in the 'I need a website' age any longer. Linux has a case and will take a piece of that cake. And I sure hope that Apple will be ready to have some, too.
(Wow, sorry for the somewhat longish post...)
hulkaros
The Incredible...
...which one will be the best we don't know!
Watermelon 1:
-Apple sells/supports PowerPC hardware+software
Watermelon 2:
-Apple sells/supports Intel/Amd hardware+software
Watermelon 3:
-Apple doesn't have THAT much money to go against Wintel at their own game
Watermelon 4:
-Apple doesn't have THAT much impact anymore: Loses school markets, video-editing markets, soho markets, etc.
I don't know about your countries fellas but in my country we have a saying: You CANNOT have MANY watermelons under only 2 hands...
Methinks that if Apple wants to play on Intel/Amd market they will have to kill their PowerPC market ASAP... And when they will do that they will lose MANY customers! Also, don't forget that the PC fellas DO NOT like buying software which supposedly that may be the way that Apple will follow... If that's the case how exactly they gonna earn money? By giving away hardware?
Come one fellas, you cannot possibly be serious that if Apple will go Intel/Amd will earn market share! Did you pause for a sec and think that hey, maybe after all that's what the Dark Side wants us to believe: Come mice, come! Let the kittie play with you!
Watermelon 1:
-Apple sells/supports PowerPC hardware+software
Watermelon 2:
-Apple sells/supports Intel/Amd hardware+software
Watermelon 3:
-Apple doesn't have THAT much money to go against Wintel at their own game
Watermelon 4:
-Apple doesn't have THAT much impact anymore: Loses school markets, video-editing markets, soho markets, etc.
I don't know about your countries fellas but in my country we have a saying: You CANNOT have MANY watermelons under only 2 hands...
Methinks that if Apple wants to play on Intel/Amd market they will have to kill their PowerPC market ASAP... And when they will do that they will lose MANY customers! Also, don't forget that the PC fellas DO NOT like buying software which supposedly that may be the way that Apple will follow... If that's the case how exactly they gonna earn money? By giving away hardware?
Come one fellas, you cannot possibly be serious that if Apple will go Intel/Amd will earn market share! Did you pause for a sec and think that hey, maybe after all that's what the Dark Side wants us to believe: Come mice, come! Let the kittie play with you!
Well, and couldn't one say a similar thing about Apple three years later?
I'm sure Be didn't say: "Look, we die anyway, let's go Intel..." Same for Steve Jobs with NeXT.
So, yes, it could be that Apple would go the same way by just also releasing it for X86.
So that's why I've said: Apple can't leave the hardware business unless they make up for that money in software sales.
I'm sure Be didn't say: "Look, we die anyway, let's go Intel..." Same for Steve Jobs with NeXT.
So, yes, it could be that Apple would go the same way by just also releasing it for X86.
So that's why I've said: Apple can't leave the hardware business unless they make up for that money in software sales.