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This topic comprises 5 pages: 1 2 3 4 5
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Author
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Topic: My first Mac will be here Thursday!!!
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Nate Lehrke
Master Film Handler
Posts: 396
From: Denver, CO
Registered: Oct 2002
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posted 06-17-2005 01:14 AM
quote: Source: PCWorld.com
If Apple Computer ever decides to let its Mac OS X operating system outside of its confines, the company may see Dell founder and chairman Michael Dell as a customer.
With the recent news that Apple plans to become a fellow Intel customer for x86 processors, Dell has expressed interest in selling Mac OS X-based PCs, Dell said in an e-mail to Fortune published on the magazine's Web site today.
"If Apple decides to open the Mac OS to others, we would be happy to offer it to our customers," Dell wrote in the e-mail. A Dell spokesperson confirmed Thursday that the e-mail exchange took place.
One-Sided
Apple, however, is not keen on striking a deal with the world's largest PC vendor.
"Mac OS X will only run on Macs. Apple has no plans to sell Mac OS X software to run on PCs," an Apple spokesperson said in an e-mail response to questions about Dell.
Dell's interest in Mac OS X raises numerous questions about how such a partnership would work. Dell's current PC product strategy is famously one-sided: Microsoft's Windows operating system and Intel's processors for all. Dell executives believe this arrangement allows them to keep their operating costs as low as possible.
However, Mac OS X, with its Unix underpinnings and secure reputation, might pique the interests of many IT managers looking for a low-cost PC that is easy to maintain. And Dell's position as the industry market-share leader could expose Mac OS to a much wider range of users.
Close to the Vest
But Apple can't afford to let Mac OS X loose right now, says Roger Kay, vice president of client computing with research firm IDC. If Mac OS X could be separated from Apple's hardware, hackers would have pirated copies of the operating system out on the streets with little delay, he says. This would cause great harm to Apple's business model, which emphasizes its tight control over the entire combination of hardware and software as a premium product, he says.
At least one analyst believes that Apple is due for a day of reckoning with this strategy, especially now that it plans to move to x86 chips. Nathan Brookwood, principal analyst with Insight 64 in Saratoga, California, thinks it is only a matter of time before someone in the PC industry sues Apple for "tying" its operating system to a specific type of hardware available only from Apple.
Digidyne, then a division of Fairchild Camera and Instrument, successfully pursued a tying case against Data General in the 1980s, in which Data General was rapped for licensing its Nova operating system only to purchasers of its hardware.
"If you sell software that can run on hardware that you do make and hardware that you don't make, you cannot require people to buy your hardware to run your software," Brookwood says. If Dell really wanted to sell Mac OS X hardware, it could force the issue through the legal system, he says.
Stumbling Blocks
Dell's interest in Mac OS X also appears to run counter to its processor strategy. The Round Rock, Texas, company's reluctance to use chips from Advanced Micro Devices is based partly on the additional costs Dell would incur setting up a product development and testing team for AMD's products, Dell chief executive officer Kevin Rollins said at the company's analyst meeting in April.
However, supporting a second operating system would involve training thousands of Dell employees on the ins and outs of Mac OS X and setting up separate product development teams. Dell is willing to do this for its server customers interested in the Linux operating system, but the company ended Linux support for consumer PCs several years ago. Large business customers can still get Linux PCs or workstations through Dell by special arrangement.
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 06-17-2005 01:02 PM
This news regarding Dell comes as so surprise. Contrary to what the above article claims at first (Dell is all about only selling Windows and Intel to all), Dell does sell lots of servers and workstations with Linux loaded.
Dell has also talked with AMD from time to time, but hasn't followed through at this point to offer any AMD processors in their hardware line. However, with the way the AlthonX2 clearly outperforms the Pentium D and Pentium EE processors, Dell may be put under more pressure to offer such chips -particularly in their gaming machines. The XPS Gen5 PC is popular, but it is not the king of the hill when it comes to gaming PCs. Alienware, Falcon Northwest and Voodoo PC typically build the fastest gaming boxes around, and offer both AMD and Intel CPUs as options (along with other high end options like dual video cards in SLI configuration).
Dell is the top PC maker. But the PC market can shift very quickly. If MacOSX were available to "clone" on mainstream PCs Dell would find some way to offer it.
Also, I think MacOSX will eventually be offered for non-Apple branded machines. It is all but guaranteed hackers will crack any security methods Apple uses to keep OSX confined to Apple branded hardware. Apple could use the development to its advantage treating it as what PC Magazine's John Dvorak calls a "shadow beta." The hackers and other open source gurus and solve compatibility problems with odd types of hardware. Then when most problems are solved Apple will move OSX to store shelves.
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Randy Stankey
Film God
Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 06-17-2005 03:37 PM
quote: Scott Jentsch
If you never install any third party apps, and never install any additional devices, I'm sure Windows XP would be pretty darn error-free.
I agree with you in principle but it's not all 3rd party apps that cause this trouble. Adobe and Microsoft, by far, are the top abusers of operating systems. They install extensions, delete system files and generally reorganize the system to fit THEIR narrow purposes without regard to overall system health.
Symantec and/or Norton Utilities are a close second. "Disk Doctor" has fucked up more computers than it has ever helped. My advice: If you have EVER installed "Norton" on your computer you need to do a "Clean Sweep" and reinstall of your entire computer!
I friggin' HATE automatic installers that don't give you a chance to see what they want to do before you let them run. (Or at LEAST leave you an installation log to tell you what they have done.)
And most of these companies have been told not to do these things, either by the developer community in general or by Apple itself, yet they continue to do them.
So, generally, yes, 3rd party software can (and sometimes DOES) mess up your computer but, in the Mac world, at least, the majority of apps DO "play nice" with your system. This, I believe, is the main thing that sets Mac developers apart from Windows developers. They spend more time making sure their stuff operates the way it's supposed to without mucking up the system. I believe his is mainly because Mac users EXPECT this kind of "polish" in the finished software they use.
People or companies that put out crap like most Microsoft users find themselves faced with will quickly find themselves out of business... Unless you are a big enough company like Adobe, Microsoft or Symantec who can foist that kind of shit sandwich on the consumer and make them eat it!
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 06-17-2005 05:12 PM
I've used lots of applications in Microsoft Windows over the last 15 years. But I haven't had many problems at all with Adobe applications like Photoshop or Illustrator.
In fact, I would say Photoshop is coded far better than most Windows applications, considering the fact I can dig out an old copy more than a decade old and have it install into WindowsXP successfully. Most other Windows applications cannot claim to do the same thing. Many are only patched together just good enough to work with the "home" version of Microsoft's latest OS release.
When I have purchased new computers at home or at work, there have always been some applications that just couldn't work with the new OS, whether it was Win95, Win98, WinME, Win2000 or XP. I would wind up having to buy a software upgrade to get an operational version. I have never had this kind of problem with any of Adobe's applications.
When Adobe ported Photoshop to the Windows platform in the early 1990s they developed it from the start as a fully WindowsNT compliant application. Photoshop has even supported symmetric multiprocessing on Windows since version 3, long before the Mac platform was able to do the same thing.
Many other Windows applications are Frankenstein like hodge podges of all sorts of code. It took the push of Windows2000 and XP to get most Windows developers to finally ditch all that old world DOS and Win3.1 code they were keeping alive in their applications. Some periphreals and software installers still use this shit! That factor is why it is such a GIANT RISK for end users to adopt the new 64-bit version of WindowsXP. If any of your drivers or installers are infected with old 16-bit code the device or application will not install.
This isn't to say Adobe is without sin. I don't enjoy all this software activation crap they've forced onto honest users. But I blame the thieving pirates for that problem. The full install of the Adobe CS2 Premium upgrade takes over 3GB of disc space (divided between 6 applications plus Bridge, Version Cue and a few other utilities). My first copy of Photoshop (version 2.5) came on four 1.44MB floppy discs.
Regardless of what Adobe may or may not be doing to my computer, I need to use their applications to help make my living. Adobe may not be perfect. But there sure as hell isn't any image editor anywhere that remotely compares to Photoshop. Illustrator, InDesign and Acrobat are all industry standard graphics applications as well. Perhaps something else might come along in a few years. For now, Adobe is by far the dominant company in graphics simply because they have by far the best applications.
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Randy Stankey
Film God
Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 06-17-2005 07:23 PM
The application crashed & not the system.
OS X and any other running applications will remain stable even if one app crashes. In fact, the Finder can crash, leaving all your running apps intact. The Finder will restart and life will continue. Now, if this happens too often it is wise to restart the system. If it STILL keeps happening you should give your Mac a checkup.
Officially, OS X doesn't crash. It has kernel panics. ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
(Toe-MAH-Toe... Toe-MAY-toe... )
Before somebody jumps on me... Yes, XP does operate in a similar fashion but nowhere near as smoothly. If you get one application crash every now and again there is no problem. But, if you have more than one, you had better restart the system soon or else you will have a panic.
Yeah, I know some things about Windows but, to me, using Microsoft products is like being forced to eat a shit sandwich!
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 06-17-2005 07:32 PM
No operating system is perfect. The Mac versus PC debate has always had those broad claims "Macs never crash; PCs crash all the time" when the reality is something a lot farther in between. As far as Windows goes, the most crash prone versions have been those consumer aimed releases (Win95, Win98 and especially WinME). I rarely have any problems with Win2000 or WinXP Pro.
Some applications have had big problems under MacOSX -Macromedia Freehand 10 was arguably the biggest offender out of graphics applications. Macromedia rushed it market to grab the title "first OSX graphics app." It ran like crap. To anger FH users further (and cause many defections to Illustrator), Macromedia never patched FH10! Freehand users were left with using an earlier version of Freehand in classic mode or waiting until FreehandMX shipped -and having to pay an upgrade price to fix the bugs in FH10. The PC version of FH10 wasn't glitch free either, but didn't have all the hangups of its OSX counterpart. Still, if you were a Freehand user on the PC platform you would likey have been better off reinstalling FH8 or FH9. This episode is primarily why Freehand will die as part of the Adobe Macromedia merger. It will be discontinued in favor of Illustrator. That's kind of a shame considering it had an arguably better printing engine and some very handy vector editing Xtras.
quote: Dylan Marchetti
Macs are all designed by the same people, so the software only has to work with a select 20 or 30 computers.
MacOSX does have an advantage in that it only has to be compatible with a limited amount of hardware, and the software has to be written for that limited product line.
I think Apple can still maintain a good amount of that control even it is sells OSX in manner that users can install it on non Apple-branded machines. They'll eventually have to do this anyway. But I think Apple should have some kind of software and hardware certification standard. If a developer wants to have a product run under OSX it should meet some very strict requirements.
Microsoft purposefully avoided enforcing any kind of quality control standards on Windows, especially in its early days. This helped make it easier and MUCH CHEAPER for software developers to make applications for Windows. It also earned the PC platform a reputation of being unstable and very crash prone. Still, it was just "good enough." Illegal business practices helped sideline superior Intel-based operating systems, such as IBM's OS/2.
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