Increasing component costs and pressure to cut its prices mean Apple’s best bet for long-term success is to quit the hardware business and license the Mac to Dell, analyst firm Gartner claimed on Tuesday. In a surprisingly ambitious report, called Apple Should License the Mac to Dell, Gartner says Apple should concentrate on what it does best – create software – and make use of Dell’s production and distribution infrastructure.
Apple would have to be insane to sell their hardware business. It is their hardware not their software that has saved their butts over the past five years. From iMacs to iPods to MacBooks it is the hardware (iMac) that pulled them out of their slump in the late 90’s not software. Don’t get me wrong their software is damn good too and it pains me to tout their hardware over software being a Software Engineer myself, but it is a fact. Between work and home I use PC’s every day from IBM, HP, Dell, and E-Machines as well as Apple and I can say without any shadow of a doubt that Apple’s hardware is superior in quality and design. Only IBM comes close in quality but their design is about as exciting as brick on your desk. So Gartner please go crawl back under that rock you have been living under.
To this I say, whatever! I’m no Apple fanboy (I won’t buy a new apple because I’m boycotting Intel), but their hard ware is well built and “just works”. Dell? They just go with the cheapest bidder. We buy Dells here at work, and will never own one personaly. It seems like 2-3 times a year they totally redesign the interior.
On a scale of 1-10 (10 being the best) Apple’s hardware designs/decisions would be about a 9, emachines (at least the ones I’ve seen) would be a 1 and Dell would be a 2. SGI? 15+.
I know many Apple fans who would leave the the Apple world in droves if Apples suddenly became “Pretty Dells with a different OS”.
Like I said, whatever.
What eMachines have you seen? IMO, they’re the best off-the-shelf PCs out there, given pretty much everything is off-the-shelf, easy to replace, hardware. Standard microATX boards, standard ATX PSU, etc.. Also, all I’ve seen have had decent expansion room, too (like a PCI-e slot).
Other than that, I agree. I’d be tempted to buy a Mac and wipe OS X as my first act once I open it! The new iMac and Mac Mini are pretty nice little boxes.
I cannot tell if you were being sarcastic about eMachines or not. I certainly hope you were being sarcastic because they are extremely crappy.
The average person is dumber than you think.
This dingo isn’t joking.
I don’t think Apple can ever quit the hardware business, because they don’t have the driver support to allow them to do this. Their OS isn’t designed to work on anything but their own hardware, just the ramp up for all the external vendors for current non-apple hardware drivers would be huge and many would just choose not to participate for 6% share of the US. I understand there may be a couple hacks that one can do in BSD to get current BSD driver support under Apple. But I couldn’t see Apple doing this because it would mean the stability of the OS is out of their hands.
Please still blame Blue Screens on Microsoft even though 99.9% of them in XP now are based on faulty drivers or faulty hardware.
Their OS is designed to work the same way with drivers for any hardware. Obviously. There is no way to design an OS so that it will only work with drivers for certain kinds of graphics cards. All this talk about Apple designing its OS FOR certain hardware is just nonnsense. All that’s happening is, a paucity of drivers. But the drivers there are all work the same way.
So you can take the drivers on Apple and drop them over on your FreeBSD box and have everything be hunky dory?
No, of course not, that is not the argument. We started out with the assertion that Apple’s hardware and software is somehow more integrated than others, whatever more integrated means. Then this morphed into the argument that Apple drivers are better written in some way, and another variant is that in some way the MacOS is specially written to work with some hardware.
I was just pointing out that the OS cannot be specially written to work only with the drivers for certain models of nVidia cards, for instance, and that it will related to all graphics card drivers in the same way, and that it would be very hard and utterly pointless to write the OS in such a way this is not true. So the issue with not supporting more cards is not the OS being specially written for some and not other drivers, its just the lack of drivers.
To which it is not an answer to point out that we cannot take a MacOS driver and run it on Free BSD. No we cannot. Of course we cannot. And that does not prove anything about integration or better writing or….anything else.
Just accept the fact, for better or worse, you are looking at an OS which relates in the same way to all drivers, it just doesn’t have many to relate to. And it relates no differently than XP or Linux, though the drivers are different.
>>I know many Apple fans who would leave the the Apple world in droves if Apples suddenly became “Pretty Dells with a different OS”.<<
Maybe. But many others would come. This project:
http://osx86project.org/
has more than 50,000 members.
There are plenty of other OEM’s out there, HP, Gateway, Sony, Toshiba, etc…
Just because Dell is the biggest, doesn’t mean it is the best choice for Apple. If they were to licence to someone else, they would probably want to maintain some control over the design process, not just the hardware specs, (after all, they are arguably as famous for design as their software) so maybe a smaller OEM would be a better choice.
…financial analysts did not run computer companies. Because the only thing that comes out of them is bullshit! In fact, their only job is to tell other people what to do with their money. That says it all – IMHO.
P.S. Apples last quarter:
546 Million Dollar profit
1.610.000 Macs and 8.729.000 iPods sold
Edited 2006-10-18 21:44
Well, you know what they say. Those who can’t, teach. And those who can’t teach become industry analysts.
Those who can’t hack it as industry analysts change their name to Laura DiDio, pancake makeup on their faces
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/eb/Airkz_20040221_laura_… ),
and review source code for SCO.
Edited 2006-10-19 00:43
And tomorrow, Gartner will say something else.
…
And nothing will happen.
edit: sorry, did a back and forward thing, *shame*
Edited 2006-10-18 21:37
Yep.
I’m not an Apple fan, but this proposal is short to win my “most stupid report of the year” price. However, Jobs doesn’t do what the analysts wants.
Apple is first of all a hardware company (with good software inside, which is actually lotsa good stuff glued together)…
And anyways, it’s not a really big deal neither for a company like Apple to design a mobo, companies like Abit spit dozens of them per year, which are mostly bought buy Dell-a-like PC assemblers… Open up your PC, and look who really made it anyways…
Apple…is a SYSTEMS company!!!!!!! not a hardware or software co…. a SYSTEMS company!!!!!!! why is this still in discussion!
Calm down, you’re gonna have a heart attack
Because no-one thinks its a systems company. There is a difference between being a systems company, and being a company that by a peculiar variety of DRM does not permit your software to run on what, apart from the DRM, would run it perfectly well.
I thought Apple just designs their hardware and outsources the production, so I doubt they’d make more from licensing. And the beauty of the software is to a great extent connected to the uniformity and control Apple has over the hardware to ensure that things “just work” most of the time. Apple’s hardware sells its software and vice versa, but I’m sure Apple earns most on hardware sales.
Whether Apple’s Steve Jobs would sanction any of the suggestions made by Gartner is hard to gauge..
Seems to me that the Gartner Group is phisihing for a response from Steve Jobs with looney tunes releases like this. Gartner has a tendancy to throw garbage into the media circus to attract attention. Just an advertising ploy, like os many of their silly statements.
WHY does OSAlert INSIST upon posting ‘articles’ (if you can call them that) put out by Gartner? They are always pretty dumb, tons of people complain about them.
And yes, I know. “If you dont like them so much, then dont read them”…
I guess people are atracted to stupidity like moths to a flame.
QUOTE
> WHY does OSAlert INSIST upon posting ‘articles’ (if you
> can call them that) put out by Gartner? They are always
> pretty dumb, tons of people complain about them.
Well Helf, I totally agree with you. I hope the next Apple related article here in OSAlert is about the recent news of record Mac sales…
o Apple shipped 1,610,000 Macintosh computers and 8,729,000 iPods during the quarter, representing 30 percent growth in Macs and 35 percent growth in iPods over the year-ago quarter.
o Apple posted revenue of $4.84 billion and net quarterly profit of $546 million, or $.62 per diluted share.
By the way:
o Apple’s Market Value (as of today): $ 63,573,195,640
o Dell’s Market Value (as of today): $ 56,108,865,800
And a bit of fun… some articles from major publications featuring analysts and columnists predictions from ten years ago:
o Fortune, 2/19/1996: “By the time you read this story, the quirky cult company…will end its wild ride as an independent enterprise.”
o BusinessWeek, 10/16/95: “Having underforecast demand, the company has a $1 billion-plus order backlog….The only alternative: to merge with a company with the marketing and financial clout to help Apple survive the switch to a software-based company. The most likely candidate, many think, is IBM Corp.”
o A Forrester Research analyst, 1/25/96 (quoted in, of all places, The New York Times): “Whether they stand alone or are acquired, Apple as we know it is cooked. It’s so classic. It’s so sad.”
o Nathan Myhrvold (Microsoft’s chief technology officer, 6/97: “The NeXT purchase is too little too late. Apple is already dead.”
o Wired, “101 Ways to Save Apple,” 6/97: “1. Admit it. You’re out of the hardware game.”
o The Economist, 2/23/95: “Apple could hang on for years, gamely trying to slow the decline, but few expect it to make such a mistake. Instead it seems to have two options. The first is to break itself up, selling the hardware side. The second is to sell the company outright.”
o The Financial Times, 7/11/97: “Apple no longer plays a leading role in the $200 billion personal computer industry. ‘The idea that they’re going to go back to the past to hit a big home run…is delusional,’ says Dave Winer, a software developer.”
Like someone said before, Gartner would be better advised to quit his analyst job…
Edited 2006-10-19 00:51
To be fair, those predictions would’ve been right on the dot, if Steve hadn’t pulled a once in a lifetime turnaround out of his hat. Apple’s turnaround was literally a miracle, and even in retrospect, the smart money at the time was on Apple sinking.
> To be fair, those predictions would’ve been right on the dot, if Steve hadn’t pulled a once in a lifetime turnaround out of his hat. Apple’s turnaround was literally a miracle
To be even more fair, a real analyst house, worth their salt and their fees, might have predicted that a good CEO could pull them out of it.
What good is an analyst house that just says what everyone already knows, but in fancier language?
Edited 2006-10-19 03:36
If you were predicting Apple to make a huge turnaround in 1997, you’re a hopeless optimist. No astute analyst would’ve come to that conclusion. A great CEO couldn’t change the fact that their products were getting very stale. A new OS couldn’t have changed the bad management and lack of direction. New marketing couldn’t have changed the fact that the market didn’t want its products.
Apple’s turnaround was based on a confluence of events. OS X turned out really, really great. In 1997, when the hype was fading on all sorts of systems technologies (microkernels, component object models, etc), the success of a new operating system wasn’t in the cards. Not to mention the fact that the transition to OS X happened with literally an unprecedentedly low level of disruption and churn. Apple’s industrial designers did some of their best work ever with the original iMac and follow-up products. In the iPod and iTunes, Apple created an entirely new market and source of revenue that took a lot of pressure of its computer division, and reinvigorated its image. Finally, they had a CEO crazy enough to follow one massive transition with another only five years later, finally getting Apple off the PowerPC merry-go-round.
All this happened at a time when Microsoft was getting lazy. Come 2000, Apple had a next-generation OS ready for home users, and Microsoft was stuck peddling Win 9x code until two years later, when XP was released. And XP itself didn’t retain all of the virtues of previous versions of NT (specifically their stability and security) in its transition to the home market.
If all of these things hadn’t happened, we wouldn’t be talking about Apple’s record profits today. And if you predicted all of these things to happen, then I’d really like your input on some lotto numbers…
“Apple’s turnaround was based on a confluence of events….. finally getting Apple off the PowerPC merry-go-round. ”
Exactly right. I was using Win95 and OS 8.X in ’97. I thought MacOs was eons ahead of Windows in UI and reliability, and this created in me a sense that Apple *could* pull through the dark years. But certainly, I had no idea they *would*, any more than anyone else. I have to say, after getting a taste of OX 10.1, I discovered to my amazement that I didn’t like Classic Mac OS at all, any more; OS X had a lot more to offer. On the Windows side, I’ve done 2000 and XP, and I am amazed that MSFT is still trying to “tough it out” and ignore the fact that their competitors– whether Mac or LINUX– are ALL UNIX-based, while they sit there making tiny, incremental changes in Windows.
No it was: back to basics. Let’s make great hardware, the best, that generates profit enabling Apple to continue to make great hardware.
HP would for sure like to bee right there now.
Gartner wants to make more readers.
“o Nathan Myhrvold (Microsoft’s chief technology officer, 6/97: “The NeXT purchase is too little too late. Apple is already dead.” ”
Myhrvold’s latest “innovation” is a company– get this– devoted to stealing other peoples’ patents by finding loopholes. Typical. And Paul Allen founded —ugghh– Ticketmaster, I think. Glaser, tehe sucky Real Networks. I sense a trend.
“To be fair, those predictions would’ve been right on the dot, if Steve hadn’t pulled a once in a lifetime turnaround out of his hat”
Gassee and BeOS MIGHT have found some traction. But I agree– Jobs is great. The trick to competing against MSFT is to stay on the island while the 800 pound gorilla slowly self-destructs in a cloud of bad software and failed side projetcs (Zune, XBox, MSN, WinCE, ActiveX)
Why does OSAlert post Gartner “articles”?
Whilst just about everybody that reads OSAlert knows that Gartner and just about every other analyst/pundit are full of crap, there *are* people out there that pay attention to what they say. Often people in senior decision making positions like CEOs, CFOs, and CTOs are the folks that listen.
OSAlert is just keeping us informed of the latest crack-pot information coming out from the analysts/pundits. By providing us with an awareness of this drivel they forewarn us of the rubbish our managers are likely to come out with, and give us a chance to prepare well thought out responses. It is not good enough to just say “Gartner are full of shit” to your boss – you’ve got to explain how and why they’re full of shit.
thats true… never thought about that. heh.
Intel makes the CPU, motherboard (Intel chipset) and in some cases the GPU (why oh why?). What does Apple even make anymore besides the casing of their PC’s?
If you take it like that – what does ANY PC hardware company make besides the casing of the PC? The others even make the OS because Microsoft does.
I love these analyst companies that seem to think they know how to better run a particular business than that business does itself. I would say Apple is doing rather good with their current business model. I’m sick of these “Apple should do this”, “Apple will do that” articles from Gartner (and other analysts).
Just STFU already!
Gartner should just give itself to me, and then I’ll promptly fire all of its staff, liquidate all of its assets, close the company, and go home with a fat pocket.
Gartner has a long history of brain-damaged-ness.
Curiously, the article never once mentions iPods. Does Gartner consider that hardware? If so, should Apple drop it?
How serious is the report’s assertion that Intel is subsidizing Apple’s hardware?
WAaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahahahahaaaa… Excuse me. On a more serious note, wwwwaaaahahahahahahahahhaha…. ahaha…haha…ahaha … wooh .
Well, this is humourous. A company which constantly comments on the industry in hit-or-miss fashion has made quite an interesting analysis. Having seen the same analysis over and over the past 21+ years, I fail to see how it will be any different for Apple–the company would die.
Yes, Dell can do things cheaply, not just inexpensively, and it shows. Personally having seen 3 of 5 Dells returned to Dell dead after 1-3 weeks of service, I think that they wouldn’t be a good choice. Apple would end up with a truly tarnished reputation for stability trying to keep up with all of Dell’s incremental changes. Other vendors are similarly equipped to create programming problems in the operating system.
It sounds like a perfect scenario for Microsoft, though.
That this study is released at about the same time as news of record Mac sales…
Apple: Gartner Should Quit The Analyst Business.
Modded up…this is the same Gartner that said time and time again that Vista wouldn’t ship before May for <insert stupid reason of the day here>. Most consulting firms like Gartner are worthless, but Gartner takes stupidity to an all time high.
MSFT Should Exit Software Business.
Hmmm– if that’s Gartner’s next heaedline, I might back that one up.
Apple tried this to an extend in the early 1990s It almost killed them (licensing Mac OS for clones). Apple is not Microsoft, it is not Dell. Apple is a little of both and neither of both. Without Apple Hardware Apple will need to go head to head with Microsoft, Microsoft leaves apple alone mostly do the the fact that OS X only runs on Apple Hardware making sure Apple is not in direct competition with MS. Without OS X The PC Manufactures will just kill Apple, offering cheaper systems, and leaching off of Apples R&D. OS X and Apple hardware is Apples core business. The fact that OS X works so Well with its hardware is why people buy Apples, it just works because it is design to work with only Apple hardware. If Apple dropped its hardware OS X Quality will drop too. Crashing from crappy cheap 3rd party drivers. Poor Performance by companies shipping systems with Centreno other then full Intel. Is short no.
I resent your comment over Intel GPUs. They are very well supported with free drivers in linux (better than ATI or nVidia) and work great all around… Sure you won’t be doing any 3l33+ gaming on it, however I can still push out a decent 25fps on planetpenguin racer (at full res 1280×800).
I’ll take an intel GPU over an ATI or nVidia any day!
The analyst points to pricing pressures as being a major factor in his recommendation, and I don’t disagree with that.
However, such a view strongly underestimates the lessons of history. Pricing pressure hurting your bottom line isn’t nearly as big of a problem as not being able to sell any of your products. OS X as a stand-alone competitor to Windows won’t work for the same reason OS/2 as a stand-alone competitor to Windows didn’t work. It won’t work for the same reason that PowerPC and MIPS as competitors to x86 didn’t work. The advantages of an entrenched position and wider compatibility are simply too strong.
To succeed in the computer market, alternative products need to find a niche to target. Java succeeded in a market dominated by C and C++ because of its “hook” (easy network/internet programming). PowerPC has managed to survive because it found its niche in embedded systems. Similarly, the Mac continues to exist because of its niche. If it crawls out of that hole, and takes on Microsoft directly, which is exactly what this analyst recommends, it will lose, and it will lose quickly.
They’d end up just like Sega … medicore.
Sphinx: Gartner should quit the analyst business,
Funny, I know Apple….they made my OS, my Macbook, my daughter’s ipod & Macbook Pro, what has Gartner made….. hmmm, bad decisions? It amazes me that when a company has difficulties many people attempt to point out what they “should” have done. If they turn it around, as Apple has done, they are told it won’t last. If Gartner was analyzing IBM, or even MS itself they would have MS building PCs and IBM getting out of the high end support/server/mainframe business and getting back into cash registers. How does a second guessing firm, who obviously used to watch sports and complaining about athlete’s performance w/o risking injury themselves, get paid for such drivel. What is sadder, the idiots that put this crap out, or those who link to it? Apple is one of the few companies that is has led innovation, style, and ease of use in the computer industry. They have made mistakes. But, overall they are wildly successful. Could Gartner be a MS plant? I don’t know. But, it does get tiresome that on sites like this we get such silliness.
about 60 % of Apple’s revenue comes from the Mac. That would be a considerable drop in company’s overall profits.
if they weren’t suffering a money-based denial of service attack right now.
o Apple shipped 1,610,000 Macintosh computers and 8,729,000 iPods during the quarter, representing 30 percent growth in Macs and 35 percent growth in iPods over the year-ago quarter.
Well, their ipod business is golden. They should never think of touching it. However, the real question is: which would make more sense. Sell 1.6 mill Macs and 1.6 million copies of OSX. OR take a chance to sell 10 times as many copies of OSX by licensing it to Dell. There are a lot of hardware makers besides just dell that would love to jump on the OSX bandwagon. Plus, and increase in OSX sales would push their other software products through the roof. Lets face it, their hardware isnt any better than anyone elses. Its made by the exact same companies as Dells hardware. And my buddy at work is on his 6th macbook in 6 months. the first four had display issues, and number five just crapped out and quit working.
My Powerbook has actually been the best laptop I have ever owned. I have not had a -single- issue with it. That’s not something I can say about my previous… 6 Toshibas.
I don’t believe Dell would immediately jump to OS X. They’d have Microsoft screaming in their ear “bad things” if they even thought out it. Notice Dell didn’t really have any AMD machines for a long time? Same story here with Intel.
Apple is a hardware company and has always been a hardware company. Apple is not about to jump ship. They know that something that makes Mac’s unique is that the software and hardware are one unified bundle. Things are more likely to just work better when you right your operating system to specifically work with hardware that is in your tight control.
If OS X did make it out of Macs, which once again, it won’t – you can pretty much guarantee the quality of the operating system going downhill. If you think about it for a little bit, you should easily realize why.
“I don’t believe Dell would immediately jump to OS X. ”
disagree. They are struggling; they’ve even tried courting AMD recently.
Mac OSX run on high quality hardwares selected by Apple. If Apple license Mac OSX to Dell, Apple must prepare additional budget for development in order to support cheap, low quality hardware that often makes problem.
Lets face it, their hardware isn’t any better than anyone elses. Its made by the exact same companies as Dells hardware. And my buddy at work is on his 6th macbook in 6 months. the first four had display issues, and number five just crapped out and quit working.
Actually, hardware quality is not the issue here.
One of the main advantage of OS X is its tight integration with the underlying hardware. It is safe to say that Apple’s drivers are a lot better than 3rd party drivers on Windows. However, this approach only works when you have a restricted set of hardware, especially when you consider Apple’s manpower.
” It is safe to say that Apple’s drivers are a lot better than 3rd party drivers on Windows…”
I don’t believe it. Does anyone else? Lets have some examples and details.
What I know for sure is that the Radeon 9000 series drivers were no better, they worked just the same as the windows and linux drivers, and the usb drivers from PPC days were far worse.
It is safe to say that Apple’s drivers are a lot better than 3rd party drivers on Windows.
Wrong. Apple don’t right drivers for the third party hardware that they use – the third parties do. Intel writes the drivers for their chipset, ATI writes the drivers for the Radeon, etc.
The big difference is the extent to which people rely on Apple’s distribution (and therefore quality control) of those drivers.
The Windows world would see a lot less problems if people only ever installed WHQL certified drivers, preferably downloaded only via Windows Update. That isn’t really an option though.
Actually, I believe that Apple contributes/writes quite a bit for all of its graphics cards (ATi/nVidia at least).
Apple’s OpenGL drivers are custom drivers for its custom OpenGL stack. They’ve got the sources to ATI’s and NVIDIA’s GL drivers, and I’m sure they share as much code as possible, but on an Apple machine, the NVIDIA or ATI drivers are made by Apple. In contrast, on a Microsoft system, the NVIDIA or ATI drivers are made by NVIDIA and ATI.
but on an Apple machine, the NVIDIA or ATI drivers are made by Apple.
You meant compiled?
Why switch from Asus to Dell?
when I look to this,
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2006/10/16/rescuecom_reliability_audit…
I feel that it’s not a good idea at all to give to Dell any thing related to design and build hardware.
The problem of Gartner is that their reports are written by people who simply don’t have any idea of the reality of the industry (they rather live in a world of imaginary statitics), and therefore they just keep coming up with crappy reports that do not make any sense!!!!
Aside from the obvious flaw in Gartners reasoning, why would Apple want to let Dell provide the hardware? Those of my customers that have standradized on Dell are really plagued by Dell’s poor build quality, and we’re talking Latitudes here that’s suppossed to be Dell’s pro-Laptops!
If you are Apple you have to decide whether to bet the company on trying to raise market share from a few percent to some 10s of percent.
Profitability versus market share is U shaped. At the left hand side share is low, profits are OK, because you are not the low cost producer, but your higher costs are more than covered by value the customers perceive in the different way you do things.
At the right side, you are the low cost producer because of economies of scale.
In the middle you are neither, and this is where the wars take place, its a constant struggle on the edge of disaster, with people entering and leaving and merging.
So the question for Apple is, whether the risk reward ratio favours betting the company on trying to get from single percentage points to 20-30+, and the question for Gartner is why handing over hardware branding, marketing and distribution to Dell would be a sensible route to this attempt?
I can’t see either. Apple is doing fine in the niche and has no need to take the huge risks involved. Asus does at least as good a job of producing hardware as Dell’s contractors would, so its hard to see what the move would gain in terms of manufacture. And its very hard to see Dell improving on brand values and distribution and marketing. So you come to the conclusion that it would be a foolish thing to try, and that Gartner’s proposed vehicle is the wrong one.
On the other hand, there is a different proposal which might have a much better risk reward ratio, and that is that they should cut hardware loose. Split into a hardware and software division, allow the hardware division to sell hardware with whatever OS they want, and allow the software division to license whoever they want. The risk is that the present rather quirky hardware line might not survive competition from standard configuration lower cost hardware running the same OS, and that the losses in their own hardware might not be more than made up by the increased sales of the OS through others.
Hard to say. The trouble with being in a niche is that people all the time come up with plausible sounding approaches that if successful will only result in your being ‘stuck in the middle’ in the center of the U shaped graph. This might well be one of them.
It is very hard to see any management committee even on a cold view of the merits making any change to the basic approach at the moment. And even harder to see this particular team in the Cupertino bubble doing it.
“On the other hand, there is a different proposal which might have a much better risk reward ratio, and that is that they should cut hardware loose. Split into a hardware and software division”
One of AAPL’s greatest strengths is that they never did this. It is a poor business model, in tech. Look at Palm / Palmsource– doomed from the get-go.
hmm a nice alienware PC loaded with OSX or a voodoo PC loaded with OSX.
Apple could license OSX and still keep on selling their niche hardware.
… where only the boredom of maximal profits counts.
Where only software business models like Microsoft’s count.
Where only hardware business models like Dell’s count.
Where everybody always joins the big guys.
Where everybody is always completely dependent on a semi-monopolist like Intel.
Where efficiency considerations always kill other concepts.
It could be that Apple licensing Mac OS X could threaten MS’ monopoly, which would be a very good thing, but a few tiny little words stand in the way of such successful licensing:
-OS X Pricing;
-Linux.
Edited 2006-10-19 07:25
Ever since Apple switched to Intel, I’ve been saying something similar – not that Apple should kill their hardware business, but that they should deliberately market as hardware to run MacOS AND/OR Windows, and sell MacOS separately to all(*) the x86 market.
To address all the common reasons trotted out for why they shouldn’t:
1) Apple’s last quarter – sales of Mac hardware is unnaturally high at the moment as existing customers take advantage of the performance jump (just as the end of the PPC era was unnaturally low as people held on for Intel).
2) Previous licensing attempts – this failed due to the hardware requirements. It was a big commitment/risk for people to buy PPC hardware – even if it was a cheap clone – to run MacOS. These are barriers that discourage new users. If it can run on the hardware you already have, and/or can simply replace it with Windows (or Linux) if you aren’t happy with it, you remove those barriers, and more people *will* try it.
3) Quality of the OS. How many people moan about the *quality* of Linux? Sure, the user experience of Linux is nowhere near as polished, but that is a separate issue. Linux is a very *solid* operating system, yet supports pretty much all hardware, including cross-architecture (and the only reason it doesn’t support more is because of hardware manufacturers that won’t release drivers or specifications).
I’m not saying that it is by any means guaranteed, but it is entirely feasible that Apple could sell more hardware by directly appealing to all people that want attractive, well built machines regardless of the operating system they want to run.
And they could have a larger OS base by selling it to the entire PC market. And the more OS installations they have, the more additional software (iLife, iWork, Final Cut, Logic, etc.) they will sell.
As I said, it’s not a guarantee, but it’s entirely possible for Apple to sell more hardware, more OS, more software – more EVERYTHING – simply through severing the tight link between hardware and OS.
(*) When I say all the market, there should probably still be some kind of ‘Designed for Mac’ certification – not that it should be required, but to give people guidance.
PS. Whilst I generally consider Apple’s hardware to be well designed and built, I still don’t see myself buying any more Apple hardware in the future (I currently own a PowerMac and PowerBook). This is simply because Apple’s hardware is very restrictive on options – and I always find that to get the hardware I *need*, I have to take on a whole load of other things that I simply don’t want with all the additional expense that involves. And whilst I’ve returned to Windows because of this, I would jump back to MacOS in a heartbeat if I didn’t have to buy Apple hardware.
Edited 2006-10-19 08:24
Its an interesting argument, but isn’t the question, how much market share would it get? If all it would do is end up with MacOS 15% and Windows 80%, is that really enough to compensate for the increased costs and the lowered Mac sales?
Probably you have to feel, if you’re going to do this, that numbers in the 30+ percent range are achievable within say 3-5 years. Maybe, but its a long shot.
Ahhh… but as I said, just because Apple hardware would not be required to run MacOS does not have to mean lower Apple hardware sales.
OK, it may be the likely scenario, but by deliberately selling to the Windows and Linux crowd – ie. by selling as any other PC clone – they could have a viable, and potentially higher profit/volume hardware business than they currently have.
That’s the difference between then and now (re: licensing MacOS) – back then, the software business on top of the OS wasn’t valuable enough, and the hardware business had no value without the OS/software.
Now, the hardware is viable as a separate concern, and the software they sell on top of the OS is valuable enough to sustain a business without the hardware (and they could reduce OS costs by further opening up to open source).
As I said, it isn’t a guaranteed success, but with the right management, it would be the best business decision – greater potential profit, and more diversified risk.
Yes, its an arguable point. Its plausible. Whether the risks and reward balance favors it is another matter. I think the point you don’t answer (yet) is how much of a success it would have to be to be viable. Because to do this and (only) get 20% share would get you caught in the middle of the U shaped curve. So you have to bet on doing better than that. Is that really credible?
It depends on the risks of business as usual also. But I agree, its an argument they have to be having, and a much smarter alternative than the Gartner one.
Previous licensing attempts – this failed due to the hardware requirements. It was a big commitment/risk for people to buy PPC hardware – even if it was a cheap clone – to run MacOS. These are barriers that discourage new users. If it can run on the hardware you already have, and/or can simply replace it with Windows (or Linux) if you aren’t happy with it, you remove those barriers, and more people *will* try it.
You totally misunderstand the story.Mac PowerPC clones was not a failure, Apple droped the clone market because the third party mac clones was cheaper and faster than apple ones and people buyed more clones than apple's mac so they hurt sales from apple.That is the reason that apple drop the clones market, not beacuse the Powerpc hardware was a big risk for people and they not buyed it
Edited 2006-10-19 09:29
PowerPC clones was not a failure, Apple droped the clone market because the third party mac clones was cheaper and faster than apple ones and people buyed more clones than apple's mac so they hurt sales from apple
I didn’t mean to say that it was a risk for people to buy a clone, but that it was a risk for *new* customers to buy into / switch to the PPC platform – if they didn’t like the OS, they couldn’t just install Windows, they would have to buy a whole new machine.
That’s why it was a failure – because it didn’t fulfil the goal of increasing the Mac market. The only people buying clones were those in the PPC/Mac market already, but Apple relied on those hardware sales.
I am not touching a Mac because I have made a serious investement in PC hardware for a computer that I myself have assembled. The components I have bought are all top-class mainstream products.
I am currently running Windows, but I am fed up with all its problems. Linux is not an option, because it does not meet my criteria for usability and aesthetics (maybe Linux is better technically at some points). So the only real alternative is Mac OS. Unfortunately Mac OS requires me to throw away all my hardware in order to buy Apple’s hardware, which is not really Apple’s but generic PC components chosen by Apple.
There are many people like me who would like a better altenative of Windows, and the only real choice is Mac OS. Software is way more important than hardware; today it is Intel, tomorrow is AMD, or another company…but software is what makes the world tick, and software is here to stay.
So the real message is:
Apple, please free us from the tyrrany of Microsoft!
>> I am currently running Windows, but I am fed up with all its problems. Linux is not an option, because it does not meet my criteria for usability and aesthetics
I don't really understand, as for aesthetics, so much is customisable, there’s so much choice out there, and for 3D acceleration you can use AIGLX/XGL and Compiz, just try the latest Mandriva, or the Sabayon Live DVD if you want to try it live first.
As for usability, I frankly don’t understand that problem either. Package management is so simple and advanced now, and the Gnome and KDE desktops have evolved to be so intuitive, I really don’t see the gap in that field between OS X and Linux anymore.
Yes, OS X has nicer fonts and better antialiasing. If that’s all, well…
The real strong point of OS X is simply software-hardware integration, flawless standby, on the fly LAN/WLAN, where nor MSW, nor Linux can beat Apple.
Which is BTW Mr. Gartner, why Apple should not leave the hardware business!
But if you want to keep you present hardware, satisfaction is guaranteed with Suse, Fedora, Ubuntu, or Mandriva.
As for usability, I frankly don’t understand that problem either. Package management is so simple and advanced now, and the Gnome and KDE desktops have evolved to be so intuitive, I really don’t see the gap in that field between OS X and Linux anymore.
I’m in a similar position, and the reason for not choosing Linux (for a home machine) can easily be summed up:
1) Reduced functionality of initial installations because of missing drivers and/or distributions not including closed source drivers by default.
2) Lack of commercial software support. Sure, it would be great to run only free open source, but the reality is that some for some application types the availability / usability of open source alternatives is woeful. Besides, you need to be interoperable with people that are on other platforms using commercial software…
>> I’m in a similar position, and the reason for not choosing Linux (for a home machine) can easily be summed up:
1) Reduced functionality of initial installations because of missing drivers and/or distributions not including closed source drivers by default.
If you don’t want to spend one hour configuring that, then pay a little money for a commercial distribution with lots of proprietary stuff.
>> 2) Lack of commercial software support. Sure, it would be great to run only free open source, but the reality is that some for some application types the availability / usability of open source alternatives is woeful. Besides, you need to be interoperable with people that are on other platforms using commercial software…
You were talking about a home machine, right? It’s funny, I haven’t had such issues for years, even though I had Linux only. If you really have to use MSOffice in stead of OOo, there’s Crossover Office these days, or virtual machines, etc.
Why don’t you give some example of the commercial software you need to use and we can work out an alternative option.
Well, nobody forces anybody to use Linux, needless to say. And I can understand people not looking forward to a little post-install configuring, I remember myself feeling the same, but really, it’s not a big deal at all, especially if you find a nice forum for some initial support.
Why don’t you give some example of the commercial software you need to use and we can work out an alternative option.
A list of software that I own for which either a decent open source alternative does not exist, or is not interoperable, and doesn’t really work under existing VM/emulation layers:
Vue d’Esprit
Logic
Cubase
Tassman
Reaktor
Reason
…need I go on?
You are right, if this is what you need, open source is not the way to go. Its not for everything and everyone.
Linux is not an option, because it does not meet my criteria for usability and aesthetics (maybe Linux is better technically at some points). So the only real alternative is Mac OS. Unfortunately Mac OS requires me to throw away all my hardware in order to buy Apple’s hardware, which is not really Apple’s but generic PC components chosen by Apple.
Apple’s tight hardware-software integration only works when you only need to support a restricted set of components.
Gnome is far superior to OS X (and definitely Vista) when it comes to GUI consistency and (sometimes) even usability. OS X is now a mishmash of different themes and UI behaviours. Most gnome applications follow the Gnome HIG, which not only defines a consistent look and behaviour, but also offers advice on how to simplify applications to make them more usable.
ps. I am a Mac user.
I don’t want to start a flamewar so i leave in the middle the Gnome VS OSX debate (Gnome isn’t a OS but a DE by the way).
Apple’s tight hardware-software integration only works when you only need to support a restricted set of components.
True,but doesn’t Alienware or VoodooPC have a restricted set of hardware?
Gnome isn’t a OS but a DE by the way
I was only comparing the GUI.
True,but doesn’t Alienware or VoodooPC have a restricted set of hardware?
But they don’t use a custom OS! It’s how the software takes advantage of the hardware (eg. CoreImage)
but is sounds to me… like you are LOCKED IN!
but wait… you are running windows on Intel… the “industry standard”
how could it be!
but seriously… dont worry about your big investment in all that great hardware…. or even ditching windows… as a mac user… i would NEVER convey that message…. but what i would say is…. you should start saving up for an Mac laptop… in time… OSX will become your primary OS!!!! and windows… well… for playing games!!!
any who knows… MAYBE… apple will supprise us all and offer a boxed version of OSX for Non apple hardware!
craszier things have happened!
BUT… apple will ALWAYS… be a systems company… and sell both HW and SW…
"The rumours of Apple’s Death are greatly
exaggerated."
Apple is testing the waters for selling the OS separate from the hardware. By making the switch over from PPC to Intel, Apple is in the same position that Microsoft was in after releasing Window 95. There is a grass roots movement building to help people install OS/X on their PC’s. While the number is small, Jobs and Co can make public comments on how this is bad. If the movement begins to attract millions of people then Apple can make the switch over to separating the OS from the hardware.
Based on the article, no weight has been put on the fact that Apple’s many – if not unique, then at least non-standard – hardware design decisions play an important role to many Apple buyers.
I know of no Mac user that is ignoring the that their Powerbook or Macbook Pro is actually not made of plastic, but rather it is made of aluminium parts.
Also I know of no Mac user that would rather have something out of Dell’s product range if the talk goes on quality and design impressions…. Among Dell customers, though, it might very well be possible to hear voices talking in praise of Apple’s products.
…The funny thing about these two different suctomer segments is the fact that hardware is being bought by different people for different reasons. I know PC useres that would love to own a Mac if it was not for the demotivating factor that it ships with Mac OS X as standard, they think it costs significantly more or simply because they do not care about the things that make regular Mac users love their equipment.
Many PC users think of a computer being a PC – running Windows XP – and do not find it to be a viable alternative to get a Mac instead – ever – since they are either content with life as it is or maybe just can not imagine living with a computer that does nor run Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player…
On the other hand, I as a Mac user would probably never be sufficiently satisfied with any Dell option to replace my Powerbook G4 12″, since they simply do not make computers like this one… No one really does. Many tries, but no one really does…
I live with the software limitations within some aspects of use and praise the advantages in other areas. I made a choice, not because of Apple as such but because of what it delivers suits me…
So I guess the ‘marriage’ would end a devorce sooner than Gartner ever would have imagined, since Dell would not know how to offer the ones interested in the Mac what the Mac is about… They mostly do cheap, generic PC while Apple mostly makes slightly higher priced lifestyle objects for computing…
-And both have their markets!
since Dell would not know how to offer the ones interested in the Mac what the Mac is about… They mostly do cheap, generic PC while Apple mostly makes slightly higher priced lifestyle objects for computing…
Dell has also acquired Alienware.http://www.alienware.com
You can argue about taste and or styling but the hardware is far from being cheap.
HP has recently bought VoodooPC.
A nice PC beginning at $3500 isn’t what you would call peanuts.While maybe not so stylish as what people are used to when they think of Apple but top notch hardware nonetheless.
I think there are enough people who don’t like the Apple culture but would like to run OSX.The same people who could buy the above brands know exactly whats good and what isn’t.
Licensing OSX doesn’t necessarily have to interfere with the Apple hardware sales. In my humble opinion it all depends on the implementation.
I know of no Mac user that is ignoring the that their Powerbook or Macbook Pro is actually not made of plastic, but rather it is made of aluminium parts.
That may be an Apple innovation, but it isn’t unique any more. It’s just that it’s coming from smaller players than Dell.
I know PC useres that would love to own a Mac if it was not for the demotivating factor that it ships with Mac OS X as standard
I as a Mac user would probably never be sufficiently satisfied with any Dell option to replace my Powerbook
I quite understand and agree – these are valid viewpoints that do exist. But you are ignoring the fact that there are Mac owners (and potential Mac users) that want to run MacOS but aren’t happy with Apple’s hardware options, and would gladly trade design for more/cheaper options – this has been *proven* by the previous Mac licensing/clone market.
“Apple should concentrate on what it does best – create software – and make use of Dell’s production and distribution infrastructure.”
Pardon me! Isn’t Apple also superb when it comes to creating hardware? If Apple wasn’t good at all in the hardware area this could be reasonable, but Apple at least is creating hardware better than those at Dell
Pardon me! Isn’t Apple also superb when it comes to creating hardware?
Just good and certaily not suberb.
Styling alone doesn’t result in suberb hardware.Forgotten the cooling problem of the Macbook Pro?
There are better integrators such as Alienware,VoodooPC,Mangear,etc..
And now I feel dirty because this @sshats get ad revenue for writing craptastic stories like this.
My sincere apologies for continuing to feed these idiots.
When Gartner talks, nobody listens.
Unfortunately, that isn’t true. Many folks in upper corporate management read Gartner reports, as they do the reports from Forrester Research and others.
Techies typically don’t read their stuff (or agree with it much), but that doesn’t mean those firms have no impact on corporate IT policies. They do, again unfortunately…
What a bunch of retards.
i think intel will buy nvidia first (or merge), then apple.
will microsoft react in time?
Dell must have payed Gartner for that. Have you seen
Dells new hardware lately? Even the poweredge servers have been build cheaper. Let’s face it, a Powermac server is extremely built well. I much prefer my Dual g5 over the Intel Design. I am a fan of the 970MP. I run both Linux and OS/X on my G4. I’ve got an AMD shuttle box for my Linux on x86 stuff. I think Apple does an awesome job at Hardware design, too bad they didn’t wait for the next generation IBM processors to be released. I really like the PowerPC a lot. You appreaciate it even more when you code for the Altivec coprocessor.
maybe someday Apple would adopt the next generation cell processor, either that or the IBM P6.
Some People just have no clue at all, Apples Hardware is actually the coolest Hardware ever. I’m still wondering why there is nobody that tries to build hardware with that style and quality too?
Seriosly, who cares about Dell Hardware? I LOVE my iBook, even if I run Linux on it.