iMac plus 6

[vandorssen]

I just got a new eMac today (ordered it last week, came today), and am fairly impressed. It has come a long way since the Bondi-Blue iMac of yore. It seems to be something Apple has done right. But, as many of you on this forum have learned, my mind has this unnerving tendency to make reasonable, but stretched connections between things; a debate started in my head about what Apple has done right since the iMac (which marked a new era in Apple), and what it has done wrong.

 

Some things Apple has done right: iMac, making Quick Time almost a universal standard for new movie trailers online, OS X (10.1 through 10.3, anyways), G4, G5, iPod, and iTunes, and making real entries into the sever market (where Unix and OS X do so well). There is more, of course, but I need to save room for my complaints.

 

Some things Apple has done not so well on: Hamstringing OS X only to “Current” hardware (although as anyone who has tried can tell you, OS X Jag. runs perfectly well on a Power Mac 9600 with plenty of RAM), charging $129 for each incremental OS upgrade (as I pointed out on another site, if Microsoft charged $129 for each service pack for Windows 2000/XP, we’d all still be using Windows 98), the Macintosh G4 Cube (Apple was really ahead of the game on this one; Mini- and Micro- PCs are all the rage now, especially if you believe Tom’s Hardware Guide), and introducing a “new” OS every 18 months… This is especially hard on developers who want to see returns on their original investment before their software suddenly become obsolete.

 

So, to everyone who uses a Mac (or even Apple ][) on this forum, what do you think Apple has done well over the past 6 years (since the iMac), what do you think it did poorly, and what do you think it could have done better?

 

I would ask, both politely and respectfully, that this not turn into a PC vs. Mac war, or that if your only comment is something along the lines of “Mac sux! Win-Doze Rulze!”, you start your own thread. This is meant to be a polite and knowledgeable discussion (or debate, if it turns that way) of what Apple has done well since the iMac and what it has not done so well. I thank you in advance for your discretion on this issue.

[Evien]

Most of their products aren't up to par though. One of the new ones only had like 800 MHz. Other equally expensive systems offer double that or more. I've never really liked Apples and I don't think I ever will based on their lack of inprovement.

[Peregrine]

Wrong:

 

1) Fail to bring the price levels to be competitive with the PC market. When I can buy a comparable PC and still have enough money left over for a second (lower quality, but still useful) PC as a dedicated server/renderer, I'm not going to buy a mac. Even if the performance is a few % better. Solve this problem and the mac become serious competition.

 

2) Fail to address the compatability issue. This is almost an even worse flaw, since it severely limits what you can do with the mac. When the market is so dominated by the PC, there are two things that need to be done. Either make software directly compatable or motivate the software industry to produce mac versions. And I don't refer to the ones that might show up long after the PC release.

 

3) Fail to properly support 3d graphics. The test results give a clear advantage to the PC in 3d modeling and rendering. There's a choice between windows and linux for that.. the mac just can't compete even when the software is available in a mac version. Identical software, identical scenes, and the PC wins every time.

 

4) Contribute to the style over substance trend with the iMac. I want a plain gray box with power, not a pretty looking paperweight.

 

Right:

 

1) Music. It's good, it's available to everyone, and the price is reasonable.

 

2) Apparently something involving 2d graphics/video. It's not my prefered area, so I don't know much more than that... but they seem to have done something right with this.

[vandorssen]

I really cannot take issue with most of what either has said, except perhaps with the price and power issue…

 

Price:

Price out the “$499” Dell so it includes everything the eMac does (both hardware and software), and it suddenly balloons to the price of a comparably equipped eMac, so the fallacy that a Mac is more expensive is moot. The fact is that a “low-end” Mac offering is comparable to the “mid-range” offerings of Dell, and is priced accordingly. What I would love to see is a “head-less” eMac, that allows you to use your own monitor (without a special adapter), and have Apple sell it for about $599. Also take into account cost of ownership and resell value: Over 3 years (the average “life” of a computer) a Mac will cost 50-75% less than a Windows PC. And Macs depreciate more slowly in value than do PCs. 7 or 8 year old Macs routinely sell for 2-3 times as much as their PC contemporaries.

 

Power:

Most people still, unfortunately, subscribe to the “megahertz myth”. The fact is that a single 800Mhz G4 is comparable in processing power to a 1.6GHz Pentium 3, which is comparable to a 2GHz Pentium 4, or a 2.4GHz Celeron (Northwood core) (yes, clock cycle per clock cycle, the Pentium 3 is more powerful than a Pentium 4, by as much as 25%!). Even Intel, the gigahertz king, no longer markets processors just on the clock speed alone. Which would you prefer: a 300HP engine that red-lines at 5,000RPM, or a 120HP engine that red-lines at 10,000RPM?

|_

|- 3D graphics power: For the most part, a Power Macintosh uses the same graphics card as your Dell or Gateway system. If you remember, the geForce 4 Ti series actually came out for Macintosh before it was available for PC. The only first-hand experience in performing a direct comparison of 3D performance between a Mac and PC has been with Quake 3 (a rather dated piece of software, I know). I’ve mentioned the specs of my dual-Xeon system in this forum so many times that I will refrain from doing so yet again. But suffice it to say it is a great deal more powerful than what even the most 3D crazed gamer is running, and I spent literally a small fortune building it. My Power Mac G5 is stock, except for an additional 2GB RAM I installed after receiving it. With OS X (10.3.3) and the Radeon 9800 (128MB) video card, I was able to routinely get 315-400FPS on Quake 3. With my PC (Windows 2000 SP/4) and Radeon 9800XT (256MB), I was able to get 300-410FPS on Quake 3. Not any appreciable difference. The Mac had a higher average FPS rate, and the PC had a higher peak rate. This is not by any means a comprehensive evaluation, but it is what most “gamers” cite as a good bench mark.

 

Again, I didn’t mean for this to become a PC vs. Mac war, but I did need to clarify these common misconceptions.

[Peregrine]

Price:

 

You're forgetting that I apply the same failure argument to Dell and all the other major computer manufacturers. For much less, I can buy parts from my local computer store and build it myself. That's where the price issue comes in. With the mac, there is no real option like that.

 

3d Graphics Power:

 

I'm talking about art, not gaming. Rendering images like the ones I do has nothing to do with the video card. The video card's only effect is better framerate when working on extremely high poly models. For the final rendering, it's done entirely by the processor (along with the ram to load the scene). And macs lag behind in this area. Even when the software is available for the mac, render times are clearly longer. For some reason, despite the "equal performance", something in the way the mac is designed doesn't handle 3d graphics very well.

[vandorssen]

Price:

 

You're forgetting that I apply the same failure argument to Dell and all the other major computer manufacturers. For much less, I can buy parts from my local computer store and build it myself. That's where the price issue comes in. With the mac, there is no real option like that.

 

Quite right there... But, Apple sells preconfigured, mass produced computers like Dell and Gateway, and IBM do, so a comparison with the "white-box" or DIY market is rather inappropriate. There is a small and determined group that has created a “white-box” Power Mac G4, but it has met with questionable results. Apple did try to get in to a similar thing to the white boxes and clones (they actually licensed the "classic" Mac OS to Umax, Motorola, and about 2 dozen other companies world wide). The problem was that these clone companies were doing too well and Apple bought back the licenses almost as fast as it had issued them.

 

As for the 3D graphics power, I’ll have to concede that, although I have never myself had any first hand experience with they type of software you’re using. There is one program (Blender) which is open source and runs under Linux, Windows 2000/XP, and Mac OS X, but I do not believe that it is particularly well optimized for any platform.