[syadasti]

That's always going to be the way, and that's why Apple, and other quality-oriented brands will never have the largest market share. Price is more important than quality to most North Americans. Period.

Not really the bottom line is that PCs are cheaper and offer the most bang for the buck (advantages outweight disadvantages). Businesses don't refuse technology that will save them money. Apple has never offered the business world (traditionally the biggest user of computers) enough reasons to switch.

Most small and some medium-sized businesses stick with commodity PC hardware for the desktop and low-end server stuff Apple competes in and I don't see it changing anytime soon.

 

[Ridemonkey]

You don't know Jack

All PCs are huge compared to JackPC:

http://www.chippc.com/products/jackpc/

That's definitely an interesting concept. Don't have time to look for specs, but I'm sensing major performance issues with a solution like that...

 

[syadasti]

Look at some of the countries (government computers for government business) that have switched to Linux:
Germany
China
India
Brazil

That is just in the last 2 years. There are a lot more on the way. Why? Because for "Joe office user" Linux is fine and for a system or network administrator, it's a dream come true for security and reliability. If they try and like Linux, then switching to OSX is a dream come true.

There is a good reason all the people in my last 2 companies ran Mac, and with the MacBook, you will see Intel drop the Thinkpad

Those governments run Linux on PC commodity hardware, not OSX on Macs. Macs are not worth the premium. Macs were always slower when they claimed to be faster and now they are on the same hardware, its even easier to see the price premium.

 

[Ridemonkey]

Those governments run Linux on PC commodity hardware, not OSX on Macs. Macs are not worth the premium. Macs were always slower when they claimed to be faster and now they are on the same hardware, its even easier to see the price premium.

No, they weren't slower, and the Mac price difference isn't just about hardware. I feel like I'm beating my head against a wall here.

 

[syadasti]

No, they weren't slower, and the Mac price difference isn't just about hardware. I feel like I'm beating my head against a wall here.

Well those goverments get cheaper hardware and a powerful FREE OS...

 

[Ridemonkey]

Yeah, they do...but are you now telling me that Linux is better for the average user than OSX?

 

[syadasti]

No, they weren't slower

Spec performance of macs always lagged behind and any comprehensive (ie not just a handful optimized vs. unoptimized software selections) benchmark has proven they were slower. Hell Jobs has said at the last two Macworlds the G5 could not cut the mustard - what more do you need to hear...

 

[syadasti]

Yeah, they do...but are you now telling me that Linux is better for the average user than OSX?

No I was clarifying that the governments are using Linux. Not Windows or OSX.

 

[jimmydean]

Well those goverments get cheaper hardware and a powerful FREE OS...

They are not using a free OS at all. Redhat Enterprise is about $150 a pop, but over the course of a year will prove its value when compared to the same system running XP when you factor in uptime, overhead, mantenance and what-not.

Also, for $150, you get the whole deal including Office apps and the like. Don't think they switched to a free version of Linux.

As for Intel, they WILL be running Mac's with OSX starting this year. Intel is cutting the ties to M$ because they have learned the hard way.

My new company is made up of Sun servers and Mac laptops. There is just no better way to do things

 

[syadasti]

I could not remember which linux they were using, I read about it a while ago. It makes sense they are using a commercial linux solution

My new company is made up of Sun servers and Mac laptops. There is just no better way to do things

Is the change department or organization wide? Will they be the various Sun server lines using the superior AMD Opteron and Sun CPUs

2005 was a great year for AMD, not sure if they can 1up the 800 lbs Intel Gorilla for long, but you never know what they have up their sleeve.

 

[jimmydean]

I could not remember which linux they were using, I read about it a while ago. It makes sense they are using a commercial linux solution



Is the change department or organization wide? Will they be the various Sun server lines using the superior AMD Opteron and Sun CPUs

2005 was a great year for AMD, not sure if they can 1up the 800 lbs Intel Gorilla for long, but you never know what they have up their sleeve.

It's not a change, it's how the company was built. The data centers are built out using Sun hardware, then all the employees use Powerbooks with a few Apple desktops tossed in. The development is on Linux software, so OSX makes sense. I got the 17" and will have it tomorrow. The whole office is wireless, so you don't have to worry about jacks. The Intel campus I was on was wireless as well, but not as good.

I haven't done the data center tour yet, I wasn't scheduled to start work until Monday, but came in to get a head start. Plus i will have my new Powerbook to play with over the weekend

 

[syadasti]

It's not a change, it's how the company was built. The data centers are built out using Sun hardware, then all the employees use Powerbooks with a few Apple desktops tossed in. The development is on Linux software, so OSX makes sense. I got the 17" and will have it tomorrow. The whole office is wireless, so you don't have to worry about jacks. The Intel campus I was on was wireless as well, but not as good.

I haven't done the data center tour yet, I wasn't scheduled to start work until Monday, but came in to get a head start. Plus i will have my new Powerbook to play with over the weekend

Its a new division of Intel then, not company-wide? How big is this company and what does it do?

Pretty funny Intel is using sun hardware considering they don't use Intel CPUs/chipsets. Let me know which servers and/or CPUs

 

[jimmydean]

No, I WAS working at Intel and no longer do. I was working on the Linux Desktop group at Intel running very nice and buff Intel hardware. It was in support of new Intel motherboards built for Linux based desktop systems that will soon be sold by OEMs.

My new company does POS transaction processing for major retail chains. The transactions are real-time using Sun based hardware. The development of the software is done on Apple machines.

I was at Intel when the deal was struck with Apple for hardware support. Intel is making a huge push to "other than windows" environments because of how bad Windows makes thier hardware look.

 

[Tenchiro]

Something you never want to hear about;