Top Microsoft exec leaving for Amazon.com

[maffoo]

redrumloa wrote:
I'm just waiting for the day Apple starts selling a retail version of OSX for white boxes, so I can build my own Mac :-)

Does anyone know why they don't do this? Is it that they don't want to go head-to-head with Windows, or is it because they would then have to support infinite hardware combinations (with all the headaches that would bring)?

[maffoo]

@motorollin

Vista doesn't look like a "poor" man's MacOS to me - look at Vista's pricing here.

Assuming Leopard costs around the same as Tiger ($129 on Apple's site) and is at least equivalent to the Home Premium edition of Vista, Leopard would be better for the "poor man"*  :-) (And IMHO for anyone who doesn't need Windows-specific software.)

* This only applies if the "poor man" already has a Mac, once the cost of buying Mac instead of an el-cheapo PC is taken into account the short-term costs are of course higher.

[maffoo]

@motorollin

Yeah I know what you meant, I just felt like knocking Vista a bit more  :-D


It honestly bugs me that Windows is so dominant, it's a shame that more people won't give OS X a go. I bought my first Mac last year (a Mini, soon after it was released) just to try it.  Now I find myself getting annoyed at work (where we use XP) when I try to (for example) view all my open windows using Expose. And it feels so clunky compared to OS X!

[maffoo]

@GreggBz

I thought it might be driver issues, hadn't thought of the security issues though.

I can't see other *nix solutions competing with OS X. OS X "just works", it has a nice user interface (IMO) and Apple is associated with ease of use. Linux, OTOH, is perceived (rightly or wrongly) as complicated, and can seem confusing to newcomers. The same goes for other *nix systems.

OS X might stand a chance in the consumer market, especially if it was pre-installed on PCs through some licensing deal with a major PC company. Admittedly this would cut into their hardware sales, but some people would still want Apple hardware (I for one think the current iMac is gorgeous, Apple definitely makes some of the more stylish PCs!)