Apple now largest tech company - ahead of Microsoft

[Bassnut (Fred)]

Well... actually they are ultra-flexible in architecture. They're a UNIX-based box, so you can do almost anything with them. It's Windows that traps you.

Its not the OS, I dont care about the OS, I have no experience with Unix or whatever apple uses, its the apps I care about. The only experience I have with apple specifically regarding OSs is apple apps hard crashing on a PC... OK, they dont crash on a MAC , again, I dont care about the OS or hardware, I just want to run all the apps I need fast. I have MANY apps that done run (natively) on a MAC.

"General, every day use?" They are being used by some of the most demanding users there are - in publishing, science, engineering and high-end graphics.

What I mean by "everyday" is apps running as is out of the box, regardless of complexity, designed for MACs. I have many apps with obscure IO that apple just doesnt address, thats the key, apple works with minimal/proprietry IO fine. Its not apples fault, but much odd IO is not made for MACs, as the authers only write drivers once for the most common OS, for low volume products.

Like this? My 27" iMac QuadCore running OSX, Vista, MaximDL5, Registar and PHD Guiding all at once and without raising a sweat... and that's just within the running Windows environment. At the same time I'm also running Photoshop CS4, Safari browser, Mail, Pages (a word processor), iDVD and a QuickTime movie on the Mac side - all concurrently and all at a pretty reasonable clip. My QuadCore PC with same basic characteristics wouldn't have a hope.

Oh please, why would I bother with a simulator when I have the real thing (and minimal use for apple apps). Im willing to be proved wrong, but would CCD stack run faster and cheaper in win sim mode than a quad core i7 with win7 pro?.

In the end, I run email, MYOB, IIS and other boring non-speed critical stuff all day with no fuss. My experience with (2) apple apps is woefull, and anyway they run OK generally on a win PC. Id like speed with PS and CCDstack and thats about it.

So why, oh why, would I even think of bothering with a MAC, with the extra cost, more drama, less compatibility with the apps/IO I have (without .....ummm, running a win simulator).

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

That's really not a problem Robin. You take it in and they fix it. It may not be same day, but where else offers that service anyway - even for boring little beige boxes? To tell you the truth, all my Macs at work have gone back to the leasing company after three years for new ones, and none have ever really failed in hardware. On occasion you might format one and go again after some software corruption - but a machine is just a machine. They're all fallible.

What "Win simulator" Fred? It's real Windows Vista-64 Ultimate I'm running - installed from my own install DVD. It isn't "simulated" - it's just running at the same time. Virtualisation is a brilliant way to run practically as many OS's as you like - and I also run Win7 Pro on my box - alongside Ubuntu and Mint Linux. I can boot into any of these OS's and run them natively if I like - but there's just no need. CCDstack runs at top speed on my machine - and probably just as fast as it does on your own. With 16Gb on board mine fair flies.

The hardware is the all Intel i7 too - but I do concede one point to you - weird little drivers for weird little devices and specialist I/O. At work we employ lowly PC's to run these when required, yes. , but I wouldn't call these "every day" requirements.

Anyway - we digress. This thread is about Apple's performance in knocking Bill off the top of the pile.

[Bassnut (Fred)]

Originally Posted by Omaroo

Apple's performance in knocking Bill off the top of the pile.

Yes, and for that at least, Im glad.

[Bassnut (Fred)]

Originally Posted by Tandum

bill owns 48% of it

Really?, that sucks.

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

Originally Posted by Tandum

bill owns 48% of it

Where'd you hear that Robin? MS bought US$150 million-worth of shares in 1997, on a 5-year deal. I believe that they sold them for a large profit years ago.

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

You've got the Chermside and Robina stores in QLD - along with dozens of channel resellers too. It isn't a problem. Really!

[supernova1965 (Warren)]

Originally Posted by Tandum

bill owns 48% of it

That's a complement to MAC as I see it and he doesn't have a controling interest but whatever you say about Microsoft as a company Bill Gates uses a very high percentage of his wealth for very worthy causes. Don't take my word for it just visit here http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx

[Tandum (Robin)]

Originally Posted by Omaroo

Where'd you hear that Robin? MS bought US$150 million-worth of shares in 1997, on a 5-year deal. I believe that they sold them for a large profit years ago.

Go looking chris. It's a cross between urban myth and fact. They did buy them out of trouble with non voting shares, but they are microsoft with a sack of money and it always costs ya, did they sell them , why would you, did they convert non voting shares to ordinaryshares , or did they just snort lines ?

[Dean]

No doubt Apple's success recently is on the back of Ipod and IPhone sales... I'd imagine these item sales would form the MAJORITY of their sales revenue in recent years (and iTunes sales too)... I doubt the Apple computer sales come even close to the Ipod/Iphone/iTunes sales figures.

[Omaroo (Chris Malikoff)]

Originally Posted by Dean

No doubt Apple's success recently is on the back of Ipod and IPhone sales... I'd imagine these item sales would form the MAJORITY of their sales revenue in recent years (and iTunes sales too)... I doubt the Apple computer sales come even close to the Ipod/Iphone/iTunes sales figures.

iPhone sales are up, yes. Macs down? No - they're growing too, but not at quite the same rate.

US Securities & Exchange Commission Report - 2010 Six Months Ended:

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/External...xUeXBlPTM=&t=1

Desktops & Portables - US$8,210,000,000 (8.2 billion)

iPod - US$5,252,000,000 (5.3 billion)

iTunes - US$2,491,000,000 (2.5 billion)

iPhone - US$11,023,000,000 (11 billion)

Peripherals - US$941,000,000 (1 billion)

Software & Services - US$1,265,000,000 (1.3 billion)

As we can see, both iPod and iTunes sales combined still don't reach Macintosh revenue. Whilst iPhone sales have rocketed, Macintosh sales are still a very prominent component of mainstream revenue.

[mswhin63 (Malcolm)]

I have never used MAC so I am not about to comment on there products, I suppose once the hacers realise MAC is getting bigger they will focus their efforts on hacking MAC instead of Windows.

Curious though whether MAC is like windows in that it needs a large amount of security updates

[Octane (Humayun)]

Malcolm,

Mac OS X internals are based upon a variant UNIX.

UNIX has been around for 40 years. Yes, you do get virii for UNIX, but, it's quite seldom.

H