Evidence of MacTel Issue Problem

Snubnose

OK, it is a little anecdotal, I admit...but here it is. My Dad, who has never owned a Mac, finally got sick of viruses and marched off to the Apple Store (he lives in Dallas) to pick up an iBook. Before buying it, though, he asked one of the workers there if there would be any issues surrounding the 2006 release of the Intel chip equipped Macs. The worker shrugged his shoulders and says:

"Um, to be honest, we know absolutely nothing specifically about the new Macs."

Apparently Apple is keeping all this under wraps...even from their own employees! Anyways, this made my Dad a bit nervous that he was splashing dough on a (possibly) soon-to-be obsolete machine. He didn't want to wait until next year though-- so he chickened out and bought a PC laptop.

NOW- I can hear the Apple pyjama-wearers already-- "there won't be any issues, Stevie said so". But this is cold comfort for newbies. Any thoughts on this? Is there publicly reliable data on the new machines that could have convinced my Dad to buy anyways?

Snubnose

asylus

This seems to be much more an issue of typical Apple quietude than one of hiding issues.

MacTel won't be just a hardware transformation, it's also going to spawn a new OS and new application support requirements, thus driving the entire Apple business strategy. Yep, that will be kept secret.

satchmo

No offense, but how does an uninformed low level employee working at an Apple retail store, hint of Intel Mac troubles ahead?

Sounds more like your Dad was simply still uncomfortable going Mac. His loss.

Snubnose

I agree...but I think it is also Apple's loss, wouldn't you say?

Lars

No Apple employees except those who are currently building the Intel-based Macs know anything about them. Every detail about the new Macs would be plastered from one end to the other on the Internet about them if Apple told their store employees about them, considering many employees are, for one stupid reason or another, incapable of keeping NDA's.

__________________
Apple Certified Technician ACMT|ACHDS 10.3-thru-10.5|10.6+
Mac mini (Early 2009) 2.0GHz|4GB|500GB|NVIDIA Geforce 9400M|AP|BT|Mac OS X 10.6.4
Sound System Audio Engine A2 2.0.
iPhone: 3GS 16GB

tedj

Why ought Joe-blow Apple employee know anything more than we about the new releases next year? It's a business decision with who-knows-how-many billions of dollars invested in a single new product line. Do you think Steve should send a personal inter-office memo detailing all the company secrets to the guy working for just over min. wage down at the strip-mall Apple store in Dallas? What kind of a company would do this?!

I don't even understand what the problem is. No company works that way, whether it be Dell or Tim Hortons. You or I could be that guy, easily enough.

ender78

Walk into a Ford Dealership and ask the average salesguy as to the performance charactersitcs at 6300 RPM of the 2012 Civic. You'll learn a great deal.

Apple's employees that work in retail have no knowledge of future product. While the are "Apple Employees" they are not privy to upcoming product details. Apple is very secretive about its application and hardware development. So secretive in fact that much of the work is compartmentalized, the iPod developers have no idea what is happening on the iMac development.

My next Mac purchase will be a MacTel box, hopefully a Powerbook.

__________________
-------------------

[1]Mac Pro - Octo - 2.26 GHz - 12GB RAM
[2]Macbook Pro 2.0 GHz 100GB HD@7200RPM 2GB RAM
[3]iPhone 3G 16GB BLACK

mr.steevo

Hi,

As far as I can guess, an iBook bought today will last as long as an iBook bought last year or the year before. I don't know how the intels will make a purchase today obsolete in a few months any faster than than usual. Next year when the Intels are released there will be a lot of software that won't run on it natively which is why people are considering buying the best PPC Mac they can afford before the switch to Intel. Those people want to ride through the rough waters of transision.

Personally, I would never buy a first generation of anything so that means I won't be buying another Mac until two or three years from now when the intels are firmly in place and run software natively.

If your dad is concerned about virus's then tell him about Linux for his new PC! It is a great OS.

s.

MacGYVER

Ok lets look at this from a common sense point of view.

Intel is not a new company, they have been producing processor chips for quite some years now, so that should be one clue as to how things are going. Think of summer 2006 as "stage 1" for rolling out MacIntel as this is what Steve Jobs had said in his speech, and it will take at least 2 years he said until the MacIntel is widely available to everyone.

The absolute worst possible case scenario would be for Apple and Intel delay the release of the new MacIntel computers. They are not going to release a piece of crap to everyone that doesn't even work. You do realize that the testers and developers actually are using a MacIntel right now since last summer.

If you want a Mac with a PPC processor then you buy a Mac now, if you want a Mac with an Intel chip inside, then wait for the first batch of them sometime next summer 2006 or later.

dona83

You will be able to use your PPC based Mac for years to come I assure you of that. Your dad's loss I guess...

__________________
eMac G4 1.25Ghz (six years young) - Dell Vostro V13 Intel SU7300 - iPhone 3GS 16 GB Black Fido

"There are only two great tragedies in life, one is to lose your heart's desire, the other is to gain it." -George Bernard Shaw.