The Rosetta emulation platform in 10.4.3 build 8F1111A has been upgraded to feature full G4 support, including Altivec. This not only adds a new layer of compatibility to Rosetta, but also improved speed for Altivec-equipped applications. Also, new ATI drivers available in 10.4.3 seem to offer much greater support for PC ATI graphics chipsets.
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Member since:"Am I the only one who thinks Apple won't reinvent the wheel? They will just copy a strategy which works, the way it works: switch to commodity HW and let Mac OS X be pirated to gain market share."
Ahhh, but commodity hardware as a business does NOT work. Ask all the PC OEMs on the market how their business has to be subsidized but other products and services and yet still they continue to lose money. Yes, the commodity PC may have been a booming business in the 80s and 90s but these days the computer industry is a dying business unless you have something to differentiate yourselves from the competition. A commodity product doesn't allow for that.
Apple is not in the business of gaining market at the expensive profit. Apple would have to sell at least 10 copies of OS X on average to make up the difference of 1 lost computer sales by adopting your strategy... and that's assuming they sold it. You're talking of piracy.
[i]"They will rely on successfull HW products (like iPOD) to get profits that they will loose by not selling OS X copies which will pirated"
The Macintosh computer is a successful product too. They won't need to depend on other successful products because they have no intentions of following your plan.
"we know how it works. Let your system be pirated and you will gain marketshare."
Market share at the expense of profit?
"First, use that marketshare to force HW makers to bundle (preload) your product gaining money from those licenses."
But that will take time to gain that dominance... a time when they will not have garnered any money from products being *SOLD* thus giving them less reason to make their products better than the competition which in turn will result in fewer people pirating it as the profitable products continue active development and then your plan goes in the toilet.
"It's that simple. Even if, by doint that, Apple raises its marketshare from 5% to 10% (of which maybe 4% will be pirated copies), they're still accessing a market they were COMPLETELY out of. "
Or Apple continues to increase its market share by selling profitable products. This way they lose nothing and gain the full benefit of their labor.
"As all HW protections, Mac OS X HW protections will be cracked in a few weeks (do you remember Windows activation?)."
We haven't yet seen hardware protection from an OS manufacturer... only software protection. I think that when you do so the two working in tandem, you'll be upset that Apple supposedly took something away from you that you stole from Apple in the first place.
"If it's not broken, don't fix it! "
Agreed. Why are you trying to break it then?
"That strategy works"
You're 100% right except for the "works" part.
"they just need to copy the leader (and perhaps, try to be original sometimes...)."
Apple is the leader... they're just not dominant. They're the leader because they're original.
"Apple has something Microsoft only decided to recently exploit: a strong brand."
Microsoft doesn't have a strong brand.
Member since:
2005-07-06
Am I the only one who thinks Apple won't reinvent the wheel? They will just copy a strategy which works, the way it works: switch to commodity HW and let Mac OS X be pirated to gain market share. It's that simple.
Now, they will probably avoid doing like MS which didn't enter the HW market until a few years ago since they're already in HW market. They will rely on successfull HW products (like iPOD) to get profits that they will loose by not selling OS X copies which will pirated but, in the end, we know how it works. Let your system be pirated and you will gain marketshare. First, use that marketshare to force HW makers to bundle (preload) your product gaining money from those licenses. Then, use that marketshare to try to impose a few users to buy licenses and drive sellings of your other products and HW.
It's that simple. Even if, by doint that, Apple raises its marketshare from 5% to 10% (of which maybe 4% will be pirated copies), they're still accessing a market they were COMPLETELY out of.
As all HW protections, Mac OS X HW protections will be cracked in a few weeks (do you remember Windows activation?).
If it's not broken, don't fix it! That strategy works, they just need to copy the leader (and perhaps, try to be original sometimes...). Apple has something Microsoft only decided to recently exploit: a strong brand. That's why Microsoft replied by trying to improve Windows brand sexyness (did you see any of their commercial? Did you EVER see ANY MS commercial since Windows 95??).