Who will emerge as the king of the desktop OS jungle: Apple’s Panther or Microsoft’s Longhorn? Read the article at Microsoft-Watch.
Why OSX Panther May Tear Up Windows Longhorn
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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>LOL so, according to you, the whole software industry is stupid since they support windows. maybe the companies should drop windows and support linux, yeah, that will guarantee them a nice cash flow compared to windows. yeah, let them shrink the range of potential customers. That is brilliant
The whole software industry is stupid becaus they locked themselves into using MS api’s only and causing themselves to be totally locked into it. Doing things cross platform has always been the only way to go.
>The whole software industry is stupid becaus they locked themselves into using MS api’s only and causing themselves to be totally locked into it. Doing things cross platform has always been the only way to go.
Can you give me some examples of software makers that are locked into only creating applications for Windows?
Two years is when all the current WindowsPC manufacturers will start selling PC’s with Longhorn preinstalled. I highly doubt that between now and then there will be a surge in people buying Apples. Main reason is the expense. I’m not a Windows zealot, but you mac zealots need to face facts, that no matter how great MacOSX is (i agree) that you’re going nowhere with it in terms of marketshare. And don’t forget that just because Windows has 90% of it, that doesn’t mean Apple has 10%.
“I’m not a zealot but you are”
LOL
good argument
Face it, neither you nor I have any idea whether Macs will be a good value (ie. inexpensive and fast) in 6 months let alone 2 years. Therefore your marketshare prediction is meaningless.
Even if there were a surge in people buying Macs it wouldn’t drastically alter the marketshare numbers (dropping MS from 90% to 87% wouldn’t alter the landscape much).
But then, the original line of the discussion wasn’t “which will sell more copies – Panther or Longhorn” but rather “which will be better”. Of course, the first question is easy to answer and the second is impossible to answer…
>The whole software industry is stupid becaus they locked >themselves into using MS api’s only and causing >themselves to be totally locked into it. Doing things >cross platform has always been the only way to go
Why develop cross platform when 95% of your market runs windows? I dont’ see the business case. It’s harder to develop for multiple platforms and the apps run more slowly. This is a classic example why techies shouldn’t make business decisions.
The transparency is handled by the Windows API, which doesn’t offload the work to the video card, but rather handles it by doing some calculations with your CPU and storing extra bitmaps in your system RAM until it can figure out what the frame looks like with a transparent window on it, and then sends that frame to the video card for buffering/rendering.
Nope. The windows api falls back on the HAL, so if the gpu supports it, transparency is done by hardware, if not then it’s by software. In nvidia’s case you’ll need to be in 32bit color mode (RGBA) and it only works with 2000/xp.
In my case i get less cpu usage when dragging windows with transparency actived.
From the article:
> Natural-language query capabiities. No longer will users have to go on
> lengthy (and often fruitless) quests for files and data stored on their
> PCs, local networks and/or the Web. Instead, they will be able to type
> in commands (such as, “Find all the spreadsheets I generated last year
> that included sales data from Bob Jones”), and Longhorn will auto-
> magically return the results.
That sounds very advanced to me. Combine this with speech recognition and we finally have the Star Trek style computer..
You mean like this:
Using the GUI in the Finder…
http://barney.gonzaga.edu/~naschbac/search.png
When the Sherlock application used to be able to do disk searches I had a speech recognition script which would do just what you are describing.
It worked like this, “Computer, new search… find documents… of type Excel… modified after May Sixteenth Two Thousand Two… containing text Bob Jones… start search now.”
It took me a couple of weeks to make the AppleScript flexible enough to be useful, but once it was done you could do voice searches like that and Sherlock would pop open, then perform the search, and show you the results. I even made a speech command to have Sherlock speak the file names of all the results returned in order.
Speech Recognition coupled with AppleScript on a Mac is pretty useful and cool technology if you are willing to spend a little time with it.
With a 64-bit OS, 64-bit desktop and Laptop machines by the end of the year! available to the public. And that doesn’t even include all the new software apps coming out before the end of the year.
Only if MS/AMD doesn’t get there first.
macs are toys
Anonymous C, the word is fallacy, not phallacy, I _really_ don’t want to know what you were thinking when you wrote that.
MS and AMD aren’t going anywhere, Intel is going to announce (If they already done so) vaporware, and most of the PC market is going to wait (Freeze) for Intel, Linux on other hand is going to move forward by leaps bounds with 64-bit along with Apple.
Wrong. Athlon64 is set to launch in September. Opteron is already here. MS already has Windows XP 64 for Opteron/Athlon64 in beta. They aren’t waiting on Intel for anything, and neither are the usual motherboard manufacturers/chipset vendors (plus new ones) that support AMD’s CPUs.
Did AMD make any money last quarter? If not why? Most of the market waits for Intel and Microsoft, some Vendor’s will use AMD’s cpu but most will wait for Intel before fully jumping in.
This is one, stupid, useless, article. The author seems to be in desperate need of something to get published. An operating system that runs on one specific, overpriced, app limited, underpowered piece of severely limited hardware can’t even come close to the flexability and useablity of windows or linux. Try building a computer and installing osx on it.
When they run on the same hardware can we then try this discussion.
This is besides the point. The original statement was that Apple would be first to market with 64-bit OS, laptop, and desktop.
There is the possibility that this may not come true. AMD will no longer be making 32-bit desktop/mobile CPUs soon. Their full 32-bit line will be replaced with 64-bit counterparts. Windows and other 64-bit OSes will be running on systems with those CPUs. Apple will be first to market only if their systems are shipping before Opteron/Athlon64 systems are available with a 64-bit OS (be that Windows or Linux/BSD/etc.). All that has to happen is for one vendor to offer a desktop, and one to offer a laptop. This isn’t a longshot because many vendors already sell AMD-based desktops and laptops. Neither the whole industry, nor the major system builders (Dell, etc.) have to have AMD systems to make the original statement false.
As for Intel, they aren’t likely to push 64-bit beyound their Itanium line unless they feel threatened by AMD. If the market waited on Intel, there would be no 64-bit offering for years. Again, there is no need to wait on Microsoft, because Microsoft will be delivering a 64-bit Windows XP for AMD systems.
Geez, whats the point in Apple moving to X86 hardware with the 970 on the horizon? Where were you haters in the PowerPC 970 article?
Build a computer and install OSX on it?
OK
http://www.2khappyware.com/order/
Don’t give me that crap that its unaffordable. I get tired of seeing homeless and financially destitute people with cable modem connections bitching about Mac prices. No one here complains about Alienware and I doubt anybody on these forums even owns one since they are sooooooooo expensive.
Open up a Dell Dimensions system sometime. We have over 500 at work. Proprietary motherboard. The restore CD only works with that Dell model. Third party internal devices other than memory are not supported. The power supply does not use a standard 4-pin P4 connector. The OS that the system shipped with is the only OS that is supported. The operating system license cannot be transferred.
I agree. I see these PC fan boys talk about how they can put together a PC for 50cents, but want they WON’T tell you is their whinging and whining they do under a different alias on how Windows XP keeps BSOD’ing because of the shonky hardware combination they’re using.
If you were to make a PC using QUALITY components then purchased the operating system, it would cost you more than buying a eMac/iMac pre-loaded with MacOS X and a boot load of other software titles.
That is what most fan boys don’t include, the price of the operating system because they normally scoot off and download a Windows XP corp iso off a local warez site and then snicker under their breath about how “smart” they are ripping off intellectual property.
@oberto: I’m not homeless, and I’m not destitute. But money is tight. I work only part-time, don’t get paid real-money, and had to pay for my last computer using student-loan money (having a laptop is invaluable to me as a student). No, I didn’t buy a Mac, because they’re too expensive. And as much as I’d love to own an Alienware laptop, I didn’t buy one of those either. In any case, the comparison isn’t fair — you don’t *have* to buy a computer from Alienware to run any of the software that will run on one. There are cheaper alternatives — there aren’t with Macs.
@CooCooCaChoo:
No, I won’t tell you under another alias about how XP keeps BSOD’ing because of bad hardware. I *will* tell you that it keeps BSOD’ing on my girlfriend’s brand-spanking-new Sony laptop, but that Linux runs like a dream on the same machine. I’ll also tell you that I can put together a perfectly respectable desktop for under 500 bucks if I’m willing to look for deals on parts, and run Linux on it with no problems at all. Even if I were a Windows user, and for some reason decided to pay for a lisence, I’d come out spending far less than I would on a Mac with comparable functionality and speed.
Please don’t get me wrong — I’m well aware that, were I to buy Windows, I’d also come out with an operating system far inferior to what I’d be buying from Apple. I’m not trying to knock OSX. I haven’t used it very extensively, but from my limited experience with it, it seems to be powerful, beautiful, and stable. But as far as money goes, there’s no contest. And the fact that I use Linux makes it even less of a contest. If I had lots of money to play with, then *maybe*; or, if Macs were less expensive, maybe.
How can you say Apple computers are expensive?
http://store.apple.com/133-622/WebObjects/australiastore.woa/841/wo…
“800 MHz PowerPC G3, 512K L2 cache @ 800MHz, 128MB SDRAM memory, 30GB Ultra ATA drive, ATI Mobility Radeon 7500
32MB DDR video memory, CD-ROM, Built-in 56K v.92 modem
AirPort ready, Up to 5 hr. battery life”, $1999
I’d consider that a pretty bloody good deal. Want a desktop solution:
http://store.apple.com/133-622/WebObjects/australiastore.woa/841/wo…
“800MHz PowerPC G4, 128MB SDRAM, 40GB Ultra ATA drive, CD-ROM drive”, $1499
If you are a student in Australia you’re most likely getting around $12-$13 per-hour for a part-time/casual job. Apple prices are NOT expensive.
If u read os news youd think 90% of the readers are apple users.. taking in to account how amazing cheap apples are, one wonders why mac sales are still so small?
Theres macworld.. then theres the real world.
Pcs are faster, windows is a much more complete OS (for the real world not just cheap thrown in apps).. the package is cheap.
What is that quote again from a Windows user: “Linux is free, if your time is worthless”.
In the same way you can say: “A PC with Windows is cheaper, if your time is worthless”
“cheap thrown in apps”? Glenn, now you’ve departed from reality.
Well, when I saw Glenns post, my question is where are these cheap throw in applications?
Why aren’t sales higher, because there is still a misconception by the majority of people that unless you have a PC, you’re incompatible with everyone else.
For example, I was chatting to a lady at work looking for a new computer, I suggested an eMac, her reaction, “oh, but I can’t get Microsoft Office, it doesn’t have an easy to use database and I can’t get some of the Macromedia software I use”, I showed here that should could get EVERYTHING she wanted. She was shocked, and she was also surprised to know that you can swap files made on a Mac and then email it to a person with a PC.
That is the misconception, and Apple needs to fight it. They need to advertise MORE of television and non-computer related, mainstream media so that the masses can be “re-educated” to the fact that being an Apple user doesn’t mean you can participate with the rest of the business/internet world.
$2000 bucks that I don’t have for that 12-inch powerbook. I spent $1300 for my Dell Inspiron 2650. How does it stack up against the powerbook? Here goes: 15′ SXGA+ LCD, 1.7 ghz Pentium 4M, 512 RAM, 32MB Nvidia Gforce2, DVD/CD-RW combo drive, 56k modem, integrated ethernet card, crappy 3-hour battery life. Tack on 50 bucks for my wireless card. $650 less for 4 times the ram, playing DVDs, burning CDs, a faster processor, a screen I can actually read on. OK, the battery life is 2 hours worse. I still think I got the better deal here.
The desktop is even more glaringly expensive in comparison. I’m currently pricing out parts to put together a new desktop — when I said above that I could put together a very respectable system for less than $500 I wasn’t kidding. That’s a little more than the price I’m looking at – I’m closer to $450. If you don’t believe me, take a look at pricewatch.com – try to price some systems out on your own there, see what you come up with. It can be done, if you’re willing to put a machine together by yourself. And with the cost of hardware these days, buying from a company will only tack on a couple hundred bucks. $1500 for that desktop? Not a chance, when I can do better for one third the price.
Thus – I don’t understand how you can say Macs *aren’t* expensive. Not when compared to the competition, anyway. If you want to argue that there’s reasons to by Mac machines even though they *are* expensive, I’d be more sympathetic, although I would also say that for me, those reasons aren’t good enough.
PS: I’m not in Australia, and I’m not making that much. It’s also rather difficult to find jobs here right now – Michigan’s unemployement rate is high for the U.S., it’s going up, and no one is hiring. Friends of mine who just graduated are in a lot of trouble. Many who didn’t want to go to graduate school right out of undergrad just went right on to more school this year because the job market is aweful. Anyway, that aside: yes, Macs *are* expensive.
what you faiil to mention is the $2000 model of the APPLE is a SUPERDRIVE NOT A COMBO DRIVE. SO that makes the price jump $200. As for RAM NO ONE orders RAM from APPLE. You Pay the same price as PC users from vendors.
Last look at the list of features on the APPLE again. it is well equiped for about the same price. Hard Drive space- Apples seem to use a lot less HD space I have a 20GIG on my iBook and it still has 12 gigs left after movie making web building and general use.
If you do not want an APPLE that is cool, i have no problems, but the reality is they are comparabe in price as their PC counter parts.
I had this arguement before, when a buddy bought a Thinkpad.. After some of his own research he did find APPLE’s are comparable. He still has his THINKPAD 🙂
If you are able to build your own systems, you certainly do not need only Apple, but any other company. I should try that sometime. i’m pretty good with hardware. I admire people who can do that.
Yes, the Mac Laptops are more expensive, but I am a victim of purchasing one of those cheap Dell laptops. The specs don’t mean crap, that $1300 price shines through in the quality of the hardware. The dell is cheap plastic, and the case has an horrible amount of flex in it, not to mention it looks ugly IMO. The keyboard eventually starts pressing on the screen and leaving marks on the LCD where the keys are (when its closed). I’ve sent the laptop back 3 times now, and I am actually on my 2nd one (the first one was not fixable i guess). I mean, this laptop, while the specs seem really good, is just crap. It has to be crap to sell it that cheap. I’ll repeat the metaphor: it costs more money to drive a Mercedes-Benz than a Ford. My family also has a Dell Desktop, and it is also a piece of trash.
On a related note, I am selling a Dell Laptop, and I am buying the new 15″ powerbook when its released (hopefully soon!).
PC User (soon to be switcher)
Equipped similarly to the machine I bought, it comes to $1800. That’s with more hard drive and less RAM, a slower processor, and with a 12 inch screen, as opposed to 15 inch.. Knock it up another 100 bucks for integrated wireless, or not — we’re talking $450-$550 more than I spent, for a machine that’d drive me nuts (because of screen size). How is the price comparable? And again — the price differences are even more striking when one looks at desktops.
You should definitely give it a shot. Once you get over the intimidation factor it’s pretty easy. You do most of the work before you sit down to put the thing together — making sure you order the right stuff.
I work as a small-town (USA) computer repairman and custom builder of pc’s for a small company. I can build an athlon 2200+, 256mb pc2400 ddr, 40gb 7200 rpm Samsung hardrive(3YEAR WARRANTY) 48x Cyberdrive cd-rw,ECS motherboard, 16x DVD player, 19″ Samsung monitor(ALSO WITH 3 YEAR WARRANTY), Keyboard, mouse and 3 piece speaker system. Total cost $452. Runs great on Mandrake 9.1 or Lycoris build 75. Add a winxp home licence for $62. With XP we sell them retail for $699. A good inexpensive PC! Go to http://www.downloads.com and download tons of freeware for windows.TRY THIS WITH A MAC……………………..
I’ve seen people have great luck with Dells, and other people have horrible luck. Thankfully I got to test-drive a model similar to the one I bought before I bought it — a friend of mine has almost the same machine. I most certainly would not have bought one without seeing it first. I’ve had great luck with it so far. It’s ugly, fast, and durable, which is pretty much what I like out of a computer. The keys aren’t *quite* as sturdy as I’d like them to be (I’m quite hard on keyboards) but they’re doing fine as of now. It’s by no means the best hardware I’ve ever touched – but it’s more than satisfactory.
Jeffery —
That’s pretty similar to the system I’m going to be building later this summer, though I’ll be going a bit higher on the processor. My only question — how the heck do you get the price that low including monitor? You guys have a deal with the devil or something?
Seriously, where are you guys getting parts?
Mac user are always drooling for the next release of Mac OS and now Windows zealots are howling “look at this cool stuff we gonna have soon. We just have to wait 3 years to get it”. Amusing.
A question: what is the usefullness of those fancy Longhorn GUI effects for professional user? Answer: zero. Most of people will get tired of them soon.
After Mac OS X came out, Microsoft was busy to add the magical X-word to it’s products: Windows XP, Office XP. Now with Longhorn, they’re using the A-word: Aero, Microsoft’s answer to Apple’s Aqua.
I bet Apple will have Mac OS X 10.5 with Aqua Extreme on sale before Longhorn is RTM…
I think that certain articles on OSNews should have the add comment option turned off. The above certainly should. Noone is realy convincing anybody. PC-lovers and Mac-lovers just keep trolling at each other. I’ll bet that people don’t even read each other’s posts. As long as there is no MS Windows on Mac, or Apple MacOS X on PC there is no easy way to convert. A really small fraction of users is willing to change their hardware platform just because of the operating system. SO WHO THE F**K ARE YOU TRYING TO CONVINCE TROLLS?
PS. The author is a veteran of such long running flame wars as: C64 vs. Atari, Amiga vs. Atari ST, Amiga vs. the rest of the world, Linux vs. Windows, VI vs. Emacs
the features listed on the Powerbooks like blueooth, ect you are omitting to make you point. That is all I am saying. You are not comparing siilar equipment.
As for HD space one again tha is not eally an issue. eality is they are deck ouy a PC laptop with same features and you find they are close.
You’re right, the 12′ powerbook is bluetooth enabled, and it has a firewire port, which my laptop does not. This doesn’t change the fact that to get a decent laptop that’ll run OSX I have to pay more than I do to get a PC, *even if only because apple tacks on hardware I don’t want or need.* And this powerbook fails to meet all my needs, like a decent screen size. Now we’re talking hundreds of dollars more. Likewise with desktops. Thus – no OSX for me, as much as I’d probably enjoy trying it out seriously.
If you think these articles shouldn’t have comment sections, why do you read the comments, and why do you post? Isn’t this one a no-brainer?
I was not trying to sell you on a MAC just trying to point out that if you really dig to a price per feature the MAC is not as overpriced as people say. That is all. The price in the last 2 years has been diminishing between MAC and PC. While Apples are still a bit higher they are no where near what people think. P.S. Now I am on my ATHLON 😉 I switch hit.
Why not make the comparison a little more fair, eh? A 14″ iBook with slightly better specs (14″ – the one difference, 640 ram, 40 HD (don’t know yours), ATI mobility graphics, better battery) comes to $1728. I couldn’t find the model Inspiron you bought on Dell’s POS site to check weight, etc… One thing Dell does offer that Apple doesn’t is what I call “desktops with a handle”. If that’s what you want (or can afford) then a PC is the place for you. But for real mobile machines with good features and great battery, Apple machines are priced very well.
Anyway, I feel your pain at finding work in Michigan. I was unemployed for a while here last summer. It would really suck to be graduating right now. IT work being shipped to India/Brazil. Job cuts. Wage cuts. Yuck. I feel lucky to have a good job (at least this week!
I agree prices have been going down on Macs, but they’re still too high with not quite enough customizability. With most PCs you can cut features you don’t need and spend the cash on ones you do. That makes a huge difference and throws price comparisons off.
They stopped making the model I bought just after the holiday season, far as I can tell. I haven’t looked at the new ones much, not sure how they compare.
I thought about an iBook, but I wasn’t really interested in a G3 processor. And it was still a bit too expensive with a large screen, by a few hundred bucks. Don’t get me wrong — I’m not saying that Apple hardware isn’t good, or even that it isn’t worth the money. I’m just saying that if price is a serious concern, it’s pretty hard to justify buying one when you can get decent hardware for significantly less elsewhere. If I had money to play with…yeah, I’d *love* to have a 17-inch powerbook. Those things make me drool. Or a 15-inch, for that matter, I’d rather have that than the machine I have now. But it’s just too much cash.
And yeah, it does suck to be graduating right now. I’m not, but some of my friends are. It’s really scary to see some of the most intelligent and competent people you know talking about moving to their parents’ houses to cut back on costs because there aren’t any jobs around, and wishing they’d applied to grad programs this year instead of trying to go into the job market. Not fun, but…it’ll get better eventually.
Feature for feature laptops (name brands) are within 200 dollars of each other, buy a Dull (Dell) and be done with it.