@Nintenboy01: I recall that Sony bought the Aiwa brand and used them for low-end gear. Apple could perhaps join forces with one of their hardware contractors to do something similar.

Sockatume

according to apple's adds in the last 2 years and since the intel-IBM war ended in 2005 is not windows vs mac, it's more like mac vs nobody; or microsoft vs everyone. Mac does not care anymore, that is why they dropped the "computer" in apple computers inc. We want to see war because is fun, but apple approach is more like, communal 60's hippies.
At least in my experience, XP runs great in mac laptops. Altough, the hardware runs hotter than using mac ox X. too bad I just upgraded my home pc to AMD, I need to wait for the osX patch.

dysthymia

@ Nintendoboy01
Instead, just make a cheap-o brand ;)

noonas

@TheDismalScience: In that case perhaps Apple could discreetly release a new brand name for higher-tier products, kinda like what Toyota did with Lexus. Of course they'll need to build the strength of that new brand as well.

Nintenboy01

This is great, and I am an apple fan.
It can only be good, and will most likely make apple bring down the prices / make even more stunning products to justify why a Mac and not anything else hacked into running OS X.

I am personally hoping 4 a slim tablet a'la iTouch with a 10-14" screen and a table stand / charger.

noonas

Oh man this is hot. Does the wi-fi work? That seems like it would be the weakest link, with the different hardware and all...

mullingitover

OS X 10.5 RC2? Isn't there a patched GA version?

It's pretty cool to be able to do this - despite what all the Mac Fanboys will post here later. Not for me though.

theimmc

One major problem with that last sentence - they'd canni sales of high-margin iMacs and Mac Pros. Since Apple's business model is based on high-margin pricing due to the relative strength of its brand, releasing a product of that nature is akin to slapping a Jaguar badge on a Civic. Bad for business.

TheDismalScience

It's not longer a PC vs Mac debate.

It's Windows vs Mac.

A PC can now run OSX, and run it better than Mac can, at a cheaper cost. And Mac can run XP better.

I don't need a portable PC, or Mac, but for $399.....

luckypictures

@ a bunch of you.
-the apple eula is why it's dubbious, they don't want os x on non-apple hardware.
-the price of apples is no longer significantly greater then equivilantly spec'd windows machines
-os x is awesome. as much as i dislike things to be closed up (and apple is really closed up, worse than m$) os x and apple's other software is just awesome. to top it off, their hardware is damb pretty (and yes looks matter, i gotta stare at it all the freaking time)
-all that said, i would love to see apple release a list of components that are acceptable, and allow other vendors (or individuals) to put together systems based on that list. that way they maintain quality control of components, and allow the market place to put (imho) the world's best OS on more machines.

EMoShunz

@Nintenboy01:

Given that much of Mac's market share growth has been with young people who are willing to stick the things on credit cards, Apple would be a victim of its own success if they sold a low-price Mac. A system that's what, 10% (?) slower than the low-end MacBook for a third of the price would annihilate the low-end MacBook sales. See my post in ref to TommySez to see how that would impact Apple's high-margin business model.

TheDismalScience

@TommySez:

That wasn't my argument. Let's not turn this into an anti-Apple rant. My argument was that creating a low-cost brand would eat Apple's margins alive, and they are a margin company. They leave the volume computer sale profits to HP, Dell et al.

I think if we examine the consumer attitudes behind Apple's ability to JUSTIFY those margins, you'd find some fairly weak stylistic commentary and a very real "OS X justifies X amount of cost in an iMac purchase" argument. Given the price of Apple's lineup relative to the hardware in those systems, the X that OS X is being asked to justify is quite higher than it is in Windows land.

A low-cost Mac brand would be TOO successful. Right now, you can't get Mac style an OS X for less than a grand or so. A lower-cost brand would be devoured by the college students that have been adopting Macs so readily. That would position Macs to be volume-profit products, which is a road I don't think Jobs is willing to go down. He can't run Honda, it's too beneath him, he has to run Jaguar.

TheDismalScience

@TheDismalScience: Ah, I see what you're saying. Stll I doubt the EEE will run even OS X Tiger as well as the low-end Macbook. Mainly because its CPU is slower (unless you get the Intel Core version) and its graphics chip is weaker. But it is only about a third of the Macbook's price.

Nintenboy01

if apple made the same exact machine they would sell it for $2500

myneid

@Sockatume:
They don't really need to buy someone. Return of NeXT Computer, anyone?

ConstyXIV

Apple's OS X license expressly forbids installation on non-Apple hardware.

Regarding Macs being overpriced, they're not. Doesn't take much time before the combination of my billable rate and time spent futzing with a Windows box exceeds the price differential. (Not that I have a sky-high rate. I don't. But time isn't free.)

And there's no such thing as too much mark-up. If people buy it, it's not too much. If Apple can get people to pay for the mark-up, it means either a) they've made a really good product, or b) the buyers are stupid.

Many will argue for 'b.' But I've used Windows for years. (And various flavors of Linux, and BeOS, and DOS, and NEXTStep, and a whole slew of others, including toggling switches on an Altair.) OS X is better. Better enough to justify the mark-up. And if you don't agree, then don't buy one, duh.

TommySez

it isn't apple hardware. its not terribly complex.

devillion

@thisaintsweettea:

I think it's because most people are going to wind up downloading licenses that they don't own. That, and I'm sure it violates the EULA to do this to OSX in the first place, to say nothing of subsequently distributing hacked OS's to bittorrent users.

TheDismalScience

@thisaintsweettea: I believe it's no problem with Asus (though you'd probably want to upgrade your RAM, maybe change the wifi card. Either of which would void your warranty, but is plenty legal). The problem is that to make OSX run on your machine, you'll have to do a little reverse-engineering and tinkering to the operating system to make it install on non-apple hardware. Every part of that last sentence goes against the OS X EULA.

The question is whether apple cares. I haven't heard of any hackintoshes bringing legal action from apple, but if it were to become a widespread and noticeable market segment, they may begin to take notice.

JomeyQ

"Lo-jacking the Asus Eee PC with OS X is legally dubious"

Could someone explain the legally questionable part of this?

What is in either the Asus or Apple EULA that would prohibit installing a brand new (never installed) license of OSX on any one device i could make it work on?

Is it because Apple does not sell OSX all on it's own? (or do they?).

Either way, make this simple and Steve Jobs' lawyers be damned, i'm doing it.

thisaintsweettea

@KJA: A 12" notebook will be mighty small, since Apple has shifted entirely to widescreen displays, and may never return (nor should they). A 13" aluminum MBP would strike my fancy though. Yes, strike my fancy very much.

Kaiser-Machead

PC has become more of the cultural term than technical term in this context

Kaiser-Machead

Apple should really bring back the 12" Powerbook and make it into a 12" Intel MacBook. I say regular 12" for business use.

KJA

@Nintenboy01:

They'd have to release gimped software that seems "cheaper" than OSX to avoid showing people just how much margin is baked into the "Apple software experience" so to speak. As it is people would probably have a hard time finding significant performance differences between the Eee and the low end MacBook, for example.

What I'm insinuating is that a low-end brand would make people realize how much they overpay for Macs, not sure if you caught that ;)

TheDismalScience

@luckypictures: Its never really been Mac vs. PC. A Macintosh Computer IS a PC!

ImTheKing

When I can intall a 2.5 SSD drive in my macbook, I'll find myself not caring again.

Kaiser-Machead

Oh great. Now my MacBook looks frickin' huge!

This is just so damn cool.

TommySez

just to be clear y'all
i ran a hackintosh on a newish system and got rid of it for kubuntu gutsy, network didn't work, kind of a killer.
OSx86 is getting there, but not yet, and if linux is any indication, it will be years before it's ready, and will never be legal (at least until apple starts sell the OS as open, which they may after the OSS OSx86 does all the hard driver work and they just use it, re: khtml koqueror and safari).

EMoShunz

@TommySez: I Agreed with you until you started typing.

StackyBotrus

Although Apple's computers (ESPECIALLY the Mac mini) may be grievously overpriced for the specs they have, I've always found their iPod line to be pretty competitively priced even if they lack some of the competition's features. And even still they make a tidy profit of at least $20 to $30 or more on each iPod sold.

Nintenboy01

Hire *more* people to count their money.

And for the record, I don't see the apple premium. Their prices aren't so bad. However, if you think Target's prices are outlandish (they're higher than the dollar store and Big Lots) ... then we're going to have to agree to disagree.

tcabeen

Also, I'm a regular linux user, and I wouldn't want to miss it.
However, OS X is damn handy for a lot of things, especially if even touching a Windows PC induces violent spasms and uncontrollable vomiting in the user in question.

Hvedhrungr

I'm afraid TheDismalScience is quite correct. Any Apple product is priced at a premium because it is an Apple product. You're not only paying for hardware and software, but for the brand.
In much the same way as sweatpants from the Chinese corner store can do the same as Adidas brand pants, a low-end computer can theoretically be used for the same purposes as a high-end machine.
The difference being, the Adidas pants are probably more comfortable, hold out longer, and look a lot sleeker (including those three stripes).

The problem TheDismalScience focused on is a very real one: If Apple offered a budget alternative, it would have to be
a) butt ugly to boot,
b) inferior in both raw power and structural design, and
c) not a Mac brand item.
However, as soon as Apple started producing these "abominations before the Steve", people who don't care about the outside (and insides) of their machines would buy these and use OS X on them, seriously damaging Mac sales.
Yes, Apple would get new customers and a bigger share of the market. But it's a customer base that Apple simply isn't targetting.
By making consumers want the more expensive product, instilling the notion that Macs are cool, Apple is getting all the business they want. Why fix something that isn't broken?

On the other hand, I would definitely give installing a spare license of Tiger on an eeePc a try. It does feel like the natural thing to do.

Hvedhrungr

If only Apple pumped these out themselves-a low-cost ultraportable Mac would sell so well they'd have to hire people just to count the money.

Steve Jobs already does this. Merely By jumping into a large building filled with gold coins, he is able to count Apple's entire net worth, down to the cent.

lpranal

i was going to going to chime in here and say that this is almost as bad of an idea as trying to run XP or Vista on an Eee... but then i realized osX runs fine on my 450 mhz g4, so how could it be worse on a 900 mhz intel? the only issue i see is how much space you ave left over after the install (arguabely moot since the *buntu that the Eee comes with is just as big)

putting windows on one of these is still a terrible idea.

linux people, linux. it really does work, and no you dont have to use the CLI. now will you stop fussing with the genuine advantage and get on board?

it used to be about Apples and Oranges. But have you tried penguin meat?

nutbastard

@TheDismalScience: "releasing a product of that nature is akin to slapping a Jaguar badge on a Civic"

Hehe that's what Jaguar did when they slapped a jaguar logo on a ford taurus.

frigg

@luckypictures: A Mac can run Windows better than a PC?...are you sure about that?...

uclabruin2

That is not a dream, that is a nightmare.
Apple can ESAD.

JaXs

@omg-ponies: Agree...

DJJS

Personally, I wouldn't trust any off-brand "Apple" hardware. I remember being "tech support" for my office when everyone's iPod's were breaking. Each and every one of them was an HP iPod.

Want an Apple? Buy an Apple. That way, when it breaks, there's only Cupertino to blame.

omg-ponies

Macs are hardly overpriced, so much as overbuilt. I can't deny that there's a "boutique tax" to their low-volume, custom-engineered hardware, but you still have to spend a pretty penny to get as much computer as you do in the mid to high-end Macs.

An MBP, for example, is hardly cheap, but that's a system with a good CPU, acceptable RAM, dedicated video (something which too many people overlook,) a quality display, optical drive, camera, Wifi, Bluetooth, an ExpressCard slot, and even an IR port for a remote control.

You can EASILY argue that you don't need all of that. Few people end up using the iSight all that often, and even if they do, it's probably much cheaper to have an external device in the first place, even if said device is bulkier, and not capable of the same resolution.

Apple's hell-bent on providing not just a computer, but an all-out computing experience. That means that they had to standardize on all of these little lifestyle peripherals frech out of the box. If you don't need that, then sure, it's an expensive computer, but it's not like you're building something 100% identical to it for much less, either.

Likewise, the EeeMac setup here is far from that polished, full-featured MacOS experience. It's probably fine, aside from the resolution, and should compare favorably against a G4 iBook in terms of available features, though that still means that you're a few years behind the curve. I can't imagine a $400 Mac like the Eee, though. They'd drive up the cost by adding all of those features back into it.

RaptorCK

@TommySez: I cannot believe my ears when I hear people say macs are not overpriced.

xxenclavexx

@uclabruin2: Gizmodo had a post showing benchmarks of a macbook pro running vista with better results than some other 'windows by default' laptops. But the benchmarks were like 6 months apart, different specs and such. So millage may very is what they say right?

I'm going to purchase a macbook pro only for the same sort of reason to get a console over a gaming pc rig... it's just easier these days as I work with computers all day the last thing I want is hardware maintance (that I have to deal with, plan on getting warenty) during my wind down time.

Weazul

Yeah, TheDismalScience. Apple is about hardware margins. That's why they don't rule the desktop today - they couldn't let go of the hardware profits back in the 80s/90s. Of course (it turned out) most of the money was in software.

On the plus side, they don't just crank out Dell boxes, they actually innovate on hardware so that they can provide new, rich and novel experiences (touch).

I think the 'cheap mac' of the future is what the iPhone will eventually become.

leMel

@nutbastard:

apples intel kernals are very very biased towards newish grahpics cards and intel CPUs with SSE3. I have tested OSX (several versions, uphuck and jas etc) on them, and the two without SSE3, preform considerably slower than the CELERON with SSE3.

endless

it's quite possible.

Palestina