“‘Sun, Apple, Gateway: you can categorize those companies as kind of laggards,” said Brent Bracelin, an analyst at Pacific Crest Securities Inc. “You are starting to see leaders entrench their positions and they maybe have been the same companies that led the industry 10 years ago,” as reported by Reuters.
Reuters reports, “Apple, known for its sleek Macintosh computer designs, innovative software programs, and high prices, is treading water with 2 percent share of the global personal computer market. Apple’s sales of its PowerMac desktop PCs have declined 40 percent in the past two years, wrote Merrill Lynch analyst Richard Gardner in a research note on Thursday on Apple’s second-quarter results. ‘We believe the decline also reflects a migration away from the Mac by many professional customers to more cost-effective ‘Wintel’ (Windows-based) systems which now support all of the key professional applications,’ Gardner wrote.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple a laggard? Maybe in some ways, but the biggest laggard affecting Pro Mac desktop sales is Motorola. We don’t believe the 40 percent decline in Power Macintosh sales “reflects a migration away from the Mac by many professional customers to more cost-effective ‘Wintel’ (Windows-based) systems,” especially since Wintel isn’t more most-effective than a Mac (TCO); a fact most pro users understand well. Rather, the decline shows huge pent-up demand out there sitting on older G4 Power Macs waiting for the PPC 970 (G5) Power Macs to finally make their appearance along with a large group still stuck waiting for Quark to get a Mac OS X version shipping before they upgrade their Mac hardware and switch from OS 9 to OS X.
While we’re not big fans of Adobe lately, at least they’ve managed to make InDesign run natively on Mac OS X. Quark Sufferers, it’s past time to switch. For more info about Adobe InDesign, click here.
Motorola is the laggard here, not Apple. I’ve been waiting for the G5 for over a year now and will continue with my Power Mac G4 until the G5 comes out. Then Apple sales will take off – not before. Hurry up and give us a G5 already, Mr. Jobs! My money is waiting to be spent.
Not to mention that laptop sales were up this quarter.
“Merrill Lynch analyst”
Hmmm, remember that analyst begins with anal. I’ve been in the industry for 17 years and for 17 years the ANALysts have predicted Apple’s imminent demise. Why bother even giving them virtual ink?
To all at Apple Computer:
I will be replacing my desktop computer this year. I WILL NOT BUY another laggard design with a 166 bus and a (WOW!) 1.x G4 that does not even get the full benefit of it’s more expensive DDR memory.
Mac OS is the greatest thing since sliced bread, but the hardware sucks for the price. What we want/need is:
a) 970 series PPC processor- don’t wait for 64-bit apps, this chip was designed to support 32-bit.
b) An up-to-date system bus speed.
c) USB 2.0 Yes FireWire & FW2 are great, but if you are going after the industry-standard model USB 2 should be supported.
d) An iMac that can be upgraded easily. The difference between an iMac and a ProMac should be performance, not upgradability.
e) A G4 if not a 970 series iBook. The G3 is/was a great chip, but the lack of a VPU is very telling on some apps. While speaking of iBooks, allow us more than 640MB of memory, and make AirPort & Bluetooth standard.
f) Ship the things with a 2-button mouse/trackpad. Half of the Mac people, and just about everybody else has them. Get with the program.
g) Stop marketing the style of the Mac & start selling the usefulness & power of our favorite OS. Don’t tell the world you’re different, SHOW THEM!
My wallet is tired of waiting, HURRY UP!
People switch to the windows platform because it’s very cheap to do so. I
fall into this very same category. It’s not as though we don’t want to buy macintosh anymore or have converted to windows, no that’s not the case at all. When the new power macs come out sporting speeds that are compatable or greater than what can be found on the PC side, I’ll buy macintosh again.
I agree with the previous post davgreg
I am more than happy with my G4. It does everything I want it to do and more. It’s easy to use, it never crashes and if I had to use Quark for a design job I’d just migrate it all to InDesign. Everyone seems to think they need the fastest and can’t settle for less but frankly I still haven’t opened up half the potential of my computer
ALL HAIL DAVGREG!
A very noble 9-step program.
-Kabeyun
I agree that Moto is a laggard. But the real problem is in Colorado at Quark. There complete lack of professionalism is starting to appear very suspicious. Bad sales of G4s? Quark is the No. 1 reason. I’d just as soon use InDesign but everyone is hesitant to make any kind of change that might disrupt business as usual. Only now are people starting to move away from AOL in any significant numbers. No one wants to learn anything new. And I have no idea how to pressure Quark. Given the choke hold it has on the graphic art/printing industry, it’s an uphill battle to speed up the OS X native version. Also given their track record for producing horrible X.0 versions of software, it’ll be 2004 easily before it can be used for production/mission critical jobs.
I’m waiting for G5. davgreg hits is right on with PowerMac config. WILL NOT buy Wintel or Dell’s cheap crap and I think many are waiting, waiting…
Did we forget that the reason for the Desktop sales decline is because recently Apple has seen a 40% increase in LAPTOP/NOTEBOOK sales. Duh! People are using the laptops than desktops. They are the number one seller surpassing Dell.
The time has come to drop-the-dead-donkey with Motorola and Quark (Moto in apples case, we don’t really have a say!)
We should all hit Quark where it hurts and I mean what I say.
Either jump ship to Indesign or this one is for you renegades out there (to show Quark how we feel for being ripped off for years on an inferior product and being left at their mercy) goto a P2P service and download a copy of Quark 6 for X today (and buy a new mac to boot, with the money you’ve just saved).
I think we are all sick to death with Quark and its time to vote with out feet
hahahahaha (evil laugh)
Hey, it’s true. Apple is falling hard. It’s amazing that this site might try to blame Motorola for the problems, though. Apple picked Motorola. That’s the problem. And only on a Mac fanatic site would a 40 percent sales decline equate to “huge pent up demand.” Yeah. Huge pent up demand for Dell.
I also remember that just before Apple’s stock took off just a few years ago, it was a Merrill Lynch analyst that proclaimed Apple to be dead. It was also Merrill Lynch that kept neutral on Apple stock while most every other stock analyst rated Apple stock a buy. There’s bad history between Apple and Merrill Lynch.
paul,
This site, MacDailynews, knows quite a bit about the state of the Mac world and, if you knew anything, you’d know they were exactly right. Most of us simply ARE waiting for G5’s. Plain and simple. The day I buy a Dell is the day Bill Gates admits he copies Cupertino.
As much of an Apple fan as I am, it is clear that professional users are migrating to Windows, and these numbers only prove it. The graphics folks I know are either doing this, or holding on to their current machines until the 970 comes out–a reasonable move, I think. Does it mean Apple is dead? Not by a long-shot! That is, if IBM delivers.
It is Motorola that is dead as a desktop chip supplier. If I were Jobs, I’d have fired them long ago.