“In a conference call to reporters Monday, Dell executives Mike George and Michael Farello said the company… would enhance its Dell DJ brand MP3-player with more capacity to chip away at Apple Computer’s market-leading iPod and iTunes combination. George said Dell could not match Apple’s marketing success or the brand loyalty, but he remained firm in his conviction that Dell would be able to undercut Apple with lower prices, compatibility with more file formats and momentum for its continued partnership with MusicMatch (soon to be updated to version 8.2),” Michael Singer reports for InternetNews.com.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Having trouble marketing a lesser solution, Mr. Dell? That’s funny, it never stopped you before.
my friend sherman told me that the michael dells son jerby owns a black ipod mini
More file formats??? WMA is only one file format regardless of how many sites use it.
The dell Dj and WMA is crap.
Buy an ipod, listen to pristine cd quality songs and invest in the future!
[url=http://www.apple.com/itunes]http://www.apple.com/itunes[/url]
It’s a good strategy for Dell. MusicMatch sucks as much as Dells, so they work nicely together, in a horribly clunky and frustrating way.
And maybe some more joint marketing efforts a la Ford?
A Focus and a Dell,
A Focus and a Dell,
Hi Ho the merry-o,
A deal straight out of hell!
you’re giving the Mac creative types a bad rap here, man ….
LOL, “chip away” they’ve been run over by the train coming down the tracks. In the last year I’ve only seen one person carrying the brick of DJ in all of NYC. They were wearing dark sunglasses to hide their identity…
So when an iPod ships with a 60GB drive able to store 15,000 songs (around 1500 albums) at 128kbits, what will Dell ship? The ability to store 1750 albums?
OK, lets look at more file formats: they already ship WMA (which nobody wants) and MP3 (which Apple already ships). What can they add? FLAC? Ogg VORBIS? Maybe they’ll add Dolby AAC to support Real – although that won’t go down well with their masters in Redmond.
And then we get to MusicMatch. Are you going to be selling more songs than iTMS? Or different songs?
This really is whistling in the dark.
The price undercut stragety has worked very well for them before – most people not seeing the difference from one desktop system to the next. However, everyone can see the differences when it comes to MP3 players. Price alone with not give them an advantage.
…compatibility with more file formats…
The new Dull DJ will be able to play all format AAI, PST, BMP, JPG, ASCII, TXT, INI, PICT, EXE, COM, CMD, BAT MP3, WMA…. etc. However, it will not support AAC because it’s just not compatible.
These guys have no shame to redicule themselves and pretend that they’ll do better with someone elses idea.
Look for major price reduction on the standard iPod for this coming Holiday Season. SJ in the WSJ says they’re working on lowering the price points. Dell is a commodity company and they do exceptionally well. They will continue to do well and that’s the way it is. Eventually Apple will not dominate but will have a good percentage of the market. It is inevitable. Jerby? Who’s dat? (There isn’t an iPod minis in black).
Isn’t that kind of like Carrot Top chipping away at the popularity and good looks of Brad Pitt?
Wow, we are a vicious crowd. Remember that the only things that Apple has above the Dell DJ is pretty much brand loyalty and coolness factor. The Dell DJ is cheaper and has a longer battery life. Sure it may not be as easy to use, but I don’t know…they do sound pretty appealing. Over time, fads come and go. Then Apple might have problems…
Yep, sounds like a typical Dell strategy:
1) Copy as closely as you can, but do a bad job
2) Throw more capacity at the consumer – yeah, that’s what they want.
3) Throw lower prices. Drive them to buy lower quality with a lower price.
Russell, that’s the whole thing that Dell/Microsloth just don’t get about Apple products – THEY ARE EASIER TO USE! They are also smoother to use and just more pleasant to use. Yeah, I can come up with a turd in a shoebox that can store my photos, but I’d rather use my iPhoto!
BTW, let’s see if Paul Turd-Rot is going to hold Dell to their “prediction” of chipping away at Apple/iPod!!!
Dell’s battery life is “Up To” 18 hours or so. Has there ever been any real-world report on actual battery life? Also the player is considerably larger and heavier then the standard iPod. Dell seems to spend a lot of time mentioning Apple in its press conferences. Interesting since MD predicted Apple’s demise a few years ago. The immaturity of its execs match the immaturity of…. Apple fanatics!
JJ
Not intentionally. And I imagine those Mac creative types in the advertising art department must have had a gun pointed at their heads.
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pkradd, yes I can vouch for the battery life of a Dell DJ. It is more than 18 hours. That’s because no one uses them, so their batteries never need charging!!!
As much as I like Mac and despise Dell, y’all should remember this: 95% of the planet owns crappy Windows products. Winblows disks and Dell boxes didn’t just bud asexually out of people– they bought them. Willingly. From the Home Shopping Network even. Hard to believe, I know, but that’s the reality. Yeah, the iPod rocks, but it won’t stop the mass of idiot sheep out there who will buy the Dell DJ, especially if they use commercials with buxom twins.
They are not just competing with Apple…they also have to contend with HP. That changes the equation. Not everyone buys a PC from Dell.
for ABQ Peter and anyone else who thinks WMA “Owns” the marketplace, this from MacCentral.
http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/2004/06/11/streaming/index.php?redire
ct=1086979799000
“Apple, Microsoft and Real Networks account for 99 percent of the
streaming media market, according to market research firm Frost &
Sullivan. While Frost & Sullivan declined to comment directly on
specific numbers, a recent report from the researcher shows Microsoft
Windows Media at 38.2 percent; QuickTime with 36.8; and Real with 24.9
percent.”
Would you care to re-think your assertion?
I’m rockin’ to my DJ as I write this. I just loaded up at WalMArt and you people are a bunch of jealous pinheads. Just wait, when the DJ hits Europe you can french kiss that iPod bye-bye.
I saw a guy with an iRiver the other day. I showed the guy my iPod and you should have seen his face. Why in the world would someone choose a second rate product when just a few dollars more could get you the “Best of Class in the World” is beyond me. There are few instances on a limited budget where you can have the undisputed “Best product in the world” in a category. Having an Apple iPod is one of them and having a Macintosh is another. (though for some strange reason, mostly to justify purchasing an inferior product I think, the Macintosh seems to be more debated than the iPod)
I hate MusicMatch. I hated MM the first time I ever used it. It could not do what Winamp did so well…just play music.
Now it can’t do what iTunes does…seamlessly organize music and sync it to a portable device. I have helped dozens of people set up their music players (Rio, iriver, Dell, Classic, Sony, ..) and none of them come with software that comes close to the ease of installing and using iTunes.
I was probably one of the first 100 people to download iTunes for windows. I wanted to learn how to get PC iPod users off MM as fast as possible. Many people I knew had their iPods gathering dust because they couldn’t work MM. Apple’s decision to release a Windows version of iTunes was genius. Dell will not be able to get a good music device market share with the crap-tastic MusicMatch as their software partner.
Me? I’m just moving students to the mac one by one
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Got all my neighbors/friends that have PCs moved over to iTunes for PeeCee. Next is PeeCee to a real computer. Already bagged a couple.