“When Apple rolled out its Mac mini in January, a lot of Apple enthusiasts excitedly claimed that the device could easily become a living room-based “iHome” device that might eventually incorporate DVR capabilities,” Paul Thurrott writes for Internet-Nexus.com. “…one thing I never bought into is the idea of the Mac mini as an iHome device. It’s just not suitable for that purpose. But [Microsoft’s] Xbox 360. My God.”
“The Xbox 360–while still six months away from shipping–kicks the Mac mini in the butt and makes the whole iHome concept look like a non-starter to begin with. I’m starting to believe that the digital media hub of my home will indeed be in my living room, and not in my home office. But it will be an Xbox 360, and not a Mac,” Thurrott writes.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Is Thurrott suggesting that Apple’s ceased all R&D and will not be releasing any new or updated products between now and Christmas 2005? By the way, Apple never suggested the Mac mini’s purpose to be anything other than an inexpensive Mac OS X machine that Windows users could pick up and easily use with their current collection of monitors, keyboards, and mice. Comparing Microsoft vapor to currently shipping Apple products seems to have become a very popular pastime with the Wintel-centric press outlets lately (Thurrott’s now taken it to an even more ridiculous level by trying to compare a game console to an entry-level personal computer). Thankfully, we don’t have to stoop to comparing future Apple products to currently shipping Microsoft products (while twisting products’ intended uses) to make ourselves feel better about our platform choice.
[UPDATE, 1:55pm ET: Changed “MDN Take” to “Christmas 2005.”]