“I was secretly looking forward to Apple’s announcements at MacWorld; I have to admit, I was deeply disappointed,” Rob Enderle writes for Designtechnica. “The iMac and Titanium notebook designs were, in my eyes, dated. Granted, in many ways they are still very clean designs and stand out against their competitors, but the current iMac isn’t as innovative as the last one (and others did similar things last decade) and the Titanium hasn’t changed that much since it was released a long time ago. While I was very sure, given the timing of Intel’s new part, that Apple was going to release their first Intel-based products, knowing Apple, I also believed they would use this opportunity to refresh these designs. Unfortunately, they didn’t; I can’t help but feel disappointed.”
“For buyers, this would suggest waiting until after mid-year to purchase the new platform (which, if you recall, was the date that Steve Jobs originally set). This should result in not only a better experience but hardware from Apple that may go farther in setting the pace in hardware design than ever before,” Enderle writes. “One thought: These things could become collectors’ items, as the initial runs could be relatively small for an Apple product. However, MacWorld was no match for CES this round; next round, I’m not so sure… Apple will have to do a lot to match the wow factor of [some of the products announced at CES]. However, Apple does have Steve Jobs, who often can make even mediocre things seem spectacular.”
Full article here.
Apple debuted the current iMac design (up to 1/2-inch thinner and 15 percent lighter with built-in iSight camera) only three months ago, in October 2005. Apple debuted the aluminum PowerBook enclosure on January 7, 2003 with the 17-inch model. Apple replaced the 15-inch Titanium PowerBook with the aluminum PowerBook on September 16, 2003. Apple portable Pro Macs have featured aluminum enclosures since that time. As usual, Enderle obviously missed those not-so-minor facts. That one man can get so much wrong so often and continue to write articles and be quoted by others is amazing and sad.
[UPDATE: 11:45am EST: Added 17-inch PowerBook aluminum release date information to MDN Take.]
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I was at MacWorld this year too and came out sorely disappointed with the announcements. I was happy to see a new iMac and specially a new laptop, but I expected them to be full-fledged 64-bit machines.
In my opinion, Apple has taken a giant step backwards with these new samples of dated 32-bit junk. I don’t care how much faster Steve makes them to be, two to four times faster than slow doesn’t cut it anymore. Specially not in these days of multiple core AMD 64-bit equipped boxes on the PC side.
Putting down thousands of dollars on dated 32-bit technology is not my idea of a good deal.
Maybe come WWDC we’ll see something worthwhile.
What intrigues me the most is the odd symbiotic relationship between MDN and Enderle. Each one claims to support opposite views, but both require the other one for significant increases in their site hits. Both love slamming the other one’s PC of preference, and yet they quietly giggle with delight by the increase in readers that the other one creates.
I fail to see how someone’s errors (even though their topic may be Macs) can be the subject of a Mac “News” website. It is obvious that MDN defines news as “anything that can generate site hits”.
MDN and Enderle; what a marriage!
Enderle must say these things just to get people riled up. Tell me he is really not that stupid.
His quote: “…while I was very sure, given the timing of Intel’s new part, that Apple was going to release their first Intel-based products, knowing Apple, I also believed they would use this opportunity to refresh these designs. Unfortunately, they didn’t; I can’t help but feel disappointed.”
He looks at an ugly-ass PC all day and is disappointed in Apple not coming out with a new, better one! Apple is so light years ahead of any of the little black or beige PC box factories that the entire Apple Industrial Design Dept. could all take a vacation for 5 years and PC’s would STILL be friggin’ uglier than 5 year old Apple designs…come to think of it THEY ARE UGLIER than CURRENT 5 YEAR OLD APPLE DESIGNS.
>I also believed they would use this opportunity to refresh these designs>
Sometimes different isn’t better. At some time, a straight line cannot be made any straighter, an excellent design may live for a while. Change for change’s sake is not needed.
If he was that disappointed, maybe he should go build some of his own products.
“I was deeply disappointed.”
Liar.
If you were deeply disappointed you’d of pulled a Curt Cobain.
F-F-Fudmeister
I think Enderle is just a “click whore”. He writes a stupid article about Apple and waits for MDN to get it’s panties in a bunch. Then the traffic to the websites he writes for, spike. He goes to his editor and sayes look at all these people reading my article, you should buy more of my articles. Lets just ignore him and he can find some other corning to stand on.
Yes I imagine Enderle was dissapointed. 1. Damn! Apple got the intel Mac’s out early, 2. Damn! Vista is nowhere on the horizon, and 3. Damn! I can’t get the taste of Bill Gates sh.. out of my mouth.
Cheer up Mr E, more viruses for Vista will be out soon!
Read:
“I look like a fool for cheerleading Apple and making so many predictions about this MacWorld which didn’t come true, nobody is going to ever listen to me again. Wah, wah, wah!”
Bozo
Whatever Microsoft is afraid of, Enderle attacks. This Enderle article means that MS is very worried about the Core Duo macs. I expect to see much more of this from all the MS black PR hacks. This, and the CNET review of the iMac, is just the beginning. It didn’t have much effect on iPod Nano sales, even with stories of the display scratching to the point of unuseability on the nightly news, and a torrent of lawsuits. But we shall see. I wonder what they will come up with for a class-action lawsuit?
Why does MDN continue to put money in Enderle’s pocket?
Just ignore the dude. Most everyone else does that has two marbles bouncing around their skull.
Hey other Mark,
The design was done last decade. Last century in fact.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”wink” style=”border:0;” /> What enderhurl forgot to mention is that it was done by Apple, and went by the name of 20th Anniversary Mac.
people get a cheap kick from watching others fall on their face… btw, I never click to his “articles”, MDN is close enough for me.
<i>The iMac and Titanium notebook designs were, in my eyes, dated.<i>
Ummm… Titanium?
Damn tags…