When I read an article the other day that Macs were finally getting a better break in the June 2008 issue of Consumer Reports, in an article entitled “Best & worst computers,” I felt optimistic. Up till now, although Macs routinely get good marks in their tests, the magazine’s editors do little or nothing to [...]

Although this conversation probably never took place, I can well believe the scene is playing out as if it did. One day, Steve Jobs and Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who sits on Apple’s Board of Directors, were having lunch and talking shop. In one of those fated eureka moments, they both devised a strategy that would, [...]

Way back when, during the nasty 1990s, Apple had so many models, it was doubtful that any single company executive could identify all of them without a cheat sheet at hand. Even salespeople, who earned commissions on the hardware they could move, would have similar difficulties. But it wasn’t just the hardware proliferation disease that consumed [...]

Lots of pundits are content with putting the words “Apple Inc.” and “proprietary” in the same sentence. A lot of that is, of course, due to the tight vertical integration of all of their products, from the iPod to Macs and Mac OS X. However, there is an awful lot about the Mac these days that [...]

Just the other day, I had a pleasant conversation with Macworld’s Rob Griffiths about his “FrankenMac” project, his weekend warrior project to build a Mac from off-the-shelf PC parts. In a sense, I understand what he was attempting to do, and it wasn’t to save money, not if you value your time. Back when I was [...]

Whenever I consider possible future hardware and software from Apple, the well-worn phrase, “We do not discuss unreleased products” comes to mind. Indeed, getting a roadmap of any of their ongoing development programs seldom occurs, and when it does, there’s always a specific marketing reason, or the need to get developers onboard. Yes, the iPhone was [...]

So I was hanging out chatting with David, a fellow New Yorker who owns the nearby UPS Store, about personal computers. He knows I use Macs, and I’m aware that he’s a Windows advocate. He started claiming, all over again, that his home PC cost a lot less than any comparable Mac. So, with [...]

Two years ago, I bought my first Intel-based Mac, a 17-inch MacBook Pro, to replace a similarly-outfitted PowerBook G4. Yes, I have an affinity for larger screens. In fact, I’d spring for a 20-inch model if I could afford it and it wasn’t too heavy — and that may be why Apple isn’t producing any. As [...]

Whenever an analyst wants to write something without thinking, it’s easy to pontificate on such silliness as the alleged resemblance of the iPod to the Sony Walkman. Both gained iconic status, but the latter was eventually largely supplanted by me-too products that were cheaper and offered identical or additional features. And let’s not forget the famous IBM [...]

In the old days, it seemed a rather formidable task to upgrade from one Mac to another. For one thing, you had to figure out what files to keep and which to transfer to the new model. Even with easy networking, this was a complicated process of manual labor to which I didn’t look forward, [...]

Back in the heady days of the Classic Mac OS, Apple had one lame-brained idea after another. Let’s not forget such schemes as QuickDraw GX, for example, which held out a lot of promise on paper but never realized its potential. But that was only one example of Apple’s failed technologies during the 1990s. Perhaps the most [...]

A normal part of child psychology is that, if the parent asks for something, the response will often be the opposite of what they expect. This is part of the process of establishing the child’s own independent personality. Now I wouldn’t say that Apple’s strategy shows a childlike veneer, but they certainly have long-term marketing [...]

I recall writing several articles detailing my original expectations of Leopard, and my sincere hope that Apple, having extra time to finish it up, would grace us all with a more stable release. Depending on your point of view, they may or may not have succeeded. But it’s my feeling Apple delivered a product that wasn’t [...]

I’d like to say that there’s no truth to the rumor that the financial media and Wall Street analysts are out to get Apple. But they’ve had a long-term habit of creating negative spins about Apple’s ongoing sales picture that have, at times, knocked its stock price for a loop. So I suppose you know [...]

Yes, everything old is new again. This week we hard the story about a certain Florida IT company that is evidently planning to sell home-built Intel-based computers that will supposedly run Mac OS X Leopard. Now before I tell you more about the alleged clone, let’s go back in time to the last decade and explore [...]

At one time, whenever Apple released a new or upgraded product, it would get major coverage at a Macworld Expo and WWDC. Today, two annual events are simply not sufficient to cover the range of Apple’s development process. Indeed, every few weeks, something new arrives with the Apple logo on it, from a new, cutting-edge [...]

On this all-star episode, Wired’s Leander Kahney discusses his new best-selling book about Steve Jobs and his management style, entitled “Inside Steve’s Brain.” You’ll also hear from InfoWorld Executive Editor Galen Gruman on the increasing acceptance of Macs in the enterprise and the status of the great desktop publishing wars involving Adobe InDesign and QuarkXPress. Macworld Lab Director Jim [...]

How well I remember the claim, years ago, that Macs weren’t really business computers. The interface was simply too cute, and you had to use a genuine PC to get real business chores done. Of course, they forgot that Microsoft Excel actually premiered on the Mac platform before it was ported to Windows. The same [...]

Although couched in an expected and extremely positive spin about future earnings, Microsoft didn’t have an awful lot to crow about this past quarter. Income from Windows was rather lackluster, even though sales of new PCs are on the increase around the world. So what’s at work here, and why the disparity? Well, one alleged reason is [...]

This week, Opera released a new beta of version 9.5 of its Mac browser. Now this isn’t necessarily a significant event, because Opera regularly releases updates for its products. However, like most other browsers — with one notable exception — Opera offers phishing protection. What this means is that, in the event you click, say, on [...]

The other day, I read an article in Daniel Knight’s usually excellent LowEndMac site, in which he interviews musician and artist Scott Hansen, a devoted Mac user who is willing to overlook alleged performance limitations with Mac OS X because he still thinks it’s far, far better. So what performance limitations are we talking about? Well, according [...]

You most likely know that the newest iteration of the MacBook Pro uses Intel’s powerful and energy-saving Penryn processors. You also know that some of the touchscreen tricks from the iPhone and MacBook AIr have been transplanted to the touchpads of the MacBook and MacBook Pro. Adding the Multi-Touch feature allows you to, for example, pinch [...]

Do you remember the good old days, when there was virtually no Mac software at any local computer shop? Well, you’d think, what with Mac sales going through the roof, you’d find a rich selection at such dealers these days. But expectations and realities are far, far apart these days. Consider those hundreds of Best Buy electronics [...]

In recent days, I’ve commented about some issues that have gotten a fair amount of press lately. Like some of the silly arguments in our presidential campaign these days about who is “elite” and who isn’t, I regard some of the most blatant spin that emerges from some tech pundits these days as completely wrongheaded. [...]

I feel real lucky to be using a 30-inch display, because I need lots of space on my screen with which to get work done. Now I have to tell you that the first Mac I brought into my home (after working at an office with one for several years) came with the famous Apple [...]

As I’ve said so many times — and I bet some of you are bored — I’m a devout believer in the backup religion. Whenever I create mission-critical files, such as interviews for my two radio shows, I make two backups immediately. Take that literally. I will even postpone a bathroom visit to start the [...]

When some of you first saw the Leopard version of the menu bar, I bet there were a few grumbles about its near-invisibility with some screen backdrops. Indeed, I suppose Apple’s interface designers took the hint and made it less transparent as time passed. At least, that’s what it seems based upon what Steve Jobs [...]

You just knew it had to happen. Within a day or two after Apple releases a major product or product enhancement, all bets are off. The ugly face of whatever it is they delivered comes to the surface, and, before long, you begin to wonder how such an abject failure can actually succeed — until [...]

Night Owl Rating: 5 out of 5 stars The first time you gaze at the Leopard upgrade kit, you wonder how something that does so much fits into such a small box. But Apple has taken its environmental pretensions to heart and reduced the extra stuffing in many of its latest software packages — except, of [...]

Across the world as I write this, tens of thousands — maybe hundreds of thousands — of copies of Leopard are on their merry way to Mac users. The tech press, and even some mainstream news outlets such as The New York Times, USA Today and The Wall Street Journal, have had the Golden Master [...]

With worldwide Leopard coming out parties, and lots and lots of copies arriving the very first day Mac OS 10.5 is out — and maybe sooner if you can believe some reports — you’d almost expect massive upgrades being performed over a period of several days. This is a vision that seems real enough, although [...]

I feel like a broken record (you do remember records, right?) when I keep preaching the backup religion, yet when Apple said that roughly 26% of my fellow Mac users backup anything at all, I had to feel extremely disappointed. The news that only a fraction of that number routinely used backup software was even more [...]

When you examine Apple’s financials in even a cursory fashion, you have to consider that, not so long ago, it took almost a year for them to earn $6.22 billion of revenue. Now Apple can do this in a single quarter, and nobody can guess just where this might end up in the next few [...]

As Leopard approaches, you have to wonder whether even 300-plus new features and enhancements will be sufficient to sway the skeptics about its potential. You see, as far as software numbering schemes go, incrementing a single tenth of a point usually signifies a pretty insignificant update. I mean, you can name most any application’s transition from, [...]

All right, with a genuine 316 new features and enhancements in Leopard, you can probably talk all day about the ones that appeal to you. But you only read, most times at any rate, about a handful of sexy features that, while useful in and of themselves, may not be the most important reasons to [...]

You know a lot of what Steve Jobs says during interviews may be overlooked when controversy erupts about something Apple is doing at any given moment. Months back, for example, when Jobs was asked about a Software Development Kit (SDK) for the iPhone, to give third-party software developers a chance to build applications for it, he [...]

Now that Apple’s latest feline is days away from arriving in your city, or at your home or office, I’m sure many of you are going to be thoroughly digesting Apple’s officially certified list of 316 new features to see which ones please you. Indeed, there’s probably plenty of meat for anyone, whether you’re a consumer, [...]

There are two things that are certain. Apple loves Friday for shipping operating system upgrades, and they were going to deliver Leopard by hook or crook before the end of the month. So these two events have coalesced with the unsurprising news that Leopard will officially arrive on October 26 at 6:00 PM local time [...]

Before Microsoft pulled a few notorious stunts to dominate the browsing world, which got the attention of antitrust regulators, there was Netscape. But over time, it grew fat and buggy, which is something you’re apt to blame Microsoft for. In those days, forgetting the dirty tricks, the original Internet Explorer, particularly on the Mac, was a [...]

From the time we are children, we instinctively know how to find a reason for doing something wrong. For example, when you slap your brother or sister, and your mother is justifiably angered, you make the excuse that they hit you first, that you were only fighting back. Unfortunately, this sort of behavior sustains itself into [...]

We all know that Apple receives its share of legal actions to defend itself against. Some are related to possible use of a patent without permission, or treating customers badly. There’s even a long-standing lawsuit from some Mac dealers who felt their businesses suffered big time because Apple favored its own retail outlets. More recently, people [...]

Years ago, Mac users had to feel like outsiders. We were a bunch of eccentrics who had money to burn, and chose to spend it on an overpriced, underpowered computer that was just too pretty to take seriously. In those days, even using a mouse was a certain sign of insanity. It didn’t help that most [...]

When I wrote a Mac War Stories column some years back, I didn’t expect to receive too many responses. Yet a lot of you have had problems with your Macs over the years. When you factor in Apple’s own extended repair programs, which cover some notebooks and desktops, you began to wonder whether quality control [...]

There’s a lot to be said about Apple’s famous marketing machine. They have managed to grab the world’s attention big-time, with a laser-like focus on the company’s important products and other announcements. On the other hand, you have to wonder whether or not they are beginning to lose their mojo, because of recent glaring missteps. While [...]

To many of you, the Mac programmers over at Microsoft are the company’s shining stars. Although they labor within the confines of a byzantine bureaucracy and strangely wrong-headed policies, they are not supposed to be drinking the company’s kool-aid. Rather, they’re supposed to be devoted Mac users who have carved out a solid niche where [...]

The best way to observe the state of the so-called computer platform wars today is to look at the ever-popular Mac and PC spots, where two friendly dudes banter about the advantages or otherwise of their chosen operating system. At the end, you come away with the impression that the personifications of the Mac and PC [...]

With extremely limited fanfare, Microsoft this week confirmed analyst predictions and introduced the second generation Zune players, which sport basic specs and pricing similar to the iPod. Now when Apple introduces a new product these days, except for minor revisions to existing models, such as Macs, there’s a huge amount of anticipation that may go on [...]

It’s a well-known fact that no PC hardware or software maker will survive if you stop buying new versions of their products. While there will always be new customers, a company wants to extract as much cash as possible from the ones that have already purchased their stuff. Of course, this applies to all businesses building [...]

On or about January 15, 2008, according to current plan, Microsoft’s Mac Business Unit will release the long-awaited — and somewhat delayed — Office 2008 for the Mac in the U.S. They are busy touting its new features, which include updated artwork, a page layout feature for Word, and various and sundry tools for easier [...]

One of the big stories this weekend, other than the usual political shenanigans and lurid celebrity gossip, was the claim that some iPhones were turned into bricks by the latest firmware update from Apple. Of course, Apple warned iPhone users about the potential consequences of unlocking their phones, which is intended to allow them to [...]