News for Sunday, 16 April 2006

Ten days ago, Apple was announcing Boot Camp, the biggest surprise of the year (so far...). Even if the capability to boot WinXP on a MacIntel is now considered as "normal", let's make a short review of the last 10 days and also explore what could be the future after such announcement.
Despite the fact that Boot Camp is still a beta version, it works relatively well. Of course one can notice some examples of users who have been unable to boot OSX after having installed Boot Camp and tried WinXP on their MacIntel. But it remains minor compared to the large community of Mac users who have successfully performed the operation on their MacIntel.
But of course one can hear many complains, and funny enough, originating from both anti-windows and anti-Mac users, who are joining their voices to condemn this new function.
If it is too early to evaluate the mid- and long-term effect of Boot Camp on the OSX developer community, when considering short-term expectation, Apple should benefit from Boot Camp release.
Of course, some users will buy a MacIntel only to run WinXP, does not matter, Apple has been smart enough to imply that Boot Camp requires OSX to be installed. So those users will of course be tempted to try OSX, and the strength of Apple's OS will for sure convert many of them into new Mac users. Only the iApps package might be enough to turn a PC users into a Mac users.
But Boot Camp is also a fantastic opportunity or a life jacket for "switcher" willing to move to the Mac, without getting the risk of entering an unknown area where they could lose their marks. Thanks to switchers that will take the advantage of Boot Camp, Apple might increase significantly its market shares of computer manufacturer. If 10% might look like an unreachable goal couple of months ago, it is definitely not anymore.
To conclude, Boot Camp is also a marketing message for PPC/PC owners who might not delay further their acquisition of MacIntel thanks to the huge PC software collection now opened to Mac users (especially that most of those applications will never be ported to OSX).
Apple is offering to users the best of both worlds, Mac and PC, and at the same time ensures its own future.

Amazing but true, less than 4 months after their introduction, one can find iMacIntel 17" and 20" models on the European RefurbStore:
- UK Refurb Store.
- German Refurb Store.
- French Refurb Store.
You might find iMac 17'' Core Duo 1.83 GHz with -15% discount or 20'' Core Duo 2 GHz model with -16% .
Pay attention, some iMacG5 17" 1.9GHz are also on sale with -25% discount; but are much less interesting to our point of view.