>From where I sit, the Apple Computer Co line was always, "Make sure they can't
buy from anyone else!" and their development of proprietary standards, just
like DEC's, was mainly for that purpose. They took it to the extreme a year
or two after the MAC came out, in that one could not easily work MACs into any
other LAN arrangement without buying lots of Apple-specific hardware to let it
happen. Once we had it done at MMC, where I was working at the time, it was
less costly, for example, to work out the networking scheme to get the MACs
and PC's on the same LAN and use a PC with a pretty extensive hardware set to
dirve an HP laserjet that was coincidentally attached to that PC, than to buy
an Apple laserwriter. I ordered a PC/AT with nearly everything one could get,
a fancy display board and monitor, mouse, huge hard disk, and the laser
printer, and still had a smaller bill than if I'd have ordered just the laser
printer. That was not an option because the software I needed didn't exist
for the MAC.
Now, that was at a point that was probably the extreme of the situation, and
soon after that one began to see some cracks in the Apple armor, that enabled
third-parties to provide lower-cost options to the all-Apple solution. Pretty
soon, we were readily networking PC's and MACs, but it was always easier to
print from a PC to a MAC printer than from the MACs to a PC-based printer.
<getting up on soapbox>
I don't think it was arrogance. I think they were pissing on their fencepost.
It did hurt them over time, though, and they've gotten away from that.
Overall, I think the committed a phenomenal blunder doing things that way,
though it's hard seeing the vast amounts of dough they made as any sort of
blunder. If they had, instead, opened up their system and made a split
between their hardware and their software, making their graphic/desktop
software a product compatible with whatever hardware they wanted, they'd have
owned the PC market within a year. MS Windows might have shown up later, but
it wouldn't have had the impact it had.
<descends from soapbox>
Just my two cents' worth.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris" <mythtech_at_mac.com>
To: "Classic Computer" <classiccmp_at_classiccmp.org>
Sent: Wednesday, May 01, 2002 11:25 AM
Subject: Re: APPLEVISION Monitor
> >Now there's one of the problems with Apple's approach ... My old (1993-94)
> >'486 setups support PCI, (some of 'em ... the ones I use) while these old
> >MAC's don't because Apple was slow to adopt PCI.
>
> Not slow to adopt... too arrogant to get with the program and stop using
> their own standards.
>
> The first PCI based macs showed up in 1995
>
> -chris
>
> <http://www.mythtech.net>
>
>
Received on Wed May 01 2002 - 12:58:51 BST