My Mac Infactuation: The Bait and Switch

From the “Mac’s are sooo much more expensive than a PC” Dept.

Hi all,

Just wanted to rant about how my favourite computer company is doing some very bad things to its loyal supporters.

In December 2001 I purchased a top of the line iBook from Apple Computer for just over $3000 CDN.

Specs for you tech-heads:

• 600 MHz G3 Processor
• 640 MBytes RAM
• 8MB ATI Rage128Mobility Graphics
• 12-inch TFT XGA display (1024×768)
• 15GB HDD
• DVD–ROM/CD-RW combo Drive

It weighs less than 5 lbs, has firewire and USB to boot—it’s pretty sweet.

I love the size and form-factor.

Now, my main beef with the iBook is that the operating system really bogs down what I feel is reasonably fast hardware. I don’t think you’ll get any arguments from anyone who uses Apple’s Mac OS X. It’s downright pokey on my iBook.

Now, currently the OS is at version 10.1.5, but a new version of Mac OS X, labelled 10.2, and codenamed, Jaguar, will be released August 27th.

Now, from what I’ve read, the OS is suppose to pack a wallop of a performance increase, even on older hardware. Although, I daresay that my 7-month old iBook is old.

Finally, an OS upgrade that doesn’t slow down your computer.

Here’s the problem: There’s no upgrade deal for it. I have to buy a full version of OS 10.2 at $195 CDN. That’s pricey.

To add insult-to-injury, Apple iTools, a free service that Apple provided to its customers (a 5 MB @mac.com IMAP Email account, 20MB of online Files storage, a greeting card service and a Webpage/photo gallery), that was advertised on the box that my iBook shipped no less, is now requiring users to pay $100 USD to keep their accounts active.

Now, I don’t use iTools all that much, but damn yo! that’s not the way you keep customers, or make PC users switch to the mac platform….

I should note that the newly rebranded iTools, called .Mac (dot-mac), does add significant functionality (15 MB IMAP email account, 100 MB of File storage, back-up software for you computer, Anti-Viral program for your computer, Online Calendar, etc).

<sigh>

Needless to say, a lot of people in the Macintosh community feel betrayed.

Personally, I don’t blame Apple. The days were Free-stuff on the Internet are way over—it costs money to run their service. However, I’m pissed because Apple didn’t give me much of a choice. Well, no choices at all, really.

You either spend the money to upgrade the operating system to 10.2, or you stay with 10.1.5.

You either spend the money to upgrade to the .MAC service, or you drop your iTools account and email account.

Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t care. Microsoft does this all the time with their OS.

However, it’s the principle of it. Mac OS X is an “incomplete” operating system. It’s cool, it looks great, but it lacks certain functionality, speed and polish. Even Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO admits it, “Mac OS 10.1 is only half-way there“, and won’t be finished until some time in 2003 when OS XI (10.3?) is released. A lot of people are asking, why should I pay for functionality that was promised all the way back when OS 10.0 was release back in May 2001? Moreover, a lot of people feel that they already pay a premium for the hardware (they do) and that the OS and especially the iTools/.Mac service was bundled with the the hardware.

Apple is a hardware company, right?

It sucks to own a Macintosh computer these days.

I’m very fortunate that I didn’t switch all my email and stuff over to iTools, or I’d be fleeced for an account that was advertised as a free service to all Mac users.

I think the OS upgrade is worth it. So I’ll spend the $200 CDN on that.

As for the new .Mac service (iTools), I’d rather spend my money upgrading the functionality of this site (PHP-mySQL support + 100 MB storage).

Now I don’t know how everyone else feels about this. I truly think that mac’s are more expensive than PCs, but you get what you pay for I feel. I just wish I had a choice.

Cheers,

Tai