Boot Camp: Apple’s Insanely Bad Idea
When Apple released Boot Camp Mac users everywhere breathed a huge sigh of relief. What the zealots never mentioned, the one thing we were most jealous of when looking at our Windows using counterparts, was not being able to run Freecell. Sure, there were Mac versions of solitaire but none were quite as polished as the 2D card game that is the crown jewel of Windows XP gaming. Being able to natively run FreeCell means Mac users can now step into the 21st century with both feet. Minesweeper is, of course, a huge bonus.
Kidding aside, the release of Boot Camp, an Apple produced method to load XP was greeted with jubilation around the web and with a sharp spike in the share price by the financial markets. The immediate upside is easy to see: booting into Windows easily means that people who have computers running both systems can now get by with a single Apple rectangle (Apple makes the most stylish rectangles in the business), Windows users that secretly desired a Mac can go ahead and take the plunge without the fear that they’ve just invested in proprietary hardware that runs an OS they don’t like, and finally Mac users can run the latest games with just a reboot.
On the surface, it seems that the switch to Intel coupled with the release of Boot Camp quashes many of the objections that people have had about Macs in the past. In fact, it even goes a long way towards ameliorating one of the biggest complaints: price. People are generally willing to pay for added utility and Apple has added a lot of utility with the free download of Boot Camp.
Of course, there are a great many things that seem like a good idea at the time that later turn out to be the worst possible move a company could make. Losing a little market share to Pepsi? Screw old Coke, a product adored by millions, let’s revamp the formula! Apple just took one of these steps with the release of Boot Camp.
Why is Boot Camp the Apple equivalent of the New Coke fiasco? Well, because Apple is trading a little short-term gain for a long-term negative. At this moment in time, OS X does have a big lead over Windows XP but Vista is around the corner and it promises to address a lot of the problems found in Windows. So, for the next few months, people might buy a Mac with the idea of using it as a dual boot machine and get slowly but steadily sucked in by OS X’s superiority, but once Vista comes out that will likely change.
In fact, Apple has tried this before. In an effort to stave off dwindling sales Apple once offered Macs with PC cards in them. These were the equivalent of dual boot machines. The theory went that people would buy the machine for their Windows needs, but use the Mac OS more and more as time went by. Finally, unable to resist the allure of Mac OS you’d have a full blown Apple zealot on your hands. The reality was that Mac users bought the machines (they were brisk sellers) and got converted to Windows users. This was when the cutting edge Windows was 3.0, it is hard to imagine that Boot Camp won’t make at least as many Windows converts out of Mac users than the other way around.
Worse still for Apple, this move hurts development for the Mac. Imagine you use AutoCad on a Windows PC. The moments you’re not using AutoCad you’re using your Mac for everything else. You’ve asked AutoCad to make a Mac version, you’ve signed the petition. You’re simply dying for the moment AutoCad comes out on the Mac.
The Mac, you’re aware, has been slowly gaining market share despite the uncertainty surrounding the switch to Itel. At some point, you feel certain, AutoCad will see the light (and dollar signs) and ship a Mac version of the software. You can bury that pipe dream in a shallow grave thanks to Boot Camp. The demands for AutoCad (or any other sufficiently expensive software) can now be dismissed with a simple e-mail including a link pointing to the Boot Camp download. Instead of the Mac software eco system getting more robust with the move, it has been invaded by a destructive, noxious weed that will stifle growth.
That is probably the most troubling thing about the Boot Camp announcement, the deleterious effect on the number of Mac developers. Sure there will always be Mac-only developers and companies that desire access to those with pre-Intel machines will be forced, at least for the next few years, to continue Mac development. There will be a short term benefit but, when considering the long-term ramifications, it is very difficult to see many positives coming out of this move.
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IMO if it puts the pressure on Apple to really truly be insanely great, then that’s just what they need.
Call me a macbot, but you’re certainly giving vista a lot of credit.
There are two points that I would like to bring up.
- First, it was already possible to boot XP on your Mac. That process would have only gotten easier as more hackers worked on it.
- Second, even after Boot Camp has been released, there is only a particular category of people who are going to try this. The vast majority of computer users will not dual boot. The process requires some expertise with your computer and a licensed copy of Windows.
None of this goes against what you have written, but it may just be that the Boot Camp release was more a PR move and a hat tip to those of us who would have installed XP on the Mac even if of Apple did not provide a method to do it.
Just like Virtual PC causes droves of people to switch to Windows, and developers to only code for Windows?
The AutoCAD reference affects only a very small majority of people. And Architects can still use a Mac to do their work, so Apple at least gets a hardware sale out of it. Apple’s new desktops certainly should be very interesting. For developers its going to come down to developement environments. If it’s easier to program in Windows, then programs will be written for Windows. It’s the applications that will make the difference. And from what I see in the Mac shareware and small utilities market some really nice programs a re being made for OSX
Complete nonsense, for one simple reason. Consumers don’t compete for developers. It’s the other way around. Any developer who wants any significant presence among Mac users needs to release an OS X version. That is never going to change, and any developer who thinks that will change, might as well just write off all their Mac business because some other developer will come along and take advantage of the fact that they have just left the door wide open for competitors.
This is some of that magical Mac thinking that developers make Mac products because of letter writing campaigns or for ANY OTHER REASON than that they want the money. That’s the only reason, okay?
Repeat after me. They want the money.
If they’re going to tell Mac users they have to switch to Windows to use their products, then guess what? They ain’t gonna get the money for long.
Mac developers aren’t doing us any favours. They want our money pure and simple. They ain’t gonna get it unless they continue to put out a Mac product.
Simple economics renders this article completely null and void.
DB.
dear person writing this article…
are you a little bit crazy? first of all, as one person mentioned already, you’re giving Vista WAY too much credit. i can’t see any cicumstance where Vista is going to be better than OS X. they’ve already announced that it’s been stripped of many of the features that were going to make it really compete with OS X.
the beauty of what Jobs and Co. have done here is that they’re saying “go ahead… double boot… compare Windows and OS X side by side… we dare ya!” they’re confident that when that happens, people will pick OS X. that’s why i made the switch 4 years ago. (that and my powerbook was way cooler than any Sony Vaio.)
besides… you know that Stevie J. has a plan. he’s not an idiot. every time he releases something that we think is crazy at first, it ends up being genious.
Dude, you are soooooooooo wrong, and I’ll tell you why.
Solitaire ‘til Dawn is waaaay more polished than Freecell.
“You can bury that pipe dream in a shallow grave thanks to Boot Camp. The demands for AutoCad (or any other sufficiently expensive software) can now be dismissed with a simple e-mail including a link pointing to the Boot Camp download”
Chris, this is totally absurd, and you should know it. I am very much with Dogger Blue. Anyone using this practice - which I will not deny exists, especially looking at specialized but low ressource software - is basically communicating “I don’t want your money, you’re not worth my effort”.
I also would be very critical about the notion that someone who has a single bread and butter app to run would do that in a dual-boot scenario. The operating system is just that, an operating environment. You may do 90% of your daily work with app X, but then you need some Email, Web, Textprocessing, Scanning, Faxing, Date & Adress database, accounting… To do all that in a coherent environment is what makes an effective setup. “Yeah, I’ll look up Peter’s address, hold on, I’ll just reboot” - yeah right.
3 reasons why this decision by Apple makes sense:
1) Apple is a hardware company—always has been. If they’re going to sell more hardware as a result of this then that is good.
2) People were going to hack their machines to death in order to get XP to boot. So rather than face a customer support nightmare, Apple stepped up to the plate with a safe and easy way to boot windows.
3) When/If Vista is released it will have very few, if any, advantages over OS X. At that time, OS X will be well into it’s 5th revision and very near it’s 6th. Vista will be brand new, and jast as with XP, there will be a host of issues. Not to mention, it’ll take forever for the majority of Windows users to begin adopting Vista over XP. It was enough of an issue to switch to XP in the forst place. Not to mention, M$ doesn’t provide the monitary incentive that Apple does to use it’s system software.
Dual booting is a good thing. I’m waiting for the great thing: real virtualization. So I can work in OSX with a Win App running natively and unobstrusively in a corner window.
Still, even with just dual booting more people who were sitting on the fence will now take the plunge and get a Mac not right away, but when the time to replace the current Wintel box comes.
And with Vista delayed and Leopard coming out August.. . I hope Apple strikes while the iron is hot and does a full all-out Mac marketing blitz this Christmas.
Basically it boils down to this: Apple is finally pitting OS X head to head with Windows, and may the better OS win (no pun intended!). This could be a disaster move, if Windows turns out to be the better OS, but if more people prefer OSX, then it will be a stroke of genius. Only hindsight will tell. My money is on OS X.
I thought April Fools was almost a week ago.
O.K.
I got my dad to switch to mac, or at least buy one.
He bought the i-mac that swivled (the best i-mac concept i.m.o. for the versatility, which personally I liked.)
However, he seldom uses it, says it confuses him, whats more, my 2 younger sisters (14 and 18 years younger...Im 32) said that windows was easier to use and less confusing for them.
I was astounded. A mac user through and through I am.
But what was this responce...ah ha...this has to do with the fact this is what they got to know. (I was raised on mac in school, they on windows.)
There is a disadvantage, and those posting saying that people will see the ease of use of the Mac OS and its superiortiy probably are like me and think this is the logicial step for those who come from the windows world.
I think you may find the opposite, and share the same surprise as I did, that yound teenagers thought windows was user friendly when they had access to macs in the house.
Who knows...maybe I have wierd relatives and I came from an egg...could be.
Best to all.
Gods Peace
I’ve seen this before, people who were taught on Windows preferring Windows. Hopefully we’ll see that as more and more people are exposed to both simultaneously, they’ll tend to prefer Macs.
FreeCell for Mac OS X.