Re: Randy, wake up!

[pubpc1@library.ucla.edu]

Todd P. Whitesel wrote,
in response to my reply:
> >According to them, the Motorolla and PowerComputing units that
> >were on the roll were faster than Apple's G3.  In fact, MW/MU
> >claims that Apple pulled the plug because these hardware were
> >_too good_.
> 
> Yes and yes. But the health of the Mac market is not the health of Apple
> Computer Inc.!! Apple is public and BIG and has had many disappointing
> quarters. The stockholders were screaming for blood; now most of them are
> feeling like they're watching a huge train wreck in slow motion. Apple is
> scared for its life and has reverted to totally selfish panic mode like a
> hunted creature in the wild.

Their troubles are nobody's fault but their own.  From their
deliberate sabotaging of their own popular Apple IIGS line
(something that Apple founder Steve Wozniak agreed Apple's
brass did in an InCider interview in the late '80s) to their
cancelation of System 7-Intel.  Time and time again, they
kicked themselves in the butt so that now they're trying to
blame the cloners for their troubles.  The cloners did nothing
but the RIGHT thing.  CHRP was good.  ZIF sockets were good
(yes, Intel's Pentium II is not, but that's because they are
acting like Apple...they'll learn when the PC makers turn on
them and go IBM/Cyrix and AMD!), System 7-Intel was good.
Incidentally, for those who don't know, CHRP is a standard
by which MacOS PPC machines would have become hardware compat.
with many PC standard devices such as parallel ports and
cost competitive with PCs.  Very good idea, killed by Apple.

With Steve Jobs back, they are putting Rhapsody, they're last
hope, on the back burner.  Have you heard, Rhapsody is only
going to be on their servers...MacOS is going to remain
separate and their prime focus.

Let's see what would have happened had Apple allowed an Intel
version of System 7, shall we?  Remember OS/2 Warp?  For a few
years, IBM's revolutionary OS sold like crazy.  Even though it
was not standard, it was so superior to Win 3.1 and DOS that
PC users flocked to it.  Remember the commercials with the nuns
and the monks talking about OS/2 and how revolutionary it was
and so on.  It was only when Windows 95 came out that OS/2 lost
its gleam (even though it is _still_ the superior OS).

Now imagine an OS/2, but with more clout.  Something that is
more accepted and already has an installed base.  System 7-Intel,
marketed at the same time as OS/2 Warp, would have probably
succeeded in drawing a major segment of PC users away from
Microsoft.  The Win 3.1 era was Microsoft's weak point and
Apple missed the boat because it was afraid.

This is the same fear that lead Apple to cancel the superior
(hardware wise and installed base wise) Apple II (esp GS) line
to try to upgrade a computer, then the Mac Plus, which was not
selling well at all at the time.

Killing the clones may protect the Mac hardware, but hurt
MacOS in the long run.  If Apple wants to be like Microsoft,
it has let others be Compaq.  Do you really think PC's would
have advanced so much had IBM continued its monopoly?

Randy says the clone makers did nothing to expand the Mac
market.  I disagree.  What I see is Apple losing market
share and the clone markers expanding theirs.  The clone
makers kept MacOS's overall market share at least somehwere
near 10%.  The reason Apple perceived the cloners as eating
into their market is because their own Macs were poor
compared to the clones.  Had Apple's Macs been up to snuff,
the entire MacOS market would have expanded.

Case in point: When my aunt and uncle went to buy their
first PC, I went along to explain to them the pros and
cons of each.  They really liked MacOS, but were turned
off by Apple's prices.  Thanks to Umax, they now own
a MacOS clone they could afford.  Had Umax not been around,
they would now have a PC.  Without the clones, the MacOS
market would have _shrunk_ more sizably by now.  The
clones were not the reason Apple was losing market shares,
PC's were.  Without the clones, we can just sit back and
watch the MacOS market collapse.  Economics really: if MacOS
machines are too expensive, people will turn to PC's.

> 
> I don't like what's happened either, but I have to agree that Apple needs
> that revenue a hell of a lot more than Motorola or even Power Computing.
> Assuming Apple pulls through, I expect them to be real nice to everyone
> they have snubbed during these dark hours.

And that's another thing: they should be nice to Motorolla.
Who makes the PPC, after all.  And Randy says the cloners
did nothing to advance MacOS.  What about the G3 chip!

> 
> >Same stupidity that led them to killed the superior IIGS!
> >(the GS of 1986 was superior in every way to the Mac Plus
> >and 6MHz IBM PC/AT of 1986)
> 
> Except for one thing: WDC couldn't make a fast 65816 in decent quantities,
> and ultimately they didn't need to. They are still around today, selling to
> the 8-bit and 16-bit microcontroller markets. They were not responsive to
> Apple when the IIgs/Mac decision was being considered. At least one
> interview of old Apple employees uncovered the nugget "if the 68K had been
> a year later or the 65816 had been a year earlier, then there quite possibly
> would never have been a Mac". Sorry, but I don't remember the source. Argh.

Not according to Western Design Center.  Their story is that
they had the faster 65C816 chips in sufficient quantities.  At
least when the ROM 3 came out, there was NO excuse for Apple not
to have upped the speed of the GS.  Not when AE and Zip Tech was
coming out with accelerators in mass quantities.

Had Apple shown interest in Western Design Center, you could bet
that the 65C832 and its 32-bit bus cousin would have followed.

> 
> On the other hand, Motorola kept cranking out faster 68K's every year for
> its war with Intel;  Moto was responsive to the requests of developers who
> wanted to use the 68K in unix boxes; and Moto used the 68K internally for
> all kinds of stuff, so there was a customer base with lots of clout pushing
> the architecture forward.

Except for one thing: the GS outsold the entire Mac line during
its first year and Apple rewarded it by cutting all advertisement.
Like with the clones, Apple was afraid the GS was selling TOO WELL.

Picture this: GOOD SALES->MORE ADVERTISEMENT->BETTER SALES->
MORE 65C816 IN USE->INCENTIVE TO PRODUCE FASTER AND DERIVED
65C832 and 32-bit bus cousin->MORE GS SALES

_Apple_ was the one that broke this success cycle.

Meanwhile, the Mac Plus was _not_ selling well.  It was only
after the Mac LC and Performa that Mac sales began to pick
up steam.  During the Mac's bad days, Apple II sales provided
the bucks for the R&D that kept the Mac alive.  Funds that
should have been used to improve the Apple IIGS and thus
kept the customer base happy.

> 
> Add to that stupid legal bogosity, like Apple Records giving the DOC chip
> on the IIgs motherboard the hairy eyeball because Apple had agreed to never
> enter the music business. (The first internal beta Apple Developer CD's had
> music tracks on them; the officially released ones didn't.) Things like that.

The thing with the Beetles was stupid, on the Beetles' part.
God, that's probably why no Macs have synthesizer chips in
them.

> 
> The point I'm getting at here is, had Apple gone with the "IIx" instead of
> the Mac, they almost definitely would have been creamed by the rise of
> Wintel. (I say almost because they could have bought WDC, licensed the 65816,
> or bought CPU design expertise to make the 65032 real. Who knows?)
> 
> Todd Whitesel
> toddpw @ ugcs.caltech.edu

Problem is, you could say the same thing about Intel.  But Intel
has become the leader.  Why?  Because IBM took the lead and
supported the chip.  For every successful chip, you have to have
a computer company back it.  If IBM had neglected the PC as much
as Apple neglected the II, do you really think we'd have the
Pentium today?  Similarly, had Apple showed genuine interest in
the GS, today Western Design Center would be a rival of Intel.
Several clone makers, including Laser, were already close to
rolling out GS clones after all.

-Scott G.