Apple's 30th Anniversary show number one: Boot Camp

I get really annoyed at

I get really annoyed at these knee-jerk anti-Apple folks that can't compare equivalent computers and keep spouting the tired, old, and untrue "30% mark-up for substandard hardware". If you compare as close to identical as possible quality name-brand hardware, Macs are price competitive. They have been for years. The apparent differences are that XP Pro is almost comparable to OS X and XP Home is no where close, you can build-your-own PeeCee (comparisons apply equally to Dell, HP, etc.), there are low-quality PeeCee manufactures (yes, Dell is a low-end manufacturer) and Apple has never sold the PC equivalent to a big-engine-manual-transmission-AM/FM-radio-power-nothing auto.

I am a new user of the Mac.

I am a new user of the Mac. I've been working in Windows for several years. I just purchased a MacBookPro and installed XP PRO. I have to use Windows on a network. As soon as I set up the network connection, I ran into the problem of the keystroke combination ctrl-alt-del. I have to attach an external keyboard in order to use use this combination to log in, get to task manager, etc. If anyone knows how you can use the MacBookPro keyboard to simulate this keystroke combination, I'd love to hear about it.

BIG DEAL!!! We've been dual

BIG DEAL!!! We've been dual booting for years between Win and Linux. Since when does Jobs come up with anything actually new?? God, I miss the Woz.

Apple coulda/shoulda been a contender. They blew it when they dusted off all of us original Apple ][ users 25 years ago. We had 150 owners, in our Houston Bay Area Apple User Group (BAAGH) of which I was the founding President, who converted 100% to the original XT, because Jobs killed off the Woz designed machine for his lah dee dah notions. The XT was like the original Apple ][... pop the top and dig around inside. Jobs sealed up his machines and had no hardware upgrade path. Woz had already left the building. I knew he was a Genius!

Running Fedora Core5 and NO stinking Windows or stinking System X, Ric

I don't see it changing

I don't see it changing computing in the least. Maybe for people already using Mac's it might get them to use Windows more often, but in a corporate and home user environment, Mac OS/Hardware offers nothing that a Windows PC can't already do, and do it better. Graphics design? Nope Mac lost that edge just a few years back. Security? Nope not here either, just Nobody cares enough to hack into a Mac (not enough people use them, mac is small fish to hackers). Infact in the long run I see this doing more harm than good. Software companies which already standardize to windows, and only release a Mac port if they want to cover Mac user's sales base (its tiny compared to the PC market, so few companies jump on this). Now they don't even have to do that, they release the PC version and tell you to install XP on your Mactel if you want. This also raises an important point for Corporations. Licensing software, domain and system monitoring, remote desktop and all these other helpful software applications you find on any Windows client domain infrastructure will no longer work. Sure you could re-engineer them, but companies don't want to dump that amount of money into making everything work on MacOS when they can simply keep everything running windows, and everything will keep on working.

The Bootcamp software from

The Bootcamp software from Apple for the Intel based iMacs is going to change computing.

This is the next advance of making the Mac platform a Universal computing tool.

With the Ability to run;-

1. Mac OS ( with the lack of Viruses, Infections, Spam, Trojans and Addware giving anybody a comfortable work environment ).
2. Unix /Linux ( with many low cost programmes ).
3. Windows XP ( providing the other programs, which are not written for the Mac OS - yet).

It makes the Macs with Intel chips, a tool for those who need to get a job done.

In addition to have hardware and technical support, which are generally much more reliable, is an extra bonus.

Michael

As a long term Windows user

As a long term Windows user and a long time fan of Apple flair and design this is a great development.
Storing the CDs in the attic and using Apple lossless on a Mac Mini as a music server to the stereo was a terrible temptation. Now there is no reason to not go for such a fabulous product.Here is one Windows user about to finally get a first hand Mac experience (somehow I don't think I'll be alone)

For years I was an avid Mac

For years I was an avid Mac user / fan. As an IT Director in a mid-sized shop I needed access to both Mac and Windows. In the mid-1990's I was excited when a Mac came out with dual boot capabilities (both Motorola and Intel CPUs.)
I was quickly disillusioned when I found that while you could have both operating systems running and quick switch between the two, you could not run virtual memory on the Mac and you could not copy / paste across the two systems or share files concurrently. I sent it back.
Over time I switched to Windows and there is nothing I can’t do now that I used to do on my Mac.
If you must re-boot from one OS to the other OS the usability will be limited.

As a network security

As a network security specialist, being able to boot both OX X and XP from one laptop is a dream come true. Now I only need one laptop to run all of my Windows and *NIX security tools. Diversity and flexibility will make the Apple hardware more valuable in the marketplace. I wish that all of the Mac purist who feel that they have somehow been physically and emotionally violated would just relax. It's not that serious.

Potential downside for Apple

Potential downside for Apple and Apple users: software developers become less willing to port programs from Windows to Mac OS, knowing that the Windows version will run on both Wintel and Mactel systems. Over time, Mac OS becomes a less useful operating system, fewer folks use it and, eventually, it dies out. Apple is left with the business of trying selling their high-end hardware to run (what we Apple fans believe is) the low-end operating system.