david@wucs.UUCP (David) (07/10/85)
I think that if the mac is going to continue Distribution: net Organization: Washington U. in St. Louis, CS Dept. Lines: 101 Summary: Apple Policies and Attitude: MacTerm, Hard Disks, RAM, ROM Updgrade Does anyone really know what's going on? to grow and succeed in a big way, Apple should adopt a better attitude towards its customers. Some things have come as a pleasant suprise, while others have caused current Mac owners to feel betrayed and misled. The software upgrade, Finder 4.1, etc. was a large improvement. The switcher has been a big help in integrating applications. MacTerminal, on the other hand was handled very poorly. Users who purchased MacTerm 1.1 with the preliminary manual and sent in the card to receive the final manual recently got a letter saying that the new manual will be shipped in 30-60 days and that they would be able to purchase MacTerm 2.0 soon. I think that registered owners of MacTerm 1.1 should be given 2.0 free or at a nominal cost. Treating customers like strangers may be good business in the short run, but it will eventually end up costing more in lost sales. The big advantage that Apple has over the Atari ST and Commodore Amiga (?) right now is existence. Even when these other MacLike machines become available, the Mac will have a substantial lead in the quality and quantity of available software. The primary advantage that the Mac has over the IBM PC's (and compatibles) is the user interface which makes it possible to do many things well on the Mac that are very difficult on other computers. Currently the software base of the IBM PC's is much more mature than the Mac's but the Mac software base has recently reached the point where there are several good, relatively bugfree programs to choose from for most common applications and several specialized ones. In order for the Mac to beat Commodore and Atari in the home market and IBM in the business market, Apple will have to present a more consistent image, and either develop and offer reasonably priced hardware expansion themselves, or adopt a more lenient attitude toward third-party expansion. The single sided drives are barely adequate, with system files usually taking about half of the available disk space. Double sided drives would alleviate the problem somewhat by almost tripling the amount of storage available to the user, but there has been no firm word from Apple on their plans other than 'Sony couldn't supply them in production quantities' a while ago. Currently, all of the hard disks for the mac cost about twice as much as ones with similar capacity for the IBM PC. As all of them, except for the hyperdrive, connect to the mac via the serial port they are also significantly slower. While 10M is a large improvement over 400K, none of the disks can begin to approach the capacities available for IBM PC's. Fast, high capacity, and reasonably priced hard disks will be critical if the mac is to succeed in the business market. While 512K seems like a lot of memory - 5 years ago I couldn't imaging filling that much memory- everything is relative. Some of the more sophisticated applications on the mac are limited by the 512K capacity. With the current prices of RAM chips it is not unreasonable that many users would opt for one or two Meg of RAM. Several third-party companies have introduced products that allow the mac to be expanded to up to two Meg. Some of these require that the extra space be used as RAMdisk while others claim that the extra memory is recognized by the new finder as extra normal RAM and could be used for example to use several large applications in memory at once with the switcher. I, and I think many others, would very much like to expand our systems, but am hesitant because of the mixed (if any) signals from Apple. It is not clear what policy (if any) Apple has in regards to third-party upgrades. Such modifications will undoubtably void the warranty. That is fair. But what effect will they have on future Apple hardware upgrades or the availability of service. For a while, the introduction of the ROM upgrade seemed eminent, so many held off buying hyperdrives, for example, for fear that this would prevent them from getting the upgrade either because of Apple policy or because of compatability problems between the new ROM and the Hyperdrive. The uncertainty in the Mac community because of the lack of a clear and firm plan from Apple is not a positive force. Current Macintosh owners who need more power and capacity, either have to risk buying third-party expansions and possibly being orphaned by Apple or look towards other machines. In such an environment, it is obvious why businesses go for IBM. Current mac owners cannot recommend Macs to users with growing needs without reservations when they themselves are uncertain what lies ahead. According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, Apple will not abandon hyperdrive owners. That sounds encouraging, BUT. If anyone at Apple (or anywhere) knows what's going on, reply or post to the net. David. -------------------------------------------------------------------- The opinions expressed above are my own while under the influence of nothing stronger than caffeine, do not neccesarily reflect those of my employer, and certainly do not reflect those of Apple * (tm). -------------------------------------------------------------------- David Burstyn UUCP: ihnp4!wucs!david or david@wucs.UUCP Computer Systems Lab CSNET: wucs!david@seismo.ARPA%csnet-relay Washington University ARPANET: wucs!david@seismo.ARPA St. Louis, MO 63130 520 Lopata Hall, (314) 889-4672