ra_robert@gsbacd.uchicago.edu (05/07/89)
You know Honda, right? Small, well-built and (at one time) inexpensive cars? Well, they're soon to introduce a $60,000, mid-engine, ultra-fast, super-hitech sports coupe. What does this have to do with the Mac? Well, Jean Louis Gassee, head of Apple Product Development, has likened the Mac and its product image/position to that of Honda. And it's time that Apple released a mid-engined Mac: y'know, with all the frills: DMA on all peripherals, co-processors for graphics, DSP, MIPS galore, floating point measured in MFLOPS, etc. I've heard that Apple has in fact had this kind of stuff in R&D for awhile, stuff that would make Next, etc. look pretty weenie. But they don't release it: market position, profit considerations, etc. So to Mr. Gassee and all the marketers: on this model, don't worry about price, don't worry about profit: the Mac needs a flagship machine, something people can drool over (like they're been doing over the Next). On this one machine: put more money in hardware, price it at >$10,000 if you need to, and make a real screamer. I know Apple will make most of its money from normally priced models; Honda does too. But it never hurts to have one awesome model in the lineup, if just to show what the company can do. Hey, just musing...it would be nice. (If anyone at Apple wants to pass this one to marketing, feel free :->). Robert