Little Mac, Big Mac, still no Middle Mac
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SmugMug CEO DonMacAskill wondered why there wasn’t one more thing from Steve Jobs on Tuesday, namely a Mac for the less graphics-intensive desktop PC user.
Keep wondering, really, because he and I and probably lots of other people have wondered the same thing over the years:
At SmugMug, we’d put a Mac on every employee’s desk tomorrow. So what exactly is a Mac? That’s easy - it’s a Mac Pro with one dual-core Desktop class Intel CPU in it. Two (or four!) Server class dual-core CPUs (Xeons) are overkill both for performance and for budgets. I know - we’ve got some at our office, and I’m writing this on my Mac Pro at home.
MacAskill says the Mac Mini isn’t suited for developers who demand dual displays, as the Mini can only drive a single monitor. The Mini also can’t handle the 30″ Cinema display, Apple’s top-end lustworthy critter at $1,799.
The Mac Pro starts out as a dual-core at $2,499, constructed as a basic Apple desktop machine. Granted any developer in his or her right mind isn’t going to complain about getting one to use, but businesses aren’t going to equip the rank and file with those beauties.
That iMac all-in-one form factor may be elegant, but MacAskill says businesses don’t like the idea of throwing out a display when the other components, like CPU or RAM, get dated.
A mid-level non-notebook Mac isn’t going to happen. Apple isn’t going to kill its margins on the Mac Pro or the MacBook lines by offering a middle product like MacAskill wants. Apple’s in a profitable niche, partly because the first thing Jobs did on coming back to the company was to kill the licenses for reasonably priced Mac-capable hardware made by other companies.
Apple has been doing well and won’t do anything to willingly jeopardize its profitability. Between the $799 Mini (a joke considering its specs) and the $1,199 iMac, there’s no room for the machine MacAskill and many others want with OS X running on it.
August 9th, 2007 at 9:41 am
That seems silly to me that there is a demand for a product, yet there isn’t any room for the machine. There are a lot of businesses that won’t pay for a Mac Pro, think the mini is not enough and already have a display. So, a $1300 Mac that has one PCI slots, one AGP slot filled with a dual display output and a desktop sized hard drive would perfectly fit the bill. There is a probability that some of the Mac Pro sales would turn into Mac Middle sales, but this would likely be made up for with larger sales numbers and a few more monitor sales. Not everyone likes the all-in-one, so there is a gaping $2000 hole between the mini and the Pro. A Mac mini Tower seems perfect for this.