Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!pasteur!ucbvax!RITVAX.BITNET!DMG4449 From: DMG4449@RITVAX.BITNET Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple Subject: Apple supporting the Apple // line Message-ID: <8809141038.aa07670@SMOKE.BRL.MIL> Date: 14 Sep 88 17:34:00 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The Internet Lines: 92 Over the past few years, I have quietly sit and watched. I watched the grow of the Macintosh, the introduction of the Apple //c, the long awaited, yet still inadequate Apple //gs, then the rumors of the GS+, the "black Mac", etc. etc. I have looked in the newspapers to see what my Apple dealer has advertised about, what they were "pushing", etc. I do some computer resale work out of my home, so I also subscribe to several great reseller magazines. Apple is often in the "tidbits" areas, where many rumors, facts, etc. are discussed. So why am I telling you this? Ever since the invent of the Macintosh, Apple has been placing more and more priority on it, and less and less priority on the Apple // line. In fact, from what I know, if it wasn't for the fact that the Apple // line kept continuing to raise millions upon millions of dollars for them, they would have just assumed dropped it alltogether. There has been a strong rumor circulating for a long time that someone high at Apple (supposodly Sculley) has wanted to stop the entire Apple // line. Examples of apple's less adequate support of the // series is the following: ProDOS was being developed 1-2 years before it was released, and the project was killed entirely at least several times (I had found a beta version of ProDOS about a year before it was released, and it was about 80% complete). Supposodly, the Apple //gs project had been stopped and started several times as well. Computer reseller magazines as well as other information sources have confirmed the fact that Apple is pushing its dealers around - if they don't push the Macintosh, they could get their Apple authorization taken away. This rumor has even extended to far as to the fact that Apple reps went to talk to members of the ASCII group, a group of computer reseleers that sell Apple products, but had just made an agreement with Commodore to sell the Amiga. Apple didn't want the Amiga to have any sort of prominant display in the store, and made that perfectly clear. That tactic is definetely immoral and unprofessional (though I'm sure anyone at Apple will deny everything- they always do). One thing I like about IBM is that at least they tell you when they are planning to release new machines and the specific features they will have. Apple plays this game of no talking until the day something happens. This makes it harder for someone to plan for the future. When Apple had marketted all of its software, it had much more for the Mac- intosh than the Apple //. Until very recently, Claris didn't even care about the Apple // enough. After every single major magazine and important person in the // world had spoken out against the treatment of the // users by Claris, they bought out Styleware. We shall see how well that works out in the future....(for some reason, I'm not very optamistic). The technology now exists to make a much more powerful GS- in fact, the technology exists to make a machine that will run all Macintosh and // software (though it would cut into the Mac or // sales, and they wouldn't want that to happen). The rumored GS+ probably won't come for a long time, if ever, and I'm sure Apple will make sure its not too powerful, that someone that was considering a Macintosh would actually buy an Apple // instead. The release of the system disk 3.2 - or lack of it, is something else in poor taste. Apple has managed to confuse many people with this, and if they have developed such a powerful upgrade, they should do anything in their power to distribute it. I really doubt it costs much more than $200 for Apple to make the actual GS CPU, especially in the quantity they buy things. With all the money and the rather high margins that both Apple and the dealers make, they could at least provide some decent tech/upgrade service. The upgrade part is easier...but has been done even worse! The coffee analogy doesnt work here--- a bottomless cup of coffee costs about $.60 around here whereas a decent computer system costs $3000+ these days. In case you weren't aware of this, Apple decided to raise the price of virtually everything they sell except the Macintosh + (which I'm sure they will stop making soon, and leave the owners forcing to eventually go out and get a SE or //). THey have raised their prices up to 35% on everything including the GS cpu (this was in yesterdays newspaper- not in front of me, and it didnt mention the raise in price of the GS specifically (how much). The Mac // w/60 mb was raised about $1,500 or so, quite a substancial jump. Apple has already had rather large margins...I am fully aware that ram prices have jumped (just at about the time they offered the extra 256k in the gs!), but the ram prices are starting to gradually go down again. They still make lots of money. Well, I guess I've spoken what I've wanted to say. I really am sick of getting the short end of the stick from Apple though. Sometimes I seriously think about getting into the Macintosh before they totally dump the // line. I welcome any opinions of anyone else on this subject. I don't have the net address of Keith who works at Apple, but could someone make sure that he gets a copy of this (or could he please respond to me). Thanks, Daniel Box # 1026 Daniel M. Greenberg 25 Andrews Memorial Drive Rochester Institute of Technology Rochester, NY 14623 Computer Engineering Technology '92 BITNET : DMG4449@RITVAX INTERNET : dmg4449%ritvax.bitnet@CORNELLC.CCS.CORNELL.EDU UUCP : {psuvax1,mcvax}!ritvax.bitnet!dmg4449 Compuserve : 71641,1311 GEnie: D.GREENBERG2 PHONENET : [716] 475-4295 "The answer is 42." "I hate quotations." (Deep Thought) (Ralph Waldo Emerson)