Charlie Owen - Apple PR Lets One Slide Through

Friday, August 24, 2007

Edit: Adding links to Apple Hot News: http://www.apple.com/hotnews/ and RSS http://images.apple.com/main/rss/hotnews/hotnews.rss.

I subscribe to the Apple Hot News RSS feed. It's clearly biased, as any official corporate public relations web site is going to be. I think they let one slip through the censors. I'm going to copy it here because I'm willing to bet it will be taken down as soon as someone realizes what they are saying:

Vista blazes when running under Boot Camp on a Mac
“If you install Boot Camp on a well-equipped Mac model, it can become a blazing fast Vista computer.” That’s what Walter Mossberg (Wall Street Journal) concluded after installing Vista and Boot Camp on a new iMac. Mossberg tested the iMac’s performance “using Vista’s built-in Windows Experience Index, a rating system that goes from 1 to 5.9, with scores above 3.0 generally required for full, quick performance. My iMac scored a 5.0, the best score of any consumer Vista machine I have tested.” That score, he remarks, is “very impressive for a computer that wasn’t designed with Vista in mind.” [Aug 23, 2007]

That first sentence *could* imply that any other operating installed on the Mac makes it not so 'blazing fast' by comparison.

Whoops!

Seriously, if the MacOS is all that why even bother installing another operating system. Oh, what? You want a blazing fast computer? Then install Windows Vista on that MacBook (Pro) and you'll have your wish. Of course, some folks will point out Mossberg limited it to comparisons with 'Vista' computers. Lots of people will miss that distinction as I did when I first read this pull quote.

Furthermore, what Apple is reinforcing is the concept of the Mac being the best Windows Vista machine out there. If true, that backs up my assertion that the Mac hardware is gaining personal computer market share directly as a result of the fact it is a Windows machine, capable of running the best darn operating system in the world: Windows Vista. Yeah, there is a Halo Effect -- it's called 'we do Windows and do it great!'

Categories: Apple | Mac | Windows Vista | Comments [7] |

| Posted on Friday, August 24, 2007 2:37:54 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

Friday, August 24, 2007 6:25:04 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

I didn't get the same observation from reading that first sentence. I just took it at face value...vista runs fast on a mac.

opuntia

Friday, August 24, 2007 7:50:13 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

I bought a MacBook Pro as my new Vista laptop. I even presented at TechReady5 with it. :) It sure is a fast Vista machine, with every score (except memory) above 5.4.

Dustin

Saturday, August 25, 2007 3:40:09 AM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

Still trying to dump some MSFT stock Charlie?

Alan

Saturday, August 25, 2007 3:56:27 AM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

Nope, I'm hanging on to mine (not that I have a lot of shares, mind you -- I'm an individual contributor many, many, many managers removed from BillG).

You?

Charlie Owen

Saturday, August 25, 2007 12:46:10 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

I hadn't seen Apple's excerpt from my column and can't speak for why they posted it. But I can say that I didn't install Vista on my new iMac instead of OS X, but merely as an addition, so I could have Vista running for test purposes on a fast desktop. As you know, I test all kinds of software, some of which I need to try on Vista. I already own several XP machines, and several Macs, and one Vista laptop. But, as with so many Vista machines, the latter is slow, despite being well equipped. So, having invested in a very fast iMac with a 1 terabyte HD, I wondered if it could serve me as a Vista desktop as well. That would give me Vista on a bigger screen, at a hopefully faster speed, and would allow me to free up space in my home office by having one desktop machine for both. And it turned out to do very well. Your interpretation, that Vista runs faster on this iMac than OS X, is wrong. I never said any such thing. I merely noted, as your post eventually conceded, the ironic fact that the Apple ran Vista faster than many dedicated Vista boxes. It also runs OS X quite fast, and thus the machine is a very good value for someone with my particular job, which is hardly the typical user case. My advice to average readers on running Windows on a Mac remains what it has been: it's a fine idea if you have one or two Windows-only programs you must use. But if you buy a Mac, you should do so because you expect to mainly use OS X. And if you expect to mostly run Windows, you should buy a PC from a Windows vendor, as long as you can afford one fast enough to run Vista adequately and can find one that isn't loaded down with craplets. The Mac's new ability to run Windows is a great insurance policy, especially for people whose companies force them to use a Windows-only app or two. But what makes a Mac a Mac is mostly OS X and iLife.

Walt Mossberg

Saturday, August 25, 2007 6:22:51 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

Thanks for reading and commenting Walt.

This particular post is really about Apple PR spin and I didn't make that super crystal clear since the pull quote only links back to you. I've edited the post to add the Apple Hot News links to the top of the post to hopefully clarify. My point in this post...

1) Apple PR is usually completely and totally umambiguous in their gushing praise of their own products.
2) Apple Hot News in particular will only bubble up only overtly positive reviews.
3) This particular pull quote could be interpreted in a fashion unintended by Apple PR.

As for the third point in this comment -- I had to read the quote several times before I 'got' what you were saying -- and that's typically not the case with Apple Hot News.

That said, you bring up some interesting topics in your comments which are largely unrelated to the theme of this post, but are good topics to discuss. I'll excerpt some (maybe all?) of them here:

"...as with so many Vista machines, the latter is slow..."
"...the Apple ran Vista faster than many dedicated Vista boxes..."
"...as long as you can afford one fast enough to run Vista adequately..."
"...craplets."
"...people whose companies force them to use a Windows-only app..."

I'll see if I can muster up the courage to respond to those in separate blog postings -- thanks for giving me more fodder to write about. :-)

Charlie Owen

Thursday, September 06, 2007 12:37:30 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

But what makes a Mac a Mac is mostly OS X and iLife.

同声传译

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