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Author Topic: Vista Ripoff  (Read 21102 times)

bjanes

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Vista Ripoff
« on: January 31, 2007, 08:37:12 am »

Tiger Mac OS X 10.4.6 Retails for $129 at PC Connection. There is no confusing maze of versions good, better, or best and you don't have to waste time and money determining which version you need.

Vista upgrades range from $102 for the basic version without the Aero interface to $259 for the ultimate version. Since I have a dual processor machine, I think I would need to upgrade to the Business version for $203.

I would also have to replace my professional level NVida level Quadro video board with a gaming video card to run the Aero interface. Of course, these 3D features are not needed in Photoshop and my image quality could suffer. In addition, Microsoft's initial releases tend to be infested with bugs.

My answer is to Just Say No to Bill. If you think you might like Vista, wait until you upgrade to a new computer where you will get the OEM version for a fraction of the retail cost. Also consider switching to the Mac. Their high end machines are priced very competitively with Windows workstations.

Bill
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Jonathan Wienke

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #1 on: January 31, 2007, 10:58:10 am »

Who is pointing a gun to anyone's head to demand a Vista upgrade? XP is currently available, stable, and runs Photoshop just fine. It will likely be supported for several years; Microsoft still supports Windows 2000 with security updates and such. The next version of MacOS will likely cost more than the current one, and isn't even in beta yet. And if history is any clue, OS prices drop some after they have been out for a while.

This pointless anti-Microsoft/PC carping gets so tiresome...
« Last Edit: January 31, 2007, 10:59:02 am by Jonathan Wienke »
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bjanes

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #2 on: January 31, 2007, 11:34:59 am »

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Who is pointing a gun to anyone's head to demand a Vista upgrade? XP is currently available, stable, and runs Photoshop just fine. It will likely be supported for several years; Microsoft still supports Windows 2000 with security updates and such. The next version of MacOS will likely cost more than the current one, and isn't even in beta yet. And if history is any clue, OS prices drop some after they have been out for a while.

This pointless anti-Microsoft/PC carping gets so tiresome...
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=98523\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Jonathan,

By the same token, no one is pointing a gun at your head and forcing you to read this thread. My point was that monopoly pricing does not benefit users. The Tiger successor may not even be in beta yet, but from what I read, Vista is just starting to match many features already present in Tiger. Monopoly does not favor innovation either.

Bill
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LoisWakeman

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #3 on: January 31, 2007, 12:19:21 pm »

And Mac application software is sometimes much more expensive than the direct Windows equivalent.

As is, I believe, the favoured Macphile phrase: "Shit happens - get over it."  
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Jonathan Wienke

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #4 on: January 31, 2007, 12:37:00 pm »

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By the same token, no one is pointing a gun at your head and forcing you to read this thread. My point was that monopoly pricing does not benefit users. The Tiger successor may not even be in beta yet, but from what I read, Vista is just starting to match many features already present in Tiger. Monopoly does not favor innovation either.

Microsoft is not a monopoly; if it was, Apple and MacOS wouldn't exist, and neither would Unix, FreeBSD, Linux, etc. You can bitch about Microsoft's pricing and bugs and whatever, but the fact that you have a Mac to use as an alternative to Windows/PC disproves your own specious argument. Regarding whether MacOS or Windows is better, either option is a sufficiently mature product to meet the needs of anyone. There are many serious professional users in both camps, and religious debates over which is "better" are no more useful than the Canon vs Nikon debate, or the 35mm digital vs MFDB debates. Each has strengths and weaknesses, and what's best for one individual user is not necessarily the best choice for someone else.

If you want to whine about pricing, why not complain about Adobe, which has a greater market share of graphics/photo/image processing software than Microsoft does of operating systems, and whose standalone products are far more expensive than Microsoft's operating systems. And I don't see anyone complaining about Adobe's image editing software "monopoly" stifling innovation in Photoshop.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2007, 12:42:39 pm by Jonathan Wienke »
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howiesmith

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #5 on: January 31, 2007, 02:21:32 pm »

Most companies are not in business to advance the state of the art for the public or to produce (near) giveaway stuff.  They are trying to make a profit.  Therefore, even without a monopoly or a niche, there is little incentive to give away or sell products (including trade secrets) at a price that does not maximize their return.

Just saying no to Bill will work fine if you can get enough other real buyers to do it too.  Pay what you want, and if what you want is too much, do without or find another source and let Bill know when you buy.
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bjanes

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #6 on: January 31, 2007, 02:32:13 pm »

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Microsoft is not a monopoly; if it was, Apple and MacOS wouldn't exist, and neither would Unix, FreeBSD, Linux, etc. You can bitch about Microsoft's pricing and bugs and whatever, but the fact that you have a Mac to use as an alternative to Windows/PC disproves your own specious argument. Regarding whether MacOS or Windows is better, either option is a sufficiently mature product to meet the needs of anyone. There are many serious professional users in both camps, and religious debates over which is "better" are no more useful than the Canon vs Nikon debate, or the 35mm digital vs MFDB debates. Each has strengths and weaknesses, and what's best for one individual user is not necessarily the best choice for someone else.

[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Jonathin, you are using monopoly in a literal sense, and this shows your lack of subtlety. [a href=\"http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/05/1215&format=HTML&aged=1&language=EN&guiLanguage=en]Monopoly and near monopoly [/url] have been used by the EU in reference to Microsoft's behavior, and my argument is not specious. You can read more about monopoly power here. Specific reference is made to Microsoft. You assume that I am a Mac user, but actually I use Windows as you could have ascertained if you had read my post, rather than jumping to unfounded conclusions (as you did in the thread about Costo shadows).

Bill
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bjanes

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #7 on: January 31, 2007, 02:34:31 pm »

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Most companies are not in business to advance the state of the art for the public or to produce (near) giveaway stuff.  They are trying to make a profit.  Therefore, even without a monopoly or a niche, there is little incentive to give away or sell products (including trade secrets) at a price that does not maximize their return.

Just saying no to Bill will work fine if you can get enough other real buyers to do it too.  Pay what you want, and if what you want is too much, do without or find another source and let Bill know when you buy.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=98574\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Howie,

Quite true, but that is why we have anti-trust laws which make the use of monopoly power illegal.

Bill
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nemophoto

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #8 on: January 31, 2007, 02:38:17 pm »

Bill,

I understand your frustration with the pricing for Vista, et al. But honestly, all the various iterations of Mac OS X are basically small tweaks and small feature addition to the original. And for that, Apple charges for almost each and every minor upgrade, justifying their changes by calling it something -- Leopard, Panther, Tiger etc. -- and charging the consumer. Additionally, many times software patches are need to make your existing programs work with these OS X tweaks.

Microsoft -- good or bad, doesn't matter -- does one major OS revision every few years (in this case, over five!), and doesn't charge you for the patches and corrections.

This isn't a battle of the OS, it's the difference in the business model. My wife works on a Mac (graphic designer). She's laid out over $500 in recent years for her OS upgrades. In that time, I've laid out $0 for my WinXP Pro. The way I see it, I'm further ahead. And with what I spend every year in software upgrades, Windows is the least expensive on my list.

Nemo
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jjlphoto

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #9 on: January 31, 2007, 02:41:15 pm »

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Howie,

Quite true, but that is why we have anti-trust laws which make the use of monopoly power illegal.

Bill
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=98577\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Hmmmm... Clear Channel, Gannett, WalMart, .......
« Last Edit: January 31, 2007, 02:41:56 pm by jjlphoto »
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howiesmith

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #10 on: January 31, 2007, 02:49:46 pm »

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Howie,

Quite true, but that is why we have anti-trust laws which make the use of monopoly power illegal.

Bill
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=98577\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I don't think just because I have the only game in town makes me illegal.  I can charge what I want for a piece of sftware or a photo.  (I have a monopoly on images by Howie Smith.)  Charge too much, I have no sails.  Charge too little, I have to work too hard to make the same living I could with a higher price/lower volume business.

I am going out on a limb here, but I think Microsoft got into trade difficulties, not because they were expensive and had a moat around their product, but because they tried to tie their product and others together.  If you want A, then you must buy B.
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howiesmith

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #11 on: January 31, 2007, 03:07:50 pm »

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Howie,

Quite true, but that is why we have anti-trust laws which make the use of monopoly power illegal.

Bill
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=98577\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

And that is why Microsoft and others have big legal departments.  Protect their market from intruders, legally.  They may be shadey, but legal.

I used to work for a large company that made, among other things, light bulbs.  They could make them really cheaply because they made so many and had a good market.  What they could not do was drop the price so low that they lost money to drive the competitors out of the business and then raise prices.  Except for regulated maonoploies, like cable TV, gas or electric power, most companies can charge whatever they want.  There is no law that I know of against making high margins.
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framah

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #12 on: January 31, 2007, 05:22:44 pm »

I'm with Jonathan here.  I have been a Mac user since I started using a computer and even tho in the past I used to defend Mac over PC,  I don't any more. I just don't care what you use nor do I care if you know what I use.  I'm so sick and tired of constantly hearing this nonsense about which is better!!

No problem... if you don't like it, don't use it. JUST STOP HARPING ON AND ON AND ON AND ON AND ON ad nauseum. As Jon said, both systems are mature enough to do whatever you need done.

How about just agreeing to disagree and get on with your life and leave the rest of the world alone. You people are like the Jehovas Witnesses that used to constantly come around our home trying to convert us. If I was unhappy with my religion ( substitute OS here) I am quite capable of  looking for something different on my own without you all harping on about how yours is better than mine.  
PLEASE...just drop it!!!  
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wolfnowl

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #13 on: January 31, 2007, 07:31:07 pm »

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jjj

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #14 on: January 31, 2007, 07:37:58 pm »

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Tiger Mac OS X 10.4.6 Retails for $129  There is no confusing maze of versions good, better, or best and you don't have to waste time and money determining which version you need.
Much better to have the single option I agree.
But there's the near annual Mac Pussycat Tax. If you bought XP when it came out and used it ever since, it would work out much cheaper as all updates and patches are free.

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In addition, Microsoft's initial releases tend to be infested with bugs.
Cough, ahem Aperture! 9 updates/revisions I read the other day and a drastic price cut. It was as much as beta as the LR beta, but with a $500 tag.  

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Also consider switching to the Mac. Their high end machines are priced very competitively with Windows workstations.
Recently PCPro tested a Mac workstation and were very impressed with it, the highest scores they'd ever seen.
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/95175/apple-ma...-in-the-uk.html
The next month, they tested a PC workstation which scored identically. [Can't find link, sorry] The Mac was nearly £5000 and the PC was £2000!!  
Not such good value! I was looking at getting a MacPro recently and for the same price one could get a Wintel box with far more memory and a decent monitor. Going from a paltry 1G on a £1,700 MacPro to a more reasonable 4G would cost an extra £740
Which would buy one of these http://shop.colourconfidence.com/product.p...aa00d4b4f05ee24
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bjanes

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #15 on: January 31, 2007, 08:55:40 pm »

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Much better to have the single option I agree.
But there's the near annual Mac Pussycat Tax. If you bought XP when it came out and used it ever since, it would work out much cheaper as all updates and patches are free.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Since I do not own an Apple, I was not familiar with their upgrade practices, but this upgrade policy of Apple was brought to my attention earlier. Still I think that the Vista upgrade is too much, especially if you have several computers in the household. According to [a href=\"http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6191812.stm]The BBC [/url], Microsoft gets 80% of its windows revenue from OEM installations (at an undisclosed low price per unit) and relatively few people upgrade their existing computers. Personally, I will sit tight with what I have now since it does the job well enough as others have pointed out.

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Recently PCPro tested a Mac workstation and were very impressed with it, the highest scores they'd ever seen.
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/95175/apple-ma...-in-the-uk.html
The next month, they tested a PC workstation which scored identically. [Can't find link, sorry] The Mac was nearly £5000 and the PC was £2000!!  
Not such good value! I was looking at getting a MacPro recently and for the same price one could get a Wintel box with far more memory and a decent monitor. Going from a paltry 1G on a £1,700 MacPro to a more reasonable 4G would cost an extra £740
Which would buy one of these http://shop.colourconfidence.com/product.p...aa00d4b4f05ee24
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I'm not familiar with UK prices, but the top of the line Apple workstation (Mac Pro 2.66 2(4x512) 2x500 SD 7300GT) costs USD $4549 from [a href=\"http://www.pcconnection.com/ProductDetail?Sku=7044372]PC Connection[/url] and I checked out the price of a Dell workstation (Dell.com) with similar specs and it was $4885 (you will have to enter the specs). This is without a monitor, 2GB of memory and a 1000GB (Apple) or  750 GB (Dell) SATA hard drive, so the prices are comparable. You could do better with an offbrand PC.

Bill
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John.Murray

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Vista Ripoff
« Reply #16 on: January 31, 2007, 11:35:10 pm »

Bill:

Since March of 2001 Apple has released 6 versions of OS X, each price at $130.  A $780 total.

Microsoft released Windows XP in October of 2001 at a retail price of $300 for the professional version.  Since that time Microsoft has had 2 major updates release as SP1 and SP2 at no additional charge.  In additon, Mircrosoft has commited full support through year 2010 with security updates through 2014.  SP3 is expected later this year.  Microsoft's stated support policy for an OS has been 7 years.  They extended both Windows 2000 and XP support so far.    Apple's support is currently "until the next $130 release" . . .

If you are having a problem sorting through the various Vista version offered please note that MS is simply responding to the demands of the market place offering versions from $99 to $400.  The $200 price for the Pro upgrade is same price MS charged for Win NT 4.0, Win 2000 and Win XP-Pro upgrades.  By your math you would be into Vista for $503 assuming you paid full retail for XP Pro, which I'm sure you didn't.

I'm not sure how to respond to your "professional" nVidea adapter . . . my Dual Head $800 Matrox is currently blown away by a $69 256MB ATI clone from Tiger Direct . . . so what?

Did you realize one of the chief benefits of Aero is the offloading of basic screen window managment from the computer's CPU to the video card's GPU?  This frees resources for your applications.

Speaking of security - please compare Secunia's compilation of security advisories comparing the two platforms since 2004 (see below)

Bottom line?  DON'T buy it, but please make an informed decision, based on facts.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2007, 11:49:08 pm by Joh.Murray »
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Jonathan Wienke

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« Reply #17 on: February 01, 2007, 02:41:51 am »

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Jonathin, you are using monopoly in a literal sense, and this shows your lack of subtlety. Monopoly and near monopoly have been used by the EU in reference to Microsoft's behavior, and my argument is not specious.

Yes it is specious. It isn't a matter of subtlety, but simple common sense. As a pro photographer, you can buy a Mac and MacOS, and run all of the same major image processing applications (Photoshop, etc), use all of the same printers (Epson, Canon, HP, etc) and most of the same hardware peripherals (spectrophotometer, scanner, etc) without spending a single cent on a Microsoft product, and get everything from major retailers at reasonable prices without having to wait any longer to receive the merchandise, and without significantly more difficulty setting it up and getting it to work. You'll pay a little more for the Apple hardware and software, but many people find the Mac hard/software to be preferable and are willing to pay a premium for it. We may not care for some of Microsoft's business practices, but they are not a "monopoly" in any rational sense of the word.

I noticed you didn't respond to my point about Adobe, either. Microsoft has less market share among graphic/imaging/photographer professionals than Adobe, and I don't see many people calling Adobe a "monopoly" or bemoaning a lack of innovation in their products.
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jjj

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« Reply #18 on: February 01, 2007, 06:57:05 am »

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I'm not familiar with UK prices, but the top of the line Apple workstation (Mac Pro 2.66 2(4x512) 2x500 SD 7300GT) costs USD $4549 from PC Connection and I checked out the price of a Dell workstation (Dell.com) with similar specs and it was $4885 (you will have to enter the specs). This is without a monitor, 2GB of memory and a 1000GB (Apple) or  750 GB (Dell) SATA hard drive, so the prices are comparable. You could do better with an offbrand PC.
Dell are expensive compared to many other brands, so Macs are always priced against them. I was also comparing machine with identical performances, a more valid comparison than just specs.
And the Mac was well over twice the price of an identically performing machine, so the fact you can find a PC as pricey as a Mac says nothing.

Apple have the highest margins [by a long way] of any computer company when it comes to hardware, so they will never compete favourably on price and non Apple products at Apple dealers can be twice the price as the same product at a PC shop.
I would buy Apple products, but not when they are so expensive and the money I save can buy me a new L lens, a much better monitor or a month's holiday somewhere exotic.
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bjanes

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« Reply #19 on: February 01, 2007, 08:16:08 am »

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Yes it is specious. It isn't a matter of subtlety, but simple common sense.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

On appeal of [a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft]United States vs Microsoft[/url], the US Court of Appeals did sustain in part Judge Jackson's finding that Microsoft was a monopoly. The US Supreme Court declined to review the case and the case was subsequently settled. These are the facts as determined by the Court and Microsoft did settle--Gates did not win the case. Many conservative economists such as Milton Friedman did not think that the case had any validity, but this does not mean that the governments arguments were "specious". Note, however, that Milton wanted to legalize narcotics and thought that doctors should not be required to obtain licenses. However, he was a great economist and man and I would not consider his arguments "specious" either. In a democracy, there is room for honest debate without resorting to name calling.

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I noticed you didn't respond to my point about Adobe, either. Microsoft has less market share among graphic/imaging/photographer professionals than Adobe, and I don't see many people calling Adobe a "monopoly" or bemoaning a lack of innovation in their products.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=98673\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

And I notice that you did not respond to my GamutVision plots of the Costco profiles that refuted your argument about saturation  . Adobe has not been dragged through the courts both in the USA and EU for anticompetitive practices. Also, their software are not copies of a more innovative firm's products. Adobe has acquired their dominance in graphics software the gold old fashioned way: outclassing the competition.  

Bill
« Last Edit: February 01, 2007, 08:35:52 am by bjanes »
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