Posted on 04/05/2010 6:44:39 AM PDT by myknowledge
Apple Inc. said Monday it sold more than 300,000 iPads in the U.S., including preorders, on the first day the device was available.
The company didn't give a precise figure, but the tally was below the estimates of some analysts.
Buyers flocked to stores starting Saturday after weeks of publicity about the tablet-style computer.
Apple hadn't offered iPad sales forecasts, but over the weekend, Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster more than doubled his initial first-day sales estimate to between 600,000 and 700,000 units, including preorders, based on longer-than-expected lines at stores and high expectations for online preorders. He had also lifted his 2010 forecast to 5.5 million units from 2.8 million.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
I wonder how many of these people would scream if asked to pay $100 for a pharmaceutical prescription, or $500 for life-saving medical tests?
Dell buys parts from the cheapest supplier. Apple buys parts from suppliers that meet their rather stringent specifications. But problems are just a matter of hit or miss, and it's our own personal experiences that determine how we perceive the manufacturing quality.
As I said before, I currently have five running Dell machines. The oldest is an Dimension 4600 that is over 5 years old and still works perfectly. Never had a problem with it. In over 20 years of buying/upgrading/building my own PCs I've had two real hardware failures with my Dell machines (the ones I've built myself are a different story ;) ). The CPU in my daughter's first Dell machine died. Blue screen of death and all, but the computer was one week short of a year old,(still under warranty). Dell sent the in-home technician out to fix it. It took a week, and three visits but they replaced everything in the computer except the power supply at no cost to me. And truth be told the failure was Intel's fault, not Dell's. The other problem was in my daughters laptop, the optical drive died a week after we bought it. Dell fixed that for free too, but it had to be returned to the factory. That took a week. That computer is over two years old now, and has never had another problem.
With my parents iMac, the hard drive died when it was ~ 6months old. It was under warranty, but Best Buy had to send it back to the factory for service. It took 6 weeks. On two other occasions my parents have had to have a computer tech come out to the house to solve problems, at their own expense. The machine seems to like to randomly rewrite it's internal setting without warning. One day the Airport connections work, the next day all the setting are screwed up. Apple's technical help has been useless in solving the problem. They can help reestablish the settings, but they can't figure out why they get reset.
I use Dell machines because I can get a decent computer (software included) for under $500. I'm not afraid to do my own upgrades, so I can get good performance at minimum cost. Apple's products are very thoughtfully designed and well constructed, but you pay a premium for that convenience, and I don't need it.
Ok, overstated too early in the morning.
Point is that you DO have to sync it with iTunes on a real computer. You can’t buy an iPad and just toss your computer(s).
Wasn't the Iphone captive to ATT?
Ummmm..., I think you've got that backwards, doncha know ... LOL ...
It's AT&T who is captive to iPhone. You do remember the CEO of AT&T coming on the platform with Steve Jobs and saying, "We just let Apple be Apple," and "We've never done this with anyone else."
Like I said, I think you've got that backwards.
BUT, you also have to remember that Apple tried to "do it their way" once before and they had the "stillborn phone" (in cooperation with Motorola). Motorola just "didn't get it" and they tried to tell Apple "how to do it" and all they got was a "stillborn phone" in the process.
And from that, Apple understood what had to be done with these companies, since they didn't know what they were doing in the first place... :-)
Is ATT known as the best cell phone service provider?
Well, it was an easy decision actually. First Apple went for the service which had the most customers in the world. That's GSM ... with 80% of the world's market.
With more than 3 billion people using GSM and approximately 80 percent of the world's population covered by mobile networks, GSM is fast becoming the most popular way to deliver information, communication and entertainment services to people worldwide.
- http://www.gsmworld.com/technology/services/index.htm
And so, with two GSM carriers in the U.S. -- (again, GSM, which carry the largest percentage of users in the world at 80%) -- it was another "easy decision" LOL ...
I suppose you would have picked T-Mobile, eh? :-)
Gees, Apple worshipers are as hopeless as Tiger worshipers.
Gees, I wish the Apple-haters and "nattering nabobs of negativity" would work on, first, just getting their facts straight. That would solve 99% of their problems... LOL ...
Yes, Apple makes great stuff. I bought an Ipod before anyone knew about them, but I don't mindlessly accept everything they make as golden.
There's nothing "mindless" about it -- with Apple continuously delivering better products than anyone else... :-)
Macs never break. That's why a local computer fix-it shop just put a big sign out front that says "We Fix Macs"!
A big metro area can only support one such shop in a large city (of maybe up to 1/2 million), and perhaps two in a city of a million.
Put just "one more" in that city -- and one of those shops is going to go bankrupt with Macintosh repairs only... LOL ...
I've had a whole slew of Macintosh computers (all models, you name it), since 1984 and I haven't had one of them in for a repair -- ever... period. :-)
On top of that, I haven't ever had one person ever come out to do any kind of software repairs. And nowadays, if someone did want that, all they have to do is go down to the Apple Retail store, and they can get in there for free to look over their machine. But, I don't hardly see anyone doing that, at least hardly any large numbers in relation to the large numbers of machines that are out there, in the user-base.
Actually, I erred in my previous statement. Unemployment compensation is up to ninety nine weeks now......and that is nothing to laugh about unless you are a Socialist. 'Course you might find that funny, too......
What I find "real funny" is how others expect those who are working and doing just fine to stop spending their money and stop going out and stop getting the good products that they want to use, because the neighbor down the street is out of work ... LOL ...
Heck! During the worst of the Depressions, the Great Depression, at the high point of unemployment, there was 25% of the workforce out of work, and that left the other 75% still making money, still spending money, still paying their bills and still buying stuff they wanted to.
In fact, those were probably the people buying up the stuff that the other 25% were getting rid of.
I suppose you want those who are working and doing just fine, to sit in their houses and moan and groan about it... instead of spending their money in the economy.
And we can clearly see, there's plenty of people able to buy plenty of Apple products and they're doing just fine... thank you... :-)
One more thing about AT&T... you’ve probably seen the commercials. There’s one salient fact that is worth more than anything else, which is probably why AT&T is advertising it so much. They advertise that they cover 97% of the population of the United States.
That’s not saying that they have 97% of the customers... no..., not at all. What they’re saying is that their signal coverage is in areas where they have a total of 97% of the population of the United States.
That means, that at the most, AT&T may leave out 3% of the total population of the United States, outside of their coverage area. I don’t think you’re going to find better numbers than that — in addition to having a phone network that works on 80% of the cellular market in the entire world.
So yes, there’s no question that Apple should have (and did, of course) go with AT&T.
You make a great point in terms of the majority being employed. I wonder, however, how many of them claim to be unable to afford health insurance, but can go buy the latest and greatest gadgets.
I have an acquaintance who is forever groaning about not making enough money, robbing Peter to pay Paul, but goes to the movies every weekend, eats out every night, etc. She's buried in credit card debt because when she bought her house, she charged them up to buy new furniture for it, too. She voted for Obama, and can't wait to get 'help'. The only help she needs is a budget and the desire to stick to it.
Employment numbers alone don't tell the whole story. While you do make a valid point that the majority continue to be employed, those out there buying the iPad (and bear in mind -- that was first day's sales only) -- are some of them the same ones 'moaning and groaning' about not making ends meet? I'd bet my socks there are a fair few of them.
I have an acquaintance who is forever groaning about not making enough money, robbing Peter to pay Paul, but goes to the movies every weekend, eats out every night, etc. She's buried in credit card debt because when she bought her house, she charged them up to buy new furniture for it, too. She voted for Obama, and can't wait to get 'help'. The only help she needs is a budget and the desire to stick to it.
Oh yeah! I know what you mean... :-)
But, I have noticed something... the ones who complain the most about being broke, and having to pay "this much money" for one thing or another -- are usually the richest ones of the bunch ... LOL ...
In fact, to tell you the truth, I would never be telling anyone that I'm doing okay. I would rather moan and groan myself about not having enough money and so on -- because if you do it the other way, and tell people how well off you are and how good life is to you -- wait till you see the people lining up at your door for a loan ... :-)
The people that others thought were the worst off, are the ones that they find out, after they have died, were so rich that they never had to live as if they were poor. But, then again, that's how they got to be rich... you see...
No matter what the jobs situation is -- people are spending money and they will continue to do so. Even in the worst of times, there are plenty of people doing very well. Even in collapsing civilizations (if you want to go that far in your assessments) there are always people doing very well. It has always been that way throughout history.
Remember, if you and your neighbor are working, it's a booming economy. If you're working and your neighbor is out of work, it's a recession. And if you're both out of work, it's a depression... :-)
Virtualization works in windows too. Also see cygwin.
Also don’t forget that the excellent Mac development tools are freely available instead of costing hundreds of dollars.
Microsoft puts out free Express Editions of their software. Apple did a good job of making an easier development environment mainly due to dropping backward compatibility though.
I have no idea what you meant about the platform “trusting” the user.
Linux is the ultimate example of the platform trusting the user. Nothing is locked out, and you can screw with stuff all the way down to the operating system's own scheduler. Windows and Mac are midway, where stuff is locked out (no source code) but there is plenty of room for tinkering. The iPhone and iPad lock you out of everything to the point that you cannot even run an application unless it has already been pre-screened by Apple.
That's an unconfirmed rumor. Another rumor going around is that Hulu's iPad app will charge a fee for you to watch their shows. The general trend is to make you pay for all content on the iPad.
What’s not a rumor is the number of major Flash-heavy sites that have already transitioned to an iPad-friendly non-Flash version.
Said shop is in a town with a population of about 8200.
I should add, they work on all brands of computers, not just Macs. Maybe they aren’t getting enough Windoze business to keep them going?
I spent a couple of hours doing stuff outside a store next to a place that fixes Macs and saw more boxes inbound than out. They do break, Macs are not perfect.
Said shop is in a town with a population of about 8200.
Oh... my condolences to the guy... how unfortunate... :-)
I spent a couple of hours doing stuff outside a store next to a place that fixes Macs and saw more boxes inbound than out. They do break, Macs are not perfect.
Oh... well..., it's like IT departments -- they have people there to help out on the Macintosh computers too -- ya know. It's just that if someone wanted to "make a living" off doing that, they can forget it ... LOL ... You can only make a living off being an "IT guy" with Windows boxes. The Mac people pretty much take care of things themselves, doncha know.
It's the same with the repair shops..., they've got them too, but like I said, you have two of them in town for Macintosh, and one of them is going bankrupt ... :-)
I should add, they work on all brands of computers, not just Macs. Maybe they aren’t getting enough Windoze business to keep them going?
OMG! It's worse than I thought!
I've seen how those Windows guys work on computers. Believe me, if you're a Mac person, you don't want a Windows repair guy anywhere near that computer. They really don't know what they're doing.
It's one thing if you've got a guy who only works on Macs. He knows them and he will do well or he will be out of business and not around in short order. But, a "Windows guy" who is trying to "make something on the side" with Macs ... ummmm..., just forget it -- if you value your Mac computer....
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