Assessing Apple's Intel ad

Macworld ^ | 01/16/2006

[Panerai]

Let us turn our attention away from new Apple portables and overlooked software suite updates for a moment to tackle true matters of grave import—Apple’s TV commercials.

In case you missed last Tuesday’s keynote, Steve Jobs punctuated the unveiling of Intel chip-powered iMacs and MacBook Pro laptops by showing off a new TV ad about the move to Intel-built chips. In fact, Jobs showed off the commercial twice, which is either a sign that he really likes the ad or, depending on how much stock you put in rumors, that something got pulled from the keynote at the last second and the Apple CEO needed to pad his speech.

The commercial is set in the sterile confines of an Intel chip fabrication plant while white-suited Intel workers bustle about with Very Serious looks on their faces. Announcer Kiefer Sutherland, also contributing to the Very Serious vibe of the whole scene, intones that for years Intel chips have been trapped in “dull little boxes dutifully performing dull little tasks when it could have been doing so much more.” But now, the announcer tells us, “the Intel chip has been set free” and will start appearing in Macs. The commercial ends with a hero shot of the all new iMac.

I like the ad. It’s got a few too many shots of Very Serious Intel workers for my tastes, but it does a good job conveying the message that Macs now run on Intel and that this is a very good thing indeed without getting bogged down in the technical details.

[Panerai]

Click here to see TV ad Quicktime format.

[afnamvet]

Ping

[goldstategop]

Ho hum. Its just a processor chip. I cannot figure out for the life of me what's wrong with Apple's current G4 PowerProcessor PC Chip.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie. Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[July 4th]

I'd like to see Kiefer Sutherland come running through the clean room with a pistol, and then torture the Mac.

[sittnick]

There's nothing wrong with the G$ and G5, except that they run too hot, and IBM was not a very good supplier of the chips. With Intel, you can always threaten to go AMD in an instant.

It's too bad that some very good chips get left by the wayside. (Dell's Alpha comes to mind) becuase the processor industry, like software, is very much economy of scale driven.

[ikka]

I think you are thinking of DEC (later Compaq/DEC/HP as they merged) Alpha.

[Boundless]

Regarding that ad, see also:

Apple upsets Intel over dull and boring allegation
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=28929

Intel: Our other customers aren't boring
http://news.com.com/2061-10791_3-6025849.html

"... Conrad said that Intel cooperated with Apple for
some particulars of the TV spot, but added, "We didn't
know what the end result was going to be." ..."

[sittnick]

Yes, I meant Digital Equipment Corporation, of course. Sorry.

[olezip]

Unfortunately

Apple + IBM = IBM

I have been an Apple user since 1978.

[michaelt]

Saw the commercial. Didn't like it.

If the Mac with Intel is so great....

....why did it take so long for Apple to use Intel?
....does that make old Macs chopped liver?

Leave it to Apple to go to the "we're so special" card again and piss off their new partner.

[ikka]

Actually this is a dumb article. The KEY point is that Intel no longer has to kowtow to MSFT all the time.

[SJSAMPLE]

Those "dull little boxes" don't require regular cash infusions like Apple does ;)

My favorite:
"iPod: Because you won't buy our other shit."

[TheBattman]

Those "dull little boxes" don't require regular cash infusions like Apple does ;)

Ummm.... "regular"? Like when was the last "cash infusion"? 7 or 8 years ago? Hmmm.. that's real "regular"....

Apple has turned a profit every quarter since the last "cash infusion"....even before the iPod.

If you want to pick on Apple - at least pick on it for something "legitimate".... like it's CEO is a raving liberal, or they use to sell computers in pansy colors, or it's headquarters is in a gay town (is Cupertino a gay town?)....

[cmsgop]

Cool,they used Music from Michael Mann's "HEAT"

[sittnick]

Actually this is a dumb article. The KEY point is that Intel no longer has to kowtow to MSFT all the time.

Apple's 5% max market share does not eliminate the need for Intel and Microsoft to cooperate. The two actually have a symbiotic relationship. Microsoft makes more memory intensive and bloated operating systems and applications, and Intel makes faster chips to deal with them.

[Panerai]

'Cool,they used Music from Michael Mann's "HEAT"' - That's a good catch, you're right.

[NoCmpromiz]

I'd like to see Kiefer Sutherland come running through the clean room with a pistol,

You've been watching too much 24...

So has my wife...

[NoCmpromiz]

(is Cupertino a gay town?)..

Every town out on the left coast is a gay town...

[Auntie Dem]

So Apple is admitting that they lied to everyone all those years, claiming their box was faster than PC's? Because NOW they are claiming that the Intel Apple really IS faster than the Intel PC's.

"Honest it is...honest...you've got to believe us...It really is faster now."