Apple's First Flops

Sabah Arif writes "Apple began the eighties with two major flops under its belt: the Apple III and the LISA. Both machines were attempts at breaking into the business market. They were technologically advanced, but major flaws prevented their success."

This is news?

[Anonymous Coward]

News for nerds, stuff that matters? Because it's not like we didn't learn of the failure of the Apple III and the Lisa a few years ago, no sire.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[MoonFog]

That may be true, but Apple never really got any sort of hold in the business market. If they had succeeded, things may have looked very different.

I call dupe.

[mooniejohnson]

I think this is a Slashdot record... a dupe of a story that developed over 20 years ago!

All sarcasm aside, how is this news? Yes, they were flops. Again, 20 years ago. Some site is just putting up a history now, but that still doesn't make it news. It's just blatant flamebait. Come on, editors, take "stuff that matters" to heart!

There should be a way to mod posters of stories

[Anonymous Coward]

But ol' Slashydot is afraid to do it.

Which is why we were discussing a Supreme Court decision about wine yesterday.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[Televisor]

But then, is it possible to hold both the business and art/design/music/general creativity markets?

Some predictions

[Anonymous Coward]

This post will be a great opportunity for Apple fans to rave about how fantastic Apple is and that they only produced two flops in their entire history. These posts will of course be modded up as this is macrumors here after all.

This post will also be a great opportunity for Apple hater to tell us how much Apple sucks and that everything they do is a failure. These posts will of course be modded down as this is macrumors here after all.

Additionally at least one major discussion about Apple pricing will break out, with one side claiming that Apple is simply to expensive and that you can get the same specs for a lot less money from $generic_computer_vendor_of_choice. This will of course prompt angry rebuttals from Apple fans claiming that nothing could be farther from the truth.
Of course comparing specs and prices is utterly pointless and will never lead to a result, but this won't stop anyone from happily participating in the flamefest.

Oh, and before I forget, at least 5 comments will mention that Macs are only used by gays.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[el_womble]

Imagine everyday coding in Cocoa and XTools as standard in businesses... bliss. Core Data is probably enough to shift the TCO and ROI on Apple Hardware in Apple's favour, but then what CFO in his right mind would get locked into a single vendor for the OS and hardware, especially with the initial investment in x86 hardware? If I were Apple I'd think seriously about licencing the fabled x86 build of OS X for business use only. Not only would they get a boost from support contracts, but more people would be exposed to the software at work, and hopefully, start thinking seriously about buying the hardware for home. They might even start to shift a few more XServes! I guess the biggest problem they'd be facing then is piracy but that could be curbed by limiting the processor compatability to Xeons and Opterons, kind of the anti Windows XP Starter Edition.

Re:I call dupe.

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it interesting and with me probably lots of other people. Does it matter it's not news in the strict sense of the word? BBC news also has "features" that are not directly news but just interesting to know about.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[MoonFog]

I'd love to use OS X on x86 hardware, but aren't Apple's main source of revenue their hardware?
They would probably require assurance that OS X could actually be a real revenue source before they make the switch.

More interesting question is - Why apple flopped .

[Gopal.V]

Apple had a sort of adolscent crisis when the compan y got to a stage when the hormones took over (this might look like a metaphor, but most companies have a childhood, youth and middle age like the people who run it). The business side started leaning on the creative side and sort of screwed each other. Apple had a bunch of cool people coding for them (I wish ... Amiga...). But the business was more concerned about sellability than the raw coolness of the app in mind (see Google right now, it's going through the same loss of innocence).

Here's my list of top apple flops :

• Apple Pippin (nice name !!)
• OpenDoc
• Lisa
• copland (no, not the movie)
• eWorld (what ?)
• Dalmatian Imacs
• Mac Portable

Btw, if it hadn't been for iMac and it appearing EVERY other commercial - apple might have just gone down silently. Now Ipod is bringing back the original proprietary wizards (Apple > Sun > Microsoft in this attitude ... they're no angels).

writer?

[_Shorty-dammit]

how do people get jobs writing anything when they don't even know the difference between 'loose' and 'lose' or 'to' and 'too' or that all sentences should end with some form of puncuation? Article's somewhat interesting as far as the information goes, but this guy can't write worth a damn.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[MoonFog]

OS X > Win XP, and I have yet to see any evidence that Apple's hardware is actually worth the money. It's massively outperformed in most test I've seen where compared to similar x86 hardware.

I'm in no way a graphical artist, my field is programming, and the hardware just don't cut it yet.

That's why I'd love for it to be available on x86, good hardware combined with good software.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[DenDave]

I think the biggest technical problem for x86 OSX is that they would have to suppprt a plethora of hardware options that really wouldn't earn them enough money in the end to pay it off. Tiger goes for around 130 retail so then what would they charge for x86 volume licenses? maybe 30 bucks? I doubt they could muster the current level of support and quality on 30 bucks a seat. Nope, better that users who really see the need dish out for the hardware as well, I mean think about it, you cannot turn a dodge into a mercedes just by changing the badge.

Growth is now the biggest threat to Apple because it is not so simple to scale your business to meet the demands of the market. Already Apple is feeling the strain, employees are being worked dang hard and the company is struggling to keep up supply. Success of Ipods, Ibooks and Mini's is so high that new OEM's are being used and all the long while, they still need to keep the quality and standards up to par with their reputation. If the mini's all started to exhibit failures and poor workmanship than that would harm the crossover (new mac users) market more than anything the competition could hope for.

The best situation for Apple now is to stabilize the growth and scale the infrastructure so it all runs smoothly. In EU there have been three month delays in some shops and that simply won't do.

Yup.

[gandell]

I'd have to agree with this...pc hardware is much cheaper, and does have a bit more horsepower for your buck than Apple's offerings.

I love OSX, but I use WinXP. I would love to be able to pick up a copy of OSX for x86. I'd most certainly embrace it, even if the OS was priced higher than XP.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[LocoMan]

The big question is wether OS X would work as well outside of such a controlled enviroment as it has now. With OS X limited to run on apple computers, they have a (relatively) very limited combinations of different hardware to test and optimize for, not the case with x86.

The list of PC/x86 Flops would fill pages

[postbigbang]

Jobs, if anything, was focused and visionary. A few screwups are nothing compared to the IBM PC Jr, and assorted junk that arrived from loads of other vendors. If nothing, he's consistent and found religion when he jumped to NeXt. The Darwin kernel and other human-factor profiles, along with sheer beauty make Job's stuff like Sony's product lines used to be.

The list of other flops is miles long. Flops are good: they test engineers and the market place. Some items are ahead of their time, others behind, and still others are just really bad ideas.

Visicalc?

[BreadMan]

Dan Bricklin's spreadsheet ran on the Apple first and was the sole reason folks went out and bought an Apple. For a period (think early 80's), Apple owned the desktop computer market, with many more business-oriented applications than creative/educational titles.

Only after they got crushed by IBM machines did they focus on thier current market. I don't think IBM did them in as much as the IBM clone market, which reduced the cost of the hardware to far below Apple's. With a lower price, more people purchased IBM-compatible machines and the demand for software followed.

The Biggest Flop

[Bullfish]

Apple's biggest flop has less to do with these products and more to do with their lack of service and support of those products. This is probably the biggest reason Apple flopped on the business machine end of things. They orphaned, most especially, the Apple Lisa. While the Mac that replaced it may have been a superior product, the bad taste left in the mouths of executives who bought into the Lisa program was too much. Business people like reliability and continuity, which is why Gates and MS made hay back in the day. MS may be a bloated tanker now, but in the early 80's it was a nimble group of techies fighting the good fight against IBM. And they gave excellent service, even to Apple users for whom they made lots of software.

Apple didn't provide that service. That was the biggest difference. The cost difference between early PC's and Macs wasn't that big. When the diverse configurabilty of the PC came into play in the late 80's, that was the death knell in terms of the greater business market.

Had Apple hand-held business in the early days, the computing world really might have been different indeed.

Very interesting article

[Anonymous Coward]

Shame the wide public does not read about these things, and commonly believe Microsoft is the innovator and responsible for cheap computing.

Microsoft's success was that of dirty business tactics and marketting - not innovation.

Microsoft - the "Missionaries" never really cared about the (world) population at large.
When will people "get the true facts"?

Also for years I've been saying Bill Gates never donated a dime to the poor, somehow the Microsoft P.R Engine picked on that and told him - "Hey go philantropic it is a good investment".

So the new propaganda is working well to buy more sympathy from the ignorant public.

What about people that have no money but still devote their time to charitable causes - that impresses me, that is true sacrifice.

Otherwise, if you are a billionary it is your f***ing duty !! For him it is hardly a dent into his luxury lifestyle. He is the world's richest man - he can donate just as much with the FUD campaign, and sick ploys against Linux and FOSS.

But then again I wonder if Apple won the monopoly if they would be just as nasty, after all Steve Jobs does possess nasty tyranical streaks.

Alan Kay [smalltalk.org] - now that was someone that truly cared about people.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[Casualposter]

I've owned a lot of systems over the years. The apples have always lasted longer and given me less trouble than the X86 hardware. I bought apple and it was painfully expensive, but some of it still works just fine twelve years later. I spend hundreds or even thousands less on X86 boxes to do basic computing and a year later (or less) and I'm replacing the mother board, the ram, the hard drive, or some other component. The X86 stuff is cheap and in many cases, cheap crap. For things that I don't want to fix, I spend extra money. You can do this with x86 hardware, but I've found that the good stuff is about the same price as apple. I recommend Apple, or higher end X86 for those people who don't want to tweek or fix, but just want the box to work for years.

Apple IIGS Deliberately Crippled

[Daniel Jansen]

The Apple IIGS was deliberately crippled. It should have run at 8 MHz, but Apple chose 2.8 MHz to make it (1) faster than other Apple II models and (2) slower than the 8 MHz Macintosh.

The IIGS had great color support but absolutely lousy resolution. If it had supported 640 x 480 instead of CGA-esque 320 x 200, that would have helped a lot.

The Ensoniq sound chip was remarkable.

But in addition to making the IIGS underpowered and giving it low-res graphics, Apple had several ROM revisions that (1) required taking the computer back to your Apple dealer and (2) broke a lot of the software you already owned.

It coulda been a contender, but Apple's decisions kept that from happening.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[MightyMartian]

Well there's good x86 hardware and there's bad x86 hardware. The advantage of the PC/x86 platform has been choice. Apple may have gained stability by controlling hardware, but it made it a far less desirable platform as far as upgrade paths went. That's changed to some degree now, but it's way too late to make it more than a niche player.

Re:want one ...

[nelsonal]

I doubt most people buy Gucci for the designs (they may choose Gucci over Prada for the design). People are buying Gucci because it makes them feel good or appear successful (as a first impression). Since Apple's status symbol is only seen in the home (generally by people who have already formed a first impression) there isn't as much value accrued to status. Look at the success of the iPod or their laptop lines both frequently used outside the home.
I'd guess that BMW would make a sweet treadmill, but it would probably have crappy sales if it were priced at the same premium to the market as their cars.

Re:Sounds reasonable.

[Anonymous Coward]

The truth about Apple hardware... once and for all...

The MHz myth is not true. There are many contributing factors to a processors performance (pipelines, architecture, et cetera).

Alright... let's not talk Apple vs. PC; let's talk IBM vs. PC...

Q: Why do the top-notch IBM workstations and servers use PowerPC processors?
A: 1st of all, IBM manufactures them; but couldn't they stop manufacturing PPC and switch to x86? Yes, but they don't.

Q: Why do companies buy IBM PowerPC-based systems?
A: Because some CTO in that company believes they're fast, and his advisers agree with him. I believe these people are qualified professionals.

Q: Why are many supercomputers powered by PowerPC processors?
A: Obviously the tech staff at universities and institutions believe PowerPC is superior to other architectures. I believe these people are qualified professionals.

Q: Why was the power.org community founded if PowerPCs were so behind?
A: Apparently multiple industry leaders believe that the PPC architecture is a profitable market, and that that will hold true for many years to come.

Q: Why do PowerPC processors at a much lower clock frequency whip the crap out of Intel's Itanium processor line?
A: I really don't know... probably a shorter pipeline in PPC procs...

Conclusion... well PPC seems a horrible architecture *sarcasm*, and Apple manufactures horrible hardware *sarcasm*... that's why there's so many zealots around... ever seen MS zealots? I sure haven't...