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Desktops (Apple) Businesses Hardware Apple

New Mac Clone Maker 'Quo' To Open Retail Store 296

bughunter writes "Cnet is reporting that Mac clone maker Quo Computer plans to open its first retail location, selling Mac clones, on June 1st. To start, Quo will offer three desktop systems: the Life Q, Pro Q, and Max Q. While details of the components are not yet available, founder Rashantha De Silva said they are looking at Apple's system configurations for guidance. Pricing has also not been finalized on the desktop machines, but the company is looking to start pricing at less than $900. While Quo is starting off with the desktop machines, De Silva said it is looking at offering an Apple TV-like media server and a smaller computer similar to the Mac Mini. He acknowledges that Quo will likely face opposition from Apple, much like Psystar. 'They probably will (sue us),' De Silva said. 'There are others doing this, but we have a different attitude. There are thousands of people in the "Hackintosh" market, but many of them are creating bad products. I don't think anyone wins in that environment.'"
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New Mac Clone Maker 'Quo' To Open Retail Store

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  • by Rosyna ( 80334 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @10:36AM (#28149275) Homepage

    Do you think Mac users are as fanatic as protestors from Westboro Baptist Church?

    (Perhaps they are...)

  • by TechForensics ( 944258 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @10:38AM (#28149307) Homepage Journal

    I know Apple hardware is supposed to be of high quality, and it is often argued that buying a similar-quality PC would cost as much as a Mac. But I still believe there is enough excess profit to Apple for a clone maker to offer the same quality for less money. This is probably the reason Apple will not see Quo just as a manufacturer who will help popularize their OS.

    Interesting. Cheap knockoffs sully the brand, but excellent ones cannibalize sales. There may be no hope for a would-be Mac clone maker without enough capital allocated to legal defense.

  • Re:Why? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by CarpetShark ( 865376 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @10:42AM (#28149343)

    The same argument applies (arguably doubly so) to people running pirated copies of Windows. Personally, I stick with Linux.

    That said, if OS X would work reasonably on my system, I'd (at least) dual-boot it for sure. It runs perfectly well on a relative's store-bought standard PC though, and I can easily see why people would run it rather than Windows.

    Apple are really being dumb by sticking with their own hardware, imho. They could probably kill windows overnight if they invested in mainstream hardware drivers, and got quickly to the critical mass where hardware manufacturers have to develop drivers for them. Even Linux has managed that, so Apple definitely could.

  • by Jeff DeMaagd ( 2015 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @11:00AM (#28149447) Homepage Journal

    The problem I see is that they've made a declaration in trying to mimic Apple's line product for product. To me, a better service to provide is to fill in the niches (gaps) in the Apple product line, a Hackintoshed netbook and a consumer tower are two obvious ones. That's not protection from getting sued though, I don't remember Psystar offering much other than consumer towers and a hokey "server".

  • What... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by motang ( 1266566 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @11:08AM (#28149493)
    What exactly Quo think they will be doing different from others? Apple will definitely go after them with all their guns loaded, and how exactly does Quo think they will win? Their thinking doesn't make any sense. Now I am all for using computers with OS X, but they way I see it, I don't want to pay the extra money that Apple charges for their machine but that doesn't mean I am going to break the EULA. Era of me pirating software is over (it was over about 5 to 6 years ago and I have Ubuntu and the Linux community for stepping up the game to thank for that) I am perfectly happy using Ubuntu on all my machines.
  • by javacowboy ( 222023 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @11:10AM (#28149499)

    All Apple has to do is to either stop offering shrink-wrapped copies of OS X, or sell upgrade-only disks that require an existing installation of OS X to work. Then Psystar, Quo and other unauthorized clones will cease to exist.

  • more like mac mini (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fermion ( 181285 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @11:15AM (#28149529) Homepage Journal
    For 1,000 it will be more like a mac mini than an imac. Honestly, Dell has probelms shipping hardware that runs well for less than $800. When you get to a decent 24" IMac, there might only be a 10 or 15% saving on the Dell with Vista installed.

    The biggest complaint I hear is not that you can't get a mac for $1000, as most people who will spend a $1000 will spend the $1300 for the imac, but that you can't get a mac for $500. This to me is that market segment that the cloners need to be in, not a 10% reduction from Apples. price. And don't try to say that these machines are going to complete with the high end iMac or low end Mac Pro and offer a 50% reduction in price. I don't see most other people shipping Xeon machines, much less with a terrebyte on board. I know that they can built for almost nothing, but really. Most people who want a $500 computer is not going to build it, they want plug and play.

  • by RiotingPacifist ( 1228016 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @11:22AM (#28149567)

    Why do their adverts compare macs to windows then?

    Apple want to have it both ways, if it wasn't for their pitiful market share the DOJ would be literally ripping them apart
    locking high-end MP3 players to their software
    locking their software to their operating system
    locking their operating system to their hardware
    locking their high-end MP3 players to their hardware (firewire only)
    locking their phone to their software which is tied to certain operating systems

    Fortunately there is no way their EULA will be found legally binding and so while they can make it hard for mac-cloners (no hw support, trademarks, no license to sell os X, etc), they cant stop them.

  • by ducomputergeek ( 595742 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @12:00PM (#28149851)

    Read a little history. They tried this in the 1990's. It nearly killed Apple. They won't do it again.

    I use mac because OSX provided me with a Unix based desktop that worked on a laptop and had commercial application support including MS Office and Adobe products. I used to play with Linux, but never got my sound card, printer, and a host of other hardware to work back in the day. Especially if you wanted to run Linux on a laptop. If the Mac saves me 1 day of hassle of having to reinstall other OS's offered on other laptops, not hunt down and compile drivers, etc. then I've recovered any premium I paid.

    Now there are ways of being smart about it. I bought the last generation of 12.1" Powerbook in 2005. I paid about USD 2500 for the machine, but I still have it and it still works and I still use it every day. But it came time where I needed an Intel mac. Bought a second generation white MacBook for $550 a couple weeks ago.

  • Re:Why? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by iluvcapra ( 782887 ) on Saturday May 30, 2009 @01:02PM (#28150319)

    OS X is designed / It is not. It is _supported_

    Distinction without a difference.

    It's amazing the number of Apple zealots who will go on and on about what mad skillz Apple's OS developers have, then turn around and insist they'd be so incompetent as to tie their basic design into particular hardware designs.

    Supporting many hardware configurations doesn't require "mad skillz," it just requires mongolian hordes of devlopers, and not minding that everyone in the support queue hates you. It would probably also mean the end of the Genius Bar as we know it, and the Genius Bar is the only compelling reason to buy a Mac for a lot of people.

  • by falconwolf ( 725481 ) <falconsoaring_2000@@@yahoo...com> on Sunday May 31, 2009 @02:26AM (#28156089)

    I paid a premium for my Mac, knowing that I could get similar specs for cheaper on a PC

    I pad no premium for my MacBook Pro. Before I got it I made a list of what I wanted to do with it then made decisions on what software was needed for those and what the hardware requirements were for the software. Looking at similarly configured computers Macs were within the price range I found from other manufacturers. Some were less, such as an HP I found cost about $50 less. But others were more such as a Dell I looked at which cost more than $200 more. And in both cases they came with Windows, and one of my requirements was NO MS Windows! After suffering for almost 10 years dealing with Windows crashes and MS treating it's users like they're criminals I did not want to deal with that anymore.

    I enjoy the fact that the hardware and software, including a number of included, free applications, are pre-integrated for me and function as a cohesive whole.

    Though I like what iLife can and does do I've never used any of the apps. The only app I use that come on Macs is TextEdit. On second thought I've used other things that come with OS X, Disk Utility and Terminal.

    It's not that one is inherently better than the other, it's that they are different value propositions. Certainly they have different strengths and weaknesses, and I would have thought that this community, if not the general public, would understand this by now.

    Nope, not going to happen. Slashdotters understanding that that is. There are the Linux, Mac, and Windows fanbois.

    Falcon

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