RealPC vs Microsoft?

Snowy_River · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by Kamu-San
Nagromme, I agree, if Windows emulation would still be (a lot) slower than running Windows on a PC, then it wouldn't be a threat to OS X development.

Still, the best thing for Apple to do would still be to lower their prices and gain more market share.

From a practical stand point, the only way for Apple to lower prices is to cut their profit margin (which isn't that substantial) or use cheaper parts. On the one hand, they might gain greater market share, but they'd loose money, which is never a good thing, especially in a weak economy. On the other hand, the reliability of their machines would go down, cost of maintenance would go up, and people would be less inclined to buy them, so market share wouldn't increase. The gripping hand is that Apple's prices are fair for the quality of computer that they are putting out. Yes, the processors may be overpriced for the performance, but we must remain hopeful that the 970 will put an end to that with lower cost and higher performance.

Snowy_River · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by Chimaera
Personally I'm highly sceptical about FWB's claims of speed - I personally suspect its going to end up being more or less the same speed of emulation as VPC at best.

Well, whether it outperforms VPC or not, I'll likely switch over. I stopped by the store just the other day and I saw the prices that are on the VPC boxes now. I was astonished. For a VPC 5 -> VPC 6 upgrade the price was $99! I only paid $149 for a full version of VPC 5. And for a full version of VPC 6 the price was $259.

I presume that this is MS's influence, but regardless, I don't think I'll be buying a new version of VPC any time soon...

Kid Red · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by Nermal
We've been left in the dark a bit, it'll be interesting to see what MS has actually got against this. FWB's site doesn't say much, just this:

Notice that they say PowerWindows, not RealPC. Will RealPC still exist, or is it being replaced with PowerWindows?

Did you read the forum at the link above?

The fulfillment of this purchase is through Kagi. They don't like Safari, and prefer Netscape 6 or higher and IE 5.x or better. They say they support any HTML,but in practice, the download links sometimes fail.
If you haven't gotten it, email fwb off their website and they will give you an alternate FTP site to download it.

The release of Real PC and the software formerly known as Softwindows, now PowerWindows is now scheduled for July... Microsoft sent us a Cease and Desist letter. One must be careful when scrutinized by their attorneys.

Kid Red · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by Snowy_River
Well, whether it outperforms VPC or not, I'll likely switch over. I stopped by the store just the other day and I saw the prices that are on the VPC boxes now. I was astonished. For a VPC 5 -> VPC 6 upgrade the price was $99! I only paid $149 for a full version of VPC 5. And for a full version of VPC 6 the price was $259.

I presume that this is MS's influence, but regardless, I don't think I'll be buying a new version of VPC any time soon...

No, they were $250 for version 4 when I got it w 98, you must've gotten a lesser OS. The newer the OS the price changes IIRC.

But I'm with you, no more VPC once an alternative comes out, and I think I can stick with v6 without upgrading for a while. Especially when I can run it on a 970 in a few months

brittrossiter · Jun 5, 2003

If there really is this kind of agreement, let's see 'em try to enforce it

Originally posted by Chimaera
...

The only grounds MS could have for taking on RealPC is if this supposed agreement between Connectix and FWB was put down in writing (and if money changed hands over it) - If there was some form of contract promising no further development of RealPC then basically FWB would be screwed as MS could enforce that. ...

That sort of agreement would be very much Against The Law (specifically, the Sherman Antitrust Act). Connectix and FWB could not contract between themselves for one or the other to kill a particular product line any more than they could contract to fix prices or carve up markets for themselves.

Sayer · Jun 5, 2003

Uhm, no

For the guy who said Apple's profit margins are not substantial.

On page 27 of Apple's Form 10-K (Annual Report):

Gross Margin percentage:

2002 - 28%
2001 - 23%
2000 - 27%

Apple's profit margins as a whole are nearly 28% of the purchase price of Mac products.

Thats for the whole YEAR.

Looking further we find that gross margins were:

31% in the First Quarter and went down to 26% in the Fourth Quarter.

The company cites reasons for decreases in margins as being due to a "rise in component costs [...] and aggressive pricing..."

So to say that Apple's profit margins are insubstantial is just flat out wrong. Apple's margins are the envy of the industry.

Gateway's margins ARE insubstantial as they are selling just barely above cost on most of their computer products. So much so that Gateway is now selling plasma TVs and such to actually make money in their many dozens of retail stores.

If you don't know, don't comment. It leaves people with a false impression of Apple Computer, Inc. that is then used as the basis for purchasing decisions or ultimately leads to changing the stock price (I am a shareholder).

MisterMe · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by pellucidity
Remember that M$ bought the emulation products primarily to kill VPC linux on x86, not Windows on PPC.

That's just plain wrong. M$ bought Connectix's emulation products for its Virtual Server technology. Virtual Server is still in beta, but the Redmond company sees it as part of its salvation. M$ faces a serious problem. Its customers don't trust its products. Enterprise customers are refusing to upgrade to M$'s newest operatings systems until they are confident that most of the bugs have been squashed. It is fairly common for Windows shops to lag two versions of Windows behind the latest version. When you are a monopoly starving for revenue growth, that is a prescription for disaster. Virtual Server will allow potential customers to employ M$'s lastest offerings on virtual machines until they are confident that they can be trusted with their mission-critical applications.

Look at it like this: Your trusted system is Windows 2000. M$ wants to sell you Windows 2003 Server. You tell them that you just upgraded from Windows NT and are not ready to trust your applications to an unreliable system. M$ suggests that you buy Virtual Server. You can run VS under Win 2000, which you trust. However, VS will allow you to gain access to all the nefty new features of Win 2003 without risking your entire operation.

reedm007 · Jun 5, 2003

Re: Uhm, no

Originally posted by Sayer
For the guy who said Apple's profit margins are not substantial.

<snip>

Apple's profit margins as a whole are nearly 28% of the purchase price of Mac products.

<snip>

Gateway's margins ARE insubstantial as they are selling just barely above cost on most of their computer products. So much so that Gateway is now selling plasma TVs and such to actually make money in their many dozens of retail stores.

If you don't know, don't comment. It leaves people with a false impression of Apple Computer, Inc. that is then used as the basis for purchasing decisions or ultimately leads to changing the stock price (I am a shareholder).

First of all, I hope nobody on these boards would ever base a purchasing decision on a MacRumors message forum, but that's just me..

But you have good points. Difference here is, vs. other hardwae companies, is the r&d, the free software, etc. 28% profit margins rapidly become a lot smaller when you realize all the other costs that Gateway, eMachines, etc. don't have to deal with, because they simply repackage boxes and provide support. In terms of raw component costs, you're right, Apple's profit margins are a lot higher than most, but it's the reason Macs are Macs still and not just faceless hardware boxes.

31% in the First Quarter and went down to 26% in the Fourth Quarter

That's impressive if you ask me, as a 5% profit margin decrease can have a major impact on profits. People on these boards who throw out "sell for $500" prices need to re-think what that actually means for profitability and sustainability. When you quarterly profits are as low as they are for Apple right now, even a 5% decrease in profit margins could have a huge impact on overall profits, but it does indicate price drops.

One thing you probably should have added is that these profit margins are for the consumer space, and don't include education or governmental discounts. Also, profit margins vary drastically by product. The $999 iBook, for example, has an extremely low profit margin (lowe than the numbers you quoted by quite a bit), whereas the 17" PowerBook is rather high.

macdong · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by Snowy_River
Ooo! Ooo! How about, instead of 'PowerWindows' . . . 'PowerPC'! Oh... wait... I guess that won't work...

or we can name it PoweredWindows.
get it??
windows that is "powered"?
ok, you don't get it...

bignumbers · Jun 5, 2003

If I go back in my memory banks to when VPC came out (and SoftWindows had already been around) I remember the difference was that VPC was a raw hardware emulator, while SoftWindows was written specifically to emulate Windows. You could easily run most x86 OS's on VPC, but due to the Windows ties in SW this flexibility wasn't there or wasn't as far-reaching.

It's possible this recent legal stuff is related to however SoftWindows (and now RealWindows or whatever) includes tie-ins into the Windows OS. If it were truly generic (like VPC) it wouldn't be an issue.

Another piece of the puzzle - what was the agreement between Connectix and FWB? Why did that agreement exist? Was FWB accused of something illegal, or did FWB get out of the emulation business of its own accord and sell certain rights (and sign a non-complete) to Connectix?

MacsRgr8 · Jun 5, 2003

Hey, wasn't PowerWindows a little Control Panel in OS 8-9 to make Finder-windows translucent?
If ya had a pretty fast Mac these effects were awsome

XnavxeMiyyep · Jun 5, 2003

If Apple wants to make money, they should release a headless iMac G4 for $300 to $400 less than it's equivelents with monitors.

nagromme · Jun 5, 2003

I'm guessing that Apple has the cash reserves to withstand lower margins on certain products--even a basic $499-$599 headless Mac--while maintaining their R&D. It would be a good long-term move, helping with market share, and Apple has been willing to spend money for the long term before.

And I'm guessing that Apple is already in 100% agreement with the above, and WILL be offering both better price/performance (like a 970 for little or no cost increase over G4 towers) AND a low-end headless Mac.

The timing, however, I leave to them. A big play for marketshare might do well to include several elements all at the SAME time:

* 970s

* Panther

* New low-end headless Mac

* Huge marketing campaign

I don't see Apple delaying 970s for the sake of Panther (although Panther might still be first, wth 970s in the fall). But I could see the reasoning behind waiting for Panther before selling a new headless model. It would make it an even better product, received that much better by the press in comparison to Windows boxes.

And if they don't all happen at once, I still think they are coming--just a matter of time.

Snowy_River · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by nagromme
I'm guessing that Apple has the cash reserves to withstand lower margins on certain products--even a basic $499-$599 headless Mac--while maintaining their R&D. It would be a good long-term move, helping with market share, and Apple has been willing to spend money for the long term before.
...

Okay, maybe I'm just misunderstanding, but are you suggesting that Apple use its cash reserves to subsidize selling computers at a loss? How is that good in the long term?

Majin Buu · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by bignumbers

It's possible this recent legal stuff is related to however SoftWindows (and now RealWindows or whatever) includes tie-ins into the Windows OS. If it were truly generic (like VPC) it wouldn't be an issue.

Another piece of the puzzle - what was the agreement between Connectix and FWB? Why did that agreement exist? Was FWB accused of something illegal, or did FWB get out of the emulation business of its own accord and sell certain rights (and sign a non-complete) to Connectix?

No... SoftWindows is a tradematk of MicroSoft. I believe all MS wants is for FWB to stop using the name. RealPC has nothing to do with Microsoft, so Real PC development should not be affected. I suspect there are other factors delaying the product.

FWB got out of this emulation business because it was losing big time money on the two products--RealPC and SoftWindows were the two products that destroyed Hard Disk Toolkit, CDT, etc. and almost bankrupted the company.

MrMacMan · Jun 5, 2003

Use another name and make a shell product, don't let any OS come with it, let the people get there own version of windows or 'reccomend' and OS to run on.

M$ is making this a real hassel.

DeusOmnis · Jun 5, 2003

I'm almost positive that Microsoft will not have a way of stopping RealPC or a similar product by FWB (they may have to change their name or something).

DeusOmnis · Jun 5, 2003

I believe the letter is about the deal that FWB had with connectix, however. FWB had agreed to stop making Softwindows/RealPC so that VirtualPC would have no competition. Apparently Microsoft believes the deal still holds.

DeusOmnis · Jun 5, 2003

One last post by me...

Also, did you notice that ms waited a really long time to do this? I'm guessing to make FWB use up resources on RealPC before having to shut it down, lol.

MisterMe · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by Majin Buu
No... SoftWindows is a tradematk of MicroSoft. I believe all MS wants is for FWB to stop using the name. RealPC has nothing to do with Microsoft, so Real PC development should not be affected. I suspect there are other factors delaying the product.
....

SoftWindows is most certainly not a trademark of Microsoft and never has been. In the mid '90's, however, M$ licensed the technology from Insignia Solutions for incorporation into non-Intel versions of Windows NT.

Majin Buu · Jun 5, 2003

Originally posted by MisterMe
SoftWindows is most certainly not a trademark of Microsoft and never has been. In the mid '90's, however, M$ licensed the technology from Insignia Solutions for incorporation into non-Intel versions of Windows NT.

According to FWB Software. SoftWindows is a trademark of Micr0soft!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Go the following page: http://www.fwb.com/html/press_at_fwb.html

Scroll all the way down to the bottom...

And read the part that says:

Note to Editors: EVM, Embedded Virtual Machine and RealPC are trademarks of Insignia Solutions, Inc. Sun, Java, Embedded Java and Personal Java are trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. SoftWindows is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation, and is used by Insignia Solutions under license from owner. Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.

By the way, someone at FWB got lazy and copied that forward-looking statements from a 1998 Insignia's press release.

Majin Buu · Jun 5, 2003

someone posted this on Macnn.com

No, FWB never had a formal agreement with Connectix. I can't figure out why FWB would claim this, but the only agreement was that a while back FWB approached Connectix and said "we're discontinuing SoftWindows/RealPC, can we refer customers to you?" And Connectix said, "Sure!". That was the only agreement. There was never anything more than that.

Huked on Fonick · Jun 6, 2003

i think pretty sure that vpc emulates the hardware where as realpc emulates windows and makes its able to run on a powerpc. I am not sure but ibeleve this to be true. I also beleve this is why its faster.

Chimaera · Jun 6, 2003

Originally posted by Huked on Fonick
i think pretty sure that vpc emulates the hardware where as realpc emulates windows and makes its able to run on a powerpc. I am not sure but ibeleve this to be true. I also beleve this is why its faster.

Nope, RealPC is a x86 emulator, its entiurely possible softwindows is a Windows emulator, which would explain some of Microsofts ire towards it, although my impression was that softwindows was basically a simplified version of realpc bundled with win98

brittrossiter> I'm from the UK, I know very little about US antitrust laws (except the MS vs DoJ thing making the whole system look like a joke).

The Shadow · Jun 6, 2003

PowerMac
PowerBook
PowerPC

PowerMate...? Alright, you use it with your power[Mac], I get that

PowerWindows...?

...relevant and as original as we've come to expect.

RealPC vs Microsoft?

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