does apple abandon their customers ?

[RAC]

The iPad was the first Apple product I bought after many years of being bitter as an abandoned Newton user.

My first Apple product was the Apple II in the late 70's. I was forced over to "the dark side" by my work situation in the early 90's. For as long as I am working, my PC will be Windows based, in retirement I would be more open to going back to the Mac.

I am also an ex Newton Message Pad user and clearly recall the abrupt dumping of that product. The abruptness was probably due in part to the John Scully versus Steve Jobs clash I suspect. It was the former's pet project. The main problem with the Newton was that the technology for the hardware platform just wasn't quite available at the time (or Apple didn't make the right choices from what was available).

I thought that maybe the wouldn't use the name iPad because of the bad memories associated with the Message Pad.

As stated in my earlier post, other products that have been unceremoniously dumped over the years include the Apple III and the Lisa. I really don' think that there is any danger of that happening with the iPad though.

 

[pallentx]

A true Microsoft user. Apple is noted for maintaining a connection with past models.

Ha Microsoft maintains its connections to past products way too much - to a fault. I had apps on my Windows Mobile 6.5 phone that ran on Pocket PC 2003. Much of the issues and complexities of past windows versions have been over maintaining backwards compatibility. This has been one of my main compaints against MS. Sometimes you just need to make a break and start fresh. Thankfully, thats what they have finally done with Windows Phone 7.

 

[iVan]

Try to keep a peripheral for a few years with Windows upgrades. Impossible. They make printers obsolete rather quickly...

 

[RAC]

Try to keep a peripheral for a few years with Windows upgrades. Impossible. They make printers obsolete rather quickly...

I can't say that I have noticed that.

AirPrint should reduce any such problems provided the the printer manufacturers come on board and Apple does the right thing (for backward compatibility) as AirPrint evolves.

 

[DaveSt]

Try to keep a peripheral for a few years with Windows upgrades. Impossible. They make printers obsolete rather quickly...

Really? I have never had a printer compatibility issue with Windows ... ever. My main printer is still a HP 5L that I purchased in 1995. I have used it with every version of Windows from Win 95 to Win 7 (x64) with no issues at all. My color printer is another HP that I purchased in 2004, no problems there either.

If you do have compatibility issues you need to look at the manufacturer of the printer, not MS. The manufacturer supplies the drivers, not Microsoft. Many manufacturers decided not to release 64 bit drivers (not just printers either), probably hoping you would go out and purchase something new.

 

[matt_90036]

ok i hope i haven't opened a can of worms in here. but i put this quite hot shot question in here because i wanted to get a feel what i can expect from apple. so far it seems everyone had a good experience. me, myself i didn't. my first actual apple product was an ibook back in 2004 or so. this thing had a very poor built quality with battery flopping to to sides or protruding 2mm over. the keyboard poped out of the notebook after 2 weeks and was seating unevenly and not to mention that 1 speaker broke after 3 months. i brought it over to Apple store at University of California Irvine and they pretty much told that me that none of those things will be fixed because the warranty expired after 1 month or so and the problems are mentioned are because of user negligence. anyways, you guys get my point i had a bad experiance. a couple of days ago i went to the Apple store and i have to say that the build quality of Apple products have really really improved. the iPAD will not be used by me as a computer replacement but more like a mobile computer - so there is no OSX issue (which i am sorry but i just don't like). the iOS seems really nice and the ability to hack this device and customize it in so many ways brings joy to my heart. so there is my apple story. i thought i would share it with you guys. i am hoping that my iPAD will not break and that it will function without a problem.

 

[Seadog]

A true Microsoft user.

I guess I don't understand that comment. My two most used MS products are Windows XP and Office 2003. I still receive weekly updates for both. Does that mean I should expect the same from Apple when my Ipad is 10 years old? I use and like products from both Apple and MS. I don't feel abandoned by either company.

I have seen more people gripe about being dumped by upgrades by MS, so to me, I can see someone who is firmly a MS user having concerns.

My big issue is that MS controls the business world with their OS and Office. I have experienced several issues about support. The constant updates, the bloatware that makes faster computers a must, etc. On the other to be shot down side of the issue, my wife and her sisters think a computer should last for decades. I keep telling my wife that I will get her a replacement for her
iBook, only to be hear that it is still working great and she doesn't want a new one.

 

[matt_90036]

On the other to be shot down side of the issue, my wife and her sisters think a computer should last for decades.

hey that is my stance on it too. the problem that i have is with the software. for example i remember that Wrod 97 only required something like 50mb of disk space and 8mb of RAM. why the F*&^ word 2011 or whatever requires 2GB of disk space (or more) and like 512mb or RAM?? i just want to write a damn essay and not do movie editing. And this problem i have observed over the years with all kinds of applications. i like the fact that Steve Jobs is force people to make light applications for iPAD, although i fear that once IPAD2 comes along they will start making more and more bloatware.
back in the days computers used to have 16 maybe 32 mb of ram and internet worked fine and the OS worked fine. i don't understand why increasingly MS kept on raising the system requirements.

 

[pallentx]

A true Microsoft user.

I guess I don't understand that comment. My two most used MS products are Windows XP and Office 2003. I still receive weekly updates for both. Does that mean I should expect the same from Apple when my Ipad is 10 years old? I use and like products from both Apple and MS. I don't feel abandoned by either company.

I have seen more people gripe about being dumped by upgrades by MS, so to me, I can see someone who is firmly a MS user having concerns.

My big issue is that MS controls the business world with their OS and Office. I have experienced several issues about support. The constant updates, the bloatware that makes faster computers a must, etc. On the other to be shot down side of the issue, my wife and her sisters think a computer should last for decades. I keep telling my wife that I will get her a replacement for her
iBook, only to be hear that it is still working great and she doesn't want a new one.

The only thing I can think of that would fit this description is when they moved from the old windows kernel to the NT kernel with windows 2000/XP. Its kind of like when Apple moved from OS9 to OSX and not everything was 100% supported on the new system.

 

[iVan]

Try to keep a peripheral for a few years with Windows upgrades. Impossible. They make printers obsolete rather quickly...

Really? I have never had a printer compatibility issue with Windows ... ever. My main printer is still a HP 5L that I purchased in 1995. I have used it with every version of Windows from Win 95 to Win 7 (x64) with no issues at all. My color printer is another HP that I purchased in 2004, no problems there either.

If you do have compatibility issues you need to look at the manufacturer of the printer, not MS. The manufacturer supplies the drivers, not Microsoft. Many manufacturers decided not to release 64 bit drivers (not just printers either), probably hoping you would go out and purchase something new.

You're right, the manufacturer is responsible for not rewriting but it's the os changes in the first place that forces them to rewrite the control software.
I bought an HP 1120c that ran on win98. The software had loads of features that I depended on for my business and the darn thing was expensive as it cost the same thing as the computer. When XP came along all the features disappeared and I was left with a shadow of the drivers, not able to perform the things it used to.

 

[DaveSt]

You're right, the manufacturer is responsible for not rewriting but it's the os changes in the first place that forces them to rewrite the control software.
I bought an HP 1120c that ran on win98. The software had loads of features that I depended on for my business and the darn thing was expensive as it cost the same thing as the computer. When XP came along all the features disappeared and I was left with a shadow of the drivers, not able to perform the things it used to.

I hear you. Unfortunately sometimes the price of progress means leaving some things behind. I did have a TV Tuner card I was rather fond of that never got a 64 bit driver upgrade, so I had to find something new. Then again, I imagine we would all be complaining if we were still forced to run a 16-bit, DOS based operating system on our quad core 64-bit chips

-Dave

 

[DaveSt]

hey that is my stance on it too. the problem that i have is with the software. for example i remember that Wrod 97 only required something like 50mb of disk space and 8mb of RAM. why the F*&^ word 2011 or whatever requires 2GB of disk space (or more) and like 512mb or RAM?? i just want to write a damn essay and not do movie editing. And this problem i have observed over the years with all kinds of applications. i like the fact that Steve Jobs is force people to make light applications for iPAD, although i fear that once IPAD2 comes along they will start making more and more bloatware.
back in the days computers used to have 16 maybe 32 mb of ram and internet worked fine and the OS worked fine. i don't understand why increasingly MS kept on raising the system requirements.

But isn't that pretty much the state of software development in general, regardless of platform? Why is the Itunes download close to 100MB? Why does it consume more system resources than Excel? I think software developers keep trying to add new features to the software to make people want to upgrade. When I was in graduate school, I could fit an entire, full featured Linux distribution on about 15 floppy disks, and I pretty much had everything I needed and it ran on much less than state of the art equipment. Now, that same distribution ships on a DVD disk and requires a rather beefy system to run well.

 

[matt_90036]

But isn't that pretty much the state of software development in general, regardless of platform?

yes it is but some people would love to have a lite version. i never used MS office for more than writting an essay and occasional lab data input. do i really need a 15GB MS Office 2020 (sarcasim here...) that is going to take 10 annoying seconds to load because of all the services it requires to run that hammer down my CPU in the first place....

 

[DaveSt]

But isn't that pretty much the state of software development in general, regardless of platform?

yes it is but some people would love to have a lite version. i never used MS office for more than writting an essay and occasional lab data input. do i really need a 15GB MS Office 2020 (sarcasim here...) that is going to take 10 annoying seconds to load because of all the services it requires to run that hammer down my CPU in the first place....

MS tried that, it was called Works and everyone hates it because it is missing too many features from Office. I do agree with your point however. In the same way I would like to have lighter versions of many applications. Take Itunes for example (yes, I despise that program). I don't need any sync capabilities at all, nor do I need the Itunes store built into my desktop application. Part of having an iOS device means that I don't need those things. But, Apple has made a unified application for all devices much like MS has made an Office application for every use they can think of. With cheap storage and processing power (at least in the Win world) that is the name of the game.

 

[Wetstuff]

I have had Mac since the late 80's. I still have a Classic II that has a 9" B&W screen.

They do not abandon us - we abandon them. In a total of 5 iMacs, laptops, 4 pre-iMacs, a few iPods and this iPad, I have only had one iMac about 3 gens. ago back for a free power supply.

Probably the most failure prone item in this food chain have been the external HDs that I use to back up my primary computer. It's best to run two if you consider your work critical.