[DougHogg]

Originally posted by Ian W.
but once again, to the casual teenage computer user, windows will be the OS of choice. why? simple, something close to all the games that most people want run only in windows. the ones that do run on mac are only converted way after the original came out for windows. so, as long as we're playing games, and games are created for windows, windows will be the OS of choice.

At one time, all the computer games ran on the Apple II. In other words, markets can shift over time. Sure, the PC will be the most popular gaming computer for a while. However did you happen to notice that Warcraft III, the biggest game release in history, was released on the Mac and PC simultaneously. In fact the same disk works on both operating systems. If the Mac gains market share (which I believe is occurring), more people will make games for it, and then more people will buy it, etc. In other words, there will be a rolling snow ball effect.

Basically the Mac has to crack the business market. If that happens in a big way, the Mac will take off.

With Mac OS X, Unix programmers finally have a way to create a program that your grandmother can use. And there are a lot of unix programmers who are very good at what they do.

Five years from now, I expect to see that the Mac/Unix world has gained a lot of market share from Windows, and we will have kick-%%% games coming out of our ears. Why? Because a lot of those unix programmers hate Microsoft (because of it's destruction of Netscape- the company, and it's tight licensing activities, to name just a couple of reasons) but those programmers need an outlet for their creativity. In fact, one of the reasons that unix programmers work on Linux for free is so that they don't have to use Microsofts products. (Linux is free.) Maybe Apple will be able to maintain a better relationship with those programmers, in which case the sky is the limit.

It could be a whole new ball game which makes me happy.

I remember a Windows 95 computer that crashed at our school. I went to reiinstall Windows 95 but the computer told me that it was the wrong Windows 95 disk. I tried every Windows 95 disk we had--about 5 of them, and I got the same message. So I erased the hard disk. But of course then the CD drive wouldn't work. So I had to find a CD driver to put on the floppy boot disk. When I finally got Windows installing, the computer asked for my OEM (original equipment manufacturer) number, which I didn't have because it was a donated computer. That was just the beginning of the saga. It took about 8 weeks to get that computer going again.

On a Mac, you hold down the "C" key and the computer boots off the CD. And I have never needed a OEM number to install the Mac OS.

Now with OS X, I expect that we won't have to worry about reinstalling the OS. OS X is unix with a pretty face, and unix was around before Windows was in diapers. The result is that OS X has all the bells and whistles of a modern operating system, with the bugs gotten out.

Like I said, it's going to be a whole new ball game.