jmmx

Cramer's Mad Money - Apple's Unbelievable Price Target (10/20/09)

I believe he meant world wide market.


On Oct 21 09:43 AM charlesjt wrote:

> Minor correction: The research firm IDC Puts U.S. Apple’s Mac Market
> Share at 9.4% for September Quarter (not the 4% mentioned here).

Cramer's Mad Money - Apple's Unbelievable Price Target (10/20/09)

"In addition, the agriculture sector is being left out of Obama's stimulus plan"

The falling dollar is a huge stimulus to American agriculture.

Parsing the Hardware Landscape: Dell Seen as Go-To Vendor

apple20.blogs.fortune..../

Points Off for Windows? Assailing the 'Macs Are More Expensive' Assumption

I did a comparison of a Dell XPS 20" with the iMac 20".

Dell - $999
iMac - $1199

In summary:
iMac had:
- faster CPU 2.66 vs 2.2
- faster Memory (1066 vs 667)
- larger HD (320 vs 250)
- MUCH better GPU
--- NVIDIA GeForce 9400M vs
--- Integrated Intel® GMA 3100

While by the tech specs alone, the displays were hard to differentiate, (Apple much better viewing angle, Dell better contrast) the Apple displays are really fantastic, and I would need to see the Dell to compare.

So, for your $200, you really do get a MUCH better system. This does not even factor in the Mac OS and the iLife suite.

BTW - I am serious upset about Apple scrapping the Firewire ports on most new systems!

Points Off for Windows? Assailing the 'Macs Are More Expensive' Assumption

@Levin70

I gave you a thumbs-up because I appreciate your post, although I do not agree.

One of your main arguments is that you can go buy components and build a computer for 1/2 the price. Well, you can go to the for-sale ads and junk yards and get parts to build yourself a very fine automobile for a fraction of a new one - even less than a used one from a dealer. There are lots of people who love to do this. Some even enjoy buying, fixing and selling. Most people, however, do not enjoy this.

I sit at my computer to get my work done, to work on my photography, etc. I will install a new drive, memory, or a card when necessary, but don't care to do anything more.

If you enjoy playing with hardware - go at it! But please do not get down on others who do not find your hobby fun.

Respectfull.

jmmx

Looking at the Market and Three Tech Stocks - Dell, Apple and IBM

To the author

You do make a good point about what happens when the homeowners we bail out make a profit later on, based on OPM. Who wants to do that? Not me either.

But the answer is not so simple The question is:

- Do we want this person, and millions like him/her to have their homes foreclosed adding to the bank losses and further prolonging the recession? How much longer do you want to wait for your DELL or Apple or IBM shares to go up? How many more jobs do you want to see lost? Do you want to see YOUR OWN house continue to loose value?

So, sometimes it is necessary to do what we would rather not do in order to achieve a greater goal. Unfortunately, we appear to be between a rock and a hard place.

Looking at the Market and Three Tech Stocks - Dell, Apple and IBM

Good post! I gave you a thumbs up. I am glad to hear that there is a lot more to Dell than I realized. It seems you have some very laudable accomplishments.

I have to say, however, that I do see a danger for Dell (data from yahoo):

Profit Margin (ttm):
14.70% --- AAPL
4.41% --- DELL
Qtrly Revenue Growth (yoy):
5.80% AAPL
-3.10% DELL (yes, that is negative)

These figures do not bode well for Dell. As the economy contracts, it can only force margins tighter. Apple has plenty of room here, Dell does not. I would be hesitant to pick up shares in this economy.

Also - we do need to repeat what others have said. Apple's PE does not reflect reality - You need to do the PE on the Non-GAAP numbers to get a real PE. Not sure the figure - but it is lots lower than the author's.

Good luck to all of us!



On Feb 24 06:14 PM cloughg wrote:


>
> In refrence to your comments re "Dell is losing share hand over fist
> to AAPL (as well as others)"..what a load of rubbish, heres why -
> 82% of Dells revenue come from business to business sales. Broken
> down by product - 26% ...

Look Who's Talking About Smart Phones

This would actually be good news for Apple.

The reason is that it will fragment the marketplace. Zune might have done OK if there were not a dozen other players aside from the iPod. Like wise, in the smartphone arena, there will be Apple RIM and others. The "Others" will be competing amongst themselves.

Let's face it, why should someone buy a different smart phone?
+ Hate Apple - well, a few people feel this way, & will never change
+ Hate ATT - more than hate Apple, also never change
+ Got to have a physical keyboard or cut-and-paste - ditto

RIM has the only really compelling story with their push email service. although Nokia also has an edge in world-wide usage.

So, if you do not have a real reason to not buy an iPhone, and you are ready to shell out the extra $ each month, then most people will go with the leading design, and elaborate "ecosystem." Apple.

What Apple Is Doing Wrong and Why It Means Trouble

BLAH BLAH BLAH

What good does it do anyone to know the details? Don't you understand - NO ONE KNOWS what is going to happen. So just let him get on and deal with his health and not a bunch of tabloid pseudo-journalists! Cult of Jobs? It is YOUR cult - you and your ilk are the ones who cultify him.

And like the Apple management really needs your advice?? LMOA!

Just look at this price drop as a buying opportunity!

IMHO

The 10 Most Important Technology Developments of 2008

Second - The cloud

Good point here. But you left out one important player - Apple's MobileMe.

Oh yes, it did get off to a truly horrible start, but there it is and I assume it is growing. Not only does it have most of the important parts of the cloud and the virtualization experience, but it comes from a company that excels precisely in integration of the user experience.

It has one other very important advantage over Google, Yahoo, and many others. It does not rely on advertising. (It also is free of the fear folks have of Big Brother Google collecting all this info on you.)

Yes - you have to pay for it, but it is a fairly nominal price (except for additional disk space), and then you are free of all the pesky advertisements. It would be easy for Apple to add in other apps, they already make them.

Personally - I think they would do well to cut the price in half. After all, it is one big subtle advert for Apple itself.

The 10 Most Important Technology Developments of 2008

Several points here. First: CPU vs GPU.

I have a Masters in CS including courses in architecture. This does not mean that I know everything, so I will say up front "Perhaps I am missing something." However! My understanding is as follows.

By Definition a GPU is an engine for performing specific mathematical operation in parallel. By definition, it does NOT have the capacity to perform all the general purpose operations that are done by a CPU. General purpose programs are compiled to run on a CPU.

THEREFORE - if you want to run a program, then you must have a CPU in the computer.

Of course - as has been noted - One can easily put an x86 (or whatever) core on a GPU chip. This would no longer be a GPU but rather an integrated chip. One can also put a GPU on a CPU chip (there is nothing magical about the operations that an NVidia GPU performs) This would also be an integrated chip.

So I do not see the big fuss here. That the GPU is taking over some of the math processing (a la OpenCL), this is an interesting development.

Dell: Where's the Competitive Advantage?

Oh yes...

Continue to grow market share WITH higher margins and higher profits.

Dell: Where's the Competitive Advantage?

Well - Mr Dell is NOT an idiot. Tho the quoted remark does make him appear so.

The article quite clearly analyzes the situation, with just one slight error.

The Apple Macs are NOT simply a niche product. They are, indeed, general purpose computers that are applicable to businesses in general and so DO compete head on with Dell and HP. Their costs are competitive with these two, and arguably better designed. Because they do not compete on commoditization, they can afford to use superior parts/build-techniques... They have earned a reputation of lasting longer, aside from the benefits of the Mac OSX.

This is why they will continue to grow market share.

Simply.

Why Is Dell Trying to Compete With the iPod?

I'll tell you why... They have no choice.

They are watching market share inexorably shift to Apple. Now it is slow, but they see it for what it is - a shifting of tectonic plates.

So they see that if they do not want to continue this escalating shift to Apple, then they need to put a dent in the Apple ecosystem. The only way to stop Apple is to develop an alternative that will keep users from the Apple experience. They are not attacking iPod per se, they are trying to break the halo.

IMHO

Three Reasons I Chose Microsoft over Apple for Home Media

Hey Dude -

I am a big Mac-fanboy. Go at it and enjoy your system. I hope it works for you.

But I do hope you will do this - give an up date from time to time and include and problems you may have. My experience with Windows machines is that if you can get them tuned for exactly what you want them to so, then they can work ok. So just keep us up on how it is going.