Apple's Snow Leopard beats Windows 7 on price, ship date
Exec calls Windows 7 'same old Vista,' but analysts doubt Apple's lower price, earlier launch matter
By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
FRAMINGHAM (06/09/2009) - Apple executives took potshots at Microsoft's Windows 7 today as they trumpeted the September release of the company's own Snow Leopard operating system and its $29 upgrade price.
"What a big hole Microsoft has dug," Bertrand Serlet, Apple's head of software engineering, said during the keynote of the company's annual WorldWide Developers Conference (WWDC), which opened today in San Francisco. "They're trying to get out of it with Windows 7 [but] it's the same old technology as Vista. Fundamentally, it's just another version of Vista."
But the more Serlet talked up Snow Leopard, the more he sounded like a Microsoft executive outlining Windows 7. Both Apple and Microsoft, for example, have described their next operating systems as less about new features and more about building on the foundation of their respective predecessors, with special emphasis on performance, stability and usability.
Serlet made that crystal clear. "We love Leopard, so we decided to build upon Leopard," he said. "We want to build a better Leopard."
That's not much different than what Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said last October as he defended Vista while also claiming that Windows 7 would be a major release, something most analysts dispute. "[Windows 7], it's Windows Vista, a lot better," said Ballmer at the time.
Analysts noticed the similarities today. "People aren't interested in bigger and heavier, loading in all these features," said Allen Krans of Technology Business Research. "They want something that works, that's simple and intuitive to use."
"This just addresses the reality," added Michael Cherry, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft. "In both cases, we are dealing with companies offering updates to fundamentally mature products. There will be some additions due to new hardware support -- Blu-Ray, for example -- but to a large extent, what is going to matter more and more is security, stability and performance."
But Apple did highlight two differences between Snow Leopard and Windows 7 today: The former will beat the latter to store shelves, and Apple's OS will cost considerably less than Microsoft's.
Sign up for ITworld's Daily newsletter
Follow ITworld on Twitter @IT_world
On Twitter now
snow leopard
Powered by Twitter
Esther Schindler
If the comments are ugly, the code is ugly
claird
SVG a graphics format for 21st century
pasmith
Take Chrome OS for a test spin
Sandra Henry-Stocker
Solaris Tip: Have Your Files Changed Since Installation?
jfruh
Android fragments vs. the iPhone monolith
mikelgan
What Gizmodo missed about the Pro WX Wireless USB disk drive
Sidekick: The Good News & the Bad News
Either way you look at it Microsoft Data Center management did not follow standards or best practices in this failure. In which case it makes me wonder more about the outsourcing of corporate data much less personal data.
- mburton325
Join the conversation here
Quick, practical advice for IT pros. Made fresh daily.
Want to cash in on your IT savvy? Send your tip to tips@itworld.com. If we post it, we'll send you a $25 Amazon e-gift card.
Sonw Leopard vs Windows 7
The point that is missed in this interesting article is the other MAJOR difference between snow leopard and Windows 7, snow leopard is upgrading, indeed finessing an OS that 99% of its users adore and rushed to install when it was released, were as Windows 7 is a hasty renovation of an OS that most customers hate, and have actively sought to avoid in many cases.replica bags
Women like jewelry replica bags as men like cars ,yet ,they are more crazy .They also like cloths ,but don't as much as replica handbags .Jewelry give more confident to them ,that why jewelry industries are so lucrative .