Economy, more than Apple, leads to Windows laptop price drops

October 27, 2008, 01:55 PM —  CIO.com — 

The dream of an US$800 Mac notebook has been deferred. So what are Windows manufacturers going to do about it? Industry watchers predict they will keep cutting prices, but Apple is only part of the reason.

It's mostly the economy.

Last week, the anticipated across-the-board price cuts for Apple's new line of MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops fell short of analyst and blogger predictions.

But Apple has amassed such a broad and loyal high-end buyer base that it can hang tight on prices and get away with it, perhaps even flourish, in an economy teetering on a recession.

Apple may be its own breed (this week it reported record quarterly sales for both Macs and iPhones), but still it seems logical to think that Apple's decision not to budge on pricing, paired with an economy forcing tech buyers and consumers to be frugal, puts Windows OEMs in a great position to sell more units.

"There are more choices for Windows so this could hurt potential Apple buyers," says J.P. Gownder, an analyst at Forrester who covers consumer product strategy. "Ultimately, Apple's decision not to cut prices could be a net win for Windows OEMs. They will be able to keep people who were on the fence about switching to a Mac."

Sign up for ITworld's Daily newsletter
Follow ITworld on Twitter @IT_world

I like it!
Close

On Twitter now

microsoft

Powered by Twitter
You are logged in | Sign out
Sign in and post to Twitter

What are you thinking?

Cancel Tweet sent

On Twitter now

Post a comment
The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
peer-to-peer

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?

sjvn
64-bits of protection?

jfruh
Android fragments vs. the iPhone monolith

mikelgan
What Gizmodo missed about the Pro WX Wireless USB disk drive

 

Where Google Chrome security fails: the password
I heard mention that the Chrome OS will have some sort of encryption available a la bitlocker. If it's possible to encrypt personal data using another password or key, then it may have potential for very secure data.... And Ubuntu has an 'encrypt home directory' option, perhaps google should follow suit.
- Dann

Join the conversation here

The Daily Tip

The Daily TipQuick, practical advice for IT pros. Made fresh daily.

Hot tips:

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.

Newsletters

Subscribe to ITWORLD TODAY and receive the latest IT news and analysis.

I would like to receive offers via email from ITworld partners.
By clicking submit you agree to the terms and conditions outlined in ITworld's privacy policy.
Featured Sponsor

AISO founders envisioned a Web hosting company that was environmentally friendly. While the company employed energy-efficient innovations like solar panels, its infrastructure produced unacceptable power and cooling requirements. Find out how AISO leveraged AMD technology to overcome their challenge in this case study white paper.

In this whitepaper, Scalar explores the opportunity to change the landscape with respect to mission critical databases built around Oracle. Leveraging technologies such as Linux, high-end commodity processing power and Oracle RAC technology to architect, design, build and maintain database infrastructure that delivers maximum availability, reliability and performance at a fraction of traditional cost.

On a typical day, weather.com, the Web site for The Weather Channel in Atlanta, serves up between 15 million and 20 million page views. But in September 2004, when back-to-back hurricanes ransacked Florida, the peak traffic on one day more than tripled: over 70 million page views by more than 7 million unique visitors. Read the full success story now.

Marketplace