RichardC (tich.delete@this.pobox.com) on September 28, 2013 6:02 am wrote:
> Doug S (foo.delete@this.bar.bar) on September 27, 2013 6:09 pm wrote:
> > Why do you think this is a problem for Intel? Apple is
> > unique, and people have never purchased their products
> > for their performance. That goes doubly true for the Air.
> > If they make the switch, it hurts Intel somewhat
> > since Apple's volumes aren't insignificant, but Apple is a special case, not a recipe others can follow.
>
> If you look at laptop design and then smartphone design over the last 10-12 years,
> everyone else has tried their damnedest to copy Apple just about as closely as they can.
> And with good reason, because Apple has figured out the trick of taking mostly commodity
> components and making a premium product which commands a high margin, through a
> combination of excellent design, manufacturing, marketing, and support.
>
> Aluminum-case laptops, chiclet keys, online app stores, touchscreen smartphones,
> usable tablets, superthin laptops, retina screens. Where Apple goes, the others
> try to follow. Often with great success (I just got a Samsung Galaxy S3 myself ...)

Aluminium cases laptops existed at a time when they were _laptops_. Not that aluminum is the best material for portable machines - properly engineered magnesium chassis with ABS+PC/aluminum/carbon reinforced plastic shells are structurally and thermally preferable. Chicklet keys was introduced by Sony. "Retina" screens was provided by IBM as an option for Thinkpads. Super-thin laptops was available from a lot of sources long before Apple tried it, one example I've owned myself is the Toshiba Portege that was thinner than the Macbook Air long before it existed. The same with the smartphone, long before the Iphone I used a smartphone with touch interface and it even had an app store.

There is much fanboyism surrounding Apple products and a that's even in otherwise technical articles/discussions.
E.g. the capacitive finger print reader on the new Iphone that quickly got mythological proportions as ("as all knows") standard fingerprint readers are optical and this Apple technology couldn't be fooled as it requires a live finger to scan.
It's just that the standard readers _are_ already capacitive and the Apple reader is as easy to fool as other readers.