Oct. 25, 2006

Macs on the Rebound

In the beginning, there was Apple.

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Apple’s chief financial officer, Peter Oppenheimer, announced last week that the company is emerging from its best back-to-school quarter ever for its higher education division, with shipments of Mac portables increasing 49 percent from last year within the sector, the increase driven, Oppenheimer said, by sale of the MacBook and Apple’s successful back-to-school promotions.

While Dell continues to grow and remains the overwhelming powerhouse on college campuses, Apple, which rapidly lost its market share on campuses in the 1990s, is now quickly expanding its presence at colleges and universities, according to experts who track both student purchasing and institutional trends. The rise of iTunes and the iPod, Apple’s marketing coup of positioning itself as an especially hip brand, and an overall increase in laptop purchases, a sector in which Apple proves particularly strong among college-aged buyers, all contribute to the trend, said Eric Weil, managing partner of Student Monitor, a national group that tracks college students’ consumer habits.

“If we look at ownership and purchase intent, among those students who plan to buy a new notebook, naturally No. 1 is Dell, but No. 2 is Apple. Which is huge. If we went back five years ago, IBM’s ThinkPad owned that spot. And now the average student doesn’t know what a ThinkPad is,” said Weil, who added that laptop ownership has nearly tripled what it was five years ago when ThinkPad sat securely on the silver medal platform.

A spring 2006 Student Monitor survey of 1,200 full-time four-year undergraduates at 100 campuses found Apple squarely situated as the No. 2 preference among the 19 percent of college students — equivalent to 1.1 million people nationwide — planning to purchase a computer within the next year. Among those students planning to buy a desktop, 41 percent said they planned to buy Dell and 13 percent Apple, with other companies, including Gateway, HP and eMachines, close behind Apple, with 9, 7 and 6 percent of the pie respectively.

Among those buying notebooks — which 68 percent of students who said they would buy a computer within the next year planned to purchase — Dell is still the leader, with 40 percent planning to buy Dell laptops. But Apple, with a 21 percent share, has no close competitor for second-place: HP and Sony Vaio, the next-largest players in the market, have just 6 percent of the share each, Weil’s data shows.

Preferred provider agreements between colleges and computer companies, in which institutions enter into agreements (oftentimes with more than one computer company) to recommend or market a particular product, are changing accordingly. Green said that the proportion of four-year public research institutions with preferred provider agreements with Apple increased from 58.9 percent in 2005 to 66.7 percent in 2006, while the percentage of private research universities with Apple agreements jumped from 50 to 60 percent. Gains among public and private four-year colleges were smaller, at about two and three percentage points respectively, said Green, who mentioned that he thinks the price differential between comparable PCs and Macs, traditionally more expensive, may have fallen, increasing Apple’s desirability within the college student market.

Those numbers can’t be misinterpreted, however, to undermine Dell’s prominence in the arena. As Apple increased its share of provider agreements, Dell did the same by comparable or greater proportions, except among private research institutions, where the percentage of universities with Dell agreements dipped slightly by about one percentage point. But the percentage of public research institutions with Dell agreements increased from 69.7 percent in 2005 to 81 percent in 2006, and the proportion of public and private four-year colleges with Dell agreements increased by about 9 and 5 percentage points respectively, Green said.

Dell continues to grow in the education market, its spokesman, Dean Kline said, and Apple’s rise has not come at Dell’s expense. “One of the reasons why Dell has been very successful in education is of course the value of the industry standard technology we provide. We’re able to play across the entire portfolio of products if you will, from one end of the higher education market to the other.”

Kline cited Dell’s strength in offering standardized services for the four different computing sectors within the higher education market: student, administrative, academic and research computing. “Technology purchasing for higher education goes well beyond the student computing piece. That said, Dell continues to see successes in the student computing program,” he said.

“Apple had gone down so far that a large increase in sales still doesn’t take them to anywhere near where Dell is, but I think they’ve made an awful lot of progress,” said David Sobotta, a former director of federal sales and higher education manager for Apple who now writes a blog on Apple issues. “Apple pulled back from higher ed very strongly in the mid-90s; it really, really hurt them at some of the mid-tier schools.”

“Dell is pervasive,” Weil said. “Dell is about price. Dell is about convenience, and I certainly wouldn’t want to minimize the image of Dell.”

“But there’s an element that everything that Apple does is cool.”

In a culture that divides itself among Mac and PC people, Mac has emerged among students as the cooler of the two types of people to be, many observers say. Apple’s association with the iPods that students always have close to their ears — and their hearts — has helped lead music-loving college students toward the brand. Proof of that is no further away than a favorite student hang-out spot these days, Facebook.

In July, the social networking Web site announced a joint back-to-school promotion effort, with Facebook pledging to give away 10 million 25-song music samplers from Apple’s iTunes. The promotion helped lure 523,000 students to the Facebook group Apple sponsors, which links to Apple education discounts, while about 3,200 are signed up for Dell’s sponsored group.

“It’s the silver laptop with the apple on top,” Dianne Lynch, dean of the Roy H. Park School of Communications at Ithaca College, said of the appeal of Apple. For the first time this year, entering freshmen in the communications school had to purchase a laptop — and they had to purchase a MacBook Pro.

Lynch, who used to write a column on women and technology for ABC News, said the school’s faculty chose the model because it can utilize both a Macintosh and a Windows operating system, but the coolness factor is an added bonus. “We love the idea that we’re cool and that the program is cool and that we get it, but we wouldn’t have done this just for the cool,” Lynch said, citing the “outstanding multimedia software package” already installed on the computers.

At Princeton University, probably about 25 percent of publicly available machines are Macs, and 75 percent are Dells, said Steven Sather, associate chief information officer for the office of information technology. Sather, who said the information technology department attempts to mirror student buying habits in its purchase of institutional computers — but of course is likely to fall behind if consumer preferences change quickly — said that while Dell still has the majority, he’s seen a steady growth in Apple sales over the past five years. Student sales conducted by Princeton’s information technology department this year were 55 percent Dell and 45 percent Mac, compared to 38 percent Mac the year before.

For Sather’s part, he said he doesn’t advocate one over another — and he doesn’t fall into easy Mac or PC categories, with both a MacBook and a Dell Latitude on his desk. “I don’t even know which way I’m going to turn, right or left, when I hang up.”

— Elizabeth Redden

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Comments

Apples

We once lived within a hegemony in which we all assumed that windows machines were superior. We couldn’t even imagine any other computer sitting on our desks. Indeed, such was a primary objective of Microsoft’s brilliant marketing ploys (and Apple’s marketing failures). Now that the blinders are off, I expect to see Macs return to a position of prominence around campus.

David Franklin Ayers, Assistant Professor at UNC Greensboro, at 10:05 pm EDT on October 25, 2006

I switched to mac because every time my Dell had problems (far too often), I would call my computer-savvy friends for help, and they would groan about how I should just get a Mac. The computer science majors are leading the way, teaching their friends that Macs get fewer viruses, freeze less often, and generally run more smoothly.

I’m thrilled with my new MacBook, and now, I recommend Macs to everyone — but Apple would catch up a lot faster with lower prices. You can get a Dell for like $500 these days — Macs are significantly more expensive, and many students can’t afford MacBooks. I have several friends who love my Mac, but they are stuck with Dell until they get out of college and start making money.

Happy mac user, A student who switched, at 4:25 am EDT on October 26, 2006

Money money money

I have a Dell laptop. It is reliable and much faster than a Mac would be for the same price, which is indeed where the problem lays: there is some tough competition on the PC market, while only Apple can make a Mac. As a result, their hardware is significantly more expensive, and it is not very surprising if, along the years, their market share has mostly decreased.

I have taken care of both Macs and PCs and the Macs used to have OS and software problems (notably, they would freeze) nearly as often as the PCs. Not as many viruses, sure, since virus makers want to hurt as many people as possible and so target the much larger PC market; it has nothing to do with Mac being inherently safer.

Mac *is* cooler, though. Even I, the practical one, cannot escape the lure. The iMac and iPop were brilliant. And something else serves Apple: the power of computers has been increasing more than the needs of most customers. Most students (unless they study computer graphics or animation or are avid gamers) can satisfy their needs with the cheapest laptops, and between a very cheap PC and a merely cheap Mac, they may now go for the Mac.

Sicart, at 9:00 am EDT on October 27, 2006

Macs are less expensive than comparable Dells

Please stop perpetuating myths. Go price an Apple Mac and then configure a Dell as closely as you can to match specs and features. You’ll find the Apple Mac is less expensive than the Dell. A link with more info and related articles:

http://tinyurl.com/y4autm

MacDailyNews Webmaster, at 3:55 pm EDT on October 28, 2006

Do Your Homework

For those of you commenting about price, do your homework. Look at the software package that comes with a Mac. Also, look very closley at configs on both machines. Often the PC side lacks in software or hardware. Macs are worth every penny. As far as viruses go, the “obscurity myth” doesn’t hold up either. There are at least 114,000 known viruses for the PC. It is estimated that 16% of computers are Macs. Therefor Mac should have at least SOME viruses. There are zero. There are hackers out there who would love to be the first to crack OS X. Don’t believe the myth. Macs are more secure than Windows PCs period. I have been using Macs for 5 years now. I will never go back to using a Windows PC. Don’t believe what people tell you. Do your homework.

scott, Student, at 3:55 pm EDT on October 28, 2006

“As a result, their hardware is significantly more expensive, and it is not very surprising if, along the years, their market share has mostly decreased.”

i was going to dispute the price myth, but that’s already covered. Now using price differences (a proven weak argument, btw) to explain Apple’s market share is comparable to one claiming Ford or GM is better than BMW because the former have a significantly greater share of the auto industry than the latter. BMW like Apple serve a niche market within their respective industries. What’s more important is how much of that niche/segment of those markets either company commands. BMW thrives in the luxury & high end sectors of auto industry, whereas Apple has proven a dominant figure for the production/editing/animation computing customers, and they’re thriving in the mobile computer segment.It’s not always wise to simple infer from raw data -like market shares -what would invariably end up being false conclusions.

mike, at 4:40 am EST on October 29, 2006

Viruses and users

“Not as many viruses, sure, since virus makers want to hurt as many people as possible and so target the much larger PC market; it has nothing to do with Mac being inherently safer.”

Ok, so what you are saying is that OS X and XP are both as secure as each other. However, Vista is going to be more secure than XP, which if the previous statement were true would make Vista more secure than OS X. That is a fair enough conclusion until you realise that the features that are making Vista more secure are ones that have been in OS X for years. So how can Windows be as secure as OS X now when it is just getting security features that the Mac has had for a long time? The lower market share does play a part, however the mac is far more secure, just down to basic things, like the administrator accounts on Mac OS X not being able to do everything without verification, unlike the admin accounts on XP, and the absence of things such as ActiveX

“Most students (unless they study computer graphics or animation or are avid gamers) can satisfy their needs with the cheapest laptops, and between a very cheap PC and a merely cheap Mac, they may now go for the Mac.”

And yet I am findings that a lot of people are using Macs. There are a large number of Mac users on my Computer Science degree (and in fact many of the professors use Macs), I have friends using Macs in Engineering, Journalism and so on. On friday I went to the Apple store with a friend who was buying his first Mac and he was asking questions such as, “What about drivers for this printer, will they work on the Mac". Of course I told him you just plug it in and it works, as with many of the things he asked about. We do a lot of Java programming and Macs come with all the development stuff installed, so you don’t have to go through the hassle of installing them as you do on Windows.

And a word about price, consider the software. On PCs most of the software is trial software and maybe MS Works. On the Mac you have two pieces of trial software, iWork and MS Office. Besides that you have several fully functional high quality applications in a package that totals around $200, remember to add that to your comparison

Martin Pilkington, Student at University of Sheffield, UK, at 8:00 am EST on October 29, 2006

You can grab a Dell notebook for less than $500. Mine officially cost more than $1500, but actually less than $800 after rebate. Dell offers such rebates a couple times a year.

For $500, without any rebate, you can still buy the cheapest Dell notebook. The cheapest Mac notebook still costs more than *twice* that price. You can say “But it’s worth it!” all you want; it is but a worthless argument for a student who already has problems paying the bills. Until today, I have used many computers, but none of my own has ever cost as much as even the cheapest Mac notebook.

Regarding the OS debate, I will not try to defend Windows XP. I would either cry or crack myself up.

Sicart, at 1:55 pm EST on October 29, 2006

“And a word about price, consider the software. On PCs most of the software is trial software and maybe MS Works. On the Mac you have two pieces of trial software, iWork and MS Office. Besides that you have several fully functional high quality applications in a package that totals around $200, remember to add that to your comparison”

Oh come on now. Windows is delivered with the same kind of basic software (media player, webrowser, email manager, scheduler, etc.) and Microsoft could also boast that they are fully functional, high quality, and total a value of several hundred dollars. And actually, they do: Windows XP and everything that comes with it does not come for free; it is all included in the price of the PC you buy, and the same thing can be said of OS X and Macs.

Fact is, I use mainly Outlook Express (free), Firefox (free), Winamp (free), Windows Player Classic (free), and MS Office (not free, neither on a Mac nor on the PC).

Sicart, P.S., at 1:55 pm EST on October 29, 2006

Mac Prices

The comments about price on this thread are *both* correct. Macs are more expensive when looking at minimum “buy-in” prices. They simply don’t make a dirt-cheap entry model computer.

But frankly, most students, even those who have limited resources, are not well-served by buying that class of computer unless their needs are very minimal (and in that case, I’d suggest just using university computers in the lab).

When you compare specs and software packages, Apple simply is *not* more expensive. Its very easy to see. Just configure the Dell and the Apple and check it out.

The “Dell offers coupon” argument is not only not valid, frankly its even more reason to steer clear of them. I think the idea that Dell sells computers at one price for the tech saavy who can spend hours on the internet and find these “one day” coupons and another price for everyone else to be extremely slimy.

Matthew House, Adjunct Prof. of Instructional Technology at North Carolina Central University, at 2:45 pm EST on October 29, 2006

A Mac or nothing?

“But frankly, most students, even those who have limited resources, are not well-served by buying that class of computer unless their needs are very minimal (and in that case, I’d suggest just using university computers in the lab).”

All of my computers have cost less than the cheapest Mac notebook, and all have served me well... if only by saving me from the need to spend one or two hours communting to get to a computer lab.

For less than the price of the cheapest Mac notebook, I could and can browse the Web, watch videos (.avi and now also DVDs), use MS Office and even some “heavier” applications such as Photoshop or Flash. So what needs are we talking about?

“When you compare specs and software packages, Apple simply is *not* more expensive. Its very easy to see. Just configure the Dell and the Apple and check it out.”

I have. And so has CNET, who writes about the Mac Book that “higher-end configurations are much more expensive than similarly configured Windows laptops".

http://reviews.cnet.com/Apple_Mac...5-3121_7-31884384.html?tag=pdtl-list

I actually tend to disagree, both with them and with you. At the higher end, it seems more or less a tie. But they have tested both higher end Dells and higher end Macs, and I have not, so between my judgement and theirs, theirs is certainly more correct.

“The “Dell offers coupon” argument is not only not valid, frankly its even more reason to steer clear of them. I think the idea that Dell sells computers at one price for the tech saavy who can spend hours on the internet and find these “one day” coupons and another price for everyone else to be extremely slimy.”

Where did I speak of a coupon you had to hunt down? The rebate was on the Dell website, directly included in the price, and available for a few days. It was not even part of my argument; I was only providing precisions on my own personal situation.

I do wish Dell offered a backlit keyboard similar to the MacBook pro, though...

Sicart, at 4:30 pm EST on October 29, 2006

So I should “do my homework"... Thank you for the advice, Scott; I am sure you will support me in this endeavor. For instance, by letting me know where you have read that “it is estimated that 16% of computers are Macs".

Could you provide a link in support of this claim? Because it is not exactly the number I find on Mac World:

“Apple’s Mac market share tops 5%”

Or was there a confusion between 16 and 6.1?

“Gartner has Apple’s market share at 6.1 percent”

http://www.macworld.com/news/2006/10/19/marketshare/index.php

Sicart, at 7:35 pm EST on October 29, 2006

The market share is typically, I believe, based on the number of new computers sold. It follows that if you have a computer that suits you well and doesn’t have problems, you will keep it longer. Hence, the discrepancy. Mac owners tend to hold onto their computers longer. Thus, while the market share may be 6%, Mac ownership is 16%. I’m not in any way, validating these figures but using them for argument’s sake.

RayCon, The discrepancy in market share, at 5:50 am EST on October 30, 2006

Mac versus Dell

This comparison isn’t terribly fruitful, as Apple is not very interested in competing with Dell. They are not trying to create a cheap computer to match Dell’s cheapest computer. They are not trying to get all Dell users to move to mac.

If you look at all those macbook ads and feel only scorn, you’re not in the target audience. If what you want is a dirt cheap computer you can pull apart and put back together yourself, or using the pieces to create your latest frankenPC, you don’t want a mac. Macs are for people who want a beautiful computer they never have to worry about. People who wants slick applications, a shiny dock, plug-and-play, and the joy of having a gorgeous computer that other people will want to pet. People who are prepared to pay a little more for the privilege of having a cool computer ARE the target audience.

I say this as a dedicated mac user. I love my ibook. Apple is fantastically successful in creating their own niche market. And it’s a niche Dell simply can’t touch.

Rochelle, at 7:00 am EST on October 30, 2006

RayCon, your reasoning is sound and I understand that you only use the given figures to make your explanation clearer, not to validate them. Thank you for making it all clearer for me. I still have to wonder where scott’s 16% come from, though, and how they were estimated. Scott, can you specify your sources? A link would be welcome, so we I can properly do our homework.

Rochelle, I agree that Macs look cooler. I fail to understand why, in the larger PC market, there are so few desktops and laptops that can manage to look... good. On the other hand, the age of the frankenPC is mostly over. First, the PC market is now producing less desktops than laptops, and a laptop cannot be pulled apart the way a desktop can be. Second, in recent years, even before I switched to a laptop, even I had stopped upgrading my desktops or making them from spare parts. Why? Because they evolved too fast.

There was a time when it was a valid move to add some RAM, sometimes salvaged from another PC, or to replace a processor, or a video card. Nowadays, evolution goes at such a pace that when you decide to change your processor, you discover that it will be of no help unless you get more and faster RAM also, and upgrade the video card too so that the display (just for Windows, not even for games!) will not be lagging, and... soon, you realize that you may as well buy a new desktop. Sure, PC desktops still are more customizable than Macs, but not many PC desktop owners today will take advantage of the fact.

Still, PCs still reign, not because they are *better* but because (1) they are more affordable and (2) a desire to be compatible with as many people as possible make most people buy what most other people use. The more compatible Macs become, as they do indeed, the more likely they are to see their market share grow, as indeed it does.

Sicart, at 1:10 pm EST on October 31, 2006

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Macs on the Rebound

Related stories

Comments

Apples

Money money money

Macs are less expensive than comparable Dells

Do Your Homework

Viruses and users

Mac Prices

A Mac or nothing?

Mac versus Dell

Jobs Related to Macs on the Rebound

Academic Coordinator — Department of Women’s Studies & Department of Asian American Studies University of California, Irvine

Webmaster University of Texas, San Antonio

Building Construction (Adjunct) Instructor Hillsborough Community College

Pharmacy Technician Instructor Corinthian Colleges

Assistant Professor of Music Education (Elementary Vocal — General) Ithaca College

Teacher Education Concordia University Chicago

Assistant Professor Princeton University

Assistant Professor — Political Communication Ithaca College

Lecturer — Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Princeton University

Director / Executive Director of Budget and Finance (Title DOQ) Stetson University College of Law