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August 10, 1999 - Corel Linux Unveiled!
Corel has now previewed its version of Linux which is much easier to use!
August 9, 1999 - AMD Releases New Athlon Microprocessor
Today AMD released a cpu chip that is not only faster than Intel chips running at the same clock speed, but also runs at a faster clock speed and on a system bus that is twice as fast!
August 7, 1999 - Dell to Offer Linux on Consumer PCs and AMD Athlon to be Fastest PC (x86) Chip
Dell will now make Linux a standard option on its personal computers marketed to consumers, right along side the Windows 98 option. Formerly Dell only provided this option for servers and later workstations.
AMD will soon release a cpu chip that is not only faster than Intel chips running at the same clock speed, but the chip will also run at a faster clock speed and likely on a faster system bus.
August 4, 1999 - Expected Major Announcements at LinuxWorld Conference & Expo
At the LinuxWorld Conference & Expo it is expected that Oracle will unveil Linux-based software line. Also at the Linux Expo, which starts on Monday, Caldera plans to announce a version of its OpenLinux software to run on Sun Microsystems' UltraSparc chips, IBM will show a demo of LinuxPPC running on IBM's PowerPC 750 (G3) copper processors, and Corel will show a beta version of its consumer edition of Linux which includes Wine running Windows programs on Linux without emulation! Wine substitutes its own Linux API's for the Windows API's when a Linux program makes a call to the Windows API's.
August 4, 1999 - AMD is Expanding Athlon Line to Include Multiprocessing!
Today AMD issued a press release saying that they will begin a branding program of Athlon. "The processor, formerly known as K7, will be called Athlon Professional." Later a consumer version will be released when it is time to retire the K6 line. "While the Athlon Professional will be aimed at desktops, Athlon Ultra chips, with support for multiprocessing, will be used for workstations and servers." AMD has never had an x86 chip that supported multiprocessing before, so AMD is entering new territory.
August 3, 1999 - Here's Where to Buy Alpha Motherboards
They can be bought at Alpha Processor, Inc. The motherboards support both Windows NT and Linux and have the ATX form factor and a Slot B for the Alpha Processor.
September 13, 1998 - Early Earnings Estimates for Apple Computer
I believe that the report of Apple having sold 360,000 iMacs in August actually means that Apple received 360,000 buy orders from customers in August. I don't believe that Apple actually managed to ship that many in August. I do believe that Apple will be able to ship 360,000 to 400,000 iMacs by the end of September.
I suppose you thought that this site would no longer be updated. Surprise! This issue marks one year of publishing "The Phoenix Arises."
Truly since January 1, 1998 Apple Computer began arising from its near death experience! Thus far Apple has had three consecutive quarters of profits (with each quarter better than the prior quarter), a new consumer computer using more industry standard components (such as USB and open firmware ROM), improvements to the Mac OS, two developer releases of Mac OS X Server (Rhapsody) for both PowerPC and Intel, the release of Web Objects 3.5, announcement of a greatly improved OS strategy, and powerful new advertising. Soon we can expect Mac OS X Server 1.0; Web Objects 4.0 for Mac OS X Server, Windows NT, Solaris, and HP-Unix; Mac OS 8.5; new consumer portable Macs; USB and Firewire shipping on G3 PowerMacs; larger revenues; larger profits; and increasing market share (starting with this quarter)!
In this issue the editor decided to post his current opinions of Apple's fiscal fourth quarter financials.
Some news reports say that Apple will ship about 400,000 iMacs by the end of September. The editor of this web site believes it is plausible. Consider this:
I tentatively expect the following financials for Q4 98:
Unit shipments = 1,100,000 (700,000 non-iMac desktops & laptops (news reports are saying that customers are showing a greater interest in existing Mac products due to the iMac drawing favorable attention to Apple) + 400,000 iMacs).
The following are in millions of dollars (except for percentages).
As for taxes, shares outstanding, and net income/share I won't bother to estimate those.
Since the iMac likely has a lower GM% than other Macs (due to the iMacs lower price) and because Apple appears to be receiving more orders than expected, the net GM % (gross margin percentage) might drop to 18%. This would result in a Pre Tax Income of $146 million instead of $194 million. Nonetheless this would still be a great figure! Even if these figures are overly optimsitic, Apple should still report a net profit of at least $80 million for the current quarter!
As a side note, Apple had net income of $188 million in Q1 1995.
May 29, 1998 - Will MACWORLD Be the Next Mac Magazine to Quit?
The number of pages in each issue (USA edition) tell the story.
As a side note, I noticed that many of the articles in MacUser and MacWeek were covered in MACWORLD. Also the more in depth articles provided by MacUser and MacWeek could be read online. No doubt these two factors contributed to the demise of MacUser and MacWeek.
A similar fate happened to the Amiga community. AmigaWorld no longer exists (which was my favorite Amiga magazine). Amazing Amiga still exists but it only has about 60 pages.
Speaking of final issues, my Investment Information site has now ceased publication. However, prior articles may still be read online.
May 17, 1998 - Competition For Apple from Amiga?
Some excerpts are from Amiga Inc. announces software and hardware strategy:
"London, UK May 15, 1998 Amiga Inc., a pioneer in multimedia development, today announced plans to provide a new software architecture that will offer enhanced levels of performance and useability for the Amiga community."
"To build upon Amiga's legacy as a multimedia leader, the company announced Amiga OS 4.0 which is slated to launch in November of '98. Amiga OS 4.0 will have a new user interface and support Amiga legacy software with an integrated emulator. Hardware developers are already working on solutions for software and hardware backward compatibility with the new Amiga architecture.
Amiga, Inc. also announced plans to unveil a personal computer that is an industry standard architecture solution. The new system will provide a bridge to the next generation of Amiga technology. The system is scheduled for availability in November with a suggested retail price of USD$999. These systems will be available through Amiga International."
It looks like Amiga is also arising from the ashes and it looks like Amiga is using a strategy similar to Apple. I wonder what impact this will have on Apple.
May 11, 1998 - Thoughts On Apple's WWDC Announcements of the Morning of May 11th
I wonder if the "X" in Mac OS X means not only 10 (as in Release #10) but also "cross" as in "cross platform" (including the ability to run Mac OS 8 apps on Intel via Rhapsody/Mac OS X). Maybe the bad 2000 Mac OS APIs are bad in part because maybe they write to hardware. Using only the Carbon APIs might make it possible to have Mac OS 8 apps run on Intel. (QuickTime uses the Mac OS APIs and uses the same code set on both Windows and Macs - maybe these APIs are Carbon APIs!) I think that Rhapsody as a separate product won't exist beyond release 1, but that most of it will exist in Mac OS X.
In the demo, a Carbon app was shown running on Rhapsody DR2, thus Rhapsody components will survive into Mac OS X (including Yellow Box)! However it does seem redundant to have both Carbon and Yellow Box APIs since they accomplish most of the same purposes.
More Speculation:
Mac OS X = MACH + BSD + Yellow Box + Carbon (Enhanced Blue Box)
On top of PowerPC (optimized for G3 but supporting 603 and 604 and possibly 601) and Intel.
Support for running Mac OS 8 on Intel is far from complete, hence the reason why Jobs hasn't announced that feature at this time. Likewise he might not wish to announce Windows support till after Mac developers have committed to Carbon and/or Yellow Box (doesn't want to repeat IBM's mistake with OS/2?). Yellow Box will be kept because of its selling point as a cross platform environment and because there are several OPENSTEP/Rhapsody apps already on the market. Then again if Carbon can run Mac OS 8 aps on Intel, maybe Yellow Box is unneeded.
Steve knows that many people are following the rumors, and he wants the stock to rise at a steady pace. Therefore he might be planning to announce Intel support of Mac OS 8 apps and Windows support at later times. Some of these things might not be announced till after Mac OS X ships in Jan. '99, or till the MacWorld in January '99. He also probably doesn't want MSFT to know about those plans, till those features are ready to ship.
Apple's current stock behavior suggests that attempting to short-term time it to take advantage of big price swings won't be the best strategy in the upcoming months. It looks like the best strategy for now (in the opinion of the editor), until at least mid '99, is a buy and hold strategy.
Don Crabb in a MacCentral article of April 15th says why he doesn't believe the Mac on Intel rumors. However I disagree with his reasoning. The following is my response.
On the 15th his website said:
"In that environment, do you honestly think Apple has or will shunkwork something as nebulous as Star Trek? To what effect? Who would buy the Mac OS to run on their Intel boxes? In place of Windows 95, 98, or NT? Gimme a break.
And if Apple were, somehow, successful at doing this, how would that effect the company's profitability? Remember, Apple makes its money selling G3's. If you could get ALL the benefits of the Mac OS and/or Rhapsody on any run-of-the-mill el cheapo Intel box, why buy G3s, which will always look overpriced by comparison?"
I have friends who are computer hobbyists with Wintel PCs and no Macs. They told me that if the Mac OS were available for Intel, they would buy it! There would be no need for them to run it in place of Win 95/98/NT all the time, since they could use a dual boot configuration. "System Commander Deluxe" allows a person to have several Intel-based OS's on their computer and choose which one to use at start-up. The packaging of the product mentions it already has support for Nextstep and Openstep (under Unix OS's heading on the package)!
Yellow Box/Openstep will eventually be built-into the Mac OS (by this summer or Jan '99?) and Apple is urging developers to write future Mac apps in Yellow Box/Openstep. After all new apps are written for Yellow Box/Openstep PC users will be able to run them anyway via Rhapsody for PCs. If Apple is afraid of people buying PCs to run the Mac OS on that platform, what about people buying PCs 3 years form now to run modern (Yellow Box/Openstep) Mac apps? A consumer (no sever software and no developer tools) version of Rhapsody should be available for under $200, so cost of the OS is not an issue. Most fellow Mac users appear to have a dislike for Intel hardware platform and G3s are faster than Pentium series, therefore most Mac users won't likely start buying Intel instead of Power Macs.
Also why would the Intel version of the Mac OS have to have 100% compatiblity or Full speed ("ALL the benefits of the Mac OS")? People have been known to buy stripped down products before. What if the product was made available as a demo-like product designed to increase interest in the PowerPC version of the Mac OS? It could prove to be a great marketing tool (especially if bundled with great Mac OS shareware programs)!
MacOS Rumors classifies talk of Mac OS the NeXT Generation as wacky. However I think it is very reasonable. Here is my reasoning:
The purpose of Mac OS licensing is to increase Mac OS market share and increase revenues.
PowerPC-based Mac clones take from Apple's hardware revenues. Only 1% of clone sales were to non-Apple customers. Therefore PowrerMac clone sales this late in the game only hurt Apple.
If Mac OS is ported to Intel and marketed to owners of Intel-based computers, Apple can grow market share with little loss of hardware sales.
This is because few PowerPC/680x0 Mac users will start buying Intel computers with the Mac OS, unless they were planning to go to Intel anyway. But 2% - 5% of Wintel owners might decide to install Mac OS on their computer (primarily the computer hobbyist, at least initally). If Apple gets 2% to 5% of Intel market, then Apple doubles it's market share! Apple also gets a big revenue increase with little loss of hardware sales. Apple will likely continue to monopolize the Power Mac market but they will also likely create an Intel Mac compatible market (not really a clone market because the hardware platform is differrent). Apple can safely have the hardware and software business models at the same time!
Though Mac users won't have a multi-vender PowerPC-based Mac market, Apple will eventually release a CHRP or nearly CHRP computer (but the Mac might not be promoted as a CHRP system).
This is because Apple is adding Firewire and USB to Macs. Macs already have PCI, some have SCSI hard drives while others have IDE hard drives, a PC parallel printer port will likely be available from Apple, system bus speeds are near 100mhz, and Mac OS 8.1 is CHRP enabled. These are the major components of CHRP systems. Hence CHRP Macs are around the corner. True, they might not have much support for other operating systems (namely dual boot from hard drive support) and they might lack PS/2 ports, but in other respects they will soon be CHRP systems.
I'm sure Apple can port Mac OS to Intel. They quickly rewrote QuickTime and QuickDraw for Intel years ago. They also now have Yellow Box technology and have created recompiliers for use with Rhapsody. Apple should be able to get PowerPC/680x0 Mac apps to run in emulation on Intel. Likewise, if they choose, they should be able to get PowerPC/680x0 Mac apps to easily recompile for an Intel-based OS that is Mac compatible.
I was initially upset with Steve Jobs' action to end Mac OS licensing, but now I believe that he intends to replace it with Mac OS for Intel licensing. Likewise Apple might even focus on licensing the Mac OS for handhelds instead of making any handhelds themselves (like Microsoft). Maybe that's why Apple stopped all production of handhelds before a replacement is available (they have no intention to make handhelds - only to make the OS for handhelds?). Mac the Knife's recent rumor suggests that this is the plan. If so, Steve has been quiet about it because likely the product wasn't quite ready when the clones and Newton were axed.
A new rumors source recently reported that Apple expects to report a profit of $66 million today. - Updated on April 15th
The following rumors are unconfirmed:
Apple expects to report a net profit of $92 million - $102 million for the quarter that just ended. G3 Macintosh sales for the quarter were about 355,000 units.
Apple expects that the Intel version of Rhapsody will likely appeal initially to Unix shops. Apple expects Rhapsody for PC Compatibles to eventually become the dominant Unix based system. This is because the Unix on Intel market is fractured and Rhapsody will be able to run consumer applications written for the Mac OS (Yellow Box applications, that is). As such it will be more popular as a retail OS than the other Unix flavors. A future release will include mkLINUX, thereby adding the popular Linux to the MACH kernal. Yellow Box will be made available for Solaris. A workstation version of Rhapsody will be available for about $150.
Mac OS for PC Compatibles (Sonata) will be available in early 1999. It will run Yellow Box Mac OS applications but not older Mac programs. Apple will license its unreleased System 7 for Intel code (code name: Star Trek) to a third party software company. The third party will develop a System 7 (and possibly a Mac OS 8) for Intel. There might also be a plug-in for the Intel version of Rhapsody.
Umax's license for the PowerPC version of the Mac OS will not be renewed. However UMAX and IBM are negotiating to obtain a license for Rhapsody for PC Compatibles and Mac OS for PC Compatibles. Interestingly Umax's license expires around July and Rhapsody CR1 is due around July.
Inclusion of Internet Explorer into Mac OS 8.1, inclusion of ColorSync into future versions of Internet Explorer, and creation of a single Microsoft/Apple Java Virtual Machine for the Macintosh are just the beginning of the integration of Microsoft and Apple technologies. Later on Microsoft will bundle Yellow Box with (or into) Windows 98/NT. Apple will include some software (the source refused to specify what software) from Microsoft into Rhapsody or the Mac OS.
Apple plans to sell the Newton technologies and sell or spinoff FileMaker Inc.
If these unconfirmed rumors are true it is great news for Apple and Apple's investors. If anyone has additional information regarding these rumors, please send them to the editor at: gyoung2@homemail.com.
The editor recently received a rumor regarding Apple's financials and OS plans. The source has requested that the rumors not be posted until after the market closes. Check back after 10 pm Pacific Time for the full report.
A few web sites have news about SheepShaver Mac OS Runtime Environment for BeOS which lets the BeOS run Mac applications. However they say that SheepShaver is a Mac OS emulator. But the creators of SheepShaver say it is not an emulator of the Mac OS! I found this out when I asked the makers of SheepShaver the question "Do the makers of SheepSaver have a license from Apple giving them the right to make SheepSaver look exactly like Mac OS 8?" The makers answered by saying that "SheepShaver forces MacOS to run as a thread of BeOS. What you see at the screenshots is the real MacOS 8. SheepShaver just uses your old installation of MacOS on your Harddisk." It runs with any version of Mac OS 7.5.2 and greater.
Are there plans to develop SheepShaver for Intel x86 and/or Windows that includes a Mac hardware emulator? The makers said "if we find a fast PPC Emulator for Intel, it should be possible to run all MacOS apps with BeOS Intel." Their method of running the Mac OS seems very similar to Apple's method of running the Mac OS (blue box) on Mach/OpenStep in Rhapsody. It also seems similar to Windows95 running on VirtualPC running on the Mac OS. It looks like Mac OS may be coming to Intel, one way or another.
Are there plans to develop SheepShaver for other PowerPC OS's? Marc Hellwig (one of SheepShaver's coders) said "Perhaps LinuxPPC (not for sure ... a matter of free time)."
What does the name "SheepShaver" mean? Marc Hellwig said "the second coder involved in SheepShaver, wrote a Mac Emulator for the Amiga called ShapeShifter (out of the C64 game archon). At a meeting of Amiga freaks someone called him a "SheepShaver" and we liked this name."
It should be remembered that buy and sell timing signals reported at his web site are not actual buy and sell recommendations. They are however information that are useful to an investor evaluating buy and sell situations.
The decision regarding whether to invest (or divest) in the companies reported at this site, or not, is yours to make. Neither I, nor this web site, nor "Gavin Young's Investment Timer Reports," nor "The Phoenix Arises - News Analysis of Apple Computer," accept any responsibility for the outcome. The publisher takes reasonable care to assure the accuracy of the information contained herein but is not responsible for any errors or omissions. Any opinions expressed herein are statements of the editor's judgement as of the date of publication and are subject to change without notice. Information is merely provided to be of assistance to investors and should not be construed as a buy or sell recommendation. Readers should weigh matters carefully and use their own best judgement in making a decision suitable for their particular circumstances.
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January 1998 Archive of "The Phoenix Arises - News Analysis of Apple Computer: Claris; Mac on Intel"
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