Top news this week: Apple is approaching 8% market share, according
to WebApplications, and Safari has a solid hold on third place in the
browser sweepstakes. On top of that, Gartner expects Apple to double
the Mac's market share by the end of 2011.
Our logs at Low End Mac, as
published yesterday, show over half our readers visit on Macs, 44%
on Windows, 35% using Firefox, 32% with Safari, and just under 25% on
Internet Explorer. Of course we'd expect Windows- and Linux-oriented
websites to be skewed from the norm as well.
PowerBook, iBook, MacBook, and other portable computing is covered
in The 'Book Review. iPod, iPhone,
and Apple TV news is covered in The iNews
Review.
All prices are in US dollars unless otherwise noted.
News & Opinion
Reviews
Software
News & Opinion
Mac Hits Record Market Share
DailyTech's
Jason Mick reports:
"Windows may be king, but Apple is trying to out-tortoise the
hare
"Apple's OS X comes nowhere near Windows in market share, but the
reality is, throughout the last couple years OS X has slowly been
gaining traction. It still has many more years to go at this rate
before ever evening the OS race, but this does not detract from the
fact that it is making progress, largely at Microsoft's expense."
Link:
Mac OS X Hits Record Marketshare, Continues to Chip at Windows
Lead
OS X Closing on 8% Market Share
Market Research firm WebApplications reports that the Mac OS
platform (green in this chart) enjoyed a 7.57% market share in January,
with the iPhone accounting for another 0.13%.
Windows (blue) still has a 91.46% share, while Linux (red) trails
distantly at 0.67%.
Link: Operating System
Market Share for January, 2008
Safari a 'Solid Third' in Browser Market Share
Market
Research firm WebApplications reports that only three Web browsers had
a market share above 1% in January, with Apple's Safari (red) at 5.82%
behind Firefox (green) and Microsoft's still-dominant but fading
Internet Explorer (blue).
Link: Browser Market
Share for January, 2008
Apple to Double Market Share in 3 Years?
ZD Net's Liam Tung reports:
"By 2011, Apple will double its market share in the US and Europe -
a trend that will also mean an onslaught of Apple devices invading
corporate networks, new research predicts.
"According to analyst firm Gartner, Apple's rapid growth over recent
years will see the company take nine percent of the US and Western
European personal computing market within the next three years."
Link:
Apple to Double Its Market Share in Three Years?
The Future Is Apple, Open Source, and Green
Computerworld UK's Jon Brodkin reports:
"Open source, Apple computers, green technology, the rise of users
and the proliferation of three-dimensional printing are among the hot
trends IT shops should look out for in the next few years, according to
Gartner.
"The analyst firm yesterday (31 January) highlighted 10 key
predictions of developments that will affect IT and business users in
2008 and beyond....
"Apple will double its market share for computers in the United
States and Western Europe by 2011. 'Apple's gains in computer market
share reflect as much on the failures of the rest of the industry as on
Apple's success,' Gartner says. A focus on interoperability between the
iPod, iMac and other devices is one of the keys for Apple.
"* By 2012, half of all workers will use devices other than their
laptops when they travel. 'Even though notebooks continue to shrink in
size and weight, travelling workers lament the weight and inconvenience
of carrying them on their trips,' Gartner states."
Link:
Gartner: The Future Is Apple, Open Source and Green
Reviews
The Fastest Mac Ever
Macworld's James Galbraith reports:
"We've published our review of the standard configuration of Apple's
recently revised Mac Pro
line, but that's not the final chapter in the Mac Pro story.
"In addition to the eight-core, 2.8 GHz model we reviewed, Apple
offers three other build-to-order configurations. We've already tested
the 3 GHz, eight-core Mac Pro and the 2.8 GHz, four-core system, and we
finally received the last piece of the Mac Pro puzzle - an eight-core
3.2 GHz model. As you might expect, this machine, powered by a pair of
3.2 GHz 4-core Xeon processors, is the fastest Mac we've tested
yet."
Link: The
Fastest Mac Ever
Software
SuperDuper! 2.5 Gains Leopard Compatibility
PR: SuperDuper is a wildly acclaimed program that makes
recovery painless, because it makes creating a fully bootable backup
painless. Its incredibly clear, friendly interface is understandable,
easy to use, and SuperDuper's built-in scheduler makes it trivial to
back up automatically. It's the perfect complement to Time Machine
under Leopard, allowing you to store a bootable backup alongside your
Time Machine volume - and it runs beautifully on both Intel and Power
PC Macs!
SuperDuper's interface confirms all your actions in simple, clear
language to ensure that the end result is exactly what you intended.
Take a look, and click for additional screen shots!
We all know that using the Macintosh is usually a trouble-free
experience.
Except when it's not. Like when:
- Your hard drive starts making that horrible clicking noise that
signals an imminent meltdown
- A momentary lapse of coordination causes your PowerBook to take a
dirt nap
- The system suddenly fails to boot
- Your most important day-to-day application isn't working with the
system update you just applied
- The new driver you just updated is causing your Macintosh to
crash
- That lousy software you just tried didn't come with an uninstaller,
and scattered files all over your drive
- You need to restore a stable copy of your system, but don't want to
lose what you've been working on
- You need to test new versions of the operating system with
production data you can't afford to lose
SuperDuper is the most advanced, yet easy to use disk copying
program available for OS X. It can, of course, make a full backup, or
"clone" - in moments, you can completely duplicate your boot drive to
another drive, partition, or image file. In even less time, you can
update an existing clone with the latest data: use Smart Update and,
minutes later, your backup is completely up to date!
The latest version of SuperDuper! can store a bootable backup
alongside Time Machine backups, copy Time Machine backups to other
drives, run scheduled copies on demand, and polishes and improves many
other aspects as well. (A full list can be found by selecting Help >
Revision History.)
SuperDuper! remains a Universal Application, and works beautifully
on Intel and Power PC based Macs.
It's a free update for users: existing copies of SuperDuper! will
auto-upgrade the next time they are run
Give SuperDuper a workout on your own system. Clone to your heart's
content - for free. See what else is possible. When you're convinced
that SuperDuper is a terrific solution - and a great value at $27.95 -
you can register right from the application and start using its
advanced features immediately.
Please note that SuperDuper! is not designed to back up to CDs, DVDs
or Tape, and needs a location (other than the boot volume) to store the
backup - typically a volume on an internal or external (FireWire)
drive. SuperDuper! only copies HFS+ (Mac-native) volumes.
Note also that USB drives do not allow booting Power PC based
Macintoshes under any version of Mac OS X: this is not a SuperDuper!
limitation, but one of the OS. If you would like to boot from a backup
stored on an external drive, and have a Power PC based Mac, please
purchase a Mac compatible FireWire drive. Intel Mac users can boot from
either USB or FireWire drives.
New in version 2.5:
- Full Leopard support
- Can store a bootable backup side-by-side with a Time Machine backup
on a single volume
- Can copy Time Machine backup volumes to other drive when you need
more space (or want to back up your archived data)
- "Run Now" button for scheduled copies
- Automatic preservation of any custom icon on the destination
volume
- Improved Spotlight handling
- Performance and other improvements
- Of course, the new SuperDuper 2.5 still improves on the acclaimed
original in many ways, including:
- The ability to easily schedule backups
- Additional imaging options
- More control over shutdown
- Better AppleScript support
System requirements: Mac OS X 10.4 or later, including Leopard.
(Optical and tape drives are not supported.)
System support: PPC/Intel
$27.95 Shareware - You can download SuperDuper! v2.5 right now and
back up and clone your drives for free - forever! - Buy to unlock
scheduling, Smart Update (which saves a lot of time), Sandboxes,
scripting and more.
Link: SuperDuper!
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