The Most Expo-struck Mac Maniac Award...

... should probably go to Steve Jobs. Sure, a lot of us have been disappointed after our Expo expectations were hardly met, but poor Steve had known it all along: the stuff he really wanted to show us just wasn't ready. No wonder he showed clear signs of tension at the event. According to MacObserver's report, at one point, when he couldn't get a digital camera to work, he got "pissed", and hurled it off the stage at an Apple employee — something they won't teach you at a PR class.

Steve was looking at a tough day ahead. It had to give him shudders just to think about how many unpleasant questions he'd need to face, how much bad commentary he'd have to endure in the next few weeks, possibly months. But first, he had to meet the faithful and demanding, loving and damning Mac crowd.

The crowd had gathered there to hear about flat-panel iMacs, the "Son of Pismo", a rack-mounted PowerMac, or just, according to last-minute "reports", something "huge" such as a new hardware product that "is not an iMac or PowerBook". But those things weren't there, and Steve still had a show to deliver.

So when can I start licking?

All the OS X announcements about the support of third parties were fine. In addition to the usual suspects like Microsoft and Alias | Wavefront, there were a few pleasant surprises. Just as we all hoped, an Adobe rep did show up and made nice promises. To everyone's great astonishment (not), Adobe isn't actually ready to give up the source of one half of its revenues, which is developing for the Mac. Even Quark showed up and announced XPress for X, to everyone's delight.

The only thing missing from the coming out party of OS X was... OS X.

Okay, we'll have to wait till September. Version 10.1 of OS X, a.k.a. Puma, showed really great promise, and is expected to deliver what we can realistically hope it to, but still, we all would have preferred to have it available for download. So would Steve, I'm sure.

Shut up and burn that CD

Steve reportedly took about a minute to go through the three "new" iMac models, which, having no combo drives, coming at an increased price, and not even shipping immediately, delivered a clear message: "Don't buy me."

MacMinute also reports that

Apple is significantly downplaying today's revised iMacs. MacMinute's roving reporters on the show floor report that just six of Apple's best-selling Mac are available for demonstration, as opposed to the rows of dozens at previous shows.

Looks like these iMacs are genuinely transitional, something to sell in small numbers at large profits till the real thing arrives. When will that be? It's anyone's guess; the August availability of the high-end model makes it unlikely that it would be discontinued too shortly after that, so we could rule out the Seybold event in late September, which is a professional event anyway.

SourMac

The Seybold Seminar could, however, mean the introduction of new professional systems. While the updated PowerMac tower might pass for a semi-decent product upgrade (with the psychological effect of the former high-end model now becoming the low-end, the availability of the SuperDrive in a less expensive configuration, and return of DVD playback to two out of the three models by default, and a combo drive as a BTO option in all), people want more.

It's not just due to the rampant rumor-mongering, though: people are actually right if they want to see gigahertz, DDR RAM and true server-scale hardware with rack-mountability (Think Secret is a prolific source of rumors on the latter concept), things you can easily get on the Wintel side of the force. I'm sure you'll read a lot of rumors about Apple's server hardware in the next few months: Seybold is around the corner, and Apple's Server G4 still sports yesterday's enclosure, possibly hinting at a not too distant revision.

Still, the PowerMac G4 was "the thing" at this event. Let's hope that its significant, though not exactly earth-shattering changes will be sufficient for Apple to meet its sales goals before we see some more dramatic announcements.

Transition this!

Let's also hope that Apple has a lot of stuff up its sleeve, because this Expo didn't deliver as much as it should have. And again, it's not just the rumors' fault. There are some logical steps for Apple's hardware to take, and we don't really see that happening yet. We've seen little indication as to whether the Macintosh is going in the right direction, or whether it's going in any direction at all.

Where is Apple's hardware going? Well, the direction was set by some concepts and products whose potential is nowhere close to being fulfilled. Right now, I don't want to talk about new software directions, and neither do I want to get caught speculating about things like Bluetooth or having your Mac operate your personal handheld satellite-toaster combo with laser beams. No, I want to stick with basic, down-to-earth stuff that requires little speculation and only takes an idiot to figure out.

DVD playback. This is clearly a consumer feature. It's nice to have DVD video in all PowerMacs, but the iMac needs that feature, or rather needs it back now. I wonder how long it's going to take Apple to kill off the current transitional iMacs and present a lineup with Combo-drives as a standard, but I hope it's within a few months. The only speculation I'm willing to get into now is this: if the new iMac lineup were here to stay, wouldn't Apple have taken the effort to include combo-drives in at least the high-end models?

DVD authoring. Guess what: this is also a consumer feature. True, Apple sometimes mentions the business use of iDVD, but isn't even the latest iDVD commercial sugesting a decidedly consumer use? (Hint: yes, it is.) Sure, unlike Desktop Video, which debuted on the iMac in 1999, DVD authoring had to come on the PowerMac first, but in about a year, it should really be available on the iMac too. The first step toward this goal should be a high-end iMac with a G4 processor: a chip that you want to have around when you start encoding a 90-minute DVD movie. If Apple's serious about iDVD for consumers, it should ship an iMac G4 pretty soon.

Gaining market share. Apple's retail stores are there, according to Apple, to help the Mac gain market share. Apple's retail web page says that the stores' purpose is to convert existing computer users (as opposed to convince first-time buyers). If that's the case, the Macintosh needs to be competitive with, eh, "other platforms". Apple must stop relying on the fact that Mac users will forever buy Macs, despite the ever-growing Mac premium they pay, the lack of configuration options, and the inferior hardware performance that a few contrived Photoshop bake-offs cannot just simply make go away. If Apple wants "real" IT managers to consider Macs as an option, they should introduce 200 MHz system buses, gigaherz processor speeds (which do matter), RAID hard drives, and a variety of configurations ranging from a low-cost client desktop to a big, hary server beast.

Apple must forget about deciding for us whether we need Gigabit Ethernet, or whether we definitely need a SuperDrive with the highest-end G4 tower. In other words: goodbye, foolproof product matrix. Fools shouldn't buy professional Macs anyway.

Good signs

Well, there is some hope for Apple's hardware to go in the "right direction." For example, Apple no longer stuffs the SuperDrive down your throat (figuratively speaking, of course) if you buy the high-end G4 from the online Apple Store. If processing power is all that matters, you can save almost $1000 if you configure a stripped-down version of the dual-800 machine for yourself. Let's hope that sensible configuration options like these will be available in offline stores as well.

Some signs I've already alluded to suggest that Steve would have loved to show us more. Touting iDVD 2, a follow-up product that isn't even due to ship for two months, as the famous "one more thing" implies that Steve was just desperate to announce anything. Past "one more things" include AirPort, the Cube, and the TiBook; how could you put them in the same league as iDVD 2?! My theory is that Steve had a much more dramatic "one more thing" in mind, something that almost made it to the expo floor. And if so, it can't be that far away.

There is also a bright side to Apple's hardware, and it's the laptops. The iBook is almost perfect, coming in four different drive options. The TiBook is due to be updated in September, unless Apple really screws up something, expect it to come with a ComboDrive as the standard.

And of course, OS X is looking very good, better than ever. We're getting Quark! Aqua is also evolving. OS X is slowly but steadily becoming a reality. It looks like we'll need to say goodbye to docklings, though...

Meanwhile, if you look at Apple's home page, please make sure you get their message: "Don't worry, we'll ship a lot of insanely great products very soon. In the meantime ... try to have some fun!"

Andr㎏ Puiz

András Puiz is a Hungarian native. He first met the Mac at a DTP job in 1997, and as a result, he has vowed to minimize his contacts with all forms of Windows. He is the proud owner of an iMac DV. He has worked for IT-related publishers and consultants as a freelance writer and translator, as well as holding full-time jobs with project management, database development and print production duties. He is also a programmer wannabe, using FileMaker as his main development platform, to everyone's ridicule and horror. As a college dropout-but-hopefully-going-back-there-to-finish-soon, he's studied mathematics and teaching English as a second language. Andras is working on a site called "Mac Thought Crime" (technical problems won't allow a link now).