PC Mike -Tech News

Never before have I seen such interest in all things Mac. There is not a day that goes by now that I don’t hear from one or two people who have had it with Windows.

Yesterday’s introduction of the $499 Mac mini will only increase the movement.

Steve Jobs is brilliant. I predict tens of thousands of these will quickly be sold and hook a whole new market on the Mac. Then, those initial mini buyers will soon pass it on to the spouse or the kids and - spoiled by OS X and the Mac’s immunity from worms and viruses and the security disaster that characterizes Microsoft products - buy themselves iMacs, G5s and PowerBooks.

And I can’t wait to start using Pages, the new Apple word processor. With the new iWork suite, added to iCal, Address Book, Safari, iSync and the whole line of OS X software, it’s now possible to effectively and powerfully be Microsoft-free.

Microsoftians, I know, are scoffing.

But the momentum is there.

Macs are about to become as hot as iPods. Apple may not sell 10 million Macs as it has with the iPod, but watch sales skyrocket.

And when the new Tiger OS is introduced this summer, they will only get hotter.

We’re only a dozen days into 2005, but come December, I’m ready to predict Apple and the Mac will be the tech pundit’s choice as product of the year.

I know we need some time to fully digest all the great Apple announcements today. But the new Apple iWork suite has excited me the most. I can tell you right now, I’d stand in line to buy this software. Bring it on, Steve.

And here’s welcome news confirming our big buzz item of the last month - there really will be a $499 Mac!MSNBC - Apple unveils low-cost Mac, iPod

Whew! The hype surrounding Apple and Steve Job’s keynote at Macworld Tuesday is huge.
Speculation is we’ll see a cheap, flash-based iPod, a so-called “headless” Mac that will sell without a monitor for under $500 and a new productivity suite of software dubbed by the rumor sites as iWork.
Then again, except for the flash-based iPod (which seems a done deal), none may be true.
Whatever, there are sure High hopes for Macworld.