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Mac OS X Sales Growing in Japan, Windows Growth Declining
by , 2:15 PM EST, November 13th, 2007
Japan's Business Computing News noted on Tuesday that sales of Mac OS X rose dramatically in Japan in September and October while Windows sales growth plummeted. The results were attributed to Vista's pricing and packaging compared to Mac OS X.
The BCN report was covered by Electronista and noted that Mac OS X sales growth climbed at a rate of 15.5 percent year-over-year, to 60+ percent, while the sales growth of Windows declined from 75.3 to 28.7 percent. While that still leaves Microsoft's sales growth rather healthy, it's a bad sign for Windows.
The report attributed the changes to the high price of a Vista upgrade in Japan (US$179 equivalent) and even more for the full edition (US$276). Apple sells a full version of Mac OS X there for US$134. Also, the ability of Mac OS X/Leopard to run on older Macs compared to the PC/Vista combination is adding to the appeal of Mac OS X.
BCN believes that Apple's approach of more frequent major updates is validated and showing results with customers. The publication noted that Leopard's growth is much greater than when Tiger was released in April 2005.
In spite of all this, Japan remains one of the most difficult markets for Apple to prosper in because customers there tend to opt for lower cost computers.
Observer Comments
Tue Nov 13, 2007 10:32 pm Subject: Vista an expensive overblown 5 year waste of time
Microsoft blew it in several ways. First they confused everyone with 6 different versions, 5 of them being totally worthless from the beginning as most of the features were taken out. Second they over priced all of there upgrades. Third they went paranoia with security and made it an intrusion on the user experience. Fourth they spent 5 years doing this and there are really no new features that came out of 5 years work. Fifth, Why did they bury all of the well known control panels that you used to be able to find in XP. Sixth, this operating system is a monster to run and sucks up memory like no tomorrow. Seventh, incompatible with to many of the newer peripherals even today. OSX everything is where it should be. Security yes, but not at the expense of the user experience. Price $129 for the Ultimate version. No long serial numbers to punch in. No online verification that accuses you of stealing your purchased copy. And there are actually new features that work right now.
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