Apple responds to Microsoft ads: "a PC is no bargain"

[hdood]

I agree with Vice. Power connectors and cables (particularly the coaxial sort) frequently fail. It's one of the most stressed parts of a laptop.

[bob21]

No i just think your embellishing the truth , 40 hard disks and not one failure is impossible considering the burn in time .

[redfish]

Roughly $100 for an operating system upgrade doesn't seem outlandish to me.

I'd find that type of price fair if I were given the license to install it on all of the computers I owned personally. $100 per computer is not fair.

[ccuk]

Don't talk crap, how the hell does a single 1.86GHz Xeon trash a Mac Pro? It certainly isn't very high end or it would have dual CPU's and they'd be 3GHz.

How about you actually read properly instead of lashing out?

The Lenovo D20 (note the D signifying a dual socket board? S20 is a single socket machine) works out cheaper in terms of hardware and they also offer a 3 year warranty as standard. With options for 4 and 5 year on site for very little extra, not to mention more USB ports and more drive bays, it is a very worthy opponent to the Mac Pro.

[BajiRav]

Last time I used WMM, it could only import/edit/export Windows Media formats or DV AVIs. Simple MP4 H.264 video or AAC audio, which is a pretty common standard today, wasn't supported. Is that still the case today?

I never cared for H.264 enough to try that but AFAIK you can import it as long as you have right codecs installed. How does that matter though?

[giga Veteran]

I never cared for H.264 enough to try that but AFAIK you can import it as long as you have right codecs installed. How does that matter though?

It doesn't--I just tried it with ffdshow. (as well Windows 7's own codecs)

And it matters because H.264/AVCHD is the standard for video transmission in many camcorders. Exporting options in WMM are even more sparse where I can't even set a custom bit rate and encoding options are limited to just WMV and DV.

[BajiRav]

It doesn't--I just tried it with ffdshow. (as well Windows 7's own codecs)

And it matters because H.264/AVCHD is the standard for video transmission in many camcorders. Exporting options in WMM are even more sparse where I can't even set a custom bit rate and encoding options are limited to just WMV and DV.

WMM hasn't been updated yet though - the WLiveMM is obviously not done yet. I am pretty sure that Windows 7 supports AVCHD because all HD camcorders now use it. You can set "custom" bit rates in WMM as long as they are in the preset list. :p I think the list is long enough to satisfy most of the target audience.

[giga Veteran]

WMM hasn't been updated yet though - the WLiveMM is obviously not done yet. I am pretty sure that Windows 7 supports AVCHD because all HD camcorders now use it. You can set "custom" bit rates in WMM as long as they are in the preset list. :p I think the list is long enough to satisfy most of the target audience.

WMM doesn't support AVCHD/H.264. WLMM does support AVCHD/H.264.

Problem: WMM is somewhat competent as an editor. WLMM is a joke so far. So in the end, there isn't a good solution today to this pretty important issue.

Presets are not a solution to custom bit rates either. The excuse of it to be "enough" for a target audience just illustrates one of the many limitations MM has.

As for actual editing features, WMM is pretty sparse in to how deep one can really go compared to iMovie.

- No color correction. iMovie has levels, exposure, contrast, saturation, and white point adjustments.

- No cropping.

- No video stabilization.

- Only one audio track.

- Limited flexibility of adjustments. You can only stack "speed up, double", "slow down, half". Same with brightness increases and decreases. Same for fading in and out video/audio tracks. Where's a damn slider?

- The titles and transitions themselves are pretty basic and haven't been updated for three years now. No dynamic theme titles and transitions either.

So maybe WMM is "enough" to satisfy a specific target base, but iMovie is "enough" and then some to broaden that base. Not much of an equal league really.

[BajiRav]

WMM doesn't support AVCHD/H.264. WLMM does support AVCHD/H.264.

Problem: WMM is somewhat competent as an editor. WLMM is a joke so far. So in the end, there isn't a good solution today to this pretty important issue.

Presets are not a solution to custom bit rates either. The excuse of it to be "enough" for a target audience just illustrates one of the many limitations MM has.

As for actual editing features, WMM is pretty sparse in to how deep one can really go compared to iMovie.

- No color correction. iMovie has levels, exposure, contrast, saturation, and white point adjustments.

- No cropping.

- No video stabilization.

- Only one audio track.

- Limited flexibility of adjustments. You can only stack "speed up, double", "slow down, half". Same with brightness increases and decreases. Same for fading in and out video/audio tracks. Where's a damn slider?

- The titles and transitions themselves are pretty basic and haven't been updated for three years now. No dynamic theme titles and transitions either.

So maybe WMM is "enough" to satisfy a specific target base, but iMovie is "enough" and then some to broaden that base. Not much of an equal league really.

I know all that - I never claimed WMM is better than iMovie. I just said they are in the same league. I wouldn't call iMovie professional grade even with everything you listed above. (p.s. I've not used iMovie after they completely changed it last year)

[giga Veteran]

I know all that - I never claimed WMM is better than iMovie. I just said they are in the same league. I wouldn't call iMovie professional grade even with everything you listed above. (p.s. I've not used iMovie after they completely changed it last year)

League. Subjective terms are subjective.

But yeah, iMovie isn't near professional grade.

[Subject Delta]

As much as I dislike Apple, I will agree WMM is pretty poor, it is far too basic, and you just don't get enough choice IMO about target resolutions, codecs, bitrates ETC when you save movies in it.

iMovie cannot physically be much worse than WMM, but the saying rings true that if you want something of professional quality, you can expect to pay for it

[the evn show]

IMO the comparison between iMovie and Windows Movie Maker isn't all that fair.

Mac OS X doesn't ship bundled with any video editing software and so by default the Windows kit is better. While it's true that anybody running Mac OS X 10.6 will have at least one copy of iMovie it's not fair to assume they'll all have the most recent version of iLife.

Likewise, Windows 7 owners will have access to Windows Movie Maker as a lowest common denominator but I think it's fair to compare to the 'common' bundled software. Do HP, Dell, Asus, etc. include any video editing software with their computers the way Apple bundles iLife with theirs? Given that Microsoft's campaign features HP machines so prominently that seems like a good place to start comparing.