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"Think of your traditional iPod owner," said a source. "This new product will be for a Windows user who has experienced the iPod, the ease of use of the iTunes software, and has played around with a Mac at an Apple retail store just long enough to know he'd buy one if it were a little cheaper."I love this idea. There's obviously a huge market of iPod users who are in love with the device and a huge portion of those are Windows users. While I don't have an iPod myself (I have an iRiver, which I prefer for it's recording function), I have decided to make the switch to Mac myself. However, for me it's the money keeping me away. I want a Powerbook, but I simply can't plunk down the cash for one at this point (and I am wondering when a G5 powerbook will come out . . . anyone have any insights?). Given this new $500 option I imagine I would buy it as a second PC, just as the article says. Why not? For $500 I could leave the computer in my bedroom and have my laptop for my coffee table (where it has been a fixture for the last month-and-a-half anyway). I already have a display and it's currently just sitting on my desk looking lonely, so why not hook it up to a nice, cheap G4? Come on Apple, give me something to work with until I can afford to buy myself a shiny Powerbook.Apple executives announced on October 13 that 45% to 50% of its retail store customers bought a Mac as their first PC or were new to the platform in the fiscal fourth-quarter. The company has refused to divulge more exacting figures on iPod buyers who also buy a Mac, for competitive reasons.
According to sources, internal Apple surveys of its retail store customers and those buying iPods showed a large number of PC users would be willing to buy a Mac if it were cheap enough, less of a virus carrier (which all Macs already are), and offered easier to use software solutions not available on Windows-based PCs. Now, Apple feels it has the answer.