[The Placid Casual]

Just saw an article on www.ThinkSecret.com about it, and my UK supplier has also said that they are not expecting Dualies until 'at least' late September...

I have just checked the Apple UK site, and they are showing 7-10 week delays on the Dual machines, again indicating October.

I ordered my Dualie on the day of announcement, and need it both for work and Education by the first week of September or I am totally 'stuffed'. I was assured over and over by Apple UK that they would indeed ship in August...

If it is October before it ships, I would have gone in another direction and waited for a Rev2 machine, and kept my Powerbook, or bought a 15" Ti for Uber cheap to last me a year...

This may be:

Not. Good. Enough.

And also;

A P.R. Disaster.

Either way, I am seriously pissed off.

[Eug]

What does your shipping date say?

Stuff ordered now indeed is 7-10 weeks, which means Sept/October, but 7-10 weeks from the day of announcement is actually August/Sept.

I would not be surprised if some people get units by the 3rd week of August.

[The Placid Casual]

Originally posted by Eug:
What does your shipping date say?

Stuff ordered now indeed is 7+ weeks, but that's not the same thing as stuff ordered a month ago.

I ordered though an AppleCentre, and they were originally given 29/8, this then slipped to 2/9. Now they have been told that any Dual G5 ordered at any time, is late Sept/early October as it is 'highly unlikely' any will be in the country before then...

The single processor machines are fine.

I guess time will tell.

[mamamia]

Originally posted by The Placid Casual:
Just saw an article on www.ThinkSecret.com about it, and my UK supplier has also said that they are not expecting Dualies until 'at least' late September...

I ordered my Dualie on the day of announcement, and need it both for work and Education by the first week of September or I am totally 'stuffed'. I was assured over and over by Apple UK that they would indeed ship in August...

If it is October before it ships, I would have gone in another direction and waited for a Rev2 machine, and kept my Powerbook, or bought a 15" Ti for Uber cheap to last me a year...
[/i] [/B]

placid casual - for someone who is as savvy a mac consumer as you are (i see you are on these boards a lot), I have a hard time being sympathetic. when was the last time apple had a major upgrade ready to ship on time? this is radical new technology - and expecting that that there won't be delays, given apple's horrendous track record on that front, wasn't realistic at all. of course apple uk said it would ship - that's what they were saying publicly and if they knew differently but didn't tell people, that would have been false advertising.

and i don't believe this will bring the bad p.r. you think it will. sure, it will piss some people off, but as long as apple ships the single G5s, and brings the dual g5s in september, the marketing gains apple saw from touting these machines early will more than make up for the bad p.r. for not being able to deliver.

[Crusoe]

Cancel your order and get a cheap flight to Deleware (no tax) in early September. Buy the system you want, brown box it and carry it back. It'll probably be cheaper too (depending on you flight cost).

[The Placid Casual]

Originally posted by mamamia:
placid casual - for someone who is as savvy a mac consumer as you are (i see you are on these boards a lot), I have a hard time being sympathetic. when was the last time apple had a major upgrade ready to ship on time? this is radical new technology - and expecting that that there won't be delays, given apple's horrendous track record on that front, wasn't realistic at all. of course apple uk said it would ship - that's what they were saying publicly and if they knew differently but didn't tell people, that would have been false advertising.

and i don't believe this will bring the bad p.r. you think it will. sure, it will piss some people off, but as long as apple ships the single G5s, and brings the dual g5s in september, the marketing gains apple saw from touting these machines early will more than make up for the bad p.r. for not being able to deliver.

I totally agree with you, I have calmed down a bit now and concur with your statements... However, it is just very frustrating when Apple live up to their appalling track record every single time! I mean, they have had years to sort this machine so one could expect some sort of decent lead time!

I rely on my machines for a living and also this year for Higher Edu, so it is just beyond a joke to me now if the reports are true, as I am having to make a lot of changed arrangements, and go to a lot of hassle in a very short amount of time!

To make things even worse for me, as a reserve machine, an Alu 15" would have suited me really well for 8 months or so, but I can't even have one of those to fall back on!

Oh well, I guess I moaning about 'trifles', and some people would be very happy to be in my situation. Guess I should count my blessings and not give vent to my annoyances...

Thanks for the voice of reason!

Peace,

Marc

[RevEvs]

this better not be true - crap crap crap crap.... i want my dualy G5...

I didnt expect it in August - but thought early sept at least! Are they not assembling them in ireland then anymore?

revs

[tikki]

If Apple cannot get the products out by their estimates time after time, they need to just not set the dates. It's getting ridiculous.

[awcopus]

Placid Casual, dude, cancel the order...or better yet AUCTION your order status on eBay, since you placed it so early. Maybe it's worth something.

Either way, if you're serious about needing a machine by September, cancel this order and get the PowerBook as per your plans. I mean, you've still got plenty of time. It's still July.

***

Apple announced the G5 way in advance because more than at any time in their history, Apple's Pro line was languishing Uber-miserably. They needed to give people a reason to still care. I know many Mac guys who switched to PCs and aren't coming back any time soon. Not until the G5 is out, and Panther runs smoothly on it, and their pro apps run smoothly on Panther on a G5....in other words, not for a while yet.

[Simon]

Originally posted by awcopus:
Apple announced the G5 way in advance because more than at any time in their history, Apple's Pro line was languishing Uber-miserably. They needed to give people a reason to still care.

True. But if Apple would just say "this is the G5, we will start selling it soon" everybody would be here on maccnn bitching about how hush-hush Steve handles everything, that Apple isn't reliable, etc... Either way, we wouldn't be happy. Rotten deal for Steve, but that's the way it is.

Instead of being happy that we'll be leading the race by September again, people are bitching. Remember, the best time with a new Mac is while you anticipate it. Once you have, you get used to it much too quickly.

I know many Mac guys who switched to PCs and aren't coming back any time soon. Not until the G5 is out, and Panther runs smoothly on it, and their pro apps run smoothly on Panther on a G5....in other words, not for a while yet.

Sorry, but "those guys" are idiots. They don't need Panther. Jag will run just fine on a G5. And that chip is coming. Panther is just bells and whistles to go with it. Real work is done with Jag just fine. They may need G5s, because they want hungry apps to run wicked fast. Well, the G5 will be here by September. If they don't value the Mac OS (compared to XP or Linux) enough to wait for these two additional months, they should switch and stay away from the Mac for good. Those who are ready to wait two more months know why they should wait.

As long as Apple gets enough switchers from the Win world (and it seems they are since 50% of the AppleStore sales go to converts) we shouldn't be too worried about CPU-geeks leaving the platform. It's better to get rid of the most-CPU-per-buck-guys sooner than later. Apple needs users due to its OS, not due to its SPECint. Granted, a good software experience relies on beefy CPUs nowadays, but with the G5 I think we're beefy enough.

[awcopus]

Originally posted by Simon:
Instead of being happy that we'll be leading the race by September again, people are bitching. Remember, the best time with a new Mac is while you anticipate it. Once you have, you get used to it much too quickly.

There's a world of difference between anticipation of a product that will be delivered on time in the not so distant future and delivery of a product that is continuously pushed back until it's forecasted to be one month late. Many people who placed their orders on the day of the announcement have seen their est. ship dates change, for the most part, in the wrong direction. I'd be bitching, too.

[QUOTE Sorry, but "those guys" are idiots. They don't need Panther. Jag will run just fine on a G5. And that chip is coming. Panther is just bells and whistles to go with it. Real work is done with Jag just fine. They may need G5s, because they want hungry apps to run wicked fast. Well, the G5 will be here by September. [/QUOTE]

I have to agree that their idiots because I'm fanatical about Mac stuff. But, in another sense, these guys had waited a long time for a substantial hardware update from Apple that never came. (Technically, it still hasn't arrived.) So they made investments in hybrid setups, choosing Wintel machines as their new computers and keeping the Macs around because they still liked them (even preferred them for general use). They made this move ostensibly for performance-based reasons plus a lack of faith in Apple, but moreover a real need for rendering speed that they felt was matched better with fast PCs. So the G5 is exciting to them...about a year too late for their upgrade cycle. They've made plenty of money on their PC rigs, and as they look to upgrade, even though they can afford a Mac rig, they see so much more for their money on the PC side that it's going to be hard to get them to return.

Honestly, I think they wasted their money. I was working on a Quicksilver 933 during that period and though they certainly got through their renders faster, the jobs weren't suddently better, they definitely had more "issues" arise than I did (though not as many as I forewarned), and they didn't suddently get more work. Also, they had to invest in new hardware and software, learning time, etc.

You're right that video editors should be less concerned with having the latest and greatest and more concerned with what works. Still, FCP4 is new, the G5 is new, Panther is new... there's a lot of buzz about each of these things, and most pros want to take advantage of one if not all of them. So prudent or not, I think video editors considering a switch to the Mac platform are waiting now because they see so much new stuff and issues of compatibility and reliability are up in the air for at least the rest of this year as a result. Nobody wants to switch to a new platform only to adopt old technologies (G4, OS9 or Jaguar, FCP3).

Of course, I can't really make the case for the G5 to my peers until the machines are available for real. Hope Apple and IBM can get the G5 out the door immediately. And in the rush to do so, I hope there aren't any issues with this machine. The first generation machines can have a few minor issues, but nothing major.

Apple, if you're listening, you should just send one of each G5 configuration to MacAddict and MacWorld and Ars Technica so they can publish lengthy, exhaustive reports on an abundance of real-world software experiences and comparisons.