Most Mac users are also PC users

All the Mac devotees I know all have Windows machines. They frequently make a show of complaining about them, but clearly they can't live without the better range of applications and games you can get on Windows.

Well stated! Mac's plan of selling only to the well-off is a good strategy considering it will keep them virus-free. Security through obscurity is the Mac way, don't let anyone tell you different.

If Macs were at the percentage of market penetration PCs are, they would be virus-ridden machines as well.

Most people I know have an old PC somewhere around the house - heck, I even have one that used to belong to my ex-wife. I let the kids use it, but it's so slow and buggy that they can't get up to much trouble with it.

I haven't been aware of any application that I've suffered because I'm using a mac exclusively. But I do acknowledge that there may be a lot of people who use PCs for gaming.

I suspect that the survey would be getting very different headlines if it said the the majority of Mac users have PCs as games machines... along with XboX 360s, PS3s and Wiis...

... about 85% of Macs simply _are_ PCs these days, with only a funny moustache for disguise. One day hopefully the marketeers will stop equating PC with Windows.

most Mac owners have three or four computers in their house
That means they're not Mac users - they're computer users. Who happen to have one (or more) Macs in their collection. I would suggest that if the survey looked farther afield than america, it would discover that almost no-one relied on simply a Mac - which kinda knocks a huge hole in their (self)image of superiority

Before spending 2-4X as much on a Mac wouldn't you first try the cheaper alternative?

I know it's entertaining to poke fun at Mac owners as people who are excessively smug and overly impressed with the shiny objects from Cupertino but these data suggest that many Mac users aren't ignorant about the alternatives.

Are Macs status symbols or a cry for help from frustrated windows users? They are both. I don't mind poking fun at those who are in the first category, but the people in Redmond deserve some blame for the second category.

I certainly am a expert on both, I fix Windows boxes all day long and come home to a nice Mac. Mind you, my work Desktop is unix, so I am trilingual.

If you read the actual press release (over here http://www.npd.com/press/releases/press_091005.html ) then what it says is that 85% of Mac users live in a *household* which has 1 or more Windows machines in it also. Since most households contain more than one person you can't blindly assume that they all use both (PC for the kids to play games on for example).
Anyone not a rabid follower of either camp (like Mr Farrell is a rabid follower of the beast of Redmond) when asked for advice on what computer to buy will first ask what the prospective buyer wants to do with it (games? internet? imaging? word processing etc) and what kind of budget they have. Wintel boxes will be better for some, Macs for others.
The part of the release that he carefully ignored (since it doesn't fit in with his world view) is that the percentage of households that have a Mac went up from 9% to 12% in the last year. More people are looking at both and deciding that they like the Apple offering better, but again that doesn't fit his world view.

Wanna gonna make a snappy comment , but got bored brain dead by end of comments....

Who really gives a rats ass anyway? If you have more money than sense you buy Mac cus of image (or cus you are arti-farty and work in design)

If you play games and generally like to tinker with tech, then Win or Linux is what you have ...end of boooring story

Toes?

Ow and: "Anyone not a rabid follower of either camp (like Mr Farrell is a rabid follower of the beast of Redmond) when asked for advice on what computer to buy will first ask what the prospective buyer wants to do with it (games? internet? imaging? word processing etc) and what kind of budget they have. Wintel boxes will be better for some, Macs for others."

True, its just that...PC will do all out of the box with ease, so you can ask what customer X wants to do with a new box, I cant think of a scenario a Mac will do what a PC cant...

"Wintel boxes will be better for some"...HAH, you must be joking, for some?

What is it with all the hate back and forth nowadays anyway? Sure we make some fun out of Mac owners, but thats because they are asking for it, because they think they are better for it. But in the end of the day, you buy what you want, that may be any random Apple product, a Zune, 5 pound a litre bottle of water, Fiat 500 or a Hummer....people need to just STFU and be happy what you bought!

My parents run winxp exclusively on two imacs, and I dualboot on my macbook pro.

Microsoft didn't recieve a cent in licensing though.

it's funny to read an article on appleinsider or another apple news site and then wait few hours/days and then it appears re-written by nick on inq with loads of rubbish around it.

why don't you cut down that bullshit and just post a link to the original article on the day it appears?

Surprise surprise surprise......

Farrell gets a hold of yet another Mac article, twists it to inject his own hatred of Apple, and spits it back out.

HOW in the world does this no-talent assclown still have a job?

Steve T "The part of the release that he carefully ignored (since it doesn't fit in with his world view) is that the percentage of households that have a Mac went up from 9% to 12% in the last year. More people are looking at both and deciding that they like the Apple offering better, but again that doesn't fit his world view."

So what you're saying is that in 1 year 3% of people bought a Mac that didn't have one before. The other 97% didn't. LMAO.

I'll do the maths in case you can't follow it, to go from 9% to 12% is a 3% change. So 3% more households now have a mac that didn't the year before.

88% still don't have a Mac at home. I would have expected a bigger jump considering that it's up against the PITA Vist.

I think both MS and Jobs are a bit crap, I'm hoping that google and the mobile phone apps can cross over to the pc.

Isn't a mac a pc, what is it if it's not a personal computer?

I'll do the maths in case you can't follow it, to go from 9% to 12% is a 3% change.

I think you'll find in Jobs-speak that's a 33% increase... ;)

@AJ - thanks for acting as an excellent example of the rabid Redmond faction. When you've done more than just tinker with a Mac at some store counter you may be qualified to say what it can and can't do, and how well. Until then try not to act too much like a prat.

@bored - maths is obviously not your strong point. Firstly you're assuming that nobody who ever bought an older Mac upgraded during the year. Apple does consistently well in customer satisfaction surveys so this is blatantly wrong.

Next Vista PEAKED at only about 19% of the market. Going from 9 to 12% of households doesn't sound too bad on those terms does it?

Thirdly as has already been pointed put it's a 33% improvement IN ONE YEAR. Ask any supplier you like how they'd feel if they'd picked up 33% more clients in a year.

i have a lot of pc at home, because plain and simple :

its cheap and everything can be done on it.

i work with OSX(apple) at work and i live it and everything can be done too. but hopefully i'm not paying for it.

for short :

i like OSX because : it's less a pain to use and troubleshoot

i like windows because : it's mainstream and games are compatible

i like Linux because : everything free, more human experience.

I use both platforms myself. Until lately I was strictly a PC user since I enjoy building my own systems. I had to start using Macs at work, but unfortunately they don't pay me enough to own one of my own. Macs are fun little computers, but doubt I'd ever switch to using only Macs. I'm surrounded my Mac fanboys here, so I rarely dare talk about my custom home rigs. I hung a small photo of Steve J. near my desk in effort to blend in. They now think I'm one of them. How cute...

I have 4 computers. 1 is a mac, 1 PC, and 1 linux, and 1 netbook (with linux).

I like having the flexibility of being able to use different machines for different things.

Really, Samba is good and all, but I wish they would all play better together.

I just forwarded the article to a friend and this was the reply I got from her
"I have the latest MACBOOK AIR, I hate pc's and will never, EVER go back again. They are slow and shit. And MACs don't get viruses.... So suck on that!!!"

Its ignorant replies from Mactards like this that get me so mad! There just is no way to reason with mactards!

What are they? Minis? Mainframes? Supercomputers(what mac users tend to think of these anyway).

So are Macs like non-personal computers?

Most Mac users are more open minded about other technology than the "pc purist' crowd who slate everything they don't understand.

Mac users are not only 'richer' generally but they are more educated and more intelligent - which is why they are able to use both.