I have to start this off by admitting that I have been working with PC’s since 1981. Sadly, that is longer than some of the developers that work for me have been alive. Having hung around the technology world for 27 years or so, I have been blessed to watch computer manufactures, start, grow, merge, die, and be reborn. Who would have ever predicted that IBM would lose this race and eventually sell their PC division to the Chinese, that Compaq would sell out to HP, and that Apple would explode on the market, nearly starve out, and then come storming back and diversify into other entertainment devices. A long strange trip to be sure.

Of the survivors, I am most intrigued with Apple. Not only with the company, but also their leader. This is beside the point, but I am always surprised that Steve Jobs does not get more credit for the turn around he performed at Apple. Some pretty big name CEO’s nearly destroyed it, and he has done an outstanding job of bringing it back. I have long made fun of my friends that are Mac “Bigots.” They would burn lots of energy and words convincing me that Apple was a better way to go and nothing I could say would change their minds. Being open minded, I started to run a Mac desktop 4 years ago just so I would be able to exist in both worlds. Frankly, I liked the operating system and the performance was good, but I got to a point where a PC was a PC for the things I do. Earlier this week I got an email from a client that asked what my opinion was of letting a couple people at their company get Mac laptops. They are a straight Wintel shop at the moment and the outgoing IT head had fought hard to keep it that way. With his departure, the door was cracking open for a few of the Mac faithful to give it another shot. My answer had to be carefully thought out because I had just moved to a MacBook Pro as my main machine and I did not want to let that good experience taint what I would say, yet… The fact is, I am really impressed with my new laptop.

Further, I called a friend of mine that has been in the technology business as long as I and he had just bought one as well for the first time. So I did a little quick research and found that Apple has over 30% of the upper end laptop market and almost 50% of the educational market according to their last earning report. These numbers are up substantially over the year before. In fact, these numbers are impressive and this is the reason I am writing this post. Many of you probably wonder about the same question – is it OK to have a blended technology structure with both Macs and Wintel boxes?

Here is my advice… I have personally setup our network at the house and I have about half Mac PC’s and half Wintel’s. Since the same software can really be run on both, there simply is no issue any longer with file types not being portable. The hardware is pretty standard as far as networking – a fact Apple has been screaming for years. There is nothing to fear. The only real issue is the problem of supporting two platforms from a help desk standpoint. Viva la Mac and all that rot. The biggest issue I face now is the nasty comments I get from the other people in the technology world that keep telling me I went over to the darkside… I will write more later about the role I think Apple will be playing from here forward.

Scott