Conclusion

Apple, Inc is one of the most successful failures in the business world. The company has seen several CEO's come and go in a single decade, all to be replaced by the God of Apple: Steve Jobs. The man that helped start the company is the only person who can keep it together. Without him, Apple seems to wither a small amount; he is their core, he gives the world all of Apples great creations. I hope after reading this blog, that you the reader is left with some knowledge on Apple, Inc. My goal was to let anybody who wants some knowledge on Apple receive it in a clear and clutter free manner. Thanks!

Powerhouse

The current computers that Apple has been producing haven't been certainly powerful computers, up until August 2006, Apple had never released a powerhouse computer. But that all changed in August 2006, when Apple introduced its fastest, most powerful computer to date: The Mac Pro. The Mac Pro was the macdaddy of all Macintosh computers. As a base model, the Mac Pro came with a 250 GB hard drive, two Xeon 64 Bit processors, 1 GB of RAM, Superdrive, and NVIDIA GeForce graphics, and 5 USB ports. This all cost $2499. The Mac Pro was a computer built for the large base of professionals who like to customize their computers. Any customer who decided to upgrade the computer could max it out with 16 GB of RAM, 2 TB of hard drive space, 3.0 GHz quad-core processor and several different graphics cards. 

Macbook Air

In January 2008, Apple unveiled their newest Macbook to its lineup. The Macbook Air, at 0.16-0.67 inches in height, is the worlds thinnest computer. To show how thin this computer is, Steve Jobs presented it in a manila folder. The computer however, is a major letdown. For starters, the computer was only running at 1.6 Ghz, which by todays standards is pretty slow. The Air also had 2 GB of RAM, which to the dismay of many, was non-upgradable. The hard drive was smaller, there were no Firewire ports, one USB port, no ethernet port, and no internal optical drive. However, Apple did include a regular, full size keyboard that was backlit, meaning the keys lit up when dark. It also had a multi-touch mousepad that enabled the user to make different gestures for different uses. Apple has raised the bar on laptop computers with its Macbook Air.

The iPhone

The Apple iPhone marked the beginning of a progressive era in the smartphone business not only for Apple, but for all other companies. The iPhone was Apples first stab at the mobile phone market, as it was unveiled in January 2007. The iPhone runs on a modified version of Mac OS X that responded to touch gestures. The iPhone included a modified Safari web application, a iChat-like text messaging program, camera, Youtube, Google Maps and normal cell phone applications such as a calculator and notepad. Apple partnered with At&t/Cingular wireless to provide the cellular plans. The iPhone could fully browse any web site, and in months to come new applications developed by third party developers would be available in the App Store. Even with this great phone, problems would arise. At&t could not support the large amount of customers that purchased the iPhone, therefore calls were dropped, messages not received, and iPhone users everywhere became angry.

The iPod

Apple introduced the iPod in October 2001, amid a technological slowdown. Steve Jobs was taking a massive gamble with the iPod. At $399, it favored style over function. The iPod was a hard disk music player, meaning that it contained a 5 GB hard-drive for its storage, compared to other MP3 players at the time that used flash based storage. Instead of using USB 1.1 to transfer music from the computer to the iPod, Apple instead utilized the use of Firewire, which produced much faster upload speeds. The iPod used a scroll wheel surrounded by four buttons: menu, forward/reverse, and play/pause. Apples gamble paid off, in 2003 Apple introduced the iTunes Music Store. This store is used to purchase music for the iPod for a cheap price per song. Over the years from its introduction, the iPod has seen many revisions. From the original to todays iPods, things have drastically changed. Hard drives are larger, speakers are built in, theres a touch iPod that can browse the web, and iPod so small its dubbed the Nano. Apples innovation for iPods is astounding.

Whole New Lineup=Success!

With Steve Jobs return, Apple began to become the powerhouse it used to be, and began to bring unprecedented innovation to the computer industry. Apples sales jumped tremendously, as did its stock. Guy Kawasaki once said "When sales are good, everyone is happy." And that was the case with Apple, they began selling record amounts of products, and everyone was happy!

This innovation included:

1. iMac in May of 1998

2. G3 "Blue and White" in January 1999

3. Airport Base Station in July 1999

4. G4 Cube in July 2000

5. Mac OS X in March 2001

6. iPod in October 2001

7. iTunes Music Store in April 2003

8. G5 in June 2003

9. Mac Mini in January 2005

10. The Intel switch in June 2005

11. Apple TV in January 2007

12. iPhone in June 2007

13. Macbook Air in January 2008

Steve Jobs Comes Back

In 1997, Steve Jobs returned to Apple, where he made several large changes, including a new Board of Directors and a new advertising plan. He also made the keynote speech at Macworld, the annual meeting where Apple introduces the new line up of products. Here he introduced the new line of Macs and Rhapsody. However, Jobs saved the most important part, for last. In the final moments of his speech, Jobs told a stunned crowd that Microsoft had bought $150 Million worth of shares in Apple stock. This was an entirely business affair, it did not save Apple from certain doom, it did however require Microsoft to continue producing its Office applications and Apple wouldn't compete with Microsoft. Microsoft's purchasing of stock made it certain that it was confident in Apples survival and that the two companies were competitors but also partners at the same time.

CEO Problems

In June 1993, John Sculley was asked to leave Apple because of his lack of interest in the company. To replace him was former COO Michael Spindler. Even though spindler was an impersonal man, he gave Apple some success. First, in 1994, Apple introduced its PowerMac family. The PowerMac family ran on a PowerPC chip that competed with Intel's line of chips. In a bold move, Spindler attempted to license Mac OS to different companies, but was met with little success. However the success of the PowerMac's was downplayed by the fact that Apple had $1 billion in back orders during summer of 1995 because they lacked the parts to construct the computers. In 1996, Spindler was asked to leave Apple and was replaced by Gil Amelio. Amelio attempted to bring Apple back from the dead. He oversaw the acquisition of NeXT, which would be incorporated into Macs new OS, this was a great gain, but Apple's quarterly losses were far to great for Apple to keep him any longer.

Problems and Solutions at Apple

Around 1983, Steve Jobs hired John Sculley, then president of Pepsi-Cola, to become the president and CEO of the company. Sculley was a true businessman, with no prior knowledge of how to run a computer business. Jobs and Sculley began arguing in 1985, Sculley believed that Jobs was to intense with his work, while Jobs thought that Sculley was an incompetent president and CEO because of his lack of knowledge for computers. Their arguments became so heated that they ended with Jobs leaving Apple. After Jobs left, Apple became embroiled in a legal battle concerning the GUI (Graphical User Interface) in Windows 1.0, and how it was extremely similar to that of Apples OS at the time. Apple and Microsoft ended the lawsuit with Gates signing a statement discerning that Microsoft would never use the GUI interface from Apples OS in Windows 1.0. With the introduction of the Mac II, Apple was booming, but that was short-lived, for PC clones were cropping up all over the place that could run Windows OS, whereas no clones of Macintosh computers had been made. Apple countered this problem with the introduction of its Powerbook 100 computer, their first portable computer in 1991. The past 8 years were a tumultuous time for Apple.

More Power and More Popularity

In 1983, Apple introduced the Lisa, which was more powerful. The Lisa set the stage for the Macintosh program and computers, which have lasted to present day. Apple introduced the Macintosh computers in 1984, along with its pivotal commercial titled "1984" that was aired during the third period of Super Bowl XVIII. This commercial introduced the Macintosh to the world, and earned Apple success and prosperity like no other. The first Macintosh computer was the Macintosh 128K, the 128K standing for the amount of RAM was in the computer. To give you a sense of how much RAM that really is, consider your computers today, most computers have at least 2 GB of RAM, so 2 GB is equal to 2097152 kilobytes. The size of computers has progressed tremendously from 1984 to the present.

The First Apple Computers

The first Apple computer wasn't built in a lab, or a nice executive filled building, no, the first Apple computer was built in a garage by two ingenious men. One, was a computer geek with a nack for writing code, the other had the power to sell anything. Meet Steve Wozniak (the geek), and Steve Jobs (the businessman). Their creation of the Apple I, followed by the Apple II, would revolutionize the way computing would be done forever. The Apple I, was built in 1976, and was just a circuit board with a keyboard, some people built wooden boxes to hold the circuitry and the keyboard. The Apple II, built in 1977, was entirely different. It sported a plastic beige case that held everything together. The Apple I contained 32 KB of RAM, and the Apple II was built with 62 KB.

Introduction

This blog is part of my Independent Project for English Honors II. During this project I will be including several blog posts about Apple and its development in the computer industry. It will follow its beginning, its successes and failures, and its current status. I will also be including several important products that Apple has produced. Thank you