Filed under: Retail, Software, Apple
Apple to charge for Boot Camp?
Reports today indicate that Apple may be planning to take Boot Camp out of beta and transition it to a full, supported, paid-for offering. InformationWeek puts the final price at $29, similar to the price for QuickTime Pro, and not too much more than the $19 charge for Apple's MPEG-2 playback codec. If this pricing is correct (Apple has not confirmed it), it indicates that Apple sees Boot Camp as similar to these other items--something that some people will need but that most people can live without. I'd be surprised though if Boot Camp were not packaged into Leopard because it seems like such an integral part of what sells Intel Macs.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
wWw said 11:41PM on 1-22-2007
Steve Jobs can't stand the fact that people are increasing WinXP sales when they purchase an Intel mac.
I tell ya, Apple's starting to get greedy... First the $5(initial pricing) for the 802.11n enabler, and now Boot Camp.
Apple, don't try to make profit off software updates! Bittorrent's gonna be FLOODED with your apps.
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Kevin said 11:56PM on 1-22-2007
MacRumors thinks it would be $29 for Tiger users, not Boot Camp for all users. Similar to how iChat for Jaguar was $29 but for Tiger it was included for free:
http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2007/01/20070121124909.shtml
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schlomo said 11:58PM on 1-22-2007
I wasn't a fan of the "N enabler" fee, even if it was required by some weird accounting practice. I can, however, understand charging for Boot Camp when not bundled with Leopard. It's just the same way they sell the iLife suite seperate from the computer, or any of their other apps seperate. Those that need it and don't have Leopard will pay - those that don't, won't. For $30, I had better get phone support for the EFI/Partitioning side of the software, though!
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David said 11:59PM on 1-22-2007
#1 - $2, not $5
and you seem to have missed the point about the boot camp charge - it will still be a free part of leopard...it will become a pay-for feature of tiger
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Travis said 12:09AM on 1-23-2007
Wait, wait. First, Apple's already said that Boot Camp will be built into Leopard http://www.apple.com/macosx/leopard/index.html (look at the sidebar). Secondly, this $29 fee is for a special Tiger version of the full BootCamp (as stated in the first article linked).
Considering the fact that once BootCamp comes out of beta (June 31 or something like that - it's in the EULA), it would no longer be available in a stand alone form, I actually think this is a nice gesture on Apple's part. They recognize while some people might not want to - or afford to - upgrade to Leopard right away, they might still want to use the full BootCamp (which might have more features than the current beta form has).
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mike said 1:21AM on 1-23-2007
"I'd be surprised though if Boot Camp were not packaged into Leopard because it seems like such an integral part of what sells Intel Macs." Since it's been announced like 2893 times.
Once the bugs are worked out, it will be downloadable off the Apple site for 30 bucks hm? Alright.
Remind me again what Windows is for? Video Games? Alright..
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JD said 1:50AM on 1-23-2007
I still content that charging $29 for Quicktime Pro is the stupidest decision Apple ever made. Really, its not the Pro that I care about, it does a lot more then what most people really want -- **full screen video.** Not even Microsoft charges $29 to watch full screen video in Windows Media Player.
Fortunately, NicePlayer (found it thanks to TUAW!) is a great replacement for the Quicktime Player--when you don't need or want VLC, of course.
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Eric said 6:48AM on 1-23-2007
who cares, i will download tiger from demonoid anways.
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CascadeHush said 9:42AM on 1-23-2007
I agree with JD, both about the lack of fullscreen in quicktime, and NicePlayer being the ultimate alternative. The lack of fullscreen mode in Quicktime seems to be solely there to force more people to buy the Pro.
As far as charging for bootcamp, well Apple may as well. Anyone who is going to buy a legit windows license on top of the cost of their Mac is hardly going to worry about an extra $19 thrown into the equation.
It's all moot, I gather. Bootcamp will be part of Leopard and anyone that wants it may as well upgrade their OS.
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Steven Fisher said 10:39AM on 1-23-2007
It'll be just like iChat AV, which was shipped for free with 10.3 and available for $29 as 10.2.
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Eli Hodapp said 11:53AM on 1-23-2007
If Apple includes EVERY driver for every piece of hardware inside of an Apple machine to dual boot Windows XP/Vista and have EVERY device working flawlessly... I'd give more than $30 for that.
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MacCrazy said 12:50PM on 1-23-2007
To get full-screen in QuickTime is extremely simple. run this script: 'tell application "QuickTime Player" to present movie 1' I do agree that QuickTime Pro should be free for other reasons but it is ridiculous that full-screen is not easier.
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andrew s said 12:53PM on 1-23-2007
COME ON ERICA, READ THE ARTICLE BEFORE YOU WRITE POSTS ABOUT IT!!
free in leopard, $29 for those not upgrading to leopard to still want to use it.
you only have to read four sentences into the article... let's see a *little* effort at getting the facts straight.
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T. Van Zanen said 4:14PM on 1-23-2007
I wonder if this is going to be a growing trend. Will Apple start offering parts of the OS as individual installs? Sort of a OS a la carte. I might want the core OSX without the iChat or Address book, will they discount the OS to say $100.00 instead of the $129.00? Maybe Microsoft would allow us to buy parts of their OS to mix it up a bit.
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Jago Silver said 6:37PM on 1-23-2007
I wonder if they'll provide a solution to the "can't partition you drive because some file could not be moved" problem.
Currently the only way around this is to format the hard drive and reinstall OSX, not something I feel confident doing.
Because it's in beta at the moent they don't have to offer a solution to this but once you're paying for it maybe they will...?
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