Pfeiffer reported on Macs only a month ago. Gartner adds another voice to the “yes, we like the Mac more than we did a couple of years ago” stance. This time, video production has caught Gartner’s attention, and it’s favourable for Apple. And when Gartner speaks, IT-departments all over the world stop and listen.
Lou Latham at Gartner starts his report with the observation that Apple’s share of the enterprise PC installed base has remained below 2.5 percent for five years. Gartner almost always advises against Macs when a questioner is from an IT organization, because IT professionals tend to prefer homogeneous environments, with a minimum number of client platforms and images. But lately, the analyst frequently answers “yes” when the questioner is a graphics or media professional in a marketing or corporate communications role.
Apple caught Gartner’s attention especially with video. According to Latham, while the answer may still frequently be “no”, even when other types of media production is involved, the answer is almost always “yes” for video.
Apple’s Final Cut Pro software has become a leading choice for video editing and compositing in the sub 10,000 USD category; it is not available for Windows. As Pfeiffer already stated in their report, pre-press and photographers—and their service bureaus—prefer Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop and Quark files in Macintosh format, and still use Macs predominately, or even exclusively; they don’t like to cross platforms because it causes problems with font and page metrics.
Most high-end image setters use PostScript, and the Mac is friendlier to PostScript than Windows is.
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Video saving Apple
Latham observes that, when video applications began to move away from high-end Unix platforms in the 1990s, video editors and compositors moved to Windows NT and its successors. Video hardware and software providers supported the Windows platform, and Apple’s media presence waned. But, says Latham, many video professionals retained a fondness for the Mac, and when Apple released the editing and compositing application Final Cut Pro on its new Unix based Mac OS X operating system, they began to return.
Gartner says Final Cut Pro rates high on the professional wish list, and Apple is once again in the forefront of creative video tool providers. Apple’s focus on the special needs of media professionals gives enterprises a substantial incentive to consider deploying the Mac in niches where it can deliver application-specific value.
Nevertheless, Gartner believes the population of Macs should be a relatively self-contained island focused on specific applications. Video is the “killer app” for the Mac, but it retains its popularity with graphics and pre-press professionals, and the skills pool will be larger if Macs are provided for applications such as graphics and pre-press layout. However, the value differential with Windows is less for these applications than for video.
According to Latham, for system administrators and IT managers, the message is: “Don’t be afraid of the Mac”. For video professionals, it’s: “Don’t be afraid to ask for a Mac”. Video, graphics and pre-press users still have high regard for the Mac and consider it a leading midrange video platform.
IT managers should take a new look at the Mac for these specialty applications, which, in general, require little interaction with large-scale enterprise systems that would raise connectivity or interoperability issues.
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