High-speed Macs to challenge Microsoft

Technofile:You've got to hand it to Steve Jobs. The chief executive of Apple Macintosh is riding a wave of popularity for his products, the iMac and the ubiquitous iPod, and it's easy to see why.

Since the 1980s, they have been widely regarded as the easiest computers to use. Little wonder that from the word go, they appealed to schools and universities, thereby cultivating a young and growing audience.

But in recent years, PCs have caught up with the Mac. The latest versions of the Windows operating systems can arguably "do" as much as the average Mac, even allowing for rarefied arguments amongst computer geeks about "multitasking operating systems".

But what Bill Gates has struggled with in the past two years is updating his operating system to really take advantage of new ideas in computing.

Meanwhile, Apple's Jobs has rolled on, coming out with new versions of the Mac OS, and wowing the market with the deliciously easy to use iPod, the dominant digital music player.

Now, I'm going to declare an interest here. I use a Mac, but that doesn't mean that I'm not aware of its limitations.

While I enjoy virus-free computing (no hacker is interested in writing a virus that will only affect 5 per cent of the world's PCs - much better to do it on the 95 per cent of Windows PCs), Macs have become increasingly slower performers compared to PCs in the last year.

While chipmaker Intel managed to keep powering PCs onwards, the Mac's IBM-made chips were starting to struggle by comparison.

To Jobs, the answer was obvious. In June last year, he announced that Macs would switch to Intel processors, and this week, six months ahead of schedule, he unveiled the first editions.

And the numbers look good. Very good. Intel-based iMacs and laptops, utilising Intel's new "Core Duo" dual processors, will be up to two to three times faster than the old ones. That is an astounding leap in computer industry terms.

Intel chips will also be inside a completely new laptop range. Gone is the Powerbook, replaced by the Mac Pro Book, which will - get this - run up to five times faster than the old G4 range. Included in the screen is a natty in-built iSight camera, meaning that you can video-conference from just about anywhere

The standard 15-inch screen Mac Book Pro comes in at between €2,179 (1.67 GHz) and €2,729 (1.83GHz). Like the new iMac, it comes with the iLife software package - including iPhoto, iMovie HD, iDVD, GarageBand and iWeb - built in. In particular, iPhoto has been vastly improved, enabling you to "subscribe" to photos from other iLife users, so granny's Mac can get all the latest pictures of her grandchildren with barely lifting a finger). And if you are a budding musician, you will be wowed by the new Garageband, which is practically a professional audio product.

At just one inch thin and weighing only 5.6 pounds, it is the lightest and thinnest Mac laptop yet. Apple is doing well financially too. Its first-quarter revenue reached $5.7 billion (€4.7 billion), surpassing the company's expectations. Mac sales have hit one million units for the fifth period in a row and iPod sales have tripled. Apple is now the biggest seller of digital music players globally. Understandably, its shares went up.

And the iTunes music store is on its way to selling a billion songs this year. Jobs said that iTunes now has 83 per cent of the legitimate digital music market.

Jobs also unveiled Aperture, a professional digital photo editing package which professionals and amateurs will probably be stunned by. However, a word of caution - I'd run it on the very latest Intel-based Macs, rather than try to use it on an older version.

However, perhaps the most astounding announcement that Jobs made at the Macworld Conference and Exhibition in San Francisco last Tuesday was that, out of 42 million iPods sold worldwide so far, a hefty 32 million of them were sold in 2005. This effectively means the iPod is virtually unbeatable at this stage in its development. Eat your heart out, Sony Walkman.

Mind you, one gets the feeling Apple likes to have its cake a little too much. Also launched this week was a new remote control for the iPod which doubles as a FM radio, for a pricey $49.

But Apple made its name originally as a maker of a great operating system and excellent software. To this end, Jobs launched the improved iLife, enabling customers to create video and websites as well as handling digital photography.

With Apple, it has never been easier to juggle your digital work and play.