How long will the Mac interest big investors?

With regard to the Mac/PC debate (DW Letters, 14 March), it was the introduction of QuarkXPress for Windows in 1992 that gave me the green light to pack up my drawing board forever and buy a PC. I had long since identified Macs as being very expensive for what they were – and especially expensive for UK purchasers.

Happily, QuarkXPress is compatible across the PC/Mac platforms – except for the fonts, that is – and I have no problems apart from the ignorance of inexperienced Mac editors who work on my files. It was because of them that I thought about buying a Mac, but hesitated after reading reports of billion dollar losses, redundancies, and a new operating system in the pipeline which will not be backward-compatible.

Surely these issues must lead to a loss of confidence in Macs from business users and their inexorable drift to Windows? And if the “grown-up” Windows NT4 operating system catches on and peripheral manufacturers get their acts together and produce software drivers for it, the drift might turn into a torrent.

So how long will software companies bother investing great sums of money to develop their products for just a few graphic designers and associated production bureaux which use Macs?

It’s a shame that the Mac people did not have the foresight to licence their operating system to the clone makers years ago. Had they done so, there might now be some competition for Microsoft and this would have benefited all users.

Michael Morey

Michael Morey Design

London SW1

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