Apple’s US Market Share Now 8.1%. Or is it 6.3%?

They must therefore exclude Apple web sales, which accounts for most of Apples sales too. That's why Paul adds up the real numbers for fun, because who really cares, except for fanatics. Real men cherish their favorite technology, or mix of technology, and are not really concerned with the numbers fight. Now I am suppose to sing "Born Free". Can you buy it at the iTunes store? I wouldn't know since I have never used it.

Re. mog0: Apple is poor at business sales because they are not targeting businesses. Why? Who knows? But they're making a heck of a lot of money just selling to consumers, and that's not going to change any time soon. Re. subzerohitman721: Vista's -improvements- aren't assimilating anything (that's not even the correct use of that word, anyway). People don't buy WIndows - hardware companies buy Windows. People buy hardware, and generally they don't care to pay for software. You make it sound like people are actively choosing to use Windows, which isn't true. Most people aren't aware that there's a choice because they walk into a retail store and every computer they can choose from runs Windows. The improvements in Vista are marketing, nothing more. Microsoft does not compete and never has competed, because they've never had too. Just because they've locked up 90+% of the PC market due to complete control over Dell, HP, and Co. doesn't mean they'll last forever. Just ask IBM what happened to it in the 80's.

RE: db I bought windows off the shelf..... The fact that people dont have a choice is because Apple wont let them. No one holds Apple back excpet for Apple itself. The company as a whole will never gain ground on the Windows market because they close too many doors on themselves by insisting that every box running their OS is build by Apple. There would be plenty of hardware companies who would gladly ship PC's running Windows or OSX, I am sure (Sony, HP) but Apple wont let them do it. I would even possibly consider running a non-Apple constructed computer running OSX (or more likely dual booting it) because then at least I know I wouldn't be sacraficing functionality for "good looks."

Brandon, you may or may not know it, but there were several Mac OS clones years ago in the 90's, which almost killed Apple, which is a hardware company. Steve returned and killed the clones by not renewing the Mac OS license, and look what happened. The company turned around somewhat, accelerating more with their gadgets. I am a typical PC and Mac user. Most of us do not upgrade. We just keep the OS shipped with the box. As Paul stated in another post, [the average] Mac useer knows little difference from 10.2 to 10.4. I had OS 9 with a G$ but got 10.2 for teachers for free, otherwise I would not have upgraded. I bought an additional G4 that had 10.3 loaded, and saw very minmal difference. I bought a Mac Pro Tower [3GHz Quad, 4GB, RAM ATI 1900XT] and now use 10.4. and see minimal difference. If it were running 10.2 I would make little difference in the average users needs. I purchased iLife 3 [I think] and now use iLife 06, but do almost nothing different then what I did with version 3. I tried NERO 7 with my custom built [by me] PC, but like iLife better. However, they do practically the same thing. My point is that the everyday user will avoid change and upgrades to stick with what works. I have two friends that use Vista, only because they just purchased a new computer. My Mac friends run the OS that shipped originally. Geeks are another breed of users.

To subzero: How can Apple gain that much market share in the US (about 3%) without grabbing Win users ? Linux doesn't even have 3% users in the US !!! Besides Linux users are fanatic geeks that will aways use Linuxand not switch to either Win or OS X. You just have to look around you and maybe half my Windows users friends already have switch to the Mac or intend to... Things have been vegetaive on the Windows side, XP installs start to be bloated and suffer from classic slow-downs and instability of old Windows install, and they hear that Vista is not better... On the other hand tey lust in front of these gorgeous Mac machines and never hear a complaint from a Mac user. I think it's what decided many Windows users to take a try wit the Mac platform, and they won't be disappointed.