You might want to hold off on buying a Mac or Photo Shop for Mac.

Apple has announced it's intention to drop the Intel processor in Macs
and go to it's own flavor of ARM chip. It has acquired an ARM
foundry. If it goes though with this change, all existing Mac software
will need to be recompiled for the new RISC processor. In other words,
no existing Mac software will run on the new ARM Macs!

So if you intend to buy a Mac or Photoshop for Mac, I would strongly
suggest you wait until Apple either completes this migration or comes
to its senses and abandons this plan. Otherwise, you may end up with
two orphaned products.

Apple has not done a very good job over the years in keeping Mac hardware
backward compatible or even uniform within the prodution of one model.
If you open up any two Macs with the same model number, chances are you'll
find different parts. It's hard to imagine Apple succeeding as a processor maker--
even just to supply it's own manufacturing.

Mac hardware is also more expensive than PC hardware and more
proprietary. PCs still conform to some open standards: any conpany
that wants to can build a PC or PC device. You are not stuck with a
single supplier (not even Intel: AMD makes Intel-compatible processors).

Neither Microsoft or Apple are technology innovators. (Anyone who
disagrees should name one major technical advance invented (rather than
acquired) by either company.) However, PC makers and former makers--
including IBM, HP, Compaq, Digital Equipment, Fujitsu, Toshiba, etc.--
have a long history of innovation. *You* could invent a better PC--but if
you invented a better Mac, you'd be sued by Apple.

One thing to know is that Apple is locked out of the server market because
Max OS/X has too much overhead. OS/X is based on the NeXT OS that it
acquired from NeXT computer, which in turn was based on the Mach
microkernel developed by Carnegie Mellon Univerisity. Every major
server manufacturer looked at Mach when it first came out and rejected it.
Microkernels simply have too many layers and too-much calling and or
message-passing. They make great workstations but bad servers. This is
a fundemental design limitation that cannot be fixed. If Apple ever wants
to sell a server, it will have to run Linux, UNIX...or Windows NT.

Finally, there is the question of business risk. PC manufactures are
not very profitable, but there are many of them. Apple is very profitable,
but there is only one Apple--and it's main product isn't the Mac--it's
the iPhone.

Most analysts I've read beleive that iPhone sales currently are subsidizing
Mac production. Thus, if the iPhone catches a cold, the Mac may well get
pneumonia--even if Mac sales remain strong.

Finally, yesterday the US President told Apple only that it should move its
production to the US to avoid possible tariffs on its products that
are made in China. In 2013, all Macs were made in China, but Apple
promised to shift some production to the USA. It is not clear whether
or not that has happened.

A lot of PCs are made in China, but not all of them. PCs are also made
in Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, and elsewhere.

These days, Apple s mostly a consumer electronics company. But a typical
consumer electronics companies (e.g. Philiips or Sony) have multiple brands
and hundreds of products; but Apple has *one* brand and is dependent on
about *six* products for 90% of its revenue.

Microsoft also has one main product and one main brand--but it doesn't make
computers. Windows is a monopoly (if you want to run Windows apps or
device drivers), and as long as Microsoft can collect royalities from OEMs
and upgrades, it will do fine.

Consumer tastes are notoriously fickle. Apple is taking a huge risk. The upside
potential of concentrating on just one product is huge--but so is the downside
potential. If the consumer suddenly develops an aversion to Tide brand laundry
detergent, Proctor & Gamble won't be hurt much because it also owns the Ariel,
Bold, Bonux, Cheer, Daz, Era, Dreft, Gain, and Ola brands of laundry detergent.
P&G has been around since 1837. Apple has been around (under various names)
since 1976, and was unprofitable from 1991 to 1997. It has been rocked more
than once by power struggles in top management.

With its astronomical stock price, any signifcant decline in Apple's earnings--for
whatever reason--would come as a big shock to its investors. Apple future hinges on
whether consumers in rich countries will continue to pay a premium for a smart phone
in a white-colored case.

Let me put it his way: would you want to buy a computer made by Nokia? Or Blackberry?
Or Motorola? All those companies were once riding high in the cell phone market.

Personally, I would prefer not to have the future of my photography linked to such
irrelevant imponderables. Both PCs and Macs have very poor security. Neither Apple nor Microsoft
is known for being transparent or easy to reach, so the less one depends on them, the better.
The only hardware I ever bought from Microsoft was a mouse. :-)

Microsoft is the lesser of two evils, because Windows is its main product, is less risky than
the smart phone business, will provide you with an upgrade path, and you have many choices
for PC hardware. Apple is a company, PCs are an industry.