After fighting for years to make headway in the overall PC market, the last thing Apple needs is competition within the Mac market. On the other hand, Mac customers would almost surely benefit. In addition to less expensive Mac imitations, customers might see slightly lower prices on Apple machines.
But who would buy them?
A few devoted Mac users might abandon the Apple brand for a cheaper clone, but I suspect most would remain in the fold, particularly since those clones would not have Apple's stamp of approval.
But switchers could be a very different story. Folks fresh from the Windows PC world might see Mac clones as an ideal compromise, a way to get the more user-friendly, less virus-plagued Mac operating system without paying top dollar for Apple's offerings.
Psystar's hardware designs don't look as nice as Apple's and could suffer from assorted compatibility issues, but they do cost much less. For many PC users, cost is king.
Apple always has refused to play in the lower end of the PC market. "We can't ship junk," CEO Steve Jobs said at an iMac product unveiling last August.
Clone customers shopping for price could help boost the Mac's overall share of the PC market, but the danger lies in clone makers selling mid-range and high-end machines more cheaply than Apple. If Apple loses those customers, it loses profits.
At this point, whether Psystar shuts its doors in two weeks or becomes merely the first of many Mac clone makers is less consequential than that the concept that a company could make Mac clones and get away with it.
