Macs in the enterprise

Any of you work in an enterprise with many Macs? There was some talk about it on this networking industry magazine i read about how more companies will use the iPhone in replacement for Blackberrys and how Macs will replace the desktop and servers......But I looked at an article this month about "what doesn't matter" in IT and one of the comments about what doesn't matter is "Apple in the enterprise, still. A few Macs for those temperamental artists, a couple of iPhones for the suits. Done...." The articles intent was more for humor and fun

At my job, at least two former Blackberry users have iPhones now, and that's because the company will no longer provide Blackberrys.

Macs were originally pushed...the plan was to replace every IT person's desktop with a Mac.......but because of the cost (and a low revenue company), that idea died. There still are about 15 Macs out there, though, for the people that matter. The IT directors are big fans of Linux and Macs, along with the CIO (which explains why there was a push for Macs).

Linux is pushed for anything that can be made inhouse.

Hi KiLLaBeE,

Unfortunately, I don't work in an enterprise with many Macs I would advise moving from Windows to a combination of Linux/Mac with a few Window boxes for applications that can't be interfaced (e.g. archaic accounting software ).
For now I don't see the iPhone being a big threat to Blackberrys, I believe this will change when the iPhone platform opens up to developers.
Just a thing to say since you mentioned costs, after the move to the intel platform and comparing the prices of macs to Dells and HPs, you can get pretty much the same value for money. And because I haven't said it before the problem of upgrading and fixing a Mac's hardware is a myth. I have done plenty of surgeries on all my macs.

I think Apple have finally seen the light re: the use of Macs in the Enterprise. A new clause has been spotted in the EULA for Leopard allowing for the virtualisation of the Server version of Leopard. Up till now, because Apple has explicitly forbidden this, the virtualisation boys, VMWare and SWsoft(makers of Parallels) have veered away from this. Yesterday, SWsoft released a Parallels Server beta. This might make things interesting ...

Good point DaLight, the opening up of the OS for virtualisation will change things in the enterprise.

By the way and since the keynote was only two days ago, what do you guys think of MacBook Air?

Had a quick read of a review and was a bit astounded. It's ultra-thin (0.16 in at its thinnest point), but no optical drives, ethernet ports or firewire? Looks like another style statement ...

True, more of a style statement and portability. It must be great though to have it around if you always need a laptop with you
My Dell laptop from work (yes i have to use a PC at work ) gives me shoulder, back and hip pains
The only drop that I consider a compromise is the firewire... the ethernet if needed is available via usb and I don't see much use of an optical drive. I personally haven't used the one on my laptop for the past 3 months. Even if I need to use it, I will probably be at home, so you have other options.
One huge dropback is the price. 900 pounds in the states, 1200 in the UK. Why pay 300 more. I believe that Apple UK needs to check their conversion rates...