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Apple offers transition developers free iMac Core Duo

Mac OS X developers who rented a Developer Transition Kit (DTK) from Apple last year can now trade those systems in for a brand new Intel iMac, the company has announced.

In June, Apple began renting to developers a $999 Developer Transition Kit, allowing them to begin developing universal binaries of their applications for Mac OS X Intel. The kits included a 3.6GHz Intel Pentium 4-based system housed inside a Power Mac G5 enclosure.

The new DTK Exchange Program will reward those developers who began transitioning their code early with a free 1.83GHz Intel Core Duo 17-inch iMac. Unlike the 3.6GHz transition kit systems — which developers agreed to return to Apple — the iMacs will be theirs to keep.

"This program will put a new Intel-based Mac in your hands to help you finish and ship your Universal Binary," Apple said. "Each Developer Transition Kit you have may be exchanged for a new Intel-based iMac at no charge."

Apple also said it will provide developers with the iMac prior to them returning the DTK to allow them time to move resources from the DTK to the iMac.

Developers have until 5:00PM PST on March 31, 2006 to processes their DTK Exchange Requests.

Only developers who ordered a DTK system from Apple between June 6, 2005 and January 10, 2006 may participate in the DTK Exchange Program.

17 Comments

nagromme 23 Years · 2831 comments

Wow--they basically get the rental of the devkit for free AND a big discount on a much better new machine.

I bet some people are wishing they ordered the devkits now

melgross 21 Years · 33667 comments

Yeah, I saw this earlier. This is pretty good.

Now I'm sorry I didn't join the program. I was thinking about it.

tedndi 21 Years · 1866 comments

That's a pretty damn cool deal!!

go apple!!

Way to treat the dev's who make all the great stuff we like and need!!8) 8) 8) 8)

michaelb 22 Years · 239 comments

Dammit!

I'm a developer in a small company and I originally decided not to order a DTK because of the $999 lease fee. That is, it was a capital purchase that depreciated over its short life.

If Apple had said they would swap it for an actual product that wouldn't have to be returned, I would have jumped at it.

As it is, I've now ordered an iMac Core Duo (for a higher cost) and my company's software may take longer than it otherwise might have with an Intel machine to test on. (That will depend on how it runs on real Intel hardware, not just with the Xcode checkbox flipped).

I guess they're rewarding early adopters, but the policy could also have caused a slow down in the emergence of universal binaries from small development houses.

melgross 21 Years · 33667 comments

Quote:
Originally posted by michaelb
Dammit!

I'm a developer in a small company and I originally decided not to order a DTK because of the $999 lease fee. That is, it was a capital purchase that depreciated over its short life.

If Apple had said they would swap it for an actual product that wouldn't have to be returned, I would have jumped at it.

As it is, I've now ordered an iMac Core Duo (for a higher cost) and my company's software may take longer than it otherwise might have with an Intel machine to test on. (That will depend on how it runs on real Intel hardware, not just with the Xcode checkbox flipped).

I guess they're rewarding early adopters, but the policy could also have caused a slow down in the emergence of universal binaries from small development houses.

It couldn't have been a capital purchase, as you weren't purchasing capital equipment.

It looks to be a "True Lease". But without having seen the documents, I'm not sure if that would be exact.