Not convinced . For starters your comparison doesnt work , why fragment one market into multiple constructors ? PC is one market , mac is one other , tough luck for apple that they are outsold by the combined might .

And it's partially their fault . They most of the time handled gaming very badly between their hardware choices and lack of real support . Hell even linux had for a while a better gaming support than macs .

strenghtening further the mobile gaming market by allowing plenty devs to flood with cheap bit sized gme is one thing .. but the real console market is another .

They have no game content of their own , shallow relationship with big publishers and studios ( steam only recently appeared even) and no supperior gaming tech to boast about .

See: linked article.

Apple already tried the console and failed miserably.

What....? Why are we breaking the PC market by manufacturer and then compare it to Mac? That makes no sense. And even if we do that, HP and Dell comes out at top.

I don't think their hardware are beautiful in design. I'm not a fan of minimalistic design nor am I fan of overpaying for hardware. You might think they look great but I think it's rather plain and bland.

Apple's pricing strategy is far from suitable with the console gamer audience. Gamers whine like there is no tomorrow about the $600 price tag on the PS3 when the hardware cost Sony $1000 to make. What do you think Apple will price that at basing on how they price their phone and computers? Probably $1200.

Also, you have to consider R&D, this isn't a quick and easy process. It takes time and experience which Apple has none as far as console game market is concern. You need to design a controller that works, hardware that will be enough but also pushes console gaming forward. They will need to study the market which will take time and money.

Next third party won't be so willing to make a multiplatform game on this Apple console. We have 3 and next year, 4 consoles on the market at the same time and possibly 6 by 2013. There is also multiplat on PC. It's not cheap nor is it easy to develop for so many systems at once. In other words, the market is damn saturated right now so the barrier of entry is incredibly high as it is.

Each successful company in the gaming console hardware industry brought the gaming world something that changes the industry for the better when they entered. Microsoft paved way to successful online gaming. Sony brought graphics to the next level, polygons. Nintendo was the one that made it common to own a console at home.

So, Apple will have to create their own first party titles. This will become a big risk for Apple since it's not going to be cheap. Then you can't sell your titles at a ridiculous high price otherwise barely anyone would want to buy their games.

Then there is marketing which they are probably fine at but they still need to tune it towards gamers.

Now let assume they do all this and put out the console. If it fails, they will lose billions and their stock will drop. Steve Jobs would probably have never went into this direction but I don't know what Apple will do with someone new in charge.

tl;dr: I did a 15-20 page paper on the console game industry. Apple's philosophy is too out of line with gamers.

Don't forget Sega and Atari. /s

Things switch hand, man. It might be hard to see someone outdoing or even just competing with the big three, but remember that Nintendo wasn't always a console developer. Neither was Sony. Or Microsoft.

Would you have guessed that a company like Sony was going to make a console at all before the PS1? Or outsell Nintendo?

What about Microsoft? Their second gen in, and they're going neck-and-neck with the leader of the two previous generations. And Nintendo came back to the top after two gens of trailing a new competitor.

In your lifetime. I guarantee it, my friend. Google and Apple are massive corporations that deal with electronics. They WILL take further steps into the industry that is making more money than the movies.

Google fiber?