If you can believe Microsoft, they frequently put groups of users in little test rooms — or some sort of testing environment — and expose them to the new features in a product. By gauging their reactions, they decide whether those capabilities deserve to go into production.

Now if you look at Microsoft’s shipping products, it doesn’t seem they’re getting a terribly good sampling, or maybe they aren’t paying attention to the results. Some of the features that end up in their products appear to be just plain weird.

Take, for example, those constant warnings in Vista about whether the next thing you do is safe or not. It comes so frequently that you many uses give the OK on auto-pilot, not realizing that they might be subjecting their PCs to potential malware as a result of not paying attention. Or, in frustration, they just turn off the feature.

So what might have been a good feature, at least insofar as Microsoft’s intentions might be considered, ended up in the “Cons” list when reviewers got their hands on Vista. Supposedly you’ll have a friendlier version in Windows 7.

Story continued in this week’s Tech Night Owl Newsletter.

At one time, Apple had to endure the accusation that they were overcharging for their products. You had to pay the alleged “Apple Tax” if you went Mac, whereas the PC was clearly a whole lot cheaper.

Well, these days that’s not quite true. When you compare a Mac with name-brand PCs with similar hardware and software configurations, matched as closely as possible, the Mac is highly competitive. What I mean is that sometimes the PC will be a little cheaper, and sometimes the Mac comes out ahead.

Just so there’s no further confusion, I’m not about to argue the point of whether all features in a Mac are actually needed or not. That’s not the point. What you get is what you get, and customization choices are kept very limited, although there are more possibilities at the high end, for the Mac Pro.

What’s more, I’m definitely not talking about the so-called “white box” PCs that you buy at discount stores or assemble yourself. Sure you can save money, but you might be out of luck when you need tech support, unless you prefer to do every little thing yourself.

I do think the Mac mini was simply meant to be a product to get people in the door, particularly those who felt they couldn’t afford a Mac. Consider the way auto dealers operate. They will advertise an uber-cheap model for an exceptionally low price to entice you to check them out.

Once you get to the showroom, they probably even have a few of those vehicles available. Usually, though, the colors are all wrong, and they are so bereft of the really cool options, such as power windows, iPod jacks and even a decent radio, that you really wouldn’t want to take one home unless you were totally desperate for basic transportation.

The plan is, of course, to upsell you to something from which the dealer can exact a real profit. Of course these days that’s not so easy. Assuming you can even get financed — and that’s by no means a given anymore — you may not qualify for the model you want. You may have to compromise, and the dealer will only be too happy to put you into something, anything, to help clear the overcrowded lots.

Now I realize some of you own a Mac mini, and you’re quite ready to dispute my contention that Apple doesn’t really care if they sell any or not, that it’s just a promotional gimmick, particularly for the converted PC user who is accustomed to cheap hardware. Indeed, with a full complement of memory, the mini is quite a decent computer. It’s a worthy product for offices, schools and they even serve duty as Web servers. Yes, I’m quite serious about that, though you have to wonder how long a mini can sustain 24/7 use before self-destructing.

But when you consider the way it was packaged, you see that maybe Apple didn’t quite sweat the details, as they do with other hardware. Take the intimidating process of adding RAM or replacing a hard drive. For that chore, you need to be handy with a putty knife or similar implement to pry open the case without inflicting damage. The Intel-based mini is worse than the original, designed so you also have to remove the hard drive before getting at the RAM slots. Explain that to me, anyone, other than to keep the product as user-hostile as possible, in hopes you’ll buy a MacBook or iMac instead.

There are indeed easier solutions, such as placing four recessed screws at the bottom of the mini’s sleek case. You should be able to remove them in two minutes, and they wouldn’t detract from the product’s looks at all. Who looks at the bottom of the mini anyway other than to take it to a different location (and maybe not even then) or to perform the upgrade?

Or maybe, just maybe, members of the Apple engineering team who designed the equally inappropriate chassis layouts for some of those 1990’s Macs, such as the infamous Quadra 800, had a hand in creating the mini. I don’t know for sure; I’m just speculating here.

Of course, a highly-anticipated requiem for the Mac mini might very well arrive at Macworld Expo 2009. Perhaps Apple VP Philip Schiller — replacing Steve Jobs for the keynote — will proudly unveil a totally redesigned mini, perhaps with a slimmer case more reminiscent of Time Machine or the Apple TV. Maybe it’ll contain the innards of a MacBook, replete with that NVIDIA GeForce 9400M chip that’s gotten rave reviews as a real solution for great integrated graphics.

Apple may not even have wanted to approach the Mac mini seriously, and it may have even been on the chopping block for a while. But fears of an ongoing economic collapse are forcing people to lower their expectations when it comes to buying a new personal computer. A revitalized Mac mini, perhaps for an entry-level price of $499, might be just the ticket to keep Apple’s sales moving in the right direction.

A bait and switch scheme? Maybe at one time, but things have changed, and I trust Apple will do the right thing for this long-neglected product.

It appears that no company is immune from economic woes. Toyota, now the world’s largest automaker, was once thought to be bulletproof, yet the company is about about to suffer from the first financial loss in its history. Apple appears to be cutting back on production for this quarter, although it seems certain they’ll still report decent profits.

That takes us to Microsoft.

Stung by tepid sales of Windows Vista, with more and more companies sticking with XP and refusing to upgrade, there are published reports that the world’s largest software company may also be looking to shed bodies from among a roster of over 90,000 employees.

Although nobody wants to see people lose their jobs, some folks who resent anything with the Microsoft label on it might just feel it serves them right. Besides, you can always hope that whatever personnel are cut from the ranks will have sizable golden parachutes, so they can sit back, play golf or do some traveling with their riches.

Or maybe I’m just being too charitable.

Ever since the Night Owl began a Microsoft death watch, I have been carefully watching for signs that they’re on a steady, inexorable decline, and I’ve not had long to wait. You all know, I’m sure, that Internet Explorer’s share of the browsing universe recently dipped below 70%, according to worldwide surveys.

Microsoft watchers can’t escape the fact that such products as the Zune were huge failures in the marketplace. Maybe that’s why promotion has been lax; they knew going in that they had a dog on their hands, and they just wanted to put their best corporate face forward and hold back on huge cash outlays for R&D.

Efforts to expand the reach of the Windows Mobile platform seem to be failing. These days, all the smart-phone related talk is about Apple and Research In Motion. If you have a Verizon Wireless account, you get a BlackBerry. If you have AT&T, your inevitable choice is the iPhone, yet even Apple admits RIM is a good company and a worthy competitor.

On the operating system front, it appears Microsoft may be rushing to get Windows 7 out the door by mid-year, hoping against hope that the Vista debacle will soon be forgotten. Then again, doesn’t Vista’s successor seem to be nothing more than a fast shave and haircut designed to obscure the fact that there are not a whole lot of real differences between the two.

True, Apple isn’t promising much surface change with Snow Leopard, but the guts of the system might make you feel that you have given your Mac a healthy dose of steroids. That is, if the promise of superior multiprocessor and graphic chip support shows a genuine advantage in the real world. Indeed, it would also be nice to see 10.6 arrive in the first quarter, if rumors of an accelerated release schedule prove to be true.

Perhaps it’s also true that the nuttier-than-ever Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer, is praying that Steve Jobs is quickly disengaging himself from Apple. That might afford them a better opportunity to compete, although I would disagree.

As you’ve read here and elsewhere, the Jobs culture is deeply ingrained within Apple, and were he to depart tomorrow, the company would likely go on to follow through and expand his vision. So you wouldn’t see a sudden drop-off in new iPhone, iPod and Mac releases. Everything would go on as before, only you wouldn’t have Steve Jobs to kick around anymore, and I doubt his successors would be as polarizing to the media.

This is not to say that Microsoft can’t right the sinking ship. But, as with Apple, fixing the problems has to start from the top. If the executives can’t voice and implement sound policies to address the company’s inefficiencies and poor product design, even the most brilliant employees will be left frustrated, feeling ineffectual.

When Steve Jobs returned to Apple, he quickly shed products that were not advancing the company’s growth, and built a leaner, meaner corporate machine that has grown to unexpected heights.

In the same tradition, new leadership at Microsoft would have to break out virtual hacksaws to clean out the dead wood, and there must be plenty. Consider, for example, what Apple can do with a staff a third of that of Microsoft, including a retail chain with over 250 branches.

Does this mean Microsoft can’t succeed beyond the cocoon of its software division? I don’t pretend to have all the answers to that question. But fixing the software issues would do wonders towards restoring faith in their products.

And, of course, if Microsoft were to ultimately vanish from the scene, would anyone, other than their former employees, really miss them?

So here’s the deal: Whenever Steve Jobs doesn’t emerge from his office or subterranean hiding place for a few weeks, the rumors about his health begin anew. Certainly his expected lack of visibility at the forthcoming Macworld Expo, where marketing VP Philip Schiller is slated to deliver the keynote, fuels the speculative files still further. Only the announcement that Apple would pull out of the Expo altogether diffused the issue, since it came at the same time and inspired its own level of serious online chatter.

When it comes to the health of a CEO, a company’s board does have the responsibility to inform stockholders when that person is unable to perform their assigned duties. Even a reduced work schedule is sufficient to require some sort of public confirmation.

Apple’s habitual secrecy about Jobs is all the more troubling in that environment. Even if not exactly true, surely they could put a spin on the situation that would satisfy most people and shut down the rumor mills before things get out of hand.

Instead, we have a certain phone call that Jobs made to a reporter for The New York Times a few months back, where he revealed his actual health problem off the record, and refused public comment other than to say it wasn’t life threatening. In a later meeting with the media, he even delivered his blood pressure readings, which were quite normal.

Sure, I’m inclined to take Jobs at his word, lacking any evidence to the contrary, except for one thing. The fact is that he doesn’t appear healthy in public. During his rare public presentations, he’s impressed people as exceedingly thin and not displaying the look of someone who is in good physical condition. That doesn’t help inspire confidence.

For most CEOs, that’s not a serious issue. There’s almost always a successor in the wings who would probably do as well for a company as the current occupant of that position. For better or worse, our educational institutions have turned out a class of professional managers who supposedly know how to get things done.

Jobs, however, is no normal CEO. In addition to being Apple’s co-founder, he is regarded as the brilliant visionary who drives the company’s insanely great product development.

Sure, he’s not a designer, or engineer. But he is reputed to have great instincts and he is thus the final arbiter of the even the most insignificant features in Apple’s new products. Indeed, for the most part, he’s been right on, and the company’s great success is proof.

It’s also true that Apple has over 30,000 employees now, and is by any measurement a pretty large company. Jobs also clearly has an instinct for finding great talent, and has surrounded himself with smart executives who know how to make wonderful things happen. No doubt many share his instincts and his vision.

So if Jobs left the world stage and returned to a private life where he just hung out with his family or traveled the world, you can bet he deserves to enjoy his remaining years, however many they will be. He is under no obligation to continue to lead Apple. Indeed, the company has grown up and flourished around him, so I rather think they would probably live long and prosper without him in the executive suite.

Indeed, it’s quite possible that he is already reducing his work at Apple even now, although I say this from a vantage outside the company with nothing more than my gut to call upon for this little tidbit of speculation. That may indeed be why Schiller is taking over that final Expo keynote. It is a way to prepare the public for the inevitable.

Now you’d probably expect a clean break, but maybe it’s better for all concerned — and certainly for the Apple watchers in the media and on Wall Street — if a leadership change is done gradually, in a way where it’s not terribly obvious to most observers.

When the final break comes, most people will be used to an Apple without Steve Jobs at the helm, and the negative impact to the stock price won’t be quite as severe.

Sure, Apple has gone through CEO transitions in the past, and they suffered under a number of executives who had no clue what Apple was all about and what it meant to loyal Mac users. They were in it for fast profits, and they frittered away great opportunities and, in the end, nearly killed the company.

Sure, anyone who is a fan of Apple’s gear should be grateful that Steve Jobs was able to save the company and deliver sales and profits that even the most optimistic financial analyst couldn’t expect. However, perhaps it’s time for him to move on and do other things for the rest of his life, which I hope will be long and healthy.

It’s not as if he needs the money.