The recent good news for Apple - the announcement of a US$47 million first-quarter profit - was offset somewhat today by news coming out of Minnesota. The Associated Press reported today that Eden Prairie-based Best Buy is dropping Apple Computers from its stores because of slow sales.

　　Once Best Buy sells out of its current inventory of Macintosh computers and accessories, it will stop carrying those items, the company announced.

　　However, Best Buy will continue to sell Mac software, and its warranties on Apple products will be honored.

　　Mac sales made up less than 0.5 percent of Best Buy's sales (in dollars) of computers in the past year, said Laurie Bauer, spokeswoman for Best Buy.

　　The decision was supposedly a joint one. Rhona Hamilton, a spokeswoman for Apple, said that the company intends to focus on selling its computers through Dallas-based CompUSA. "Best Buy focuses more on the home office," the AP reported Hamilton as saying. "Our target is education, design, and publishing. Generally, CompUSA is a nice format for that combination of things."