Your claims that Jobs followed Dell's advice is the most ridiculous claim I have ever heard. Not only is the logic twisted and distorted, but what you stated as facts are actally all wrong.
Firstly, Apple did not abandon its personal computer business, and Macintosh computers remains an important part of Apple's business. While you claim that Apple was clearly losing in the computer business, the fact was that after Jobs's return, he was able to make the Macintosh business profitable. In fact, Apple's profit margin on Macs sales alone is much higher than those of makers of windows boxes.
More importantly, Apple did not pull R&D effort away from computers. Here, your claims that Jobs shit-canned his own operating system is not only factually wrong, but reveals that you know very little about Apple's history. At that time, the operating system used by Macs, known as Macs OS 9, is the one that everyone know was obsolete. The new operating system to replace it, Macs OS X, is based on the operating system developed by the NeXT computer company, which is founded and owned by Jobs. In fact, Apple purchased the NeXT computer company from Jobs in order to get its operating system. Since then, Apple continued to make significant R&D investments in Macs OS X. If simply grabbing FreeBSD, Konqueror and Cups would allow one to make a decent desktop computer experience, then Linux or FreeBSD should have a higher market share of desktop operating system than Macs OS X.
And by calling the shift of focus to iPad/iPhones as "moving to gadgets", you have failed to realize that these gadgets are actually computers themselves, although in a form factor different from the traditional desktop. What most people used to do using a desktop computer, can now be done using an iPhone without having to sit by a desk. The operating system of iPhones is an adaption of Macs OS X, which is the technical foundation which enable an iPhone to do the same things that were used to be done by desktop computer. To say that Apple's computer line has failed and need to be killed off is like saying that Intel microprocessor business has failed and need to be killed off because the old Pentium 4 CPU are obsolete, while in fact Intel is making heaps of profits producing newer core i3/i5/i7 CPU.