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A maxed out iMac would depreciate within 5 years, and any particular part would render your entire system unusable for week(s). Three years later and Apple adds
by colept 10y ago
A maxed out iMac would depreciate within 5 years, and any particular part would render your entire system unusable for week(s). Three years later and Apple adds a new feature that for the slightest reason requires an entire hardware upgrade because you can't upgrade components individually. Then factor in that the thin iMacs have terrible heat dissipation which means the CPU can't run at full speed without overheating.
That top of the line iMac costs four grand while a Hackintosh costs half that and gets you a top of the line graphics card and the ability to keep on par with the top of the line.
- _delirium 10y agoI'm not going to claim they're really cost-competitive with PC equivalents, just that they're fast enough machines to make good workstations, and the price is within the range of what our IT considers a reasonable office workstation purchase price. At least where I work, desktop machines aren't kept for five years anyway, so I don't think this distinguishes it from any other supplier. Our standard depreciation/replacement cycle for workstations is 3 years, whether it's coming from Apple or Dell. Obviously for home use the economics are different, but then a lot of things are different there, e.g. I build PCs from parts, and there's no way work wants people to be DIY building their own office workstations. And yeah, you can spec out a comparable Dell that's cheaper (though don't forget to add in a high-quality 27" monitor!), but not by enough to really make a dent in the IT budget one way or the other.
- colept 10y ago> just that they're fast enough machines to make good workstations Except they're not. The heat dissipation in the thin iMacs is terrible in that it prevents the CPU from working at full capacity 100% of the time.