7 ms·

The price difference between Macs and PCs widens

49 points by spydez 18y ago

qqq 18y ago
While I don't deny he has a point, average selling prices are not a very fair metric. Mac buyers more often care about computers, want a higher end one, and allocate a larger budget to their computer.
- henning 18y ago
  Correct. How much is it worth to you to have a machine that is beautiful to look at and which has as few extraneous cables as possible? For many people, the answer is "very little" and those are the people cheap Dell grey boxes are for. On the other hand, if you want, say, a sub-$1000 laptop (just something for email and net browsing on the go), Apple can't help you at all, and in that regard price comparisons are kind of irrelevant: you can pick up a Dell laptop for $600 that probably wouldn't be enjoyable for heavy everyday work but is fine for the casual use most people intend on when they purchase a machine.
  - josefresco 18y ago
    I bought a $600 Dell Inspiron laptop ($350 rebate) and upgraded the memory, and battery to about $800 and have used it for everyday, heavy-at-times work (web design/development) for over a year now. Sure I could have spent $400-$600 more on something with a nicer case (XPS) but just because something is cheap, doesn't mean it can't be used to 'work' (and I didn't need to buy OSX just because I'm a 'designer') Also, I spend the most money on machines for 'play', like my new Inspiron 1720.
  - Retric 18y ago
    For 820$ you can get a Dell Inspiron 1525 with: Intel Core 2 Duo @2.16GHz, 4GB ram, 15.4 inch display (1680x1050), and a 320GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM). (http://www.notebookreview.com/dellCoupon.asp http://www.notebookreview.com/dellCoupon.asp) What more do you need for heavy everyday work?
    - henning 18y ago
      You can't add in a decent video card (the integrated X3100 is garbage), for one thing.
      - scw 18y ago
        As much as I prefer discrete graphics, the X3100 is actually quite good. Good enough to be the only video option for the Macbook Air, Macbook, Thinkpad X300 and Thinkpad 61s all well received laptops.
    - rbanffy 18y ago
      OSX and Xcode? ;-)
  - ken 18y ago
    > On the other hand, if you want, say, a sub-$1000 laptop (just something for email and net browsing on the go), Apple can't help you at all store.apple.com -> Refurbished Mac -> Apple Certified Refurbished MacBook -> $899.00, free shipping. Judging by the graphics chip and CPU, it's the latest revision, released in February. How much is it worth to you to have a machine that comes in a white box (instead of the brown refurb one)? For most Mac users, the answer is "a couple hundred dollars" and those are the people new Macs are for.
  - elai 18y ago
    To be honest, having a mac doesn't let you escape the too many cable curse. I have a cable for my mouse, one for my printer, one for my itouch, one for my cellphone (iphone = unwise in canada), one for my backup HD, one for my second monitor, one for the gigabit ethernet, one for the power and one for my headphones which equals 9 different cable outputs. I could go wireless(ish) w/ the HD, printer, mouse, headphones & network, but that compromises speed or quality in some way.
  - Herring 18y ago
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2030260032+4802+4021&name=%24500+-+%24750 http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&#3... Newegg bestsellers is a great place to find anything. Those are all $500 - $750 & all very decent.
jimbokun 18y ago
I wonder how the screens compare. I know when I bought my MacBook Pro, it had a higher pixel density than most PC laptops with similar screens, and that got lost in a lot of comparisons. Slimness and weight are sometimes also overlooked. PC notebooks equally slim or light as the Mac equivalent are often more expensive than the Mac model. Does that $699 PC have equal or better pixel density to the equivalent Mac model? Is it as skinny? (I honestly don't know. It's been about 3 years since I last looked.)
- halo 18y ago
  I bought a Dell M1330. It is: * Lighter than the Macbook (but there's not much in it) * Same screen resolution (1280x800) * Slot-loading disc drive, but with a DVD Writer * Nvidia 8400M compared to Intel X1300 graphics * Had 1gb more memory * Had 40gb bigger hard disk drive It does, however, lack 802.11n, and the Macbook is marginally prettier. The kicker is that the M1330 was £130+ cheaper than the Macbook equivalent even after factoring in the educational discount. There really is no way of spinning it - Apple's hardware is, and always has been, comparatively expensive, and in exchange you get Mac OS X. Apple has never competed on price. If one day I can afford to spend £700+ on a laptop I'd certainly consider buying a Mac but until that point I'm happy with my mid-spec PCs.
  - alex_c 18y ago
    Battery life?
    - halo 18y ago
      From what I read, ~2.5hrs vs. ~3-3.5hrs - not altogether unexpected considering the significantly more power hungry graphics card on the Dell.
      - alex_c 18y ago
        That's still not bad.
  - 18y ago
yan 18y ago
I find that most numbers treated as specs became less relevant, say 2-3 years ago. Today, I want a computer that will be a pleasure to use and agree with what I think constitutes a well-designed laptop. Today, where even the cheapest boxes have enough horsepower to do everything I do and more, how good I feel while using the machine became more important to me. Those cheap PC laptops are generally more gaudy designed, feature cheaper materials and make me feel like I'm being treated like a child. Just like you don't pick the person you date as a simple list of pros and cons, you don't pick a laptop via purely a tally of features.
- josefresco 18y ago
  If you want a computer that makes you "feel good" and think PC's are 'treating you like a child' (which is somehow possible with enclosure design), then you should probably stick with your shiny overpriced MAC and leave the bargains (and cheap horsepower) to us PC/Linux guys.
  - ardit33 18y ago
    I agree, even if you hate windows, a Linux box is much more cheaper than anything mac has to offer for the same price range. Admit it guys, mac has done a decent job in polishing the user interface,and overrall experience, but it has done even a better job in marketing. A good chunk of your money is buying a brand name, and contrubuting to Apple's higher margins. While the PC world is just much more cut-throat.
    - deleted 18y ago
      [deleted]
    - mechanical_fish 18y ago
      A good chunk of your money is buying a brand name, and contributing to Apple's higher margins. Ah, but the question is: Which chunk? How much of the money buys the brand, and how much buys the OS? The answer is that we aren't allowed to know. So the question doesn't really come into play. It's clear that if you could save money by buying a box without Apple's brand, or their industrial design, but with the Mac OS a lot of people would be interested. Probably including me. But that's not Apple's game plan, for good reasons that were explored back in the Mac clone era, a time when (probably not by coincidence) the company nearly went out of business. As it is, you're stuck with the whole package. So the question is: How much is the Mac OS worth to you? Given that even if I accept all of this guy's arguments the price difference is of order $600 to $800 -- less than 10 hours of my time -- the Mac OS doesn't have to save me much time or pain at all over the lifetime of the machine to justify the higher cost. The real lesson here is that both PC and Mac hardware are cheap. Compared to many people's time, hardware is cheap. Compared to a developer's time it is really, really cheap. The Mac-PC pricing flame war is obsolete; it's a relic from the Elder Days when Macs cost $3000 to $5000 and didn't even run Unix.
mace 18y ago
<disclaimer>I am not a Mac fanboy.</disclaimer> The argument in the article is flawed for two reasons: 1. Windows Vista needs more hardware to accomplish the same thing as Mac OS X. For example, I can get a along fine with 2 gigs of memory on a MacBook while it would be excruciating to run Vista with anything less than 4 gigs. 2. Generally what you are paying for when you buy a Mac is the experience. The fact that a growing number of consumers are still willing to buy Macs given the price difference reinforces this. Macs have always been a great demonstration of the synergy between hardware and software. The article would have more merit if the author discussed the cost, in time and money, of performing a task (ex. create a document) on a PC or Mac.
- Oompa 18y ago
  I don't agree with the first statement. My mom's laptop has 1 GB of RAM is performs just fine, even when I had to use it. Granted, she doesn't do much but play a few very low demanding games (Zuma), browse the internet, and chat on Skype.
- briansmith 18y ago
  I can get a along fine with 2 gigs of memory on a MacBook while it would be excruciating to run Vista with anything less than 4 gigs. There's no way that Vista needs 4GB of memory. 2GB is plenty. 1GB is more than enough, especially if you disable some of the effects.
wheels 18y ago
Mac is the first computer maker that has succeeded in making computers a fashion item. They get to charge extra for being the in name-brand.
- gaius 18y ago
  Obviously you were never a schoolboy in England in the 1980s. Sinclair, Acorn, Commodore, these brands were more hotly contested by the nerds than football teams or pop bands ever were by the cool kids...
  - nuclear_eclipse 18y ago
    I believe he meant that Mac is the first company to make computers and devices fashionable to everyone who isn't a nerd. There's a big difference. It's now "cool" and "hip" for any set of mainstream consumers to own a Mac/iPod/iPhone, while it's never really been "cool" to own any sort of Windows machine, except in tiny little crowds of geeks and nerds.
  - wheels 18y ago
    Obviously you were never hip. :-) (Just being silly.)
menloparkbum 18y ago
I flagged the article and downvoted everyone who has made a comment because Mac vs. PC flamewar at #1 on Hacker News is sad.
- jcl 18y ago
  I agree that a flamewar would be sad, but I don't think this conversation has devolved to one yet. Many of the comments cite facts, give both pros and cons of Mac/PC, and are related to the claims in the article.
  - Herring 18y ago
    There isn't much of a discussion imo. The people who like it still like it, the people who don't won't. As for me, I've been meaning to try out Time Machine & ZFS so I just started up my OSx86 torrent.
    - comatose_kid 18y ago
      No ZFS in Leopard.
      - Herring 18y ago
        Well I hear it can read/write ZFS & I'm getting solaris too.
        Zev 18y ago
        A bland OS X install can't write to a ZFS partition yet. You could try prereleases of ZFS for Mac from http://zfs.macosforge.org http://zfs.macosforge.org if you want write support. However, it doesn't let you boot to a partition with ZFS or index the partition with Spotlight. There's a few other limitations as well - look around the trac wiki and you should find the list pretty easily.
- cpach 18y ago
  To me, who is about to buy a new laptop, these were some of the most interesting comments on HN for at least a week. I consider the Macbook's price tag to be quite good with regards to performance and design. Too bad it's not very Linux-friendly...
KirinDave 18y ago
Yes, they're much more expensive. But I think that saying it's the hardware is to miss the point. People don't really think as much about the mac hardare as much as the mac software. And let's be honest here, smart and educated software engineers go out of their way to buy macs when they definitely have the skills to install and run linux. They could definitely buy a cheaper Windows PC. Unless you want to be utterly derisive and dismissive, you can't simply say, "It's a fashion item." People are buying macs because they want Mac OS X. Maybe instead of arguing about how "overpriced the hardware is" or "how people love candy coating" people in charge of competing products/projects should look into the reasons why hen you go to a tech conference you see a sea of glowing Apple logos. People there are not stupid, and if you just dismiss their choice as such you're going to miss out on key information.
- jonmc12 18y ago
  I agree. There is a great lesson to understand here about pricing and profiting from a premium product offering that customers enjoy.
  - netcan 18y ago
    Definitely. Another thing to note is that apple haven't really done any black magic marketing (though they have done that too) to get their margins up. They simply differentiated effectively. Noone else has in that market so it seems like voodoo. But in most markets (batteries, soap, jeans, cars) you have differentiated brands that command different premiums. A mac is not comparable to a windows pc (in the minds of many consumers at least). So the get to raise their margins. Dell including XYZ = Toshiba including XYZ. The specs are the value, pretty much exactly. So, like petrol stations, they don't have margins. Another thing to note is that most price comparisons compare based on seller costs. Because in a competitive market that is what market prices reflect. The value to a consumer is necessarily higher (or they wouldn't buy) and it can be much higher. If the cost of production is $1000and & the value to the consumer is $10000, the machine will be priced somewhere between those two. The more competitive (less differentiated) the market is, the closer to $1000.
- youngnh 18y ago
rbanffy 18y ago
A Ferrari can be four times as expensive as a Corvette. News at 11. It's an apples to oranges comparison. Average selling price is a terrible comparison tool - it only works for very similar products that cater to the same public. While I am not a Mac user (I am, but my main computer is a PC running Linux and the Mac is used mostly at home), I have the deepest respect for the product and I understand fully it's not the same as a more mundane Dell PC.
lally_singh 18y ago
Note that this follows a standard fallacy: comparing circuitry alone. You're not buying a motherboard, RAM, and disk, you're buying a whole machine. For example, the Inspiron 518 that they mentioned was a cheap plastic tower, and they compare it to the integrated iMac. The integration is going to add cost, no matter who builds it. Apples to apples folks, apples to apples. When I do comparisons, here's what I usually find: 1. When you find the same build quality (e.g. a macbook pro versus upper-end thinkpads or dells (I don't remember their naems)), the prices get pretty close 2. At an update, the macs are slightly cheaper. But the PC vendors quickly adapt. Then the macs are more expensive (usually ~$100). 3. To do fair comparisons, you have to also match in the software/accessories included. Lots of stuff free on either platform has to either be given credit or be matched. 4. You usually don't want everything included. But, for the sake of intellectual honesty, you have to make the comparisons fair. 5. Complaining that Apple offers poor selection or customization options are perfectly fair.
- netcan 18y ago
  According to the article's links (& I think this might be fairly accurate), we are on the 'mac is high' end of that swing. Ant this time it's higher more then a $100 difference.
iigs 18y ago
The article takes it on faith that the current margins Apple has can't last. Maybe I missed the part of the article where they back that up, but overall it seems like Apple's done a bang-up job selling (the perception of) lack of computing misery for a premium. If people want to pay extra to have the experience debugged for them out of the box, good for them, and great for Apple. That quoted blurb from Wilcox about the Apple announcement of dropping product margins ignored the other parts of that announcement, when they also said they were planning on releasing a new product. Maybe the Macbook is staying upmarket and the new product is going to be a low cost / high volume machine that would eat into the cheaper machine segment. It would actually be quite novel (for the PC business) if Apple was intending to invest in their brands and move them up and out instead of down and out. The Mac Pro (formerly known as a Power Macintosh), as a nearly $3k, 8 core Xeon desktop, has been positioned as an ultra-premium product that is suitable for only the highest level users, the MacBook Pro (formerly known as a PowerBook) is holding the cost line and too expensive for anybody but professional users or monied geeks. The MacBook is currently the laptop a non-geek would buy, but Apple has not addressed the lowest mobile market segment, which probably should be considered the sum of the cut-rate laptop market and the eeepc-type market. This is a pretty common strategy in the automobile industry. The current Honda Civic is larger than the first generation Honda Accord. The Honda Fit slots into place where the Civic used to be. Honda has spent decades moving brands upward, keeping them relevant to their customer base and fixing segment gap with new vehicles that are the right size and marketed toward the appropriate people. It's nice to see a tech company market their products more like major investments (Honda Pro) than like disposable consumer goods (Gillete Mach 8 Vostro 2100xblqi). tl;dr: Apple cares about their brand -- don't expect to see a $500 MacBook, Apple probably will create a new product to combat the threat in the article.
drmark 18y ago
I bought my mac because I wanted OSX, I write software. I'm shocked at how many of my friends that bought a PC with Vista say it's utterly horrible. I'm happy I chose to switch given that common sentiment.
weegee 18y ago
Yet another Apple-bashing article. Really, I thought HN was above this crap, this kind of submission is better on Reddit or Digg... Cmon folks, get real. Most of the people who buy Macs want OSX, they aren't even considering a Windows machine. And this article had deliberate mis-prints on the Apple specs, for example the iMac has a Core 2 Duo processor, not the older Core Duo. When I bought my MacBook Core 2 Duo laptop in December, 2006, I went to Dell.com and the exact same machine spec'd out to a few hundred more for the Dell vs. what I got with my Mac. Apple does indeed have an entirely new laptop line planned and rumors say they will be introduced in September. And they also say the Apple laptops will have entirely new Intel processors in them. I can run Windows and OSX on my MacBook, very useful really. But I only run Windows to play games, I get my real work done on the Mac. :-)
- cpach 18y ago
  "I thought HN was above this crap" Who reads TFA? ;-) I'm here for the comments.
Mistone 18y ago
I'm more than happy to see info like this come out and put apple in its place as an expensive computer. I was shocked at the low prices and great hardware I've been seeing on PCs compared to Macs. If this forces apple to be less stingy with hardware specs on macs then its a good thing. Its great that apple is going so well but i care far, far, far less about their bottom line than mine and other consumers.
csl 18y ago
Funny thing, I just discussed this with a friend. We are both mac users. I think they are overpriced if you compare hardware only, but he maintained that if you compare the hw specs on the best MacBook pro with an HP laptop, you only save like 40 bucks (at least in this part of the world). Anyone got numbers?
jrockway 18y ago
It's easy to find price differences when you compare the wrong specs. In their example, they compare a 19" LCD with no viewing angle, slow updates, etc. with a 20" one of better quality. Yeah, that's going to cost more. You can't compare the 20 to 19 and assume they are the same; there are lots of different 20" panels and lots of different 19" panels. Anyway, I still think my Thinkpad is much nicer looking than any Apple laptop. (Oh, and it's more expensive than a Dell. It must be some sort of conspiracy between Apple and Lenovo, yeah, that's it!)
- william42 18y ago
  I agree about the Thinkpad being better than any Apple laptop--both in looks and the fact that unlike Macs the Thinkpad has a nipple.
TrevorJ 18y ago
That makes me sad :-(
startingup 18y ago
Let me be a contrarian here. I have both a Mac and a Windows PC right here on my desk. I use the Windows XP machine far more often (and not because of any apps I cannot get on a Mac). Before you flame me as a Windows nut, keep in mind that my first computer was a Mac, and I started on Windows after 2 years of Mac. I am fairly certain I am not alone, but most Windows users are the silent types.
niqolas 18y ago
Face it – arguing over computers is futile. Certain characteristics simply hold more value to some individuals over others, which is why some people choose to share their lives with blondes and others with brunettes or redheads. Similarly, some people choose to have Macs; while others choose Windows or Linux. Suggestions that WomanA is "better" than WomanB are incredibly subjective e.g. a 5/10 to you might be a 10/10 to someone else. Although such suggestions can promote passionate discourse (as in this thread), inevitably the arguments that ensue end in deadlock - where you realise that no matter how much you argue, you and your critics will never see eye to eye. Quoting hardware specifications is like saying "she's an X out of 10” and running Windows, Linux or OSX is like preferring blondes, brunettes or redheads. Hackers, it’s time to agree to disagree - because we all like to think we’re spending our lives with babes.
jessewmc 18y ago
The notebooks really are price-competitive, especially right after a refresh. People compare numbers saying "oh I can get this from dell with the same processor and memory and harddrive for half the price!" but neglect several things: -Almost all those inexpensive PCs are significantly heavier than the macbook. -The screens are not as good as the macs, at all. Even at the same resolution the macs have better backlighting and better color & contrast. -The macs have better battery life. Show me a PC that weighs 5 lbs or less, gets 5 hrs of battery life and has a screen as nice as the macbook for the same or less money. They don't exist. You can get a Sony with all these qualities except the price. You can get a Dell with all these qualities except the battery life and nice screen. (Or you can get a nice screen in a machine that weighs 6+lbs and still has terrible battery life). You can get a Lenovo with all these qualities but the screens are awful. And so on.
LKM 18y ago
It's always the same. Apple introduces new Mac, it's priced competitively. Apple waits a year until it releases a new version and doesn't cut price while other manufacturers release new versions, so the Mac becomes comparatively more expensive as time goes by. Then, Apple releases a new Mac, and the cycle starts anew. Repeat annually. There's really no need to write these "Apple is cheaper" "Apple is more expensive" articles twice each year.
ojbyrne 18y ago
One of the things that makes these comparisons annoying is the multiple versions of Vista (is Home Premium really comparable to OSX? I don't actually know) I think they do that just so they can have a positive showing on these checklist comparisons, but it ends up hurting the consumer, who has to make uninformed choices and ends up being dependent on slimy salespeople. In addition, developers also have to deal with multiple versions, which must be a support nightmare. It's a classic example of marketing directives (market segmentation and looking good in these price/feature comparisons) hurting the overall product.
plinkplonk 18y ago
fwiw here in India the Macs have a 33% surcharge for some reason ( The dealers say "customs duty", though PC prices track international prices pretty well - something strange is going on). This makes the macs way more expensive than an equivalent PC.

49 points by spydez 18y ago

qqq 18y ago

While I don't deny he has a point, average selling prices are not a very fair metric. Mac buyers more often care about computers, want a higher end one, and allocate a larger budget to their computer.

henning 18y ago
Correct. How much is it worth to you to have a machine that is beautiful to look at and which has as few extraneous cables as possible? For many people, the answer is "very little" and those are the people cheap Dell grey boxes are for. On the other hand, if you want, say, a sub-$1000 laptop (just something for email and net browsing on the go), Apple can't help you at all, and in that regard price comparisons are kind of irrelevant: you can pick up a Dell laptop for $600 that probably wouldn't be enjoyable for heavy everyday work but is fine for the casual use most people intend on when they purchase a machine.
- josefresco 18y ago
  I bought a $600 Dell Inspiron laptop ($350 rebate) and upgraded the memory, and battery to about $800 and have used it for everyday, heavy-at-times work (web design/development) for over a year now. Sure I could have spent $400-$600 more on something with a nicer case (XPS) but just because something is cheap, doesn't mean it can't be used to 'work' (and I didn't need to buy OSX just because I'm a 'designer') Also, I spend the most money on machines for 'play', like my new Inspiron 1720.
- Retric 18y ago
  For 820$ you can get a Dell Inspiron 1525 with: Intel Core 2 Duo @2.16GHz, 4GB ram, 15.4 inch display (1680x1050), and a 320GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM). (http://www.notebookreview.com/dellCoupon.asp http://www.notebookreview.com/dellCoupon.asp) What more do you need for heavy everyday work?
  - henning 18y ago
    You can't add in a decent video card (the integrated X3100 is garbage), for one thing.
    - scw 18y ago
      As much as I prefer discrete graphics, the X3100 is actually quite good. Good enough to be the only video option for the Macbook Air, Macbook, Thinkpad X300 and Thinkpad 61s all well received laptops.
  - rbanffy 18y ago
    OSX and Xcode? ;-)
- ken 18y ago
  > On the other hand, if you want, say, a sub-$1000 laptop (just something for email and net browsing on the go), Apple can't help you at all store.apple.com -> Refurbished Mac -> Apple Certified Refurbished MacBook -> $899.00, free shipping. Judging by the graphics chip and CPU, it's the latest revision, released in February. How much is it worth to you to have a machine that comes in a white box (instead of the brown refurb one)? For most Mac users, the answer is "a couple hundred dollars" and those are the people new Macs are for.
- elai 18y ago
  To be honest, having a mac doesn't let you escape the too many cable curse. I have a cable for my mouse, one for my printer, one for my itouch, one for my cellphone (iphone = unwise in canada), one for my backup HD, one for my second monitor, one for the gigabit ethernet, one for the power and one for my headphones which equals 9 different cable outputs. I could go wireless(ish) w/ the HD, printer, mouse, headphones & network, but that compromises speed or quality in some way.
- Herring 18y ago
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2030260032+4802+4021&name=%24500+-+%24750 http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&#3... Newegg bestsellers is a great place to find anything. Those are all $500 - $750 & all very decent.

jimbokun 18y ago

I wonder how the screens compare. I know when I bought my MacBook Pro, it had a higher pixel density than most PC laptops with similar screens, and that got lost in a lot of comparisons. Slimness and weight are sometimes also overlooked. PC notebooks equally slim or light as the Mac equivalent are often more expensive than the Mac model. Does that $699 PC have equal or better pixel density to the equivalent Mac model? Is it as skinny? (I honestly don't know. It's been about 3 years since I last looked.)

halo 18y ago
I bought a Dell M1330. It is: * Lighter than the Macbook (but there's not much in it) * Same screen resolution (1280x800) * Slot-loading disc drive, but with a DVD Writer * Nvidia 8400M compared to Intel X1300 graphics * Had 1gb more memory * Had 40gb bigger hard disk drive It does, however, lack 802.11n, and the Macbook is marginally prettier. The kicker is that the M1330 was £130+ cheaper than the Macbook equivalent even after factoring in the educational discount. There really is no way of spinning it - Apple's hardware is, and always has been, comparatively expensive, and in exchange you get Mac OS X. Apple has never competed on price. If one day I can afford to spend £700+ on a laptop I'd certainly consider buying a Mac but until that point I'm happy with my mid-spec PCs.
- alex_c 18y ago
  Battery life?
  - halo 18y ago
    From what I read, ~2.5hrs vs. ~3-3.5hrs - not altogether unexpected considering the significantly more power hungry graphics card on the Dell.
    - alex_c 18y ago
      That's still not bad.
- 18y ago

yan 18y ago

I find that most numbers treated as specs became less relevant, say 2-3 years ago. Today, I want a computer that will be a pleasure to use and agree with what I think constitutes a well-designed laptop. Today, where even the cheapest boxes have enough horsepower to do everything I do and more, how good I feel while using the machine became more important to me. Those cheap PC laptops are generally more gaudy designed, feature cheaper materials and make me feel like I'm being treated like a child. Just like you don't pick the person you date as a simple list of pros and cons, you don't pick a laptop via purely a tally of features.

josefresco 18y ago
If you want a computer that makes you "feel good" and think PC's are 'treating you like a child' (which is somehow possible with enclosure design), then you should probably stick with your shiny overpriced MAC and leave the bargains (and cheap horsepower) to us PC/Linux guys.
- ardit33 18y ago
  I agree, even if you hate windows, a Linux box is much more cheaper than anything mac has to offer for the same price range. Admit it guys, mac has done a decent job in polishing the user interface,and overrall experience, but it has done even a better job in marketing. A good chunk of your money is buying a brand name, and contrubuting to Apple's higher margins. While the PC world is just much more cut-throat.
  - deleted 18y ago
    [deleted]
  - mechanical_fish 18y ago
    A good chunk of your money is buying a brand name, and contributing to Apple's higher margins. Ah, but the question is: Which chunk? How much of the money buys the brand, and how much buys the OS? The answer is that we aren't allowed to know. So the question doesn't really come into play. It's clear that if you could save money by buying a box without Apple's brand, or their industrial design, but with the Mac OS a lot of people would be interested. Probably including me. But that's not Apple's game plan, for good reasons that were explored back in the Mac clone era, a time when (probably not by coincidence) the company nearly went out of business. As it is, you're stuck with the whole package. So the question is: How much is the Mac OS worth to you? Given that even if I accept all of this guy's arguments the price difference is of order $600 to $800 -- less than 10 hours of my time -- the Mac OS doesn't have to save me much time or pain at all over the lifetime of the machine to justify the higher cost. The real lesson here is that both PC and Mac hardware are cheap. Compared to many people's time, hardware is cheap. Compared to a developer's time it is really, really cheap. The Mac-PC pricing flame war is obsolete; it's a relic from the Elder Days when Macs cost $3000 to $5000 and didn't even run Unix.

mace 18y ago

<disclaimer>I am not a Mac fanboy.</disclaimer> The argument in the article is flawed for two reasons: 1. Windows Vista needs more hardware to accomplish the same thing as Mac OS X. For example, I can get a along fine with 2 gigs of memory on a MacBook while it would be excruciating to run Vista with anything less than 4 gigs. 2. Generally what you are paying for when you buy a Mac is the experience. The fact that a growing number of consumers are still willing to buy Macs given the price difference reinforces this. Macs have always been a great demonstration of the synergy between hardware and software. The article would have more merit if the author discussed the cost, in time and money, of performing a task (ex. create a document) on a PC or Mac.

Oompa 18y ago
I don't agree with the first statement. My mom's laptop has 1 GB of RAM is performs just fine, even when I had to use it. Granted, she doesn't do much but play a few very low demanding games (Zuma), browse the internet, and chat on Skype.
briansmith 18y ago
I can get a along fine with 2 gigs of memory on a MacBook while it would be excruciating to run Vista with anything less than 4 gigs. There's no way that Vista needs 4GB of memory. 2GB is plenty. 1GB is more than enough, especially if you disable some of the effects.

wheels 18y ago

Mac is the first computer maker that has succeeded in making computers a fashion item. They get to charge extra for being the in name-brand.

gaius 18y ago
Obviously you were never a schoolboy in England in the 1980s. Sinclair, Acorn, Commodore, these brands were more hotly contested by the nerds than football teams or pop bands ever were by the cool kids...
- nuclear_eclipse 18y ago
  I believe he meant that Mac is the first company to make computers and devices fashionable to everyone who isn't a nerd. There's a big difference. It's now "cool" and "hip" for any set of mainstream consumers to own a Mac/iPod/iPhone, while it's never really been "cool" to own any sort of Windows machine, except in tiny little crowds of geeks and nerds.
- wheels 18y ago
  Obviously you were never hip. :-) (Just being silly.)

menloparkbum 18y ago

I flagged the article and downvoted everyone who has made a comment because Mac vs. PC flamewar at #1 on Hacker News is sad.

jcl 18y ago
I agree that a flamewar would be sad, but I don't think this conversation has devolved to one yet. Many of the comments cite facts, give both pros and cons of Mac/PC, and are related to the claims in the article.
- Herring 18y ago
  There isn't much of a discussion imo. The people who like it still like it, the people who don't won't. As for me, I've been meaning to try out Time Machine & ZFS so I just started up my OSx86 torrent.
  - comatose_kid 18y ago
    No ZFS in Leopard.
    - Herring 18y ago
      Well I hear it can read/write ZFS & I'm getting solaris too.
      - Zev 18y ago
        A bland OS X install can't write to a ZFS partition yet. You could try prereleases of ZFS for Mac from http://zfs.macosforge.org http://zfs.macosforge.org if you want write support. However, it doesn't let you boot to a partition with ZFS or index the partition with Spotlight. There's a few other limitations as well - look around the trac wiki and you should find the list pretty easily.
cpach 18y ago
To me, who is about to buy a new laptop, these were some of the most interesting comments on HN for at least a week. I consider the Macbook's price tag to be quite good with regards to performance and design. Too bad it's not very Linux-friendly...

KirinDave 18y ago

Yes, they're much more expensive. But I think that saying it's the hardware is to miss the point. People don't really think as much about the mac hardare as much as the mac software. And let's be honest here, smart and educated software engineers go out of their way to buy macs when they definitely have the skills to install and run linux. They could definitely buy a cheaper Windows PC. Unless you want to be utterly derisive and dismissive, you can't simply say, "It's a fashion item." People are buying macs because they want Mac OS X. Maybe instead of arguing about how "overpriced the hardware is" or "how people love candy coating" people in charge of competing products/projects should look into the reasons why hen you go to a tech conference you see a sea of glowing Apple logos. People there are not stupid, and if you just dismiss their choice as such you're going to miss out on key information.

jonmc12 18y ago
I agree. There is a great lesson to understand here about pricing and profiting from a premium product offering that customers enjoy.
- netcan 18y ago
  Definitely. Another thing to note is that apple haven't really done any black magic marketing (though they have done that too) to get their margins up. They simply differentiated effectively. Noone else has in that market so it seems like voodoo. But in most markets (batteries, soap, jeans, cars) you have differentiated brands that command different premiums. A mac is not comparable to a windows pc (in the minds of many consumers at least). So the get to raise their margins. Dell including XYZ = Toshiba including XYZ. The specs are the value, pretty much exactly. So, like petrol stations, they don't have margins. Another thing to note is that most price comparisons compare based on seller costs. Because in a competitive market that is what market prices reflect. The value to a consumer is necessarily higher (or they wouldn't buy) and it can be much higher. If the cost of production is $1000and & the value to the consumer is $10000, the machine will be priced somewhere between those two. The more competitive (less differentiated) the market is, the closer to $1000.
youngnh 18y ago

rbanffy 18y ago

A Ferrari can be four times as expensive as a Corvette. News at 11. It's an apples to oranges comparison. Average selling price is a terrible comparison tool - it only works for very similar products that cater to the same public. While I am not a Mac user (I am, but my main computer is a PC running Linux and the Mac is used mostly at home), I have the deepest respect for the product and I understand fully it's not the same as a more mundane Dell PC.

lally_singh 18y ago

Note that this follows a standard fallacy: comparing circuitry alone. You're not buying a motherboard, RAM, and disk, you're buying a whole machine. For example, the Inspiron 518 that they mentioned was a cheap plastic tower, and they compare it to the integrated iMac. The integration is going to add cost, no matter who builds it. Apples to apples folks, apples to apples. When I do comparisons, here's what I usually find: 1. When you find the same build quality (e.g. a macbook pro versus upper-end thinkpads or dells (I don't remember their naems)), the prices get pretty close 2. At an update, the macs are slightly cheaper. But the PC vendors quickly adapt. Then the macs are more expensive (usually ~$100). 3. To do fair comparisons, you have to also match in the software/accessories included. Lots of stuff free on either platform has to either be given credit or be matched. 4. You usually don't want everything included. But, for the sake of intellectual honesty, you have to make the comparisons fair. 5. Complaining that Apple offers poor selection or customization options are perfectly fair.

netcan 18y ago
According to the article's links (& I think this might be fairly accurate), we are on the 'mac is high' end of that swing. Ant this time it's higher more then a $100 difference.

iigs 18y ago

The article takes it on faith that the current margins Apple has can't last. Maybe I missed the part of the article where they back that up, but overall it seems like Apple's done a bang-up job selling (the perception of) lack of computing misery for a premium. If people want to pay extra to have the experience debugged for them out of the box, good for them, and great for Apple. That quoted blurb from Wilcox about the Apple announcement of dropping product margins ignored the other parts of that announcement, when they also said they were planning on releasing a new product. Maybe the Macbook is staying upmarket and the new product is going to be a low cost / high volume machine that would eat into the cheaper machine segment. It would actually be quite novel (for the PC business) if Apple was intending to invest in their brands and move them up and out instead of down and out. The Mac Pro (formerly known as a Power Macintosh), as a nearly $3k, 8 core Xeon desktop, has been positioned as an ultra-premium product that is suitable for only the highest level users, the MacBook Pro (formerly known as a PowerBook) is holding the cost line and too expensive for anybody but professional users or monied geeks. The MacBook is currently the laptop a non-geek would buy, but Apple has not addressed the lowest mobile market segment, which probably should be considered the sum of the cut-rate laptop market and the eeepc-type market. This is a pretty common strategy in the automobile industry. The current Honda Civic is larger than the first generation Honda Accord. The Honda Fit slots into place where the Civic used to be. Honda has spent decades moving brands upward, keeping them relevant to their customer base and fixing segment gap with new vehicles that are the right size and marketed toward the appropriate people. It's nice to see a tech company market their products more like major investments (Honda Pro) than like disposable consumer goods (Gillete Mach 8 Vostro 2100xblqi). tl;dr: Apple cares about their brand -- don't expect to see a $500 MacBook, Apple probably will create a new product to combat the threat in the article.

drmark 18y ago

I bought my mac because I wanted OSX, I write software. I'm shocked at how many of my friends that bought a PC with Vista say it's utterly horrible. I'm happy I chose to switch given that common sentiment.

weegee 18y ago

Yet another Apple-bashing article. Really, I thought HN was above this crap, this kind of submission is better on Reddit or Digg... Cmon folks, get real. Most of the people who buy Macs want OSX, they aren't even considering a Windows machine. And this article had deliberate mis-prints on the Apple specs, for example the iMac has a Core 2 Duo processor, not the older Core Duo. When I bought my MacBook Core 2 Duo laptop in December, 2006, I went to Dell.com and the exact same machine spec'd out to a few hundred more for the Dell vs. what I got with my Mac. Apple does indeed have an entirely new laptop line planned and rumors say they will be introduced in September. And they also say the Apple laptops will have entirely new Intel processors in them. I can run Windows and OSX on my MacBook, very useful really. But I only run Windows to play games, I get my real work done on the Mac. :-)

cpach 18y ago
"I thought HN was above this crap" Who reads TFA? ;-) I'm here for the comments.

Mistone 18y ago

I'm more than happy to see info like this come out and put apple in its place as an expensive computer. I was shocked at the low prices and great hardware I've been seeing on PCs compared to Macs. If this forces apple to be less stingy with hardware specs on macs then its a good thing. Its great that apple is going so well but i care far, far, far less about their bottom line than mine and other consumers.

csl 18y ago

Funny thing, I just discussed this with a friend. We are both mac users. I think they are overpriced if you compare hardware only, but he maintained that if you compare the hw specs on the best MacBook pro with an HP laptop, you only save like 40 bucks (at least in this part of the world). Anyone got numbers?

jrockway 18y ago

It's easy to find price differences when you compare the wrong specs. In their example, they compare a 19" LCD with no viewing angle, slow updates, etc. with a 20" one of better quality. Yeah, that's going to cost more. You can't compare the 20 to 19 and assume they are the same; there are lots of different 20" panels and lots of different 19" panels. Anyway, I still think my Thinkpad is much nicer looking than any Apple laptop. (Oh, and it's more expensive than a Dell. It must be some sort of conspiracy between Apple and Lenovo, yeah, that's it!)

william42 18y ago
I agree about the Thinkpad being better than any Apple laptop--both in looks and the fact that unlike Macs the Thinkpad has a nipple.

TrevorJ 18y ago

That makes me sad :-(

startingup 18y ago

Let me be a contrarian here. I have both a Mac and a Windows PC right here on my desk. I use the Windows XP machine far more often (and not because of any apps I cannot get on a Mac). Before you flame me as a Windows nut, keep in mind that my first computer was a Mac, and I started on Windows after 2 years of Mac. I am fairly certain I am not alone, but most Windows users are the silent types.

niqolas 18y ago

Face it – arguing over computers is futile. Certain characteristics simply hold more value to some individuals over others, which is why some people choose to share their lives with blondes and others with brunettes or redheads. Similarly, some people choose to have Macs; while others choose Windows or Linux. Suggestions that WomanA is "better" than WomanB are incredibly subjective e.g. a 5/10 to you might be a 10/10 to someone else. Although such suggestions can promote passionate discourse (as in this thread), inevitably the arguments that ensue end in deadlock - where you realise that no matter how much you argue, you and your critics will never see eye to eye. Quoting hardware specifications is like saying "she's an X out of 10” and running Windows, Linux or OSX is like preferring blondes, brunettes or redheads. Hackers, it’s time to agree to disagree - because we all like to think we’re spending our lives with babes.

jessewmc 18y ago

The notebooks really are price-competitive, especially right after a refresh. People compare numbers saying "oh I can get this from dell with the same processor and memory and harddrive for half the price!" but neglect several things: -Almost all those inexpensive PCs are significantly heavier than the macbook. -The screens are not as good as the macs, at all. Even at the same resolution the macs have better backlighting and better color & contrast. -The macs have better battery life. Show me a PC that weighs 5 lbs or less, gets 5 hrs of battery life and has a screen as nice as the macbook for the same or less money. They don't exist. You can get a Sony with all these qualities except the price. You can get a Dell with all these qualities except the battery life and nice screen. (Or you can get a nice screen in a machine that weighs 6+lbs and still has terrible battery life). You can get a Lenovo with all these qualities but the screens are awful. And so on.

LKM 18y ago

It's always the same. Apple introduces new Mac, it's priced competitively. Apple waits a year until it releases a new version and doesn't cut price while other manufacturers release new versions, so the Mac becomes comparatively more expensive as time goes by. Then, Apple releases a new Mac, and the cycle starts anew. Repeat annually. There's really no need to write these "Apple is cheaper" "Apple is more expensive" articles twice each year.

ojbyrne 18y ago

One of the things that makes these comparisons annoying is the multiple versions of Vista (is Home Premium really comparable to OSX? I don't actually know) I think they do that just so they can have a positive showing on these checklist comparisons, but it ends up hurting the consumer, who has to make uninformed choices and ends up being dependent on slimy salespeople. In addition, developers also have to deal with multiple versions, which must be a support nightmare. It's a classic example of marketing directives (market segmentation and looking good in these price/feature comparisons) hurting the overall product.

plinkplonk 18y ago

fwiw here in India the Macs have a 33% surcharge for some reason ( The dealers say "customs duty", though PC prices track international prices pretty well - something strange is going on). This makes the macs way more expensive than an equivalent PC.