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The article makes even more sense if you ignore hardware geeks, PC gaming enthusiasts and case modders. I don't see tons of teenage gamers lining up to buy new

The article makes even more sense if you ignore hardware geeks, PC gaming enthusiasts and case modders. I don't see tons of teenage gamers lining up to buy new motherboards and 3 PCIx graphics cards for their Mac Pro. ref: http://www.anandtech.com/ http://www.anandtech.com/ http://www.tomshardware.com/us/#redir http://www.tomshardware.com/us/#redir http://www.overclockersclub.com/ http://www.overclockersclub.com/ http://images.google.com/images?client=opera&rls=en&q=case+mods&sourceid=opera&oe=utf-8&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=hWNySsf5BIy0sgOyiKDICA&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=4 http://images.google.com/images?client=opera&rls=en&...

jonny_noog 17y ago
I used to be a case modder, put together my last three PCs myself. Got sick of it. Now I have a Mac Pro.
- wglb 17y ago
  I do both. Except for the case mod.
- PStamatiou 17y ago
  I'm exactly the same way as jonny_noog here. I grew up case modding, going to lan parties, winning fastest-pc-build competitions and all of that. Then I went to college and got a Mac mini a year into it after seeing some friends with Macs. then I got a Macbook, then an iMac, then a MBP, then the new MBP, then the MB Air, then the new MBP... now I'm a big Mac guy.
  - _pi 17y ago
    So you fell into the social pressure aspect of Apple's Marketing technique? I thought of getting a Mac for college, however for the price it doesn't offer much over a Lenovo or a Dell. You get alot of nice touches, but those things I'd never use. Multi-touch trackpad? Unibody? There are products out there that do those things much better, such as tablets and toughbooks. Mac is like a DND bard, jack of all trades master of none, and not even better than a master of one. They're nice, they're shiny, but you want toughness? Get a toughbook. You want battery life? Get a Lenovo t400. You want something light that you can surf the web with? Netbook. If you want to impress your friends about how much better your purchase is, then get a Mac.
    - jc76 17y ago
      So your point is it's impossible to get toughness, battery life, light weight, unibody and multi-touch into one PC. Cool, got it.
      - _pi 17y ago
        No my point is that Mac is a computer and is subject to the same shit that other computers are subject to, so if "this crap just works" stops working on a PC it will also stop working on a Mac. Mac's suffer hardware issues and software issues as well, however the perceived notion is that they don't.
        jc76 17y ago
        That's a different argument. You said Macs only sell because of marketing but don't have features to justify price. But you named all the features Macs contain in one package and said it takes multiple PCs to get the same features. So I argue that they do justify the price. Whether those features appeal to you personally is yet another argument, but Apple knows thier target customer appreciates those features and will pay for them all in one computer. And yes, Macs also break. Although they're rated at the top in customer-service and repair every year.
        _pi 17y ago
        Not exactly, I named specific types of computers that excelled at delivering the features of the Mac. I called d Mac a jack of all trades. Although they're rated at the top in customer-service and repair every year. Depends how you rate it, in fact I'm not surprised at this rating because Apple makes a business out of it more than any manufacturer Not only that but for some things they don't even service things, such as iPods. iPods/iPhones are the most disposable piece of hardware never considering they just throw out the "broken" one and give you a new one. Some people would call that service, I call that waste. I will concede they have a great service plan, give customer under warranty a new one, repair old one and sell it for a smaller profit as a refurb.
    - 17y ago
- alexsolo 17y ago
  There's probably lots of reasons why the over $1000 PC gaming market is in decline. There are the people that just grow out of it (I am one). But the big factor here is that consoles are taking over gaming. It used to be the fact that PCs were way better for gaming than any console, but now that consoles have caught up, PC gaming is becoming a niche. (BTW, I now have a PS3 which is gathering dust, as I just don't have the time to play it) Microsoft does deserve some credit here, as they do have a big stake in the console market with the XBox.
  - jonny_noog 17y ago
    I have no time for games any more either, I stopped playing games frequently about the same time I stopped buying UV reactive IDE cables and blue LED fans. But I think it also depends on what kind of games you're into. For me first person shooters are best played with mouse and keyboard where as fighting games (like Street Fighter) or sandbox-style action games (like Prototype) are best played with a controller. I know you can interchange your interface devices these days, but I find myself still thinking, FPS? I want to play that on a PC, or sand-box style action game? I want to play that on a console.
- xal 17y ago
  Precisely my situation as well.
bdotdub 17y ago
I think a lot of people who buy Macs are the opposite of hardware geeks and case modders. I bought my MBP because I got tired of dealing with hardware, picking out parts, etc. I just wanted a nicely designed and built computer that let me do what I wanted (in my case, programming). To me, having to deal with hardware just gets in the way of letting me do what I want, which I feel many people can relate to.
eli 17y ago
They're easy to ignore because they're in the minority. The vast majority of computer buyers don't care at all about that stuff.
- _pi 17y ago
  When I was going through grade school, I heard such bullshit rumors about Mac computers, such as "They're really popular in Europe." Which not only is ignorant of computers, but ignorant of socio-economics of the average European who has much less expendable income than the average American. For them buying a computer that was priced at 1.5-2.0x that of a PC at the time would have been improbable.
carbon8 17y ago
Specs don't matter like the used to. 6/7+ years ago an upgrade or a better performing machine was actually a big deal even for regular users. These days it's almost the opposite. Components perform at such a high level that consumers are willing to buy worse-performing machines because the experience just isn't any different.

jonny_noog 17y ago

I used to be a case modder, put together my last three PCs myself. Got sick of it. Now I have a Mac Pro.

wglb 17y ago
I do both. Except for the case mod.
PStamatiou 17y ago
I'm exactly the same way as jonny_noog here. I grew up case modding, going to lan parties, winning fastest-pc-build competitions and all of that. Then I went to college and got a Mac mini a year into it after seeing some friends with Macs. then I got a Macbook, then an iMac, then a MBP, then the new MBP, then the MB Air, then the new MBP... now I'm a big Mac guy.
- _pi 17y ago
  So you fell into the social pressure aspect of Apple's Marketing technique? I thought of getting a Mac for college, however for the price it doesn't offer much over a Lenovo or a Dell. You get alot of nice touches, but those things I'd never use. Multi-touch trackpad? Unibody? There are products out there that do those things much better, such as tablets and toughbooks. Mac is like a DND bard, jack of all trades master of none, and not even better than a master of one. They're nice, they're shiny, but you want toughness? Get a toughbook. You want battery life? Get a Lenovo t400. You want something light that you can surf the web with? Netbook. If you want to impress your friends about how much better your purchase is, then get a Mac.
  - jc76 17y ago
    So your point is it's impossible to get toughness, battery life, light weight, unibody and multi-touch into one PC. Cool, got it.
    - _pi 17y ago
      No my point is that Mac is a computer and is subject to the same shit that other computers are subject to, so if "this crap just works" stops working on a PC it will also stop working on a Mac. Mac's suffer hardware issues and software issues as well, however the perceived notion is that they don't.
      - jc76 17y ago
        That's a different argument. You said Macs only sell because of marketing but don't have features to justify price. But you named all the features Macs contain in one package and said it takes multiple PCs to get the same features. So I argue that they do justify the price. Whether those features appeal to you personally is yet another argument, but Apple knows thier target customer appreciates those features and will pay for them all in one computer. And yes, Macs also break. Although they're rated at the top in customer-service and repair every year.
        _pi 17y ago
        Not exactly, I named specific types of computers that excelled at delivering the features of the Mac. I called d Mac a jack of all trades. Although they're rated at the top in customer-service and repair every year. Depends how you rate it, in fact I'm not surprised at this rating because Apple makes a business out of it more than any manufacturer Not only that but for some things they don't even service things, such as iPods. iPods/iPhones are the most disposable piece of hardware never considering they just throw out the "broken" one and give you a new one. Some people would call that service, I call that waste. I will concede they have a great service plan, give customer under warranty a new one, repair old one and sell it for a smaller profit as a refurb.
  - 17y ago
alexsolo 17y ago
There's probably lots of reasons why the over $1000 PC gaming market is in decline. There are the people that just grow out of it (I am one). But the big factor here is that consoles are taking over gaming. It used to be the fact that PCs were way better for gaming than any console, but now that consoles have caught up, PC gaming is becoming a niche. (BTW, I now have a PS3 which is gathering dust, as I just don't have the time to play it) Microsoft does deserve some credit here, as they do have a big stake in the console market with the XBox.
- jonny_noog 17y ago
  I have no time for games any more either, I stopped playing games frequently about the same time I stopped buying UV reactive IDE cables and blue LED fans. But I think it also depends on what kind of games you're into. For me first person shooters are best played with mouse and keyboard where as fighting games (like Street Fighter) or sandbox-style action games (like Prototype) are best played with a controller. I know you can interchange your interface devices these days, but I find myself still thinking, FPS? I want to play that on a PC, or sand-box style action game? I want to play that on a console.
xal 17y ago
Precisely my situation as well.

bdotdub 17y ago

I think a lot of people who buy Macs are the opposite of hardware geeks and case modders. I bought my MBP because I got tired of dealing with hardware, picking out parts, etc. I just wanted a nicely designed and built computer that let me do what I wanted (in my case, programming). To me, having to deal with hardware just gets in the way of letting me do what I want, which I feel many people can relate to.

eli 17y ago

They're easy to ignore because they're in the minority. The vast majority of computer buyers don't care at all about that stuff.

_pi 17y ago
When I was going through grade school, I heard such bullshit rumors about Mac computers, such as "They're really popular in Europe." Which not only is ignorant of computers, but ignorant of socio-economics of the average European who has much less expendable income than the average American. For them buying a computer that was priced at 1.5-2.0x that of a PC at the time would have been improbable.

carbon8 17y ago

Specs don't matter like the used to. 6/7+ years ago an upgrade or a better performing machine was actually a big deal even for regular users. These days it's almost the opposite. Components perform at such a high level that consumers are willing to buy worse-performing machines because the experience just isn't any different.