apple news/media reports
11/08/2007, 10:20am, EST
Thursday, November 8th
Salon: Macs indeed cheaper than PCs
Despite popular perceptions, Macs are cheaper computers to own than PCs, a new article argues. Although the Salon piece concedes that most Macs are more expensive than comparatively-powered PCs when purchased, they are said to maintain better resale value, offsetting any initial costs. Held up as examples are last year's HP Pavilion Media Center A1640n, and a Mac mini; although the Mini would have cost $799 versus the A1640n's $699, while being less powerful, the resale value for the A1640n has plummeted, and is now between $236 and $257 on eBay. By contrast, the Mac mini is going for $445 to $500, netting a $50 advantage. [corrected]
Similar price balancing can occur with notebooks. A Dell Inspiron E1505 from last year, selling for $999, is now on resale at a peak of $550. A comparable MacBook would have been $1,099, but these are now on eBay for costs between $710 and $800, easily recouping the difference or improving it.
The article contends that the difference is attributable to an inherent longevity in Macs, which makes them useful for as much as five years, whereas some PC owners may have to upgrade every one or two years. Apple also has more brand value, particularly because it has devotees who will only buy Macs.
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Or is it that you're just going to use sarcasm to impliedly discredit it, without actually having to address the substance? There is too much of that in politics, don't really need it here.
As far as the article is concerned, it seems to me that it was an interesting point. PC fanboys constantly go on about how much cheaper PCs are, but they never think resale value, but generally, with a PC, there isn't any, so it is not even within their consciousness. Macs DO have resale value, and that is a perfectly legitimate point.
1. Brand new models of macs are generally the same price (sometimes cheaper) than similarly configured brand new PC models. True.
2. PCs drop in price so a not brand new PC model (say 4-6 months past initial release) is often cheaper than a similarly configured not brand new mac model. Also true.
What this writer is saying, is that even if you get the mac when the model is not brand new, and could have gotten a similar age PC for less money, you can (if you're willing to put in the effort) generally make that money back in 1-3 years when you go to upgrade to you next machine. Macs have resale value. PCs, much less.
What is the problem with this argument again?
Then again, maybe the higher resale value has to do with the actual market of new computers. New Macs one year over the next may not be appreciably better (just compare this year's mini to last years), but the price stays the same.
However, in the PC market, you can buy low-end laptops NEW that meet or exceed last year's model, for a lower price. Therefore, there's going to be less demand for used laptops at higher resale values.
But, I'm sure the half-glass-full crowd will point out that Apple's limited computer line-up, never reducing prices, and not daring to overlap a product line has its advantages.
I mean, that extra money will come in handy to pay the finance charges you needed to incur because you ended up buying a more expensive Mac.
I don't know how often anyone re-sells their computer, but what I do know is that virtually every non-nerd PC owner I know, periodically has to pay some PC repair shop to fix their PC when it slows down for no apparent reason. That, of course, assumes the PC repair shop knows what they are doing and actually fixes the problem without making it worse.
Then there's the productivity and time lost to blue screens of death, virus attacks and malware, maintaining anti-virus software, hardware conflicts, and so on.
A Mac is virtually trouble-free and I can train anyone - even my technophobic mother - how to do the minimal maintenance required when occasionally things do go awry (repair permissions/Disk Warrior).
I own a G3 iBook and a G4/533 tower. Both work just fine for nearly all of what I do. I don't know anyone who has a PC that's five years old which they use day-in, day-out. It is fucking ridiculous that one should have to replace a computer every couple or three years but that is exactly what PC owners do.
Macs are cheaper in the long run but the average consumer is somewhat ignorant of how to make a rational purchase decision and so they only look at the up-front cost.
And if you want a tower or a computer you can expand, its $2500 for the Mac. How much is that PC again?
And resale value only works if you don't get screwed out of money on ebay.
"Hey, you can sell last year's laptop this year for more money, so it must be better!"
I couldn't find that quote anywhere. This article isn't about which is better. It states long term cost is lower. The author gave examples of equivalent machines at purchase time and deltas if resold in a year.
I've found the same to be true with my own purchases. I sold a 4 year old Powerbook for over $800. Equivalent pc laptops of the same generation were currently selling for less than 1/2 that. I paid $2000 for the laptop new and could have saved a couple hundred with a Dell coupon model at the time. That puts me ahead about $200 after 4 years.
Do you ever add something useful to a forum testudo? At least the fanboys could argue they enjoy their machines and that enjoyment along is of value. But to simply go to a website dedicated to mac news and post childish comments is really sad. I hope there's something in life you have a passion for.
Another artist here just realized that he's on his fourth PC since I bought my Mac ... he has spent more than $6,000 on hardware in that time, I spent less than $3,000 in November of 2001.
The ultimate irony: We'll probably both be in the market for a new machine in about 18 months ... Think he's getting another PC? Nope.