What's so fantastic about Apple?

[Fast Eddie B]

BTW, the above gem was posted via a first gen iPad w/16 gigs.

Lying down in bed. As was this one.

If I had a lengthier missive to type, I'd do so from my MacBook Pro.

They both please me. I've gotten exactly the bang for the buck I expected.

"Can't we all just get along?" - Rodney King

 

[kajata]

I'm trying to imagine a reason where 4 would be better than 8.

Number of men your wife slept with on your honeymoon?

 

[John Albert]

And for the extra money you get a faster computer (see "Performance and Graphics") with a higher-resolution display and better battery life.

Yeah, and they compared the cheapest one with the Macbook AIR that costs $400 (30%) more. Is that difference in speed enough to justify a 30% price difference? You can buy another extra desktop computer for that $400.

To look at it another way, for the price of the bottom-of-the-line 13" Macbook AIR ($1300) you can get the top-of-the-line Acer Aspire S that has the i7 processor and all-SSD storage.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

...and for roughly the same price I'd pay for one of their machines, I can get fer greater performance and features elsewhere.

Maybe, but does the quality of the spell-checker figure in somewhere?

 

[John Albert]

Maybe, but does the quality of the spell-checker figure in somewhere?

I don't use spell-checkers because they make one lazy about spelling.

But all my computers can run Flash applications, their displays sit upright at the optimum viewing angle all by themselves without needing to be held, and they also have real keyboards.

Even my netbook has a 1.6 GHz dual-core processor, 40GB of storage, and 2GB of RAM. It can multitask, and could even run apps like Photoshop if I needed it to, and it only cost me $200.

 

[kajata]

Yeah, and they compared the cheapest one with the Macbook AIR that costs $400 (30%) more. Is that difference in speed enough to justify a 30% price difference?

For some people it would. If one wants a slower computer with a mediocre display where in practically every review says it's not a particularly good computer and certainly not as good as the MacBook Air, than maybe it's not worth the difference.

You can buy another extra desktop computer for that $400.

Or 160 mouse pads!

 

[John Albert]

For some people it would. If one wants a slower computer with a mediocre display where in practically every review says it's not a particularly good computer and certainly not as good as the MacBook Air, than maybe it's not worth the difference.

You chose the Acer for a comparison, not me.

 

[TheL8Elvis]

The VAIO Z Series, being an ultra-high-end laptop, is more appropriately compared to the Macbook Pro, not the much cheaper Macbook AIR (which competes with low-end laptops and high-end netbooks).

I disagree. It's an ultrabook. They have comparable specs, just like the acer you showed below.

You've compared the cheapest Apple product you could find with the most expensive competitor's product you could find, just like you did a few pages back with the Apple vs. Samsung USB cable example you posted.

That's dishonest.

You made a sweeping generalization that you already admitted was 'an exaggeration' - but I am dishonest. OK, whatever *shrugs*. I stand by my statement that the the macbook air and VAIO Z are comparable.

You also appear to have ignored the rest of my post above, where I made the more appropriate comparison to Sony VAIOs:

I ignored what you linked to, because besides being notebooks, they weren't really comparable in my opinion.

As for the Acer:

The Aspire S3 is a glorious knock-off of the Air

Simply comparing specifications the exclusion of everything else is dishonest and does not tell the whole story.

 

[John Albert]

Simply comparing specifications the exclusion of everything else is dishonest and does not tell the whole story.

For the rest of the story, you have to turn to Apple's marketing department.

I disagree. It's an ultrabook. They have comparable specs, just like the acer you showed below.

What is an "ultrabook" anyway? Sounds like marketing BS to me.

What it really is, is a computer.

I regard computers on the basis what they're capable of, not what they look like or what kind of jargon the marketing departments have attached to them.

 

[JohnnyG]

To look at it another way, for the price of the bottom-of-the-line 13" Macbook AIR ($1300) you can get the top-of-the-line Acer Aspire S that has the i7 processor and all-SSD storage.

And it has the same screen resolution as the 11" Macbook AIR. How much to upgrade to match the 13" model? Sorry, not available.

 

[John Albert]

And it has the same screen resolution as the 11" Macbook AIR. How much to upgrade to match the 13" model? Sorry, not available.

Again, I did not choose that particular computer for the comparison.

 

[Stray Cat]

I'm trying to imagine a reason where 4 would be better than 8.

Years in jail?
Years Bush remained president?

ETA: Number of slugs you find in your salad.

 

[JohnnyG]

My company just dropped Dell from the laptop preferred supplier list and added Apple. The reason is because of the WUXGA (1920x1200) screen resolution on the Macbook Pro. We do software development and data modeling and analysis; the extra resolution really useful for our type of work. We'd even go higher if we could. We used to be able to get WUXGA on a Dell Inspiron 15" laptop. A couple years later it was only available on 17" models. Now they don't offer it at all. The highest resolution they offer is 1920x1080. It is often called "Full HD" as if it is some sort of maximum resolution, but it is actually a substantial step down from what was common a few years ago.

Does anybody know of a major laptop maker still making WUXGA laptops other than Apple?

 

[JohnnyG]

Again, I did not choose that particular computer for the comparison.

Of course not, you chose the Sony VAIO E Series which is not anything like the Macbook AIR. At least the Acer is an honest comparison.

 

[John Albert]

I'm trying to imagine a reason where 4 would be better than 8.

• Years it took to get your Bachelor's Degree
• Months at your new job before you get a day off
• Feet of water that flooded into your basement
• Number of coronary bypasses your cardiologist says you need

 

[TheL8Elvis]

I disagree. It's an ultrabook. They have comparable specs, just like the acer you showed below.
...
The Aspire S3 is a glorious knock-off of the Air

Simply comparing specifications the exclusion of everything else is dishonest and does not tell the whole story.

For the rest of the story, you have to turn to Apple's marketing department.

What ? I linked to the first review I found on the Aspire S3. I didn't hunt to find a particular review or anything. Are you implying wired works for the apple marketing department ??

You want another one ?

"Bottom Line
The Acer Aspire S3 has a super-thin profile, larger storage capacity than competitors, and unmatched affordability, but it has some rough patches, like a cheap-feeling construction and a disappointing display."

I am just making what I think to be an honest assessment that the whole package may be greater than the sum of the parts, and simply picking and choosing certain technical specs to compare is not a complete picture.

As for Ultrabooks, it's a way to describe a class of notebooks. Did you really not know not that ? Or do you wish to make the case that a notebook is a notebook is a notebook, and size, weight etc have no bearing on prices or purchasing decisions ?

I thought the use of the term made it made it much easier to discuss comparable notebooks to the air. But you just see it as marketing too.

 

[John Albert]

Laptops are always getting smaller, thinner and lighter. There's nothing new or revolutionary about that. There's no real need for the goofy jargon, either, other than to generate hype. "Ultrabooks" is just another marketing term.

 

[TheL8Elvis]

So you've picked another overpriced machine to put up against Apple's overpriced machines.

It just occurred to me that both reviews I posted on the Acer S3 agreed that it was a phenomenal price. Lowest price ultrabook.

And you called it overpriced.

So, Apple is overpriced, and their least expensive competitor is overpriced.

I think I now know enough about how you define overpriced.

 

[BobTheDonkey]

That's the bumpf, as I said I went to the online stores and I showed you above what you get.



That was not what I was pointing out, what I was pointing out and showed to be true is that if someone is like you and knows nothing about hardware at all it is the Dell store that describes what the laptops can do/are for without the lingo that you don't understand.

Have a look above at the screen grabs, under the Apple store you immediately have to decide what processor you want, what GPU, RAM and so on, go to the Dell equivalent and it tells you what the different laptops can do without the lingo that you don't understand.

Which is the point I was making - Apple throws you straight into a screen that you need to know what all the lingo means before you can decide which one to order, Dell does it in a "lingo free" manner. (Of course both of them open out to much more detailed screens that require you to choose using the lingo.)

Yup. I pointed this out in my post with the 3 different laptops and their specs. I'm really a bit confused as to what was difficult about what I did when I changed the CPU and HDD specs. I changed the CPU from the stock 2.2Ghz to the 2.4Ghz to match the MacPro spec, and changed the standard HDD from 500GB to 750GB, again to match the MacPro. It's exactly the same setup as the Mac store setup (little button to choose which part to put in).

I could see how graphics cards could be confusing. And it's not so much confusing as it takes a bit of industry knowledge/research to see which one (ones) is (are) better. But understanding that one laptop has dual video cards and the other has only a single video card is sufficient to know that one is (most likely) already more powerful than the other graphically.

This stuff really isn't rocket science. That some people choose to approach it as though it is (Really, as was pointed out 8>6>4, 2.4>2.2, Quad > Dual, 750>500, etc) is a spurious argument in Apple's favor - especially after it's been shown that the Mac store has similar options that must be picked through and actually shows less information about what those options mean.

 

[BobTheDonkey]

I think in the tablet sector it is hard to argue that Apple's offerings are overpriced.

I disagree.

For less than the price of an iPad2, I can score a Windows Tablet that runs a full operating system. With faster processor and more RAM (granted, it's needed to run Windows 7...but still...imagine if the iPad had the same specs) (same HDD size).

Chalk the extra $150 on top of what you'd pay for the Windows tablet to the Apple tax.

ETA:


iPad 2 (32GB) ($749) (1024x768 9.7" display)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16858753070

MSI Windpad (32GB) ($599) (1280x800 10.1" display)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834152278

Acer Iconia (32GB) ($519) (1280x800 10.1" display)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834215081

ETA2: And if you want to really get into it, we could start adding Android Tablets to the mix:

ASUS Transformer (32GB) ($499) (1280x800 10.1" display)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230217

Samsung Galaxy Tab (32GB) ($549) (1280x800 10.1" display)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834131139

Motorola Xoom (32GB) ($349 refurbished) (1280x800 10.1" display)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834209002