AOL Shopping settles Mac vs. PC debate?

Ok, so the article is speaking specifically about new business purchases but this is something I've not found mentioned here and, since many of the comments are consumer (read: non-business related) I had to chime in.

I've got two Powerbook G4's. I bought them when new and they've been great computers. While I would love to have built-in iSight cameras in them, and larger hard drives, the fact is they are great machines. They just work, which is NOT anything I can ever say about the PC's I've used up to this point.

With these statements, keep in mind I was ALWAYS a PC guy due to the high entry cost of Apples. But, having used "outdated" macs for 3 years now, I've realized that you can do what most people do on cheaper computers. The problem is that an older and/or "used" PC, like a PII/PIII will drive you completely insane while trying to open up applications/programs when using XP. This is not the case with my G4's which both have 10.4.11. It's not Leopard, but XP's no Vista.

So, if you're looking to get something that just runs e-mail and the web, or do Office, why do people rule out using 2nd Hand Macs? Just because they're not flashy? Because they're, "used?" The only thing that puts me off is the statements I've found about "Snow Leopard" being Intel-only. But, even then, do you NEED the new OS if all you want to do is e-mail and the web?

It's all about the market, but again this is not something that's put forward very much. I'm all for the new Macs, but there are lots of older ones that still have plenty of usefulness left in them and for a great many people.

Macintosh computers are more expensive than PCs. People don't match computers to meet Apple's specs when they buy a PC. That's part of the reason why they are less expensive. I can still buy a computer sub 500 that runs XP, can you do that with a Mac? That being said I enjoy all of my Macs, but the price argument is all wrong. Part of the draw of getting a Windows PC is the fact that they can be purchased and upgraded at low cost.

This is awesome. We got a lot of this same type of feedback all day yesterday. I'm the one who wrote the "Mac vs. PC" photo gallery, but not the one who wrote the "PC vs. Mac" article that compared the MacBook Pro to an Acer (which I don't agree with). We have a lot of contributors to AOL Shopping with a variety of viewpoints. I, personally, am a recent Mac convert (since last November) and love Mac products. You probably didn't get that from the photo gallery, because I was actually trying to be completely unbiased. I may have overcompensated and given PCs more credit than they deserve. However, you also have to take into account your audience. AOL Shopping's current demographic is more likely to purchase PCs. And they don't need top-of-the-line specs. So, for someone asking why they would choose a $1,200 Mac over a $600 PC laptop they can get at Best Buy, how do you convince them that Macs are worth the extra cash? It's kind of a hard sell. If they just want a machine to do basic tasks like MS Office, web browsing and e-mail... do they need a MacBook? Probably not. So, basically, I do think Macs are better machines, and I would never buy another PC. But because it's "better" in that sense, doesn't mean it's universally the best choice for all people. I don't think making blanket, absolute statements like that is helpful. I provided several conclusions to the promotion, ending with my personal opinion...

"If money is not an issue, go with a Mac. You can always use VMware Fusion or Parallels to install a Windows partition on your Mac."

Either way, I do appreciate all the discussion my promotion created. I'm definitely listening and will adjust future Mac/PC promotions accordingly.

Thanks,

Michael Tolosa
AOL Shopping
http://shopping.aol.com

You say that the article "glosses over the fact that Apple makes excellent Windows PCs that will happily run your legacy Win32 applications"; I saw two mentions of this fact. Were they added later?

You mock the AOL article's suggestion that "If money is not an issue, go with a Mac". A high-quality PC will usually fall into roughly the same price bracket as its Mac counterpart, but the average amount spent on a consumer laptop in the UK is more than £200 less than even the cheapest MacBook. The same machine in the US is listed at $1,099, but the average spend there dropped below a thousand three years ago. The article effectively states that if you can spend substantially more than the average, you should spend it on an Apple computer, rather than a comparable PC. Where's the problem?

The TCO arguments in favour of the Mac are from a business/corporate perspective, which is hardly the audience AOL Shopping is aimed at. Personal users can afford to rely on free software for security, and friends and acquaintances for support, which cuts the TCO dramatically; and lost time doesn't equal lost money in the same way in that context. My own experience is that my MacBook Pro does cost me more than my VAIO S did when it was my primary computer; it's often difficult to find free software for a particular task. I never paid for a Picasa update, but Apple want a fair chunk of money out of me to upgrade iPhoto. (yes, I know you get the complete iLife package; I don't want it, and there seems to be no separate upgrade option.)

Now, I feel that the extra cost, both initial and ongoing, is entirely worth it; virtually every aspect of the user experience is superior, and commercial software like VisualHub, Things (when it goes payware) and Scrivener runs rings around free semi-equivalents on other platforms. It's the third-party development, rather than Apple's own hardware or software* which is the true strength of the platform, in my opinion. Most people, though, can't see the point in paying so much more for a bit of email and web; in a lot of cases, they don't use their machines enough for there to BE any point.

I can't believe I just defended AOL.

*Although, of course, credit is due to Apple for setting up the foundation.

Umm, hardware is better? Isn't in the SAME hardware now? All Intel based?

It all comes down to OS and software now.

Let me know why with the same hardware specs, the Mac is consistently 400 to 500 dollars more? Is the OS and software THAT much better to justify it? Why won't Apple let people install their OS on a PC without crippling it?

Same thing goes for the iPod vs Zune vs other MP3 players. Is iTunes THAT much better than dragging and dropping files into a flashed based Mp3 player?

Or is it the brand name that makes people think that Coke and Pepsi is THAT much better than generic grocery store cola, which justifies the 100 percent markup?

assuming you have the money for a mac straight up there is no reason not to get one b/c for about 100 dollars it will work as a pc as well
my parents got two imacs when they redid there study last summer and havent booted up into mac maybe 5 times they bought them b/c there so goergous and im slowly converting them into mac users

The out the door price is very important to consumers. Regardless of the total cost of ownership potentially being the same or lower the initial cost of the hardware has an impact on consumers decisions. Perhaps the sales of the second generation iPhone will be an illustration. It has a higher TCO but a lower initial price.

Heaven forbid I (of all people) try to dunk this in a cold shower...

True, if you look at a MacBook and compare it to a comparable Dell/Sony/HP/etc., the Apple product comes out smelling pretty good. In fact, if you count the impact the two OS's have on your purchase, the Mac looks even better.

But consumers see that Best Buy regularly sells a 15" HP with a combo drive for around $500, and that matters. It may not live up to the MacBook, and it may not 'live' as long in productive use, and it may come with Windows Vista Home Edition (yech!) -- but it's $500. Despite years of MacBigotry, my wife and I settled on such a beast for her use; even though we (as daily dual-platform users) felt ill at the notion of having to be tied to Vista for the foreseeable future.

Because no matter how much a better buy the MacBook was (is), I only had $500 to spend. That's it. It gets no more complicated than that.

People have been begging Steve Jobs for years to lower the price-for-entry, and the mini was a step in a helpful direction. But it's very, very hard for Apple to concentrate on where their core market is while also entertaining the *possibility* of new customers in the lower-end market.

Apple knows it can do well with devices that are priced so that no sane person will go for it -- witness the iPod, the iPhone, and the 17-inch MacBook Pro. Yet look how many 'insane' customers are out there? Apple is doing well addressing that audience; and because no one else does it so well, it would be foolish of them to remove the blinders and dilute their attention to compete in areas they can't be absolutely sure of victory in.

Apple has the best (commercial) OS. Apple has (arguably) the best hardware. Anyone who can get on board, will -- and it's only a matter of time before the Linux market brings throw-away laptops in the $300 range to the masses, letting 'the rest of us' finally avoid Windows entirely.

But for now, the MacBook that I use at work is the perfect machine for me; and I imagine that if Apple had to compete more directly with other hardware manufacturers -- in their own back (low-budget) yard -- my beloved MacBook would have a bunch of features that I will never need (like a mouse nipple in the middle of my keyboard and a built-in cellular data card), and the quality of the system would be a mere shadow of the slick little sidearm that it is.

It is true that you can compute for less money.

You just won't be as happy about it as this Mac user is.

The total cost of ownership? Give me a break. I have an eMachines - it's 5 years old, running on last year's RAM upgrade to 1G and a 1.87 mHz processor and little hard drives that don't hold nearly as much as I want to store and you know what? I got it as a gift from a friend who upgraded two years ago - and it has not cost me one penny or given me a bit of trouble since.

Macs are better for photo/graphics editing? PC users have Photoshop, Paint.NET, GIMP and many more excellent choices such as Corel to choose from - end of story. Video-editing? Windows users have so many excellent - and free - choices I don't know where to start.

Cost? Come on. What cost? Exaggerating a bit for page views, are we? And AOL? Who cares what they have to say? When they can figure out how to slim down and modernize their ruinous software maybe then they can talk about which computer is best - and someone will actually give a damn.

Total Cost of Ownership is something businesses think about, not consumers unless we're talking big ticket items like cars and houses. The consumer thinks of the upfront cost as the barrier to entry...it's why arguments about how much the iPhone will cost over the length of 2 years reacting with "OMG it's so expensive" is the same strawman employed here. The average consumer does not think that way. They see a $600 laptop and a $1000 laptop and make their choices then. Same reason why people see a $200 iPhone and comment "wow it's cheaper!"