Macbook vs PC Specs

majormattmajormatt
Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited January 2014
I do realize specs arnt everything, I do realize it not the end all but there comes a point. I was looking at the Staples flyer this morning and saw a PC laptop (real price)



PC Laptop



Core 2 (Centrino) Duo

15.4'' Screen

2GB RAM

160 GB HD

Wireless Networking

$1149





Macbook



1.83GHz Intel Core 2 Duo

512MB memory

60GB hard drive1

Combo drive

Wireless Networking

$1099



This is not good. I'd rather ofcourse use OSX and will always choose a Mac over Windows, but such disparity will have to make me wait. The PC laptop has 4 times more memory and nearly three times more hard drive space, a larger screen and only $50 more overall.



Ya, maybe this is just too superficial, maybe the bus is no where as fast, maybe alot of other things I havnt considered. Come on Apple!

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 17
    e1618978e1618978 Posts: 6,075member
    So buy the PC! Your hardware and experience will be crap, but you saved a couple hundred dollars. I just went to the Dell site, btw, and their prices are the same as Apple prices (more or less), and the buying experience is horrible in comparison.



    If you are buying a product which is even lower on the totem pole than Dell, then god help you - your life will be hell.
  • Reply 2 of 17
    majormattmajormatt Posts: 1,077member
    Haha, I was expecting a, "so buy it" response.



    I'd still choose the macbook but I'd only buy in the beginning of cycles, though the debate is a bit more abstract since I dont have money for either. Ok, I guess my initial look at the Toshiba laptop was a kneejerk reaction, the Dell's seem to be pretty much inline with Apple. The $50 cheaper dell has twice as much memory and a 20 GB hard drive. But still, for the love of god apple, 512 today is pathetic!
  • Reply 3 of 17
    wircwirc Posts: 302member
    I agree about the memory, but I bet that Toshiba is thicker, and certainly larger. So it's apples to oranges. I can't say that without it sounding like a pun. I hate puns.
  • Reply 4 of 17
    joe_the_dragonjoe_the_dragon Posts: 931member
    The pc may have a better video card.



    512MB - 80 MB for on board video on the macbook is a joke.
  • Reply 5 of 17
    lundylundy Posts: 4,466member
    I agree with wirc's comment. When comparing laptops nowadays, it is easy to miss the things that the Apple product has. Thinness and lighter weight cost money, and are the #1 things not considered when people claim that PC laptops are "cheaper".



    In the interest of brevity, I will just list some of the things to check and you'll see that you have to add stuff to the PC to bring it up to the Apple specs:



    - clockspeed (the cheap PCs have 1.5 gHz)

    - screen resolution

    - FireWIre

    - Camera

    - Windows Vista Business, to compare with Mac OS X

    - BlueTooth

    - Remote

    - Battery Life



    and, size and weight, as mentioned.



    I have done numerous comparisons of Apple laptops with configured Dell laptops and the prices always come out almost exactly the same.
  • Reply 6 of 17
    cakecake Posts: 1,010member
    Mac vs. PC System Shootouts
  • Reply 7 of 17
    illutionzillutionz Posts: 46member
    Recently I tried to configure 15" Dell E1505 laptop to compare it with MacbookPro 15" 2.16 model. I noticed that I get a cheaper price for the Mac and also, MBP has the refurbished one which is even cheaper and comes with 1yr apple warranty
  • Reply 8 of 17
    machope theworldmachope theworld Posts: 145member
    I don't care which one you buy, but I'm going to get a Macbook Pro after Leopard comes out. Right now I'm using a Toshiba Satellite, and it's crap. It was cheap when I got it in the Summer of 2005 (1 and a half years ago)But it randomly shuts down when I unplug it (though sometimes it's because I forget to put the battery back in), and just yesterday, the backlight died. After I restarted it (which takes almost half an hour) the backlight was fine.



    I still use my Satellite, but I really want a Macbook Pro to come out already!!!



    It's really a preference, in my experience, between price or productivity.



    So to sum it up, the problems I've had so far with my Toshiba are:\



    Random shutdown after unplugging

    Random backlight shutoffs

    Start up that takes nearly 10 minutes (i've done everything to speed it up, but there's no difference)
  • Reply 9 of 17
    majormattmajormatt Posts: 1,077member
    I guess I fell into a classic consumer trap, looking just at the numbers. Sigh, I should know better. I guess I have a tendency to look at the PC specs and imagine it running OSX with apple-eque quality. I need to pull myself back into reality and remember that the polishing touches arnt there and the things I take for granted would be missing.



    Forgive me my mac bretheren
  • Reply 10 of 17
    jeffdmjeffdm Posts: 12,951member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lundy View Post


    I agree with wirc's comment. When comparing laptops nowadays, it is easy to miss the things that the Apple product has. Thinness and lighter weight cost money, and are the #1 things not considered when people claim that PC laptops are "cheaper".



    In the interest of brevity, I will just list some of the things to check and you'll see that you have to add stuff to the PC to bring it up to the Apple specs:



    - clockspeed (the cheap PCs have 1.5 gHz)

    - screen resolution

    - FireWIre

    - Camera

    - Windows Vista Business, to compare with Mac OS X

    - BlueTooth

    - Remote

    - Battery Life



    and, size and weight, as mentioned.



    I have done numerous comparisons of Apple laptops with configured Dell laptops and the prices always come out almost exactly the same.



    That assumes that all those features are necessarily desirable, I think most people don't use or need any of those features. With Apple, you have to buy them, with many other products, you don't.



    I doubt battery life is significantly different. It was when desknotes were popular but they are in the fringes now.
  • Reply 11 of 17
    vineavinea Posts: 5,585member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JeffDM View Post


    That assumes that all those features are necessarily desirable, I think most people don't use or need any of those features. With Apple, you have to buy them, with many other products, you don't.



    I doubt battery life is significantly different. It was when desknotes were popular but they are in the fringes now.



    With a baseline set of capabilities Apple can augment OSX to use any of those features across the board. This is part of the Apple advantage so if its not desirable then the platform itself is not desirable. In which case the logical thing to do is buy a Toshiba or Dell.



    In any case, size, weight, battery life, increased CPU and screen resolution would seem desirable for most people. If you have numbers to support your assertion that these are not desirable features for notebook users I'd be interested...



    Vinea
  • Reply 12 of 17
    jeffdmjeffdm Posts: 12,951member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by vinea View Post


    With a baseline set of capabilities Apple can augment OSX to use any of those features across the board. This is part of the Apple advantage so if its not desirable then the platform itself is not desirable. In which case the logical thing to do is buy a Toshiba or Dell.



    In any case, size, weight, battery life, increased CPU and screen resolution would seem desirable for most people. If you have numbers to support your assertion that these are not desirable features for notebook users I'd be interested...



    It may be desirable, but if it's not ultimately necessary and it costs extra money, then most often, based on my experience, that money won't be spent. Given that the average sell price of computers is below Apple's minimum, I don't think it is an irresponsible statement.



    As I said before, I really don't think the battery life is notably different, it hasn't been in my experience. The size (usu. only thickness) may be slightly larger. The weight isn't significantly different that I've found. Chip speed is nice, but for most users, not that important anymore.



    The extra features I was contending as not really necessary for mainstream computer use are BlueTooth, remote, firewire, camera, OS X as compared against Vista Business.
  • Reply 13 of 17
    lundylundy Posts: 4,466member
    Well, that is a different issue. We were talking about a PC laptop comparable to the Mac.



    If you want to talk about the cheapest possible laptop, then yes, Dell makes one and Apple does not.



    It's not relevant to Apple whether people "want" the uber-cheap laptop, as there is no money to be made in that market and they are not interested.



    Here is an interesting comparison of Apple's approach to Dell's and HP's.
    image
  • Reply 14 of 17
    rageousrageous Posts: 2,170member
    I wouldn't make a big deal of the RAM disparity since that PC is going to need a shitload just to run Vista.
  • Reply 15 of 17
    ricksbrainricksbrain Posts: 517member
    Considering how many fewer computers Apple sells, I'm surprised they're prices are as competitive as they are. Note how the iPod dropped in price as volumes went up. The same could happen with the computers, but not likely.
  • Reply 16 of 17
    japplejapple Posts: 91member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lundy View Post


    Here is an interesting comparison of Apple's approach to Dell's and HP's.



    I'm no accountant but I'd like to think I'm intelligent, and I can't make any sense of those numbers... Nothing seems to add up or correspond to each other. What am I missing?
  • Reply 17 of 17
    slewisslewis Posts: 2,081member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jApple View Post


    I'm no accountant but I'd like to think I'm intelligent, and I can't make any sense of those numbers... Nothing seems to add up or correspond to each other. What am I missing?



    I recognize the Thumbnail from RoughlyDrafted. It's an interesting comparison of their 4Q Net Income on their Computers, but it's not entirely relevant compared to Annual Overall results.



    DELL on Finance@Google

    AAPL on Finance@Google



    Sebastian
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