Does Apple deliberately rip you off?

[KAWSquared]

I'm just curious if anyone shares my opinion on whether or not Apple deliberately rips you off for hardware. I mean sure they give you the beautiful aesthetics that [possibly] only Apple can create, but how do they ever expect to gain a real solid foothold on the market by providing SUKKA MC specs? Seriously Apple, we need bettar specz pl0x.

[iTim]

Are they deliberately trying to rip us off? No.

Because the do everything in house, I'd assume they pay a much higher price on hardware. This trickles down to the buyers.

Also, not many people buy Macs. While that is rapidly changing, Apple is still the 3rd top seller of computers, behind Dell and HP. Because Macs are so radically different than PC's, lowering the price doesn't really mean more people will buy them - Susy Homemaker who uses "The Internets" for checking her ISP provided crappy email account and maybe some word processing isn't going to switch, even if the prices are the same.

Another thing you've got to remember is that, unlike companies like Dell, a much larger portion of Apple's profit per unit goes to research and development, so that they can maintain their own OS, and continually come up with increasingly sexier looking computers.

[Sir Pimpalot]

@iTim: No they don't. Their Core2Duos, Intel GMA and Nvidia cards, etc are no more expensive than those used by other vendors. These companies do not go "Oh I think we'll make some really high quality shit just for Apple Inc and charge them out the ass for it lololololz!!!".

The MacBook's glass and aluminum enclosures alone probably cost at least $120 to produce. Then you have to factor in the backlit keyboard, fancy touchpad, weight, and thinness, among other things.

The MacBook Air is expensive because it is thin. Check out similar notebooks from Toshiba, Voodoo, and others and you'll see that the Air has the upper hand in both specs and pricing. The same goes for the iMac and Mac Mini.

As for Apple's Pro lineup, however, there is simply no justification for its radical prices.

[AirForceOnes]

its like buying a lexus, you buy it because you WANT to

[iGo]

@iTim: No they don't. Their Core2Duos, Intel GMA and Nvidia cards, etc are no more expensive than those used by other vendors.

While I agree, but not entirely. Apple still designs and develop their own logic boards... as far as I know, HP doesn't and Dell also does so for some of their models.

If you go by standard configurations, Apple is very much competitive with other vendors (HP/Dell)... where Apple rips you off, is in upgrade options (Ram, HDD etc). Sensible thing to do is pick up standard configuration and upgrade it your self using cheap deals... newegg such as.

[iTim]

@iTim: No they don't. Their Core2Duos, Intel GMA and Nvidia cards, etc are no more expensive than those used by other vendors. These companies do not go "Oh I think we'll make some really high quality shit just for Apple Inc and charge them out the ass for it lololololz!!!".

Apple does pay more for it's hardware than vendors like Dell and HP, because it doesn't buy parts in extremely large volume like they do. If you buy 800 Core2Duos instead of 1,200, you'll be paying significantly more per chip.

[CubanPete]

its like buying a lexus, you buy it because you WANT to

Exactly and it doesn't do anything different than a Hundai

[Sir Pimpalot]

Perhaps more than Dell, but I doubt they buy in smaller volumes than HP, seeing as they're passing HP. It still doesn't account for a $300-$1,500 price difference, and if you can't accept that you're wrong. You don't even know who buys what, you're simply assuming based upon market rank.

I will still consider your scenario however and ask this: Why can I get a maxed-out Lenovo Thinkpad with much higher specs than the base MacBook Pro and 3 years of accidental damage protection warranty for nearly $600 less? Lenovo holds a smaller market share than Apple, after all.

Exactly and it doesn't do anything different than a Hundai

I hate to break it to you, but there's quite a large performance gap between a typical Hyundai and a typical Lexus. They're not even close to being in the same class.

[KAWSquared]

Hyundais are absolute shit. Nothing rides like a Lexus

So does Apple charge you more because they're trying to get more $$$$ because of their poor percentage of users?

What population of the tech world uses Macs? Like 5% or something? How many use Winders?

[Sir Pimpalot]

Hyundais are absolute shit. Nothing rides like a Lexus

So does Apple charge you more because they're trying to get more $$$$ because of their poor percentage of users?

Well their iPods and iPhones are severely overpriced as well, albeit the fact that they own the MP3 player market and that the iPhone was like the top selling phone last year, so I'm guessing it's not because of market share.

What population of the tech world uses Macs? Like 5% or something? How many use Winders?

I think they're up to like 17% now, but I'm not sure.

[KAWSquared]

Do you think they'll lower prices if they get a higher percentage of users?

Then again, the prices of living are increasing as well, I read somewhere that everything is up like 3% from last year in terms of price.

[SbuxBlaze]

Apple does pay more for it's hardware than vendors like Dell and HP, because it doesn't buy parts in extremely large volume like they do. If you buy 800 Core2Duos instead of 1,200, you'll be paying significantly more per chip.

So you're saying apple can't buy 1,200 Core2Duos? That just doesn't make any sense, it's not like apple makes 800 notebooks a month

Also, apple now has a higher percentage of users but the prices went up instead of down

[Levi- The perfectionist]

hardware is more expensive.

With apple though you are buying a more 'complete' package. hardware+software and flawless integration.

Furthermore Mac OSX runs a lot faster on the hardware than other operating systems.

its been argued to death. it still remains a matter of personal preference.