So, I went out to at least partially test this theory, and to do appropriate comparisons between Dell computers and Apple computers. I’m hardly the first one to take this challenge but I’ve decided it’s time to stop talking and taking other peoples’ word for it, and go get some concrete facts to put on (digital) paper.
If you look at the base prices for all the comparisons he did, Dell was almost 2-4 times less in all cases. This article is blatently bias twords Apple. What kind of pricing did he do to get a personal computer from Dell up to almost 3000 dollars? What did he add every option and digital camera available for purchase?
He probably upped the RAM to 512, video card that doesn’t share RAM with the rest of the system, maybe put Virus protection. You know, all the things that makes owning a computer worth while. But you do make a point, he should have made a PDF print out of the options he added on. If he reads this, and he can remember the options he made, he can go back and make them avaliable and we can debate those options. Because if you look that the Mac Mini, he definately bummed that up a bit with RAM and something else, maybe keyboard.
Go with AMD, build it yourself, and you can get a dual opteron for the same price as the dual G5. The dual opteron will beat the tar out of the dual G5. Besides, more software runs on PCs, and you computer will be useful for more than just work. Put Linux on it, and that’s one smoking machine.
Ofcourse it’s full of s***
Comparing a dual 2Ghz apple with a Nvidia 5200 to a Dual Xeon 3.2 with a nvidia Quadro (<– lol).
I can let look Apple computer’s cheap that way too..
Just admit it people; Mac *ARE* expensive. (not that i hate Mac’s, since i own one myself).
I agree with Nick. The article is extremely biased. I could write a similar article to show that Dell is cheaper than Macs.
I have a Dell Linux laptop (Yes you can get your money back from Microsoft), a Windows XP desktop, and a Mac tower (OS 10.3.9), so I have experience with both sides. I like both Macs and Dell, and Dell is cheaper. You simply can not argue that Macs are cheaper cause it’s a lie.
If you want to include software you’re making an even bigger mistake. On Macs, you can’t even view a QuickTime movie full screen without purchasing software. People buy software to accomplish simple tasks like taking a screen shot, which is something you do not need on Linux and Windows.
200 posts at least by tomorrow
And about 180 involving name calling.
Nick, did you read the article? Did you look at the direct comparisons? BTW look at the comparison to the “Workstation 670.”
b’geez
And again nobody mentions devaluation.
An x86 machine looses value quicker than the dollar, whereas a Mac can be sold for a really good price after a few years. So, you get more money back than from selling an x86, so your next purchase will be easier on the wallet.
Its all about economies of scale. X86 is everywhere, its cheap, hot, power-hungry stuff, its also got the biggest sales, and accordingly, demand and profit allows more for less. PowerPC though isn’t as ubiquitous as X86, PowerPC parts of magnitude shorter manufactured. Add in materials, support, software, it adds up.
I might also add you can’t compare a 1.42Ghz PowerPC to a 1Ghz x86, they are different architectures.
Mac Mini is pretty competively priced if you want a bit of the PowerPC action.
No name calling here. Macs are expensive, although the prices have come down a bit. Ultimately it will be the market that will determine VALUE associated with the product. As usual, the more VALUE attached to the product and the UTILITY attained from it, people will buy and use it. It’s always a balancing act. I know several people that will happily SPEND MORE for the MAC because they like it and perceive it to extend VALUE to their purchase.
That said, this article had some bogus methods, but it was fun to read.
By the way, I’m a real cheapo. I have cheap Intel hardware running cheap linux, and I seem to get a great deal of VALUE out of that!
it’s not comparing apples to apples, they’re both *COMPLETELY* different, you can’t compare them. All you can do is look at which suits you best, and make your decision based on that. If I want a high-end Dell for playing games, I don’t care that it costs more.. I care that it plays games. The reviewer failed to recognise this.
However, I enjoyed reading the article nonetheless.
“What kind of pricing did he do to get a personal computer from Dell up to almost 3000 dollars?”
Just try to add an extra processor and see the price jump
“People buy software to accomplish simple tasks like taking a screen shot, which is something you do not need on Linux and Windows.”
*sigh*
I heard that it can’t connect to the Internet or even show images in color.
This kind of argument will never end. PC users will always find fault with paying a couple of hundred extra than their el cheapo Dells that break down in twelve months, and Mac users will always point out that their machines last longer than PCs and come with several thousand dollars worth of software built-in for free.
It all boils down to how much you want to get engrained in a yearly PC upgrade cycle, which comes out way more expensive than an Apple computer. The next version of Windows is going to recommend 3Ghz, for Christ’s sake, while OS X Tiger still happily runs on a G3.
Yeah, it’s biased and more details would have been nice…. I definitely have my doubts about the results. But rebuttals like “You simply can not argue that Macs are cheaper cause it’s a lie” pretty well levels the playing field.
I’d go as far as to say “PC’s are cheaper if you either want stripped down junk (which is generally not available from Apple) or want to build your own system (and BTW, an awful lot of people don’t.)” Also, if you care nothing about usability: I’ve taken the attitude for years that the Windows UI slows me down more than any CPU could ever compensate.
If you’d care to loudly dispute any of that, please use “Re:Comparing Apples & …” in your subject line, to make it easier to skip over.
I would say Mac are now affrodables with the Mac mini, but still expensives..
By Timothy Baldridge (IP: —.iaa.us) – Posted on 2005-04-25 16:40:33
Go with AMD, build it yourself, and you can get a dual opteron for the same price as the dual G5. The dual opteron will beat the tar out of the dual G5. Besides, more software runs on PCs, and you computer will be useful for more than just work. Put Linux on it, and that’s one smoking machine.
I agree with you and I don’t think you’ll find anyone who’ll argue with you. The difference is this, apple caters to a very small part of the market right now. They’re a niche company. They do not cater to the do it yourselfer such as yourself. I mean look at it like this, sure you can build a computer but lets say you wanted a car you could take down to the drag strip…something fast that could get you to work if you needed it to(this is similar to the performance computer segment). If you’re like me you’d go out and buy a new Mustang GT or something similar. Lot’s of guys down at the track would laugh at you and say something like “Why’d you spend 25 grand when you could’ve bougt an old fox body mustang for 2 grand and dropped a 500 hp ford crate motor in it for another 5 grand?”. You see the parallel? There’s always cheaper ways to do it if you’ve got the skill and background, I personally don’t in automobiles so I buy it premade, same reason people buy Apples and Dells. In that segment apple is a great value. A computer that works and is easy to use. Whether Apple or Dell is a better value it’s close but I’ll leave that up to the buyer to decide
He claims these huge speed gains over intel/amd cpu’s but then says that he isnt going to go into any benchmarks, and claims a 1.6ghz is as fast as a old g4 1.0, and then he goes into how intel doesnt have any 64bit cpu’s and only apple does and how it is much better because everyone will buy a machine with more than 3gb of ram.
I do have to agree that dell does try and trick people into buying the more expensive models when you do go out and get a new computer but doesnt every company do this. He fails also fails to mention how apple does the same thing. Wish it could have went into benchmarks so we could have said that his benchmarks were biased too but that will have to wait for another day. As far as hating apple, well I dont, I like them but would not compare them to a pc or compare a pc to a mac. I think you can get more done with an apple with less hassle but you cant play the games on it, its kinda the same deal with linux but with a less flashy gui. Just to say I do have an emac with a 1.25 ghz and it doesnt feel as fast as my 1.7ghz althlon(but i am not comparing apples to apples so i will have to install linux to get a real feal for how both perform).
“The dual opteron will beat the tar out of the dual G5.”
Too bad it won’t run OS X.
this certainly turned huge fast, it was at comment one when I read the article.
“Furthermore, Apple machines that use the newer G5 RISC chip from IBM have an even greater advantage. Unlike Pentium and Celeron chips, which handle 32-bit processing, the G5 chip can handle 64-bit processing. Briefly, 64-bit chips can run longer, more complex instructions than 32-bit chips, so they will enable much more powerful data-intensive tasks such as audio and video encoding, advanced engineering design, and games. Another key advantage is that a 64-bit chip can recognize and use a lot more RAM. Windows 32-bit chips can address up to 3GB of RAM, and though that seems like a lot, it’s a puny amount compared with the theoretical 1,000GB capability of a 64-bit chip. ”
This paragraph is full of shit. With the addition of EMT64 and AMD64 processors to the x86 line, PC users have had 64 bit computing and they have had operating systems that use it before Mac users have.
I mean, just look at the way he calls it a “Windows 32-bit chip”.
This guy is just kicking around his own agenda. Here’s an excerpt from a sidebar on the page:
“A good friend of mine recently sent me a 9-page argument for why he’s using Rhapsody rather than an iPod/iTunes, and why he’s sticking with Windows rather than trying out a Macintosh. This guy is highly intelligent, well read, and well intentioned. But he also suffers from the general brainwashing I’ve noticed afflict many humans when it comes to thinking about all things Apple. I’ve observed a large number of humans who share these strange opinions. They probably don’t remember the night they were whisked away by Microsoft’s goons and subjected to hours of in-depth brain abuse, but their behavior certainly reveals the lasting effects of this treatment. I am beginning this blog by addressing the common, but peculiar and illogical arguments, that these humans make, reflecting their commonly held myths and misunderstandings about:”
Yeah, the 9-page argument does seem excessive (I suspect the guy might be exaggerating) but it just seems that this guy sees EVERYTHING as Apple vs. Microsoft. Linux? BSD? What the fuck is that? PC’s are for Windows, duh!
I’m *sick* of seeing the “RISC vs. CISC” argument whenever Macs come up. Why don’t people get it? Modern processors are a hybrid of *both* RISC and CISC designs. This isn’t the 1980’s anymore.
I agree!
I’m not american, so I have to orient myself by norwegian prices. Anyways, I’ve been looking into notebooks lately, planning to get one when I start my studies.
So, I’ve been looking around various online shops, trying to find a good bargain for a powerful portable solution.
I never considered Mac to be a viable alternative, as I can’t stand OS X, but in light of this article, I thought I’d put up a machine I pieced together, paired up against a Mac machine at the same price:
Customized Inspiron 6000
Price: 13.774,- nok
Specs:
Celeron M 1,5 ghz
15,4 widescreen monitor (1680×1050 px)
XP Home SP2
1024 mb ram
Radeon X300 Mobility 128mb
80 gb hd
The mac alternative:
Powerbook
Price: 13.290,- nok
Specs:
1,5 GHz PowerPC G4
12,1″ monitor (1024×768)
OS X “Panther”
512 MB ram
NVIDIA GeForce FX GO 5200 (64 MB DDR)
60 gb hd
Just for the hell of it, I thought I’d put up the “über” laptops against each other as well:
Inspiron 6000 (upgraded hd to 100 gb and dvd-rw):
Price: 21.876,- nok
Specs:
Pentium M 2 ghz
512 mb ram
17″ UltraSharp™ Wide Screen WUXGA (1920 x 1200)
Geforce GO 6800 ULTRA 256 mb (!!!)
100 gb hd
8x DVD-RW
The Mac alternative:
Powerbook 17″ Superdrive
Price: 22.990,- nok
Specs:
1,67 GHz PowerPC G4
17″ screen (1440 x 900)
512 MB ram
100 GB hd
ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 (128 MB DDR)
Claiming that Mac hardware is more reasonably priced than x86 hardware is wishful thinking.
And this point is just ridiculous:
“The most ridiculous case is their “budget” system. Walk into the store, and you look around and say, “Wow! Look at that, Martha! They have a computer for $299! It comes with a printer, too!” But what a crock that is. The $299 system is so ridiculously crippled that no one will ever walk out of the store with one and be happy. No, before you know it, the price has climbed way up, well above the Mac Mini comparably equipped.”
It seems to escape this guy that people buying a $299 computer with free printer isn’t after l33t multimedia capabilities, some people just need to read e-mail and news.
If you actually price any of these items yourself, you will quickly see his numbers are WAY off.
example:
imac w/512mb, 64mb fx5200, 160gbhd, 1.8Ghz PPC, 17inch Flat Panel= 1700 (no problem here, NOT a great computer, but OK)
but comparing it to a dell 8400 for 400 LESS you can get:
512mb, 256mb gf 6800, 250gb hdd, 3ghz HT, DVD+DVRr 2 drives, 17inch Flat Panel
This guy is SOOO full of it, this has to be a joke.
What you can get with $600 from Apple:
Answer: Mac Mini
1.42GHz PowerPC G4
256MB DDR333 SDRAM
ATI Radeon 9200 with 32MB DDR video memory
80GB Ultra ATA hard drive
Combo drive
DVI or VGA video output
What you can get with $600 from Dell:
Answer: Dell Dimension
3.2 ghZ P4 Hyperthreading
512 MB DDR2-400 Dual Channel
ATI Radeon X300 SE with 128MB RAM
80GB Serial ATA hard drive
DVD+-R/CD+-R Burner
DVI or VGA video output
17″ LCD Monitor
keyboard and mouse
Windows XP Home Edition
Conclusion:
I seriously want to buy a Mac. I love gadgets and gizmos and right now OS X is just that. I want to buy a Mac just to tinker with the OS a bit. It is something new and different and that just works like Windows. But, thanks to Dell, I’ve been able to resist the temptation. The Dell system is just too awesome of a deal to bother with anything else.
I think this guy is a bit off base. I wish Mac’s were legitimately less expensive. They aren’t ludicrously more expensive than windows machines, but they aren’t less expensive either. I recently went through the PC purchase process. I had to get a PC for my business because that’s what my target customers run. I got a decked out Dell Latitude D800 for about $2800. The closest equivalent Apple laptop, came out several hundred dollars more expensive. Unfortunately that laptop didn’t have some of the things I was insisting on in my purchase. I insist on having a 7200RPM hard disk. I insist on having a high resolution screen ~15″, greater than 1600×1200. I couldn’t get those options with the Apple laptop. That’s just the way it is folks.
Incidently, I also needed to spec a large network storage solution. The xServe/xRAID system came out far less expensive than the equivalent Dell systems, especially when factoring in software costs.
Creating a similar configuration based off of a 15″ PowerBook my loaded laptop + accessories (extra battery and MS Office) is still over $3000 at the Apple store. I bought my D800 last year. At least now I can give it a 128MB graphics card, before it was stuck at 64MB. That was another must have for my purposes. There is still no option for a 7200RPM drive or a higher resolution screen however.
Just for all those Mac heads who don’t know, I’m a Mac enthusiast, but I hold fast to reality on this issue. I’m probably going to end up replacing my beloved Mac Cube with a new Mini mac in the near term now that Tiger is being shipped. Is it more expensive than a brand new decked out tower, once you add reasonable amounts of RAM and a better CD drive? Yep. And I don’t care. 🙂
Niche? hmmm, CAD/CAM is niche… web serving is niche, Game playing is niche… The Mac is NOT niche but mainstream. Think about it, the ‘general user’ who wants to use the computer for office stuff, emails, photos, video editing (fathers with those DV cams etc.).
So I say… hey! Macs are more mainstream then the other. all IMHO, of course, but what do I know? I’m not a programmer, just a user.
Jb
if you build your own low end computer with generic parts, you will destroy any comparable apple offerings. if you build a computer with good parts, you will still win, but not at the same level.
if you buy a premade, top of the line machine, the price point is real comparable. i recently did a laptop comparison with toshiba models, its the same deal. low end isnt even a comparison, high end is real competitive. the toshiba was a bit less expensive, but the apple looked nicer, was significantly lighter, and looks like a wet dream. component wise they were pretty similar, with the toshiba having a bit of an edge there as well. for me, osx is a big selling point, thats what tipped the scales.
when you start geting into high end consumer electronics, things like industrial design start comming into play, and apple wins hands down. we are talking stuff like a sony vaio, or an alienware, or that acer firari that rob enderle likes so much. you are paying for something more then the sum of its parts. some people dont buy things like that, and if you are one of them you will NEVER be able to figure out why people would waste money on it.
Dude,
you ever hear of freeware??
V?lan?? Mplayer?
what about the included software on the mac,, good stuff..
I love it when a poster will nit pick one thing (that turns out to have an acceptable solution) but ignore the other cool things.
Sorry, the claims that leading-edge PowerPC chips are 1.67 times as fast as x86 chips with the same clock frequency are wildly off. Furthermore, the amount of work done per clock cycle has less to do with the instruction set architecture than with the ability of the processor to exploit instruction-level comparison. This has to do with the number of functional units, depth of pipelines, etc. and the result is that processors running the same ISA can vary greatly in performance given the same clock frequency. This can also depend on the type of load. To compare Intel and AMD, for example, Intel’s leading processors, because of their deep pipelines, do best on straight-line code or simple loops, while AMD does better at code with lots of branches and indirect calls.
While all benchmarks are imperfect, standard benchmarks such as SPEC that are based on real applications are a fair way to compare two machines. Let me assure you, the comparison will show that you pay a premium for a Mac. You might well feel that the premium is worth it, as Apple puts out well-designed computers. But you are paying a premium and no amount of spin will disguise that fact.
We have PCs in our small office … and one Mac Mini, purchased last month. I love the Mini. Fast enough for QuarkXpress corrections, which is what we bought it for. And, after using it for several weeks, it just feels like OS X is more refined than Windows XP.
I’d love to get a Mac … however …
I don’t wanna pay $600 (basically what you’d need to spend on a used G4 tower or a Mac Mini) for the privilege of using OS X. To me, the cost isn’t worth it, especially if I’d have to re-purchase a buncha apps (MS Office being the main one — and no, I don’t want to use OpenOfficeIdiocy.)
Now, if I *DIDN’T* have a PC yet … or, if the one I have gave me tons of trouble (which it doesn’t) … then, I’d be more tempted to just go with the Mini/OS X.
But, unlike other folks, my Athlon XP 2800+ with 1.5 GB RAM runs just fine, with only an occasional glitch. Not enough to warrant chucking all my Windows software and going Mac.
I just wish Jobs would release OS X on Intel/AMD/X86 … boy, if he did, OS X would dwarf Windows in minutes. 🙂
Comparisons between Mac and PC’s. This “is” a dead issue, however to humor those who read these postings here are my “2” cents.
Mac’s have thier declining
niche market. Period.
Mac’s are expensive. Their is
no getting around the Steve
Jobs Reality Distortion Field Period.
Apple is no longer a Computer
Company perse’. They are
a Multimedia Company. This is
where Apple is making thier
money on thier flimsy Ipods. Period.
Any propietry machine is going
to be expensive generic
reagrdless if it is a Mac
or PC. Period.
This “is” a PC world. Corporate Executives make Corporate decisions.
And they chose the PC. It always comes down to the bottom dollar. And Apple lost that battle 7 years ago.
If the author wanted to make a non-biased comparison of Mac vs PC, He should have done the other major players as well such as Gateway, Compaq/HP, Hell even E-machines for a cheap desktop.
I worked in a PC repair shop since 92. Don’t you dare tell me that Mac’s are easly to fix either. I’ll take a Dell over a Mac any day to trouble shoot.
They do make great paper wieghts though. I could go and ramble on in detail on my loathings on company known as Apple. I was one of the first who owned a Mac SE 30. Wonderful machine for its time. Now I do all of my graphic arts on a PC.
I get angry on what Apple could have been instead of what it is now. A company of Smoke and Mirrors
yeah, thats another thing. just because there USED to be a collosal difference between RISC and CISC doesnt mean there still is.
one thing the G4 has going for it is that it was designed for mobile devices, and consumes a fraction of the power that a p4 will. i wonder if apple laptops will be as attractive when/if they do G5 versions.
Yawn…. ancient argument that will never end.
Anyone can cook the numbers to support their point of view, just as the author has done in this case.
Any propietry machine is going
to be expensive generic
reagrdless if it is a Mac
or PC. Period.
Should read.
Any propietry machine is going
to be expensive over generic
reagrdless if it is a Mac
or PC. Period.
sorry about that
In the case of laptops (I’m not talking about the G5), the 1.67GHz Pentium-M is NEVER going to be the equivalent of a 1.0GHz G4. The 1.67 Pentium-M will smoke the 1.4~1.5GHz G4 ANY TIME! The Pentium-M has some features that the G4 was never designed to have. They are not comparable! For more info, check Arstechnica!
I am sad to see this published on OsNews. Because this will be read by many people who don’t actually know too much about CPUs and PC and MAC architectures, and they will think it’s like that.
Just more FUD from a MAC zealot! This is a SAD day!
(Before flaming me, remember that I excluded the G5, I do have a lot of respect for IBM’s processors)
The comparisons and writeups on this site are so biased that I suspect this is a troll. For a semi-decent comparison site, see
http://www.systemshootouts.org/
Mac’s are more expensive because you CAN’T build them yourself, you can’t go buy generic parts and get a cheap system up. You have to deal with Apple, and on that fact your buying the cool case, the white plastic and the cool designer cardboard box (which might very well be the most important part of any good computer system)
The problem is that Dell is constantly adding extra features at the same price much faster than Apple.
Everynow and then the ibooks and powerbooks seem competitively priced, or cheaper than the equivalent Dell offers. However,ram memory, video card, dvd burner etc, are upgraded at a very slow pace compared with Dell. Dell adds free monitors, dvd burners and other perks, etc and their computers appear to be a better deal. For example, shipping any osx computer with 256 ram is outrageous. In 2002, they were shipping ibooks running osx with 128 ram standard, which was a complete mistake since it degraded the user experience out of the box. They should be offering dvd burner across the whole line and 512 ram standar for every computer.
jobs will never ever let apple become a software company. jobs has been putting good computers in boxes for years now, and does a good job at that (just from a quality point of view, he also has this delusion people will pay for quality). this goes way back to the first apple, where he first starting going off the deepend was with the lisa, and then finally losing it completely with the NeXT cube.
dont expect apple to become a software company. what they make, will be made for their “experience”. expect them to be able to trounce microsoft/dell with the MCE deal, apple could make a computer for the living room in a heartbeat that would be better then anything possible from the dell industrial design department. thats the kind of place were you will see jobs taking apple. selling osx as an os would mean not selling a complete computer, and that is pretty much the opposit of steves’ vision. its going to be real interesting to see what happens in the next few years, if the shareholders dont keep him on a tight leash, i wouldnt be suprised at another lisa (retailing for 10k/box), jobs getting the boot again, and apple ending up in one of its standard bouts of irrelivancy. on the other hand, people may actually be willing to pay for the “information appliances” he has been selling for so many years now, and the ipod sure points in that direction. if he has actually learned something from the debacles he has been involved in, then we could see apple not defeating microsoft, but becomming the kings of a market that looks totally different from what it is today.
anyways, all that to say, dont ever expect apple x86 while jobs is at the healm.
If you insist on comparing them, at least attempt to include out-of-the-box value, not just hardware specs. With OS X, iLife, built-in PDF creation, a simple text editor that reads Word files, etc., Macintosh has it all over PCs.
where we get into the realms of insanity is the 2ghz pentium-m to a 1 ghz G4 (which i have had told to me, more then once *sigh*). 1.67 ghz pentium compared to a 1.5 g4 isnt too bad, the pentium is definately faster though. 2ghz pentium-m is definately more powerful then anything apple offers from their mobile line though.
The grief I get from working on a PC is priceless!
I want less grief so I use a Mac.
IMHO
Jb
The article is horrible. The intro is long-winded and shows a distinct lack of knowledge of CPU architecture. Pushing “barefeats” as an “objective sources of benchmarks” is laughable. Lastly, the configurations he chose are ridiculous.
Consider his “professional desktop”, where he prices the Precision Workstation vs a G5. First, anybody who uses “pro” systems knows that the Quadro is infinitely better for “real work” than the FX 5200, because the Quadro does line AA in hardware. Second, I have no idea how he arrived at the price he did. In order to get to $3200 on the Precision, I had to throw in a Quadro FX 1400, which would utterly destroy the FX5200 in the Mac.
Also look at his “consumer desktop”. How did he get to $1870 with those specs? Radeon X300??? Dell has a pre-built machine on their website that is $1500, includes the same CPU, and a GeForce 6800. Oh, and it has PCI Express too!
”
Besides, more software runs on PCs, and you computer will be useful for more than just work
”
From what I’ve seen, most of the software that runs on PCs seems to be crap. So if you want to run more crappy software, buy a PC.
My point exactly. Glad to see there are other people who realize that the G4 is too old to be compared to a modern CPU like Pentium-M featuring enhanced branch prediction, micro-op fusion and stack engine!
Next year, when we’ll have dual-core Pentium-Ms Yonah @ 2GHz, the MAC trolls will probably still be comparing the G4 to it, saying that it smokes the “old x86 architecture”! hahaha
I mean…will they ever get the G5 inside laptops? Seems that not anytime soon…
Till then, comparing G4s to Pentium-Ms is like comparing a 3dfx Voodoo3 AGP to an Nvidia GeForceFX 5900 Ultra…
“OMG teh G5’s 4r3 teh r0xx0rz cuz tey hav3 teh RISC!!11!oneone!11”
Does this guy have no idea what RISC means?
The distinctions of RISC/CISC/VLIW are basically not very useful anymore. Most desktop processors now include a SIMD unit, which basically disallows any of them from claiming the title of “RISC”, and modern x86 processors have RISC, CISC, and VLIW architectural components.
AMD processors have consistently outperformed Intel processors at lower frequencies for years now (with the exception of the Pentium M core).
“The fact is, those RISC chips Apple uses in both its consumer and pro-model products are the same kind that power high-end Unix workstations and servers”
No. Sorry, its not. That’s ok though. They’re pretty close to the same. Although, we can follow your logic and say that the X-Box 360 has 3 processors of the same kind that power high-end Unix workstations and servers. And it costs 1/3 what you pay for your Apple laptop. Microsoft wins again.
“Another key advantage is that a 64-bit chip can recognize and use a lot more RAM.”
Yes, they do use a lot more RAM. The native word size is twice as big, so typically, any variables (numerical and pointer) that are the size of the native word size, occupy twice as much space as their 32-bit counterparts. Now, that doesn’t nullify the advantage of addressing a lot more RAM – absolute worst case (and likly impossible to achieve) is that the program will occupy 2x as much ram, but the limit on the amount of RAM is exponentially more.
There are some other very funny lines, but I’ll leave those as an exercise to the reader.
One of my favorites, that I’ll leave you to play with, is
Basically, for every 7 steps a RISC chip (like the G4 or G5) takes in completing a process, a CISC (complex instruction set computing) chip like Intel’s or AMD’s takes about 15.
Let’s just assume for the sake of argument that the article is not biased and the pricing is accurate. I saw on the comparison of desktop systems, they have a 64MB vid card on each system. Well, I’m sorry but you’re going to get a HELLUVA lot more performance with a 64MB vid card on an XP machine than you will OSX. The problem with OSX is that for as good as people say it is, you DO need more horsepower to run it at the same speed than you do XP. (This is assuming, of course, that you know how to run an XP box properly – eg .. not having 30+ apps running at startup in the system tray.) Of course, when Longhorn comes out (which will require a LOT of horsepower), than maybe these types of comparisons will be accureate. And of course, as pointed out, you can get a PC much cheaper if you build one yourself. But apparently, Mac people aren’t smart enough to do that – that’s why they pay all that money for a Mac
Also, the Mac zealots need to get over this lie that buying a PC means it’s gonna die in a year. I just retired one last year after 13 years of service (started as a 386 w/4MB RAM, ended as a P233). The slower of my two PCs (Athlon 1.2ghz) was bought back in 2001 and I have replaced NONE of the parts on it, except for the hard drive. Another one of my old PCs is a P3-450 w/192MB RAM that was bought back around ’98 – it’s now owned by a friend of mine. Still runs quite nicely and has more than enough horsepower to run XP. So, unless you go out and buy a $300 e-Machine, there’s nothing that says a PC is going to give up the ghost after being owned for a year or less.
“Windows 32-bit chips can address up to 3GB of RAM, and though that seems like a lot, it’s a puny amount compared with the theoretical 1,000GB capability of a 64-bit chip.”
3GB? If the memory is byte-addressable, and we use a 32-bit address, then we should be able to address up to 2^32 bytes, or 4 GB.
And 2^64 is a lot larger than 1,000 GB! It’s more like 17,000,000,000 GB.
Dear Lord! I am getting sick of Apple apologists.
If you do a fair comparison, that is what you would get in my opinion.
I was recently hunting for a PC and did a lot of comparisons. Finally, it came down to emachine for desktop and IBM Thinkpad Express for mobile. I bought the ThinkPad due to low weight and robustness-I did not want the ugly and huge eMachine in the house-not enough room in the apartment. The PC was not that different in price from the 15′ PowerBook that I also have but did not have the DVD burner.
The PC came with no useful software on it except for Norton Antivirus that keeps bugging me each time I log on. The Mac came with Quickbooks, Omnioutliner, Omnigraffle, Graphic Converter,Mail, iLife (iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, iDVD), Preview, Safari, Chess, Zinio reader, Address book, systemwide spell checker . Text Edit that can open Word documents. Some nice utilities on the Mac (no need for Nero for burning CDs or DVD). The Mac has built in ability to format drives and burn CDS and DVDs using either the Finder or Disk Utility. Other utilities include a System Profiler (which identifies all hardware specifications either on the Mac or connected to it via USB or FireWire), Process Viewer, Activity monitor, Audio MIDI setup, Console, digital Color meter, Grab (to grab screen shots- also possible to get screen shots using built in key strokes), ColorSync Utility, Bluetooth assistant, Keychain (to safely store all passwords), Netinfo manager, Network utility, ODBC administrator and so on.
The Mac has a nice network browser right in the Finder, to connect to both Macs and PCs, an easy to set up Firewall (one click to turn it on), and super easy to set up Apache Web server-again one click! Any thing one can print can also be saved as PDF document. It also came with airport card and bluetooth.
There is a lot of very high quality freeware and shareware available for the Mac at http://www.versiontracker.com/index.shtml. You can also install X-code-FREE developer software /IDE suite and write your own programs using a number of different programming languages. Fink and X11 (comes preinstalled now, I believe) allows you to use OSS and even run KDE or GNOME window managers.
My Mac also came with restore DVDs so that I can install the OS and all software in case I needed to change the hard drive. No such luck with the ThinkPad- Once the HD fails, I am sunk. That reminds me, I need to ‘ghost’ the HD onto CDs. I don’t know how to do that on the PC without another program, but on the Mac you can create drive images using the Disk utility.
As everyone knows here, Os X Panther is leaps and bounds ahead of Windows XP in all departments and is the one of most important reasons to get a Mac. Also all Macs, with the right amount of RAM, are perfectly capable of running Os X and all included software including Video editing really well (this includes the PowerBook with only a G4 processor).
As you see from this partial list of software and hardware, the Mac is ready for serious work from the get go.
From all the posts from PC users, it appears that PC users only look at specs before buying the PC-cause that is the only way to differentiate one manufacturer from the other. But one should not compare a Mac to a PC on Hardware specs alone.
Just buy the Mac that best suits your needs and budget. There is a Mac for all budgets and it will not disappoint you. The best thing is that you don’t have to worry that your computer will get infected while going online and upgrading the OS. I was very concerned while I upgraded the XP professional with SP2 since I had read that within the first 20 minutes of getting online, a PC has the potential to become infected with malware and it took more than 20 minutes even on cable to upgrade the OS. I am, therefore, never online with the PC and use it for those software that is not available on the Mac-in my case Fritz 8- the chess program that is available only for the PC. I never use the PC for on line banking for the same reason.
Just to able to go online without worry is sufficient reason for anyone to get a Mac, in my opinion.
Happy computing!
Has anyone done a real price comparison of equivalent specification Macs and PCs? It could be genuinely interesting and informative, unlike this laughably biased article.
Macs are generally better made than the average PC and IMO they have a much better OS. But you can definitely get a faster PC for your money, even if it’s made from high quality components. You really have to twist the facts and play with the figures to make Macs seem cheaper.
It seems to escape this guy that people buying a $299 computer with free printer isn’t after l33t multimedia capabilities, some people just need to read e-mail and news.
That’s very true. I know plenty of people still happily using Pentium II and <400Mhz Celeron PCs. If you just want to type letters, web browse, use spreadsheets, do simple image manipulation, etc. then even the lowest spec modern PC is more than adequate.
A lot of thought and care goes into producing not only the Mac hardware but all the software and even the packaging. Even the box in which the Apple hardware comes is well made. Mac is not a cheap machine but a well designed one. For cheap and throw-away stuff you cannot beat the PC but it is gut wrenching to even through away the box that the Mac computer comes in. You get what you pay for with the Mac. I know, I own both.
This article seems very biased, and also has some errors;
[quote]
3GB? If the memory is byte-addressable, and we use a 32-bit address, then we should be able to address up to 2^32 bytes, or 4 GB.
[/quote]
Usually x86 systems reserve half of the addressable space for the kernel. This (at least under Windows) can be changed, so that the user has a 3GB user-mode address space.
This is in fact an OS issue, and I think this scheme is used in every modern system (but I might be wrong here).
The author seems not to have heard about Windows XP x64. IIRC it was to be launched today, and – unlike the 64-bit Tiger – this system is a free upgrade for previous XP Pro users (don’t know about Home).
Also the part about RISC vs. CISC is not really true; how do AMDs compare to the PowerPCs? An AMD equivalent of a P4 3000MHz typically runs at about 1900MHz. So it seams the instructions per cycle ratio is even better on AMD processors. And AMDs definitely are CISCs…
Apples are still somewhat more expensive than PCs, even the ones built at Dell, although they are much more affordable than a few years ago.
32bit chips can address 4GB but can’t use all of that for programs due to other things needing to be mapped into the range as well. I believe I have read in the past that XP can use up to 2GB of ram for programs. Of course, ia32 can address 64GB with PAE (36bit) though it suffers a major slowdown by using it.
The 1000GB comment he made was a bit off but not far from the truth. At least with the current AMD64 chips they can only address 40bit physical (1TB) and 48bit virtual (256TB). The G5 may have similar limitations. Theoretically of course a 64bit chip can use 2^64 bytes of memory.
“From what I’ve seen, most of the software that runs on PCs seems to be crap. So if you want to run more crappy software, buy a PC.”
http://perversiontracker.com/ (Though the name might imply otherwise, this is completely SFW. Think of it as Something Awful meets VersionTracker.)
http://www.systemshootouts.org/
Its not about the guy being bias. He was simply getting tired of hearing about how macs are Soooo expensive etc. There are always ways rig shopping up at Dell.com to play in either directions favor. I’ve even experimented with this myself.
The bottem line in my experience is that Neither is cheaper than the other. You can argue it both ways. If you configure the Dell with all similar features…including upgrading to XP pro from Home, they are about as much as the equivalent macs. However, its important to note that his take on performance is way off. The simple fact is you get more horsepower for your buck with x86 all day long. To contrast that, you get a better OS and Software packages for you buck with the Mac. Its a 2 way street no matter how you look at it.
Everyone just needs to buy what they want and stop whining. I use x86 for my Linux servers, and x86 AMD box for my game rig, and I do all my other computing on a mac powerbook. Use what works for you and makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside and stop ripping on what works for other people.
It all boils down to how much you want to get engrained in a yearly PC upgrade cycle, which comes out way more expensive than an Apple computer. The next version of Windows is going to recommend 3Ghz, for Christ’s sake, while OS X Tiger still happily runs on a G3.
—
That may be true, be we have four Macs in our publications dept, all of the G4’s with 1.5GB of RAM (the maximum for G4’s) and they’re basically unusable for anything that department does. They all run OS X.3.latest.
The PC’s we use are on a three-year update cycle, and they’re basically all pathetically unusable with Windows OR OS X by then. That’s just the nature of the industry.
…I wish that Mac advocates would stop using hyperbole that makes them sound like wrestling fans.
The emperor has beautiful clothes. That the populace hardly spent any tax money at all. It truly is a miracle.
If people were honest they would say that they are willing to pay more for the hardware in order to run OSX. Apple has a business model where they rely on higher margins for their hardware in order to drive their business. There’s nothing wrong with that as long as it works for them.
Of course this whole debate could go away if they would release an x86 version of OSX, but that’s not probably happening anytime soon. Maybe when Apple has no dependencies on Microsoft.
i might agree that the 2ghz Pentium M is a wonderfull chip and that its faster then the G4 1.67ghz… HOWEVER you have to be kidding me if you think the pentium M 1.5 is worlds faster then a G4 1.5 ..
I have a powerbook with 512MB ram (g4 1.5ghz the new alu one) AND i have a 1.5ghz pentium M Compaq Evo laptop with 512MB ram.. in photoshop, which i suspect IS real work, there is no comparison in speed.. the G4 IS actually faster (ok lets blame it on altivec optimization) in GCC compiling gaim the powerbook IS faster by quite a bit ( i don’t have a stop watch, sorry, i’ll make something more clearlater) so while i agree that the 2ghz pentium m is the fastest mobile chip around, so far the G4 is holding up DAMN well in the world.
Now would all those PC and MAC trolls please stop comparing apple to PC . numbers can be interpreted as needed.. these are 2 different architectures… noone ever compares a SUN station to a PC.. WHY?… or a HPUX station. they might not be a consumer product but still comparable in the pro area.
IMHO the PC experience used to be so fast but nowadays its as slow as anything out there, no matter WHAT processor etc you have.. as soon as PC users turn on the ANTI everything suite (anti virus, anti spam, anti adware, firewall..) it comes down to normal levels, just like everything else.
and with dual core.. well great you will have 1 core for ANTI and one core for Usage… so ou are back to square one. since apples don’t usually have ANTI suites installed. (that was a flamebait.. sorry)
my 2 cents
FR
http://www.2blocksaway.com
http://pcnmac.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=326&sid=6f1c5fdfb84e20fbe6…
just helped a friend get a dell laptop
The notebook was configured as:
Reg Price: $2205
Sale Price: $1455 ($750 off) ($750 off $1899 Inspiron Notebooks Coupon Code 1DSDZQPDRZH$L7 [Exp 4/26, 5:59am CDT])
Free shipping $0 (saved an additional $49) UPS Ground
Tax: $72.75
Total: $1,527.75
Inspiron 700m
Intel® Pentium® M Processor 745 (1.80 GHz/400MHz FSB/2MB Cache)
12.1-in WXGA (1280 x 800 resolution)
Intel® Extreme Graphics up to 64 MB shared memory
Memory 1GB DDR SDRAM 2 Dimms
Hard Drive 80 GB Hard Drive
Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Network Adapters Integrated 10/100 Network Card
Modem Internal 56K Modem
CD ROM/DVD ROM 8x CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) with double-layer write capability
Wireless Networking Card Intel® PRO/Wireless 2200 Internal Wireless (802.11 b/g, 54Mbps)
Primary Battery 4-cell Lithium Ion Primary Battery (32WHr)
Limited Warranty, Services and Support 3Yr Ltd Warr,At-Home Service,and Tech Support plus Nights and Weekends
1 Firewire 1394
2-USB 2.0 (Universal Serial Bus) compliant 4-pin connectors
Audio jacks: Line-out (external speakers/headphone) and external microphone
Video: 15-pin monitor connector for external monitor
S-Video/TV Out: 7-pin mini-DIN connector
Memory: Secure Digital memory slot
Connectors: Supports (1) Type I or Type II card (3.3 and 5 V cards supported)
Weight: 4.1 lbs. (1.86 kg)
Thickness: 1.5 inches (38.1 mm)
Width: 11.7 inches (297 mm)
Depth: 8.5 inches (216 mm)
Free Dell Color Printer 720 ($49 value)
Compare to an iBook or Powerbook 12″ model:
ibook is 4.9lbs
powerbook is 4.6
both only have 1024×768 res
neither have a PC card slot
ibook doesn’t offer a dvd burner at all
if you configure both to be as close as possible to the above dell you get prices of
ibook $1873 plus tax
powerbook $2,473 plus tax at apple’s store
yep, macs are expensive.
(if you then want to argue software, add Nero 6 Ultra for $29 and Adobe Premiere and Photoshop Elements 3 for $100. The two of those easily compare more favorably against iLife that comes on the two Macs)
A 13 year old PC is from a different era, when they were actually built well. Today’s Dell’s and HP’s are essentially junk.
Apple isn’t at the top of quality surveys just by sheer dumb luck. Skill and effort put them there.
OSX is the biggest part for sure. But I also prefer the asthetics of Mac hardware. Park a top of the line Dell next to a 17″ Powerbook and you will understand. Its hilarious. Of course that sort of thing doesn’t matter to a lot of people, so they can go enjoy their x86 stuff……just let me enjoy mine without giving me the third degree.
I amazed reading this forum how little respect some people have for a VERY successful company with VERY successful products. Apple has several billions in the bank folks. And they’ve done that without having a world monopoly. And please don’t say its because of iPod….thats another great myth. Ipod has no doubt added a ton of cash to Apples fortunes, but it still accounts for less than 30% of their income.
You still haven’t duplicated the software you get with an Apple. You’re not really trying are you.
Please tell me youre joking. So you basically just copied and pasted yesterdays Dell deal from firingsquad or gotapex. Dont be ridiculous. Those coupon codes are good for the first 4000 that sign up and generally you have to get on them the second they go live because they are gone within minutes. Its absurd to compare a very brief point in time $750 off rebate because Dell was on inventory control to a regular priced retail Mac.
Park a top of the line Dell next to a 17″ Powerbook and you will understand.
I just don’t care about some vague “aesthetics”. I want functionality. And I’ve found Powerbooks to be woefully underpowered and way more expensive compared to the type of notebooks I’m always in the market for. http://www.pctorque.com.
…not to mention, with the Dell you get the ability to make your office sound like the tarmac of the USS Nimitz.
Please folks, when my 1.6Ghz Pentium M cranks up it sounds like the Space Shuttle preparing for takeoff. My Powerbook – nada.
Those of you with AMD’s or high-end Intels also don’t factor in the near brown-out of the grid you create every day when you power your desktop up. Those fans are amazing! Can we include the increased electric bill in your desktop price comparison?
If you do save a couple of hundred on the Dell, at least you can afford the sound-cancelling Bose headphones so you can get some work done. 😉
Regards.
You all are a bunch of whiners. Entertaining, but useless whiners. Use what you wish, but don’t try to fudge your numbers.
Ohh, the mac comes with more software… not really XP has a lot of extra software that people don’t give them much credit for. Oh, you have to pay for yearly upgrades to iLife ( and you complain about windows )? How much does MS office cost under the mac?
Just live with the fact that until mac hardware starts selling at the volume that x86 hardware sells it will never be as inexpensive as Dell.
No, it’s not ridiculous to use those sales. Dell runs these things all the time, and all it takes to get a good deal like that is a bit of legwork. Paying the listed price for Dell equipment is like paying sticker price at the car dealer! Only people with more money than sense do it… The other day, I got a 2405FPW for $899. All I did was watch Fatwallet for couple of days, then call the appropriate sales agent when I saw the special. Took me maybe 20 minutes of time over two days, and I saved $300 off the regular price. This sort of thing just isn’t possible with Apple hardware.
All the fancy features of OS X and iLife can be easily reproduced using included or freely avaiable software.
OpenOffice can freely cover all your MS-format and PDF needs, WMP 10 mops the floor with iTunes – both in regards to support for players and choice of store – and the library function works quite well both for audio and movies (no codec woes with ffdshow installed), free utilities like Irfanview and Picasa handles my photo collection excellently, for audio editing there’s Audacity, for video-editing there’s Windows Movie Maker 5.1. (With a decent VIVO card, it’s actually quite usable for home movies. (To claim that iMovie is professional grade goods would be a blatant lie, no matter how much one loves Apple.)
As for security; I don’t think there’s one aspect of security that can’t be covered without additional costs; anti-virus, firewall, encryption, all available in free software packages, patches are downloaded free. (There was no cost in updating from XP to SP1/SP2, unlike the OS X version increments)
Sure, everything isn’t 100% integrated, and it requires a bit of bandwidth and time spent, but for the money I save, I consider it worth it. Plus, I’m a gamer, without STEAM, the Mac platform is worthless to me.
Anyways, I better stop typing now. I’m just feeding the pinstriped trolls.
“both in regards to support for players” above should read “both in regards to support for portable mp3 players”. Sorry.
That’s not really a fair comparison. Dell laptops are generally desktop-replacement machines. The Pentium-M is a *lot* faster than a G4 at the same clockspeed (a P-M is more comparable to an Athlon or G5 at the same clockspeed). If you want something comparable to the Powerbook, get one of those low-voltage PIII laptops Dell sells. Those are cool, quiet, and will perform just as well as a G4 at the same clockspeed.
Unfortunately for Apple, the shoe is on the other foot when it comes to desktops. I’ve got three Dell P4 desktops in this room, and they are nearly inaudible 2-feet away. You have to strain to hear them above the ambient noise. Meanwhile, the G5 powermacs are quite rather loud.
“Those of you with AMD’s or high-end Intels also don’t factor in the near brown-out of the grid you create every day when you power your desktop up. Those fans are amazing! Can we include the increased electric bill in your desktop price comparison?”
Is that why G5 towers ship with a 600w power supply and NINE fans plus two liquid cooling units?
No, the G5s ship with liquid cooling and 9 fans so that they’re SILENT. (and they are, even under a heavy load)
These fans aren’t the snow-blower types you see in x86 boxes, there’s 9 of them so they can be lower-rpm, ans quieter.
You also have to look at total cost of ownership when you decide the cost of going with Apple compared to Generic x86 (Generic meaning any of the x86 line; IBM, Dell, Compaq/HP, etc…) Due to the cost and availability of software for the PC the PC has way better cost of ownership than Apple. This article did not make out that point; so no matter how much you compare “System specs per performanc/Cost per performance” you are still better off with x86. Heck, even cost per performance is cheaper.
Jim
“These fans aren’t the snow-blower types you see in x86 boxes, there’s 9 of them so they can be lower-rpm, ans quieter.”
Right, and on a PC one can choose to use high quality low RPM, 120mm fans to reduce noise. I don’t think Apple has a patent on low decibel fans.
Um, Dell doesn’t ship “snow-blower” fans either. They use a couple of high-volume, low-RPM fans, along with ducting. In any case, I think it’d be intellectually honest to point out that the G5s (PowerMac, not iMac) are still quite loud, and a lot of people have complained about how much noise they make. Well, that’s what you get when you ship a machine with overclocked CPUs…
If macs are so cheap why arn’t there more of ’em?
If ever there was a place for low-decibel fans it’s in a laptop. Stand next to my Penium M while it’s compiling code and try to have a conversation without yelling. I have trouble hearing someone ten feet away when they speak normally.
Not to mention, I’m tethered to a wall far more often than I am with my Powerbook.
This IS a never ending argument but this article was sort of a good read until the author just starts with his “I love Apple” banter.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I own and work on both, I even used to work for Apple. Fact remains though Apple is certainly NOT cheaper.
First off, from a consumer perspective who cares which architecture is better? I can really see someone waltzing into to Best Buy and arguing who processor is *faster* with a store rep. Most people will tell you what they want their machine to do, and that’s about it. That being said, both a low end Dell, and Apple are more than adequate for “everyday tasks”.
Other points:
“Starting this week, Apple will be delivering a major update to its Mac OS X operating system that will be able to take full advantage of those G5 chips, and Macintosh software vendors will be re-working their applications to take advantage of this. For various reasons, Windows PC’s are still stuck in 32-bit computing, and it’ll be some time before they catch up.”
What time zone do you live in, Mars? There has been a 64 bit version on Linux out for alomost ten years, right?
There are 64 bit AMD and (finally) Intel chips out right?
There has been a 64-bit version of Windows (beta) for about a year, correct? The hell do you mean they will never catch up? Furthermore, Panther is not a full 64-bit OS, and neither will Tiger be. Ever seen a 64-bit OS install on a non 64-bit platform? Then you understand my point. So if anything, Apple has some catching up to do.
Furthermore, your shopping experience shouldn’t even be in this article because this implies that somehow that every Apple store magically has a more helpful and knowlegeable staff. This is pretty much a crapshoot. Just another quick point though, I hope your shopping experience isn’t based on the Apple store in Towson, MD. These people know less about Macs then I do, and they SPECIALIZE in the “bait and switch” tactic.
“Dell capitalizes on consumer confusion about PC specs too, by providing more choices than you can possibly absorb, or need. It’s like the way I feel sometimes when I go to the drugstore to pick out cold medicines. These days, there are varieties on the varieties, and maximum on the maximum strengths. I don’t know enough about marketing to understand the motivation for this profusion of unnecessary choices, but I do know that it makes shopping more stressful than it should be”
This implies Apple doesn’t capitilize on consumer confusion. Remember a certain COURT ORDER demanding Apple stop advertsing the G5 as the “worlds fastest computer” when it clearly is NOT? Or how about that nasty little battery issue with the iPod that resulted in a class action lawsuit? Now in fairness to Apple, almost every major electronics/computer supplier engages in devious selling tactics. That’s just marketing for you.
In closing I’d say buy whatever works for you, and do your own research.
You surely are wrong…the $1499 iBook includes a DVD burner (a.k.a. SuperDrive). If you add bluetooth, an 80GB HD, an extended 3 year warrantry that also covers an Apple Display if you choose to buy one, will set you back $1800. Add a 1GB memory stick from TransIntl or OWC for $200 (as opposed to the $500 apple charges) and the iBook makes a better deal than the Dell, because it includes a real video card with real 64MB of VRAM as opposed to the shared memory Intel thing.
Oh and don’t bring me that resolution argument…in a 14″ screen, 1024 x 768 is the optimal resolution. Everyone I know hates the high-res dell displays as they force you to use Large Fonts which breaks a lot of programs (good and bad)….
I picked up a Dell 8400 for my brother
3Ghz processor
1Gb of ram
dvdburner
ati x300 videocard
19inch LCD screen
for $699 before a $100 mail in rebate its true it was a 3 hour window deal but these things pop up all the time.
He could have added Elvis at the end to lend credibility to the rest of the article.
Which PowerBook and which Dell do you have?
//Everyone I know hates the high-res dell displays as they force you to use Large Fonts which breaks a lot of programs (good and bad).//
Funny, I’m using an Dell Inspiron 5100, with a 14″ screen, at 1400×1050, and I see none of the “Large Fonts” you’re talking about.
What are you referring to?
Ah, Apple messed up by using too many bitmaps in their GUI, and now the Apple apologists are trying to explain why Apple laptops can’t use the wonderful high-res screens you see in the x86 world. 1600×1200 is a *wonderful* resolution for a 14-15″ screen. It makes text look super sharp, and is much easier on the eyes. If you remember to use the DPI setting (rather than the ‘large fonts’ setting) in Windows, most recent apps will work just fine. Those that don’t, well, they get deleted — they’re simply not worth losing such good-looking text.
“You surely are wrong…the $1499 iBook includes a DVD burner (a.k.a. SuperDrive). If you add bluetooth, an 80GB HD, an extended 3 year warrantry that also covers an Apple Display if you choose to buy one, will set you back $1800. Add a 1GB memory stick from TransIntl or OWC for $200 (as opposed to the $500 apple charges) and the iBook makes a better deal than the Dell, because it includes a real video card with real 64MB of VRAM as opposed to the shared memory Intel thing.
Oh and don’t bring me that resolution argument…in a 14″ screen, 1024 x 768 is the optimal resolution. Everyone I know hates the high-res dell displays as they force you to use Large Fonts which breaks a lot of programs (good and bad)….”
Sorry that was a comparison of 12″ laptops, not 14″. You can toss out the video card issue and the Dell side can toss out things like the dvd burner or it being dual layer or it having a PC Card slot for future expansion. Some things are a toss up, but an ATI 9200 with 32MB memory is a dog too, so don’t put it up as a showstopper. These are laptops not gaming rigs. As for resolution, that is a user specific preference and its nice to have the option for higher res if you want it. On the Macs its not an option.
revenant: If ever there was a place for low-decibel fans it’s in a laptop. Stand next to my Penium M while it’s compiling code and try to have a conversation without yelling. I have trouble hearing someone ten feet away when they speak normally.
(Note I’m not hard of hearing)
Somehow… I doubt that… My Windows/Linux laptop (not a Pentium M granted) makes basicly zero noise. In fact I have to strain to hear it. (It’s a Gateway) And I use it to compile all the time.
My friend’s Pentium M Windows laptop makes basicly zero noise as well. I had to strain to hear that one too. (Can’t remember who made it)
I also have to strain to hear this dual processor Xeon I’m sitting next to right now. (That’s a Dell)
Now… With one of my machines which has a fan that is off, you can hear that one quite clearly. (In fact, it’s one of the loudest fans in a computer I’ve ever heard) But even then you still don’t have to yell to have a conversation.
You can also hear this external fan setup I have for my large number of external devices. But even sitting next to it you still don’t have to yell by any stretch of the imagination.
So… I’d have to say… Either you are seriously exaggerating, something is wrong with your laptop, or you have one… Interesting… Laptop there.
I run 1600×1200 on my 15″ UXGA panel, and it’s wonderful. I would never buy a laptop that wouldn’t allow me to run at that resolution. It’s crystal clear
Some posts about RISC and CISC reminded me of some interesting articls I read at http://www.realworldtech.com. The first is from mid-2003 . . . but not much has changed since then. It’s a good look at the economics of Pentium’s and why there’s no performance difference.
http://www.realworldtech.com/page.cfm?ArticleID=RWT060503232439
Along with it, an article a year later made some predictions about future processor developments that’s sort of related. I think it’s pretty interesting, and puts IBM’s/Sony’s CELL idea in a good light, and the latest released of dual core processors.
http://www.realworldtech.com/page.cfm?ArticleID=RWT062004172947
Oh, and there’s an old article on the same site that you could argue is still valid today, maybe.
http://www.realworldtech.com/page.cfm?ArticleID=RWT021300000000
All of the articles are from the same person, so any bias on his part would be reflected in all of the articles. It’s still more in depth than usual web sites like Tomshardware or Anand.
First he states how a CISC chip with a RISC core and a translator can’t make up for the disadvantages of CISC. He then proceeds to state that G5’s 64bit instructions allow for more complex instructions. While yes, this is true, it does allow for more complex instructions making up for one of the disadvantages of RISC (more correctly called load-store), this is still a bit of a contradiction of his over-simplification that RISC > CISC. I wish it were that simple.
Error 2: There is no Windows chip sold on the market TMK. All x86 chips are non-specific to any feature of Windows (i.e., anyone else can use all the instructions present).
Error 3: 64bit address systems aren’t limited to 1000GB. They’re limited to 2^64 bytes: 2^32*2^32 = appr(4,000,000,000) * appr(4,000,000,000). Maybe G5 limits itself to a terabyte.
Error 4: Pentium M is a lot more efficient per clock than he understands: A 2.13GHz Pentium M is a better buy than any laptop processor coming out of Apple. Facts are: Pentium M is one of the nicest things Intel is producing, and it’s new. G4e is really showing its age. Now powerbook vs. latitudes; I’d definitely buy the power book: Better casing, better features, motherboard turned in the correct direction, etc.
And the biggest error: Apples are made affordable for more reasons:
1.) They run the latest OS longer: Apple was kind enough to place 3d accelerators in their old imacs, and lo-and-behold today you can run OS X 10.3 on the oldest iMac (we’re talking 1997 folks) with a hefty memory upgrade.
2.) They are generally more durable than many, but not all, pc manufacturers. Some PC manufacturers seem to use some really crappy parts; I think Dell is NOT one of these.
3.) They have a resell value.
4.) Their laptops are cased better.
5.) They often have better power-consumption.
6.) You can’t get much more quiet than a Mini.
7.) The commercial OS commonly available in retail stores for them is rediculously more powerful and has far better free ($$$) software available (Fink repos vs. download.com).
8.) They don’t endlessly talk about work they haven’t finished! *cough* Longhorn *cough*
“if this then why didn’t people care” scenario.
Well since we are into hypotheticals that work in a perfect world: If Adolph Hitler was a scumbag why did he gain power?
Please, no inane/stupid comments like that. It’s just rediculous to think that something’s true quality is its determining factor of success in either a free market or world politics.
If lights are shiny but meaningless, then why are people attracted to them?
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Man – I must say that I enjoye the article – but I am enjoying the comments even more! i cannot belive people have made a mountain out of a molehill!
“All the fancy features of OS X and iLife can be easily reproduced using included or freely avaiable software.
OpenOffice can freely cover all your MS-format and PDF needs, WMP 10 mops the floor with iTunes – both in regards to support for players and choice of store – and the library function works quite well both for audio and movies (no codec woes with ffdshow installed), free utilities like Irfanview and Picasa handles my photo collection excellently, for audio editing there’s Audacity, for video-editing there’s Windows Movie Maker 5.1. (With a decent VIVO card, it’s actually quite usable for home movies. (To claim that iMovie is professional grade goods would be a blatant lie, no matter how much one loves Apple.)
As for security; I don’t think there’s one aspect of security that can’t be covered without additional costs; anti-virus, firewall, encryption, all available in free software packages, patches are downloaded free. (There was no cost in updating from XP to SP1/SP2, unlike the OS X version increments)
Sure, everything isn’t 100% integrated, and it requires a bit of bandwidth and time spent, but for the money I save, I consider it worth it. Plus, I’m a gamer, without STEAM, the Mac platform is worthless to me.
Anyways, I better stop typing now. I’m just feeding the pinstriped trolls.
”
Too bad WMP 10 sounds like shit. You have to be joking about Windows Movie Maker. The paragraph with the reference to the “STEAM” malware says it all. Typical gamer.
Windows Movie Maker does it’s job if all you’re going to do is to clip together a family video to show the next time grandma’ is over for coffee. If you’ve professional needs, you’ll be using the top line Adobe programs anyway. (Like a Mac pro would use Final Cut)
As for STEAM, I like it. Never caused me or my system grief, and it keeps my games up to date without any needed effort.
Well this is the last straw for me the constant flame bait on this site, all you trolls, that’s it – I’m leaving. This whole OS X versus Linux versus Windows thing is just way too old, this site is a joke.
/me removes OSNews.com from his bookmarks.