MacBooks are NOT overpriced!

[shahin90]

I have a retina macbook pro and I use Windows through bootcamp for my work and is pretty much the main OS for my work environment(unfortunately).

I tried to buy the new Lenovo X1 carbon through Lenovo's website and give PCs another try since I use Windows mostly. The pricing is INSANE. Same configuration as a 13inch retina macbook pro with 8gb ram, 256gb SSD, i7 processor costs $2319 vs. the 13inch retina MacBook with the same specs at $1699

http://shop.lenovo.com/ca/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/

I then asked the Lenovo sales agent online to give me a student discount and they offered me $100 off and I told them about Apple giving more student discount and without the hassle of negotiating with a sales agent and this is what he told me:

Lenovo agent: "But Apple charges you so much more"
Me: "The same spec device is cheaper on Apple's website"
Lenovo agent: "You don't have to buy it if you hate Lenovo so much"

Anyways, I changed my mind and won't ever buy a Lenovo product because of all the hassle to go through and the rude agents/customer representatives.

I don't understand why everyone thinks Apple products are more expensive than the competition and so hard to buy a nice Windows machine...

 

[aziatiklover]

Try Dell with their newer line that just came out from CES.

 

[shahin90]

Try Dell with their newer line that just came out from CES.

I have always heard horrific stories with the XPS laptop and their trackpad being the worse thing ever.

 

[Cloudsurfer]

If people would actually do some more research instead of just comparing numbers they would indeed find that Macs are not overpriced at all. Apple only uses Intel's highest end chips which makes Macs so expensive.

However apple doesn't adjust prices for Macs that have not been updated in years, so in those cases you do pay an Apple premium. The 2012 Mac mini was a good example of that.

 

[Freyqq]

Macs are expensive because they only sell high-end. That being said, macbook airs are getting overpriced. Not really an excuse anymore for them to not have high-dpi screens.

 

[leman]

To be fair, you should also keep in mind that the X1 is an ultraportable and significantly lighter than the rMBP (and uses ULV CPUs). But yeah, those prices are a bit crazy.

On the other hand, the 2nd-gen X1 is priced toe-in-toe with the rMBP for comparable specs.

 

[Samuelsan2001]

We know

and if you take all the free software and upgrades into account they are a bit of a bargain....

 

[Sym0]

I just won a Dell M3800 which is priced at $4000 here, it only slightly edges out my 2013 rMBP in specs and still fall short in some areas.

Price $4000 vs $3200 (I paid $2700)

Screens are about the same 3800x1440 vs 2880x1800

Processors about the same 3.3GHz i7 vs 3.7Ghz i7

Same 16GB RAM

256SSD vs 512SSD

dGPU about the same Quadro 1100K vs 650m

Similar keyboard

Similar IO

Same Profile 18mm

Similar battery life 7Hs vs 8Hs

So for what is a two year old laptop the rMBP not only holds it out for latest performance, form factor and quality but is better priced by a significant margin.

Now to decide what to do with the M3800, sell it or keep it...

 

[Thunderboltedge]

If you work mainly in Windows is reasonable thinking of using PC, and honestly the prices you mentioned for Lenovo sound like a rip-off.
Generally speaking prices are lower in the PC environment, maybe you struggle to get the PLC interface and the screen would be FULL HD but not a retina.

I do not know how you can work on Windows on bootcamp. When i installed it in that way I could not apply all the shortcuts I always use in Windows, so i moved to parallels for my personal mac, since I rarely have to use it out of work.

Anyway if you are a student APPLE is a convenient choice, nothing to add

 

[maflynn]

There is an apple tax, sure you can buy a windows PC that is near the price, but for most consumers who only use facebook and email. Spending 2k for a laptop or an iMac vs. a 600 dollar laptop shows the inequity of the pricing.

Don't get me wrong, my rMBP is the best laptop I've bought, but I'll not be spending that much next time, I just can't justify spending over 2,000 for a laptop any more.

 

[blooperz]

dGPU about the same Quadro 1100K vs 650m

Quadros are in a completely different class than the consumer grade 650m ...especially for professional uses...sometimes you have to go by more than numbers on a spec sheet. If rMBPs were capable of having quadros they would be significantly more expensive.

 

[marc55]

I have always heard horrific stories with the XPS laptop and their trackpad being the worse thing ever.

I have an XPS-15 (9530) and the trackpad is really decent and very good IMHO; much better than the older XPS models which you must be referring to.

 

[Brian Y]

There's also the resale aspect of it. A MacBook Pro will generally hold its value better than an equivalent Dell would.

 

[BenTrovato]

This thread just became valid this year though with the release of the Lenovo Carbon and the Dell XPS. While Apple has been reducing their prices over the past few years.

I had a Dell XPS a few years ago and it was the most premium windows laptop I ever had. Unfortunately the 8600m GT died literally 2 days after the warranty ended and that was the end of my Dell premium laptop experience.

 

[luvmymbpr]

You get what you pay for. Apple pays attention to the details. These details add up to a superior machine.

I love my MBPr (look at my username). It's extremely thin and light. The trackpad dominates any garbage trackpad on other laptops. I previously couldn't use a laptop without a mouse. Now I can even play games on the Mac using the trackpad. The retina screen dominates everything. The SSD is lighting fast. Oh... and I can do work on it for 8-10 hours.

While other manufacturers are hanging on to the old "but our specs are better for cheaper," Apple keeps pushing out superior products that are finely polished machines. They are just a joy to use, and I'm sitting here with teary eyes as I type this on my mediocre lenovo work laptop.

 

[blooperz]

I tried to buy the new Lenovo X1 carbon through Lenovo's website and give PCs another try since I use Windows mostly. The pricing is INSANE. Same configuration as a 13inch retina macbook pro with 8gb ram, 256gb SSD, i7 processor costs $2319 vs. the 13inch retina MacBook with the same specs at $1699

X1 carbons have always had a high price point due to materials, form factor etc... A more comparable comparison would be to the new xps 13... You get a broadwell processor, higher resolution display, same specs otherwise, decent glass trackpad...no annoying beZel around the screen and comes with touch capability ...and its 1599 compared to the macs 1799 before discounts

 

[leman]

Similar battery life 7Hs vs 8Hs

Just a quick comment on this: all real-life battery test I have seen show that XPS has an awful battery life compared to the rMBP. That figure is very optimistic.

Quadros are in a completely different class than the consumer grade 650m ...especially for professional uses...sometimes you have to go by more than numbers on a spec sheet. If rMBPs were capable of having quadros they would be significantly more expensive.

Except that its not that simple. Physically, pro and non pro cards use exactly the same chips. Non-pro cards are just shipped with gimped drivers that artificially slow down some archaic OpenGL features that professional applications rely on. A professional application can be rewritten to take advantage of contemporary GPUs without needing to rely on those features, as AutoCAD 2013 shows quite clearly. The only benefit of a 'pro' card is that some of them are actually better in 64-bit floating-point calculations because some vendors have artificially gimped the consumer card's computational units (I'm looking at you, Nvidia)

 

[maflynn]

There's also the resale aspect of it. A MacBook Pro will generally hold its value better than an equivalent Dell would.

Completely, Dells are a disposable commodity.

 

[blooperz]

Except that its not that simple. Physically, pro and non pro cards use exactly the same chips. Non-pro cards are just shipped with gimped drivers that artificially slow down some archaic OpenGL features that professional applications rely on. A professional application can be rewritten to take advantage of contemporary GPUs without needing to rely on those features, as AutoCAD 2013 shows quite clearly. The only benefit of a 'pro' card is that some of them are actually better in 64-bit floating-point calculations because some vendors have artificially gimped the consumer card's computational units (I'm looking at you, Nvidia)

Yup that's true, but flashing a nonpro card to be able to use the same drivers as a pro card is not something the average user will be able/want to do. And if the machine is being used for company work you can't do that due to liability concerns. Sure if your familiar with that type of fiddling and its a personal computer than you can pull it off, otherwise it's not really realistic (or pro cards wouldn't even exist).

 

[Sym0]

Just a quick comment on this: all real-life battery test I have seen show that XPS has an awful battery life compared to the rMBP. That figure is very optimistic.







Except that its not that simple. Physically, pro and non pro cards use exactly the same chips. Non-pro cards are just shipped with gimped drivers that artificially slow down some archaic OpenGL features that professional applications rely on. A professional application can be rewritten to take advantage of contemporary GPUs without needing to rely on those features, as AutoCAD 2013 shows quite clearly. The only benefit of a 'pro' card is that some of them are actually better in 64-bit floating-point calculations because some vendors have artificially gimped the consumer card's computational units (I'm looking at you, Nvidia)

The battery life test was from a review running the same wi-fi browsing test as the rMBP and the difference was 1 hour. Given both would using iGPU in their native environment I'd say battery size is all the difference. As for absolute numbers? Too many variables but the difference is small but still another win for the rMBP which is several years old in design.

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Quadros are in a completely different class than the consumer grade 650m ...especially for professional uses...sometimes you have to go by more than numbers on a spec sheet. If rMBPs were capable of having quadros they would be significantly more expensive.

According to the reviews performance was in favour of the Quadro by a small amount but not because it's a Quadro, it's more because the chipset was a newer platform.

I agree that pro cards are not better, just marketed to business with more guarantee it won't fail or play up.

 

[MarvinHC]

There's also the resale aspect of it. A MacBook Pro will generally hold its value better than an equivalent Dell would.

That is very true. A 5 year old Macbook Pro would still fetch at least $300-400 while a 5 year old windows machine is worth about as much as the harddrive and RAM inside.

But back to the pricing: I think on a like for like comparison they are indeed not overprices in the US, however when you come to Europe it is a very different picture.

The prices in Euro are the same as in USD, i.e. the entry 13" Pro costs 1299 Euros vs. 1299 USD in the states. That's was a 35% up-charge still this summer, not as bad any more as the Euro dropped like a stone (today about 16% higher still). So at European prices Macs are still very much premium products, even taking the good specs into account.

 

[EmlynDewar]

Completely, Dells are a disposable commodity.

Not sure what year you're living in, but it's definitely not the current one.

 

[maflynn]

Not sure what year you're living in, but it's definitely not the current one.

So you're telling me a 600 dollar dell laptop is not a commodity? What kind of resale will this have after a few of years when you are looking to replace it - 50 bucks?

 

[Brian Y]

That is very true. A 5 year old Macbook Pro would still fetch at least $300-400 while a 5 year old windows machine is worth about as much as the harddrive and RAM inside.

But back to the pricing: I think on a like for like comparison they are indeed not overprices in the US, however when you come to Europe it is a very different picture.

The prices in Euro are the same as in USD, i.e. the entry 13" Pro costs 1299 Euros vs. 1299 USD in the states. That's was a 35% up-charge still this summer, not as bad any more as the Euro dropped like a stone (today about 16% higher still). So at European prices Macs are still very much premium products, even taking the good specs into account.

The difference in the UK isn't ad bad as it used to be.

A base 13" rMBP is $1299. In the UK it's £999.

$1299 is (currently) £853. Add 20% tax which is included in the price over here, and that gives us £1023. So in real terms, after tax, the machine is £23 cheaper here in the UK than in the USA.

This will obviously vary based on exchange rates, but it's largely equal.

 

[abta1]

I have a retina macbook pro and I use Windows through bootcamp for my work and is pretty much the main OS for my work environment(unfortunately).

I tried to buy the new Lenovo X1 carbon through Lenovo's website and give PCs another try since I use Windows mostly. The pricing is INSANE. Same configuration as a 13inch retina macbook pro with 8gb ram, 256gb SSD, i7 processor costs $2319 vs. the 13inch retina MacBook with the same specs at $1699

http://shop.lenovo.com/ca/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/

I then asked the Lenovo sales agent online to give me a student discount and they offered me $100 off and I told them about Apple giving more student discount and without the hassle of negotiating with a sales agent and this is what he told me:

Lenovo agent: "But Apple charges you so much more"
Me: "The same spec device is cheaper on Apple's website"
Lenovo agent: "You don't have to buy it if you hate Lenovo so much"

Anyways, I changed my mind and won't ever buy a Lenovo product because of all the hassle to go through and the rude agents/customer representatives.

I don't understand why everyone thinks Apple products are more expensive than the competition and so hard to buy a nice Windows machine...

If this is how the Lenovo agent spoke to you as a potential customer then that's just not on. You can be more expensive, you can have a worse product even but there is no excuse for poor customer service. In fact good customer service can be the difference between a customer staying with a brand rather than moving to a slightly better or cheaper alternative.