Price Comparison

[LonestarOne]

This table shows all of the desktops I have purchased over the last 32 years, with the price and inflation-adjusted price for each. I did not include laptops. These are full retail prices, which I did not always pay.

In the bottom row, I included the Mac Studio base configuration (not the configuration I ordered).

I think this shows the Mac Studio to be a good value by historical standard. Even in non-adjusted dollars, the base price is as low as the cheapest desktops on the list. In adjusted dollars, it beats all of them, easily. Even with the $1600 Studio Display thrown in, the base configuration would exceed the inflation-adjusted price of the 5K Retina iMac (which was easily the best value of any machine on the list) by only $600.

The Power 120 is colored differently because it was a Mac-compatible built by Power Computing, not Apple. You’ll notice it was a real bargain compared to the Mac IIsi but not much cheaper than the later models from Apple.

I swallowed at the price of the high-end Mac Studio I ordered, and it is the second most-expensive machine on the list, but it’s not that far out of line with the rest.

 

[now i see it]

The Mac Studio may seem like bonkers fast today - but the next 2023 Mac Pro is going to blow its doors off.
So the Mac Studio really can’t be put in the same class as the old Power Macs or Mac Pro Quad, because those were “top of the line” machines back then, the Mac Studio will soon be mid tier.
The 2023 Mac Pro (which we haven’t seen) needs to be in this list to show that top tier Macs are still eye wateringly expensive.

I guess.

 

[m1maverick]

Thanks for this. However there is a huge difference between the 1990's and today. Back then computing was somewhat in its infancy. Today computing is pretty much a commodity. I would expect new systems to be lower than previous systems.

 

[velocityg4]

Computing was really expensive back in the day.

A while back. I was looking through some old Macworld issues. In 88/89 you could easily hit $10k on a lot of Macs. Just having a color monitor and slight upgrades. For something capable of desktop publishing in color. You could easily spend $30k. Without coming close to maxing out the upgrade options.

My first Mac in 93 was about $2500. For a base IIvx, 14” color monitor, keyboard and mouse. I spent a lot more a couple years later on a 7100/66AV, 72MB RAM, 2GB HDD (fast/wide) and FWB Jackhammer card, SyQuest EZ135, 1GB HDD, 17" Sony Trinitron, 14.4K modem, webcam and Stylewriter (II then 2400 I think). I don't recall how much as I pieced it together over about a year. But that thing was a speed demon.

At any rate. The current Mac Studio isn't that bad. Not for the type of computer you are getting.

 

[TJ82]

The Mac Studio may seem like bonkers fast today - but the next 2023 Mac Pro is going to blow its doors off.
So the Mac Studio really can’t be put in the same class as the old Power Macs or Mac Pro Quad, because those were “top of the line” machines back then, the Mac Studio will soon be mid tier.
The 2023 Mac Pro (which we haven’t seen) needs to be in this list to show that top tier Macs are still eye wateringly expensive.

I guess.

We had to get some nonsense to balance the OP’s excellent contribution out. I guess.

 

[LonestarOne]

The 2023 Mac Pro (which we haven’t seen) needs to be in this list to show that top tier Macs are still eye wateringly expensive.

Based on the current price curve, and assuming the Mac Pro is as fast as the rumors predict, I am confidently forecasting a base price of $8,000.

Which is roughly the same as the base price of the Mac IIsi (the cheapest member of the Mac II family) in 1990. For a machine that is eye wateringly more powerful.

 

[PianoPro]

My 2010 Mac Pro, 6-core, that I am still using was $3700 at the time (12 years ago). That's about $4800 in today's dollars. It wasn't even top-of-the-line in CPU options. Compares to the $2000 base Max Mac Studio.

The 2010 Mac Pro 12-core version (dual 6-core CPU's configuration) is a better comparison to the $4000 base Ultra Mac Studio ($4400 with 2 TB SSD I ordered). That Mac Pro sold for $6475, about $8400 in today's dollars.

So the Mac Studio seems very reasonably priced to me. I'm glad I didn't wait to spend another $2000 or more for a little PCIe expandability or replaceable internal SSDs (I'll guess) in a new base (similar CPU/GPU to the Ultra I expect) Mac Pro later this year or next. But even that would still compare well to the 12-core 2010 Mac Pro.

If you really want a stretch a comparison, my Apple II (48 KB RAM) to run VisiCalc spreadsheets back in 1977 cost about $2600, or about $12,200 today. But adding a pair of Disk II floppy drives was about another $1000, or $3600 total, which would be about $16,900 today. I estimate that I eventually had about $5000 invested in that Apple II (stuffed with 8 expansion cards including a RAM card, a 80-column graphics card, a Microsoft Z80 co-processor card to run CP/M, and more), or over $23,000 today. Hard to believe I actually spent that back then, but I did.

Heck, even my original Mac in 1984 was $2500 base model, equivalent to about $6800 today.

The Ultra Mac Studio at $4K feels like a bargain and the Max Mac Studio at $2000 a steal.