Why do many Mac User believe that Macs have better hardware then all PCs

[Mactrillionaire]

I think a better comparison for looks would be these 2 laptops.

HP Envy 17

2.3Ghz Quad-Core i7
1GB GDDR5 Radeon 6850
8GB DDR3 RAM
750GB 5400RPM HDD
1920x1080 Resolution
Blu-ray Drive

$2,159.99

Macbook Pro 17"

2.3Ghz Quad-Core i7
1GB GDDR5 Radeon 6750
8GB DDR3 RAM
750GB 5400RPM HDD
1920x1200 Resolution
DVD Drive

$2,949.00​

Im not comparing Operating Systems, because thats purely down to preference, and you cant compare the 2 as rival "specs".
The HP has roughly same size and materials etc (Aluminium + Magnesium and not Unibody Aluminium). The Macbook bends the Envy over the table for battery life of course, and I dont much care for HP's reliability record (9th in the world). I dont know why PC companies just dont stick a higher capacity battery into laptops like Apple. Although in the end, I went with a Sony Vaio, for the reliability, Sony being the 3rd most reliable computer company in the world, the Asus and Toshiba, (1st and 2nd) didnt offer the specs I wanted.

When you mention build quality, do you mean reliability rates? Or just "how sturdy" it feels?

Great, a half-hearted imitation of the real thing is about $800 cheaper with almost matching specifications. By the way, the screen resolution is a little higher on the MacBook Pro, though I can't comment on which graphics card is better because I don't spend a lot of time studying them (likely they are very similar). On the other hand, you should have included a graph showing user satisfaction and reliability trends for the two models. I think that would have been a lot more illuminating. And if you're spending that much money on a laptop, I don't see why you wouldn't do an upgrade to a solid state disk.

 

[ender land]

I dont know why so many people complained about it, when its the very same thing that gets heaps of praise for in the Macbook Pro's. I guess you can't please everyone.

Although on the other side, not all the people were complaining about it, others were saying they loved it. There dont seem to be any comments in the middle, they either seem to love it, or hate it.

Well they put markers there that seemed to indicate you would click on the location the left/right click buttons on non-Mac laptops are traditionally, so I can understand why people would be confused.

If the entire thing is a clickable button they made it look like you can (and should) only click the little areas which are clearly marked.

 

[GFLPraxis]

I have been told by many owners of macs that simply because they have a Mac that their hardware is better then any other computer. I attempt to tell them the only actual difference between mac and "PC's" is the OS and in actuality Apple buys its hardware from the same people that the PC vendors get their hardware from.
In fact I have often dug up evidence that Macs do not have the best Hardware. Currently ASUS and Toshiba lead with mac in fourth of the largest 8 PC manufactures.

It's a difference in how you're defining the word "hardware".

There's a difference between raw performance (which basically just depends on which Intel and AMD/NVidia components you buy) and build quality.

Most Mac users are referring to build quality and hardware design. Macs are reknown for hardware engineering and build quality. That's what we mean when we say they have the best hardware; not that they benchmark better than a cheaper Asus with the same CPU and GPU.

Asus does not have better build quality. xD

 

[gregoryalee]

I think a better comparison for looks would be these 2 laptops.

HP Envy 17

2.3Ghz Quad-Core i7
1GB GDDR5 Radeon 6850
8GB DDR3 RAM
750GB 5400RPM HDD
1920x1080 Resolution
Blu-ray Drive

$2,159.99

Macbook Pro 17"

2.3Ghz Quad-Core i7
1GB GDDR5 Radeon 6750
8GB DDR3 RAM
750GB 5400RPM HDD
1920x1200 Resolution
DVD Drive

$2,949.00​

Im not comparing Operating Systems, because thats purely down to preference, and you cant compare the 2 as rival "specs".
The HP has roughly same size and materials etc (Aluminium + Magnesium and not Unibody Aluminium). The Macbook bends the Envy over the table for battery life of course, and I dont much care for HP's reliability record (9th in the world). I dont know why PC companies just dont stick a higher capacity battery into laptops like Apple. Although in the end, I went with a Sony Vaio, for the reliability, Sony being the 3rd most reliable computer company in the world, the Asus and Toshiba, (1st and 2nd) didnt offer the specs I wanted.

When you mention build quality, do you mean reliability rates? Or just "how sturdy" it feels?

Which envy is this? I keep getting over 3000.00 on HPs website for a laptop that has a 2 hour battery?

 

[Mactrillionaire]

Well they put markers there that seemed to indicate you would click on the location the left/right click buttons on non-Mac laptops are traditionally, so I can understand why people would be confused.

If the entire thing is a clickable button they made it look like you can (and should) only click the little areas which are clearly marked.

The point of the trackpad is to decrease user fatigue (Apple does this by providing a large entirely clickable area for their trackpads). Bad habits shouldn't lead to complaints due to lack of use comprehension about the matter when presented with a trackpad that solves the problems of the other trackpads. The typical trackpad makes things more difficult than they have to be and also doesn't typically support any kind of multi-touch gestures. If I had to use a trackpad like that every day, I would fail to see its point and would instead carry around my favorite PC mouse with me. With the Apple trackpad, you don't need to carry along a mouse.

 

[Dr McKay]

Great, a half-hearted imitation of the real thing is about $800 cheaper with almost matching specifications. By the way, the screen resolution is a little higher on the MacBook Pro, though I can't comment on which graphics card is better because I don't spend a lot of time studying them (likely they are very similar). On the other hand, you should have included a graph showing user satisfaction and reliability trends for the two models. I think that would have been a lot more illuminating. And if you're spending that much money on a laptop, I don't see why you wouldn't do an upgrade to a solid state disk.

I could have customized it to higher specs, but I deliberately chose the closest specs as possible to the highest MBP 17 inch. As you questioned earlier, the Envy's Video card is slightly better, and it's a slightly newer model. I could have put SSD's in both, I just chose the highest capacity HDD in the MBP, and matched the Envy choice.

Which envy is this? I keep getting over 3000.00 on HPs website for a laptop that has a 2 hour battery?

Customize Envy Here Choose "Customize & Buy" on the right, for the $1,500 option. And I previously mentioned, the battery is short.

Asus does not have better build quality. xD

But they do have better reliability rate, and lower rate of failure.

 

[gregoryalee]

I could have customized it to higher specs, but I deliberately chose the closest specs as possible to the highest MBP 17 inch. As you questioned earlier, the Envy's Video card is slightly better, and it's a slightly newer model. I could have put SSD's in both, I just chose the highest capacity HDD in the MBP, and matched the Envy choice.



Customize Envy Here Choose "Customize & Buy" on the right, for the $1,500 option. And I previously mentioned, the battery is short.

But they do have better reliability rate, and lower rate of failure.

I chose: Windows 7 Ultimate (This is the appropriate choice) Home versions are stripped down and an it's unfair to price with hobbled software.
No Extra Warrantee
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2820QM (2.3 GHz, 8MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.4 GHz
System Recovery DVD (this comes with every apple)
1920 x 1080 option to match MBP
I added the battery since we need to compare battery life which is appropriate. as 2 hours is abysmal.
I subtracted the blue ray to be fair apple has no option for this.

Grand total on the machine you chose with matching options:

$2,333.99. That price wouldn't sway me. I am Sure its a nice computer though.

 

[gregoryalee]

I could have customized it to higher specs, but I deliberately chose the closest specs as possible to the highest MBP 17 inch. As you questioned earlier, the Envy's Video card is slightly better, and it's a slightly newer model. I could have put SSD's in both, I just chose the highest capacity HDD in the MBP, and matched the Envy choice.



Customize Envy Here Choose "Customize & Buy" on the right, for the $1,500 option. And I previously mentioned, the battery is short.

But they do have better reliability rate, and lower rate of failure.

I do know that Asus quality is good. Just curious as to where you take your asus for motherboard replacement? Last time a buddy of mine had to wait 2 weeks via mail for a replacement.

 

[Hellhammer]

But they do have better reliability rate, and lower rate of failure.

Comparing brands just like that is not fair. Apple's laptops start from 999$ while HP offers lots of budget models that can go for less than 500$. Those are included in the study as well. It's obvious that cheap laptops most likely have worse build quality and thus have higher failure rate.

The only truly fair way to compare these two laptops would be to look at their failure rates, not Apple's or HP's rates in general.

 

[Dr McKay]

Comparing brands just like that is not fair. Apple's laptops start from 999$ while HP offers lots of budget models that can go for less than 500$. Those are included in the study as well. It's obvious that cheap laptops most likely have worse build quality and thus have higher failure rate.

The only truly fair way to compare these two laptops would be to look at their failure rates, not Apple's or HP's rates in general.

The HP Envy line, especially with the Quad-Core laptop suffered from heating issues early on, I have no idea if these have been resolved yet. I don't personally like the look of HP's failure rate overall, I was just using the HP Envy to point out that a PC Notebook can have the same specs, and (In my Opinion) look just as good as a Macbook Pro can, personally, I went for the Sony Vaio E, for reliability.

I know what it looks like, but it isn't a cheap tacky craptastic generic plastic laptop. I find the materials used very high quality, it doesn't creak, it feels very sturdy, runs whisper quiet and the screen is excellent.

 

[haveknot]

This is a very loaded title question!

It's difficult to argue when MBP's design is unmatched. And yes , MBPs have better hardware - battery .

 

[ender land]

Where did that chart come from?

It looks like an Excel graph to be honest

 

[Hellhammer]

The HP Envy line, especially with the Quad-Core laptop suffered from heating issues early on, I have no idea if these have been resolved yet.

If I had to guess, those were the old Envys that used Clarksfield CPUs. They were hot and required a discrete GPU to provide any graphics at all, which added lots of heat. All Clarksfield laptops were more or less hot. SB should be cooler.

Where did that chart come from?

It looks like an Excel graph to be honest

SquareTrade

 

[AppleScruff1]

If I had to guess, those were the old Envys that used Clarksfield CPUs. They were hot and required a discrete GPU to provide any graphics at all, which added lots of heat. All Clarksfield laptops were more or less hot. SB should be cooler.



SquareTrade

Thanks for the link. There is some interesting info there. Not much of a difference between premium and entry level laptops for reliability.

 

[Great Dave]

I haven't seen a new XPS, so I can't fairly comment on the screen, but I will read up on it. Thanks for pointing that out. Personally I wouldn't be able to use 1920x1080 on a 15", but I'm sure that would be a benefit to many. From what I see on the Dell site you are looking at $1250+ to equip it the way you have suggested, not including which warranty you want to buy for the accidental damage etc., so it is over $1300 with accidental damage warranty for 1 year. No doubt at all it is cheaper. The Mac has a better chassis and touchpad plus the integrated software, IMO. I'd also give Apple the edge in customer service and repairs.

There are a couple of stackable coupons out - that bring the thing down to just under a grand.

You do have some other options for the screen, too. So, you don't have to go with 1920x1080 on a 15 if you don't want to. But, still Dell offering a much wider gamut, better blacks, higher contrast, etc. is a big deal if photo/video edit at all on a laptop.

As for integrated software - yeah I still love the Mac OS, but Win 7 is also pretty awesome - it has come along way.

Customer Service and repairs - not being a dell owner, can't really say. But, I can say that IMO the build quality for Apple has really come down since the last powerbook iteration. And dell offering accidental protection and/or on-site service is pretty huge.

 

[mrsir2009]

This is a very loaded title question!

It's difficult to argue when MBP's design is unmatched. And yes , MBPs have better hardware - battery .

+1. I've never seen a batter laptop battery.

 

[Cammer]

Not intended to bash MBP at all, but have you ever used a Lenovo Thinkpad? Just about every major review has stated that it has the best keyboard in the business. As far as features go, be realistic. Many any other notebooks have more features, especially in the business world.

It's funny that you mention this. I have a company issued Lenovo Thinkpad. But I also bring my 15" MBP to work with me and I use them side by side all day long, every day. My personal opinion is that, while the Lenovo is a great workhorse of a laptop and the keyboard is very good, I still prefer my MBP keyboard as far as quality goes. I like the feel of it and the key placement/size/etc. I also like the fact that my MBP keyboard is backlit. This is a very nice feature when I'm working in the evenings after the office lights are off.

 

[AppleScruff1]

It's funny that you mention this. I have a company issued Lenovo Thinkpad. But I also bring my 15" MBP to work with me and I use them side by side all day long, every day. My personal opinion is that, while the Lenovo is a great workhorse of a laptop and the keyboard is very good, I still prefer my MBP keyboard as far as quality goes. I like the feel of it and the key placement/size/etc. I also like the fact that my MBP keyboard is backlit. This is a very nice feature when I'm working in the evenings after the office lights are off.

Good to hear side by side comparison.

 

[AppleScruff1]

Next time this comes up, let's vote on it.

 

[unchecked]

Nope. Most electronics these days are designed to fail after a certain amount of time, namely your warranty. So you can buy their new refreshes again.

 

[TheUndertow]

Comparing brands just like that is not fair. Apple's laptops start from 999$ while HP offers lots of budget models that can go for less than 500$. Those are included in the study as well. It's obvious that cheap laptops most likely have worse build quality and thus have higher failure rate.

The only truly fair way to compare these two laptops would be to look at their failure rates, not Apple's or HP's rates in general.

Every (3) premium Asus laptop (w3J, G71G-A2, G71G-Q) that I've had has failed in a max of 1 year and a few months.

 

[Tonepoet]

Im not comparing Operating Systems, because thats purely down to preference, and you cant compare the 2 as rival "specs".
The HP has roughly same size and materials etc (Aluminium + Magnesium and not Unibody Aluminium). The Macbook bends the Envy over the table for battery life of course, and I dont much care for HP's reliability record (9th in the world). I dont know why PC companies just dont stick a higher capacity battery into laptops like Apple. Although in the end, I went with a Sony Vaio, for the reliability, Sony being the 3rd most reliable computer company in the world, the Asus and Toshiba, (1st and 2nd) didnt offer the specs I wanted.

When you mention build quality, do you mean reliability rates? Or just "how sturdy" it feels?

The O.S. is included in the price, so we have to make sure the O.S. you get is comparable to ensure that we null the value of software to get an accurate reading of the hardwarerice ratio. Now a lot of it is indeed subjective as you claim but we have to remember that Windows Home Edition simply doesn't have some features that better versions of Windows and OSX have. Say if for your applications security is of a high concern, an easy to use built-in encryption program may be of some value. Mac OSX comes with Filevault by default but you need the Ultimate edition of Windows 7 to get their equivalent, Bitlocker. Getting Ultimate through the BTO program adds $180 to the price already. I really think we should be using Ultimate as our base O.S. since it's the only "fully featured" Microsoft O.S. where as Mac O.S. is fully featured by default. Recovery media, which Apple includes with every mac, costs another $20 with Hewlett Packard and everybody really should have a set on hand incase something goes wrong.

I could have customized it to higher specs, but I deliberately chose the closest specs as possible to the highest MBP 17 inch. As you questioned earlier, the Envy's Video card is slightly better, and it's a slightly newer model. I could have put SSD's in both, I just chose the highest capacity HDD in the MBP, and matched the Envy choice.

If this is your modus operendi, you'd need to choose the two battery option to bring the Hewlett Packard Envy as close to the Macbook Po as possible, giving it what I'd imagine to be a 5.625 hour battery life expectancy (where as the MBP is advertised with 7) instead of the advertised nearly unusable 2.25 hour battery life. To be fair however, you'd also save $100 dollars by dropping the the Bluray drive and add $35 to the MBP's price by throwing in the offered Mini Displayport to HDMI adapter, since the Envy has both displayport and HDMI built in. With these alterations to the B.T.O. procedure I find that the HP envy now costs 2333.99 and the MBP now costs 2,979.00, closing in the gap a little but still giving the HP Envy a clear edge so far. (Now personally speaking, I'd only ever buy the minimal RAM configuration on a laptop, given how easy it is to upgrade on a MBP, closing in the gap even further but I can see how for the sake of simplicity you'd want to make them both 8GB instead of 4GB and 6GB which certainly isn't a 1:1 comparison.)

However keep in mind that I'd say that the data connections situation on the Envy is a bit more congested overall. You have 1 USB 3.0 port, one dedicated USB 2.0 port and one shared USB 2.0/eSATA (eSATAp?) port, only allowing up to three connections unless you want to carry hubs with you everywhere. With the MBP, you have three USB 2.0 ports and a Thunderbolt port which can be daisy chained to multiple devices. I'd go on further about this but I'm unsure about one thing. Is the eSATAp port utilizing SATA II or SATA III connections? It sorta makes a difference because if it's SATA II, USB 3.0+SATA III = 11.0Gbps combined putting it above Thunderbolt™ assuming you're using a singular HDD and a USB 3.0 device, where as USB 3.0+SATA II is only 8Gbps putting it below Thunderbolt™ by greater margin. Either way, Thunderbolt™ is a bit more versatile. I'm also curious as to whether the Envy has an expresscard slot built in or not. I think I see one pictured, however it's not listed in the specs at all if it is and it does add even further versatility to the MBP.

 

[kuwisdelu]

I realize some people desire a numeric keypad in a laptop (I doubt it's very many), but personally the fact that it pushes the rest of the keyboard and the trackpad (why the trackpad too?) off-center would drive me crazy. Same with the Vaio up there.

 

[iMackPro]

I realize some people desire a numeric keypad in a laptop (I doubt it's very many), but personally the fact that it pushes the rest of the keyboard and the trackpad (why the trackpad too?) off-center would drive me crazy. Same with the Vaio up there.

yeah, and the way the keys feel is just no where near as nice as the new macs either. do these illuminate? thats another reason i love my macs, i remember at the time i bought my first mac, a uMB first gen, it had an illuminated keyboard and i was sold on it!

 

[Furifo]

Comparing brands just like that is not fair. Apple's laptops start from 999$ while HP offers lots of budget models that can go for less than 500$. Those are included in the study as well. It's obvious that cheap laptops most likely have worse build quality and thus have higher failure rate.

The only truly fair way to compare these two laptops would be to look at their failure rates, not Apple's or HP's rates in general.

I've not had a chance to have a read of the article because I'm in a bit of a hurry so I've only had a look at the graph.

Does that graph include the early 2008 macbook pros? Those were the ones (I think) with the dreaded 8600M GT which had abnormally high failure rates. If that graph includes the MBPs that had 8600m cards, there's going to be a higher than normal failure rate which could have affected Apple's result on that graph.

Based on personal experiences, my late 2008 MBPs and onwards have been rock solid.

Some friends and family of mine have reported hardware problems with their Vaios and Toshibas although I've heard and seen nothing but praise for Asus from both my sisters. The 2 Asus laptops and the sole MBP (mine ) have been completely reliable with no hardware faults at all.