Why do you buy Apple products?

There's also something else to factor in. It's fairly well known that people tend like and defend their purchase of something that had a high price tag despite evidence of it being not as quality as they claim. It comes down to the fact that people don't want to feel stupid for spending so much on something that isn't very good. I'm not at all saying that this is the case for Apple but it does make me wonder if the Apple fanboys have a little of this going on..
Fanboys of any camp, by def, always have that going on. If the hype of an Apple (or whatever) straw grasper is a factor in your purchase, you're buying for the wrong reasons and should look at your options again. ;)

See also; heatlesssun and Microsoft. :p
 
When it comes to computers (desktop, laptop) I view Apple products as workstation-caliber products that, unlike Dell Precisions or Lenovo W-series laptops or HP w-series Elitebooks, just happen to be sold at malls and targeted at consumers.

Like workstation-class products, packaging, durability, robustness and support are the issues. Expandability is not. Very long shelf life is important.

This last point is one of the appeals of Apple products to me, and I find myself very confused at the OP's statement of "having to upgrade every six months" since that's what I find over in the PC world. The build quality lasts for years. The interface points (keyboard, sound, display) all remain attractive for years. The OS remains fairly tight, so compute power also tends to "last" longer. My experience is that Apple products age very gracefully. My iPad is over a year old and I still prefer it to any new model on the market, and it still looks new. iPhone4 is about 9 months old now and I feel absolutely no need to upgrade. iMac 27" is over a year old and again, no itch. (12 months later and I still have not seen a display I prefer more.) Apple products take me back to a time 15 years ago when a computer had a 5 year shelf life and remained relevant during that time.

This is a notion that will fall on deaf ears in an enthusiast-and-upgrades-and-modding forum like this, but there is some appeal to having a piece of equipment that you fully expect to be in active use 5+ years later. In this sense I treat my Apple products much like my AV products (receiver, amp, speakers) or my camera lenses: long-haul investments.

I also find Apple products to be relatively affordable. What I pay for MacBook Pro 15s is about what I've been paying for Elitebook 8540w and Thinkpad W510 for some time now. The Mac Pro is actually one of the lower price workstations on the market; if Apple provided GPU certification for CAD/FEA and modeling apps under Windows, I'd be buying them instead of HP Z800s. (And they would look prettier too!) And yes, someone buying a Mac Pro for home makes as much sense as buying a Z800 or dual socket Precision. Being sold in a mall does not change this fact.

I do not think Apple is perfect. I am VERY disappointed in their default warranty - for the price, they should include default 3 years like all other comparably-built and comparably-priced products. This is my biggest peeve; not doing so makes them seem cheap, and not in a fiscal sense.
 
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There's also something else to factor in. It's fairly well known that people tend like and defend their purchase of something that had a high price tag despite evidence of it being not as quality as they claim. It comes down to the fact that people don't want to feel stupid for spending so much on something that isn't very good. I'm not at all saying that this is the case for Apple but it does make me wonder if the Apple fanboys have a little of this going on..

I think you're missing a key element here especially when you're talking Macs vs PCs. From my observations Apple folks tend to very form focused, PC guys like me I think tend to be features and function focused. Case in point, I have an HP tm2 convertible Tablet PC and yes the screen sucks. However when I looked around last year guess how many convertible tablets existed with dedicated GPUs. Wacom digitizers and 5+ hours of battery life with a base price of around a $1000? There to this day is still only one that meets these criteria. So I had a need and want for specific features and while you can blast the screen on the tm2 there simply wasn't anything else 15 months ago that foot the bill so to get the features I wanted I made a trade off.

So sure if you don't want or need the features of this device then it wouldn't make sense to make a trade off for an important feature like screen qaulity but then all the screen qaulity in the world isn't a Wacom digitizer and a dedicated GPU. For some reason a lot of people seem to not understand the simple concept of compromise which is something that every human being does almost daily.

That said I am just about to pull the rigger on a Lenovo X220t which will cost me about the same as the tm2 last year and has a bigger, slightly higher resolution IPS screen, something not even in most Macbooks currently I believe. The only thing is that the X220t doesn't have a dedicated GPU but the Sandy Bridge HD 3000 looks to be slightly faster than the Radeon HD 4550 and when coupled with an i7 over the Core 2 Duo of the tm2 it should be a good boost in graphics department overall. I get the devices that I can afford that fit my needs and when better devices come along and if I'm able I upgrade. What a novel concept.
 
Fanboys of any camp, by def, always have that going on. If the hype of an Apple (or whatever) straw grasper is a factor in your purchase, you're buying for the wrong reasons and should look at your options again. ;)

See also; heatlesssun and Microsoft. :p

See also: you don't know what the hell you're talking about. I use Microsoft technologies because I make my living with them and I get the software for free as part of my job. The average Apple fan here is sending Apple a lot more money than I send to Microsoft personally. If I think a Microsoft platform is a good solution when people ask I'll say so. If I don't think it is I'll also say that. The bulk of my tech dollars go hardware OEMs, I have some Zunes and but no Xboxes. Also most Apple fans here aren't making a decent living based on software development on Apple platforms.

Enough with the idiotic and lame attacks. We're having a decent discussion here overall and don't need the BS. Thanks.:cool:
 
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I'm really curious why none of the other manufacturers have put in the effort to come up with a trackpad that works as well as the Apple one, it's been 3 years so it's not new or anything. I guess you don't know the difference until you spend a year or two on the Apple trackpad and then go back to the PC ones.

That said, anyone want to buy an x120e? ;)

From my observations Apple folks tend to very form focused, PC guys like me I think tend to be features and function focused.
Don't take this the wrong way, I mean nothing inflammatory by it but what kind of car do you drive? I see a lot of people talking along these lines and then they drive something not stripped down ;) I'm a car guy at heart, I think what someone drives says a lot about them in a lot of cases (assuming they are driving something they like).
 
We have the T410 laptops at work, and the trackpads are awful. I cannot stand the textured feel of it, and it does not seem to respond to light touches very well.

The pad on my MBA is by far the best laptop input device I have ever used, so good in fact that I purchased the magic track pad to use at my desk instead of a mouse.
 
While I don't have any surveys that make the claim that more expensive machines get have higher customer satisfaction I don't think I'm being illogical or a fan boy.
I didn't say you were being illogical. I just asked you to back up your claim. Why are you getting defensive?

This was my point and while I don't have a survey to back it up I think I was just stating a common belief.
So it is your assertion that it is "common belief" that other vendors have higher customer satisfaction than Apple's if you spend enough? Is this what you're stating?
 
I think you're missing a key element here especially when you're talking Macs vs PCs. From my observations Apple folks tend to very form focused, PC guys like me I think tend to be features and function focused.

There is this ridiculous notion that form and function are mutually exclusive. In the best circumstances, form is function. Things like excellent keyboards, best trackpads in existence with multitouch gestures, magsafe, long battery life, great displays, thin and light, those are functional things, no?

They are functional and they have immediate benefits to the user, especially given that gesture based inputs are systemwide and completely supported by the operating system. This functional and very logical integration of hardware and software is a huge reason why people like Mac notebooks so much.
 
There's also something else to factor in. It's fairly well known that people tend like and defend their purchase of something that had a high price tag despite evidence of it being not as quality as they claim. It comes down to the fact that people don't want to feel stupid for spending so much on something that isn't very good. I'm not at all saying that this is the case for Apple but it does make me wonder if the Apple fanboys have a little of this going on..

It is certainly possible. As for myself, I know Windows and OS X backwards and forwards and can spend my money on any hardware I want (and apparently I do based on my sig :(). If I'm getting a PC, I'm building it myself, I don't trust any OEMs to do as good a job or pick components like I can (I'm also including things like case and monitor). If I buy a prebuilt, it is going to be a Mac, again because I don't trust the majority of PC companies out there to put together a good machine. HP, Dell, eh, no thanks.
 
See also: you don't know what the hell you're talking about.
LOL, this:
I use Microsoft technologies because I make my living with them ...Also most Apple fans here aren't making a decent living based on software development on Apple platforms.
Enough with the idiotic and lame attacks. We're having a decent discussion here overall and don't need the BS. Thanks.:cool:
Photo%20Apr%2030%2C%201%2057%2032%20PM.jpg


I think you've muddied "attack" with "jesting with another person." Ironically, the converse of how you exclusively lumped Apple users/products into "form focused" and non-Apple users into "feature and function focused" groups. :p
 
One thing seems sure, Blu Ray will never come to Mac. Start ripping hard drive versions now if you want Blu Ray qualtiy movies on Mac. Or get your own Blu Ray Drive. I personally would just use my PC to convert the files to my Mac, but hey. I'm sure Steve Jobs would rather you just buy weaker HD versions on iTunes all day instead. They are skipping that Blu Ray "Bag of Hurt" like Flash on iOS! Eventually it's a non issue as new stuff comes along like HTML 5 (which I do think works better, but it's not fully implemented yet) and Internet distribution (which is mostly promise at this point, not matching the current quality/freedom of Blu Ray. It's better for Apple, perhaps future me too, but not for current me, which is the choice Apple denies you). So we have to suffer in the meantime, like in the lack of REAL trimmed SSDs for all that time. Apple is just going to ignore it til it's obsolete or they have no choice. Smart :rolleyes:!

That said, I'm buying the white iPhone 4 next week! Yea, I know it's old. What about it?! lol, I have to complete my sequence of Web OS, Android, and iOS ownership. I've done them all, they all have their good/bad points. After owning a Palm Pre, HTC Droid Incredible, iPod Touch/iPad 2/iPhone 4, If I had to rate them it would be:


1. Software NOT Counting Apps and Overall Polish:

WebOS > Android > iOS


2. Software Counting Apps and Overall Polish:

iOS > Android > WebOS


3. Hardware Quality:

iOS > Android > WebOS


This is important as going forward, iOS is more important to Apple than Mac OS X. There is talk of the two Apple OSs becoming more alike in the future than not.

As you can see, iOS wins more when you look at it from this ratings perspective. iOS has the best combination of polished software with outstanding hardware. Apple has the best overall package. Android is still a good comprise if you want a more technical/customizable/progressive OS, and WebOS is the best thing that never took off enough to get the Apps/Optimization/Polish/Quality Hardware levels of iOS.

The often overlooked WebOS was super progressive but didn't sacrifice the fun. It has such fun simple fluid gestures, a gesture area which the iPhone 5 is rumored to get, great progressive notifications and message consolidation, just a cool way of working with the "Card Apps" and Multi Tasking, very adaptable HTML based OS, ETC, I loved - absolutely loved - my Palm Pre... save for the absolute crap hardware that broke 4 times in a row on me. However, the keyboard was much preferable to software keyboards and I really liked the implementation of that keyboard. While newer better hardware from the HP backed Palm Pre 2 (and upcoming Palm Pre 3) has things like better LCDs and Gorilla Glass over plastic, it's not enough anymore to save WebOS from distant 3rd Place. They need a head turner to the degree of the first iPhone or Palm Pre.

Going forward with the future of WebOS's potential and success uncertain, I have better hopes of Apple bringing themselves up to WebOS's level of simplistic gesture fun and progressiveness more than Android. Android is still very technical and menu driven, while also more progressive than iOS, this saps the fun out of general navigation despite the greater control over options. And Apple does roll out the cool new software revisions regularly, they just go about it at a slower pace, but the improvements do come eventually, like in multi-tasking.

Not a whole lot to mention about Android, the hardware is good but not Apple good, the software is up there, but not enough to keep me away from the iPhone 4. The best way I could sum up my Android experience is with this: Android was good enough to keep me away from an AT&T iPhone, but not from a Verizon one :) and the best thing about it now is that Google keeps Apple from getting complacent, so competition becomes the drive for innovation for both of them. The real winner in this race is you.

Ultimately after using all of them for a year, both competitors still lack the Apps/Optimization/Polish of the iOS stuff. Then you come to the fact that construction wise, the iPhone series feels rock solid, more so than any other cell phone. I love the new Retina LCD too. That said, I would defiantly buy a WebOS tablet if the hardware is done right. HP make it happen!
 
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I use Apple products because I find them to be an exceptional value for what I get out of them. I don't care if their market share is 1% or 95%. I buy Apple products because *I* like using them.
 
Because if Apple were to make a $500 laptop, it'd be absolute shit. Apple doesn't bother making absolute shit, except for their previous mice. And the first-generation Apple TV maybe. And various incarnations of the iPod shuffle. The trouble-prone water-cooled PowerMac G5s. And possibly the eMac, but I could really go either way on that. And probably some other products I'm forgetting. You get the idea.

+1 The boot camp drivers.
 
heatlesssun, Not having an IPS option kinda rubs me the wrong way. However, the TN screen on my MBP isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I find that I'm always sitting right in front of the monitor and I don't have to see off-center picture quality. IMO it looks pretty good when viewed head-on.

NOTE: I'm a big hater of TN panels. I've never owned one and I never will. I made sure I setup my dual-monitor setup at work with a PVA as main display, but I didn't have a choice with my 2nd monitor. It's TN and it's terrible.

At home I use an HP IPS, but I've owned Dell IPS and M/PVA monitors. If the MBP display was a shitty TN panel I wouldn't have bought it.

A coworker has an iMac and of course the monitor is beautiful. Apple knows how to grab you at first sight.
 
I'd buy a Windows laptop if there was one available that had the following:

Aluminum (not plastic)
17" display
16:10 resolution
Centered trackpad (no nipple and not shitty trackpad drivers like HP has)
Magsafe connector (this has saved my ass many times)
 
There is this ridiculous notion that form and function are mutually exclusive. In the best circumstances, form is function. Things like excellent keyboards, best trackpads in existence with multitouch gestures, magsafe, long battery life, great displays, thin and light, those are functional things, no?

They are functional and they have immediate benefits to the user, especially given that gesture based inputs are systemwide and completely supported by the operating system. This functional and very logical integration of hardware and software is a huge reason why people like Mac notebooks so much.

Not trying to get into a semantics contest and I gave a perfectly clear and correct example of what I was talking about with the tm2. Call it what you will, form versus function, form versus form, function versus function, features versus function, etc., the bottom line is that you can't always have it all even if you have the money. A perfect example of what I am talking about is 120 Hz stereoscopic 3D and IPS panels. Those two things no matter what you call them currently ARE mutually exclusive.
 
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I think you've muddied "attack" with "jesting with another person." Ironically, the converse of how you exclusively lumped Apple users/products into "form focused" and non-Apple users into "feature and function focused" groups. :p

Fair enough. Here's my point about form versus function however, thanks to Vega for the pic:

SANY0009-6.jpg


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1588587

I think it's safe to say that this is a rig that's pretty much function focused, hard to nice things about the form I'd say. Does a rig like this appeal to Apple users in general? I see very few Apple people posting in threads like this.
 
I didn't say you were being illogical. I just asked you to back up your claim. Why are you getting defensive?


So it is your assertion that it is "common belief" that other vendors have higher customer satisfaction than Apple's if you spend enough? Is this what you're stating?

Not being defensive. You made a claim that Apple couldn't make a decent $500 and I agreed. Well if Apple can't then probably no body really can right? So cheap PC laptops probably lower overall customer satisfaction because if Apple, the maker of what many of you think are the best laptops, can't make a good $500 laptop then no one can.

I could ask you to back up your claim that Apple can't make a decent $500 but in all honesty I think that one's a given.
 
Just stop. The thread started out really good and is now going off the rails. Agree to disagree and let's get back to the actual topic.

Rumor has it, you'll be able to use a portable device to storage your preferences to use on any Mac you're on. Early screenshots show Windows 8 may have a similar feature. Very cool. Let's see how well they work.
 
Hey shawn, one thing that I really like that wouldn't work in the Windows world is how Apple constantly leaves "the old" behind. I know Windows 7 is a modern OS, but sometimes you see an icon or dialog window that is totally out of place. At some point they have to make a break with the old, but I doubt MS would ever do so.
 
Hey shawn, one thing that I really like that wouldn't work in the Windows world is how Apple constantly leaves "the old" behind. I know Windows 7 is a modern OS, but sometimes you see an icon or dialog window that is totally out of place. At some point they have to make a break with the old, but I doubt MS would ever do so.

Yeah, this is a non-starter in the business world, backwards capability is CRITICAL in business environments. It'll be interesting to see how much of the Windows API is actually supported in Windows 8 ARM compared to x86. Silverlight will be the main development platform like Windows Phone and it'll be interesting how that gets leveraged. For now Windows 8 is looking to be one of the biggest risks Microsoft has ever taken. If the features that are leaking out mostly come to pass and are well implemented and Windows 8 ARM has a high degree of interoperability with Windows x86 it will be without doubt a gamer changer. Downloads of the beta are going to kill the Internet for a few days methinks.
 
An Apple is not a computer, it's a device that can do a lot of the typical things a computer can do. So if you want to do those things but don't want the hassle of a computer and have tons of extra money, you get a mac. You plug it in, it does what it's advertised to do, no more, no less. Some people just want something simple that works out of the box without any configuration or worry of even knowing what an OS is.

For a typical enthusiast on the other hand, a PC fits the bill better. You can change hardware, OS, mod it, etc and build it from scratch. Whatever route you go it will also be cheaper and be able to do more.

I'm talking more about Macs, but this goes with other devices, like comparing an iPhone to any other phone out there. with the iPhone you can't even change the battery and don't think it even has any memory card slots, while other phones do. It's easy to use and does what it's advertised to do, but no more no less. On the other hand you have phones like the Open Moko which runs Linux on it and you can pretty much mod it inside out.
 
Fair enough. Here's my point about form versus function however, thanks to Vega for the pic:

SANY0009-6.jpg


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1588587

I think it's safe to say that this is a rig that's pretty much function focused, hard to nice things about the form I'd say. Does a rig like this appeal to Apple users in general? I see very few Apple people posting in threads like this.
Functional... yes... practical... not in the least.
I had my Peltier cooled AMD Thunderbird machine back in the day before it was too common... those days are long past. Just like I don't daily drive a car with a clunky 1way diff, coilovers, no interior , and a rollcage anymore ;)
 
An Apple is not a computer, it's a device that can do a lot of the typical things a computer can do. So if you want to do those things but don't want the hassle of a computer and have tons of extra money, you get a mac. You plug it in, it does what it's advertised to do, no more, no less. Some people just want something simple that works out of the box without any configuration or worry of even knowing what an OS is.

For a typical enthusiast on the other hand, a PC fits the bill better. You can change hardware, OS, mod it, etc and build it from scratch. Whatever route you go it will also be cheaper and be able to do more.

I'm talking more about Macs, but this goes with other devices, like comparing an iPhone to any other phone out there. with the iPhone you can't even change the battery and don't think it even has any memory card slots, while other phones do. It's easy to use and does what it's advertised to do, but no more no less. On the other hand you have phones like the Open Moko which runs Linux on it and you can pretty much mod it inside out.

So car is not a car if you can't modify it?

How did you pass the second grade?
 
Based on my experience of using Apple laptops/desktops/mac pros for the last 3 years, Apple's computers seem to be more reliable than the PC counterparts. Maybe that can be attributed to Apple's ability to create a homogenous computer with its own designs of hardware and software. But the funny thing is that Dell does the same thing - but generally Dell's consumer computers/laptops are less reliable than Apple's.
 
What would you say is the average cost of the Macs and what would you say is the average cost of the PCs?
 
Apple products look nice. I am willing to pay a premium for that.
 
What would you say is the average cost of the Macs and what would you say is the average cost of the PCs?

I would -guess- that average person buying an Apple pays quite a bit more compared to the average person buying a PC. I would also imagine that the average person cross shopping an Apple and a PC pays about the same no matter which they choose, assuming they don't just decide to spend half of what they were thinking.

Meaning:
Average PC buying person buys a cheap brand name system in the $400-700 range
Average Mac buying person spends in excess of $1200 on a system
Average person looking at either a Mac or PC equally is shopping based on specs and quality; the prices come out fairly close comparing apples to apples hardware wise (as in not people saying Mac Pros are overpriced because their i7 is faster than a Xeon)

I could be dead wrong though :) Lots of assumptions... and you know what they say about those.
 
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Case in point, I have an HP tm2 convertible Tablet PC and yes the screen sucks.

You forgot about the keyboard, trackpad, input device, operating system (Windows 7 is still 1000x better with a mouse and keyboard than with finger or stylus), form factor, construction, and performance sucking.

At least we got you to finally admit that the screen sucks when the Asus EP121 came out with its better display, now its just time for you to admit the rest of the tm2 blows. ;)
 
Not being defensive. You made a claim that Apple couldn't make a decent $500 and I agreed. Well if Apple can't then probably no body really can right?

Yup, nobody can make a good notebook for under $500, not yet apparently. It simply doesn't exist, maybe it will someday.

Now, if people want to go with a cheap laptop, that's their prerogative, but they shouldn't expect quality, nor should they criticize people who choose to spend more money on superior hardware.
 
heatlesssun, Not having an IPS option kinda rubs me the wrong way. However, the TN screen on my MBP isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I find that I'm always sitting right in front of the monitor and I don't have to see off-center picture quality. IMO it looks pretty good when viewed head-on.

NOTE: I'm a big hater of TN panels. I've never owned one and I never will. I made sure I setup my dual-monitor setup at work with a PVA as main display, but I didn't have a choice with my 2nd monitor. It's TN and it's terrible.

At home I use an HP IPS, but I've owned Dell IPS and M/PVA monitors. If the MBP display was a shitty TN panel I wouldn't have bought it.

A coworker has an iMac and of course the monitor is beautiful. Apple knows how to grab you at first sight.

Even with TN+ monitors in their laptops, they do better than pretty much everyone else out there.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3991/apples-2010-macbook-air-11-13inch-reviewed/5
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4205/the-macbook-pro-review-13-and-15-inch-2011-brings-sandy-bridge/10

Their desktops go without saying, freaking gorgeous displays, ditto the iPhone and iPad.
 
Functional... yes... practical... not in the least.
I had my Peltier cooled AMD Thunderbird machine back in the day before it was too common... those days are long past. Just like I don't daily drive a car with a clunky 1way diff, coilovers, no interior , and a rollcage anymore ;)

You beat me to it. Practicality has nothing to do with projects like that. They are fun hobbies and I won't criticize it (the guy did a great job!), but they have much more to do with self-indulgence than they do with every day practicality or elegant solutions.

When I said this...

There is this ridiculous notion that form and function are mutually exclusive. In the best circumstances, form is function. Things like excellent keyboards, best trackpads in existence with multitouch gestures, magsafe, long battery life, great displays, thin and light, those are functional things, no?

They are functional and they have immediate benefits to the user, especially given that gesture based inputs are systemwide and completely supported by the operating system. This functional and very logical integration of hardware and software is a huge reason why people like Mac notebooks so much.

...practicality and logical design were at the heart of what I was talking about. Again, there is this ridiculous idea that form and function are these two discreet and seperate things. Using a modding project as an example (and I used to take a dremel to my cases back in the day, way before blowholes and shit became standard) is completely missing the point as it completely sidesteps the notion of practicality, which is integral to the idea of "function".
 
Rumor has it, you'll be able to use a portable device to storage your preferences to use on any Mac you're on. Early screenshots show Windows 8 may have a similar feature. Very cool. Let's see how well they work.

This could really be a great way of moving profiles from one computer to the next. It would be great to see Windows 8 utilize this.
 
there is this ridiculous idea that form and function are these two discreet and seperate things. Using a modding project as an example (and I used to take a dremel to my cases back in the day, way before blowholes and shit became standard) is completely missing the point as it completely sidesteps the notion of practicality, which is integral to the idea of "function".

I agree. Part of the reason I went MBP was because the small form made it more functional for me to carry around all day at school. I'm on the train 6 times a week and going to a couple classes and the library 5 days a week. Anything bigger in form than a 13" MBP would not be functional.
 
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