Comments on: My visit to the Apple Store

By: Lunarts

Lunarts — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 21:31:03 +0000

@Michael Draga

Well, it seems that Apple is only friendly to fellow Americans.
Here, in Europe, there are many complaints about warranties, services and quality hardware.
I am sure things are a lot better in the US.

By: Michael Draga

Michael Draga — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 03:34:20 +0000

My last visit to a Mac store was very similar. My video card had gone out and of course it was beyond the warranty. A long story short, I was given a brand new Pro Mac in place of my G5 for just the cost of the video card. Why would anyone have any other machine?

By: Lunarts

Lunarts — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 18:08:14 +0000

And (sorry I forgot) the Leopard 10-5-4 was included and installed

By: Lunarts

Lunarts — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 18:03:21 +0000

My 18 months old Macbook Pro had a DVI in problem. After talking to Apple support in Ireland I went to a Mac shop and they told me it would cost me 1100 Euro’s to replace the motherboard because the DVI is part of that. European Consumer Law did not apply because my Macbook was bought for my (1 person) business.

In the end I bought a Psystar 8800 quad intel processor, 1 terrabite HD, 8 GB ram, wireless card, 10 usb ports, 3 Firewire 400 and 2 800 and some more digital inputs on sound and video I don’t use. Price was 1100 Euro’s ex VAT.

Fuck Apple

By: Roger

Roger — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:52:42 +0000

I had a similar experience with my macbook pro when it refused to boot. I turned up at Regent Street and the people in the shop reinstalled the OS without losing any apps or data, solving the problem and getting me up and running at no cost. Think how much saving my work related data would have cost me elsewhere. Again, when my iPod battery went outside warranty, they replaced the whole thing, and did the same thing for my son later, in Bristol. The only thing I would add is – buy it from John Lewis, as they give an extra year of warranty free for the same purchase price, and the customer service and returns policy is also terrific. They replaced the macbook pro when the case went wonky, free of charge for a new spec machine. Macs don’t cost twice as much as similar quality machines such as Vaios, just as twice as much as shoddy machines such as Dells, Toshibas & the like. I’ve been 25 years in the business and thus far my experience has been “buy the best, forget the rest”

By: Das Jas

Das Jas — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 06:30:28 +0000

I cant believe any of you who say its not worth it to get a mac or that you have gotten bad service. Macs may cost more, but what do you get? You get: top of the line hardware (I have had no problems with my Macbook Pro), amazing software, a willingness to work with Microsoft, and customer service.
I went in to buy a computer at an Apple store and they waited on me hand and foot to help me figure out which computer I wanted. AND they have done the exact same every time I’ve had a question or I’ve screwed something up. For instance, I installed an Ubuntu studio on my Mac to test it out, but in my haste, I failed to incorporate an exit strategy. Upon trying to uninstall it, it unmounted the partition and left a full swap partition that is unmountable cutting the main portion of my harddrive off from about 20 gigs of space, which has been rendered useless. I contacted Apple and they tried to help me as best as they could even though it was not their software and I probably shouldn’t have been trying to install Ubuntu anyway.
I found that, even though it is not fixable, even while reinstalling the OS, they were completely helpful and I never even got so much as a bad attitude from any of their representatives.

By: Bob Saggett

Bob Saggett — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 21:25:15 +0000

I don’t own a mac but I have had iPods. I have always found Apple to be a little too desperate to get hold of my credit card details so it is good to hear a positive story.

One question, could they not have put an optical drive in temporarily for you? That’s what we do with PCs and laptops.

By: Rudolf Olah

Rudolf Olah — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:04:22 +0000

Bill Moore is absolutely correct. There used to be Apple/Macintosh clones being sold until Jobs killed that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_clone#Jobs_ends_the_official_program

By: Mac Fanboy

Mac Fanboy — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 08:01:28 +0000

Harry,

“Logic dictates” that you shouldn’t leave a freaking essay in a place reserved for comments.

Dude . . . get your own blog. We come here for the flame wars. 😉

-Mac Fanboy

By: Harry

Harry — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 22:05:53 +0000

The ongoing debate over whether Macs are better or over-priced as compared to PCs, is like so many other similar debates, an utter waste of time. By definition, the evaluation of any complex, multi-faceted product that has human interfaces which differ from equivalent interfaces on a competitive product involves personal taste, which is subjective and cannot be measured in any reliable way. Similarly, logic dictates that if someone purchases a Mac, they obviously do not consider it over-priced. Since people have different interpretations of better and place different values on various things in all aspects of life, that should be the end of the discussion.

Making it worse is that the whole premise of the debate is ill-defined, and is argued without any supporting empirical data or logic being used. To add to the Alice in Wonderland quality, many of the proponents on either side of the debate seem to be zealots without a shred of objectivity.

Before starting, consider first how difficult it is for competent, well-intentioned individuals, myself included, to be completely objective, and it quickly goes downhill from there. People who use a Mac (or PC) almost exclusively and by choice in the course of doing their jobs obviously already have a pretty clear bias about which platform is better. Although they may try and be objective, realistically their view about the other platform is skewed. Some of them may have limited experience with the other platform, which makes it difficult for them to properly evaluate it, and even if they use both on a regular basis, that presents its own problem. Consider that on your problem of choice you have probably mostly internalized its aggravations, while on the other platform continued use only reinforces its aggravations and reminds you why you like your platform better.

Another problem, while not strictly one of objectivity is closely related, and that is whether they represent typical usage. It is all too easy to consider our own usage to be typical, when it may in fact be atypical. Consider software developers and journalists. Both put their machines to hard use on a regular basis. Minor things are much more significant to them than to casual users, making their input less useful to the population at large. That is not to say that it is not valid, but only that it is of less importance to Joe Consumer. In the same vein, my experience as a casual user, while not totally without merit, has less value to a developer than that of a fellow developer.

Unfortunately, once we get past those opinions, we get into the general population, and civility among large parts of the population at large seems to be non-existent. I’m referring to so-called ‘fanboys’, who seem to make up a significant amount of the commentators on various issues, including the Mac/PC one. Occasionally they might have something genuinely interesting to say, but the abusive manner in which they express themselves is a turnoff to considering it.

To determine value, (defined here as the combination of price, the actual hardware or software and the various intangibles associated with them,) the hardware and software needs to be evaluated separately, in spite of them typically being bundled together for purchase. Evaluating Apple and Microsoft as corporate entities as well is somewhat useful for context.

On the hardware side, the first issue to consider in an ‘apples to apples’ comparison is whether Macs and PCs can run the same operating systems and applications in their native form without some kind of emulation. Since both use Intel chips, the answer is yes: Apple can run Windows and its applications without problems, and OS X has been hacked to run on non-Apple PCs, although this is a violation of its license.

Given that hardware is irrelevant (from a non-legal standpoint), the next thing to consider is the price of identically configured Macs and PCs (sameness of processors, memory, drives, ports, display size and resolution, etc.), net of the operating system. As best as can be measured, Macs are more expensive in absolute terms. In spite of this, you have to give Apple a lot of credit for getting a significant percentage of the population to pay a premium for what is essentially a commodity product. Ask any marketing person just how difficult a task that is.

An interesting question, for which unfortunately there is no comprehensive data available, is where Apple’s defect rate lies in relation to those of PC manufacturers, both in terms of overall units and discrete components. A lower rate would indicate a better engineered and manufactured machine; a higher rate would indicate the opposite and might explain some of the price premium, in that Apple needs to charge more for its hardware to make up for higher warranty expenses.

In summary, aside from a few design issues which are difficult to evaluate objectively, the hardware is functionally equivalent, with PCs being somewhat cheaper.

On the software application side, its important to note that the lack of a high quality native application on one of the platforms does not mean that the platform is incapable of running it, only that it is unavailable for some reason. The fact that software is infinitely malleable, meaning that any software developed for one platform can be developed for the other platform, makes judgement based on availability problematic.

Consider ‘TextMate’ on the Mac, which seems to be a favorite among programmers. The developers have made a decision not to produce a Windows version for whatever reason. It is hard to make a case that Windows is inferior simply because a program like TextMate isn’t available for it. It is entirely conceivable that if the developers produced a native Windows version that included a couple of whiz-bang features that weren’t available on the Mac version, that programmers on the Mac would look more favorably upon Windows as a development tool. Another example would be Microsoft Access, available only as a native app for Windows. The fact that it is not available for the Mac in no way diminishes the Mac.

Somewhat related to this is the high quality apps that Apple bundles with its operating system and how it affects peoples objectivity. While it is great for the consumer in the sense that it adds value to their purchase, it also has the effect of potentially reducing the market for independent developers. Realistically, if someone is using a great app that is included with the OS, how much incentive do they have to search out even better ones? There is plenty of evidence that most people will put up with mediocre applications rather than pay for a good one. In any case, you have to wonder whenever anyone is praising a free/cheap application if they have searched out better programs. That it is free/cheap doesn’t automatically mean it is no good, but given buying behavior it begs the question. (TextMate, which seems to be the poster boy of a truly great application provides an interesting example. If it were twice the price, consumer purchasing behavior suggests that it would have sold far fewer copies. Given that the vast majority of the copies sold are most likely to professional developers, and expenses, it makes you wonder about any ‘professional’ who would use an inferior tool only because it’s cheaper. But that is another story.)

Ignoring the quality of applications — features, ease of use, and bugs — there is a greater selection of software available for the PC, although the Mac has at least a couple of programs in each category, so it is hard to say that either platform is markedly superior.

Based on the list prices of both OS X and the base version of Windows, Windows is clearly more expensive. Factoring in more expensive versions of Windows versions makes the difference even greater. Apple does not offer upgrade prices, while MS does, which makes Apple’s advantage less but still significant.

Apple offers new versions on a more-or-less regular basis, while MS offers new versions of Windows on a seemingly random basis, using service packs to add functionality in between. Even ignoring ease of use, etc., Apple the clear winner here.

Security seems to be Apple’s shortcoming. According to security reports over the last few years, Apple has had both more deficiencies overall and more serious ones. To compound that, Apple takes longer to address them. While MS has its own security problems, they appear to take the issue more seriously. The question is why Apple is in this position, given OS X’s close relationship to FreeBSD, which is very quick about fixing security flaws.

On a corporate level, both companies have demonstrated some pretty odious behavior, Microsoft in support of its customers, and Apple towards its customers. Take your choice: neither is very appealing.

Apple has shown a surprising indifference to its customers. Witness when customers had to start having the batteries replaced in their iPods. Not only was it an expensive process, but Apple was returning used iPods that were similar models (but not the original item) and with all the music erased, with no advance warning that this was the procedure. Their attitude was ‘you got back a similar machine and it works — what’s the big deal?’ Another example is when Apple censored postings on their forums that dealt with defective LCDs. Is that any way to treat a customer? Or how about some of the behavior inflicted on independent software developers in regards to the iPhone store? Finally, Apple has a terrible reputation for rewarding compliant members of the press and punishing journalists who write critical, if accurate articles and reviews. ‘So what?’, you may ask, but it inhibits potential customers from getting accurate information about buying decisions.

In the case of Microsoft, the biggest thing they have going in their defense is their role in making personal computing affordable. There was a time when Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect were each hundreds of dollars. Microsoft’s business model allowing commodity hardware, and MS Office brought application prices down dramatically. (Apple products are priced better now, partly as a result of Microsoft, but Apple used to be outrageously expensive.) Microsoft has a bad reputation for anti-competitive behavior, not to mention being a convicted monopolist. While the argument has been made that Janet Reno prosecuted the wrong Bill so that she didn’t have to prosecute the other one, there is no denying that MS is guilty of some pretty abusive behavior. We have no way of knowing the true effects on the market of that behavior, and if that behavior that was helpful in reducing prices might not have changed once MS accomplished its goals of driving off competition. It’s probably as safe bet to assume that it would have changed, and not for the better.

So what is the bottom line? Given that the hardware really doesn’t matter, the issue becomes one of software. And given the subjective nature of software, while some people might genuinely be better off with one or the other platform, for many the choice doesn’t make any meaningful difference.

Computers are tools, pure and simple. They are no different than culinary knives, of which there are several high-end brands. Among equivalent knives (similar size and purpose) that all do the same thing, there is a wide range of prices. The only discernible differences are the balance point and shape of the handles. I doubt anyone would say that a chef, who uses his knives all day long, and who chooses the most expensive one because he likes the feel of it in his hand better, paid too much. His increased productivity using it as opposed to a cheaper knife probably can’t be measured, but he no doubt enjoys his working day more. If a Mac is a tool that someone enjoys using more and they are more productive because of using it, due to certain intangible qualities, than it’s hard to see how they didn’t get good value.

Or consider digital single lens reflex cameras. Using roughly equivalent models from Canon or Nikon produces photos that are pretty much indistinguishable from each other. It has been said that Canon cameras seem like they were designed by engineers, while Nikon cameras seem like they were designed by photographers, but they both do the same thing equally well.

That is perhaps the best way to view the Windows/OS X debate. They both do the same thing, but Windows seems like it was designed by engineers, and OS X by users.