(no subject)

[theducks]

So, a year and a half ago, I did a comparison of a similarly specced iMac Intel and hand-built PC. Back then, the Mac stacked up pretty well against the PC, in terms of price. It was in fact $223.70 /cheaper/ than a similarly configured PC.

Let's see how we're doing 18 months later..

	Intel 20 inch iMac	Handbuilt PC
Screen	Built in 20 inch	Dell E207WFP ($329)
Memory	1GB (2 x 512MB)	2 x 512MB ($58)
Hard Drive	250GB SATA	250GB WD SATA ($89)
DVD	SuperDrive	Pioneer DVR-K06 ($117)
Case	iMac	Antec Sonata with PSU ($178)
OS	MacOS X 10.4.10	Windows Vista Home Premium ($168)
Graphics	128MB Radeon X1600	128MB Radeon X1600 ($92)
Internal components	Intel Core 2 Duo 2.16ghz	Intel Core 2 Duo 2.13ghz ($254) Intel D965 LTCK ($149)
Subtotal:	-	$1434
Other items	Apple keyboard, Apple Mighty mouse, built in wifi, bluetooth, iSight	Apple keyboard + Mighty mouse ($129), Intel Webcam ($39), PCI 802.11n card ($104.50), Bluetooth 2+EDR USB dongle ($25)
Total cost:	$2069.10	$1731.50

In short, not great. The iMac (at EDU pricing too!) is now $337.60 more expensive than a PC. There's a couple of reasons for this.. the big one being the LCD monitor. 20inch 1680x1050 panels are now becoming the sweet spot of the market, and Dell do an economy model, so it's $329 vs $958 last Janurary. If I was comparing the same model I did last year, it would be $200 more, but you don't get those features with the iMac, so it wouldn't be fair to. The other movement has been on OEM Windows pricing. Last year I compared Windows XP Pro, this year I'm comparing Vista Home Premium, which is $70 less than Vista Business.

The really interesting part? You can buy a very similar system to both of the above from Dell, and it will set you back $1640

So yeah.. lift yer game Apple :P

Comments

[trs80.ucc.asn.au (from livejournal.com)]

The iMac is also 10 months old now, and getting an update in the next month or so. Now $329 for the Dell 20" widescreen, that's pretty awesome.

[matt (from livejournal.com)]

Yeah, that's the general problem with any apple price comparison. It's worth bugger all unless you're integrating over 12-18 months, eg see the growing gap between flash ipod prices versus the raw flash memory.

[dilettantiquity.livejournal.com]

While being pretty much a PC girl all the way (in spite of my graphic design background), I have to note that the image quality on those Mac monitors is something incredible.