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• Wednesday, August 8, 2007 02:53 PM

  Bang for the buck?

  Apple already had their laptop-on-a-stand iMacs out, so the only thing new is the case and the drop in price. But Macs are still mroe expensive than PCs.

  Here's a price I got from Apple's online store for the 2.4GHz 24" model with options selected to come closest to a 2.4GHz Gateway w/24" screen:

  Summary

  Subtotal $2,499.00

  Estimated Ship:

  3 weeks

  Free Shipping

  Click "Update Details" to reflect changes to system price and shipping.

  Specifications

  2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo

  2GB 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM - 2x1GB

  1TB Serial ATA Drive

  SuperDrive 8x (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)

  Apple Mighty Mouse

  Apple Keyboard (English) + Mac OS X

  Accessory kit

  ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO with 256MB memory

  24-inch glossy widescreen LCD

  AirPort Extreme

  Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR

  The Gateway FX530XV (The closest I could get easily, but I couldn't downgrade the processor cache from 8MB to 4MB and the FSB from 1066MHz to 800MHz) is $1999 (on sale for $1899).

  So the iMac with the slower FSB and half the L2 cache is $500-$600 (25-30%) more expensive than the Gateway. Just because Apple is cutting their expensive prices does not mean that they have yet to get down to PC prices. And that's not even home-built barebones which would probably cut the price of the PC even further.

  I'm sure there are those who would be willing to spend the $500-600 premium for Apple branding and styling, but I'd rather spend it on CPU, mobo, or memory. It is hardly obvious that it is the best home computer for the money. Depending on your tastes, it could be the prettiest home computer for the money.

  —1969L46 Read 1969L46's other letters
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