• Cost of consultants to keep your PCs working. Macs are just a lot less trouble.

• Cost of your time dealing with malware. Yes, Macs can theoretically get compromised, but it's just not happening in reality. And it's unlikely to happen on the scale seen on Windows due to the Mac's better security design in general.

• Time cost of dealing with clunkiness of Windows/Microsoft software. This is a generalization, but time after time I find complex multi-step interfaces for functions like installing software or just saving a file. When instructions are provided for doing the same task on Windows and Mac, the Mac instructions are usually shorter (at least if the writer knows the Mac).

The main obstacle to switching I run into is the cost of purchasing Office for Mac. But for the vast majority of users, Apple's iWork suite, which now includes a spreadsheet app, is all they need. $79 a seat, even for business users (and a 5-user family pack for $99).

Macs aren't perfect, just very good.

P.S. to Miette: Macs have shipped with a 4-button/scroll wheel mouse (the Mighty Mouse) for about two years (which, to help newbies, physically seems to be a one-button mouse until you set the other buttons).

I've been playing World of Warcraft on my PC for over two years, and that is all that really matters.

I do not buy a computer, or a car, for its resale value. This sounds like BMW logic to me. The problem with that analogy is that a BMW is a very nice automobile. the Mac is still an unusable piece of crap. No wonder they have higher resale value, after two years they will be just like new. They are not used for anything but running the OS.

If you end up with an unusable pc after two years, you do not know anything about using or maintaining a computer and should probably keep using you Mac in your parent's basement.

Why are all your price comparisons based on year old data? Computer prices change everyday. Not only that, but obviously the only market for used macs is to existing mac users. Pretty small market. But they are used to over paying for stuff.

In todays market:

Entry level pc laptop about $500. Mac $1100

Loaded pc quad core, 4 GB ram 500gb hd dual nVidia 8800 $2500

Comparable Mac $6000

This is not an insignificant difference. Macs are like BMWs in one way, they are both over priced status symbols.

Seriously pal, when you write this-

: I have an i-Mac G5 that is so noisy that I have to wear ear plugs while using it"

I can only conclude either your iMac requires servicing, or you are just making this stuff up. I regularly render hi-definition video files with a G5 imac, and its fans are just above a whisper. Exactly what are you running when you must don the earplugs?

And, if you'd care to compare the acoustic signature of that iMac to its PC competitors of that era (circa 3 years ago), even the most diehard PC fanboy would concede comparably priced Dells, Gateways, HPs, etc SCREAM compared to iMacs. Unlike most PCs of that era, fans on the iMac speed up and down based on load, unlike those silly ATI and NVidia videocard fans that whine mercilessly no matter what you are doing. PCs would have never gotten into the business of building quieter PCs had Apple not shamed them into it, and they still lag far behind.

~gtd

Perhaps indirectly...in certain coffee shops at certain times of the day and in specific areas of the country.

But the odds are probably against it. And "mac girls", if there are such people, are not nearly as cool as they would have been several years ago when Apple's market share was slightly smaller.

So, just buy a PC and use the extra money that would be foolishly squandered to buy other products--like the iphone.

And here's a few tips when in a coffee shop:

Either just get the coffee and leave.

or

Stay and enjoy your coffee, but keep your windows-based machine at home, in your car, or just in your laptop bag. Let her wonder if you have a MAC Book PRO in there.

OR, and you have to have a certain amount of charisma to pull this off, turn your weakness into a strength!

Pull out your Dell laptop, put it on the table, and defiantly check your emails with it. Swagger a little too. If a mac girl comes by and giggles a little, just tactfully pull out your wallet with all your unspent cash, offer to but her the most expensive coffee they make, and explain, charmingly, why you're so much better than all the other losers around there.

...this thread will catch up to the Greenwald thread on Ron Paul by tomorrow. Nothing like a holy war to get the commenter juices flowing!

For what it's worth, I use both and have also done the Linux/Unix thing. The one thing I don't love about my Powerbook Pro is the keyboard/touchpad design -- the keys are way too far from the front of the machine for my taste, so it tends to sit on my desk connected to a KVM switch while my PC laptop (which also happens to be smaller and lighter) does the travelling. I love playing around with GarageBand, so that's the thing I love most about the Mac, but I end up doing most of my work on the PC, probably because I tote it everywhere with me while the Mac stays home. Count me also among those who tend to keep computers for a long time and then pass them on to friends and family members when I'm ready to trade up.

This article is so silly that I created a Salon account just to reply.

I thought this story might be a well-reasoned and thought-out explanation involving the lack of anti-virus subscriptions or something like that. Who the heck thinks of trade-in value when buying a computer? How many people really sell their old computers after a year or two?

And if I did sell or give away a Windows machine, I would never do it without first wiping the hard drive, thereby solving any concerns about it being "gummed up" with viruses and spyware (which, btw, I never have a problem with anyway).

I couldn't care less which computer people choose to use. And I'm certainly no big fan of Microsoft or Windows. But this whole line of reasoning is just dumb.