Someone remind me why Apple products are so expensive.....?

[broc]

Apple products are highly priced for the following reason

 

The sheer volume of work that goes into it to make sure that it works as described so the user doesn't have to faff about installing drivers and such like.

 

For one set of machine specs, for it to work flawlessly, it takes say 3 months of coding and driver testing to be sure, plus a further 3 months on building enough to do tests. Then when thats done, they sell for the price of the components at the HIGHEST cost when they first came out. Doubling up on some parts sometimes involves a premium cost to do so (EG RAM, GFX Card).

 

It is a very good and clearly working business model.

 

The OS sells for cheap because it is easy to use, easy to update, and just works fine on the hardware that apple provide.

 

The lengthy development cycle clearly worked then for iPhone 4 ..... testing that users could make a phone call while holding the phone.....

 

But you cannot fault the Apple model for stability....If you lock down the hardware & prevent people plugging anything into it/installing what they want then you will get stability....

[andyturpie]

No urban myth about this.....

 

It WAS proved a few years ago that this had taken place across a whole raft of products. The minor shrinkage in size, but no apparent lowering of the price.

 

Anyway, just to add another strand to the thread....

 

I LOVE Adidas trainers, and won't wear any others..... Why? Well, experience has told me that they "just fit"....Every single time. However, Reeboks, Nike and others are always a little small or a little too big. Mind you, I've never gone on a forum and decried someone for wearing ASICS (even though i should!!!).

 

Apple does seem to instill a "love or hate" reaction in most people.

 

Whats wrong with ASICS lol?

[synaesthesia]

This argument/discussion always brings a nice array of opinions. I will always dislike Apple as, whereas Mars will happily shave a gram or two off their bars and say nothing of it, that's definitely better than being lied to outright

[aerospacemango]

Whats wrong with ASICS lol?

 

EVERYTHING!!!!!

 

They don't make size 10 trainers for a size 10 foot!!!

 

Whereas the mighty Adidas make trainers that fit straight away! Nike are poo too!

 

and the aforementioned Reebok too!

 

And don't get me started Dunlop!!!

[LosOjos]

EVERYTHING!!!!!

 

They don't make size 10 trainers for a size 10 foot!!!

 

Whereas the mighty Adidas make trainers that fit straight away! Nike are poo too!

 

and the aforementioned Reebok too!

 

And don't get me started Dunlop!!!

 

What are all these trainers you speak of?

 

Nothing but Airwalk will do for my Frodo's!

[aerospacemango]

What are all these trainers you speak of?QUOTE]

 

They are a mythical type of footwear that are worn by youngsters (for I am still young....in mind, if not in body!!!)

 

They allow you to walk and run comfortably over all types of terrain....except mountains.....and possibly ice and snow.......

 

You should try some Los, as they are much more comfortable than Airwalk!!

 

(That is just my opinion, and in no way meant to upset the Airwalk fanbois, who will now inhabit the thread, and call for all those who wear trainers to be ritually slaughtered......probably!)

[Flatpackhamster]

EVERYTHING!!!!!

 

They don't make size 10 trainers for a size 10 foot!!!

 

Whereas the mighty Adidas make trainers that fit straight away! Nike are poo too!

 

and the aforementioned Reebok too!

 

And don't get me started Dunlop!!!

 

Nothing wrong with Dunlop. I have a good sturdy pair of Dunlop green wellies.

[Domino]

Nothing wrong with Dunlop. I have a good sturdy pair of Dunlop green wellies.

 

My dunlops don't fit...

 

[aerospacemango]

Nothing wrong with Dunlop. I have a good sturdy pair of Dunlop green wellies.

 

And I thought it would be the Airwalk brigade that came for me......

 

Turns out that Dunlop get there first!

 

Wellies should always be Hunter!!! (And green!)

[Flatpackhamster]

My dunlops don't fit...

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]12837[/ATTACH]

 

Then don't try to fit them around your ankles, wear them around your waist.

[Flatpackhamster]

And I thought it would be the Airwalk brigade that came for me......

 

Turns out that Dunlop get there first!

 

Wellies should always be Hunter!!! (And green!)

 

Hope you're wearing them with your Barbour then, to blend in with the other people who think they belong to the Country Set.

[andyturpie]

Adidas originals for the win (Forest Hills/Gazelles). Dunlop green flash were big in the 80s....

[localzuk]

How do you all know the brand of your shoes?!

 

All I know about my trainers is they're black with some red bits, and they cost £14.99. *Doesn't understand*

[aerospacemango]

How do you all know the brand of your shoes?!

 

All I know about my trainers is they're black with some red bits, and they cost £14.99. *Doesn't understand*

 

I know because I will ONLY wear Adidas, for the reasons already stated! If I could find a bargain pair that would fit and be as comfortable as the ones I already buy, then I may be persuaded otherwise!

 

Hope you're wearing them with your Barbour then, to blend in with the other people who think they belong to the Country Set.

 

Never owned a Barbour, and never will. Nor do I think I'm part of the "Country Set"! I just know good wellies when I wear them!

[NikChillin]

If they didn't charge so much their business might go pear shaped....

[andyturpie]

I know because I will ONLY wear Adidas, for the reasons already stated! If I could find a bargain pair that would fit and be as comfortable as the ones I already buy, then I may be persuaded otherwise!

 

 

 

Never owned a Barbour, and never will. Nor do I think I'm part of the "Country Set"! I just know good wellies when I wear them!

 

Dont disrespect the Barbour - quality jacket (quilted not the waxed ones) and nice for the winter when matched with an aquascutum scarf.

[aerospacemango]

Hmmmmm....good days work so far!

 

Upset ASICS, Dunlop, Airwalk and Barbour wearers!!!

 

Unintentionally, of course!

[mthomas08]

See Apple products getting more flack

 

Must say its weird that this convo popped up again at work, 3 months ago our Dep Head asked about prices for his own personal IPad. He wanted one, just like he wanted his iPhone (previously Blackberry). We knew what was coming, just few weeks ago we was told to order two IPads one for him and one for another Dep Head who he shares an office with.

 

Will he use it for work or anything like that nope, but the school purchased expensive toys just so he has something fancy. Just like the iPhone which the school pays for, the only thing work wise they use it for is to Sync email which lets face it - they could have purchased him self. This is the same guy who owns a BMW, Grey suit and will use an umbrella from his car to his office (10 feet). You can guess he certainly cares about his image.

 

We recently purchased a MAC Book and the Head was warned, when one gets it so will every one else. Conveniently we had a lot of "Apple" requests and each time we ask "Why do you need it" they look glum and clueless. I my self have an iPhone 4 and I dont use it for anything special other than calls/texts and my work emails. Which frankly you can do on most phones nowadays.

 

Luckily enough we have a new Head coming september and well let's just say Staff heads are going to roll hard, I met the guy and know a few things about him and he certainly will not be giving in to staff. Schools are apparently struggling on money, redundancies so where is the legit reasons for purchasing expensive toys which frankly do less then a laptop.

[Flatpackhamster]

Never owned a Barbour, and never will. Nor do I think I'm part of the "Country Set"! I just know good wellies when I wear them!

 

At £80 a pair, I'd expect those wellies to be effing EPIC. I'd expect them to fly me across the mud to my Range Rover.

[LosOjos]

This is the same guy who owns a BMW, Grey suit and will use an umbrella from his car to his office (10 feet).

 

whoa whoa whoa... what's wrong with grey suits?

[aerospacemango]

At £80 a pair, I'd expect those wellies to be effing EPIC. I'd expect them to fly me across the mud to my Range Rover.

 

They were a Christmas present from my (now ex) girlfriend. We used to share a house that was on a farm. Thus wellies were a necessity.

 

Having split from her, the wellies are an expensive doorstop!

 

And, by the way Flat, I am an ordinary working class fella.....so the country set was ALWAYS beyond me.....

[edutech4schools]

One of those shoe makers is going to add a jet pack and for the next few years they are going to charge a fair amount for them, which is fine, after all the came up with the idea. But then a few years down the line the other shoe makers have also added a jet pack, and a few other extras, and a range off different designs and they are cheaper. So should the original shoe maker still be charging lots more for a design that has not really changed.

[Arthur]

If people want to waste their money on over valued trash that has a logo on then more fool them I say.

The world is full of suckers! Why do people buy their groceries from Waitrose/Sainsbury's instead of Aldi/Lidl, buy clothes from designer shops instead of Primark, drive German cars instead of Korean, buy razor blades with a 4750% markup, use expensive perfume when cheap deodorant would do, and so on. I take it you practice what you preach for everything you buy? If not, then you are being a bit of a hypocrite!

 

HP don't have the cult following

HP will never be cool because they create the same boring ***t as everyone else does. They simply don't care what they sell to consumers. e.g. laptops full of crapware and Synaptics trackpads which are barely usable.

[mac_shinobi]

The world is full of suckers! Why do people buy their groceries from Waitrose/Sainsbury's instead of Aldi/Lidl, buy clothes from designer shops instead of Primark, drive German cars instead of Korean, buy razor blades with a 4750% markup, use expensive perfume when cheap deodorant would do, and so on. I take it you practice what you preach for everything you buy? If not, then you are being a bit of a hypocrite!

 

 

HP will never be cool because they create the same boring ***t as everyone else does. They simply don't care what they sell to consumers. e.g. laptops full of crapware and Synaptics trackpads which are barely usable.

 

Just quoted you as wanted to agree, the below is just generally how I feel and agreeing with your crapware on laptops etc, the same as symantec software at least as far as Symantec AV vs say Vipre or NOD32 etc as far as using the resources wisely instead of oh you have 4gb of ram and a quad core, let me just use 3.8gb of RAM and 90% of your CPU, windows only requires 200mb RAM and 5% of the CPU now that you have purchased such a high spec PC... yeah right......

 

You earned your money fair and square yet you don't have people who use apple moaning or complaining about why people buy expensive hardware and are forever upgrading due to the constant release of new hardware forced by the constant release of

 

1. Games that require better hardware to play said games

2. To run windows 7 / 8 at a reasonable rate ie so that it's usable

 

Also windows requires a lot of user intervention to maintain its usability ie

 

* clear temp files

* adjust virtual memory

* defrag

* adjust startup items or services

* use multiple utils for anti ( spyware / viruses / malware )

 

Yes all OSes inc OS X require some tweaking / maintenance. I did use sophos av due to being free etc but after using it for aprox a month it never found anything so I just ditched AV as felt it was a waste of resources and so far has been fine, yes OS X has loop holes etc but so does windows and other OSes if you know enough and you have physical access to said device(s).

 

I generally find windows does require more input or time as far as maintenance is concerned. My windows 7 32 bit machine at work has had windows 7 re imaged on it twice in the space of 3 months and it's used for a Cisco soft phone, lotus notes, Firefox for our e ticket system and ms office 2010 standard yet regardless the audio service is forever crashing and even after clearing all temp files, defrags and deleting un wanted files regardless of having 90% free disk space or 30% free space with virtual memory set to system managed still runs as slow as anything. Ok the hdd it uses is a SATA 2 7200 rpm but my 2011 uses a 5400 rpm laptop hdd yet I can run word, excel, firefox, safari, a few video players, iTunes and it doesn't crap out any services or slow down to the point where you have to give it 10 mins and a reboot. Sure it doesn't have any GPO's being applied etc but GPO's shouldn't slow a machine down that much

 

Or you have to legally use Linux / free bsd or another OS of choice which requires

 

1. Knowledge to configure and do things differently ( sure so does OS X ) but at least the commands are shorter and yes Linux is getting better in this department

2. You can't legally install OS X on a windows PC and if you do ( maybe different now ) but before it wouldn't take advantage of the graphics card you had as it would work in a VESA mode. Also apple don't update the support for all the latest graphics cards ie gtx 590 and the ATI 6xxx and possibly 7xxx range of cards are out but the best one apple use is a mid to low end 6950 as far as I know.

 

3. The cards ( as far as graphics ) that macs have or use are good enough as if we want games then there are macs that have the ATI 5870 or similar cards. Let's face it if you buy an apple mac wanting to simulate DNA on a 3D projector / HD TV like scientists do or are wanting to always play the latest games then you may of made the wrong purchase. There are games consoles for playing games and you can play just buy a decent windows based pc which you can upgrade quicker / easier than a mac

 

In relation to the car thing - there are some people on here who have say the honda civic 3 door sports edition which must of cost around the £10,000 mark pic below :

 

 

They could of purhcased a 2nd hand cheaper car but they obviously wanted the 180 bhp, better looking car etc etc, sure the mirrors automatically retract / open upon switching the engine or ignition off or starting the car and possibly other useful things but still a lot of money just to do those things when a seat / vauxhall may of been cheaper.

 

Sure if you had the money you could of purchased a Veyron Bugatti sports edition or an Aston Martin DB 9 vs a Ford KA.

 

My personal preference was to get a 1.6 Litre honda civic executive which was a bit under £1,500 mark and yes I prefer my honda cars to anything else and it's called personal preference as well as spending money I earned , don't see what the fuss is all about.

 

It's not like I've hacked or stolen your hard earned money to buy or purchase something you would never purchase due to your personal preferences.

 

If you would much prefer an android based phone or a windows pc you can upgrade - good on you. I can see the advantages on using windows vs os x or PC vs Mac ( Yes I know apple mac's are a lot more money ) but I do enjoy coming home and being able to switch on a computer at home that is non windows without configuration and just being able to do what I want to.

 

>> Uses windows PC's at work, a Mac at home with vmware fusion / virtual box / boot camp ( for windows now and then ). I could of purchased a small or mini pc like an nvidia ion but I wanted to spend the money on a mac mini so I could use it as a media centre with plex, yes there is XMBC etc but Plex works on OS X and it works how I want a media centre to work. Maybe XMBC does the same but afaik XMBC runs as or like an OS and it is only a media centre where as Plex is an OS X app and I can switch between using it as a media centre or using it to do a plethora of other things ie email, word, excel, etc etc.

 

Just makes me wonder with all these anti apple threads on edugeek, do said anti apple people on edugeek sign up to apple forums and post bashful / anti apple / you're wasting money threads on apples website or on apple website forums such as TUAW or on forums or do you just go to the genius bar big bang theory style like Sheldon and mock the people at the genius bar for calling it a genius bar and telling them they are not genius and swearing etc only to get kicked out of the apple store ?

 

I'm not stating that everyone does but just seems a bit childish - sure you are entitled to your opinions and I can see why ie you are not locked in, its cheaper, you can still do the same things as OS X ie video editing / music editing etc but some of the windows software to do this is still expensive licensing wise and maybe just me but the OS X tools seem a lot more intuitive.

I would like to know why there is constantly anti apple and why people feel the need to constantly bash all the apple stuff on here, feel like I have to hide in the corner and to a degree unless it's related to getting help networking apple macs into an AD network then it's almost taboo to post or speak about apple macs because "oh look at that daft user, what a total sucker for spending all that money on an apple mac when they could of just purchased a PC for half the price etc etc"

Edited January 27, 2012 by mac_shinobi

[synaesthesia]

It will always be a love/hate thing with Apple kit and I don't think that will ever change. What will change is the usage patterns both at home and in the business/school and that could swing either way as far as Apple are concerned; and they know it. So do MS and all suppliers of PC hardware (PC includes Apple because Macs are PCs too and I care less about what any marketing idiot says than I do about anyone who witters on about the Cloud like it's something new).

They cater for a different market and direct comparisons perhaps are not entirely fair. We all know how I stand; I hate the company Apple with a passion with a very good and very factual reason. My mind is black and white therefore I can't possibly see the white from a black company. I did recently tweet though that I am in a constant state of confusion with this; disliking a supplier SO much yet it doesn't take me much persuasion to part with (someone else's) money, it's obvious where the benefits lie with kit like iPads and it's good to see such use of IT equipment on mass. I'm starting to come to terms with it by not thinking who's pockets I'm lining. It's the end user that's important and if what they have in their hand does the job then great. Then I start to think about Sparklebox and that grey bit inbetween gets worried again. The resources were great but the owner is an alleged paedophile. It's a bit harsh of course, Job's was a genius moron (could I therefore call him an oxymoron? ) but to noones knowledge is he or anyone at the top of Apple a sex offender. But they lie and cheat considerably more than the next company along.

Sometimes you just have to let things go and look at the greater good (not Hot Fuzz in context although some will be quick to compare the cult in that film to that of an Apple following).

I have often sit and wondered what actual benefits would come to the users of iPads when they leave school in 10 years time and the only answer is none, directly at least. It's not about the technology, what it can do or how they use it. It's about the end goal- social interaction, learning to interface with technology of the time, using it alongside other subjects to reach a goal at that time.

 

At no point should a user of any product have to hide in a corner. Does it do what it needs to for you? Yes? Great - out of the corner you come and be proud you achieve your goal with the tools you choose. I will stand by my right to beat anyone who knowingly and willingly buys a Macbook, removes any trace of OSX and sticks an install of Windows on it, with the largest 386 Compaq laptop I have in my possession. That is an "Apple Idiot" by definition. No different to someone who buys a BMW 3 series/Mercedes C class/Audi/insert premium car maker here, rips out the engine and replaces it with a 1.2 zetec from a fiesta.

Not saying Windows is bad, nor a 1.2 zetec.

 

The point is simple; if someone wishes to mock another based on their choice of tool and that tool does exactly what is required, then that person needs slapping. That's the childish part. In general we need to stay objective and focused on the important people, our own judgement is of course important but our thoughts on devices or a company should not detract from what could possibly do a lot of good for the children who's lives we are charged with improving, the minds we are charged with expanding.

Edited January 27, 2012 by synaesthesia