Originally posted by falconeye What an odd remark ...
Since four years, I edit my 36mp raws with a now six y.o. MacBook Pro and even at the time I purchased it, it was a hair cheaper than an equivalently built Dell or HP.
Taking resale value into account, a Mac is more value for the bang. Only problem, you won't get the stuff built to lowest standards. Just my two cents to oppose you. OT anyway
It depend how you do it man. Building a computer is a puzzle with less than 10 parts, anybody can do it when you buy all the pieces yourself, nobody can bullshit you. You choose the right brand, hight quality gear for each part and you get no issue. when you buy thing made for you, they use non standard part, typically a sub part motherboard (because it is never written on the spec), soso power suply (one of the thing that is responsable of most issue) and you don't know if the memory used is of good quality or not. Cheap memory tend to have failure and make you computer fail or reboot randomly. If you get only high quality part, you get a very solid build. Last you can't choose the bundle that match your needs. If you deviate from most manufacturers marketing targets, you have to pay for thing you don't need to have the key upgraded part you really need.
3 year old destop brought for 720€:
79€ for Mini PC, Antec case with power suply
76€ for ASUS H81Plus motheboard
134€ for 16GB Asus DDR3 1600 CAS9
106€ Windows 8 OEM 64 bit (got updated for free).
211€ Intel Core i5 4670 3.4Ghz
29€ DVD RW drive
70€ 1TB HDD
Price new today: 720 (the same)
85€ equivalent case.
89€ for ASUS H81Plus motheboard
96€ for 16GB Asus DDR3 1600 CAS9
129€ Windows 10 OEM 64 bit
234€ Intel Core i5 4670 3.4Ghz 4 core
29€ DVD RW drive
60€ 1TB HDD
Cheapest Mac that match or surpass 3.4 Ghz 4 core, 16GB RAM:
Mac mini:no one is powerfull enough.
iMac: For 1739€ I can get 2.8GHz i5 and 16GB RAM (less powerfull) For 2179€ I get a 3.3 Ghz i7 higher end processor that as part is costing 418€ instead of 234€, so 440€ more to get a part that cost 180€ more.
Mac book pro: For 2569€, the most expensive laptop couldn't match the 3.4Ghz base frequency of the i5 desktop. This is to be expected, laptop have more constraints for heat and power consumption and so can't match a desktop for actual performance.
Conclusion:
- The resale value of the 3 year old destop would be very high has the price new didn't drop 1 bit overall. I did it in the past, if you resell over ebay, you get amost the new price for it.
- The branded computers are much more expensive.
I have nothing again Macs, they look better, their build quality is nice, their software run well. They give you an interresting experience. I had a few before so this is not like I don't know what I speak about. I plan to change my car in 2-3 years for a BMW if all goes well. Well I know that an equivalent Renault car is going to cost 30% less rougly. But this is a choice. When the previous Mac was really too slow for photo editing and the batterie inflated in the MacBookPro destroying it actually, I had to buy something else, just after I got a mortage for a flat and had lot of things to do in the flat. A fancy computer was not the priority. In 5 years I may buy a mac again. Why not?
I don't want to start war or whatever. I just provided facts. Mac are luxury products like Leica or BMW. There reason to buy them, that for sure. But when people go there and speak of the money they need to invest on a new computer, I assume they would get the basic thing. Not the BMW equivalent.