Jewish World Review Oct. 6, 2004 / 21 Tishrei 5765
Myths die hard, even for insiders
By Mark Kellner
http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com |
Gutenberg invented movable type. Columbus discovered the new world. And
a Macintosh computer always costs more than an equivalent Microsoft
Windows-based PC.
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JWR contributor Mark Kellner has reported on technology for industry newspapers and magazines since 1983, and has been the computer columnist for The Washington Times since 1991.Comment by clicking here.
Free software worth something
As my e-mail inbox last week demonstrated, the latter statement a
modified version of something said in this space seven days ago is
not true. Neither are the other two assertions, for that matter. China
has movable woodblock printing four hundred years before Gutenberg and
Korea used copper type for printing in 1392five years before the German
innovator was born. And while Columbus made an important discovery in
1492, he was not the first explorer to reach this part of the planet.
Now, back to Macs, which I've used and enjoyed for the better part of 15
years. While it is true that one can buy an inexpensive PC running
Windows (or even Linux for that matter), there's a difference between
saying you can get an inexpensive PC for half the cost of Apple's iMac
G5, and what some readers' perception was, that one could find the equal
of that new Mac for half off.
To clarify: the iMac G5, with a 64-bit PowerPC (stet) processor at its
core, is a far more powerful system, processor-wise, than any bargain
basement Windows machine. You can buy desktop computers running
Microsoft Windows that have 64-bit processors Intel Corp. and
Advanced Micro Devices, or AMD, each offer such CPU chips to computer
makers and build-it-yourself users but the price of such systems can
equal or surpass similar Mac configurations. In August, writer Paul
Murphy of the online publication LinuxInsider.com made a comparison
between a dual-processor Mac G5 system and a dual-processor Intel Xeon
box from Dell Computer. Both are 64-bit computers, both have enough
power for high-end computing tasks such as scientific computations and
computer-aided design.
Mr. Murphy looked at Dell and Mac units that had equal amounts of RAM
(512 Mbytes), hard disk space (160 GB) and even video memory (128
Mbytes). The Dell system, at $4,009, was $1,010 more expensive than the
equivalent Mac, priced at $2999.
At almost every level in the market, Mr. Murphy found that Macs were
less expensive than Dell units equipped with similar specifications.
E-mailing readers, such as Martin Hill of Curtin University of
Technology in Bentley, Western Australia, also pointed out the
differences between certain "all-in-one" PC configurations and the iMac
G5: you can't equal the latter system's power on the PC side.
Why does the myth persist? Well, old "truths" do die hard: Macs have
traditionally had higher "entry system" prices than PCs, and while you
can get a very good starter "eMac" computer from Apple, with 17-inch
CRT, or cathode-ray tube, monitor built-in for $799, it's not as widely
known as some other Mac models, and it has the old G4 processor, not the
new G5. Rob Enderle, a veteran technology industry analyst who now
operates his own consultancy, The Enderle Group, in San Jose, Calif.,
says that buyers also pay a premium for Apple's forward-thinking
industrial design.
"Design has a cost. You do get what is a very elegant design with the
iMac. It is a very attractive box. Neither of the other [all-in-one
computers] are on the same page as the iMac," he said in a telephone
interview last week.
At the same time, Mr. Enderle believes Apple could do more at the low
end to challenge the entry-level machines from Dell, Hewlett Packard and
others: "There's a lot of activity in the sub-$800 category," he said.
What is the average PC shopper to make of all this? The old Ronald
Reagan line the late President used with Mikhail Gorbachev comes to
mind: "Trust, but verify." When shopping for a computer, be certain that
what you're comparing is equal in power; but also, be sure of your
needs. Do that, and the Mac at your local dealer may well be a better buy.
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