The price of personal computers has dropped to the point where the actual box is a small part of the equation. The cost of software, broadband, accessories, movies, cameras, printers, music , music players and general consumables make the cost of the actual computer less relevant than ever, especially if it can be used for three or more years.
read on….
The price of personal computers has dropped to the point where the actual box is a small part of the equation. The cost of software, broadband, accessories, movies, cameras, printers, music , music players and general consumables make the cost of the actual computer less relevant than ever, especially if it can be used for three or more years.
The original Mac cost $2,495 and I could do very little with it?s floppy drive and minimal memory. It became obsolete very fast as the number of things you could do with a personal computer expanded. I purchased a Mac IIfx when they were first released and even at the educational discount, it cost what a nice late model used car would have cost. When you look at the cost of software like Adobe?s Creative Suite or even Microsoft Office, the cost of the computer is now a major bargain. The cost of computing has gone up because of all the things you can do with your computer. It seems ridiculous to split hairs over the box itself at current prices.
OK, now I will confess that I buy on price. I live on the trailing edge of technology these days. I needed the IIfx when I got it, because computer aided design and drafting required that much power. Those needs are now trivial and I just don?t need very much computing power. The last four computer purchases I made were of discontinued models that were refurbished but still came with full Apple warranties. At a little more than half the original price, they were such an improvement over what I was replacing, I did not even think of spending nearly double for the latest and greatest. I am quite content to work with my 400MHz TiBook and ?crippled? Quicksilver 733MHz with no L3 cache. I checked, and the cost of my last four Macs added up to less than the IIfx – not adjusted for inflation – not taking into account what interest rates are now – Imagine that!
People will shell out for an iPod because it is about entertainment. People will nickel and dime over a PC because it is about work. Yes, style and design count once it gets personal. For me it is about the experience of computing and Steve Jobs has my number. Not so much over the design of the hardware, because for me the software and the OS need to be elegant. I could live with the look of a generic PC much more easily than with Windows.
