Recent Technology Squabbles

[Hakoda]

Okay I think it's about time I made a blog for all the people who are involved in this ever long debate with operating systems and brands and what good technology is and what bad technology is.

First off all let's get one things straight: Just because the product is made by a certain company and that company is good at what it does, doesn't mean that that one product is the best out of all of it's competitors.

That doesn't make sense? See this:

[youtube]FL7yD-0pqZg[/youtube]

The dude's right, if Apple took a brick, stuck its logo on the back, and called it an iPhone, a majority of the people would still think its made with Apple's "top-brand quality".

On the subject of Apple's quality, its actually not all that different from its competitors but you still end up buying it overpriced.

Now in terms of iPods and Apple's music industry, I think they're a bit overrated but only because consumers decide to make them ubiquitous. iPods are everywhere and frankly they do work well. Are they overpriced? Yes a little bit, but not by much. Not as much as other Apple products.

iTunes. Thank god you don't have to use it. Other software can do the same thing as iTunes and they actually don't hog system resources (astonishing, I know!). However, the iTunes Store is something completely different. Probably one of the most overpriced music stores ever. They charge more than their competitors and then what do they do? That attach DRM so you're forced to use iTunes. Wait, WTF? I thought we stopped using iTunes cuz it was so clunky. I guess we'll have to find an alternative.

Amazon Music is the answer. DRM-Free music at a reasonable price in the most widely known music format in the world, MP3. Amazon's Cloud service just make it even better to use everywhere. Well what about iCloud? What about it, it doesn't do anything special. We've had cloud computing for a long time and network analysis actually depicts that iCloud services don't even point to Apple, they point to Microsoft's Azure services and Amazon's Cloud services. Once again, Apple isn't innovating, they're just refining what's already been invented and then charging you for the control that they have on the consumer.

So Apple Tax is defined finally. The reason behind Apple's overpriced products is not in their hardware or software but in the control the company has over what the consumer can and can't do. To maintain this control, the company has to pay up and their level of vertical integration goes to the point that they need to charge consumers for their own exclusivity on their products. Now I'm not sure if that made a whole lot of sense but let's look at Macs.

Let's open them up and see what's inside this Mac Pro for $2500. Let's see it's processor is an Intel X4 Xenon Nehlam clocked at 2.8GHz. Graphics is an ATI Radeon 5770 1GB. Everything else is generic hardware such has hard drive, memory, and optical drive. . So why the hell does it freakin' cost $2500 for this machine that made up of PC-hardware? Is it the software? Last time I checked, OS X was $30.

So Macs are PC's made with specific hardware for OS X. So why am I paying double the amount for this machine if its internals, when priced on the PC market, don't add up to even half the price of Apple's machine? Oh I guess I forgot about the aluminum case. I guess it costs a lot of money for the aluminum case. My bad.

That brings us to the in-between case of OSx86 or in other words, Hackintoshes. A Hackintosh by definition is a computer with non-Apple hardware running OS X. Well Apple hardware=PC hardware so I'm not sure this different than the normal Mac. I guess its that aluminum case once again, darn that aluminum.

So normal computer hardware can be engineered to run OS X but Apple still insists on pricing it so high? WHY? I just can't fathom why.

However I have to say, any OS based on UNIX kick's Windows' ass at the moment. If Microsoft used a different file system (not NTFS), fixed the permissions system (not UAC), and somehow got rid of the registry, then I'd say Windows NT would be a good core component to use.

Apple rant is over.

Let's move on to Canon. Bless them, they're actually good at the professional cameras they make and I mean REALLY good. Have you seen their latest line of SLR's? They're pretty nice.

However, I was provoked to talk about them because of their compact point-and-shoot cameras. They're a little expensive and don't exactly live up to what I want in terms of some features but I view them just as Apple's iPods: a little expensive but they do the job well.

I was talking to someone about me trading in my Samsung PL200 for Panasonic's DMC-FH25K because the PL200 can't take pictures of a moving object indoors for its life. They immeditaely told me, as if it was law, that only Canon's cameras have the technology to take good pictures in low light. I didn't say anything outloud but my thought process went kinda like this: BULLSHIT.

Canon's cameras are great, don't get me wrong, but for a point-and-shoot there are better alternatives. Their HS System or High-Sensitivity System is what the person was talking about and its not a unique system. Other cameras have similar engines. Such as my Panasonic of choice is running Panasonic's 5th generation Venus Engine which is basically their competition to Canon's HS System. So if the two cameras are equally matched in terms image processing, why would I go with the one with less features? Just because it was made by Canon?

Okay this blog is effectively over. If you had the stamina to read through all that, leave your comments.

TL;DR: Just because a product is made by a certain company doesn't make it good. Many examples from Apple and Canon. Apple's computers are overpriced and I can't fathom why. iTunes & its store suck. Canon's point-and-shoot cameras a bit overpriced and lack features in comparison to competitors.

 

[nando]

actually apple's "quality" is all that different than other companies. material alone is way higher "quality" than other companies. it may not be "better" but you can't deny the precision in which apple materials are treated with far surpass other companies.

 

[thegame07]

All I can say is "I Agree with everything you said!" It's also the same with Nintendo products imo.


My flame war sense is tingling.

 

[Hakoda]

actually apple's "quality" is all that different than other companies. material alone is way higher "quality" than other companies. it may not be "better" but you can't deny the precision in which apple materials are treated with far surpass other companies.

I understand perfectly well that Apple's quality is actually superb to most competitors. But in terms of its computers, if the internals are made from other company's and are present in PC's then the only quality you're paying for is build quality. And I'm pretty sure build quality doesn't cost hundreds of dollars more.

I tend not to flame Nintendo because this entire site functions around their existence; flaming them would be suicide.

As for Apple flame wars, keep it concise in this thread and don't be stupid and this debate should turn out okay.

 

[Ace]

The only useful iProduct to exist was their line of Music Players (Nano and Classic), and even they are being phased out in favor of fucking online devices. It's a sad day when I need to use a constantly online device that Apple in essence has full control over like the their Touch devices, unlike my beaten down Classic. I really just wish they would renew the freaking Classic, since they're even gonna stop stocking them here......

 

[nando]

actually apple's "quality" is all that different than other companies. material alone is way higher "quality" than other companies. it may not be "better" but you can't deny the precision in which apple materials are treated with far surpass other companies.

I understand perfectly well that Apple's quality is actually superb to most competitors. But in terms of its computers, if the internals are made from other company's and are present in PC's then the only quality you're paying for is build quality. And I'm pretty sure build quality doesn't cost hundreds of dollars more.

it can costs hundreds of dollars more because no one else is competing at the same level. is as simple as that. yes you can get a zune or sansa or whatever with a hundred more features than an ipod. or a wintel machine with the power of an ox, but to may consumers it is not as appealing as the fine lines of a macbook pro, the sexiness of the ipod glass and tiny fragile bevel to the point that it becomes a fetish to protect it.

yes you may not get the same value out of apple as you do with other products. but apple "quality" is unsurpassed in the computer market and as long as they stand alone, they can charged many hundreds dollars more than competitors. but then apple is a small percentage of the market so i don't see why should concern themselves with products they don't even want. i'm a mac geek and i don't even push mac products to my family because they are out of their price range, so its not like i don't understand value versus luxury. but i only live once and i can afford so i'm gonna have it.

 

[Hakoda]

Nando, if you're arguing that Apple's pricing is higher than it's competitors because it's more of a brand of luxury and less of a brand of value then I agree.

I don't doubt that Apple's quality is unsurpassed, I'm just doubting if pricing that high for such a product is necessary for profit. Perhaps for Apple to gain what it believes is a satisfactory profit, they needs to charge that much and that's up to them.

You have a good point, I'm not sure why I'm concerned with them if I don't want them. Interesting realization that'll keep me out of debates in the future. But I think I care about them because they seem like a mystery to most people; they try figure what is the secret behind their pricing and quality but some of us have come to the truth that there is no secret. They're luxury products just like cars are.

I respect you because you know the true value of your Apple products and you aren't one of the generic Apple fanboys that the company's exclusivity creates.

 

[Mangofett]

Apple's quality is unsurpassed?

Maybe their initial polish is higher, but Apple computers aren't more reliable than other higher end computers, statistically.

And in my opinion, I think ASUS has a better design in a lot of their laptops. And they're priced reasonably...

 

[pistone]

well i have to say i tried a loooooooot of phones they didnt pass the year ,believe me ,and now im stuck with a iphone 2g for like 2 years ......for me its kinda a record so yeah i like how the iphone is build so i think it deserves those 500$
i dont know about the apple pc but all says that its good so.......?well maybe here im wrong but im not gonna try it as a macbook pro costs like a eye

so better with a asus
i always liked asus and toshiba like @linkiboy said they are made by a excellent quality build ,my only concern is that dell is in the middle zone and i just bought a new 1764
T-T lets hope at last pass the 4-5 years T-T