Dell, Apple, and HP
Posted: Tue 1 December, 2009 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 1BEM, Customer Services, Geeky, Own Business, Work-related |4 Comments »Yet again today I’ve been involved in an argument about the costs of Dell vs. Apple laptops. It gets really old, really fast.
All the normal excuses get trollied out, “They’re not that more expensive really”, “Apple Macs are lovely, and built from a solid block of aluminium”, “Dells fucking suck” so forth, so fifth.
So for the sheer fuck of it, I decided to do a comparison. Dell vs. Apple Mac vs. HP (as one person recommended). HP isn’t really fair, as they don’t appear to offer much in the way of customisation.
The spec : An “office-ready” machine. (i.e. not Dell’s low-end inspiron, but corporate Latitude). 4Gb RAM. 500Gb hard disk (or highest size possible). Best possible monitor/screen resolution. And what we come up with is this :
| HP | Dell | Apple | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Model | HP Compaq 6730b | Latitude 6500 | Macbook Pro |
| Screen Size | 15″ | 15″ | 15″ |
| Processor | 2.53Ghz Core Duo | 2.53Ghz Core Duo | 2.53Ghz Core Duo |
| RAM | 4GB | 4GB | 4GB |
| Hard Disk | 250Gb | 250Gb | 250Gb |
| Resolution | 1280×800 | 1920×1200 | 1440×900 |
| DVD Drive | Not Specced | 8x DVD +/RW | Superdrive 8x (DVD +R DL/DVD) |
| Additional Info, as requested by Matt in the comments | |||
| Dimensions | WxH : 35.6×26.6cm Depth: 3.4cm |
WxH : 35.8×25.7cm Depth : 3.3cm |
WxH : 36.4×24.9cm Depth: 2.41cm |
| Weight | 2.7Kg | 2.3Kg | 2.5Kg |
| Price | £767 inc VAT | £1105 VAT | £1299 incl VAT |
Not the most convincing (once you’ve added in VAT – Dell and HP don’t show it ’til afterwards) but still the Apple is nearly £200 more than it’s nearest competitor.
Interesting though.
I’d love to see a weight/size comparison.
There is also the small issue of software. For many people they’ll need to go out and buy software for the Windows boxes, whereas as Apple has most of everything you’d need.
Yeah, free software and all that but it depends who your target audience is..
Me? I have a MacBook and a Dell tower. They play nicely together and I couldn’t afford the Apple version of the tower.
So I wonder if that £200 is a little less once you include software… hmmmm good comparison though.
P.S. I think the Apple machine will run faster and smoother, due to hardware level hooks in the O/S. Could be wrong though.
I agree, Gordon – however, software was so subjective, it’s hard to do a decent comparison.
For example, a writer : MS Office, Open Office, Scrivener (Mac Only), Final Draft. Which to compare to?
A designer : Gimp, Photoshop, Fireworks, who knows?
I did think about adding software, but decided to do the eval just on hardware in the end.
As for faster/smoother – again, that’s pretty subjective. I wanted to stick with stuff that didn’t fit the “but Macs are more cuddly/better designed/Not PCs” guff that usually gets spouted in these things.
@Matt : Added in, as requested