Apple extends its desktop design lead

All of the major Windows PC vendors have improved their desktop designs lately, but after today's iMac redesign announcement, Apple has distanced itself even further from its competition. The trimmer, sleeker iMac, and especially its new keyboard, cut a cleaner profile than any of this year's new PCs from Dell, Gateway, HP, or Sony.

Apple's new iMac takes the lead in desktop design.

(Credit: Apple)

Looks matter of course, but so does value. And with this update, Apple appears to have shed its reputation for going beyond its competition in terms of price. If you compare component for component, you'll find that Dell and Gateway, in particular, offer competitive configs to Apple's new lineup. You lose an aesthetic step or two with those traditional Windows desktops, but worse, you also miss out on the iMac's strong iLife '08 software suite, which eliminates the PCs' price advantage.

Thanks to the various virtualization apps and Apple's own Boot Camp, you also can't really argue that by going with a Mac you're locked into the Apple ecosystem. The new iMacs and their all-in-one design don't solve the lack of upgradability, but we're willing to bet that doesn't effect that many mainstream computer buyers. Our bigger concern is the upgrade path to Leopard, Apple's OS X update later this Fall. Apple has not said whether it will charge new or existing Mac owners to upgrade to the new operating system. That would make us extracautious about purchasing a new Mac now, knowing that we might save $129 or so on an OS upgrade if we wait a few months.

[MickBurke]

Not to be rude...

But there's a distance between prety adn practical. Don't get me wrong, I'm not the 'PCs are good and Mac is bad' guy, but we have to consider that any system taht has the monitor go bad, and you can't replace the monitor, looses practical points. Kind of the "J. Evans Prichard" scale for computer; 'I give it a 9 for apearance, but a 2 since the monitor went bad and I can't use it'. Kind of like a laptop, but with the laptop you can at least plug in an outboard / additional monitor if needed. Of course, if this thing has a DVI port or docking station option, it goes up to a 6.

[smartin684]

video outputs

iMac Video outputs: Mini-DVI output port with support for DVI, VGA, S-video, and composite video connections via adapter3

[groyal]

Consumer Products are Emotive Sales

I have to disagree, these products are more emotive products than practical products. It is like cars. You don't buy a car these days based on whether you can fix the carb or how easy it is to replace the crankshaft.

These things are bought because not only do they work great but they are a statement in the home office or bedroom workspace.

[Techno Guy]

Not enough to make me swoon

So crave pronounces that the new iMac extends Apple's desktop design lead, and I'm supposed to swoon? Personally, I find the design of this rather bland -- practical, yes, but nothing that would grab my attention.

[tabernak]

Nice new look

The look reminds me of my the titanium laptop, my favorite looking laptop, the shiny plastic always looked cheap to me. I don't think it's fair to compare prices with HP or Dell the same day Apple releases their new models, give them a couple weeks (like when AMD and Intel drop prices). During the release Steve actually said something about them never making stripped down products, pretty muchly saying they'll never compete for the low-end market. It annoyed me that he justified it was because they don't want to make "lousy" products (all sub $599 computers aren't "lousy") and not that they just go after the big profit margins.

To a previous poster, who buys a computer to make a statement in the bedroom?

[wjanoch]

All in One Advantage - Lots of Upgrade options

iMacs are awesome All-In-One computers. Hook up a second monitor and
OS X mirrors to it automatically, and you can change that to extend your
desktop easily. Need more hard drive space, hook up some FireWire
400/800, or USB harddrives, up to a couple hundred of them, and each one
can be up to 750 Gigs. Need a floppy drive, get a USB Floppy Drive. Need
more RAM (comes with 1G upgradeable to 4G). Need a Card reader? USB Card
Reader easy to add. Video Card? Upgrading the Video Card is some thing
you do to a system that came with a crummy one to start with because Video
Cards are Expensive and a Great one doesn't out perform a really good one by
much. Need a faster burner, then FW burners are nice. Upgrade the CPU? To
really see a big advantage to upgrading the CPU you almost always need a
new mother board at the same time, which often means entirely new RAM, so
how much are you saving over a whole new system which would give you
redundancy since your old system would still be intact. In Fact, with an All-
In-One you can often sell them for a lot more than an upgraded system, even
at a garage sale. So where's your savings there? And that's not counting the
time if everything goes well, let alone if you have problems. Not to mention
that once you do upgrade the all in one, all the external devices easily detach
for the old one, and attach to the new one, leaving the old one clean and
ready to sell (except for your data on the internal drive).

It's true that you spoil the All-In-One nature by adding external devices, but
you don't have that nature with a Modular Desktop in the first place, so
remember what we're comparing it to.

Wm

[qprize]

What On God's Little Green Earth Are You Saying?

QUOTE: "And with this update, Apple appears to have shed its reputation for
going beyond its competition in terms of price. If you compare component
for component, you'll find that Dell and Gateway, in particular, offer
competitive configs to Apple's new lineup."

It sounds like you're saying that Dell and Gateway are finally catching up to
Apple in terms of dollar/performance value (wrong). Except for the last 453
years (maybe less, maybe more) you've done nothing but carp that Apple's
are too expensive. Now it seems you can't even pimp for WinTel without
changing your lies. Very sad.

A comparable Dell XPS210 costs $1568. The base iMac, upgraded to a 320GB
HD and 2GB RAM is $1398, including a DL DVD and FW800, not available on
the Dell. If you decide to save money and go for the bigger box, the Dell
XP410 costs $1468, still lacking FW800.

So I guess your latest statement is right. Dell is (finally) APPROACHING Apple
on price. But not value.

[workshopmusic]

serviceability is not really an issue

"If a monitor goes bad" under warranty you take it in and get it replaced
under warranty. For the terminally cautious you can buy AppleCare and
extend the warranty.

I second the point made by another post; computers are
no longer bought for the ease of repairing them. Hardware is reliable enough
and warranties good enough to make that a moot point.

Unless you believe you get status points of some kind for owning the latest of
everything, you probably buy a computer based on the kind of you're going
to get done on it, and how well that computer suits your needs now. There
will be a faster model soon enough; but yours will still be working. There's no
reason you can't get five or six years of use out of one of these.

[tabernak]

imacs aren't upgrade friendly

Sure, every USB and firewire upgrade works with it, but that defeats the all-in-one look and makes a typical tower design a better solution. They just offer the typical upgrades of laptops, because that's basically what they're being designed as. If it has what you need in the box, it's a great solution.

If someone builds their own computer with upgrades in mind, it beats the imac easily for upgrades. Video cards are actually a GREAT upgrade, if you game it's the most likely component to be outdated and become your first bottleneck for new games. A smart motherboard choice allows for a huge upgrade, you can buy a dual-core now and a quality quad-core for $200 in 2 years.

These are great all-in-one solutions, but not so much for upgrades like a previous poster said. Unfortunately, I'm still waiting for imac hardware stuffed in a mac pro tower to buy my first mac.