How many things wrong can you find with this statement?

[Shibathedog]

NVIDIA CEO:

 

Apple uses the best technology for their [computers]. Apple says to their customers: if you buy a computer from us you can be sure we have selected the best technology inside for you. That is their promise to consumers. Their promise to consumers isn't we've selected the best technology for you with the exception of what Intel allows us to use. That's not their promise. And that's why Apple uses the best technology where they want whenever they want. And that's why I'm all Apple! At home it's just Macs everywhere. It's NVIDIA's technology in all of them but I use Macs. My son has two Macs, my daughter has a Mac, there's an extra Mac just in case and my wife has a Mac. It's just Mac, Mac, Mac! Because I know it's got the best stuff inside.

 

I think he was obviously paid to say this, it's just idiotic on so many levels. You can't even use most nvidia cards (including the top of the line GTX 295) in an apple. At least he didn't say anything about it being a good deal or anything.

[emsley]

i think he should stick a mac where the sun dont shine.

[The-Ice-Man]

Someone post the Ice-T vid again. Fucking backwards machines. Up until a couple of years ago I'd never even seen one with more than one mouse button. Our university had Macs in the performance studios, and I couldn't believe they only had one button. Having to press the apple button to right click, rediculous. Then they got new ones and they had two buttons and a tiny mouse wheel, but still looked and felt like a bar of soap though. I never understood people who said they're better than PCs. I remember when I first started getting really into PC gaming, round about Duke Nukem 3D's release, that era, and I'd look at the games coming out, and like 1% of them would say Mac compatible. I'd think, 'Yeah, Macs are so good they can't run anything'. Don't know how much different it is now, but back then if you wanted to play games, you didn't get a Mac.

[Shibathedog]

Your right, but it's not even totally about the games. He claims macs have the best hardware available, which is just plain wrong. I remember when they where selling DDR2-533/667 when 800 was the standard and most people got 1066. I'll quickly go over the latest Mac Pro:

 

CPU

 

What they are selling here is a Xeon X5550. Xeon? A Server processor!? But why!? Will normal users notice a difference? No, especially since the Xeon X5550 is basically the same thing as the i7 920. There are minor differences yes, but typically you would only pay attention to these differences when overclocking (which you can't do on a mac anyway) or I dunno, actually using it in a server. Oh and I forgot to mention, the Xeon costs 1000 bucks while the i7 costs 290. It isn't a bad CPU, just not a very good choice and not top of the line.

 

RAM

 

Again they are selling the lowest possible spec RAM, DDR3-1066. This is the slowest DDR3 you can buy, They don't even give you the standard 6GB, only 3GB! and they charge you 150 bucks for an extra 3GB (actual cost retail 50) I bet the timings (CAS Latency, etc.) are also terrible but they don't even tell you what they are (they used to and they where). Way to tell me wtf I am paying you for. For those that do not know, the fastest DDR3 is DDR3-2200, more than twice as fast (depending on timings). The standard is pretty much DDR3-1600 but a lot of people get faster stuff.

 

RAID CARD

 

700 bucks? For some apple raid card? No thanks!

 

HDD

 

It comes with a 640GB HDD, again who knows which one or how fast because they don't tell you. If you want a 1TB they charge you 100. It costs 100 for an entire 1TB top of the line HDD at retail, shouldn't the price be more like 25 for the upgrade? There are 4 bays available to rip you off 4 times here.

 

GPU (Graphics)

 

This is the silliest part of all, It comes with a GeForce GT 120. This card is so low end I couldn't even find it for sale anywhere. I'm guessing the GT 220 (NOT GTX) is a newer version of it but I haven't been following low end graphics for awhile so I'm really not sure. According to benchmarks it performs about the same as an 8600 GT. That is fucking WEAK. This is supposed to be the top of the line Mac yet they can't even give you a GPU that outperforms a GPU that is several generations old and was only ever considered low-mid range?! BUT WAIT!!! Apple is here with a solution! Just slap more in! For the low low price of 150 dollars per extra card (another apple bargain) you can have up to four of them. Why not just put one good card in there? At least they offer an ATi Radeon 4870...ATi?....Does the CEO of Nvidia realize what is going on here? So if you want one good card you get ATi I guess. They don't offer any kind of dual/triple/quadruple setup there for some reason though. They don't rob you on the price as much with the 4870 either. A 4870 usually sells for 150-200. This is just weird. They seem to favor ATi.

 

OPTICAL

 

It comes with an 18X SuperMulti Drive (WTF? maybe I'm just picky about optical drives because I know my shit, but I WANT TO KNOW WHAT I AM BUYING!!!) and they will charge you an extra 100 for a second one, which is nice because an optical drive will run you 20-35 bucks nowadays.

 

Then there are a bunch of useless addons/stupid software that is of course overpriced and you probably don't need. Apple monitors are nice (they are not TN) but of course are a huge ripoff. I just don't get why people buy these machines.

[ken_cinder]

Dude..."Apple" is YUPPIE for "Here, have my money...as much as you want and I won't ask questions"

[veristic]

^Lol that was a good one.

 

Macs are all about a particular culture that Apple has taken over. The mainstream, and while they try to cover it up with a feel for sophistication and quality (like a Mercedes), people don't realize Apple is synonymous with the kind of junk popular radio symbolizes. I'd be fine with everyday users buying macs if the price-to-quality wasn't so fucked. Shelling out g's for a shiny email notebook... good job Apple, you've suckered in the masses for your sucker kingdom of flossing iPimp your culture.

[ken_cinder]

I'd have to agree that for professional uses, when Apple was sporting some nice 64bit PPC RiSC processors and not x86/x86-64 tech, at the time they were second to none for those professional uses in video editing and processor intensive jobs.

 

I still think OSX should be illegal, it's based on a free backbone and not only does Apple charge for it...but they lock it down with heavy restrictions on what it CAN be run on. I hate the Apple of today, they're the new Microsoft of yesterday....

[VT-Vincent]

Oh boy... this is what happens when the CEO and marketing department get together. Truth be told, I wouldn't go out on a limb to call any manufacturer "the best", as all of them generally use the same components from the same suppliers. It still amazes me that most people believe there is some mystique about "Apple hardware" that somehow makes it drastically different from it's "PC counterpart". The truth of the matter is they are built on the same architecture on the same hardware that most other vendors use.

 

Truth be told, I actually like Apple's products a lot but I think calling it an ideal platform for graphics performance couldn't be further from the truth. Due to how much customization Apple does on their hardware (at least compared to companies like HP that just pick it up of the shelf and throw it in a box), there has always been a "spec lag". This is particularly true of video cards since they need to be customized for the platform and most of Apple's systems are fully integrated. In short, if you want the latest and greatest hardware you can probably cross Apple off your list.

 

With that in mind, I think there is a lot that Apple has done right. In my opinion, they have the only other consumer-ready operating system that can actually compete with Windows. Their hardware design is also more streamlined and elegant compared to their competition. With their hardware there is also the benefit that it will continue to be well-supported due to the set scope of their product lines. With a manufacturer like HP, you can expect any "odd ball" computer they create to have support quickly dropped after it has had it's run. Lastly, the fact they present their product as a platform and not individual components takes care of a lot of the issues that can be found on the PC side.

 

In the end, I think it's really a matter of personal preference... personally, I would like to have both platforms around and continue to stay for a long time. I don't think either side dominating the market would have any positive impact for consumers.

[Lucandrake]

There is a thing called laughter. Use it in their direction .

[Shibathedog]

I think PC Building 101 should be a required class or something. Then these companies will have to actually use the huge discounts they get to sell you a cheaper PC instead of just ripping you off. It would help people understand this apple thing a lot better too.

 

I just realized when I was talking about the video card I didn't even notice that they are adding 200 on top of the price, so it really isn't a good deal, There where so many ripoffs I couldn't keep track of it all. I even forgot to mention, to fill up those last three bays that are empty at stock, they want 300 dollars for a 1TB HDD!!

[Robert]

I don't personally know anyone who uses a Mac. Honestly.