If you want to impress your friends about how much better your purchase is, then get a Mac.

At the time I wanted none of those.. I just wanted something small that could run OS X (this was before OS x86 and hackintosh obviously) as I thought it was a cool OS and had previously only used OS8-9 and not much OS X in high school. As for "social pressure aspect of Apple's Marketing technique", I guess you could pile me into that group but in a different way. Most of my friends were hardcore linux types, and some just happened to have Macs as their weapon of choice.

I could go on, but I don't feel like starting a huge Mac v PC war again. I'm happy with my decision and that's all I care about. :) As for why I use a Mac now in 2009, well I do lots of Rails and design stuff and there are just so many great, small Mac apps that help out with this.

Mac isn't Linux with a "more polished" interface, it's a closed system with the stability of *NIX but none of the benefits of decent package management, and a less developed system interface.

But for me, being a web developer who doesn't do much in the way of kernel hacking or other deeper system type work, OS X really is effectively Linux (or Unix as the case may be) with a more polished interface. I would never have considered getting a Mac if OS X was not based on Unix.

I am much happier with a combination of OS X on my desktop (used for work plus multimedia entertainment) and Debian on my laptop (used for work) than I was with Windows on my desktop and Debian on my laptop.

Example: I have a Hauppage HVR 1600 TV tuner with on board MPEG-TS transcoder. What linux allows me to do using the character device /dev/video0 either through netcat or through SSH stream the device across the network to another computer, effectively creating an MPEG stream of live TV. I can change channels using V4L2 architecture.

Thus when I'm in college my friends can record shows through my computer through the network onto their laptops (obviously the same channel at a time) simply by tapping the stream.

And because Mac doesn't have a great package management system you probably spend more time than you should upgrading libraries you use (depending on your setup obviously, I've never used Rails so I don't know what goes into that but PHP could be a bear).

Personally I like the expose feature of Mac and I was upset that it took either retarded compiz or a half broken hack to get it working on Linux. Then kwin came along, which does all of what finder does and more. And I will give Mac props for inventing that because it's one of the most useful window management techniques (I find taskbars outdated), but when I look at their system I can see that while I get stable polish, I get overall less features, turning it off, then turning it on kills plasma rendering properly).

But in terms of raw features that are really nice and extensible albeit crashy, commercial OSes, Mac included are always behind. (I mean seriously no one has addressed dependencies and dynamic library management like Linux has.)

Open source web dev tools are great on the Mac though. I get by just fine using Ruby Gems for all my Ruby/Rails package management needs (the Ruby Gems system actually makes sense on OS X where as on Debian, it just felt redundant at best and annoying at worst) and I prefer to compile Ruby, MySQL, PHP, Git etc. myself in /usr/local anyway. I feel like I've got more control of where everything goes that way. When it comes to using these kinds of open source tools, I very much prefer to have a Unix style terminal to work in rather than what passes for a terminal in Windows.

I'll never totally give up Debian for OS X, but if it's a choice between Windows and OS X for my general work/entertainment machine, I'll choose OS X.

You said Macs only sell because of marketing but don't have features to justify price. But you named all the features Macs contain in one package and said it takes multiple PCs to get the same features. So I argue that they do justify the price.

Whether those features appeal to you personally is yet another argument, but Apple knows thier target customer appreciates those features and will pay for them all in one computer.

And yes, Macs also break. Although they're rated at the top in customer-service and repair every year.

Although they're rated at the top in customer-service and repair every year.

Depends how you rate it, in fact I'm not surprised at this rating because Apple makes a business out of it more than any manufacturer Not only that but for some things they don't even service things, such as iPods. iPods/iPhones are the most disposable piece of hardware never considering they just throw out the "broken" one and give you a new one. Some people would call that service, I call that waste. I will concede they have a great service plan, give customer under warranty a new one, repair old one and sell it for a smaller profit as a refurb.

http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23/1816257...

Out of what you mentioned: Tough, decent battery life, good performance, thin and light, decent screen size and resolution and graphics card, nice keyboard, in one package.

A t400 does the same, it's arguably as tough as a MBP, it's got better battery life (compare 10.5 hours vs Apple's advertised 7), the t400 is already thin and light, but the t400s takes it a bit further(albiet costing battery), screen size and resolution is the same even with LED, and switchable graphics are on all high-end laptops. Keyboard just depends on what you like anyway. Not to mention, with a Mac your portability and serviceability for your machine is greatly affected, ie, I can hibernate most modern PC's and change the battery while you can't. I can replace the battery when it dies and you can't without voiding warranty. You can't replace ram, keyboard, or anything without Apple service or risking a void warranty.

So I take back the implication that the t400 is not well designed. ThinkPads have a good reputation for hardware design, which I assume is well earned (have not owned one myself). The same cannot be said for all PC laptops. And software is a whole other matter altogether, of course.

As for customization, Apple deliberately restricts the options for customization relative to other vendors. They definitely have an attitude of designing a few models that fit the needs of a many customers, as opposed to many models each appealing to smaller, more specific groups.

It does, look at the installed ram and the sticker on it.

As for the theory that of many fits one, fact I feel that that is false. I could have bought my college's laptop which is gaurenteed to fit everyone, but I found it wasteful. Yeah the tech specs are better than the laptop I bought but it wasn't good for me, not enough mobility, too big, useless features such as the high end processor that isn't worth the cash tradeoff, etc. I don't need that. Customization is good, example Apple's displays aren't changeable to a higher resolution. That pisses me off 15.4 inch laptops should be able to handle 1680x1080.

2. The sticker refers to ITSELF, not the RAM module. I've seen it on numerous third-party computer components, including RAM and hard drives. It contains information on the date and location of manufacture, and the manufacturer of the part needs that information to track consumer-discovered flaws.

Were Apple to put a removal notice for the RAM component itself, it would attach to both the RAM stick and the motherboard, so that removal would be evident.

3. Apple specifically states that HD and RAM upgrades may be done by consumers without violating warranty.

I have a new MacBook Pro (the SD card one) and it has instructions in the manual IT CAME WITH on how to replace the RAM and hard drive. Apple wouldn't give you explicit instructions to void the warranty. Replacing RAM or hard drive does NOT void the warranty.