Apple's computer products are on par and often mediocre with the last few years of Windows-based computers. Retina is on match from other vendors for less. Many retailers offer price-for-price better performance, better graphics support, as much or more memory.

Apple offers a fantastic tactile experience and OS X -- the user experience ecosystem is the big sell for them, which is why their operating system has been a loss-leader for so long. A similarly priced Dell XPS 13" is going to out-perform a new MacBook pretty much everywhere but battery life (which it misses by something like an hour), but the Apple is the more attractive buy because of OS X and the joy of using it.

It's demonstrated and acknowledged, through profit and market dominance industry-wide, that there's more to life than tech specs, and that more is user experience. There's really little else to say on it...