Did hackintoshing lead you to buy from Apple again?

[Vendetta]

In some ways absolutely not ever again: It seems the "apple tax" gets steeper and steeper all the time. The new air is such a rip I can't believe anyone buys them when laptops like the Asus U36JC are available: better in nearly every way (except flash storage) by a huge margin, for $600 less. Apples mobile products are locked down, which is extremely irritating to me. If I am paying the premium for an ipod, ipad, or iphone, I should not have to hack it to bits to get it to do what I want.

For computers, you may have a point. But, I find your comments about the iPods, iPads, and iPhone to be interesting, considering that there isn't any company that seems to be able to compete in any of those markets in a manner that makes those devices appear to be overpriced. For the iPad, companies are still struggling (1 year later) to produce something equivalent for the same price (or cheaper, as you allude). For the iPhone, it appears the it is exactly in line with all other smartphones of the same caliber. And for iPods, well, I'm not sure there is any competitor even in sight (Zune? Really?), and this isn't to mention that iPods are becoming more and more affordable as the models are produced.

Also, I could tell you why someone would by a Macbook Air: ultra portability and OS X wrapped into a gorgeous package.

 

[Rankel]

Well sure, that is why anyone buys any mac. They are nice looking and convenient. I didn't say the portable devices were too expensive, I just said If I am paying that much for a product, it shouldn't come locked down and choked up. In the next six months you are going to see quite a few products that will be giving the ipad a real run for it's money. ( Motorola xoom, asus transformer to name a few)

 

[Vendetta]

In the next six months you are going to see quite a few products that will be giving the ipad a real run for it's money. ( Motorola xoom, asus transformer to name a few)

The iPad 1, or the iPad 2 that will be out by then?

Regardless, I'm not seeing it. Especially if the Xoom is $800 and locks down wifi until you pay for 1 month of service. :?

http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/06/best ... uary-24th/

Only time will tell.

 

[Rankel]

Its all speculation, especially since apple has released zero information about a second ipad.

 

[georgeba]

The reason for my building a Hackintosh was that I owned an iMac.
Apple had to be the most arrogant and unreasonable company I have dealt with in my 72 years. So now they can stick their "policies" where the Sun don't shine. :
I have sold my iMac and will never have to argue with a bunch of moneyhungry people.
Good riddance.

 

[Vendetta]

The reason for my building a Hackintosh was that I owned an iMac.
Apple had to be the most arrogant and unreasonable company I have dealt with in my 72 years. So now they can stick their "policies" where the Sun don't shine. :
I have sold my iMac and will never have to argue with a bunch of moneyhungry people.
Good riddance.

Woah...

 

[Rankel]

The reason for my building a Hackintosh was that I owned an iMac.
Apple had to be the most arrogant and unreasonable company I have dealt with in my 72 years. So now they can stick their "policies" where the Sun don't shine. :
I have sold my iMac and will never have to argue with a bunch of moneyhungry people.
Good riddance.

I agree with you 100%!! I LOVE that Apple uses most of the same stuff to build their computers that we use to make a hackintosh, but when we build it in a shed, it has 3-5 years warranty on all the parts, but if apple builds it professionally, everything only has a 1 year warranty. I can't believe the apple website still says "we make the hardware AND the software, so everything just works."

I have had sound go out on 2 apple products since apple went with intel, and both times they were more than happy to offer to charge me full price for a new motherboard and labor charges. No, as long as I can, I will build my own computers to run their software. If for some reason apple makes it so we can't do what we do, running windows isn't half as bad as purchasing a product that the manufacturer won't stand behind.

 

[Stork]

Well, I have the opposite experience that you've had, Rankel and several others.

As you can see from signature block, I still have most of my Macs and all of them are working just fine. (I haven't listed my Apple IIC, nor my 7600, 8600, 9600, Beige G3, Powerbook 17" (1.5GHz) or Sawtooth, all hot rodded.) I can report that I'm not the Lone Ranger, either. In my limited sphere of the world, I don't know of anyone who's had a problem with their Macs. So, your Macs must be the exception rather than the rule.

In the forty five + years I've been using computers to do stuff, I've used some mighty neat systems, both huge mainframes and desktops & laptops. I personally own one other make of computer, a Silicon Graphics (SGI) Indy, which changed the way I did my job, just like the DEC VAX did in 1980.

One of the reasons Macs cost more is the technology levels in the systems, and the market segment Apple targets. You can buy a 17" HP laptop a Blu-ray of 1/3-1/2 the price of the 17" MBP I'm typing this post on, but the screen & processor are low end.

Bottom-line: I'd never hesitate to recommend a Mac to anyone. I have a Hackintosh because the engineer in me needed a challenge, and the last time I built a computer was a S100 buss system back in the days. I didn't have fun building that sucker. I've had blast putting this Hackintosh together.

 

[Rankel]

Stork, I still have a number of pre-intel macs that have run for years and years without a glitch. It is only recently that apple has had problems in my eyes. I LOVE my g4 tower! realmz and kings quest all day. system 9 had a neat feel to it.

I'm not sure about your statement with the mac book though. You can get a 17'' laptop from a number of pc brands with the same 2.8 GHz core i7 that comes in the $2700 macbook pro, but for under $2000. They don't offer a warranty longer than 1 year standard either though.

 

[Implied]

Biggest nuisance about Apple is how they've changed.

In 2005 Jobs stood up at his Keynote, announced the move to Intel and said (looked it up just to get the exact wording): "We want to constantly be making the best computers for you, and the rest of our users." Around 1:20.

Now I don't know if they still stand by that, but honestly: The stuff we get is no longer "the best," in terms of speed, at least. USB 2.0, SATA II, no Blu-Ray even Build-To-Order Options, low-end SSDs which decrease in quality over time (so people report), non-modifiable computers with custom screws so that they're almost 100% tamper-proof. They're soldering stuff onto the Motherboard so we don't mess with it.

These days you can barely even upgrade the Hard Drive. OCZ gives you a whole toolkit just to replace the SSD on an MBA. Not everyone wants to pay Apple to replace the Hard Drive for them, they'd rather do it themselves. Custom Screws apart, its easy enough. Just flip off the case (the custom (patented) screws apart however, thankfully its a lot easier than it used to be. Plastic iMacs had it so hard to replace components....).

About 12 years ago, when someone said "Apple just released the fastest Notebook on the market" that was true. Apple had, literally the fastest Computers on the Market. No competition. 1999 Apple Laptops were the fastest back then. They were the first to adopt new Technologies. Floppies to CDs, USB, etc. Now Apple doesn't even have SATA III, USB 3.0, Blu-Ray, nothing. Not even as Build-To-Order options. If Apple had adopted these, they'd be default baselines on anything and everything by now. They'd be dirt-cheap.

The Screens are fantastic, yes. The new 27" Cinema Display is wow. Unique. Except: Glossy. The amount of times I hear people complaining about the Gloss.... And then there's the lack of ports. The 30" Aluminum had FireWire 400, USB 2.0. This one only has USB 2.0. The MBPs have a Non-Gloss option. iMacs don't however. Neither does the Cinema Display (on a side note, sad that they're down to only 1 Monitor option).

I understand Apple wants to hold off on USB 3.0 because Intel doesn't support it natively in it's Chipsets. I get this. But without even using SATA III, Apple can no longer say "we are making the best computers." Not in terms of speed. Sure, maybe in terms of stability. OS X is lightyears ahead of Windows 7. The hardware however, is going downhill.

Not to mention that Jobs's constant mania to constantly make everything thinner, thinner, thinner and thinner is a killer when it comes to cooling. No proper ventilation, reduced product life-span.

I like thin and light, I think we all do. But I don't like decreased life span due to enclosed ventilation spacing.

Sorry, QQ post over now.

There's no denying that Apple is still strong in creating revolutionary products. iPhone rocked the branches of the "Smartphone" market to the core. iPad created a whole new branch. Who knows what else will come from them in the next few years (although please no Touchscreen Desktops.. Least until the Fingerprint Smudges issue is resolved first) They'll probably start launching Liquidmetal products soon too, either this year or next year.

Still remember "The Cube".... Awesome machine. And the first iMac with a fan almost bigger than the monitor

Sad to see the apparent demise of the iPod Classic though. No SSD transaction, nothing so far

TL;DR:
If I can avoid it, never going back to a "real" Mac. Great design, but otherwise nothing interesting in them anymore.