Macs and the real reason they are more expensive...

Macs have always had the reputation of being well, expensive. Lately with Intel Macs and the new unibody macbook pro's people have been flocking to get a mac. Not to mention the clever adverts on TV. But what are you really getting? Are you getting a PC that never has issues like Windows machines do? Or are you being lied to? Odds are if you bought a mac in the last 5 years, you swallowed some big Subterfuge. Let me explain before all the Mac fans send me kill-mail.

I own several PC's, one of which is a MacBook 15" from late 2007. Recently I decided to go on a little adventure and install OSX on a Non-Mac Machine (Won't tell you how, that's not the point). After waging war with drivers and compatibility I finally did it and had everything working on my Non-Mac Mac.

The interesting thing while doing this is what I found about Mac's and the hardware/software relationship they have.

Up until the Unibody Mac's, Apple has used Intel hardware. Intel Processor, Intel Motherboard (or Logic Board as Apple likes to call it), Intel SATA Controller, Intel Video. A program for Linux called lspci can verify this...

00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/PM/GMS, 943/940GML and 945GT Express Memory Controller Hub [8086:27a0] (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/PM/GMS, 943/940GML and 945GT Express PCI Express Root Port [8086:27a1] (rev 03)
00:07.0 Performance counters [1101]: Intel Corporation Device [8086:27a3] (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device [0403]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) High Definition Audio Controller [8086:27d8] (rev 02)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 1 [8086:27d0] (rev 02)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 2 [8086:27d2] (rev 02)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 3 [8086:27d4] (rev 02)
00:1d.0 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 [8086:27c8] (rev 02)
00:1d.1 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 [8086:27c9] (rev 02)
00:1d.2 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 [8086:27ca] (rev 02)
00:1d.3 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 [8086:27cb] (rev 02)
00:1d.7 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller [8086:27cc] (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge [8086:2448] (rev e2)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge [0601]: Intel Corporation 82801GBM (ICH7-M) LPC Interface Bridge [8086:27b9] (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface [0101]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) IDE Controller [8086:27df] (rev 02)
00:1f.2 IDE interface [0101]: Intel Corporation 82801GBM/GHM (ICH7 Family) SATA IDE Controller [8086:27c4] (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus [0c05]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) SMBus Controller [8086:27da] (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: ATI Technologies Inc M56P [Radeon Mobility X1600] [1002:71c5]
02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8053 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller [11ab:4362] (rev 22)
03:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Atheros Communications Inc. AR5008 Wireless Network Adapter [168c:0024] (rev 01)
0c:03.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394) [0c00]: Texas Instruments TSB82AA2 IEEE-1394b Link Layer Controller [104c:8025] (rev 01)

As you can see, almost all of it is Intel except Ethernet, Wifi, and Firewire. The above lspci -nn output shows an ATI Radeon as the video card (MacBook Pro, Late 2006) while my normal MacBook has all the same parts except Intel GMA 950 video card. Here is a lspci output for the latest MacBook Pro.

00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 Host Bridge [10de:0a82] (rev b1)
00:00.1 RAM memory [0500]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller [10de:0a88] (rev b1)
00:03.0 ISA bridge [0601]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 LPC Bridge [10de:0aae] (rev b3)
00:03.1 RAM memory [0500]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller [10de:0aa4] (rev b1)
00:03.2 SMBus [0c05]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 SMBus [10de:0aa2] (rev b1)
00:03.3 RAM memory [0500]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller [10de:0a89] (rev b1)
00:03.4 RAM memory [0500]: nVidia Corporation Device [10de:0a98] (rev b1)
00:03.5 Co-processor [0b40]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 Co-processor [10de:0aa3] (rev b1)
00:04.0 USB Controller [0c03]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 OHCI USB 1.1 Controller [10de:0aa5] (rev b1)
00:04.1 USB Controller [0c03]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 EHCI USB 2.0 Controller [10de:0aa6] (rev b1)
00:06.0 USB Controller [0c03]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 OHCI USB 1.1 Controller [10de:0aa7] (rev b1)
00:06.1 USB Controller [0c03]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 EHCI USB 2.0 Controller [10de:0aa9] (rev b1)
00:08.0 Audio device [0403]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 High Definition Audio [10de:0ac0] (rev b1)
00:09.0 PCI bridge [0604]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 PCI Bridge [10de:0aab] (rev b1)
00:0a.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 Ethernet [10de:0ab0] (rev b1)
00:0b.0 IDE interface [0101]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 SATA Controller [10de:0ab5] (rev b1)
00:0c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 PCI Express Bridge [10de:0ac4] (rev b1)
00:15.0 PCI bridge [0604]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 PCI Express Bridge [10de:0ac6] (rev b1)
00:16.0 PCI bridge [0604]: nVidia Corporation MCP79 PCI Express Bridge [10de:0ac7] (rev b1)
02:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: nVidia Corporation GeForce 9600M GT [10de:0647] (rev a1)
04:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4322 802.11a/b/g/n Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:432b] (rev 01)
05:00.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394) [0c00]: Agere Systems FW643 PCI Express1394b Controller (PHY/Link) [11c1:5901] (rev 07)

Later Macs have hardware from nVidia. All of it. Why should you care?
Price Fixing....

Apple charges a lot because, well, they get a bum deal from a hardware standpoint. Why are all the parts from the same company? Why doesn't Mac shop for the best hardware price and include that instead of going with one company? The answer is they would rather market you the idea of a mac, than an actual piece of hardware. Windows is the opposite, it's all about hardware and price (how low can you go for power kinda deal). Linux/Unix kinda caught in the middle with their open architecture. What's funny is that Mac OS X IS Unix (Darwin BSD, Successor to Free-BSD). Free-BSD supports a lot of hardware as long as you can find the vendor and device id for your setup.

Apple passes off their Hardware R&D to one company, lately nVidia, to come up with a hardware solution they can use. Apple then puts it in their Unibody cases and (with minimal effort) writes a driver for that hardware using the hardwares vendor and device id.

So, the real reason why Mac's are so expensive is because they use all the same manufacturers hardware and truth be told, the manufacturers have control, not Apple.

Apple Fan-Boys, direct hate mail to flame@gabereiser.com