
Testing the ‘Apple tax’ - anu_gupta
http://news.yahoo.com/testing-apple-tax-cost-build-windows-version-mac-185551099.html
======
cromwellian
The only problem with these comparisons is that the majority of people do not
need ECC memory nor "workstation" GPUs which are in fact, inferior to their
gaming counterparts on many workloads and mostly exist as expensive dongles
for CAD applications.

Really, the Mac Pro sports a set of $3000+ "workstation" class FirePro
W9000's, which are egregiously marked up versions of last generation GPUs. For
the price of a single D700 in the Mac Pro you could buy 3+ Radeon 290X's.

A PC user building a high end system would not opt for Xeon CPUs, ECC RAM, and
workstation GPUs. They'd put in top of the line consumer CPUs with liquid
cooling, top-end current generation NVidia or AMD cards, all for a fraction of
the cost.

And in an Apples-to-Oranges comparison on major benchmarks, there's be
practically zero different in performance, the PC would whup the ass of the
"workstation" class system in games, and some DCC apps might perform slightly
worse.

To show what a rip off these workstation cards are, there used to be a jumper
hack for NVidia cards that would turn a consumer GPU into a "Quadro"
workstation GPU, which would allow the workstation class OpenGL drivers to
work, and the result was no different in benchmarks.

That is, the "workstation GPU" turns out to be a HW dongle to allow OpenGL
drivers tuned for triangle throughput to run.

The exception is if you are perhaps running long running simulations. ECC
could be useful there. But for Final Cut Pro? The ECC and workstation GPUs are
overkill.

There isn't an Apple tax, there is an "Intel tax" and "workstation tax" on
unneeded/overkill HW that delivers marginal returns to performance for
enormous extra cost.

I love the Mac Pro's design, I just wish it came in non-Xeon/non-FirePro GPU
versions.

~~~
mpweiher
'...the majority of people do not need ECC memory nor "workstation" GPUs...'

Yes, and the majority of people do not need or buy Mac Pros. They buy iMacs,
minis or laptops.

"Really, the Mac Pro sports a set of $3000+ "workstation" class FirePro
W9000's, ... you could buy 3+ Radeon 290X's."

Well, on the Mac Pro, you _do_ get 2 of those $3000 graphics cards for $1000
total, or $500 each. This is an upgrade price from the low end cards, which
have been estimated at a combined value of ~ $1000 themselves[1], so the total
would actually be $1000 per card, or what you said you can get that sort of
card for...

[1] [http://architosh.com/2013/10/the-mac-pro-so-whats-
a-d300-d50...](http://architosh.com/2013/10/the-mac-pro-so-whats-
a-d300-d500-and-d700-anyway-we-have-answers/2/)

~~~
cromwellian
They're still last generation GPUs, not AMD R9's.

I had Mac Pro (old 2005) model and over the course of 8 years of continuous
use I had maybe a handful of ECC errors detected. I had far more crashes from
unreliable software.

There are a class of people who want fast expandable machines with top end
GPUs who don't want ECC level reliability. The iMac is not a replacement for
the guy who wants a Mac that runs Crossfire AMD GPUs for games or video
editing.

Again, the Xeon is a huge unneeded tax that leaves a whole in the market
between iMac and Mac Pro, a whole that PCs fill. There are lots and lots of
people who build tricked-out PCs that run rings around this Mac Pro as gaming
or video editing rigs. The cases and build quality and "design" suck ass,
power speed and cost wise they win.

Apple is leaving money on the table I think by leaving such a huge donut
whole, and the people comparing Mac Pros to what PC users can build don't
understand what PC users want.

I'd argue ECC is far more important in cloud based systems handling mission
critical data than say, The Verge.com editing a review video, in which a
single bit error is unlikely to be catastrophic or invite a law suit over data
loss.

~~~
mpweiher
_They 're still last generation GPUs, not AMD R9's._

Can you elaborate?

 _There are a class of people who want fast expandable machines with top end
GPUs who don 't want ECC level reliability._

Sure, but I think we can agree that people who actually expand machines are
not a majority. We are also now straying from the article, which asked "is
there an Apple tax?" (not really, the machines are good value for money) to
"does Apple make the machine I want?". The latter is a valid question, but a
different one.

 _The iMac is not a replacement for the guy who wants a Mac that runs
Crossfire AMD GPUs for games..._

Again, I'd say that Apple doest not target gamers, and I don't think they'd be
very successful if they did. How does this affect the position that the MacPro
is good value for the market it serves?

 _...or video editing._

I don't think I'd take as cavalier an attitude towards RAM errors as you do,
especially since computers are digital and therefore have highly non-linear
failure modes.

[1] [http://www.zdnet.com/blog/storage/dram-error-rates-
nightmare...](http://www.zdnet.com/blog/storage/dram-error-rates-nightmare..).

------
adamnemecek
For the heck of it, I did the breakdown

CPU: $2,789
([http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116...](http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116925))

RAM: I could not find the identical type but it seems like it's in the
ballpark of ~$800 given the ones I found were either a tad slower or came in 8
pieces instead of 4 (but then they were faster).

GPU: It seems like the exact GPU was introduced only for Mac Pro so it does
not seem like you can buy it normally. But let's say ~$700.

HDD: ~$500-$600 [http://www.amazon.com/Crucial-2-5-Inch-adapter-Internal-
CT96...](http://www.amazon.com/Crucial-2-5-Inch-adapter-Internal-
CT960M500SSD1/dp/B00BQ8RGL6)

Motherboard: Seems like best LGA 2011 motherboards are in the the ~$500 range.

Total: ~$5300 (given you'd probably spend a couple more hundred on a power
supply, case etc). Note that when I was estimating the prices, I was generally
estimating higher than lower.

So I'd really like to see their cost breakdown of the 11k they mentioned.

~~~
stormbrew
This is the real article that talks about the parts chosen:
[http://www.futurelooks.com/new-apple-mac-pro-can-build-
bette...](http://www.futurelooks.com/new-apple-mac-pro-can-build-better-
cheaper-pc-diy-style/)

The problem with this is it tries too hard to match things about the Mac Pro
that would never matter to someone building their own. No one is going to
choose a twice-as-expensive AMD card that adds thousands to the cost for no
reason, and honestly no one ever seemed to care about a workstation being a
small form factor until Apple made one that looks like R2-D2.

~~~
girvo
HP and Lenovo make nice SFF workstation. I wanted one of the HP ones for ages,
I like SFF and want a workstation styled desktop for work

------
jlawer
While I think the Mac Pro is a nice bit of kit, it feel heavily specialised
for video editing, post production and 3D work with a quiet profile.

But if your speccing competing kit, why wouldn't you build a 'better' product,
rather then trying to find the exact parts. Your never going to build an off
the shelf system with the same parts, make it quieter and keep it under budget
when apple is pumping them off the production line.

Why would you spec a wintel system with a single 12 core proc instead of 2x
hex (or oct) core procs?!?!? The 12 core part is rare and expensive, compared
to the commodity 6 core part.

Why would a workstation grade machine at this point in time not have a
mirrored disk array?

Why would you not have either 10gbit or quad 1gbit ethernet. Bond these up and
connect to fast NAS / SAN storage for storage. Alternatively use a SAS
connector and directly connect to a JBOD. A dual proc server board might even
have 14 SAS/SATA ports to allow you to have a nice local storage array running
RAID10/5/6.

An Intel Xeon E5-2630v2 (hex core, 2.6ghz) can be had for $792 AUD a pop.

Not to mention that you can put hundreds of GB of ECC memory in a Dual proc
Xeon board.

Some people will value size over performance/price and think that such a
machine will never be a replacement. I think on the other hand having a RAIDed
system disk and much more ram is more valuable for my workloads.

While they will sell thousands of them, I really don't see the value outside a
small number of applications optimised for OSX. For these workloads the cost
is insignificant compared to the productivity.

Its disappointing for those hoping Apple might finally build a decent general
purpose workstation, but with such limited upgradability I can't see these
being used for a lot of the applications that people considered the previous
mac pro for.

~~~
walshemj
Yes that is what I thought if your building a high end DIY mac pro replacement
why would you not go for a dual processor system based around something like a
SR2 water cooled board.

------
ZoFreX
This copy-paste job adds nothing to the original article:
[http://bgr.com/2013/12/26/mac-pro-windows-diy-
cost/](http://bgr.com/2013/12/26/mac-pro-windows-diy-cost/)

Edit: And the article they copied from is a shorter write-up of the actual
original: [http://www.futurelooks.com/new-apple-mac-pro-can-build-
bette...](http://www.futurelooks.com/new-apple-mac-pro-can-build-better-
cheaper-pc-diy-style/)

------
mpweiher
This has been a common observation since time memorial: equivalent Mac systems
tend to be competitive. Apple just doesn't compete in the very low end of the
market at all.

~~~
kubiiii
Common observation also : if you build a car from scratch using parts you'll
end up with a much higher price. If a competitor builds a similar PC with the
same sales volume, enabling the same bulk discount, the comparison would be
valid.

~~~
_frog
Although you could also argue that building a PC from scratch is a far less
exceptional case than building a car.

------
lmm
If you match exactly the specs of an apple system the price tends to be
competitive; the reason there's a "tax" is the apple model range is a lot
smaller. If you choose the specs to start with (e.g. the system requirements
for some game), and then compare the cheapest mac you can get with those specs
with the cheapest PC you can get with those specs, that's when a price
difference tends to be visible.

------
yalogin
Apple has unfairly gotten this rep that their machines are expensive when in
fact equivalent windows systems are in fact more expensive. I realized this
when I was searching for a display and naturally thought that I can find a
display comparable to the Apple one from some other manufacturers at a much
steeper discount. But found that most do not make equivalent displays or when
they do (Dell) its priced higher than Apple's. I have found the same thing
when it comes to Mac Mini's as well. For the form factor there is nothing on
the market that is even comparable. Things might have changed now (I hope)
have not checked.

------
bane
Funny, I ran a similar comparison and came up with ~$9000
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6937203](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6937203)

I didn't include ECC RAM which might up the price a bit. My conclusion was
that there really wasn't much of an Apple tax anymore.

However, I think the system is spec'd wrong. In same ways it's spec'd out like
a server, in others like a high-end CAD workstation...but it's not really
suitable for the former and the market for the latter is really small.

As a server the overly expensive video is completely unnecessary. And the form
factor is all wrong anyways.

For gaming, music production, video editing, photo work, etc. the workstation-
class video parts, CPU and expensive RAM aren't useful and the storage is too
small anyways.

Nobody targeting either class of user would spec a system out like this.

So who is this targeted at? The more stationary rMBP users who do lots of
virtualization and want more RAM with the occasional CAD work and/or bitcoin
mining?

I dunno, this product line _feels_ weird.

I just built a pretty decent system that I'm expecting to last for the next
4-5 years and spent well under $2k.

Core i7-4770K

Nvidia GTX680

32GB RAM

512GB SSD

4TB HD

Blue Ray writer

\+ some other odds and ends and they tossed in 3 free brand new games.

However, I would have liked to have it running with fewer fans, in a smaller
case (half the size of my current mid-tower would have been nice).

Had I gone with 2x the RAM and a pair of the top of the line video card I
would have still been around the cost of the lowest end Mac Pro at better day-
to-day performance. But then again, my case is _huge_ compared to this thing.
Hell, I think my CPU cooling setup alone is about the same size as a Mac Pro.

I think the good thing is that at least the small size and high power at least
has the tech world thinking and talking again, about part sizes and shapes,
airflow, heat management etc. I predict some fast followers in the PC market
at various specs and similarly sized form factors, including the huge open gap
in the Apple lineup.

Maybe my next system build in 5 years will be in a tube shaped case with a
single fan and much smaller parts?

------
patrickg_zill
Typical fanboi-ism that is being repeated.

There are 2 different lines of AMD GPUs that use the same GPU parts: FirePro
Wxxxx and Radeon xxxx / R7 or R9 xxx.

For instance, the W9000 uses the same GPU as the Radeon HD 7970 Ghz Edition.
This card sells for a retail price of maybe $500. Even if it is instead based
on the 7990, that card is not $3K either.

The difference between the W9000 and the Radeon is that the RAM on the card is
ECC on the FirePro and not ECC on the Radeon series... and nowhere that I can
see, does Apple say that the DDR5 RAM on the graphics card is ECC; only that
the main RAM for the CPU is ECC.

See this for codenames of the various GPUs:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radeon_HD_7000_Series#Southern_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radeon_HD_7000_Series#Southern_Islands_.28HD_7xxx.29_Series)
.

Look up the equivalent retail prices of the cards mentioned, on the Wiki
page... note that currently the prices are higher at retail because of the GPU
shortage due to people buying these for Litecoin / Dogecoin mining.

See that the Apple fanbois in their "I Want to Believe" behavior don't
understand what is going on...

~~~
gte910h
>note that currently the prices are higher at retail because of the GPU
shortage due to people buying these for Litecoin / Dogecoin mining.

And that price issue doesn't effect apple at all, right?

~~~
patrickg_zill
Probably not, given the nature of long-term OEM agreements; the shortage is
just due to early supply ramp-ups going into the Christmas season (the R9
series cards were press-released in late September 2013).

Apple has been an ATI customer for 10+ years IIRC .

------
interpol_p
The original article states that the Windows machine is _without_ any
Thunderbolt 2 connectivity. If you wanted to match the hardware more closely,
you would have to add the price of fairly expensive Thunderbolt 2 add-on
cards.

I'm not even sure you could match the _6x Thunderbolt 2 ports_ and _4x USB 3
ports_ available on the Mac Pro with a DIY PC at this time.

The Mac Pro also has dual gigabit ethernet and built-in speaker, which this
comparison does not seem to take into account.

------
mjp94
Even if there was an apparent 'Apple tax' on the new Mac Pros, as long it
wasn't too much, I wouldn't mind. They make great hardware and software, and
sometimes it's worth it to pay a little bit extra to get this. After all, we
don't go around testing the Apple tax on the iPhone, and comparing it to other
smart phones, since the iPhone is one of the more expensive phones on the
market.

------
lucaspiller
If you compare an Asus Zenbook to a equivalently specced Macbook Air, they
actually come out at pretty much the same price.

~~~
tbrock
Yes but the MacBook will actually last. I have a co-worker that has a Zenbook
and while the hardware specifications are nice it has garbage build quality.

When will there be another great PC hardware manufacturer?

I've wondered if one would come along or if the barriers to entry and consumer
preferences would simply never allow it.

~~~
trimbo
> When will there be another great PC hardware manufacturer?

No joke!

I think this is the most disappointing thing about Surface. Microsoft is now
in the hardware market. They could have put that kind of build quality into an
actual ultrabook, but instead focused on this weird design for Windows 8.

------
greenwalls
Isn't the new Mac Pro built in the USA? It seems like it would be even less
expensive if it was built in China.

