Apple Laptop Upgrades Costing 200% More Than Dells

An anonymous reader writes "C|net is highlighting the astonishing cost of Apple laptop hardware upgrades, compared to Dell — in some instances, Apple is charging 200% more for upgraded components, such as memory and hard disks. Either there's a serious difference in the quality of components being used, or Apple is quite literally ripping off those who aren't able to upgrade hardware themselves."

Comments

quality of components isn't the only cost factor

[Lazy Jones]

There's a lot more that determines pricing apart from "quality" (you mean cost) of components and greed. First and foremost, there is cost of labor (although I doubt that Apple employs expensive US/European people for assembling their stuff). Also don't underestimate the cost benefit of having efficient logistics / infrastructure for assembly.

Also, compared to most smaller market players, both Apple and Dell are outrageously overpriced in this regard.

Re:Neighborhood friendly computer geek

[LaughingCoder]

I bought a MAC mini a few months back at the local MAC store. I asked if there were any spare DIMM slots so I could increase the memory. The answer was "no, and besides you have to do memory upgrades through us or else you void your warranty". Well, I told him I was able to install the memory myself and would do so rather than pay their high prices. As we closed the sale he asked me if I wanted to buy the extended warranty. I said "I just told you I am going to void the warranty as soon as I get it home ... why would I buy the extended warranty?"

Re:Neighborhood friendly computer geek

[John_Booty]

I upgraded the hard drive and memory on my MacBook Pro and had no problems with getting my machine serviced by AppleCare on two occasions. And those were full logic board replacements, not cursory looks at the battery or anything.

(It was the first-gen MacBook Pro. Lots of issues with those, although Apple did take care of me.)

Let me fix that for you

[GameboyRMH]

Fashionable vendor charges more for service than mass-market vendor.

Film at 11.

There fixed it for you :)

Apple computers have their uses to professionals, but to the average Joe on the street it's just a more fashionable (and perhaps reliable) computer - and those are the people who are getting fleeced because they don't know how to swap out some computer parts.

Re:Neighborhood friendly computer geek

[gnasher719]

Don't you need a Torx #8 to get the drive off its sled?

Would be nice to have, but if you don't have one, then you don't need it :-)

Re:Neighborhood friendly computer geek

[Gewalt]

No, you'd use superduper to just bitcopy the entire volume. It's free. It's fast. It just works. (yes, I had to add that last part)

Re:Apple

[The-Blue-Clown]

Can anyone besides me remember back when IBM clones took off while Apple was charging 100% markup? Jobs/Apple has become what is used to condemn. A bloated company focused on ringing money from it's customers.

Re:And here demonstrated is the sad truth..

[omeomi]

You paid more for the hard drives, and my friend's vintage first generation g4 still boots up perfectly on its original hard drive despite being continuously on for its entire life.

I'm reasonably certain that Apple has never manufactured hard drives. If you bought a hard drive from an Apple store, chances are good you could have gotten the exact same hard drive somewhere else. That has always been one great irony of Apple, that users think they're getting better hardware than PC users (and because of discount PC builders, in many cases they are), but dollar for dollar, they're not getting hardware that you can't get on a comparatively priced PC.