Guaranteed 100Mbps for corporate subscribers in Stockholm costs around USD 810 (SEK 7000) without any caps. How much does that kind of bandwidth cost in the US and France?
Btw, I've had two residential 100Mbps connections. I might just be lucky, but at our old place north of Stockholm and at our new place, we're consistently able to achieve downloads at around 8MB/sec from TechNet.
"Last, the reason behind the calling the defense for defense and not military is that the law forbid the Swedish military to perform any aggression. Even on the order from the riksdagen. The purpose of the military in Sweden is strictly defense and hence it is called Försvarsmakten."
The official translation of Försvarsmakten is "Swedish Armed Forces" though. See: http://www2.mil.se/en
Before ordering my MacBook Pro I compared it's price to laptops from Dell, HP, and a couple of other OEMs. A Dell configured as close to the MBP as I could get cost $200 more and the HP was about the same price
Your price must have been after the ADC discount, because an HP 8710p (KR888UT) comes in at $2,349. It comes with an Nvidia Quadro NVS 320M (based on the 8700M GT) instead of the 8600 GT in the MBP, a BluRay burner, and 3-year warranty on parts. Otherwise, everything else is the same in both the default 17" MBP ($2,799) and this 8710p ($2,349) configuration.
My 17" MBP is 1680 X 1050, and some text looks small, however 1920 X 1200 is available. The only need for high resolution is graphics and photography but if you're doing that then you really should have an external monitor at least 21", I'm looking for one at least 24".
My wife works daily on a 15.4" HP nw8240 with a WUXGA (1920x1200) display. DPI settings were adjusted to make text not look too small. The higher resolution gives her a lot of screen real-estate making it possible to have multiple documents open simultaneously without having to be tied to a desk. I work on an 8510p with a WSXGA+ (1680x1050) screen, and although I do usually work with an LCD hooked up to a docking station when at the office, I can tell you that it wouldn't be much fun if when I undocked I automatically had a much lower resolution making Eclipse look all cramped. Both of us disagree that "the only need for a high resolution is graphics and photography" and I'm pretty sure a number of developers would take issue with that as well. Sure, multiple screens are preferable, but when you want to work untethered to a desk, then a high resolution's practically a must.
I think it's actually the other way around. I've been unable to find a similarly specced workstation from other vendors that could match the Mac Pro at the same price point. I ended up having to spec a server model from Dell to even come close to Apple's price, and even then it was still at least $500 more expensive.
On the other hand, it seems like Apple's notebooks are almost always at least US$200 more expensive than similarly specced business notebooks from Dell, HP and Lenovo. The cheapest 15" MacBook Pro for example comes in at $1,999 and only offers a WXGA+ (1440x900) LCD and a single year warranty on parts, compared to the HP 8510p, Dell Latitude D830 and Lenovo T61 which all offer 3-year warranties on parts and WSXGA+ (1680x1050) screens.
Thanks, I managed to spec out a PowerEdge 2900 III a lot cheaper than an equivalent Precision T7400. Like you said, it's a bit funny that Dell's workstations are more expensive than their servers, even considering the cost of a workstation-class graphics card (default on Precisions), an LCD and the OS.
I'm curious, where should I click to configure a Dell desktop system without a graphics card? I've been looking at the Precision line and couldn't find this option. (The Precision line being the only desktop offering with Xeons)
Same thing over at HP, I couldn't find a way to configure an xw8600 or xw6600 without a graphics card, lowest I could get was a Quadro NVS 290M on either, and a Quadro FX570 from Dell. Could it be you were looking at servers?
$1,500 is stretching it. The lowest price I could find for those Xeon E5462s was $850 a piece on PriceWatch. Here's a quick rundown of some of the components in the Mac Pro:
2x 2.8GHz Intel Xeon 5462 Quad-Core processors (1600MT/s FSB) ($850 @ MemoryLabs.com)
2GiB 800MHz DDR2 Fully-buffered RAM (PC6400/DDR2-800) (at least $175 accdg to Kingston.com)
Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MiB ($75 @ NewEgg.com)
320GB Serial-ATA HDD ($75 @ NewEgg at most)
16x DL DVD-RW ($30 at most over at NewEgg and these were mostly 20x drives)
==========
Apple's price: $2,799.00
Custom price exluding motherboard, PSU and case: $2,055.00
Cheapest dual-LGA771 board I could find cost $130, but most of them cost $175 and a higher-end brushed aluminium case from Lian-Li can run from between $200 to $250. A decent power supply will probably run you $100 to $150 if you buy retail, so that brings our cost to somewhere between $2,285 to $2,630 not including operating system. First figure is if you go for the $130 mobo and a $100 case which already has a PSU (probably not a good idea), second figure is when you go for a $175 mobo, $250 case and $150 PSU.
A lot of Apple's products cost more than those of their competitors, but the Mac Pro in particular doesn't seem to be grossly overpriced and it appears to be the only workstation-class machine that's offered with consumer-class graphics cards.
I don't recall what model of Dell I used. I looked for one than had the same or close to the same CPU the MBP had and a 17" LCD. From there I configured the Dell to be as close to the specs the MBP had. I did the same with the HP.
I tried coming as close or exceeding the specs for the MacBook Pro as I could, and here's what I came up with. I marked the items which exceed the MacBook Pro 17"'s specs with an asterisk.
MacBook Pro 17"
2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (T7700)
17" display @ 1680x1050
2GB 667MHz DDR2 memory
160GB hard drive (5400RPM)
8x Dual-Layer DVD+/-RW drive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT w/ 256MB SDRAM
Airport Extreme WiFi 802.11b/g/n (802.11b/g and draft-N)
iSight camera (built-in)
OS X
90-days support, 1-year warranty
Built-in Bluetooth module (2.0EDR) $2,799.00
Dell Inspiron 1720
2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (T7700) 17" display @ 1920x1200*
2GB 667MHz DDR2 memory 250GB hard drive (5400RPM)*
8x Dual-Layer DVD+/-RW drive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT w/ 256MB SDRAM
Intel WiFi Draft-N module (802.11b/g and draft-N)
Integrated 2.0MP camera
Windows Vista Ultimate (Yeah, chose the most expensive option)
1Yr In-Home Service, Parts + Labor,24x7 Phone Support
85W Lithium Ion battery (9-cell to match the MacBook Pro)
Built-in Bluetooth module (2.0EDR) 56kbps modem (have to pay extra for this on the Mac)* $2,308 (Dell had an Instant Savings thing going for $314 which would have brought the price down to $1,994)
The Dell doesn't have gigabit ethernet though, but most Mac users I know don't like being "tied down" anyway.
Were you comparing the $2999 Dell XPS M1730 to the $2,799 17" MacBook Pro?
A bit of an unfair comparison there considering that the XPS has dual-GeForce 8700M GT cards in SLI and a WUXGA screen (1920x1200) don't you think?
Checked out the specs, and they are actually pretty decent (http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/cmod.to?seg=H HO&coid=-30597) but I still don't get why there are so many manufacturers that won't offer higher resolutions on their notebooks. I personally feel that 1440x900 on a 17" widescreen is just too low since I've gotten used to 1400x1050 on a 14.1" screen. Which is probably the same reason I won't be going for a MacBook Pro anytime soon.
It would probably help if Opera wasn't set to identify itself as MSIE 5.0 by default too... Then again, I guess the guys at Opera decided to do that because of the various (older) sites with obsolete JavaScript that would let you in if you were using IE, but would tell you to use IE if you weren't.
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Guaranteed 100Mbps for corporate subscribers in Stockholm costs around USD 810 (SEK 7000) without any caps. How much does that kind of bandwidth cost in the US and France? Btw, I've had two residential 100Mbps connections. I might just be lucky, but at our old place north of Stockholm and at our new place, we're consistently able to achieve downloads at around 8MB/sec from TechNet.
"Last, the reason behind the calling the defense for defense and not military is that the law forbid the Swedish military to perform any aggression. Even on the order from the riksdagen. The purpose of the military in Sweden is strictly defense and hence it is called Försvarsmakten."
The official translation of Försvarsmakten is "Swedish Armed Forces" though. See: http://www2.mil.se/en
Before ordering my MacBook Pro I compared it's price to laptops from Dell, HP, and a couple of other OEMs. A Dell configured as close to the MBP as I could get cost $200 more and the HP was about the same price
Your price must have been after the ADC discount, because an HP 8710p (KR888UT) comes in at $2,349. It comes with an Nvidia Quadro NVS 320M (based on the 8700M GT) instead of the 8600 GT in the MBP, a BluRay burner, and 3-year warranty on parts. Otherwise, everything else is the same in both the default 17" MBP ($2,799) and this 8710p ($2,349) configuration.
My 17" MBP is 1680 X 1050, and some text looks small, however 1920 X 1200 is available. The only need for high resolution is graphics and photography but if you're doing that then you really should have an external monitor at least 21", I'm looking for one at least 24".
My wife works daily on a 15.4" HP nw8240 with a WUXGA (1920x1200) display. DPI settings were adjusted to make text not look too small. The higher resolution gives her a lot of screen real-estate making it possible to have multiple documents open simultaneously without having to be tied to a desk. I work on an 8510p with a WSXGA+ (1680x1050) screen, and although I do usually work with an LCD hooked up to a docking station when at the office, I can tell you that it wouldn't be much fun if when I undocked I automatically had a much lower resolution making Eclipse look all cramped. Both of us disagree that "the only need for a high resolution is graphics and photography" and I'm pretty sure a number of developers would take issue with that as well. Sure, multiple screens are preferable, but when you want to work untethered to a desk, then a high resolution's practically a must.
Lenovo says it's more like 6.7%.
I think it's actually the other way around. I've been unable to find a similarly specced workstation from other vendors that could match the Mac Pro at the same price point. I ended up having to spec a server model from Dell to even come close to Apple's price, and even then it was still at least $500 more expensive. On the other hand, it seems like Apple's notebooks are almost always at least US$200 more expensive than similarly specced business notebooks from Dell, HP and Lenovo. The cheapest 15" MacBook Pro for example comes in at $1,999 and only offers a WXGA+ (1440x900) LCD and a single year warranty on parts, compared to the HP 8510p, Dell Latitude D830 and Lenovo T61 which all offer 3-year warranties on parts and WSXGA+ (1680x1050) screens.
Thanks, I managed to spec out a PowerEdge 2900 III a lot cheaper than an equivalent Precision T7400. Like you said, it's a bit funny that Dell's workstations are more expensive than their servers, even considering the cost of a workstation-class graphics card (default on Precisions), an LCD and the OS.
I'm curious, where should I click to configure a Dell desktop system without a graphics card? I've been looking at the Precision line and couldn't find this option. (The Precision line being the only desktop offering with Xeons)
Same thing over at HP, I couldn't find a way to configure an xw8600 or xw6600 without a graphics card, lowest I could get was a Quadro NVS 290M on either, and a Quadro FX570 from Dell. Could it be you were looking at servers?
$1,500 is stretching it. The lowest price I could find for those Xeon E5462s was $850 a piece on PriceWatch. Here's a quick rundown of some of the components in the Mac Pro:
2x 2.8GHz Intel Xeon 5462 Quad-Core processors (1600MT/s FSB) ($850 @ MemoryLabs.com)
2GiB 800MHz DDR2 Fully-buffered RAM (PC6400/DDR2-800) (at least $175 accdg to Kingston.com)
Radeon HD 2600 XT 256MiB ($75 @ NewEgg.com)
320GB Serial-ATA HDD ($75 @ NewEgg at most)
16x DL DVD-RW ($30 at most over at NewEgg and these were mostly 20x drives)
==========
Apple's price: $2,799.00
Custom price exluding motherboard, PSU and case: $2,055.00
Cheapest dual-LGA771 board I could find cost $130, but most of them cost $175 and a higher-end brushed aluminium case from Lian-Li can run from between $200 to $250. A decent power supply will probably run you $100 to $150 if you buy retail, so that brings our cost to somewhere between $2,285 to $2,630 not including operating system. First figure is if you go for the $130 mobo and a $100 case which already has a PSU (probably not a good idea), second figure is when you go for a $175 mobo, $250 case and $150 PSU.
A lot of Apple's products cost more than those of their competitors, but the Mac Pro in particular doesn't seem to be grossly overpriced and it appears to be the only workstation-class machine that's offered with consumer-class graphics cards.
I tried coming as close or exceeding the specs for the MacBook Pro as I could, and here's what I came up with. I marked the items which exceed the MacBook Pro 17"'s specs with an asterisk.
MacBook Pro 17"
2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (T7700)
17" display @ 1680x1050
2GB 667MHz DDR2 memory
160GB hard drive (5400RPM)
8x Dual-Layer DVD+/-RW drive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT w/ 256MB SDRAM
Airport Extreme WiFi 802.11b/g/n (802.11b/g and draft-N)
iSight camera (built-in)
OS X
90-days support, 1-year warranty
Built-in Bluetooth module (2.0EDR)
$2,799.00
Dell Inspiron 1720
2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (T7700)
17" display @ 1920x1200*
2GB 667MHz DDR2 memory
250GB hard drive (5400RPM)*
8x Dual-Layer DVD+/-RW drive
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT w/ 256MB SDRAM
Intel WiFi Draft-N module (802.11b/g and draft-N)
Integrated 2.0MP camera
Windows Vista Ultimate (Yeah, chose the most expensive option)
1Yr In-Home Service, Parts + Labor,24x7 Phone Support
85W Lithium Ion battery (9-cell to match the MacBook Pro)
Built-in Bluetooth module (2.0EDR)
56kbps modem (have to pay extra for this on the Mac)*
$2,308 (Dell had an Instant Savings thing going for $314 which would have brought the price down to $1,994)
The Dell doesn't have gigabit ethernet though, but most Mac users I know don't like being "tied down" anyway.
Were you comparing the $2999 Dell XPS M1730 to the $2,799 17" MacBook Pro? A bit of an unfair comparison there considering that the XPS has dual-GeForce 8700M GT cards in SLI and a WUXGA screen (1920x1200) don't you think?
Checked out the specs, and they are actually pretty decent (http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/cmod.to?seg=H HO&coid=-30597) but I still don't get why there are so many manufacturers that won't offer higher resolutions on their notebooks. I personally feel that 1440x900 on a 17" widescreen is just too low since I've gotten used to 1400x1050 on a 14.1" screen. Which is probably the same reason I won't be going for a MacBook Pro anytime soon.
It would probably help if Opera wasn't set to identify itself as MSIE 5.0 by default too... Then again, I guess the guys at Opera decided to do that because of the various (older) sites with obsolete JavaScript that would let you in if you were using IE, but would tell you to use IE if you weren't.