First, it's not black or white. My point is not that it is not illogical to be proud of America's history, but rather, doing so requires giving up the simplistic ideas of "right" and "good" preached by modern society. Most Americans do not do that. Instead, they retain their pride in their history by being ignorant of that history. Of course, it's not fair to single out Americans, because everyone else does it to. However, I'm not really interested in French denials of their colonial history --- I don't live in France...
Second, "circumstances that we had to go through" is a very diplomatic way of saying "the people that we had to kill, enslave, and disenfranchise, not just in the Americas, but around the world." A logical American must accept the fact that our country would not be nearly as prosperous today had these dark acts not been committed in the past. They must accept that America's policy for much of its history has been that democracy is not always good, that freedom is not always good, that murder and slavery can be justified, and that war is a legitimate political tool. It can be debated whether specific instances of this policy were useful or not, but its hard to debate that the policy has indeed been one of "doing what needs to be done."
Third, nationalism is something different from what you're talking about. Nationalism is the belief that a group of similar people, of a similar culture, should be able to determine how to govern themselves. National pride was always a tool used by nationalists to achieve their goals, but was never really a central tenent of nationalism itself. When the South suceeded from the Union, nationalism was at play. Sure, national pride was invoked to support that succession, but was pride in their history the reason for their sucession? No! Rather, it was their desire not to be ruled by a government that did not respect its culture, or have its best interests at heart.
Which brings me back to my point: it's a little silly to be "proud" of a nation's history. It means being proud of the actions of a nation as a whole. For most nations, including ours, those actions lean more towards the self-serving than the admirable. It makes far more sense to be proud of individuals*, or of ideologies (which more often than not cross national-boundaries), then to be proud of the actions of government.
*) Attributing individual achievement to the nation as a whole is strange in a Western society. Why should France, who was until relatively recently a nation of farmers, get credit for the ideas of its greatest intellectuals? Why should the French people get credit for the liberal democratic ideals pushed by a few people in Paris, and widely opposed by most everyone else?
It has nothing to do with being friendly either! It's about recognizing the government as a legitimate representative of its people. The US deals diplomatically with lots of governments it is antagonistic towards. They don't have to be friendly with them, they just have to be willing to have diplomatic relations with them.
What system of government is that exactly? The one we copied wholesale from the British and modified slightly to fit our needs?
Seriously, read your history sometime. The American system, especially in its initial form, was a systematization of elements already present in the British government.
Muslims don't vote for al-Queda, nor do they, en masse, continue to support them with campaign contributions.
Moreover, as an American, I must point out that its a little silly to be proud of America's history. The US has done a lot of very bad things in its history, specifically the genocide of the native people and continued intervention into the affairs of Latin America. Being a proud American, thus, means either being ignorant of history, or swallowing some of the simpler ideas about fairness, humanity, and democratic freedom. Of course, that is not to say that the latter is that unusual a state of mind for people. Certainly, the Chinese, the Japanese, the British, the French, nor the Germans (or whomever else sees it fit to criticize America as of late), cannot say with a clear conscience that their dark history is any better than ours.
It's not just a matter of economic support. It's the diplomatic isolation. You can't claim to support democracy, then refuse to recognize a democratically elected government.
This is information leaked from the inside, not stolen from the inside. If someone in your house leaks one of your business secrets to the press, do they have the right to publish it? Yes.
Why do you need 1080i? 720p has several times more resolution than SDTV, and looks damn good, especially on screens in the 27-35" category.
I've got a 60" 1080i screen at home, and my friend has a 720p 37". The picture on each screen is about the same, all told. Both are a hell of a sight better than any SDTV at that size.
We shipping at the same store? That particular machine is, by itself $1450 at the Dell Home website. Add all the little extras the Macbook has (bluetooth, etc), you're up to $1550. That's a $350 premium, to own a Dell!
BluRay brings a better picture iff you have a $2000+ TV
Where do people get the idea that HDTV's still cost so much? You can get a 27" 1080i HDTV with an HDMI input and built-in tuner for $380 from Best Buy (probably even cheaper online). This is only about $80 more than the corresponding non-HDTV.
There is one thing you're neglecting, however. The cheaper console does not necessarily win. It's content that's the ultimate arbiter of the winner. Unlike the previous shift, from Nintendo to Sony during the N64 versus PS1 contest, you're not seeing a mass defection of content providers away from the PS3 to the XBox 360. Moreover, I'd argue that much of the 360's potential head start has been squandered by an underpowered library. It's not unusual to see a crappy set of launch titles on a console, but with the 360, it won't be until this summer (6 months after the console's launch), that games start coming out for the 360 that are actuallly worth having. If Sony has a decent launch lineup, this advantage of the 360 could be mitigated.
Now, Sony does certainly have the ability to muck up the PS3, but its certainly not decided. Remember that this game is still Sony's to lose. The installed base of PS2s is more than double that of the Gamecube, XBox, and 360 combined. Over the next two years, the console with the largest installed base, and the one generating a substantial portion of the revenue in the industry, will still be the PS2. This is a decisive advantage for Sony, one that isn't going to be overturned lightly.
How is it any more "crappy" than the low-end XBox 360? The XBox 360 core system doesn't even have a hard drive! At least the low-end PS3 isn't missing a critical gaming component. What its missing are legitimate extras, like extra drive space, a remote, etc.
Games aren't going to require more than 20GB of HDD space. That's there if you want to store movies, music, etc, on your hard drive. Games *will*, however, require a hard drive, which makes the XBox 360 core system truely crappy.
I've owned the past 2 Nintendo flops. Both the N64 and the GC were hailed as "innovative" and "fun", with "great 1st party games". Both had a painfully sparse game library. Unless you're the sort of lapdog that likes every game Nintendo spits out, owning the N64 or GC was a matter of short gaming sessions punctuated with long waits for the next remotely interesting game. I soldiered through both systems for a year before wising up, selling them, and getting a PS1/PS2 (respectively).
Most of my friends who played games did the same thing. In fact, pretty much the only person I know who still plays his GC is an arcade/classic gamer nut, who doesn't feel stupid playing DDR and still plays old SNES games. These people are in the decided minority of gamers. If the Wii is designed to appeal to them, it'll fail.
There is a reason Nintendo lost their enormous SNES-era lead to Sony and even Microsoft. Their game libraries, though they contain a few really innovative and excellent titles here and there, are otherwise sparse and uninteresting. First-party Nintendo titles cannot be the sole driver of a gaming library! Nintendo simply can't release Zelda games fast enough. Owning a Nintendo system is like being in a theater that only plays movies from one studio, and fills in the rest of the time with either Indie flicks that nobody cares about, or movies on DVD after they've gone out of the other theaters. Nintendo has given no indication that the Wii will be any different. I seriously think they are in for a major fall.
I don't understand how the lower-end PS3 is the "crappy" one? It's got everything the "premium" 360 does, except the wireless controllers (which suck, btw, batteries are ass). Sure, it's not as good as the high-end PS3, but relative to the competition, it's damn good.
I've never seen an external iSight. I wouldn't be surprised if it had better quality, since it has a fairly large lens, etc. However, the iSight in my new iMac Core Duo is quite good for a webcam, better than the Orbit MP (actually 2) I have. The Orbit MPs are known for having pretty good quality, as far as webcams go.
That's just a fancy version of "the word on the street".
No, consumer reports is a based on a statistically representative survey. Two different things.
you can't use their reputation as evidence that this is a good product
I'm not using their reputation to say this is a good product. I'm saying its a product from a premium brand (which Apple is). Products from premium brands carry a price premium in the market. That doesn't mean that such products can't be a good value within their market segment.
it's a typical laptop for a higher than comparable price.
Higher than comparable to what? Where else can you get a Core Duo laptop from a premium brand for $1099? Show me that Vaio or that ThinkPad. All the comparisons I've seen put the Apple laptop at more or less the price category of HP and Dell (slightly higher price, slightly more features, better ergonomics). That's like Lexus putting out a car competing in the same price category as Honda. Sure, a Lexus is basically a Toyota, but from an economic standpoint, the label carries real tangible value, and in this case, Apple is giving you a discount on it.
According to this article (referenced by BluRaySucks.com), 3m people have non-digital capable HDTVs. That means the other 12m people will have digital compatible HDTVs. Given that almost all HDTVs sold recently do have digital inputs, the concern about non-digital HDTVs is marginal at best.
On top of that, 4 of 5 movie studios have said they will not use ICT for their initial release. Yes, this leaves those 3m people at the whim of the studios, but let's face reality. The realities of the market will not allow Hollywood to put ICT back in if they leave it out at first.
Um, lot's of people own HDTVs. We have one at our house, and my roommate has one in our dorm. I've got an HD-capable LCD, with components inputs, on my desk.
There are about 100m households in the US. The projects suggest that about 15m should have an HDTV by now (up from 12m at the end of 2004). The projections for market pentration vary from 30m by 2008 up to 65m by 2010.
So by the time this comes out at the end of this year, 15% or more of households will have HDTV, and over the course of its lifetime, that'll grow to 50%+.
Apple's iBook line has been relatively trouble-free since the 800 MHz G4s were phased out.
Of course, you could just listen to the people who have problems with their machine. That doesn't mean they're a representative sample. I had to have the LCD on my Inspiron 8200 replaced twice because entire regions of the display died. That doesn't mean I'll assume every Dell machine will have such problems.
I've bought five iPods for various friends and family. Not a single one has ever had a problem, though "everybody knows" iPod batteries crap out after a year! Simply put: the word on the street isn't necessarily a reliable indicator of reality. Apple's got a ridiculously high customer satisfaction rating from consumer reports. I'd take that as much more evidence of their reputation than random forum posts.
The point is that you haven't shown that "there are PC models with equivalent functionality out there selling for less." You've offered two competing laptops which differ moderately in price, features, and the reputation of their brand name (the 3000 you pointed to isn't a Thinkpad!).
If you're going to trot out the "PC models with equivalent functionality out there selling for less", at least try and do an apples-to-apples comparison. Don't completely ignore the software advantages of the Mac (ease of use, lack of spyware/viruses, eye-candy, etc), and the features of the Macbook. I'm seeing some really ridiculous statements on this thread. Like "Compensate for the built-in iSight with a $25 USB camera". The quality of the built-in iSight is *very* good. It definitely beats the $100+ Quickcam Orbit MP I've got lying around here. You should add $100 to the price of all the competing notebooks to compensate for the iSight. The rigidity of the Macbook case is a big deal. As someone who has carried around a flimsy Dell laptop for years, I can tell you that a good solid case is worth a lot more to me than $100. The weight and slimness do matter. 1.5" versus 1.08" (for the Acer you pointed to) is a difference you'll notice when trying to cram our laptop bag full of all the documents you carry with you. That convenience is worth something.
So if you want to be able to criticize the Macbook's value, do it legitimately. Compare the Macbook to a laptop from a top-tier company, with a similar screen size, similar thickness and weight, and similar features. An equivalent Vaio SZ 13.3" runs $1660. It's almost identical feature-for feature, but a pound lighter (due to the use of magnesium versus polycarbonate). An equivalent Dell E1405 has a bigger screen at a similar weight (5.3lb), and costs $1040 similarly specced (no video camera, though). That's Dell --- a manufacturer widely regarded as selling very affordable machines! An equivalentlly specced (complete with webcam), and sized (14.1" LCD, 5.37 lb) HP DV1000t costs $1150 after $50 MIR. A ThinkPad T60 has a slower processor, dedicated X1300 graphics, but starts at $1500.
Look at the vendors Apple is competing with. Relative to them, Apple is selling a product that has the reputation of Thinkpads and VAIOs, in a price range right around that of Dell and HP...
Um, how do you get $800? On Dell's online store, the base $800 model is a 1.66 GHz. When you add:
The 1.83 GHz processor ($100) The remote ($30) The DVD burner ($60) The bluetooth card ($50)
The total comes to $1037. With Apple's educational discount (remember, the Dell in question is heavily discounted), the price difference is negligable.
Now, you could niggle about the features here and there, but I don't think any of the above are gratuitous. The processor upgrade is simply to even the comparison. The remote is something I can see getting used in a dorm situation where the laptop serves triple duty as a music player hooked up to speakers or a media server hooked up to a TV (I know in college I used my laptop to do both). Bluetooth is a fairly recent amenity, but remember that Bluetooth devices are everywhere these days, from $50 cell phones to $200 PDAs.
I like big screens (I've got a 24" LCD on my desk), but I've come t the conclusion that its pointless trying to have both features in the same laptop. When you're using the thing on the move, the bigger screen is a liability (I can't open my 15" LCD in coach if the buy behind me decides to recline). When you're using the thing on your desk, every laptop screen pales in comparison to a good desktop LCD (I've got a 24" on my desk). Therefore, screen size is basically a wash. Bigger laptop screens make the laptop less useful and more painful to carry around. Smaller screens are harder to work with, but at least you can work with them in cases where you would not be able to with a larger screen.
IIRC, Intel does sell EFI capable motherboards. In any case, EFI is an open standard intended for PCs. Apple is just early with their use of it. That's distinct from "proprietory" hardware like ADB, for example.
It's also a full 1/3 thicker (1.5" versus 1.08"), heavier, has a slower processor, no DVD burner, and no built-in video camera. On the upside, it's got 20GB more hard drive space and a bigger screen. That seems entirely reasonable tradeoff for the $100 price delta.
Let's face it. At $1100, the new MacBook is an excellent value. It's a premium laptop from a premium manufacturer, it's got a great software suite courtesy of OS X and the iApps, its reasonably small and reasonably light, and its specs are just about in-line with other laptops in its price class. It's not going to convince hardcore Windows users who think OS X is a liability, not an advantage. However, for those people who actually want to use a Mac, it is a good machine at a very reasonable price.
The Acer has a bigger screen and more memory, but it also has a slower processor, and is a lot bigger and heavier (in the laptop world, making things small costs money). And its only $100 cheaper in the end. I'd say Apple did a hell of a job pricing the new iBooks, especially considering they're competing with IBM and Sony, not lower-tier manufacturers like Acer.
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First, it's not black or white. My point is not that it is not illogical to be proud of America's history, but rather, doing so requires giving up the simplistic ideas of "right" and "good" preached by modern society. Most Americans do not do that. Instead, they retain their pride in their history by being ignorant of that history. Of course, it's not fair to single out Americans, because everyone else does it to. However, I'm not really interested in French denials of their colonial history --- I don't live in France...
Second, "circumstances that we had to go through" is a very diplomatic way of saying "the people that we had to kill, enslave, and disenfranchise, not just in the Americas, but around the world." A logical American must accept the fact that our country would not be nearly as prosperous today had these dark acts not been committed in the past. They must accept that America's policy for much of its history has been that democracy is not always good, that freedom is not always good, that murder and slavery can be justified, and that war is a legitimate political tool. It can be debated whether specific instances of this policy were useful or not, but its hard to debate that the policy has indeed been one of "doing what needs to be done."
Third, nationalism is something different from what you're talking about. Nationalism is the belief that a group of similar people, of a similar culture, should be able to determine how to govern themselves. National pride was always a tool used by nationalists to achieve their goals, but was never really a central tenent of nationalism itself. When the South suceeded from the Union, nationalism was at play. Sure, national pride was invoked to support that succession, but was pride in their history the reason for their sucession? No! Rather, it was their desire not to be ruled by a government that did not respect its culture, or have its best interests at heart.
Which brings me back to my point: it's a little silly to be "proud" of a nation's history. It means being proud of the actions of a nation as a whole. For most nations, including ours, those actions lean more towards the self-serving than the admirable. It makes far more sense to be proud of individuals*, or of ideologies (which more often than not cross national-boundaries), then to be proud of the actions of government.
*) Attributing individual achievement to the nation as a whole is strange in a Western society. Why should France, who was until relatively recently a nation of farmers, get credit for the ideas of its greatest intellectuals? Why should the French people get credit for the liberal democratic ideals pushed by a few people in Paris, and widely opposed by most everyone else?
It has nothing to do with being friendly either! It's about recognizing the government as a legitimate representative of its people. The US deals diplomatically with lots of governments it is antagonistic towards. They don't have to be friendly with them, they just have to be willing to have diplomatic relations with them.
If I'm being prosecuted for a nation-wide spying program, then I suppose I have to say "that's fine with me".
What system of government is that exactly? The one we copied wholesale from the British and modified slightly to fit our needs?
Seriously, read your history sometime. The American system, especially in its initial form, was a systematization of elements already present in the British government.
Muslims don't vote for al-Queda, nor do they, en masse, continue to support them with campaign contributions.
Moreover, as an American, I must point out that its a little silly to be proud of America's history. The US has done a lot of very bad things in its history, specifically the genocide of the native people and continued intervention into the affairs of Latin America. Being a proud American, thus, means either being ignorant of history, or swallowing some of the simpler ideas about fairness, humanity, and democratic freedom. Of course, that is not to say that the latter is that unusual a state of mind for people. Certainly, the Chinese, the Japanese, the British, the French, nor the Germans (or whomever else sees it fit to criticize America as of late), cannot say with a clear conscience that their dark history is any better than ours.
It's not just a matter of economic support. It's the diplomatic isolation. You can't claim to support democracy, then refuse to recognize a democratically elected government.
This is information leaked from the inside, not stolen from the inside. If someone in your house leaks one of your business secrets to the press, do they have the right to publish it? Yes.
Why do you need 1080i? 720p has several times more resolution than SDTV, and looks damn good, especially on screens in the 27-35" category.
I've got a 60" 1080i screen at home, and my friend has a 720p 37". The picture on each screen is about the same, all told. Both are a hell of a sight better than any SDTV at that size.
We shipping at the same store? That particular machine is, by itself $1450 at the Dell Home website. Add all the little extras the Macbook has (bluetooth, etc), you're up to $1550. That's a $350 premium, to own a Dell!
BluRay brings a better picture iff you have a $2000+ TV
Where do people get the idea that HDTV's still cost so much? You can get a 27" 1080i HDTV with an HDMI input and built-in tuner for $380 from Best Buy (probably even cheaper online). This is only about $80 more than the corresponding non-HDTV.
There is one thing you're neglecting, however. The cheaper console does not necessarily win. It's content that's the ultimate arbiter of the winner. Unlike the previous shift, from Nintendo to Sony during the N64 versus PS1 contest, you're not seeing a mass defection of content providers away from the PS3 to the XBox 360. Moreover, I'd argue that much of the 360's potential head start has been squandered by an underpowered library. It's not unusual to see a crappy set of launch titles on a console, but with the 360, it won't be until this summer (6 months after the console's launch), that games start coming out for the 360 that are actuallly worth having. If Sony has a decent launch lineup, this advantage of the 360 could be mitigated.
Now, Sony does certainly have the ability to muck up the PS3, but its certainly not decided. Remember that this game is still Sony's to lose. The installed base of PS2s is more than double that of the Gamecube, XBox, and 360 combined. Over the next two years, the console with the largest installed base, and the one generating a substantial portion of the revenue in the industry, will still be the PS2. This is a decisive advantage for Sony, one that isn't going to be overturned lightly.
How is it any more "crappy" than the low-end XBox 360? The XBox 360 core system doesn't even have a hard drive! At least the low-end PS3 isn't missing a critical gaming component. What its missing are legitimate extras, like extra drive space, a remote, etc.
Games aren't going to require more than 20GB of HDD space. That's there if you want to store movies, music, etc, on your hard drive. Games *will*, however, require a hard drive, which makes the XBox 360 core system truely crappy.
Here's my thinking.
I've owned the past 2 Nintendo flops. Both the N64 and the GC were hailed as "innovative" and "fun", with "great 1st party games". Both had a painfully sparse game library. Unless you're the sort of lapdog that likes every game Nintendo spits out, owning the N64 or GC was a matter of short gaming sessions punctuated with long waits for the next remotely interesting game. I soldiered through both systems for a year before wising up, selling them, and getting a PS1/PS2 (respectively).
Most of my friends who played games did the same thing. In fact, pretty much the only person I know who still plays his GC is an arcade/classic gamer nut, who doesn't feel stupid playing DDR and still plays old SNES games. These people are in the decided minority of gamers. If the Wii is designed to appeal to them, it'll fail.
There is a reason Nintendo lost their enormous SNES-era lead to Sony and even Microsoft. Their game libraries, though they contain a few really innovative and excellent titles here and there, are otherwise sparse and uninteresting. First-party Nintendo titles cannot be the sole driver of a gaming library! Nintendo simply can't release Zelda games fast enough. Owning a Nintendo system is like being in a theater that only plays movies from one studio, and fills in the rest of the time with either Indie flicks that nobody cares about, or movies on DVD after they've gone out of the other theaters. Nintendo has given no indication that the Wii will be any different. I seriously think they are in for a major fall.
I don't understand how the lower-end PS3 is the "crappy" one? It's got everything the "premium" 360 does, except the wireless controllers (which suck, btw, batteries are ass). Sure, it's not as good as the high-end PS3, but relative to the competition, it's damn good.
I've never seen an external iSight. I wouldn't be surprised if it had better quality, since it has a fairly large lens, etc. However, the iSight in my new iMac Core Duo is quite good for a webcam, better than the Orbit MP (actually 2) I have. The Orbit MPs are known for having pretty good quality, as far as webcams go.
That's just a fancy version of "the word on the street".
No, consumer reports is a based on a statistically representative survey. Two different things.
you can't use their reputation as evidence that this is a good product
I'm not using their reputation to say this is a good product. I'm saying its a product from a premium brand (which Apple is). Products from premium brands carry a price premium in the market. That doesn't mean that such products can't be a good value within their market segment.
it's a typical laptop for a higher than comparable price.
Higher than comparable to what? Where else can you get a Core Duo laptop from a premium brand for $1099? Show me that Vaio or that ThinkPad. All the comparisons I've seen put the Apple laptop at more or less the price category of HP and Dell (slightly higher price, slightly more features, better ergonomics). That's like Lexus putting out a car competing in the same price category as Honda. Sure, a Lexus is basically a Toyota, but from an economic standpoint, the label carries real tangible value, and in this case, Apple is giving you a discount on it.
According to this article (referenced by BluRaySucks.com), 3m people have non-digital capable HDTVs. That means the other 12m people will have digital compatible HDTVs. Given that almost all HDTVs sold recently do have digital inputs, the concern about non-digital HDTVs is marginal at best.
On top of that, 4 of 5 movie studios have said they will not use ICT for their initial release. Yes, this leaves those 3m people at the whim of the studios, but let's face reality. The realities of the market will not allow Hollywood to put ICT back in if they leave it out at first.
Um, lot's of people own HDTVs. We have one at our house, and my roommate has one in our dorm. I've got an HD-capable LCD, with components inputs, on my desk.
There are about 100m households in the US. The projects suggest that about 15m should have an HDTV by now (up from 12m at the end of 2004). The projections for market pentration vary from 30m by 2008 up to 65m by 2010.
So by the time this comes out at the end of this year, 15% or more of households will have HDTV, and over the course of its lifetime, that'll grow to 50%+.
HDTV is definitely a safe bet for Sony.
Apple's iBook line has been relatively trouble-free since the 800 MHz G4s were phased out.
Of course, you could just listen to the people who have problems with their machine. That doesn't mean they're a representative sample. I had to have the LCD on my Inspiron 8200 replaced twice because entire regions of the display died. That doesn't mean I'll assume every Dell machine will have such problems.
I've bought five iPods for various friends and family. Not a single one has ever had a problem, though "everybody knows" iPod batteries crap out after a year! Simply put: the word on the street isn't necessarily a reliable indicator of reality. Apple's got a ridiculously high customer satisfaction rating from consumer reports. I'd take that as much more evidence of their reputation than random forum posts.
The point is that you haven't shown that "there are PC models with equivalent functionality out there selling for less." You've offered two competing laptops which differ moderately in price, features, and the reputation of their brand name (the 3000 you pointed to isn't a Thinkpad!).
If you're going to trot out the "PC models with equivalent functionality out there selling for less", at least try and do an apples-to-apples comparison. Don't completely ignore the software advantages of the Mac (ease of use, lack of spyware/viruses, eye-candy, etc), and the features of the Macbook. I'm seeing some really ridiculous statements on this thread. Like "Compensate for the built-in iSight with a $25 USB camera". The quality of the built-in iSight is *very* good. It definitely beats the $100+ Quickcam Orbit MP I've got lying around here. You should add $100 to the price of all the competing notebooks to compensate for the iSight. The rigidity of the Macbook case is a big deal. As someone who has carried around a flimsy Dell laptop for years, I can tell you that a good solid case is worth a lot more to me than $100. The weight and slimness do matter. 1.5" versus 1.08" (for the Acer you pointed to) is a difference you'll notice when trying to cram our laptop bag full of all the documents you carry with you. That convenience is worth something.
So if you want to be able to criticize the Macbook's value, do it legitimately. Compare the Macbook to a laptop from a top-tier company, with a similar screen size, similar thickness and weight, and similar features. An equivalent Vaio SZ 13.3" runs $1660. It's almost identical feature-for feature, but a pound lighter (due to the use of magnesium versus polycarbonate). An equivalent Dell E1405 has a bigger screen at a similar weight (5.3lb), and costs $1040 similarly specced (no video camera, though). That's Dell --- a manufacturer widely regarded as selling very affordable machines! An equivalentlly specced (complete with webcam), and sized (14.1" LCD, 5.37 lb) HP DV1000t costs $1150 after $50 MIR. A ThinkPad T60 has a slower processor, dedicated X1300 graphics, but starts at $1500.
Look at the vendors Apple is competing with. Relative to them, Apple is selling a product that has the reputation of Thinkpads and VAIOs, in a price range right around that of Dell and HP...
Um, how do you get $800? On Dell's online store, the base $800 model is a 1.66 GHz. When you add:
The 1.83 GHz processor ($100)
The remote ($30)
The DVD burner ($60)
The bluetooth card ($50)
The total comes to $1037. With Apple's educational discount (remember, the Dell in question is heavily discounted), the price difference is negligable.
Now, you could niggle about the features here and there, but I don't think any of the above are gratuitous. The processor upgrade is simply to even the comparison. The remote is something I can see getting used in a dorm situation where the laptop serves triple duty as a music player hooked up to speakers or a media server hooked up to a TV (I know in college I used my laptop to do both). Bluetooth is a fairly recent amenity, but remember that Bluetooth devices are everywhere these days, from $50 cell phones to $200 PDAs.
I like big screens (I've got a 24" LCD on my desk), but I've come t the conclusion that its pointless trying to have both features in the same laptop. When you're using the thing on the move, the bigger screen is a liability (I can't open my 15" LCD in coach if the buy behind me decides to recline). When you're using the thing on your desk, every laptop screen pales in comparison to a good desktop LCD (I've got a 24" on my desk). Therefore, screen size is basically a wash. Bigger laptop screens make the laptop less useful and more painful to carry around. Smaller screens are harder to work with, but at least you can work with them in cases where you would not be able to with a larger screen.
IIRC, Intel does sell EFI capable motherboards. In any case, EFI is an open standard intended for PCs. Apple is just early with their use of it. That's distinct from "proprietory" hardware like ADB, for example.
It's also a full 1/3 thicker (1.5" versus 1.08"), heavier, has a slower processor, no DVD burner, and no built-in video camera. On the upside, it's got 20GB more hard drive space and a bigger screen. That seems entirely reasonable tradeoff for the $100 price delta.
Let's face it. At $1100, the new MacBook is an excellent value. It's a premium laptop from a premium manufacturer, it's got a great software suite courtesy of OS X and the iApps, its reasonably small and reasonably light, and its specs are just about in-line with other laptops in its price class. It's not going to convince hardcore Windows users who think OS X is a liability, not an advantage. However, for those people who actually want to use a Mac, it is a good machine at a very reasonable price.
The Acer has a bigger screen and more memory, but it also has a slower processor, and is a lot bigger and heavier (in the laptop world, making things small costs money). And its only $100 cheaper in the end. I'd say Apple did a hell of a job pricing the new iBooks, especially considering they're competing with IBM and Sony, not lower-tier manufacturers like Acer.