New data reinforce the notion that Apple Macintoshes cost significantly more than comparable Windows machines. It's harder to argue now that hardware from Apple costs about the same as comparable Windows computers, as Joe Wilcox and others have said in the past, writes Wilcox in his "Apple Watch" blog.
I never much bought that argument, anyway. We have Macs and Windows PCs in our home, and my experience is that the Mac is consistently more costly. It's a great product—a premium product, at a premium price.
Meanwhile, Wilcox reports that it isn't prices that have widened the gap, according to NPD data. It's that Windows sellers like Dell now pack much better hardware into their machines. Macs haven't kept up, particularly in recent months.
Rumors abound about price cuts coming from Apple, which suggested its margins would fall in coming quarters. And others, like Don Reisinger in his Digital Home blog, are calling on Apple to grab market share while Windows Vista struggles.
But I'd be surprised if Apple got aggressive about price cuts. I think the company is happy in the premium end of the PC market, where people pay more for style and simplicity.
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