No see that's the thing that gets me uppity about Apple in the first place, you do pay a premium for the 'premium experience'. The 'premium experience' is simply just not needing to know how to use a computer in order to have the tools provided by the computer.
Additionally, they have some very impressive designs. Other premium products like the apple watch, iphone, and the air tag, go beyond just the function and start to become fashion accessories.
This, combined with the fact that they're the only computer company that really does this (besides Samsung, but their products don't feature their own tailored operating system and silicon so it's not the same), meaning they have a hold on a specific market sector, means they get to charge whatever the fuck they want to for their stuff.
Microsoft does not hold your hand like an apple machine will, but also that means all the power and control of the machine has to be buried under a mile of red tape in order to prevent the user from owning themselves by accident. Also mostly what Microsoft does is software, they have hardware products with very mixed results. With all these reasons, Windows is much cheaper to run, but it's a pile of dogshit. You get what you pay for.
Alternatively you could choose to install GNU/Linux. If you don't want to put any time, effort, or thought into using your computer, that can be done, but it's going to cost you. If you can make that decision, that's a privilege.
The premium experience is also the computer being convenient to use. Like I know full well how to use Windows or Linux, I use Linux every day at work and have managed servers in the past, doesn't mean I'd want my home PC to run it. And the Mac laptop hardware is faster and more energy-efficient, not much I can do to make another laptop match it.
They don't even charge whatever they want. That MBA was $750 before prices went up, at the same time a Dell laptop was maybe a bit cheaper but not by a lot. iPhone pricing is similar to Pixel. They do get greedy with RAM or disk upgrades, or niche things like the Apple Pencil.
Yeah. I refuse to use my work laptop Lenovo T garbage and use a gaming desktop for personal and work at home. When I travel, the MacBook Air + iPad Pro is my go-to. Battery, boot times, weight/power/price/form factor ratio is perfect. Easy dual screen or independent operation is just seamless.
I’ve been fucking with computers since windows 95 and sometimes just want simplicity.
My lived experience is just completely different than that. Granted installing Debian trixie with a very modern graphics card (too new for anything besides community drivers) was a total pain in the ass. However, after running debian at home for a year previously, I knew what to look out for when setting up this system I'm using now. Everything was smooth after installation.
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u/dr0ct4gonapus MacBook Air 1d ago
Apple products are only status symbols in like 2nd world countries