Today I got all excited about Inversion of Control after listening to a a .NET Rocks Podcast by James Kovacs on IoC. Trouble is, I was tired as heel, so here are the links that I did not get around to reading (weekend task I suspect)
I stumbled across this today while I was trying to figure out who the better carrier/plan is.
http://www.mobchoice.com.au/compare-cap-plans-spreadsheet
Give it a go - you might be very surprised. I also had a look at the forums of Whirlpool.net and found them extremely helpful.
Just goes to show: The mobile phone market is so confusing it takes a hell of a lot of research to make sure that you are not being ripped off.
Macs are cool. They look cool. They ooze cool. But they also ooze a price tag that is so not cool.
Take for example my Dell XPS 1530. I bought this off of the Dell site 4 months ago. I configured it as follows:
Intel Core 2 Duo T9300
4GB 667 RAM
320GB HDD
3 Years on site warranty
Vista Ultimate
DVD Burner/Reader
The price? AUD$2100.00. Delivered. With a 24inch high def monitor it was $AUD2600.00
It looks ok. It does the job very well. Vista is awesome, and I have come to rely on a lot of it's features/ I leave UAC on - because it has saved me from installing a cruddy app. It works. It takes some getting used to, but it does work.
I would like a Mac for the coolness factor. Everyone seems to be buying them, and I am the kind of person that struggles being not being cool (which is strange considering that I have never ever been cool). So I go the store, and configure a similar Macbook Pro.
Intel Core 2 Duo T9300
4 GB 667 RAM
200 GB HDD
Apple Care
Max OS X
DVD Burner/Reader
The price? Well, try AUD$4697.00. With a 23inch High Def Monitor it is AUD$6096.99. So I am paying a premium for coolness. There is nothing in the OS that is better (apart from the perception that Windows is just pure evil, and that Vista is so so crappy which I totally disagree with). As well, I am buying into a limited selecting of hardware, I am beholden to apple for my products (this does have it's benefits, but we are buying into a closed market where Apple sets the price).
As well as this, I would then be migrating all my data from a Windows machine to an Apple.
Now I am sure that I am going to get comments along the lines of "well, you are doing it wrong, man. You can get it cheaper by doing this or that". Which is fine, if you are part of the clique. But what if you are a consumer? My view is that people are being ripped off enormously in the name of cool.
But then again, hasn't it always been that way? The cool kids always pay more for cool stuff.
So I admit that Windows is no longer "cool". It has become a commodity. Cool kids don't like commodities.
Let the flames begin. :)