Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!dalcs!aucs!paul
From: paul@aucs.UUCP (Paul Steele)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: The cost of A/ux and Mac pricing.
Message-ID: <874@aucs.UUCP>
Date: 26 Feb 88 12:58:52 GMT
References: <11540137@hpsmtc1.HP.COM> <430018@hpcea.CE.HP.COM> <427@sering.cwi.nl> <645@aimt.UUCP>
Reply-To: paul@aucs.UUCP (Paul Steele)
Organization: School of Computer Science, Acadia Univ., Nova Scotia
Lines: 33

I haven't bothered to check what the price of AU/X is in Canada since
Apple Canada pricing is so out of line.  Apple's HD20SC, which AU/X
comes on, lists at $5295 Cdn.  Is this expensive?  Well, I just ordered
the Jasmine Direct Drive 80.  Its going to cost me $2000 Cdn by the
time all the shipping and duty and exchange is figured in.  I doubt that
Apple's 80 Meg disk is that much superior in quality to the Jasmine; I
wouldn't be surprised if its the exact same drive.  I don't know what
a reasonable mark up on hardware is, but Apple Canada's 400 to 500 percent
seems ludicrous. They obviously do not want to sell to anybody but business
organizations (who don't care about price) and educators (who get a nice 40%
discount).  Us people who have to buy at close to list price are out of luck.
Just consider these prices, for example (all Canadian $):

               PC Clone        IBM PS/2 Model 30         Mac SE
dual floppy     $1300                $3163               $4576
20 Meg disk     $1800                $4063               $6150

On the Model 30, the price difference between dual floppy and a single
floppy, 20 Meg hard disk configuration is $900.  On the SE, the difference
is $1574!  I know, I know, Apple has spent YEARS of R&D developing the
perfect microcomputer for the user.  And they have to get back all those
man years of research.  Unfortunately, no one can afford their perfect
computer.  Obviously, Apple doesn't care one bit about end-users.

I love the Mac, but I will continue to flame Apple until they acknowledge
their ridiculous pricing schemes and make the Mac affordable for the rest
of us.  I guess I'll be flaming for long time...


Paul H. Steele      USENET:   {uunet|watmath|utai|garfield}!dalcs!aucs!Paul
Acadia University   BITNET:   Paul@Acadia
Wolfville, NS       Internet: Paul%Acadia.BITNET@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
CANADA  B0P 1X0     (902) 542-2201x587