Quote Originally Posted by h0bbes View Post
I remember taking a better look at the macbook battery life and found laptops of similar if not better hardware, with better energy consumption. The business models of both Dell and HP are not bad at all when it comes to build quality but they can be a bit more pricey than the macs but you get pretty good service. In my opinion, the Dell studio XPS 16 was better value for money than its rival macbook pro 15 (i could set it up with a quad core, + SSD + better screen and it would be cheaper than the mac), even though it has a heating issue (the macbook pro 15 does as well from what i remember). You can also look at the non mainstream brands such as Sager, which build quite good gaming laptops from what i know.
trust me; i have both my E6410 (newest dell business offering) and a 13" MB PRO at hand and if you factor in weight; build quality and battery life nothing comes close to a macbook

while the XPS16 is a great notebook its build quality is a complete joke compared to the macbooks; display hinges and display flex are horrible; batterylife completely sucks witht he non-stand out battery; let alone that it's heavier than a 17" MBP

while there are many great non-apple notebooks (my E6410 is one of them) there is a reason why macbooks cost more: they offer more than other notebooks in terms of weight/battery/performance (ALL 3 factors together; sure there are alot of PC notebooks with higher performance; good build quality (still 2 notches below apple) and great displays (dell precision M6700 is one of them) but their weight and battery life are subpar and suck compared to the macbooks; additionally these notebooks are even more expensive than Apple parts

And don't start to compare sub 1000$ notebooks from acer; asus; hp and so on to macbooks because their quality and reliabilitx is NOT acceptable (same goes to those glossy display lids; crappy loud fans; low battery life; cheap plastics; EXTREMELY sucky touchpads (nothing comes even remotely close to an apple touchpad)

there is a reason why alot of people buy macs; and in at least 30% of all cases it's not the design; it's the overall package...