The Cynic Says……

TechDirt reports that apple’s share price at the close of trading today unintentionally contained a geek joke. Apple’s share prices closed @ $80.86 today on the day they announced they were releasing the first Intel-based laptop and iMac. The stock price did actually go up to $81.89 in after-hours trading so it’s no longer at $80.86 but that’s still a rather interesting stroke of irony to have stock prices end at that specific price. Now, for those of you non-geeks out there that don’t understand the historical significance of “8086″, it’s basically the Intel chip that started it all and gave rise to the x86 architecture most of us use today. So yeah, strangely ironic that it happens on the same day Apple releases their first Intel-based computers. Both the new MacBook Pro and the iMac are based on Intel’s new dual core “CoreDuo” CPU’s. Both of them look really nice but they’re still a bit higher-priced than an equivalently equipped PC. Still, the iMac looks to be just about perfect for the average home user who just uses their PC to surf the web, chat, listen to music, watch movies, burn CD’s & DVD’s and edit pictures. I wouldn’t mind having one as a second PC, actually. They’re not so hot for gaming but the average user doesn’t care about insane 3D graphics performance. They want it to do what they need it to do with a minimum of hassle…. That’s something that Apple and OSX have in spades. The 17″ iMac will set you back $1300 and includes a dual core 1.83Ghz CPU, 512MB DDR2 SDRAM (upgradeable to 2GB), 160GB serial ATA hard drive, ATI Radeon X1600 graphics card, two firewire, three USB 2.0, GB ethernet, 802.11g wifi, Bluetooth 2.0+EDR, built-in iSight camera, speakers, flat panel display… lots of stuff. Granted, it’s a bit more expensive than a similar PC, it’s still a nice piece of equipment and takes up a WHOLE lot less space. Not a bad investment for the average user if you ask me.