I was having a nice conversation with my brother the other day and we were discussing upgrading the server at my house to a new configuration. Given that both of us are no hardware geeks, we don’t follow the computer hardware progress particularly close. So just to deepen our knowledge in the subject matter, we decided to see how high can an average person go these days in terms a desktop computer. The satisfy the requirement of an “average person”, we settled to compare the websites of the two industry sharks out there such as Apple with their Mac Pro  and Dell with their Precision. While, the post title speaks for itself, enjoy our finding below.

We first started with Dell. The top configuration that can be build with Precision is shown below:

Two Quad Core Intel® Xeon® Processors E5460 (3.16GHz,2X6M L2,1333)

32GB, DDR2 SDRAM FBD Memory, 667MHz, ECC (8 DIMMS)

2 Hard Drives: 1TB SATA 3.0Gb/s,7200 RPM Hard Drive with 16MB DataBurst Cache™

512MB PCIe x16 nVidia Quadro FX1700, Dual Monitor DVI Capable

16XDVD AND 16XDVD+/-RW, w/ Cyberlink PowerDVD™ and Roxio Creator™

2 Displays: UltraSharp 3007WFP-HC 30-inch Widescreen Flat Panel LCD 

Grand Total: $12,512.00 + TAX

Moving on two Apple. The top configuration of Mac Pro is shown below.

Two 3.2GHz Quad Core Intel® Xeon® Processors (8-core)

32GB SDRAM Memory (8 DIMMS)

Mac Pro RAID Card

4 Hard Drives:  1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s

NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 1.5GB

Two 16x SuperDrives

2 Displays: Apple Cinema HD Display (30″ flat panel)

Total: $23,347.00 + TAX

First reaction: WTF????

While, it’s imperative to note that the top configuration of the Mac Pro is noticeably superior to the that of the Precision, the additional hardware in no way can account for the overwhelming price difference. Yes, the 1.5GB NVIDIA Quadro alone is around 2 grand more expensive than 512 MB one. But holly shit, the Apple monster is almost twice as expensive as Dell‘s most precious creation. Do you really want your computer to cost as much as your car? Suit yourselves.