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Kisner, Thomas wrote:
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<pre wrap="">$100 for windows/$100 for Mac OS X....I don't think that explains it.
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<pre wrap="">In the case of OSX it is Apple paying itself, with a PC it is Microsoft
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<pre wrap="">charging a manufacturer.
A very different set of circumstances.
Dare I say it, you are comparing apples and rotten tomatoes.
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I don't want to argue about this but...but it's sorta fixed cost verses
a variable cost issue.
I don't know what Microsoft is charging Acer for an OEM copy of Windows,
but it's something to the bottom line of every box that they must add on
to the price. Apple has R&D into OSX, but how much spread across how
ever many units they ship?
I think the applicable cost here is the money they spent stripping down
OSX (something they already own) and customizing it for AppleTV. It may
be a small team of people, or maybe one guy? Let go on the very high
end and say they have spent $1 million dollars on salaries for a team
that did nothing but customize OSX for AppleTV. So, if they sell 1
million of them, the fixed cost per unit is 1 dollar. If they sell 2
million of them it's .50 per unit. They just need to have enough margin
in each one they sell to cover the cost plus some profit.
Compare that to Acer. Lets say they got a sweet deal from Microsoft and
they are only paying $50 per copy of Windows. That's $50 variable they
have to add on to every box just to break even. You add a little bit of
margin to that...
Hardware in the Acer box is probably more expensive, but much of the
$100 cost difference has got to be directly attributable to Windows,
which is why I made that comment.
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Not to mention the rumors that Apple is selling them at a loss to get
their boxes on people's tvs first.<br>
<br>
Jon<br>
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