High-End Consumer Desktop: Dell Dimension 8400 vs. Apple G5 iMac
Updated 5/3/05 with release of updated G5 iMacs. Equivalent Dell was also re-priced.  
| Features | Apple | Dell | Inequalities (any worth noting) |
| Processor | 2.0 GHz G5 | Pentium 4 3.2 GHz |   |
| Operating System | Mac OS X 10.4 | Windows XP Professional |   |
| RAM | 512MB 400Mhz (1 DIMM) | 1 GB 400Mhz (2 DIMMS) | At crucial.com, you can buy 512MB RAM for the iMac for about $50, but you don't really need 1GB. The Dell had a free upgrade to 1GB as a special today. |
| Monitor | Built-in 17" Digital Flat Panel | Dell 17" Ultrasharp Digital Flat Panel | Note: The Dell came by default with a noticeably inferior analog flat panel monitor. We upgraded to ensure accurate comparison. |
| Speakers | Built-in stereo speakers | Dell A215 stereo speakers |   |
| Graphics | ATI Radeon 9600 128MB | ATI Radeon X300 128MB |   |
| Hard Drive | 160GB Serial ATA, 7200 RPM | 160GB Serial ATA, 7200 RPM | Note: 160GB is the standard amount for new iMacs. At Dell, the upgrade from 80GB was one of the day's "specials." |
| Mouse | USB Optical Mouse | USB Optical Mouse |   |
| Printer | None | Dell 720 Color | This is Dell's bottom-of-the-line printer and costs $44 separately. But you have to spend $20 on a USB cable if you want to be able to connect it to your new computer. |
| Optical Drive | 8X Superdrive (DVD-R/CD-RW) | 16X Superdrive (DVD-R/CD-RW) | Dell doesn't use the term "Superdrive." This was the only "Superdrive" in a 1-drive configuration offered by Dell. |
| Networking | 802.11 b/g card Bluetooth 2.0+EDR Gigabit Ethernet | 802.11 b/g USB adapter Gigabit Ethernet | Note: Dell doesn't offer Bluetooth as an option for short-range wireless, and to get 802.11 wireless, you need to use one of your USB ports. A Bluetooth USB adapter costs about $50 at Dell, plus it takes up another of your USB ports. |
| Ports | Optical audio in/out, 2 Firewire 400 ports 3 USB 2.0 ports 2 USB 1.1 ports VGA video out S-video and composite video | Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS 1 Firewire 400 port 8 USB 2.0 ports DVI/VGA/S-video out | The Dell has a few more ports, though to match the built-in wireless networking options on the G5, you have to use two of them. |
| Expansion options | No internal expansion.
However, with this model, customers can easily upgrade the following internal components themselves: 
|
2 internal hard drive bays 2 optical drive bays 3 100 MHz PCI-X slots | Dell customers can add more hardware items to the inside of their computer than Apple customers can. However, except for the video card, Apple users can achieve the same upgrades by adding on external devices. |
| Support option | 1-year limited warranty | 1-year limited warranty |   |
| Software options | The iMac comes with the following free software that doesn't have equivalents in Windows XP: 
|
The following software options Dell provided during checkout were selected to achieve rough parity in software: 
|
Even with these add-ons, the Dell as configured still lacks the following
software functionality that comes with the Apple system. The retail
cost of this software is not huge, but it's probably $200 or so. Also,
note that the software cost of the Dell increases because of the need
to purchase antivirus subscription services. 
|
| Total Cost | $1,499** | $1,762** |   |
| *Added this software to the Dell, since they were reasonably priced and covered more of the iMac's built-in functionality. **In the original shootout, the IMac was $1,653, and the Dell $1,780. The May 3 iMac revision added to the previous model: Standard 512MB RAM, standard built-in wireles and bluetooth, standard gigabit ethernet, standard 160GB hard drive, and increase in processor to 2.0GHz G5... not to mention the upgrade to Mac OS 10.4 (Tiger). The Dell model was more or less unchanged, with the addition of a free cheapo color printer this time around. | |||
