I found this article over at Apple Matters via digg. This is something I’ve known deep down but never really gave it much thought. The article pretty much demonstrates that although Mac’s are pricey (not so much anymore) at first, their prolonged life and distinct hardware kept their resale values high. Even to this day, 3 years after purchasing my Powerbook, I can still get a solid $1400 CDN on eBay for my initial $3200 laptop (with free 20GB iPod).

One thing to note is that the time period between 2004 and 2005.5, when Apple was stuck with the G4 processor for longer than they should have been, the price difference between the 1.5ghz and 1.67ghz Powerbook (the only real change in those years) is negligible.

The first way is to look at these prices and assume that because Apple faces no hardware competition, prices stay artificially high. And I think this is a fair way to view the current market for used Apple products. However, the second approach is to realize that Apple’s hardware stays relevant longer than the equivalent in the PC world. With the announcement of Vista, all the reviews I have seen recommend either a new (or fairly recent) computer if you want to run the new Windows OS. How many Mac users bought a new machine to run Tiger? Quite a few, no doubt, but it should be noted that I ran Tiger just fine on a six-year-old 667Mhz laptop. Go get a six-year-old Dell and let me know how well it runs Vista.

I predict that this won’t be the case anymore with the Intel Mac’s as they are beginning to swap hardware earlier than before due to competition from the Intel-based Windooz market.