Totally agree.
Anyone that buys into the Apple hardware or software or other products ( iPhone, iCrap etc. ) needs to do some research first.
You can get much better price / performance ratio out of non-Apple parts !
I am not one to pay for shiny plastic or for the "fashion" or brand etc.
OS-X is actually a good reason to pay Apples premiums for a lot of people.
I use linux myself, but I can acknowledge its not for everyone. OS-X is actually pretty decent and the windows headaches it avoids alone would be worth the premium to me if I didnt have linux as an option. Add to that some pretty decent hardware and a hard/software stack that actually works together rather than fight each other, and one doesnt have to be crazy to buy one.
Likewise, ipad is still the best tablet out there IMO, mostly because of iOS. Android is catching up, but not quite there yet for big screens.
RIM Playbook and HP touchpad could have been contenders if given time and a software ecosystem. I particularly like the playbook I ahmm.. played with. There is like no software for it, but Ive never seen a better GUI in my life.
iphones vs the competition is something else. Id say Android has become the superior option by now, and with a million implementations to chose from, iphone seems like a waste of money. A thing of the past, much like ipods.
