The boys and girls who work in Cupertino have released some wonderful gadgets over the years. At the same time, there are far too many people out there who blindly listen to Steve and buy Apple products without considering some suitable alternatives. Just as you would probably spend a good deal of time shopping around for a new car or even a new home, it pays to do some background research before splurging on a new gadget or gizmo too. It’s your money and you probably want to make sure that it’s well spent. Let’s have a good look at some of the best alternatives to Apple products, or in some cases, the best alternatives to products that Apple “reinvented”.
Apple iPad vs. HP Slate
The HP Slate (with Windows 7 Home Premium) looks like it could be a very competitive alternative to the iPad. The display is a little smaller, at 8.9-inches, but it’ll support pens and digitizers. You get bumped up to an Intel Z530 1.6GHz processor (vs. 1GHz Apple A4) and the Slate gets several features that the iPad does not: webcam, card reader, USB, HDMI, and 1080p video support. Although preliminary hands on tests on early hardware haven’t been exactly stellar, the product is still a little ways from release and much can change in that time frame.
Looking ahead to the future, there will be even more tablets to consider. There are rumors swirling around the Internet that Google is working on its own Android-based tablet to compete against the iPad. This is in addition to third-party manufacturers making Android tablets too. Since Android has already been used for netbooks and smartbooks, this could be a perfect fit and we’ll no doubt be seeing more products in a tablet like format when we hit COMPUTEX this June in Taipei.
Apple iPhone vs. Google Nexus One
While I’m still partial to my QWERTY-packing Nokia smartphone, many others prefer a full touchscreen interface. I can appreciate that, but that doesn’t mean that you are restricted to the iPhone alone. You can consider something like the HTC Hero or Samsung Omnia II, but one of the best Apple alternatives is the Google Nexus One.
The hardware is manufactured by HTC and the Nexus One comes with a very impressive AMOLED capacitive touchscreen display. The 480 x 800 pixel resolution on the 3.7-inch screen bests the iPhone in both regards, while maintaining appealing features like the accelerometer, proximity sensor, and 3G connectivity. Compared to the iPhone 3GS, the Google Nexus One boasts double the RAM, a microSD expansion slot, a higher resolution (5MP) camera, similar battery life, and a faster processor (1GHz Snapdragon vs. 600MHz ARM Cortex A8).
You don’t get the App Store, but you do get the Android Market which is growing in size and attracting some major support, particularly from disgruntled iPhone app developers. All that Google integration in the Nexus One is pretty great too. Last but not least, Steve Jobs says you get a bunch of porn with Android. However, a certain native application on the iPhone called Safari provides that too, and in abundance.
Apple iPod Touch vs. Microsoft Zune HD
Many people have turned to using their smartphones as media players, but there’s still a very viable market for standalone MP3 and video players too. Microsoft has come a long way since the original Zune and the Zune HD is a very viable alternative to the iPod touch. First off, you get a great OLED display, 720p video output via HDMI, integrated Wi-Fi with web browsing, and access to the Zune Marketplace. The Zune also has something called Zune Pass which allows you to have all you can eat music for a single low price every month. Something that Apple has yet to adopt with its music distribution model.
Though, Zune apps may not be quite as numerous or robust as their iPod counterparts, you can still do everything from Facebook to weather on the Zune HD.
Apple TV vs. Xbox 360 Media Player
Want to enjoy a wide variety of multimedia content in your home theater room? Want to take advantage of those great speakers and that glorious big screen HDTV? Apple TV does a good job of bringing your media files to your living room, but there are alternatives. Interestingly, one of the better options just happens to be the Xbox 360. The built-in media player can draw from local storage (e.g., in the form of a flash drive), as well as over your home network. Better still, you can draw from the Zune Marketplace or stream from Netflix.
If you’d prefer something smaller and simpler, the Western Digital WD TV Live HD Media Player can be quite suitable too. It’ll play just about any video file and it can even stream content from YouTube.
MacBook (Pro) vs. Asus UL30Jt
This suggestion may be met with the greatest resistance. I agree that Mac OS X is a very good operating system, but Microsoft has done a very good job with Windows 7 too. The new generation of PCs, both desktop and notebook, should be considered alongside the increasingly ubiquitous MacBook and MacBook Pro.
One of the better offerings I saw at the Consumer Electronics Show in January was the Asus UL30Jt. This 13.3-inch laptop gives you the same kind of weight and dimensions as the 13-inch MacBook, so portability is not an issue. It can be spec’d up with an Intel Core i7 processor, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, up to 640GB hard drive (7200rpm), and up to 12 hours of battery life. A cool feature contained in the UL30Jt, along with some other Asus notebooks, is the ability to switch between discrete and integrated graphics on the fly. For video editing and gaming, you jump up to the NVIDIA GeForce 310M 1GB graphics card. For casual web surfing, you dial down to the Intel GMA HD. This is similar to how the current MacBook Pros switch from different nVidia graphics chips depending on load.
Apple iMac vs. HP TouchSmart 600t
Maybe you don’t need the portability of a MacBook. I’ve played with the Asus Eee Top all-in-one PC in the past, but it was too netbook-like in performance. For a “real” desktop PC, you need some more powerful components. Instead of jumping into the iMac arena, you might want to consider something from the HP TouchSmart range.
For about $1000, you can get the basic HP TouchSmart 600t with a 23-inch full HD 1080p touchscreen display, Windows 7, Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB DDR3-1066 RAM, 320GB HDD, NVIDIA graphics, Bluetooth, webcam, card reader, wireless keyboard, and wireless mouse. If you want to save more money, you can go with the TouchSmart 300z all-in-one desktop instead. It’s about $200 less and it gets its power from an AMD Athlon dual-core processor. For both options, you can upgrade to quad core processors too; all for substantially less than a similarly equipped iMac.
You Always Have an Options Other Than Apple
No matter what I say, someone is going to say I’m anti-Apple. I’m not. In fact, if it wasn’t for Apple, this article wouldn’t be written. All I’m saying is that you lay off the Cupertino-flavored Kool-Aid and take a moment to consider some great Apple alternatives. From smartphones to laptops, media players to desktops, other companies have perfectly viable products that can take the place of the offerings from Steve Jobs. A lot of them cost less, have equal or better quality, and might even make more sense to you financially. You just have to look and keep an open mind.
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