[macintologist]

*click*


Compare / contrast.

[Wiskedjak]

Because, component suppliers want to make sure the consumer knows their components are being used inside (Intel, AMD, etc). Why M$ insists on having a sticker there, I'm not sure since 99% of all new laptops sold have Windows installed ...

[Agasthya]

for money.

for ex: ati will pay lenovo a little $ to have their sticker on each machine. keeps prices down or some crap.

[Lateralus]

Usually the computer makers get a discount from the component/software suppliers for agreeing to put their stickers on the outside of the machine. And in the case of Intel, I hear it's a pretty large discount.

[Kerrigan]

Not to mention, people like stickers. Look at a typical car, it's bound to have little stickers all over it, demonstrating that the driver has been to the Outer Banks, owns a labrador, and that W is still the president.

[macintologist]

So why doesn't Apple sell a sticker-laden MacBook for a discounted price?

[Agasthya]

Originally Posted by macintologist

So why doesn't Apple sell a sticker-laden MacBook for a discounted price?

Doesn't work that way. Apple is reverse.

They would charge more since there is more substance to the computer now.

[harrisjamieh]

Originally Posted by Agasthya

Doesn't work that way. Apple is reverse.

They would charge more since there is more substance to the computer now.

Hehe.

No, in seriousness, Apple would never cover its products in stickers found on every other product in the industry. The majority of computer manufactures don't care about what their products look like (and if they do, I can't tell), but Apple does

[Judge_Fire]

Why? The stickers distract you from the crap design of the laptop enclosure.

Remove them and the utter horror of their bad looks eats your eyes away.

J

[Chuckit]

Yep, it's because PC manufacturers are about price at the expense of elegance while Apple is about elegance usually at the expense of price.

[galarneau]

The only stickers I ever saw on a Mac laptop where from the old PowerBook 5xx series (and also the 190 series, I think).

They had a little red sticker on them that said something like "Upgradable to PowerPC"

[Hal06]

Much like good print/web design versus bad one. White space is your friend.

[angelmb]

The "iPod packaging by Microsoft" video was SO TRUE.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeXAc...crosoft%20ipod

[galarneau]

That video is frickin' brilliant.

[Chuckit]

Hee, I never saw that iPod packaging video. That's hilarious.

[Kerrigan]

The funny part is that the video was created by Microsoft as a joke for their marketing team.

[Love Calm Quiet]

The stickers are used to hold the laptop together. It's an economy move: that's why PCs are "cheaper"... so to speak.

[OreoCookie]

Funny thing is most people will keep the stickers on

[krillbee]

Originally Posted by Chuckit

Yep, it's because PC manufacturers are about price at the expense of elegance while Apple is about elegance usually at the expense of price.

the funny thing though about a sticker is that they can just be removed

I wonder how much of a discount apple is missing out on?

Oh well, you guys are right, apple will never even think about including stickers on some of them for a discount. That would make intel look bad (for being greedy), plus it would make apple and their design look bad, the sticker would be like an annoying stain on a white dress.

And apple wouldnt want to do anything to make themselves resemble a PC.

[davesimondotcom]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie

Funny thing is most people will keep the stickers on

Yep. I have been to many friends/relatives houses where they have a PC (that gathers dust because they bought it cheap and it doesn't work right) and they always have those stickers with all of the specs for the computer still stuck to it.

My father-in-law always picks on me about my love of Apple. Telling me they are going out of business or that Windows is better, etc.

So one time I asked him why he still had the sticker on his computer that had all the specs. His answer "So that when I call technical support, I can just read those numbers do them. Don't you do that?"

To which I replied, "Nope. I don't need technical support. I bought a Mac."

[kcmac]

I used to work at a place that actually reprimanded a bunch of us for defacing our laptops...by removing these stickers.

The funny part was, after this nearly everyone did the same thing. It was a beautiful thing. As mentioned above however, we revealed some ugly a$$ design...or lack thereof.

[Ulrich Kinbote]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie

Funny thing is most people will keep the stickers on

Because it's really, really hard trying to get them off.

Before I switched to Mac, I had a Toshiba Satellite with a bunch of stickers. I went to work on one. I could only peel of the glossy cover. The sticky base did not dissolve in water. Or solvent. I Ended up with a little patch of solvent-burnt, scratched up plastic and still there was a thin layer of glue and traces of sticker-paper left behind. In the end, I had to cover it... with another sticker

Or maybe I was just using the wrong kind of solvent.

Edit: I should add, the computer was second-hand, and pretty old, so maybe the stickers had "petrified".

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom

My father-in-law always picks on me about my love of Apple. Telling me they are going out of business or that Windows is better, etc.

So one time I asked him why he still had the sticker on his computer that had all the specs. His answer "So that when I call technical support, I can just read those numbers do them. Don't you do that?"

To which I replied, "Nope. I don't need technical support. I bought a Mac."

My father always leaves those on too.

You know, for months, he (and his parents, too) was pushing me to get a PC notebook rather than a PowerBook. Of course, I got the PowerBook anyway. Since that time, he has gone through three cheap, stickerful PC laptops, all of them either broken or unsatisfactory in some way. So he was looking at my PowerBook the other day, amazed that it hasn't burst into flames, and he goes, "Wow, you've taken care of that computer well." I just answered, "I haven't really needed to. It's a Mac."

[Salty]

I tried peeling off a view sonic sticker at a friend's house... it only half tore off and I couldn't get the rest off... his dad got minorly mad at me for it...

[kcmac]

Originally Posted by Ulrich Kinbote

Because it's really, really hard trying to get them off.

Before I switched to Mac, I had a Toshiba Satellite with a bunch of stickers. I went to work on one. I could only peel of the glossy cover. The sticky base did not dissolve in water. Or solvent. I Ended up with a little patch of solvent-burnt, scratched up plastic and still there was a thin layer of glue and traces of sticker-paper left behind. In the end, I had to cover it... with another sticker

Or maybe I was just using the wrong kind of solvent.

Edit: I should add, the computer was second-hand, and pretty old, so maybe the stickers had "petrified".

I am trying to remember the goo we used to remove the stickers without hurting the surface of the laptops. It did a pretty good job. Without it, they are on for life.

[mduell]

Because the OEM gets branding discounts from the suppliers... recently I saw an article that Dell/HP/etc were complaining because applying the stickers adds 30 seconds to the ODM's 4 minute build time.

[ghporter]

That 30 seconds is a lot! That's a 12.5% increase in build time.

And in many cases they can't automate all of the label placement (which seems to work out properly with a 30 second time expended), so that means someone who will eventually do the job wrong.

You gotta wonder whether these branding discounts help anyone... The only labels I'm interested in having on a laptop are the ones that show compliance with various communications agencies requirements so I don't get in trouble using the thing wherever I go.

[davesimondotcom]

Originally Posted by Chuckit

amazed that it hasn't burst into flames

I know you didn't mean this literally, but remember when PowerBooks COULD burst into flames?

[residentEvil]

the laptop/desktop stickers don't bother me...

what bother's me is the green lable/energy star stickers people leave on their electronics...like on their $5000+ brand new tvs. ass hats. or the smaller one on their dvd drive door.

take

them

off!

[powerbook867]

It makes the machine much faster...sorta like the cars I see with stickers all over them...

Maybe those guys work for the computer manufacturers?

[Pao|o]

All those stickers translate to cheaper parts for the laptop's PC makers. Intel gives financial incentives for their customers to put stickers that says their PC has VIIV or Centrino or Core. It also improves name recall. Like you'd tend to go Intel if you keep seeing it on PCs you'ved used. You'd specify Pentium even if you're buying an Athlon.

[chris v]

There's no accounting for taste. I can't count the number of PC laptops I've seen in the last couple of years that people had pasted even more stickers on. Radio stations, fave bands, etc. I've seen some with the lids totally covered. The fact that a Mac user would almost never do such a thing says something about the sense of asthetics of Mac users in general, and the quality looks of Apple kit.

[Chuckit]

If I had some people's laptops, I want to hide them under stickers as well.

[FireWire]

Originally Posted by Inside Man

Much like good print/web design versus bad one. White space is your friend.

But, empty space doesn't make the thing "pop" enough

[Salty]

Actually I have a ton of stickers on my Rev D iMac, none on my PowerBook or my iBook when I had it. Actually one of the guys at school stopped me in a hall way and was like, David... go see what Jon did to his iBook you'll flip! Jon of course being the only person I've ever known to buy a Mac only "because it's light and gets good battery" and really not care one way or another about it... I think he actually deep down loves it just doesn't want to admit it to me. Anyway he'd put a bunch of black and silver band stickers on it. I was like... oh this is what Barry thought I'd be mad about... I've done the same thing to my iMac ha.
Seriously though sometimes it's an indication that people love their machines and want to personalize it. People do the same thing with guitar cases.

[Nicko]

The first thing I did when I got my thinkpad is remove all the stickers.

First put some hot water on a cloth and place cloth on the sticker. That should soften up the glue. Then just carefully and slowly peel the stickers off one by one. Any left over glue will come off with a bit of soap.


I had an apple logo on my old thinkpad...looked like a black ibook

[hayesk]

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom

I know you didn't mean this literally, but remember when PowerBooks COULD burst into flames?

That never happened. Some where recalled for a chance of overheating of the battery, but there has never been a recorded case of a customer PowerBook catching on fire.

[Salty]

I know a guy who put a white apple sticker on his compaq. It's really funny.

[ehjay]

hey -- not all mac users adhere to the no-sticker rule.

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by ehjay

hey -- not all mac users adhere to the no-sticker rule.

Panic folks… they are in a Class of Its Own

If not the most, one of the nicest Mac software companies.

[JoshuaZ]

I knew quite a few people (boys and girls) in college who stuck stickers all over their Macs. Powerbooks, iBooks, iMacs.... nothing was safe from silly college stickers.

[ghporter]

I've seen such "adorned" machines on campus too, though I don't recall seeing any Macs with extra stickers. I don't get it anyway-I like to keep things simple myself. And none of my favorite bands has stickers...

[TheoCryst]

I've also seen countless Macs on campus that are absolutely hidden by stickers... it upsets me almost as much as noticing someone still using Internet Explorer on a library PowerMac... *shudder*

And just for the record, some of those stickers are really frickin' hard to get off! I ended up scratching the s*** out of my old Toshiba laptop trying to get the Windows logo off the palmrest (why have a Windows logo when you are booting Linux?)

[ironknee]

forget pcs, have you ever seen guys who keep the label on the sleeve of their suits?

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by ironknee

forget pcs, have you ever seen guys who keep the label on the sleeve of their suits?

KMart?

[ehjay]

I can understand the Intel Inside stickers, even the Optimized for Windows XP, etc etc --

what gets me is, as people have said earlier, when users refuse to remove the spec stickers from their machines, monitors, and laptops. i can't understand the merit behind it, especially since i know several intelligent windows-based programmers / sys-admins that insist on keeping those stickers intact on the machines.

merely for aesthetics as well, they clearly know how to access all of that information within the OS. nor do the stickers retain any UPCs or similar for corporate management.

[n8236]

LMFAO, best thread ever!

I wonder who came up w/ the idea first. Rice rockets or PC makers

[Love Calm Quiet]

Originally Posted by Salty

I know a guy who put a white apple sticker on his compaq. It's really funny.

Thanks for the idea. Been wondering what to do with my Dull (IE6-testing) laptop.

[legacyb4]

At least all we have to say is "I want a Mac... a new one" and not worry too much about what's inside...

Originally Posted by Pao|o

You'd specify Pentium even if you're buying an Athlon.

[Love Calm Quiet]

legacyb4:

BTW: on your lumine.net site... your google ads (and some headline spacing) are munging-up what would otherwise be an attractive blog. (at least on Safari)

[note to webmaster]