Linus Torvalds (torvalds@linux-foundation.org) on 9/19/09 wrote:
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>But if you argue for "well built" and "high quality", you
>really are missing the point. Apple loves you for buying
>into the brand, but it's not actually real.

I agree about the hardware reliability: on that Apple
seems unexceptional. But the other aspects of the brand
really are important, and really are difficult to achieve.
The Apple Store is a good place to go and the staff are
knowledgeable and helpful; the integration between
Apple computers and other Apple products such as iPod and
iPhone is really neat - my wife was impressed when she
bought her iPhone, took some photos on a trip, plugged
it into her MacBook Pro and the photos didn't just get
uploaded, but got automatically assembled into a slideshow
with music; MacOS X has done a good job of adding new features,
new eye candy, and support for new hardware without getting
too bloated to run on older hardware (c.f. Vista)

And much as we techies might look down on the ads and the
marketing hype, it's pretty clear that stuff really is
difficult - otherwise HP and Dell and Microsoft would be
matching it - and that Apple really does it very well
indeed.