Boblet Learned things and Japan diary, by Oli Studholme

Are we buying a new computer or what?

By Oli
At 12:42 PM · Sunday, 14 December · 2003
To Apple · Life

The price for Apple’s PowerMac G5/1.8 GHz dual has just dropped a massive 30,000 yen. While the new price of 272,000 yen is almost at my buying threshold, I’m now tempted to hold off for another month (yet again). According to the rumour mill the MacWorld Exposition in January 2004 should see the release of a new PowerMac lineup (this is despite the current lineup only being on sale in Japan since September, and the G5/1.8 dual I want being released a month ago). This makes sense remembering the current models were announced back in June.

I’ll probably still buy the same model, unless the new lineup puts an equivalent model in the 250,000-270,000 yen price range. However, with non-current tech getting large discounts in Japan, I think the price for this model might drop another 20,000-30,000 yen yet if it’s not in the new lineup. Also I expect Apple will release a new LCD lineup that coordinates with the G5 case. Their current 17" monitor price of 80,000 yen is a year old and should take a tumble. I plan to eventually buy two monitors, so it’d be nice to have a matched pair (and having a G5 without a monitor for a month seems somewhat pointless ;-)

At this rate it feels like I’ll end up holding off until G6 models are released! However, with just a little bit more waiting Santa will hopefully be delivering a very nice (slightly late) Christmas present.