6.12.2008

Apple Products in the UAE

Apple products are imported here by a company called iStyle. They are actually pretty cool stores, similar to Apple Stores with their own style. It isn't the brushed metal and wood look like in the US. It is a nice place and typically the people that work there are a little knowledgeable. Today I went there to look around prior to seeing a movie and ended up talking to a guy that was going to buy a Macbook.

We got to talking and he was telling me about how he is a DJ and has been recording for years and how the only thing he will ever record on is an Apple. He told me that he uses OSX to "spin" his music, but that he has modified a pc laptop to do it. I accepted this and didn't really say much else as I am quite sure that to do so he would need to gut an Apple laptop and put it in the case of another computer to do this, and that doesn't make sense, why not just leave it in the original case?

The he told me all this wackiness about OSX being slow to search for files and how he prefers the "Search" feature in Windows much more. I didn't understand this and asked him how he was searching. He said, "the normal way." I showed him Sherlock, or whatever it is called and he asked how I got there. Anyway, something tells me this guy hasn't been using Mac that long and probably doesn't know the ins and outs of the system as well as he pretended.

The point of this though is that the markup on Apple products here is rediculous. It is all based on demand, and I understand that, as I think Apple works that way as well. My problem is when they mark up the Apple price by hundreds of dollars. They are an authorized reseller so they have to get some discount from Apple like the resellers in the US who are able to sell at the same price as Apple. I would understand if they marked it up by 5% as that is the duty for bringing it into the country, but doubling the price of a TimeMachine is beyond sanity.

I wonder if Jobs knows about this.