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<li><p>Four year warranty is included with the Dell. Four year warranty with the Mac is an upgrade. Dell warranty includes accidental damage protection, Mac warranty does not. One tiny fall or a single spilled beer is all it takes.</p></li>
<li><p>IT is paid by IBM and Dell for each laptop serviced under warranty. This is called warranty self-maintenance. It’s one of the reasons IT does not have to charge for services like almost every other institution does. Direct mail (aka depot) repairs would eliminate this revenue, as well as lengthen repair times to days or weeks, instead of hours.</p></li>
<li><p>What about thousands of identical Macs? How would that not pose the same theft risk? </p></li>
<li><p>Fair enough. I would also urge parents to ask their children which they would prefer when they have an upcoming paper or exam: getting their computer back usually within 24 hours of it breaking, often the same day - or being without it for a considerably longer period of time but being able to listen to music on their free iPod while they are waiting for repairs. </p></li>
<li><p>Macs are susceptible to an increasing number of malicious attacks. As their popularity grows, so does their attractiveness as a target. There ARE viruses for Macs, and I’m sure you recall the PWN 2 OWN contest held by the CanSecWest security conference in which the Mac was hacked in two minutes. ([Macworld</a> | Gone in 2 minutes: Mac gets hacked first in contest](<a href=“http://www.macworld.com/article/132733/2008/03/hack.html]Macworld”>Gone in 2 minutes: Mac gets hacked first in contest | Macworld)) Mac’s biggest safety feature until recently has been its small market share.</p></li>
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