Disclaimer - Talking hardware and software - I hate apple in every way shape and form; I can appreciate their design and understand that it is great for some people. I love the PC design - I do not like Microsoft... Not a big fan of Linux either... but I tend to use Microsoft products on my PC due to the huge compatibility that I can achieve. Each have their place in the world...

PRIMARY REASON THAT APPLE IS 'SPECIAL'
Primarily - the reason that Apple appeals to people is because 'it looks cool' and is 'easy to use' - it is designed with an 'out of the box experience' - so when you buy your Apple and go home - you plug it in and it WORKS... no need to remove bloatware - no need to install media players or other odd things... You have a fully working ready to go machine out of the box. Any newly purchased Windows 7 pc may look like its ready to go-- but you will still have to install your messenger, your web browsers & addons, antivirus, media players, adobe/flash addons - you will have to spend at least a few hours downloading and installing other software - some of which you will have to purchase - just to equal what apple gives free. (though with the open source projects becoming more popular - this problem is less about money and more about time to install everything)

SECONDARY reason is that Apple has always marketed itself as a graphics based system - for those who are doing multimedia... Apple got color monitors long before PC did - Apple got the mouse standardized before the pc (though their standard mouse sucks and has never improved) Apple tries to sell itself to Graphic artists - those people appreciate the 'pretty white designs' and the 'pretty graphical interface' - all the 'icons' that now populate the iphones / ipads / etc... PC systems were more focused on TEXT based menu systems - structured - rigid type menus and designs that were more angular... Apple has always been more 'bubbly and rounded' in design.

HARDWARE DIFFERENCES:
In the beginning Apple offered all in one systems that were very appealing to people - before laptops were common... having a screen with your floppy on the bottom was awesome... all the schools and businesses started buying them up... -- no you could not expand on them like their PC counterparts (back in windows 3.1 time)

Now Apple tends to use printed circuit boards and very small components - which allows them to make skinny products. They do not have surface mounted items hand placed - they have tiny compact components -- good for the person who wants light weigh -- bad for the person who wants to fix one that has been broken (PC style systems tend to have multiple components attached to the motherboard so that you can remove and replace things using connectors) Apples have never been designed to upgrade or expand (yes you CAN upgrade them - to a limited effect - but you can not customize them to the same extent that you can customize a PC - not as easily as going to best buy and buying the latest graphics card/ sound card / whatever...)

It is important to note that though apple has 'dedicated graphics Chips' - they are not as good as a PC laptop with a 'dedicated graphics CARD' - meaning that apple has a cracker sized chip soldiered onto the mobo -- where a pc *MAY have a full graham cracker sized card full of chips / memory/capacitors/etc that is attached on top of its motherboard- removable, upgradable - replaceable... Most pc laptops have integrated chips - or dedicated chips - I'm referring to the elite models that have full graphics CARDS...
Graphics Card > Graphics Chip

View the original article here