But, actually, if you look at the specs, which I went heavy on the updates and mods for the HP, I actually spent closer to $1,600 to get the highest resolution display, fastest SSD, and highest performance CPU (which is still beaten by the MacBooks Ivy Bridge, but not by much I admit). $500 is a fairly negligible difference and the HP is far too full of defects for that price point while the $2199 MacBook Pro w/Retina which offers a far better quality in design and function. The 'aluminum body' on my HP is a half-assed attempt at looking cool but it's a joke. The overall quality of most PCs I have bought in the past two or three years is horrendous, even if they are cheaper.
Again, I have been doing this for a long, long time and I know value when I see it. Otherwise I would have stayed a skeptic for the rest of my days.