Apple TV costs $237 to make
These days it seems everyone wants to know how much profit Apple makes on each and every one of its products. From the Mac Pro all the way down to the iPod and its newest product, the Apple TV. How much profit does Apple make on the Apple TV?
The $300 Apple TV costs $237 to make meaning Apple makes about $63 before marketing costs on the unit. Having now introduced a higher capacity $400 160GB model, Apple makes about $120 per unit on that one.
Apple has used some relatively inexpensive components in the Apple TV to keep costs down. Business Week did a break down by component.
The Pentium M processor used in the Apple TV is underclocked to 1GHz to keep costs (and heat) down which is valued at $40 and the associated chipset is worth $28.
It surprised me that the Apple TV uses a Geforce 7300 Go graphics chip valued at $15 and the only reason it has that is for the ability to display high-definition content. (Why can’t Apple put a 7300 Go in the MacBook, it’s certainly not about space).
The 40GB hard drive is worth $37 and the 160GB hard drive is worth $73.
As for everything else there is a WiFi-n chip worth $19, a couple of other unspecified chips worth $1.65, a $1 microcontroller and the cheapest of the cheap, a 75 cent Realtek audio processor. Shows you how much those AC97 chips are worth, now doesn’t it? (Note: I’m not saying that it is an AC97 chip, just that Realtek audio chips are cheap and don’t have great sound quality).
Compare that AC97 to a Creative X-Fi sound card, or heck even compare it to a Soundblaster Live! Value, the difference is night and day (on $250 5.1 speakers and $300 headphones, that is).
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