As an off-again on-again customer since the II, that's clearly never been the case. Assuming anyone can know what 'the best' is (apart from measurable technical performance). Every piece of Apple hardware I've owned/operated was measurably not the best. Including the $400 'super' floppy drive they were using to filter the air. If Jobs decides you don't need a serial port any more, it doesn't matter how many thousands you've got invested in serial gear.
Since the Mac advent, Apple is about proprietary everything. That's what they're 'best' at: they're control freaks. It's like joining the DAR. You had to join a club to program their computers.
If you don't like the Game, don't play. There are other options than being a dedicated follower of fashion.
I don't think what you describe is really accurate for Apple in recent years. For starters, their laptops are objectively the best laptops that are actually portable. Apple has really only been excessively proprietary in a few instances, most notably with the App Store where they are acting out of the fear that an unfiltered marketplace could hurt their platform. (In this respect, they are very much like game console manufacturers.) However, most of their other oddities, including Firewire, AAC, Objective-C, GCD, launchd, and miniDisplayPort are at least as open as their primary competitors. The rest of what you perceive as being too proprietary is probably a combination of Apple's willingness to be different and their refusal to compete in many low-end low-margin markets.
I haven't owned an Apple laptop. I've been using a Gateway (Vista) for a year that has had zero problems. You may be right, since I'm aware (as a musician) how many musicians prefer them.
I did get an iMac in 2005 which had a HD that went flaky in 6 months, and a display which developed (after about a year of use ...for thousands of users) a rash of colorful vertical lines which slowly took over a big chunk of the screen ... a problem which Apple resolutely avoided addressing.
The proprietary nature of Apple (like iPhone's battery) became self-evident to me as a result of two decades' experience. (Maybe you haven't done much hardware-level programming? Try to implement any MIDI before Doug got on board?) From a distance I don't see any reason to think things are different from when I was much closer. I'm staying away.
As an off-again on-again customer since the II, that's clearly never been the case. Assuming anyone can know what 'the best' is (apart from measurable technical performance). Every piece of Apple hardware I've owned/operated was measurably not the best. Including the $400 'super' floppy drive they were using to filter the air. If Jobs decides you don't need a serial port any more, it doesn't matter how many thousands you've got invested in serial gear.
Since the Mac advent, Apple is about proprietary everything. That's what they're 'best' at: they're control freaks. It's like joining the DAR. You had to join a club to program their computers.
If you don't like the Game, don't play. There are other options than being a dedicated follower of fashion.