[SHAMELESS PLUG: Technologizer will be liveblogging the Apple notebook event on 10/14/2008 @ 10am PT. Please join us.]

Fact: There’s no better way to spur debate among technology fans than to start talking about whether Macs are overpriced in comparison to Windows PCs. I did that in a series of stories back in August, and they remain among the most-read, most-commented-upon pieces that Technologizer has published to date. (I found that my conclusions varied depending on which Macs I was looking at, and which PCs I compared them too…and I got feedback both from people who said I was too partial to Macs and from folks who said that I was unfair to ‘em. I took that as a sign I was reasonably balanced.)

With new Apple portables due next week, I’ll need to update my assessment. Whatever Apple announces, it’ll change the comparison at least a little–and it seems a dead certainty that any new models will sport more RAM, larger hard drives, and faster CPUs than the ones they replace.

From a pure price standpoint, the most interesting rumor about next week’s news is that it will include an $800 MacBook, which would be the cheapest Apple portable ever. (Current MacBooks start at $1099.) It’s an entirely plausible idea, and while that doesn’t mean it’ll turn out to be true, it got me to thinking about what a machine might be like.

So why don’t we try to configure it, spec by spec?

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When the crescendo of rumors about upcoming Apple products gets really deafening, it’s usually a sign that the company is about to hold a press event to unveil something (or several somethings). And it’s true again: Journalists have received invitations for an event at Apple in Cupertino next Tuesday, and to nobody’s surprise, that event involves notebooks:

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[SHAMELESS PLUG: Technologizer will be liveblogging the Apple notebook event on 10/14/2008 @ 10am PT. Please join us.]

So Engadget has published a shot of what might be a next-generation MacBook built with an innovative manufacturing process:

The shot has several things in common with most tech-product spy shots:

1) It’s of an unannounced but eagerly-anticipated product;

2) Nobody really knows whether it’s real or not, except, maybe, for the person who leaked it;

3) It’s a horrible photo, one that’s fuzzy and which otherwise just doesn’t show the product in question in a manner that would help anyone judge its veracity.

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