The thing about Motorola is, yes they have their "issues" which drove them to reduce their work force and focus a large percentage of their efforts on embedded processors for cell phones, networking equipment, and the like.
You can't run a desktop computer on a CPU designed for a cell phone
That is why Apple finally decided to go with IBM for future desktop CPUs. IBM makes workstation and server class CPUs. Making a desktop class CPU out of the Power4 core wasn't rocket science, you just reduce it to a single core and chop the mega L2 cache.
Please stop suggesting Apple switch to x86 CPUs. Yes I realize AMD, Transmeta, and VIA (they bought Cyrix) make cheaper CPUs, but the G5 just helped Apple get the upper hand in performance, do you *really* think they want to take a huge step BACKWARDS by going with weaker CPUS? I'm talking about Transmeta and VIA, AMD chips now a days are just as expensive as Intel chips because of the price wars.
Hypothetically, if one could purchase (off the shelf) the G5 chasis with the cooling system and power supply, that alone will cost more than the CPU. The graphics cards customers have to choose from is very narrow. Why can't I buy a brand new G5 system with a cheaper GeForce 3 video card? Why can't I buy a new G5 system without Firewire and USB 2.0, or how about just a plain ol' CD-ROM drive?
My point is Mac systems seem more expensive because Apple decides what customers can/can't buy. In the PC market, you can buy/build-to-order a system with much more flexibility and cut corners anywhere you want. The same is not true with Macs. You can cut corners to a certain degree, but not as flexible as for example: Dell's system config website. I can gaurentee you, if Apple switches to x86 Macs will still be just as expensive as they are now. It's the business mentality, not the hardware design.