I don't like either of these two worlds. Yes, plenty of people will buy an expensive laptop/desktop that's only ever used to run benchmarks. If anything I could admire the $5K bag more if it's actually nicer than the cheaper ones, but a lot of the time it's not.
So is buying a $5,000 laptop. Much like shoes and bags, a kernel of practical demand quickly grows into an unlimited demand for vain materialism.