One wouls hope that the overpriced accessories sold by the computer's manufacturer would of course be plug and play... Let's see... those "overpriced accessories" would be:
- Printers - almost all manufacturers
- Network Printers - almost all manufacturers
- Bluetooth Printers - almost all manufacturers
- Scanners - almost all manufacturers
- Multi-purpose all-in-one Scanners, Printers, Copiers, Fax - almost all manufacturers
- Bluetooth Cellphones - almost all manufacturers
- USB PDAs
- Digital Still Cameras - almost all manufacturers
- Digital Movie Cameras including HD - almost all manufacturers
- USB and USB II Web Cams
- Firewire Web Cams
- USB Flash drives
- Internal SATA II drives - all manufacturers
- Firewire External Hard Drives - all manufacturers
- USB and USB II External Hard Drives - all manufacturers
- Firewire External Optical Drives - all manufacturers
- USB and USB II External Optical Drives - almost all manufacturers
- USB Multi-button input devices, mouses, track balls, track pads, pens, etc.
- Monitors, LCD, CRT, Plasma, etc.
I have almost all of the above... and, except for my 23 inch Cinema LCD Monitor, none of them were manufactured by Apple or sold to me by Apple. Most of them are available through normal retail or discount channels.
Every one of them was recognized and mounted by the OS when it was plugged in. The only one that required special software to be installed after it was recognized and mounted was my PDA... but I could still synch my Mac Addressbook, iCalendar, and notes without it.