Are Adept Characters really worth it Options

[Gunslinger057]

As an assistant GM for my local Shadowrun group, I have had the privilege of crafting more than a few characters for our GM to throw at our party. While in the process of making a 500BP adept character, I began to question just how legitimate adepts are, at least as far as low level prime runners and PC's are concerned. My question is this: how can adept characters possibly compete with cyberware/bioware characters in the short term, and, potentially the long term. Now, I'm not looking for an explanation of how adept characters are better perse; what I'm looking for is whether or not the two builds are balanced right off the bat.

I should hope that, given enough Karma, an adept character might come out on top - much like a technomancer vs a hacker. Is this the case? Are adept characters just karma sinks that require a bit more playtime before they become equivalent?

Any comments would be appreciated. Thanks!