I supported both platforms professionally for 9 years and PC is my preference. PC's tend to go wrong more often but if you've got half an idea what you're doing they're pretty simple to sort out. Macs seem to just go belly up, less often but for no fathomable reason. Macs are much easier to use, everything just works seamlessly together, unless you want to do something slightly different to the norm and then you just can't. Whereas a PC you have choice on just about everything, but may need a hour or two to get them all working together. Macs have a nicer design on the whole but some PC manufacturers are fighting back on that ground. Macs are twice as expensive and half as fast. I had a very bad experience with Apple technical support, full of jobsworths with no common sense. We were a business partner at the time, actually supplying them equipment and the way they treated me, a support professional with a 2 week old computer worth over £4K 6 years ago was disgraceful. I just don't like the Apple ethos of sewing up the market, locking you into their products, stealing other peoples ideas and then trying to sue companies that develop similar product to them. Note recent/current lawsuits with Nokia & HTC regarding the iPhone. I however do not condemn people who prefer to use Mac if it better suits them but wonder why a large proportion of Apple fanboys are almost violently opposed to PCs.
I agree im not a big fan of the apple marketing technique, but in a way its similar to what microsoft initially did, just microsoft had very little in the way of competition. for the record im not a mac fan-boy. i own a sony laptop and a HP desktop, ive just been very impressed with the mac.
Interesting perspective on it, HM. I am a new user of Macs and a long time user of PC's. What I've quoted above seems applicable to the 90's, but not so much now in my opinion. Nowadays, Apple users think their turds are golden rays of sunshine, and think PC users just need to be freed from servitude. I think the key is if you can mess with the settings and monkey with things on a computer, a PC is better for you, but if you (like me) tend to ruin electronics by trying to 'fix' them, Macs are really nice. They are expensive as hell, and I find it ironic that the current generation of Mac users are ignorant of how whiny the 90's users were about the jackbooted thugs of Wintel Industrial Complex trying to rub Apple out, when now that the shoe is on the other foot, they simply look down their noses at PC users and make that tsk tsk sound as they shake their heads in pity. I'm jealous of my dad's tiny $300 mini laptop, but it's hard for me to go back to my work laptop (pc) sometimes.
Not accusing you of being a fan boy. I just know two personally who are i this and i that. As far as I'm concerned they can i-feck off.:biggrin:
I have a Mac, and a Macbook Pro, because I use them for work, and they simply work better than Windows alternatives. Linux is the best though.
I tried Linux for a while and though the idea is really cool, I found the reality to be even more difficult to tweak and get results out of than Windows.
Yep Linux is a "Tweakers operating system" Technically it's the most powerfull of the lot but as tep on again from the ease of use difference between Mac OS and Windows. There is always the compatibility issues with less popular software as well.
Didn't know that but it makes sense. There's a lot of bolt-on windows systems using Linux as a base. I used Open Windows at Uni but I think there was X-windows or something as well. I wonder how Apple selling a Free OS based system runs with the ethics behind it though? I wonder if they're opening themselves up for another lawsuit.
Did a bit of research. Mac OS is NextStep Unix based, and Ubuntu which is Linux/GNU based is supplied free, however bolt on developed software is chargeable, that's how Ubuntu get around the open source free nature of Linux. I shared a student house with computer scientists, they raved about Linux, at a time when I was using DOS 6 and Windows 3.1. To me it looked like an awful faff having to download and compile software (The internet didnt have graphics then until mosaic developed the cello browser, showing my age). I used Sun Sparc Stations with Linux for c++ programming and IC fabrication design, but it all seemed a little to techy and unfriendly to me as a system. Remembering the good old days here, we set up a serial cable network so we could play Doom against each other, I had a beast of a 486sx-25 with a huge 210Mb hard disk.:biggrin:
I can recommend the Linux distribution Linux Mint (I am on a mint machine now). It is basically Ubuntu but where Ubuntu is all open source, Mint has things which aren't - which means you can watch youtube for example without having to tweak first. To me - having run both Mint and Ubuntu - with Mint you don't need to tweak unless you have out of the ordinary needs. For me that need is to get the machine to recognise my s-video output but that's a whole other story. Someone said there's less software available on Linux - it's quite the opposite. You are spoilt for choice but will often have to do a bit of research into which programme best suits your needs. Adding software is much simpler too with a software center from which you install stuff directly. Another cool thing about linux is that you can have a complete PC with OS, browser, office package incl. mail/calendar and all the other stuff you'd normally need - on around 500MB or even less. This means you can have an entire boot disc on a USB memory stick or SD card. That's why the netbooks first came out with a Linux OS because that allowed for PC's with a 2GB SSHD.
The forum runs on a Linux server, so Linux wins, game over! Got a few Macs and several flavours of Unix/Linux running in the office alongside most versions of Windows, and it always amazes me how some so called technical experts run a mile rather than get involved in anything other than Windows :biggrin:. A few years back, (actually about 10), I was just another member of technical staff for the company when we took on a heavy Unix based product. It was a case of everyone else took a step back and bingo, I was the main man to support this stuff around the UK, much to my horror. Well it turned out to be the best thing that could have happened as I had to learn fast, and the systems simply took off. When the company sold up and the new lot went t**s up, I had no problems finding another job quickly, mainly due to the Unix experience. For that reason alone I will always love it!
One thing I like about Linux (not a linux user btw) is that if there is a program that is required someone has written one. Also if you can get the source code, you can compile the program on the mac. Useful. Just a comment.
comparing likes of macs to windows and linux is like comparing cars really. all very differently balanced making them useful for your chosen needs such as modifying for more intensive performance or just doing the mundane daily activities. some may have loads of cup holders if thats what you need lol. problem is there is only a few dominant systems and it seems you have to be one or the other.Unlike the varst car market its not about choice, its about loyalty all of a sudden. i still feel apple denote an image of someone who wouldnt even check his oil level if he had too though lol
