If Macs are so good (according to their users) ...

[Jon]

My personal opinion is that Mac users suffer from 'Mac Pride', and its a bit like Gay Pride.

This is based on my experiences at neowin, with the growing Mac community. I've got nothing against the hardware. I get *very* annoyed by the community. It seems that because they are a minority, there is some kinda of (arguably misplaced) pride associated with owning a mac, and its very very annoying.

To me my PC is a tool to do a job, I dont post my specs in my sig because I consider it 100% irrelevent whats inside the box, I'm interested in how well I can use the box, and what I can do with it. I take pride in my abilities, and dont like to blow my own trumpet.

As a guitarist I've seen many people with flashy guitars, who constantly talk about them, along side the best gear, but when it comes down to it their playing is scruffy and not fun to listen to.

Then I've seen people who play the cheapest nastiest guitars you've seen, but make them sound like angel's singing.

The point is, the machine doesnt matter. What you do with it does, and in my opinion, someone who spends a lot of time talking about his gear but not the subject of computing is probably not 'all that'. FYI thats largly based on reading the mac forums.

[Robbeke]

want to reply to all those macfans saying that we should try Mac OS X... I want to, but i have to do it in my own room, and not going to buy a expensive mac to test. You can't just test it.

[cyberfrem]

That's a most excellent point, Jon!

And one that I think that we can all learn something from.

Thanks.

[Inertia]

My personal opinion is that Mac users suffer from 'Mac Pride', and its a bit like Gay Pride.

This is based on my experiences at neowin, with the growing Mac community. I've got nothing against the hardware. I get *very* annoyed by the community. It seems that because they are a minority, there is some kinda of (arguably misplaced) pride associated with owning a mac, and its very very annoying.

To me my PC is a tool to do a job, I dont post my specs in my sig because I consider it 100% irrelevent whats inside the box, I'm interested in how well I can use the box, and what I can do with it. I take pride in my abilities, and dont like to blow my own trumpet.

As a guitarist I've seen many people with flashy guitars, who constantly talk about them, along side the best gear, but when it comes down to it their playing is scruffy and not fun to listen to.

Then I've seen people who play the cheapest nastiest guitars you've seen, but make them sound like angel's singing.

The point is, the machine doesnt matter. What you do with it does, and in my opinion, someone who spends a lot of time talking about his gear but not the subject of computing is probably not 'all that'. FYI thats largly based on reading the mac forums.

I agrea with most of this, but i do enjoy tweaking and upgrading my PC system , maybe im a bit of a power freak, lol, doesnt mean i dont know how to put my system to good use.

[corrosive23]

The thing I hate is this supposed "windows always crashes crap" Yeah sure it does :rolleyes: I love my 193 day uptime and that is with heavy gaming, divx encoding, mp3 ripping and encoding and some video editing. Sure they crash all the time.

[the evn show]

193 days of uptime...are you not installing the weekly security updates (i know at least 3 in the last 2 months have required a reboot for the one XP machine I'm forced to use from time to time). Not really a jab - os x updates require reboots too, they just tend to happen a little less frequently.

------

Why aren't wintel users jumping ship to the OS X camp?

You tell me - I did already - what's holding you back. If I had to hazard a few guesses I'd say:

1) You're affraid to look foolish. After how many years/decades of saying how crumby Macintosh systems were you don't want to look like an dolt by using a computer you've said was stupid/slow/worthless/etc for so long.

2) You can't think for yourselves. Maybe you just can't see how 95% of the world could be wrong about what the best desktop computing platform is.

3) You don't want to be on the recieving end of all that redicule that you've been spewing for years. It's a lot easier to be the bully than the victim (stretching here I know) so why not just stick with what you know.

4) You're cheap. You just can't afford to drop Windows and the X86 to move to another platform and another OS. This might be especially true if you have a substantial amount invested in Windows software and re-purchasing your software library could cost more than a new car. Your job might only leave enough money left over to buy a $500 PC every couple years: the extra $300 for an emac might be the difference between having food or not - times are tough right now, and some times you have to live without the nice things when they're not essential and when you can get the "next best thing" for less cash.

5) You're not capable of learning a new OS. My grandparents had a hard time getting a handle on Windows 98 - they can't upgrade because if ANYTHING changes they'll be lost. You might not have the time to devote to mastering a new OS (OS X is a lot more complex than windows at the lower levels because of it's unix guts and the fact that you have the source to those parts)

6) You're ignorant. The last macintosh you used ran System 7. Everything you've heard (from your Windows using friends) is that macintosh systems are slow, incompatible, expensive, etc.

7) OS X doesn't meet your needs. Maybe you need to run some Windows or X86 *NIX only software that has no macintosh equivilant and moving to similar software isn't an option. (IE: 3D Studio MAX).

8) You just don't know any better. You don't realize that there might be a better way to do things or you don't think that there is a problem with how you do things now.

9) You like to play games and don't want to own consoles, or maybe you do own several consoles and need to play even MORE games in your bedroom. Tony Hawk and Enigmo are great - but for some people that might not be enough.

10) You just don't like OS X. I Just don't like Windows - I think it's a crumby, obfuscated, insecure POS and I can't understand how a logical human being would make some of the UI and system design decisions that made it into WinXP. Even after writting all the Microsoft certification exams, developing for years on it, and participating (legally) in 3 beta programs I just can't stand Windows any more.

Maybe you have similar thoughts (justified or not) about OS X - If I can grow to hate windows I can't see any reason why you couldn't have similar feelings about OS X.

Note I use the phrase "you" to reference the Wintel group or some members there of - and "us" to refer to the OS X group, not specific individuals. Those are just my guesses as to a few reasons why people aren't moving over to OS X en mass. By no means an exhaustive list, and possibly not even accurate; like I said, I did buy a mac (3) so clearly I don't have any personal reason not to buy them.

[cyberfrem]

Just got to thinking:

Why does it have to be so "black" or "white", so "us" and "them"?

Aren't we all computer owners with similar interests participating in the same forum?

Does it matter what tool we use to achieve this?

[mac15]

Power

The new G5 Processsors (manufactured by IBM) outperform the Intel Xeon processors in almost every instance. They feature a 1GHz bus for each processor, VMX (which on a bus like that just flyes) and some great bandwidth -- 6.4gb/s throughput.

It mops the floor with the Dual Xeon systems and well, I bet most of you guys are stuck with a single P4 system (no such thing as a dual P4 system).

Hyperthreading on or off, Linux or Windows, it get killed in SPEC tests -- escpecially floating, thanks to VMX.

Cost

Macs did use to be expensive. I'm the first to admit that.

For the last 6 years though, they've been competing and even beating x86 boxes on price.

For instance, the Dual G5 PowerMac system costs $2,999 vs. a Dual Xeon system from Dell for over $5,000 (prices fluctuate on the Xeon's as Intels availability is terrible, but Dell have never gone under $5,000 for a dual 3.06GHz Xeon system). And... The Mac would outperform the Dell.

This is true also for Apple's consumer line of computers. As I stated earlier, compare an iMac G4 to a Gateway or a Dell. You'll find Apple's leading the way on price.

Software

There is more software for the PC than the Mac. However, I haven't found a single product that runs on Windows, but not on Mac OS X that I need to use. I do web development, Obj-C development, loads of PHP/MySQL stuff, loads of games, photoshopping and hell, I even use Microsoft Office for Mac OS X. I've got over 300 apps installed on my Mac. And that's a very small part of the spectrum. There IS LOADS of Mac software out there.

On the off-chance that you need to run a Windows app on your Mac, you can use Microsoft's Virtual PC for OS X software. This allows you to run Windows on your Macintosh (yes, it's pretty scary).

Networking

Microsoft is infamous for bad networking. Their security is attrocious, reliability is notoriously bad and setup... well, that's probably the worst part.

Macs DO WORK FINE on Windows networks though. Just this week, my mom got a new job. I took her iBook into work to hook it up to the PC network. The IT guy was absolutely adament that it wouldn't work on the Windows Network. Well, I just plugged it in and bam, web access worked immediately, windows file sharing worked immediately and windows printing worked immediately. For Email, I just opened up Mail, clicked Preferences, chose "Exchange" from the Account Type pulldown and threw in her username and password for the network. Same with enabling the MS Exchange Address Book.

It's just as easy to use a Mac on a *nix network as it is on a Windows Network. Except most of the UNIX admins use Macs themselves, so they know it's going to work. So unfortunately, you don't get the whole jaw dropping thing happening.

Support

Well, that's all well and good, but what happens if I screw something up, or get a virus or if someone hacks me?!

Well, for starters there are under 100 known Mac viruses. None of which are compatible with new macs. In the PC world, there are, as you're probably aware, over 90,000 known viruses. Put it this way, I've worked for a local distributor of a Mac anti-virus product and we didn't get a single support call about a virus. Never.

In terms of hackers, as Mac OS X's networking is based on the Darwin standards and third-party open source protocols, it's all open source, which means vulnerabilities are normally patched before they're exploited. I can't reacall there ever, for any time, being a security risk in Mac OS X that would affect the average user. As an extra plus (yes, Windows XP has this too, but it blocks off File Sharing and other networking features, so most people turn it off pretty quickly), Mac OS X has an inbuilt rock-solid UNIX standard Firewall. Good thing is, you don't need to worry about opening ports for sharing stuff -- your mac does it automatically.

If something does go wrong, then you'll find it really easy to get support. Sites like FunMac.com are full of experienced Mac gurus waiting to help you out with any problems. If you're having trouble making the transition to a Mac, then there are loads of sites like PCtoMac.com. Good thing is most mac problems are easily remedied. It's very very rare that you need to reformat your disk... unlike using Windows. There's no BIOS that you have to mess with -- it's all done automatically.

..And well, no one's raised any other issues... But if you do have some concerns, please post.

Mac OS X is a new ballgame -- it's fast, it's flexible, it's customizable, it's standards-based technology, it's got great multitasking and the stability is just amazing. If you've tried the mac before and didn't like it, I don't blame you, I wasn't using Macs before OS X. Give it another try now.

I'll leave you with this final thought:

I've converted over 30 friends and family members to Mac OS X. Every single one of them loves it and swears -- they'll never go back.

[macster]

But there are also a lot of PC users too who come into the MAc forum or into Mac threads and post nothing constructive at all. For example, "Mac sucks" or "There are VERY few apps" or "I cant play any games on it" or "OS X is so difficult to use"

I agree that Macs has less apps and games. But i get really annoyed by PC users who make sweeping statements esp in threads where ppl are considering to switch. These people would come in and bash the Macs. The worse are people who never use a Mac before or used one when it was OS 8-9.

Since Steve Jobs came back to Apple, they have improved a lot (OS X)

Because of these ignorant PC users (not a large number but they can be really loud and spread a lot of crap), the mac users are forced to defend the platform.

Mac users do tweak and play with their machines. It is not just a beautiful computer. Developer Tools (A Full IDE) are free to download from Apple and we can change a lot of things in the cmd line

BTW Robbeke, Dont you have any friends at all that own a mac? or at least a mac shop nearby?

[mac15]

That maybe true but at the end of the day the mac's dont have their own Dirrctory service which means they're relying on other systems kind of selling themselves out!

Mac OS X uses the standard NeXTStep Directory -- NetInfo. You'll find NetInfo Manager in the Utillities folder, within the Applications folder on every single Mac running OS X.

[nutternutin]

PC = Personal Computer

Mac = computer

It it belongs to me, it is my PERSONAL computer

Mac = PC (just different brand) so why does everyone talk about them like they are not PC's???

[Fozzieb]

Apple drop the marketing ball in the late 80's an with more and more IBM cloanes turning up you had a choice of PC manufacturers. Mac have allways kept the systems their own, If other companies made mac compatabile systems like they did PC's the the market would be either 50/50 or tilted in Apples favour.

Oh and i am a pc user and allways have been, although this is because i could buy parts of my pc over a period of time rather than just buying out right.

[mac15]

Mac less customizable

More OS's support PC

More software for PC's

With a PC you have multiple suppliers (cheaper prices), Mac only Apple.

etc...

The Mac is far more flexible, or customizable than any verison of Windows ever released. It's not quite like Gnome, but it's easy for the average user to just pick up and use.

I'd actually argue exactly the opposite. You'll find many more operating systems that will run on a PPC architecture, keeping in mind that older OS's (say Windows 3.1 for instance) won't run on your P4s.

There is more software for the Windows Operating System than for Mac OS X. But what do you use on Windows that you can't get on a Mac? Found something? Okay, run it under Virtual PC :)

Well, I thought I debunked the Macs are expensive myth with my other post. I open up many macs on a daily basis and can promise you, you'll find that nearly every component excluding the motherboard isn't made by Apple. Use any RAM, use any HD, Apple uses Moto and IBM for processors, NVIDIA or ATI for graphics etc.etc. I can't think of anything that's made by apple inside a powermac apart from the board.

[the evn show]

We argued this out a couple of time in the mac form. For ease of typing people typically say:

Mac -> Macintosh computers running OS X (previously running classic mac os)

PC -> x86 hardware running Microsoft Windows 2000/XP

*NIX -> A system running a Linux, UNIX, or BSD based OS. May or may not include OS X depending on the conversation.

"IBM compatible computer running windows", "x86 Windows computer", etc are just annoying to type.

cyberfrem: Why is it black and white? Well you asked why aren't PC users moving to macs. Why isn't group 1 moving to group 2. why aren't we joining them. Computer users as a whole may have similar common interest but there are opposing factions just like in any large community. Even in america there are splits between pro and anti abortion, for and against capital punishment, etc. You may have similar interests in life, liberty, and the pursuit of money but your ideas on how to go about that are different.

EDIT: Off topic.

Gnome and KDE will run just fine on os x - you can even use them in place of finder if you're into that. Combine with MOL you can use a full on unix system as your base platform running X11 and Gnome or KDE as your shell. You get all of the driver support of OS X with all of the benifits of Linux. Then you can run your favorite GPL apps (installed with fink of course) and use MOL to run the odd OS X app from within X11 or restart the full os x experience complete with rendezvous, cocoa, and finder.

Simple instructions:

Install os x

install fink

install x11

install kde

configure x11/kde

logout - and log back in with >console as the user name

startx

Edited August 7, 2003 by the evn show

[mac15]

PC = Personal Computer

Mac = computer

It it belongs to me, it is my PERSONAL computer

Mac = PC (just different brand) so why does everyone talk about them like they are not PC's???

The term "PC" is used to refer to computers that use the x86 hardware architecture.

"PCs" were computers used for Word Processing and other such lowpowered tasks. x86 is an architecture for just that -- lowpowered, slower tasks.

In contrast the Mac uses a RISC architecture -- PPC. SGI Workstations for instance use again, a sophisticated RISC architecture, this one called MIPS.

So yes, Apple wanted to distinguish their PPC boxes from the low powered x86 boxes is basically where that name difference came from.

[aem4162]

I'd LOVE to have a Mac but too many things are holding me back. Price, having to buy all new software, and the fact that I can't build my own are the biggest factors. The OS is prolly better and the machines are gorgeous.

[mac15]

Even in America there are splits between pro and anti abortion, for and against capital punishment, etc.  You may have similar interests in life, liberty, and the pursuit of money but your ideas on how to go about that are different.

"Even in America"? You guys still have open debates on social issues in the US? Wow, I'm impressed. I thought you gave up on the whole Democracy thing back in 2000.

Anyways, your analogy is interesting. I guess what you're saying is that basically Macs vs. PCs keeps coming up as a subject becuase there are people passionate about (surprisingly enough) both products.

If I may suggest an alternate analogy, it's kind of like how you've got Green Party supporters in the US -- generally well educated, economically aware (Mr. Buffett is a member) and represent the intellectual left vs. the Republicans -- the extremeist right-wingers who think anyone who doesn't share their rather pervocial view on the world is a communist.

Sorry I had to come up with my own... I just didn't like your implication that the Anti-Abortion camp believes in Liberty or Freedom. I can't believe that for one second.

[mac15]

I'd LOVE to have a Mac but too many things are holding me back. Price, having to buy all new software, and the fact that I can't build my own are the biggest factors. The OS is prolly better and the machines are gorgeous.

You can build your own if you want. Just do a google search, you'll find loads of guides to it.

And as for apps, whatever happened to good ol' piracy?

[the evn show]

If you use your computer for any kind of business it's not worth risking getting caught. All it takes is one angry/vengeful client or ex-employee to have the BSA audit you, when you're caught it's major fines not to mention the note in public records. For most companies paying for software is no more than a couple thousand dollars - because the penalties are so high it's not worth pirating.

Mentioning that piracy is illegal would be pointless - there's no point in arguing about it. Either you're a fraud (theif isn't the right word) or your not, nothing anyone says on the internet is gong to change that.

EDIT - OT: I'm not an american, but I'll give them the benifit of the doubt and assume thier still mostly a democracy. I'm in the states maybe 1 month total out of the year and it's not too bad from what I can see (infact I prefer their government to my own). I'll leave the division and faactionizing analogy alone as it's doomed to get way off topic.

[-=SD=-]

4) You're cheap. You just can't afford to drop Windows and the X86 to move to another platform and another OS. This might be especially true if you have a substantial amount invested in Windows software and re-purchasing your software library could cost more than a new car. Your job might only leave enough money left over to buy a $500 PC every couple years: the extra $300 for an emac might be the difference between having food or not - times are tough right now, and some times you have to live without the nice things when they're not essential and when you can get the "next best thing" for less cash.

That is my reason, if I could build a Mac and not pay the price of a new machine that would be better, as that is the cheapest route for the PC but I don't see any way online that will allow this.

(without buying from ebay)

[aem4162]

You can build your own if you want. Just do a google search, you'll find loads of guides to it.

And as for apps, whatever happened to good ol' piracy?

ok...I never tried google - ya got me there. But I can't walk into the 2 mom'n'pops that I frequent and expect to find Mac cases and whatever proprietary stuff that goes with them.

As for piracy...I'm as guilty of it as the next person and software is too expensive.

[Wickedkitten Veteran]

http://www.2khappyware.com/ibox/

[aaron901]

because people think Macs are expensive. because people think Macs are slow. because people think that there is no softwares for Macs. because people don't care about the design of their computers. because people can build a PC for the price of a burger. because people can obtain Windows OSes for nothing. because anything before Mac OSX 10.2 suck big time. because there is not much Apple stores. because people don't feel like changing. because there's not many people willing to fork out thousands of dollars just to try out Mac OSX. because Windows XP is pretty good. because there's not much games for Mac. that's about it.

[-=SD=-]

http://www.2khappyware.com/ibox/

That's a good idea but from that page doesnt even look like he got started on it yet. And the latest update was back in April.

If they had more online shops that sold motherboards, cpu's, memory (if its any different from pc's) and their cases then that would be a better option for those wanting to make a "switch", until that happens I won't being getting a Mac (unless I hit the lottery :p)

[Starman]

I'm sorry that I haven't read each and every post in this thread (yet) but it seems from skimming that there's a lot of PC/Mac history that a lot of people just don't know, or ignore.

Macs kicked ass when they were first released. It's hard to really describe what it was like to see a Mac for the first time when all everyone was using back then were green-screen PCs running DOS and Wordstar. They were expensive back then, but at the time they were worth it.

This is where the problem began:

You're business A and you want to do business with company B. Company B only deals with PCs/DOS/Windows 1.0 so in order for you to properly work with them, you have to deal with the same OS. Multiply that by the number of companies out there and you get a sense of why PCs became popular.

Now, why start with PCs instead of Macs? Price. To this day I curse Apple for making the prices of their hardware so high. It's gotten better, but back in the 80's it really hurt them.

Now, just to dispell some ignorance here on this thread, I'll list some of the ignorant thoughts people have about Macs.

Macs aren't customizable. In fact, some of the nice Windows themes you see and use were started on the Mac.

http://forums.macnn.com/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=94

Little software for the Mac. Oh, really? Like what? We have our Office, our Everquest, our DLC, our Kazaa, our DVD authoring software (which kicks ass), etc. What EXACTLY don't we have? The only disadvantage the Mac has is in gaming.

Hardware isn't upgradable. This isn't 1989. We don't use SCSI anymore. We use standard RAM, standard IDE hard drives, most of what you'd spend extra for on a PC is built into the Mac, and the video cards are flash upgradable. USB and Firewire peripherals work fine.

I think that most '133t d00dz' are too afraid of being laughed out of their clique if they even look in the direction of the Apple Store at their local mall (but we know you want one!).

Mike