Why buy a Mac?

[Zatodragon]

That's always a tough debate. I've always like to think of it as mac is a simplified machine. Your not gonna tweak a mac very much, just kinda use it as it's given to you.

For me, i didn't like the mac so much since i'm very fluent in XP and have a crash maybe....once a year? And it's because i did something out of it's capabilities. But i build my own pc's up.

For a lot of other people, mac does well for them. For me, i can do way more work on a PC than a mac.

 

[forceofnature]

If Mac has gone Unix I may just get one. There may be hope for mac afterall. Only problem is they are the minority especially in big business.

I just like building my own PC so that may become an issue. When I can get better components and install them myself for about 3K less than the mac pro its a little bit of a hard spot.

I priced up a mac pro with my requirements and it was over 5K. A PC with the best video card, memory, quad processor, and mother board was below 2K.

Now all I need is for the family PC to die which it already is doing. The capacitors are leaking and it has become unstable.

I still have always wanted a mac since heck 1989. I was also impressed with the amiga at that time. Its too bad that amiga died, that computer had promise, even more so than a mac.

I am crossing my fingers that the PC dies a hard death soon. I already backed up my photos and documents. LOL Maybe I can help it on its way.... dont tell the wife....

 

[domromer]

If Mac has gone Unix I may just get one. There may be hope for mac afterall. Only problem is they are the minority especially in big business.

I just like building my own PC so that may become an issue. When I can get better components and install them myself for about 3K less than the mac pro its a little bit of a hard spot.

I priced up a mac pro with my requirements and it was over 5K. A PC with the best video card, memory, quad processor, and mother board was below 2K.

Now all I need is for the family PC to die which it already is doing. The capacitors are leaking and it has become unstable.

I still have always wanted a mac since heck 1989. I was also impressed with the amiga at that time. Its too bad that amiga died, that computer had promise, even more so than a mac.

I am crossing my fingers that the PC dies a hard death soon. I already backed up my photos and documents. LOL Maybe I can help it on its way.... dont tell the wife....

I still have my Amiga 128 and my commodore 64!

 

[SnakeVnzl]

well, mac's and X OS it's awesome. really. it may be weird at the begining, but's awesome.

however, your pc things won't work with mac things. so you'll have to buy them again for mac. or install windows in a mac (i hate this, it's stupid unless you NEED to use one thing or two (and only one thing or two, if you need to use more than that use PC).

and learn to use it.

anyway, if you like mac pc's and mac os and want to pay like 2k more to have it. why not?

 

[forceofnature]

I still have my Amiga 128 and my commodore 64!

Nice! Do you still have some of the Amiga games? I sold the commodore 64s and Timex Sinclairs when they first came out

I heard they used Amiga computers on babylon 5.

 

[acekreations]

The simplicity of mac and the easy workflo make it worth the extra money.


http://acekreations.com/

 

[Sw1tchFX]

That's always a tough debate. I've always like to think of it as mac is a simplified machine. Your not gonna tweak a mac very much, just kinda use it as it's given to you.

For me, i didn't like the mac so much since i'm very fluent in XP and have a crash maybe....once a year? And it's because i did something out of it's capabilities. But i build my own pc's up.

For a lot of other people, mac does well for them. For me, i can do way more work on a PC than a mac.

ditto.

 

[Garbz]

How many Windows users out there are running on an Administrator level account on a daily basis?
How many Mac OS X users are logging in as "root" on a daily basis?

That is a good point. Mac and Windows can be equally stable, and secure if the user is knowledgeable, but mac clearly has an advantage from out of the box configuration.

Windows tried more out of the box security privileges in Vista and we all know how that ended up, enless messages asking for admin permissions so annoying that the user turns them off and you're back at square one.

That's the basis for my statement, ultimately there really is little difference between a well setup system of both types and the result is personal preference. Now you can swear green and blue that this isn't the case, but unlike your experiences my sister's Macbook is currently suffering all sorts of weird startup problems and my copy of windows 2003 hasn't suffered a blue screen since I put it on at the beginning of the year. So it only comes back to if the user is competent they can keep their system running, and admittedly this is easier on a mac.

 

[usayit]

for every O/s, I could name an example of a machine that is not behaving properly and perhaps dieing. BUT I"m talking about properly managed healthy machines... I'm talking about basic design..


Given Application A defied as
while (true) {
malloc() /* allocate a block of memory */
}

How many Windows machines will die under such condition?

How many Mac OS X machines will die under such condition (assuming some idiot didn't set ulimit to infinity)?


OT: double edged sword.. this has historically been one of the reasons why game development prefer windows...

 

[usayit]

Given a mixed environment of Windows and UNIX servers...

How many NFS shares can a windows (out of the box) workstation mount?

How many NFS AND Window Shares can a MAC OS X workstation mount?

 

[usayit]

How many keyboard O/S devices are protected under Windows? (keyboard loggers)

How many keyboard O/S devices are ~not~ owned by root thus protected (at least a little) under MAC OS X?

 

[usayit]

Hardware wise...

I work in a Disaster Recovery site that is absolutely HUGE... HUGE... I tell yah!!! We beat the piss out of these machines... nothing gets setup and left alone like in production. We build and destroy thousands upon thousands a year.

Of all the frequently failing hardware... DELL is absolutely the worst. The Least to fail.. (I think) have been IBM AIX hardware but they are so damn expensive. You get what you pay for.

Too bad we don't have tons of Macs around.. I'd like to see how this hardware holds up in our environment.


Honestly.. I like Linux the best.. BUT their GUI is just so awful. Apple should be worried if a Linux born company creates a wonderful interface that competes.

Gates is brilliant... I wish I could learn a little from him. Years ago... he managed to sell thousands of users the Brooklyn Bridge. Keep in mind that he got Windows ontop when there was more competition in the market: Next Step, Apple, OS2 Warp. Each are arguably better than Windows 3.1 by leaps and bounds.

 

[usayit]

Given a slow (small bandwidth) connection from remote... (9600 baud modem for example)

Can a windows admin remotely and completely administer a series of windows servers?

Can a Mac OS X (UNIX, Linux) admin completely administer a series of machines (think: ssh, telnet, ftp)?



Given a Server and Laptop of the same processor type

Can a windows admin boot the Server's boot disk on the laptop?

Can a Mac OSX admin boot (even recover) the MAC OS X server's internal disk on the laptop?



I've got a whole book of these.... but I'm just uping my post count at this point... There was a time that Windows was viewed as more flexible and oriented towards the power user. Mac was seen as the beginner's computer that was inflexible but easy to learn. Since MAC OS has embraced its UNIX background and opened it to all users, I think that is beginning to change.


In the end.. it is still personal preference... If Windows works for yah.. all the more power. I still have windows boxes to work on as well as at home. I think 99% of the users out there will NOT care about ulimit,DR, etc...

 

[shorty6049]

Just figured i'd throw this up to illustrate some of what i was talking about... dont let this fuel any further arguement or anything, just good for a chuckle. its a little NSFW (language)
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=macs_cant

 

[Hertz van Rental]

I've been using Macs since 1989 and been accessing the internet with them since about '95. In all that time I have only suffered one virus - and that was a Windows one that hooked into MS Office and didn't cause me any problems. I've never had any spyware problems either.
Friends who use PC's seem to have regular traumas with the things.
Hackers just don't seem to bother with Macs. I think it's MS and Gates they don't like. Can't think why