Pros and Cons of Switching From Windows To Mac

It's been a couple of years since Apple ran their Switcher ads — but folks are still making the switch. Rockgod writes to point us to his list of pros and cons after he switched from Windows to Mac recently. From the article: "It took me a long time to be convinced that Windows 3.1 was a better program launcher than X-Tree Gold, but it happened eventually. Since then, I have been a sucker for every upgrade — 95, 98, NT 4.0, 2000, XP... I bought the cheapest Mac available, a Mac Mini with a single-core Intel chip and the minimum of RAM — 512 MB. It cost me AU$949. Since plugging it in, I have barely used my $3000 Windows desktop... All this time later, I have almost exclusively switched to the Mac."

well...

PRO - you won't be using windows
CON - Your sexual preference could come into question...not that theres anythign wrong with that of course

Re:well...

Your sexual preference could come into question

That's right. Once you stop using Windows, people won't think you're so gay.

To: Mac Users

Really, there's nothing wrong with being straight.

Re:well...

Sexual preference?

Look, man, I love my mac.. but even I won't take it THAT far.
Besides, they don't have a port for that yet.

Re:well...

Well... [fu-fme.com]

Re:well...

Take that as evidence of Macs lagging behind in the technology stakes then. After all, Windows boxen have plenty of holes that allow them to be thoroughly fucked...

bytesex

Most guys here prefer having sex with their computers over women anyways. quad GPU, raid0, dual core rigs. how can women compete really.

Re:well...

So let me get this straight. What you are basically saying is "Don't judge them by what they do, judge them by what they say!".

It seems to me that you need a good beating with a clue-stick if this is your position in everyday life. Now, it might just happen to be true in this specific case, with this specific company, in this specific time-period. And you may have other data to back this assumption up with. But from the data presented so far, I would consider the closed DRM-enabled platform with more skepticism then a competing open platform.

stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

First, it isn't 10 Pros, and 10 Cons, it's 10 Pros and Cons (which I guess is technically what the article "says").

I recently ordered and am expecting a Nov 29 ship date (why?) for a new Mac Mini, the very first Mac I'll have ever owned. I'd never hesitated in the past to recommend to friends and family an Apple over a Windows box, and those who chose Mac virtually never came back with support issues.

As the blogger states, he's never looked back - my reasons for getting a Mac are more for being able to test my software on all platforms. I will review my experiences in my journal when the box gets here and I've burned it in for a few laps. I'm looking forward to it.

For the record, though the author loves his machine, I'd guess anyone considering today a Mac should look at a heftier configuration. (I'm getting the dual-core, super drive, 2G memory, 160G drive configuration.) I guessing I'll be happy with this box.

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

Well, when it comes to switching, it tends to mean that you liked the thing you switched to more than the thing you switched from. In this case, preferring Macs to Windows.

Uses for "I never looked back!"

"I just backed over a family of four in my SUV, and I never looked back!"

"I was miraculously born with no neck, and I never looked back!"

and so on...

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

We shouldn't have to expend the energy and time to critically examine our religion as we do OS choices. It's just a religion for crying out loud.

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

True, isn't the whole point of the article that he is now looking back and comparing the Mac to his old Windows PC?

Re:It wasn't that unbalanced.

I keep hearing this I don't get what the problem with 512 Megs is on Mac OS. My iBook has 512 Megs and runs fine. I mostly run Firefox, terminal, text editors and OOo (in X) on it (at the same time even) and never really felt memory constrained. OTOH if I had known beforehand how much disk space OS X eats, I wouldn't have gotten a 30GB model. Of course if you're going to do heavy graphics work, or simulation, or somesuch, things might be different, but it's not really platform specific...

This being said, and while OS X mostly runs fine despite a few annoying bugs (no showstoppers), I still find KDE way more comfortable to use. Notably because of much better network integration and the fact that windows don't have to be in front to get focus (none of this is really KDE specific though, more a Unix desktop thing).

Re: never looked back

Never trust the opinion of someone who "never looked back". When did the phrase "I never looked back" become a way to endorse a product?

Worked for Lot. Too bad about his wife...

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

I was required to use a brand new Mac Mini (1.66GHz Core Duo with 512MB RAM) as a research scientist with a major government lab last summer during an internship. My background involves working primarily on Windows XP Pro (on my laptop) and Debian on my desktop in my former research laboratory. I found the Mac to be unimpressive compared to both of my other experiences, and personally, would not ever purchase one for myself or a member of my family.

The rationale for this is broad and based solely on my own user experiences with that machine and with my supervisor's Dual G5 Power Macintosh (with 8GB of RAM, which was nice for the 3D modeling we were performing). I'm not going to troll and say Mac is better for everyone or Windows or Debian is better for everyone, I just think that articles like this are useful for seeing what people like and dislike in an OS. There are some things I like a great deal about each OS - Debian has never... ever... crashed on me (My Mac Mini did it regularly, as did my supervisor's Mac, with the "Sorry, an error has occurred" box popping up in 5 or 6 languages on an almost daily basis) - maybe we both just had lemon hardware, though. Windows is nice because of its broad compatibility and user base for support.

Example: I was trying to burn a DVD using the Mac Mini. I was using some new Memorex 16x compatible DVD+R discs that the lab had purchased. Our lab has a policy of burning the data at a low speed - 1x or 2x - since some IT guy decided it ensures the best chance of a successful write. Anyway, I try to burn the CD using Mac OS's built in software - basically by dragging and dropping files on the DVD, then clicking the "record" button once I'm done. I set the record speed to 1x. The system hums along for about 2 minutes... then pops up with an archaic error: "There has been an error recording the disc. Code 0x981fa192." or something like that. We tried 2 other DVD+R discs. Neither worked. Searched google for the error - couldn't find it. Searched Apple's support site for the error - couldn't find it. Finally, using Yahoo and searching through the archives of a forum (forget its name at the moment) we discovered what the error means: The disc is incompatible with a 1x burn speed, you must select a speed of 2x or higher. That's simplicity for you, I guess. I have other examples of why the Mac still hasn't won me over, and I'd be happy to elaborate on them if anyone is interested. But I knew that if I just posted with a single statement on this OS in particular, people would fire back with more childish comments about "but see how bad it is on Windows or OS/2 or whatever else you want to list!?!?!?" type accusations. I'll be less verbose in talking about the problems with the other two OS's... see:

Example of how I dislike Debian: Try updating anything to the latest version. Period.

Example of how I dislike Windows: Do I really need to list all the reasons?

The point of all this is that with each iteration of the operating systems, features are added, refined, removed, and rethought based on experiences like those had by the author of this article. It's not valid for someone to sit back in their chair and say "This OS (put your favorite OS's name here) is the best one for everyone." It's like saying a particular model vehicle is most fitting for every individual. It's great to see that there is such dedication to the various camps, but I think that sometimes people need to just calm down, look at things rationally, and think about what this means as a whole for the future. It's just childish to post so many "plonk, sounds like you're describing Linux!" or "plonk, sounds like you finally saw the light and experienced the semi-religious conversion to Apple-dom," comments. Grow up, Slashdot.

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

"Our lab has a policy of burning the data at a low speed - 1x or 2x - since some IT guy decided it ensures the best chance of a successful write.

Your IT guy doesn't know what he is talking about. Burning discs at an ultra low speed will not necessarily make the quality of the burn better, and it may even make it worse. With DVDs you should burn at the speed the media is rated at. If that results in bad discs, you should bump the speed down to the next slowest speed. Once you reach a speed where the data is readable in other DVD drives, then you should probably just stick with that speed.

The CD burning software *should* be able to query the media/drive and get supported burning speeds for your drive/media combination, and it shouldn't let you select invalid speeds. I guess the burning software in OSX is deficient in that area.

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

Your IT guy doesn't know what he is talking about. Burning discs at an ultra low speed will not necessarily make the quality of the burn better, and it may even make it worse.

Nowadays, you're mostly correct, but the conventional wisdom was always slower = better, mostly because the faster you burn, the more errors are introduced.

Anyone who really cares should be willing to sacrifice a few discs to burn them at different speeds, then check the results with any of a variety of programs. [cdfreaks.com]

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

I was an intern for the government in a research lab - totally new to the world of the Mac. It was not my place to question long-standing policy on DVD media. I guess we all just figured that Macs are so user friendly, they would only allow a user to choose speeds compatible with the media inserted into the drive. Instead, the Mac produced an archaic error message that was less helpful than the average BSOD on a Windows machine. My fault in expecting a Mac to perform as asked or otherwise respond with a message telling me what is wrong if it is unable to comply. I guess that makes me, not the software, "retarded."

Sorry to say, but you're just the type of Mac user that keeps people who are actually interested in switching, but run into problems with their new Mac experience, from ever becoming a Mac user. It's the typical "Macs work great; say otherwise and YOU MUST BE THE PROBLEM" mentality that has always crippled Apple's campaigns to reach out to users of other platforms.

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

Example: I was trying to burn a DVD using the Mac Mini. I was using some new Memorex 16x compatible DVD+R discs that the lab had purchased. Our lab has a policy of burning the data at a low speed - 1x or 2x - since some IT guy decided it ensures the best chance of a successful write. Anyway, I try to burn the CD using Mac OS's built in software - basically by dragging and dropping files on the DVD, then clicking the "record" button once I'm done. I set the record speed to 1x.

And there's your problem - most higher speed disks don't contain a write strategy for 1x / 2x. Some 8x I've got here - Verbatim or TDK, I forget which - don't have any write strategies below 4x. That's actual write strategies, located in the extended data area - not the strategy stored in the drive and accessed by a MID lookup.

(In theory, 1x write strategy should be a standard across discs of all make. So say the rainbow books and, by extention, the DVD+-* standards. In practice, not so much...)

The right answer, the one your IT guy should already know if he has a clue, is to burn at the minimum speed the disc supports. I'm not familiar with the Memorex discs in question, but most 16x discs only contain write strategies for 4x - 16x.

"Write Strategies for high performance DVD+R/RW" [philips.com]

Re:stay tuned, I'm waiting for my new mini

Again, it wasn't my intention to insight a massive debate regarding the Mac's capabilities with regards to burning CD's. My intention was to prove that every platform has some problems. The fact that people are getting SO defensive about this, reverting to namecalling, saying the "IT guy has [no] clue" etc. just proves my point. If new Mac users are treated this way by people when they voice a problem or concern, why should I "join the club?" I can pop over to any of a thousand forums focused specifically on the Windows platform and obtain excellent help with the problems I encounter on that system - or even find more friendly support for problems with (gasp) Debian! People are saying "go talk to a Mac genius at a Mac store" and crap like that and that I'm the problem. The point is, if I try to burn a disc too slowly on a Mac, it should tell me that's the problem. Not produce the strange error I received.

And so, everyone attempts to justify and defend the helpless mac - it's my fault. It's the IT guy's fault. It's common sense to burn archival research data at a very high speed since that should work better than a lower speed (disregarding the prevalence of errors created in the data-set). OK, so I'm wrong and Mac is right. I still won't buy one after this experience or the dozens of others I had during my three month forced stint with a Mac which I did not elaborate on.

Lack of Mac Games is not a "Con"

You'll just be able to buy more of those $300 jeans with all the money you will save not buying games.

Re:Lack of Mac Games is not a "Con"

You'll just be able to buy more of those $300 jeans with all the money you will save not buying games.

Hang on... how much material do you think needs to go into the average Slashdotter's jeans?

Re:Lack of Mac Games is not a "Con"

I agree, the lack of games isn't a con. After all, World of Warcraft runs on Macs, and isn't that the only game anyone is playing nowadays anyway? :P

Re:Lack of Mac Games is not a "Con"

WoW players would comment, but they're too busy at the moment.

$3,000[!]

A $3,000 Windows desktop?! Fucking gamers...

Re:$3,000[!]

It's Australian dollars, not real money.

Re:$3,000[!]

How is that a problem? Some people do not want to build their own machine, how much is your time worth? Some do not know how. Others just have a lot of money, and some just need their computer to look like a giant alien head.

Re:$3,000[!]

As someone already mentionned, its a matter of what your time is worth to you.

Example: I built my own machine, AND paid 3000$ for the thing. Obviously at the time it was a total monster in that case. #1 I regreted building it myself, because when shit hits the fan, I had to maintain it. However, thats not my point here. #2 The reason I spent so damn fucking much on a computer, is so I wouldn't have to deal with it. This box is like 4 years old (or something, I didn't keep track) and runs very, very respectably just about everything. Aka: I didn't have to upgrade it in 4 years, and its still an upper tier machine (save for the video card, and the only reason the video card has issues is Nvidia's rediculous DX9's implementation in their first batch of cards). And the way things are going (aside the video card), I still won't have to touch it for at least another year, while still running high end apps like Visual Studio and most games.

That buddy, when you have a busy life, is priceless.

Re:$3,000[!]

VS high end app? common I don't think you meant what you wrote there.

How about: Visual Studio is an ass-end app that requires a high-end machine to run.

Actually, if you change your editor settings to no longer track changes (the almost invisible green and yellow bars in the left-hand gutter that you don't pay attention to anyway) and if you disable the [mostly useless] navigation bar, VS performance almost improves. Of course, there is no fix for the mysteriously obstinate Properties dockbar that stays pinned no matter how many times you click the damned button. Don't even get me started on "Pending Checkins".

This post has made me so depressed, I think I'm going to go install Eclipse, Mono, and be done with it.

Re:$3,000[!]

Ridiculous. Not Rediculous. Please.

Oh man, are you going to be busy round here. Just try not to loose sight of the discussion! ;-)

Re:$3,000[!]

I'm assuming he means $3k AU since he mentions how much the mac cost in Australian dollars earlier in the blurb. 3k Aussie dollars is about 2275 [yahoo.com] USD, still a bundle but....

a step above any Linux distro ?

"The GUI: It didn't take me long to get used to it. It is super smooth, even on the cheap Mac Mini .. It makes Windows XP look very late-nineties."

"It's Unix!: You've got a very, very nice GUI but under the hood is good ole' Unix"

"It is only when you open the Terminal and get to a shell that you see all the ancient Unix directory structures, combined with Apple's more hip and happening directory names like Applications, System, etc"

"Notice I didn't say anything about viruses, trojans, spy-ware? I haven't been infected in three months on the Apple .. I don't run as an administrator. This simple action protects you from about 99% of malicious software. It is a simple fact."

"unless you are a rabid freedom-fighter it is a step above any Linux distribution out there. KDE and GNOME are still a long way away from achieving the polish that Apple has delivered with Mac OS X"

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

"unless you are a rabid freedom-fighter it is a step above any Linux distribution out there. KDE and GNOME are still a long way away from achieving the polish that Apple has delivered with Mac OS X"

One man's polish is another man's useless eye candy... Some of us enjoy having a simple, uncluttered, low color, high contrast GUI. And a terminal.

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

I disagree. Polish is the art of making less seem more. It's a time-intensive process and isn't really one geeks do very well - it's that indefinable quality that makes good closed-source software feel good. Don't get me wrong, I'm used to gnome and KDE, and they're impressive efforts, but they've not had hundreds of focus groups full of arts students and old ladies.

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

No shit. When I read the part about dragging text from the browser to the desktop in OS X and it actually created the file for you I was thinking of my mom (i.e. an old lady). Mom has never been able to grasp the concept of cut-and-paste despite my many attempts to teach her. A few times she seemed to be able to do it then would forget. I even gave her a keyboard (Logitech) that indicated "copy" and "paste" on the "c" and "v" keys to no avail. Kudos to Apple for having productive focus groups that must have included old ladies because a room full of *nix geeks would never have come up with that. Instead, it would have probably become an arguement over the lusers that couldn't freakin' cut and paste like everyone else. :-)

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

Gnome.

Now, if only it put the file where you actually dragged the text to, instead of in a completely different place that you can't see so you think it didn't do anything.

Which kinda reinforces the original point. Even when Gnome does get the functionality right, the implementation is wrong.

But that's so much more work

Put it this way. Say your system has 100 features, and your "polish" level is such that the average user can understand half of them. Effectively it has 50 features. To reach 70 available features you can either improve the polish to 70%, or implement 40 new features.

And I claim that for the vast majoriy of software, doing the actual "polish" work is much more bang for the buck.

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

Let's see, OSX's interface is...

simple..............check
uncluttered.......check
low color...........most interface elements are black/white/grey, so check
high contrast.....if not enough so, you can increase the contrast, I suppose, so check
has a terminal...check

So you're an OSX fan, then?

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

Polish is not "eye candy". Eye candy is merely flashiness. Polish is everything being intentionally designed, fully thought out, finished. Something can have a lot of eye candy but still be very rough & incomplete. Something can be polished yet very visually simple (though certainly designed). "Eye candy" is often a way to compensate for, or distract from, a lack of polish.

A few good examples of what people mean by polish are in TFA under #8 "Lots of other nice little things". Not a single one of them is "eye candy" they are not even related to visual design at all... but they are exactly what people mean when they say that Mac OS X is polished.

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

How vain do you have to be to prefer a nice GUI to having several hundred dollars in your pocket?

vain: [reference.com] excessively proud of or concerned about one's own appearance, qualities, achievements, etc.; conceited: a vain dandy.

It's not vain to want a nice GUI. First because people don't usually show their GUI off, it's something they use, unlike say a flashy car or clothes (although those don't necessarily reflect vanity).

A nice GUI is useful to some people. It's not just about the shiny buttons, but it works differently/better. The GUI is part of the function of the software, so to say it's "vain" to want a nice GUI is to say that it's "vain" to want nice software.

And some might say wanting "several hundred dollars in your pocket" is a "vain" act, anyway.

Re:a step above any Linux distro ?

Um My Mac earned me more money then I spent for it. Even though in reality my Mac was cheaper then any other system out there with the same specs with a good enough reliability rating. Just by using a Mac and getting use to the extra Nice GUI, it help me make better GUI's for my customer applications. Even for windows applications. Actually the time it takes me to make these advancement to the app over time adds up to be more then if I didn't have a Mac. Also Mac Interface make sure that I am spending more time on Billable Hours (Handy for Commission based Jobs) and less time on Non-Billable time for me to say research the name of the CD Burner software that came with my Linux Distribution, or having to download install it, figure out how it works, test it. Time is Money, The Less time I am focusing on stupid tasks that the computer should do easy anyways, vs spending more time on actuall work. Makes me more money and my powerbook well earned it extra $100 (Which it wasn't)

Why I dropped MacOS in favor of Linux

The primary reason was the hardware. I don't mean this in the sense that I have a particular affinity for homebuilds, or that there aren't any other reasons. The cost was simply prohibitive with Apple, and this was big enough to cut short any consideration I might have otherwise given to the platform, regardless of merit.

I needed a workstation, but I have no use for a quad-core machine, so a Core 2 Duo or Athlon64 could easily meet my needs. I also needed a large RAID array and a scratch disk, as well as other things like multiple ethernet ports, PCI/PCI-E slots, and so forth. With Apple hardware, the only way to get what I want is to spend large amounts of money on stuff that won't benefit me (like that extra Xeon). When I tried to price out a Mac Pro to meet the same requirements it couldn't be done without more than doubling the price. Even if I were willing to go around upgrading the thing with cheaper 3rd party hard drives, RAM, etc, that stuff wouldn't be covered by Apple's warranty, and that's a big downside for me. Even then, it would still cost thousands more, and it wouldn't even be that much easier than a homebuild when all was said and done.

A secondary reason was that I've had an iBook up until recently, and getting the various *nix software I need was significantly more annoying there. A good distro's package manager will have many times the selection of the Mac alternatives such as Fink and Darwin Ports, and the time I spent compiling the missing stuff by hand on MacOS was significant. This easily overwhelms any savings of effort that I might have gotten from MacOS initially, and that's not even that much with easy distros like Ubuntu. I'm not a rabid freedom fighter, I just know empirically it's a lot more trouble for me to use MacOS.

Another way this advantage applies is that the software I need comes almost entirely from one place. With MacOS, it was a mix of Fink, Darwin Ports, stuff I've compiled myself, various .sit and .dmg files downloaded from various websites (Apple, VersionTracker, etc), and so on. With Ubuntu, it's all available from a single interface. One front end handles all the installations, removals, and updates. Even proprietary things like video card drivers and Sun's Java are handled this way. This cuts way down on the time it takes me to get a system set up with all the various apps I need. Downloading something from VersionTracker isn't difficult, but doing that over and over again for dozens of different things takes a significant chunk of time. With Ubuntu, I've found that I don't need to do it all at once, because clicking a checkbox and clicking "apply" in Synaptic takes seconds -- installing an app is barely more difficult than lanching it, and making a list of things I need would be more trouble than installing them when I notice they're missing.

I've seen what Macs have to offer, and I don't think I'd be interested even if it didn't cost so much more to meet my needs.

Migrate to GNU/Linux and have more pros than cons

Our company did last year, city of Vienna did, it should work out very nicely for you too. Our former XP users love KDE.

No need to put yourself through pains when you can improve security, save money and achieve a good deal of vendor independence all at the same time. Why exchange overpriced software (Microsoft) for overpriced hardware (Apple), when you can run Free software on the industry standard (and thus inexpensive) hardware?

Knowing everything I know now, I only regret that we did not migrate to GNU/Linux sooner.

Ex-Linux desktop user...

You know, I get more and more sick of postings like this.

No need to put yourself through pains when you can improve security, save money and achieve a good deal of vendor independence all at the same time. Why exchange overpriced software (Microsoft) for overpriced hardware (Apple), when you can run Free software on the industry standard (and thus inexpensive) hardware?

Don't get me wrong, I liked the Linux desktop, but I switched back to Win2k before ultimately moving to OS X. Free software is excellent when it's available. Even on Windows, I used loads of free software. If your company does a lot of office work, Linux is great. I've heard it's excellent for scientific work too. However, exactly how do you do things like desktop publishing, video editing and real graphics work (a la Illustrator and Photoshop). You don't.

Software availability has and will continue to cripple Linux on the desktop. People can scream about "choice" all they want and say, "See, I have 30 browsers to choose from (running a whole 2 rendering engines) and a bunch of IM clients, three office suits and a program that makes a pair of shifty eyes sit on my desktop. I even have two whole major desktop environments to choose from!" Of course, you have zero choices for much of the above mentioned software.

Linux works where it works, but just like Windows or Mac, it's not the be all, end all nor is it a universal solution.

Mac OS X vs. Ubuntu

Probably more relevent to the /. crowd would be this article from someone that switched to Ubuntu from OS X and then went back to OS X:

http://digg.com/apple/Mac_OS_X_vs_Ubuntu [digg.com]

Let me say that if I could go into a store right now and buy a reasonably priced copy of OX X that would run on a plain PC, I would be running OS X at the moment (Yes, I understand that running on *any* hardware would make OS X less stable, but I would be willing to take the risk...and huge amounts of people would rather pay more for Apple's hardware and stability, and I wish Apple could see that and make us both happy).

But since that isn't going to happen, I'm really considering going to Ubuntu because I think MS is just going insane with Vista.

As the above mention, he doesn't think Ubuntu is too far behind OS X.

I would be interested in hearing others thoughts on this?

Transporter_ii

Re:Mac OS X vs. Ubuntu

I installed Ubuntu this Monday. I really had to hammer at it to get the programs I wanted installed and get settings the way I wanted them. Linux still has a way to go before the average Joe will be able to pick it up and use it...

My first problem resulted from Ubuntu's installer assuming my system clock was set to GMT and not asking me. When I corrected the clock +4 hours from the LiveCD's meddling and installed Ubuntu, it adjusted my clock +4 more! I didn't notice until I had worked with Ubuntu off my hard drive for a bit. When I set the clock back -4... I was locked out of SUDO! This restriction would have to be lifted or at least EXPLAINED to the average user who is not going to understand why he must wait 4 hours to perform any administrative actions. Not to mention the fix is not intuitive... I had to adjust my clock +4 again, run sudo -k to kill my sudo timestamp, and finally set my clock correctly. Then sudo worked again. No way the average user could have done that.

Also the lack of up-to-date precompiled packages (Wine package is still back at 0.9.9, ScummVM 0.8.0) for my favorite programs was annoying enough for me to have to search out more recent binaries... now I really like the Linux idea of putting program files in /bin (which is also in the path env... ooh Linux has Windows beat on this!), settings in /etc, user settings in ~, etc etc. But most precompiled binaries aren't like this! They just throw everything in one directory... so if I want these "distributed" files, I need to compile from source and make install (right? well that was my solution >.>).

Also Linux will need out-of-the-box support for Windows apps. This is critical for it's success, I believe, as if you tell a Windows user he can migrate to Linux without having to give up any of his favorite programs while gaining all the advantages of Linux... well I think that would help alot.

Currently Wine seems OK, but it still has some problems with XP profiles (it tries to use hardcoded 9x profile paths... I can't figure out how to override them) MDI dialogs (they don't work quite right, fooling around with them crashes wine) and fonts (I can't get a font dialog to pop up, font changing doesn't work in my favorite app...).

Furthermore, I still haven't gotten some things to work QUITE right (Cedega overwrites Wine when I make install it! And it's broken... it complains a SO can't be found. I'll probably figure this out eventually). Also when I built Firefox 2 and Thunderbird 2, they ended up with the internal names "Bon Echo" and "Mail/News Client"... bah... plus Ubuntu's Firefox 1.5 and Thunderbird 1.5 have different program names than my compiled versions, so the old ones still occasionally pop up when another program runs them...

Re:Mac OS X vs. Ubuntu

Also Linux will need out-of-the-box support for Windows apps. This is critical for it's success

IBM's OS/2 had that. That was one thing that led to its demise. Ability to use MSOffice fles is fairly useful though. And Vista will have a whole new set of APIs and supporting apps that use them will be a huge task.

Re:Mac OS X vs. Ubuntu

Let me say that if I could go into a store right now and buy a reasonably priced copy of OX X that would run on a plain PC, I would be running OS X at the moment (Yes, I understand that running on *any* hardware would make OS X less stable, but I would be willing to take the risk...and huge amounts of people would rather pay more for Apple's hardware and stability, and I wish Apple could see that and make us both happy).

But since that isn't going to happen, I'm really considering going to Ubuntu because I think MS is just going insane with Vista.

Actually, you can get OS X to run natively on a PC [uneasysilence.com]. You just need to ask yourself if its worth the trouble. I'd think you're better off just getting a Mac mini.

As the above mention, he doesn't think Ubuntu is too far behind OS X. I would be interested in hearing others thoughts on this?

There's no doubt that Mac is more polished and more user-friendly. But Ubuntu is a complete, polished, intuitive, full-featured environment. Provided you're not using non-standard hardware, pretty much everything works straight out of the box with very little tweaking.

In fact, Ubuntu on my laptop handles the various power-saving modes (sleep, hibernation) flawlessly and with no special configuration, whereas Windows XP would sometimes sleep, sometimes not, and refuse to come out of hibernation if and when it hibernated (which often had little bearing on how, or even if, it was configured to hibernate).

Much in contrast to a Windows install, the Ubuntu install is fast, easy, intuitive, contains all the software you'll need, doesn't require multiple reboots and separate installation (with more reboots) for installing software and device drivers, and doesn't require yet further instalalation and reboots for OS and software updates.

Last time I had to reinstall Windows after a drive failure it took over three hours and no fewer than 10 reboots to get the system installed (reboot), upgraded (reboot), upgraded to SP2 (reboot), updated again (reboot), install/update drivers (reboot), install Office XP (reboot), update to Office 2003 (reboot), security and other Office updates (reboot), more Windows updates since I now had Office installed (reboot), etc. Installing other necessary software required more reboots.

My last Ubuntu install (incidentally, my first) took all of 45 minutes start-to finish with OS and all software installed and upgraded. Much simpler than any other Linux I've installed (FC3, FC4, RHEL, Mandriva, SuSE) and in a completely different league than Microsoft.

But don't take my word. Try it out for yourself [ubuntu.com]. Installation is even easier with Automatix [getautomatix.com] for adding bits that aren't in the core Ubuntu distribution like all the multimedia codecs and various packages that don't meet Ubuntu's strict libre-only policy.

Re:Mac OS X vs. Ubuntu

Here are some brief thoughts on OSX vs. Ubuntu. My wife has a Macbook Pro running OS X, and I have an Acer Aspire laptop running Ubuntu 6.06, so I've had a chance to use both.

Macbook Pro:

* Nice eye candy, some people like the way windows do that slurpy thing when you minimize them, etc. Personally I don't like the dock, find it a bit big, clunky, and lacking real information about what programs I have open.
* Most everything 'just works' the way it's supposed to. If you can get into the "Mac way" of doing things, eg, iphoto, itunes, etc. then you'll be right at home. The drawbacks are that OSX is not very customizable the way Gnome (the default Ubuntu desktop environment) is.
* Terminal application is somewhat lacking. It has basic features but cannot be customized very much. If you do a lot of work on the command line you'll probably want a third-party terminal application to get your real work done.
* The wireless setup is not straightforward, and if you're not used to it can be a bit confusing.
* If you want an office suite, you have to pay quite a bit extra to get it. MS Office for Mac is something like $379 or so. If you're a student you might get it for less.

Ubuntu:

* Easy installer, even on newer hardware seems to work well. I had out-of-the-box wifi connection with the Atheros chipset adapter in my laptop, even with WPA and WEP. I've never had a Linux laptop working wifi before I tried Ubuntu.
* If you install EasyUbuntu, you'll have most of the proprietary codecs and other stuff that most people want to be able to watch DVDs, see Flash movies, play mp3s, etc.
* Takes a bit more hands-on tweaking to get it working exactly the way you want, but is much more flexible and customizable than OS X.
* The office type applications are finally getting to the point where a business user or student can be productive with them. For example, Evolution (the Outlook clone) has come a long way as far as usability goes, and it syncs just fine with my Palm Pilot.
* Free (as in beer).
* There are a few downsides. You won't be able to run some Windows-only applications without an emulator, but I guess that could be said for Macs as well. Also, with any Linux distribution you pretty much have to learn some command line to really be able to use your system to it's full potential.

Re:Mac OS X vs. Ubuntu

You must be joking.

"* Terminal application is somewhat lacking. It has basic features but cannot be customized very much. If you do a lot of work on the command line you'll probably want a third-party terminal application to get your real work done."

The defaults are stupid, but once you get it setup with white text on a black background and a reasonable font, it's pretty equivalent to Konsole for me. Konsole has the terminals in a nice tabbed bar that are nameable, while the Mac version just has different floaty windows, but the two operations I do (new terminal window and next/prev terminal window) are identical in behaviour.

"* The wireless setup is not straightforward, and if you're not used to it can be a bit confusing."

You just be joking. MacOS wireless is the easiest wireless I've ever setup. Even doing complex LEAP/PEAP stuff is yonks easier than on Windows. And don't talk to me about Linux wireless -- that's just a fucking joke.

"* If you want an office suite, you have to pay quite a bit extra to get it. MS Office for Mac is something like $379 or so. If you're a student you might get it for less."

Or you could get iWork for 49$ [wikipedia.org]. It's got what you're most likely needing (advanced page layout and presentation software) unless you're sitting down to do serious spreadsheet work, which would require Excel. Apple's supposed to be adding a spreadsheet application at some point. I expect it to be as well thought out and designed as Keynote and Pages, and will happily upgrade.

"* Takes a bit more hands-on tweaking to get it working exactly the way you want, but is much more flexible and customizable than OS X."

You know, a large number of people don't change the defaults. I'm unconvinced it's that much of a big deal for people to make some small adjustments in how they work, especially when it allows you to be a lot more productive overall.

"* The office type applications are finally getting to the point where a business user or student can be productive with them. "

I'm going to talk about Keynote v3 here. I arrived at a presentation I was giving with my notes ready, but found I'd be standing on a platform far away from my laptop. Solution? I quickly customized the presenter display so that my laptop would show my presenter notes in 48pt font, and then pulled out my Apple remote which I could use to control slide next/previous while giving my talk. How awesome is that? It just works -- that's Apple.

I've yet to see anything that approaches their iWork suite in terms of being useful for me. Pages is a lot like LaTeX, except that it's easy to make your pages not be printed in Times New Roman (I've written 4 papers in TeX, and still don't know how to make it sans serif). In Pages, I just change the styles in the styles drawer, which are applied to the paragraphs/etc/tagged with that style. You can easily import/export from things like MS Word or PDF, and generally have full control of your document easily -- despite it being a GUI! Plus, I've yet to fight with it like I remember fighting with MSWord autoformatting when I learned to use word processors a decade ago.

iWork is not old -- the first iteration was released in 2005. Why is Linux office software stuck copying MS ideas when Apple so quickly put out a different suite and had it work so well?

Not that much of a sucker

Since then, I have been a sucker for every upgrade -- 95, 98, NT 4.0, 2000, XP...

He at least had the good sense to skip Windows ME.
 

Re:Not that much of a sucker

"He at least had the good sense to skip Windows ME."

That's implicit in his statement. He said he took every upgrade...

Cheers,
Ian

Huge Mac con: mouse acceleration sucks

God I hate the mouse acceleration on my Mac Mini. Either you set the acceleration high so you don't need, you know, the entire desk to move the mouse a reasonable distance at the loss of fine movements, or you set the acceleration low so that you gain precision at the cost of having to drag and drop the mouse a few dozen times to get the cursor across the desktop. Windows doesn't have this problem. If you move the mouse a tiny amount your cursor moves in tandem; move it a lot and so does the cursor. Wow. Why can't my Mac do that? It's so retarted.

Don't get me wrong here, I love my Mac, but the mouse thing drives me nuts.

Mouse Acceleration Solution

To solve the Apple's mouse acceleration problem, install a utility called SteerMouse or better yet, buy a third party mouse like Microsoft and Logitech and use their driver. Then your mouse acceleration will be just like Windows. Switchers are always complaining about this and rightly so, it's a pain if you aren't used to it.

Re:2nd Mac con:The Theme/Fonts are Not Handicap-Re

Finder > View > Font size.

For looks

I'm buying my Mom an iMac, for the sole reason it's SEXY. It's slim, compact, and doesn't make alot of noise. Better tha the dell portable desktop they just made. Macs are like computing with a built in safety net. You can almost never break it. The only people I know that hate windows are the poor souls that manage to still run AOL, download weather bug, and install every piece of software that wants to install itself. I run windows XP, with firewall and firefox, and I watch what I download. My virus infection rate? 0. People need to LEARN how to surf, instead of just going out there all willynilly.

Re:For looks

I'm buying my Mom an iMac, for the sole reason it's SEXY.

Your dad isn't doing it for her?

Getting used to...

This are done slightly differently on OSX than on Windows. Getting used to adequately use OSX takes time and experience. This can be frustrating. It *really* helps if you have friends who can help you make the best out of the OS.

One simple example. I love Spotlight. This feature changes the way we work with computers. If you switch from Windows and no one told you to try if that feature is for you, than you're missing one potential benefit for switching. Same for many other features. Mail is very good too (I'm an open source fanboy, but hey, I'll use the best free/open tools available :-).

Be curious. Try things. Discover your new OS. Maybe the icons view is not for you and you'll prefer the column view? It's worthed to attend to some Mac User Groups in your area. They'll be able to show you some nice tricks, and, important, answer the questions you have. (oh, there's some great mac-oriented mailing lists for that too)

Switching is *not* that easy, especially if you're not a geek (but since this is /. ...). Learn, ask questions. After a time, you'll probably like your mac more than your windows machine. Why? It depends. Generally, it's for the details. The little intuitive things that makes you happier using a Mac.

Upgradability?

I'm enticed by the new iMacs -- particularly that juicy looking 24" -- but it would appear that it's impossible to add hardware to those machines. Over the years, I've gotten used to extending the life of a PC by upgrading components like memory, vidcard, etc. I get the impression that few MacHeads do things that way. I'm not sure I could get used to that way of life, since I love to tinker, and it's kept my last desktop machine usable since early 2002 and it's still my main workhorse. I'm guessing that the Pro models are more upgradable, but those prices(!) keep me from making that jump. Has anyone managed to open up a new imac and replace a hdd or the like?

Re:Upgradability?

We don't do component upgrades often because they are less necessary in the Mac world. For the last five years we have enjoyed an OS where version n+1 runs (or at least "feels") faster than version n did on the same hardware. The only thing that really needs to be added internally to most Macs is RAM. For more HD space, that's what those nice FireWire and USB 2 connections are for. And when it comes to video-- let's be honest, what really drives video card upgrades on the Windows side of the fence? The latest flavor-of-the-month GPU-hungry game, that's what. Like it or not, this is still not much of an issue on the Mac side. When a (consumer-level) Mac user really wants better video performance, their existing machine is probably a couple years old... They'll likely just buy a new Mac and throw the old one up on eBay to offset the cost. Since migrating your stuff to a new machine is a completely automated and (IME) painless process, and since Macs retain their resale value much better, it's a quite palatable option.

~Philly

Re:Upgradability?

I'm enticed by the new iMacs -- particularly that juicy looking 24" -- but it would appear that it's impossible to add hardware to those machines. Over the years, I've gotten used to extending the life of a PC by upgrading components like memory, vidcard, etc.

The Mac world mindset is different, for one very basic reason. An out-of-the-box Macintosh has all the hardware (most) people need: built-in Bluetooth, wifi, USB, FireWire, DVD burning, etc. There's little need to have an upgradable machine because each Mac has just about everything already.

RAM and hard drive are the only components people really upgrade. RAM is pretty easy in all Macs. Hard drives (and optical drives) can be done, sometimes easily and sometimes not so much. I've personally replaced hard drives in "non-upgradable" iBooks and PowerBooks with little effort.

Video cards are really the main stumbling point of the closed Mac models. But the 24" iMac has an upgradable video card, so expect to see some third-party offerings eventually. Or go with the Mac Pro, which is the upgradable tower Mac. The reality is, though, that 3D gaming lags on the Mac platform and you probably don't need the hottest video cards for the available games. If you're into professional video or something you'd be wanting a Mac Pro anyway, where you can swap out the video card.

OS X Satisfaction Chart

One of my fellow goons created this to illustrate the mentality of someone going through the Windows > OS X switch, and I thought it was relevant to this discussion, as it perfectly illustrates the joy and agony of moving from one platform to another:

The OS X Satisfaction Chart [stunningabsurdity.com]

Re:Disappointed

It is just as slow, crashy, inconvinient and annoying as the rest (With a few less annoying "update me" popups than Windows, perhaps).

I've never known anyone to consider OS X as crash-prone as Windows.

Expose is cool, and the smooth movements of some appearing windows (rather than a one-frame screen-update) is also nice. But these are the only 2 serious improvements I've seen. Things are still very slow to launch, programs crash, and things fail for configuration reasons.

Programs are slow, crash-prone and things can be misconfigured? That's obviously the OS's fault!

It doesn't have any easy and useful way of exposing available keyboard shortcuts (as in KDE's readily available shortcut settings dialogs, Emacs's show-keybindings command, etc).

The keyboard shortcuts are listed directly next to the menu option in drop-down menus. Example [stunningabsurdity.com]

For people with a background of both Windows and KDE, who had no troubles with either or with Gnome/etc, it is still very difficult to figure out how to make shortcuts to applications, copy files (rather than make shortcuts), etc.

It's under the FILE [stunningabsurdity.com] menu under "Make Alias" and in the right-click contextual menu [stunningabsurdity.com] under "Make Alias". I'm not sure how this could be implemented in a more effective manner.

All in all, the Mac is yet-another-lousy-GUI, in my opinion.

A computer is not a GUI.

Disclaimer: I'm a KDE fan [though I believe all of today's GUIs, including KDE are very lousy], and not too fond of closed-source applications in general.

I think you mean to say "It's different from what I'm used to and it's closed-source, therefore I hate it."

Re:Disappointed

OS X is one of the few OS's to allow total customization of keyboard short-cuts. You can assign almost any combination to any menu item on any program. The downside is you have to do it from System Preferences. Although MacOS has always been mouse centric, it's actually more keyboard-friendly than windows or even linux (Gnome is only now getting good keyboard shortcut access via atk and other accessibility things). Shortcuts are very consistent and work in almost every program. Command-Q to quit, Command-W to close the window, Command-H to hide the entire app (very useful -- almost eliminates the need for multiple desktops when combined with expose and command-tab), Command-S to save, command-O to open, etc.

One thing that annoyed me to no end was the apparent lack of a way to communicate with dialog boxes using only the keyboard. Most of the time command-first letter works, but often it doesn't. I found that if I turn on some of the accessibility options in system preferences, suddenly I can tab between buttons and use the space bar to activate buttons (enter always activates the default button, not the one you're highlighting).

Knowing about how to set shortcuts, the default shortcuts, and the accessibility options has really made OS X more efficient on the keyboard for me than any other OS (well almost -- I still like activating menus on linux and windows with alt-letter). Certainly it's not as bad you illustrate.

I agree that all GUIs are lousy to a degree. Case in point is CAD software. The old autocad shortcuts (still available on autocad to this day) are the way to fly. Puck in one hand, 2 and 3 letter shortcuts in the other. Modern GUIs just don't lend themselves well to CAD.

Unpopular on slashdot

I use on a daily basis: Mac OS/X Tiger, Ubuntu, Fedora Core and Windows XP Pro. I consider myself an advanced user and a very good sysadmin on many platforms. I still prefer Windows.... - why? I'm not sure myself! (No I do not work for Microsoft). I've been trying to switch to OS/X as a primary OS admitting that it's driven mostly because of peer pressure - it's just not happening for me. I don't feel that compelled to switch - I don't see a good reason and I'm being opening minded about it, I feel like it's much more trouble than it's worth. Is there anyone else that feels the same way? I feel alone!

Re:Unpopular on slashdot

You're not alone, at least we are two :-)

I had the same experience - Mac's are slick, better looking and all, but to me it just seems like their GUI is designed for idiots that like eyecandy. Stuff that would take me two clicks to accomplish in windows takes me four clicks to accomplish on a Mac. It just isn't as great as it is made out to be, at least not if you use it as a professional tool, and are more interested in getting things done than in awing at the amazing graphics...

Just my opinion ;-)

I go back and forth

I also use Windows XP, Mac OS X, and Ubuntu Linux on a daily basis- desktop, laptop, and server, respectively.

There is something about Windows XP that just makes me feel efficient. I can get things done really quickly. If I need to do any sort of tedious computing task, I'd like to do it on windows.

However, sometimes I get in a "mac" mood and want to use my laptop. But as flashy and cool as it is, everything usually feels clumsy and cumbersome. Simple tasks seem to have many steps and seem to take longer. I feel like I am swimming in molassas, as opposed to water with windows. But it's a warm and comfortable molassas.

Ubuntu is bringing a very polished product to the table. If open source ever catches up with applications and drivers, Ubuntu could be a very real choice for many people. Linux was my primary OS on and off through college. Mark Shuttleworth is doing a great service to the public with Ubuntu. If I ever made it big time like he did, bringing high quality open source applications to Linux (video editing, etc.) would be high on my list. As they stand, Linux applications are simply too limited/unstable for my daily needs which include music and video production.

I still think that a mac is an excellent choice for the "casual computer user," due in no small part to the fact that you can bring it back to that Apple store and they are going to fix it. Computers are complicated machines and they have problems. The Apple Store is not going to tell you it's a hardware problem and so it's not their fault. They're not going to tell you that it's a software problem so it's not their fault. They're going to fix it, and that's what casual computer users need - service and support.

The windows desktop/mac laptop/linux server setup has been working very well for me and satisfies all of my OS moods, so I will probably continue with this for a long while.

iMac G3 333 $35 at the GoodWill store !!

I couldn't pass it up. It's got 256 Megs of RAM OS-X 10.3. I use it, too, for checking how sites I design look on a Mac. Even given that it's old and a bit slow, the experience is not bad at all. I think a Mac Mini is in my future, too.

OSX Talks to Everyone

OSX gets along quite well with Linux (X11, Samba and ssh) and Windows (Remote desktop, Samba.) It also syncs to my Symbian 60 cell phone using bluetooth, can use the cellphone to connect to the Internet via bluetooth and does wireless networking on most Apple systems. It seems to be able to use those problematic Microsoft file formats and and you have your choice of DRMed and unDRMed media. It has a better selection of games than Linux does, though not as good a one as Windows does (No EVE Online client for OSX but you apparently can play WoW...) You also have tons of open source software that you can install on it.

Overall I'd say OSX is an excellent choice for Windows users who want the advantages of UNIX without having to learn arcane lore, for Linux users who need a laptop that will just work without requiring a virgin sacrifice during a full moon and for people who need to talk to a variety of different systems in a heterogenuous network. It's a bad choice for Microsoft executives, MCSEs or anyone else who makes a living on Windows being the dominant OS in the market. If you're somewhere in the middle you should probably pick OSX for the better security. It's not perfect, but any improvement is better than nothing.

Happy after Switch to OS X

I used to use Windows exclusively, with Linux at work when I had to. I recently got a Mac and figured that I'd still use Win32 most of the time. Boy was I wrong.

After using OS X for a few months, I'm very happy to use it *all* the time. My 'favorite' apps--Firefox, PowerPoint, Excel, Word, iTunes, PhotoShop--all run there. After I figured out the OS it seemed slick and easy to use compared to Windows. And the things I like about Unix are all there at the command line when I want them. Now my PC is for games only, and with the amount of hassle of PC gaming, it is second string there to consoles.

-m

Easier then switching to Vista...

When I got my Mac, the control panel and features gave me no problem whatsoever. Very neatly organized, common-sense names..... But when I tried Vista last, the control panel was terrible... Different then XP, but by no means more user friendly. Might have changed since when I tried it (Beta 2 or Pre-RC1), but doubtful....

Re:Not every switcher falls in love

You obviously didn't give it much of a chance. You can put the dock on the left, right, or bottom of the screen, AND you can have it hidden except when you bring your cursor to the side of the screen where it is located. It's a LOT better and more efficient than the Windows taskbar in pretty much every way imaginable.

Apple Overlooked The Shared Menu Bar

FTA

"On a 19" [monitor], the available screen space is used more efficiently - the shared menu bar and the dock being the main reasons."

Yeah, but on a Apple's 30" monitor it sucks. When you have a window open and positioned, say, in the lower RH corner and you need to access the menu bar, it is a long drag to move the mouse to the upper LH corner. And often you can accidentally click on the desktop or other window along the way and lose focus of the application's menu bar causing you to go back and repeat the procedure.

I like OSX but this design feature should be a user's choice.

x-tree

It sounds pretty rational to me. X-tree was a superior file interface to anything MS had. Even with MS Windows 3.1, it was a while before MS got it working as well as X-tree. IIRC, it was really the 'long filename' hack that made X-Tree kind of dated.

In the same way, MS Windows, if you run simple applications and games, was a very good choice, particularly through the 90's when people were migrating from Unix and Apple had trouble refreshing Mac OS. Now, however, with vista being increasingly delayed and features dropping away, Mac OS X is becoming a very viable alternative. It is here now, it works, it has a time tested CL interface, and in many ways there is much less vendor lock in than with MS. For instance, the OS Update does not require IE, although MS has gotten rid of that limitation in exchange for an update process that insures the User is running a version of MS Windows that MS believes is legitimate.

You know, I am on the other side of the fence. I appreciate MS for allowing a liberal development process which allows quick and dirty coding in the languages I know, particularly C and C++. But I never believed they were capable of producing an OS that would allow me to work without the OS getting in my way too much. Certainly MS Windows NT proved that they could, but it was never so good to make me move from my Mac. It does not look like MS Vista will do so either.

I couldn't agree with you more...

I have been a PC Wiindows(Microsoft) bubba for over 20 years. I have a taught many classes on PCs and Windows. I recently purchased a Mac Book Pro. I started off dual booting. After about a month I realized I was hardly ever booting to the PC side. I deleted the Windows side and reclaimed the space.

There is simply no good reason to get a PC. If you want to run Windows, fine, get a Mac and dual boot. At the least you double your chances of getting things done. It also makes you more versatile and more marketable. Apple was genius to first change to a BSD based OS and then to move to intel. The BSD based Mac OS X has the best of both worlds. Simply the best most powerful command line interface, and the most impressive and user friendly GUI.

I recently wrote and article for the Ins and Outs Magazine.

Viva La Revolution!

http://www.insandoutsmagazine.com/content_tek.html [insandoutsmagazine.com]

I advise all my clients and students that, if you are going to get a computer, get a mac. Once you go Mac, you will never go back! ;)

What do you want to do?

Since a computer is just a tool, it all depends what you want to do.

As a game player and game developer (PC, consoles), using a Mac would be a painful exercise in disaster.

But if it runs all of the applications you want, in a more user-friendly and efficient environment, then why not switch?

Hardware is irrelevant - software rules. The OS is irrelevant, whether it runs the software you want is all that matters.

Cons of Switching to Mac

I maintain a school district full of Macs (almost 1200 machines, including desktops, laptops, and servers) so I'd say I'm fairly familiar with their hardware and software, including the new Intel macs and OSX 10.4. So here are my criticisms of the Mac platform: 1. The finder is the worst file manager I have ever used. Nautilus, Konqueror, and even Explorer are vastly superior for manipulating files. You can't set it to default to list view or even alphabetized icon view, its "column view" is absurd, its tree view shows you everything in every folder(instead of just showing the folders), so moving something from one folder to another is a real pain, you can't have it list folders before files, it's slow over the network, it can connect to ftp sites but only in read only mode. It remembers how far you were scrolled down in a file list, even if you change view modes, so if you switch from icon view to list view and you're scrolled down to the bottom, you're suddenly looking at a blank space and have to scroll up to view files. If someone moves stuff around in a folder, and then you go to look at it, you see it as they left it - an arbitrary mess. In every other file manager you can set it to ignore customized folders, but not in the finder. I could go on but I think you get the point. 2. The Dock sucks. If you're using a resolution of 1024x768 or less (which is the default, and maximum size of the 12" powerbook and ibooks, which I use every day), then the dock constantly gets in your way. If you have it set to hidden, if your mouse gets anywhere near the edge of the screen it pops up, even if you moved to an area where the dock isn't - it's centered on the screen, and doesn't take up the whole width of the screen, but if you move the mouse to the corner of the screen it pops up anyway. You have no idea where the dock is when it's hidden. On windows and in gnome, kde, xfce, etc. you see a thin line on the edge of the screen to show you where you hidden taskbar/panel/whatever is hidden. With the dock, you just have to try the left, right, and bottom of the screen until you find it. The difference between running and non-running programs in the dock is minuscule - running programs have a tiny black triangle underneath them which is very easy for a new osx user to miss. We have people in our district who have been using osx for 3 years who still don't get this distinction. Since mac applications can still run without having any windows open, it's very easy for someone to have a bunch of stuff open and not realize it, then wonder why their computer is performing so slowly. 3. There's no "maximize window" button. I like to run some applications in full screen, such as my web browser. Instead of "maximize window", the mac has "optimal size". It makes the window just big enough to show you everything it contains. If you happen to be viewing a web page that's very small when you hit this button, then browser window will be very small. In order to get it to fill the screen, you have to move the window so it's top left corner is in the top left of the screen, then grab the resize handle and drag it into the bottom right of the screen. Also, the window controls are ambiguous - the don't show their icons until you hover on them, then they show the "dash square x". Granted, these glyphs are ambiguous in themselves, but at least someone familiar with other operating systems would be able to figure out what there were immediately. 4. OSX seems to corrupt its own file system through normal use. We have a lot of incidences of computers not booting - either they get to the apple logo and hang, or they flashing mac logo with a question mark icon. In order to fix them, we have to run a third party utility called Disk Warrior. Yes, macs come with fsck but this doesn't always do a good job of fixing the errors, and it doesn't fix the metadata in the filesystem (aka, the "resource fork"). I'm sure I see these kind of problems far more often than a home user does since I deal with so many computers on a daily basis, so my view of this is probab

Sorry, this article is cr@p

Why? Because the article tries to imply that Macs are cheaper than PCs. I have a ton of respect for Macs, but they are not cheaper than PCs.

$3000 Windows deskop? I guess it's possible, but $300 windows desktops are far more common. About a year ago I bought a complete brand-new windows system for my brother-in-law for $200 after rebates. It's not the greatest system, but it's perfictly acceptable for ordinary home use.

Now tell me where I can buy a brand-new complete Mac system for under $300?

Even with cons, I'm very happy!

I'm a sysadmin in a Windows shop for my day job, and I have a Mac at home. I've always been partial to them, but I went back from a PC about 2 yeats ago.

The pros are definitely that I have to worry less about the computer. Security is an issue, no matter what anyone else says, but things like installing software and upgrading versions of software are much more predictable. I have a very busy day-job, and the fact that I can come home to a working computer for my personal tasks is nice.

The cons stem from lack of industry support. If you're a gamer, your choices of ported games are limited. Certain specialized software either doesn't exist for the Mac, or the Mac version is inferior to the Windows version. To combat this, I keep a Windows machine to run the occasional Windows-only program. Also, virtual machine technology can be a help here.

The software support issue may be going away soon anyway, given vendors' rapid move towards hosted applications. Take Windows Live mail for example (the hotmail replacement.) The UI is almost as good as MS Outlook, even in browsers other than IE.

We'll see what happens in the next few years. Personally, I'm happy paying the premium for what I feel is a better designed machine.

Re:Oh spare us...

It certainly feels like UNIX to me

Your operative term, "feels"

Yes, but since I mentioned that I've been working with UNIX systems of various flavors since 1976, a reasonable person might give my perception some consideration. I stand open to correction, but you haven't provided any further information.

Let me try to make my question more clear: Is there some feature set, some API, that OS X doesn't implement that makes it 'NOT UNIX'. Or perhaps you are refering to the fact that it is not 'UNIX(TM)'? If so, do you also correct people when they refer to "Kleenex(TM)" or "Xerox(TM)"? If Leopard Server [apple.com] is certified by the Open Group will it become UNIX with the stroke of a pen?

Vista is helping me migrate

I was going to spend $399 on a full retail copy of Windows Vista Ultimate, but then I caught wind of the EULA they're including with it, and now I'm noticing that the low-end Mac Mini is only 50% more.

I'll likely be making the switch before Vista is released.

It's the hardware.

Here's my main concern with Macs. They're better machines with better OSes, but here's what I can't do with a Mac. I can upgrade a component in the Macintosh but only after doing extensive research on what is and what is not Macintosh compatable. This was a major problem for me when I moved to a house that did not have Wired ethernet, only unwired ethernet, and my computer could only take Airport instead of Airport Express -- eventually I looked around for a compatable card, and found a Motorola - but I was very lucky in that regard. If the power supply goes bad in my Macintosh, I have to order a special part. There are no "off the shelf" MacCPUs or MacMotherboards that I can quickly replace. The Macintosh is tied to the Macintosh chassis - I got a little burned by the fact that my 800mhz PowerMac did not allow for two optical disc drives - when I already had a DVD-Rom drive that I could have used. I'm not -unsatisfied- with my Mac experience - I used a Macintosh for three years... but the problem was that in the intervening time, I couldn't make the tiny little upgrades - esp. to the CPU/motherboard - that would have enabled me to keep it. Instead it just ran slower and slower to the point that I was frustrated with response times. After three years, I just built my own, and for the cost of a Mac Mini, I have a PC that can be upgraded; I plan to drop in a dual core Athlon 939 chipset chip when I save up the money for it - I'm thinking of adding a TV tuner for $60 (instead of $200 for the Mac) etc, etc, etc. The thing is, I'm not happy with either proprietary vendor - Apple's DRM forbids you from running MacOSX on your own hardware, Microsoft's DRM forbids you from upgrading your computer (with Vista, which is why I'm not upgrading.) But if I'm going to get screwed, I'd rather be screwed to the order of $500 for an upgradable box than $500 for a tiny, non-upgradable box.

Keyboard control.

There's a lot of free and commercial programs for remapping keys. I use Controllermate, which has all the GUI loveliness you could like and a reasonably versatile flowchart-style configurator.

But, yes, Microsoft's user interface is more keyboardable, and more consistently keyboardable. Though I will never forgive them for deciding that the standard keyboard navigation would bypass the task bar, requiring a separate set of keystrokes to access it, and that toolbars wouldn't be keyboard accessible at all. Windows 95 has much to answer for.

Something like Controllermate, but operating at a higher level (generating events like 'paste' or 'beginning of line') and that applications would register hotkeys with ('expose - show desktop', 'spotlight - search selected word') is something that Apple should have had long ago. Automator, Applescript, Spotlight, all these tools are frustratingly close to the tool that's needed...

Slow news day?

It's been a slow news week. Nothing to see here, move along.

Back to the insipid article - yep, I'm on XP, nope I'm not going to Vista. And I'm probably not going to Apple - too much of a pain in the ass for another vendor lockin.

When I get around to it (next year or so, perhaps), I will start playing with linux again and getting Photoshop and Vue to behave on crossover. Until then, XP just keeps on kicking (and rebooting and rebooting).

Well, I have to go know, Zone Alarm wants me to reboot and I really should do something more useful than sit in front of this screen.

Re:Not a good comparison

If you want a new Mac with more features than the base model and still save money, you need to get the base model and upgrade it yourself. I got a base model black MacBook (the extra $200 USD covers a bigger hard drive and the black sexiness) and I replaced the 512MB memory with 2GB third-party memory for $80 USD that took only 10 minutes to switch out. I will eventually upgrade the hard drive when SATA laptop drives get more reasonable in price. I had no problems using my MacBook over the last three months and the only Windows system that I still use is my gaming rig.

Re:Apple Should Dump Their Hardware

Apple did not "get dumped" by IBM. The PPC chips they were using were manufactured by Motorola, not IBM. IBM simply partnered with them and Motorola to develop it, and went on to manufacture their own version of it. At one time, they did buy the IBM version, but moved to Motorola a few years ago.

Apple has been running an Intel version of Mac OS X since the very beginning. They began developing it in a dual process from the git go. How do you think they were able to switch from PPC to Intel in less than a year? You don't think they actually DEVELOPED the OS Intel version from scratch in a year? D'oh! So, actually, Intel really was their first choice!

And given the fact that their US share went from 4.8% to 6.1 % in just one quarter, then I'd have to say that, yeah, there is an increasing number of people in the computing world that ARE willing to pay for Apple computers, and they aren't all higher priced anymore, either. (and along with the US market, their standing worldwide went up too, just not quite as dramatically.)

Re:My Top Ten Pros and Cons

I am an experienced Windows user and a GNU/Linux geek. This summer, I worked at a company which used Macs, primarily, and I was loaned a G5 server to use at home.

Mac OSX did not run well on it, and it was considerably better than a 400MhZ G3. Applications took a fairly long time to load, and if the machine was on for a few days it got so unresponsive/slow, that I had to upgrade. I was never happy to work on it, and always glad to get back to my nice GNU/Linux computer (though never to Windows).