Apple vs PC

[Zelig]

You certainly need to know far more about PCs than you do any other product to make use if it. A large percentage of the public can't even successfully use PCs without constant help.

This was particularly true before GUI PCs came along which were innovated by ... Apple.

Those type of people don't use Macs either.

I've seen people who never used a PC use both a PC and Mac OS for the first time, and they're equally useless on either.

 

[Winner]

I totally don't understand why people by any Apple products. They're overpriced and restrictive, as far as I am concerned. Of course, since electronics these days is treated pretty much like jewellery (equally useless), nobody really cares.

 

[Thoughtful Thug]

From where I am at, mostly women use the Iphone over other smartphones.

If a guy own one, I sometimes question his manhood.

 

[aronnax]

I use both Apple products and Windows. My laptop is a Macbook and my home computer runs windows. Before my Mac laptop, I used a Windows Computer.

In terms of strength and weaknesses, they both excel differently.

Pros of Macs:
Better Integration - videos, pictures, mail, documents, presentations, images, music, all of them can be easily accessed and arranged according to your needs and wants. I'm editing a school video? I can easily get pictures from iPhoto, music from iTunes quickly and easily.

Better battery life - Macbooks have a very long battery life. I have noticed that Mac batteries tend to last much longer, 4-5 hours longer than other computers. And this isn't some inkling. My friends and I had a test. 10 laptops, 3 of them Macs, the rest other laptops (albeit of different sizes) with internet connection and videos playing. All the Mac laptops outlasted the others by several hours.

Better connectivity - With Macs and an internet connection, without additional software, you can transfer documents among each other without using a thumbdrive or anything like that. It's useful in huge group projects that I have encountered with friends.

Incredible tech support - Apple tech support is fast and effective. It goes in, gets fixed and comes out in 3 days. The fact that both hardware and software are from the same company means that getting help is more streamline. My mother's as well as my friend's laptops took ages to fix.

Grapher - This is program made of making mathematical graphs (equations, stuff like that). It is far easier to use than any other similar mathematical graphing program. Although I only used this for 3 different occasions for school. Any person, whose job revolves around this will greatly appreciate Grapher.

It's also easy to find things (Spotlight)

Macbook Cons

Unable to play many games - Due to the issue of PC Games and Mac Games

Document type restriction - It is terrible to work hard on a powerpoint presentation only to have the file converted and a whole lot of things changed.

Mircosoft Words and Powerpoint - There are far better to work with than Pages and Keynote. Especially for complex Math Equations that need to be typed.

Adapters - Additional hardware is required for projectors and stuff like that since it is usually a windows compatible hardware that is present

That is all.

 

[Yeekim]

Time for this picture:

But there will always be enough iFools.

 

[Grisu]

Pros of Macs:
Better Integration - videos, pictures, mail, documents, presentations, images, music, all of them can be easily accessed and arranged according to your needs and wants. I'm editing a school video? I can easily get pictures from iPhoto, music from iTunes quickly and easily.

that is probably true as long as you exclusively use iStuff. But if you want to stray from the iFamily it gets much harder than on Windows (which is, of course a rather clever way of Apple to vendor lock its users)

Atm, the only part of apple hardware I own is a Apple TV, and that only because I won it...at first I thought, well enough, I was considering getting something that lets me stream to my TV anyway (as my TV doesn't yet support Wi-Fi). But after hours of trying to get something meaningful streamed, I gave up. Turns out that the AppleTV only accepts iTunes as its streaming source. And iTunes is severely limited when it comes to video codecs (basically it only supports what's supported by Quicktime, which is next to nothing). Also, iTunes really doesn't seem to fit in with the Apple philosophy...rarely have I seen a Media Player/Library/Organizer/Whatever that's more clumsy to handle.

 

[Thoughtful Thug]

I would hate to be an admin in one of the many official or unofficial tech support forums for the itunes. It's kinda chaotic from what I have seen.

It's probably the fault of MAFIAA, and/or some of the shareholders.

 

[Camikaze]

that is probably true as long as you exclusively use iStuff. But if you want to stray from the iFamily it gets much harder than on Windows (which is, of course a rather clever way of Apple to vendor lock its users)

Why would you want to stray from iStuff though?

I have an iMac. My parents have an eMac. My sister has a Macbook. We're an apple family. My family initially got Macs because in the mid 90s my Dad was able to get a good discount, being a teacher. Since then we haven't really changed over because we find Macs easier to use and generally better (having heard a million complaints from people with PCs). I guess this is familiarity, rather than objective ease of use, but I would hazard that someone starting from scratch would find a Mac more intuitive and user-friendly. I have both OSX and Windows7 on my iMac, and I find OSX far easier to use (again, potentially familiarity); I only got Windows7 for Civ5, as I've found no other reason to need it.

I've also always found the Apple customer service good, but maybe this is a function of a three-year warranty. Not sure what they'd be like if you weren't under warranty.

In terms of value for money, I will concede that Macs are probably overly expensive. A lot of my friends told me I should just build my own computer. I don't know how, though! Time is money, and when I'd have to invest a fair bit of time into figuring out how a computer actually works, I don't consider that worth it. Even the time it would take me to make a more informed decision and get greater value for money represents a cost that swings the calculation in favour of a Mac.

 

[Grisu]

Why would you want to stray from iStuff though?

sheeple!!!

I have an iMac. My parents have an eMac. My sister has a Macbook. We're an apple family. My family initially got Macs because in the mid 90s my Dad was able to get a good discount, being a teacher. Since then we haven't really changed over because we find Macs easier to use and generally better (having heard a million complaints from people with PCs). I guess this is familiarity, rather than objective ease of use, but I would hazard that someone starting from scratch would find a Mac more intuitive and user-friendly. I have both OSX and Windows7 on my iMac, and I find OSX far easier to use (again, potentially familiarity); I only got Windows7 for Civ5, as I've found no other reason to need it.

if that's working for you that's good. but sometimes you want to stray for iStuff because it just doesn't do what you want it to or doesn't do it in an acceptable manner (once again a good example here is iTunes). If that happens, you'll be having a much harder time with Apple products than if you're using a Windows Box.

Furthermore, I'd say it's rather exceptional if a whole familiy is an apple family. Your normal family will probably have a more heterogenous hardware landscape.

 

[Thoughtful Thug]

In terms of value for money, I will concede that Macs are probably overly expensive. A lot of my friends told me I should just build my own computer. I don't know how, though! Time is money, and when I'd have to invest a fair bit of time into figuring out how a computer actually works, I don't consider that worth it. Even the time it would take me to make a more informed decision and get greater value for money represents a cost that swings the calculation in favour of a Mac.

Well you spend a lot of time here. So I am sure learning each different parts (CPU, PSU, MOBO, GPU, and the likes) will not be a burden for you.

I would love to see a bright minded young fella like you spend more time learning these things. I am sure we will be ok with your brief departure; and who knows, maybe we will learn a few things after you had shared your experience in the Computer Talk part of the forum.

 

[Verbose]

Mircosoft Words and Powerpoint - There are far better to work with than Pages and Keynote. Especially for complex Math Equations that need to be typed.

Adapters - Additional hardware is required for projectors and stuff like that since it is usually a windows compatible hardware that is present

That is all.

So the obvious move is to work with Mircosoft Works on you Mac, no?

I've so far never encountered a problem. Virtually never encountered any problem moving stuff from a PC to a Mac. Trouble only tends to crop up if I do something on a Mac and tries to migrate it to a PC. Somehow the PC just doesn't "understand".

 

[NedimNapoleon]

PC is better.

 

[IglooDame]

Funny all this talk about PCs, and the assumption seems to be "Windows OS" - no mention of Linux at all.

 

[NedimNapoleon]

Linux Ubuntu is really good, I've tried it, its just a shame few people use it.

 

[classical_hero]

Most people don't want to learn computer code, just to use a computer. That is why we don't use Linux.

 

[Zelig]

Why would you want to stray from iStuff though?

Because it's not particularly good, and forces vendor lock-in.

I use a Mac as my primary workstation for work purposes, but I stay away from proprietary Mac OS stuff as much as possible.

Linux Ubuntu is really good, I've tried it, its just a shame few people use it.

Gnome and XFCE are both ugly, and Putty sucks. Mac OS gives you the nicest terminal support in a stock OS.

 

[Wolfbeckett]

Most people don't want to learn computer code, just to use a computer. That is why we don't use Linux.

There are very good GUI distros of Linux now (and have been for a while) that require no technical proficiency whatsoever to use.

 

[warpus]

Incredible tech support - Apple tech support is fast and effective. It goes in, gets fixed and comes out in 3 days. The fact that both hardware and software are from the same company means that getting help is more streamline.

Really? My friend has a macbook - the dvd drive stopped working a couple months ago.. And he doesn't want to send it in to get it fixed because "it will take a couple months to get back to me".. or so he claims anyway

 

[Skwink]

Really? My friend has a macbook - the dvd drive stopped working a couple months ago.. And he doesn't want to send it in to get it fixed because "it will take a couple months to get back to me".. or so he claims anyway

It helps that the company that makes the computers makes the OS too, and know exactly how they go together.

 

[downtown]

I'm not enough of a computer guy to venture into the personal computer battle between macs and PCS...but I *love* my ipod, and will prob not buy another brand's mp3 player.