The "Get a Mac" Thread

[john]

It seems like lots of people go out and buy expensive PCs and accept the reality that they will have problems. Whether they get infected with spyware, crash frequently, or just plain don't work well, people with PCs have problems. I was one of these people just less than a year ago. Viruses and system slowdowns were plaguing my Gateway, and it was almost unusable! The internet stop connecting due to a Microsoft error, and I was almost to the breaking point.

[john]

As I said, it really is a personal choice. Some people just don't feel the need to change. That's fine for them, but for others that have problems or are looking for something different, the Mac is the way to go.

It's strange that your roommate's mac is giving him problems, is it an older one? I've found mine to be extremely stable, although it has it's "quirks" now and then.

[john]

Mac's cost a lot more than a comparable PC, and if you are into gaming, PC is the only way to go.

[john]

I recently did the switch. I picked up a 20" iMac Core Duo and haven't looked back. I rarely use my PC now. The only thing I could see myself using a PC for is posibly games, but since I don't play PC games it's no big deal for me (of course, I could easily dual boot for games).

I have my iMac set to dual boot Mac OS X and Vista and it's no contest. OS X is the more solid operating system hands down. Mac OS X is the power of BSD with the beauty of the Mac interface, which to me is a winning combination. Will Vista get better when it comes out in the fall? Possibly. But as of right now it has a looooong way to go to even match OS X.

[john]

That might have been true for classic Mac OS, but there's more to it than that with Mac OS X.

In Windows XP, and in Mac OS X, it is common for people to (automatically) log into administrative accounts. The administrative accounts on Windows XP give you access to everything. The ones in Mac OS X are more on the order of non-privileged ("peon") accounts that can do privileged things via the programs su and sudo.

Thus, if a piece of Windows malware wants to do something nasty to system files or the Registry, it can go off and silently trash your system. A piece of Mac OS X malware would have to get you to type in your password; without this, it would have no root-level access. If the request for a password came at an unexpected time, many users would suspect malware, and refuse to let the malware have it.

This type of protection has limits. A Mac OS X malware program could still trash files in the user's own directory (e.g., "delete all MS-Word files"). But that's a bit of an improvement over malware being able to trash all the user files and all the system ones!

[john]

Depends on the model and the timing. When the iMac G4 (LCD screen, DVD burner) first came out, it was cheaper and better than the Dell alternative. When the 12" iBook G4 came out, it was virtually the only notebook available in the (small/lightweight, full-featured, cheap) category. Back then you had to pick two out of the three. Even the PowerMac G4s and G5s aren't so bad if you consider them as competitors for Unix workstations.

[john]

All this time I had 2 coworkers I was close with that were macheads. I always shook my head and thought of those things that are in that cartoon above. I really never felt the need to switch.

But I noticed something about the PC recently. Ever install a brand new WinXP machine and notice how damned fast it is? Then slap on some virus scan, a spysweeper, ZoneAlarm, etc. And next thing you know, that nice 3GHz 1GB RAM machine is a lot slower than it was before you put all those things on it. Sure, you could add more RAM, etc. But the sad fact is that with all the vulnerabilities on XP, you can deduct about (and I'm getting this from my IT friends who do this for a living) between 500MHz-1GHz of processor speed and 256-512MB of RAM from your PC when you have it fully protected. That means my 3GHz P4D 1GB machine runs like a clean-installed 2-2.5GHz 512-768MB RAM machine. Anecdotally speaking, I think they're right.

And let's talk about installs. Being able to "clean install" WinXP is a luxury most don't have. Because I work for a company that has a site license to WinXP Pro, I can install it fresh on any new PC or laptop that I own. However most users have to have the Home version loaded with extraneous programs that HP, Compaq, Dell, etc. pre-load on their machines. That in and of itself shaves some more performance off. I recently went to my uncle's house who had a brand new HP machine (2 months old) and it was spec'd out decently. Not top of the line, but not a slouch either. I was surprised at how sluggish it was because it was loaded with all sorts of crap from the vendor. Apple doesn't do that to you.

I recently bought a MacBook Pro. My first Mac in a over a decade. And that shouldn't really count because I always used my roommate's (in college) Mac, so this is the first I've owned outright. I bought it because I wanted a powerful, portable, graphically beautiful and still light laptop. My eMachines Athlon64 laptop was 8.5 lbs. This is 5.6. I also bought it because I had tried out Bootcamp on my friend's MBP. And the student store was having a sale for the top-end 15.4" MBP (retail $2499) for $1999 + free iPod (which went to my sis and knocked off another $180 from my price). It's a 2.16GHz Core Duo/1GB PC5400/256MB ATI x1600 monster. The closest WinLaptop I could come to it was the new Lenovo (Thinkpad) T60p (not the regular T60). I spec'd it out at $2300. So at that point a Mac wasn't a price premium anymore.

[john]

Fine, we both agree an X1600 is great for people who don't game. But kinda funny how Apple says this..

"...plenty of headroom for games, Dashboard widgets, games, even faster user switching, games, iPhoto full-screen mode, games, Front Row, games, and, well, games."

[john]

I used to think so too. But by evidence of those commercials they run (i.e. "we work out of the box, we work with just about anything, etc.) allowing DIY'ers to make Macs runs counter to that.

Personally I've built 4 PCs for myself and my girlfriend, and another 4 over the years for friends and relatives. They're great coming out of my hands, but after a while, they eventually have problems with them, whether it's OS based, driver based, incompatibility with new hardware, whatever.

Apple wants complete control over their hardware so that there are few variations out there for them to support. That's a big reason that OSX doesn't have near the problems that WinXP does: XP has to account for a billion variations of Windows machines, Apple does not.

I've actually come full circle. I used to think building my own PC and upgrading it as needed was the way to go, especially when I thought of myself as a gamer. But now I see that it only spreads out the cost, and every 3-4 years you need to totally overhaul things anyway, so I don't have a problem with the Buy A Mac Every 3-4 years philosophy that I used to ridicule. One thing Mac has done with the MBP is make memory and HD upgrades much easier, which is how you prolong the life of systems anyway.

[john]

Technically there's nothing wrong with that statement (though I admit I haven't seen it, and it does come across as annoying so it doesn't surprise me if gamers would find it irksome).

The x1600 is more than enough to play most any game at a reasonable resolution. It's not going to get the best FPS. It's not going to have all things enabled at 1600x1200. But it will play the latest games at reasonable settings.

So yes, the x1600 games.

If Apple said "it beats the pants off of any other video card or PC for gaming at high resolutions with all effects and antialiasing enabled" then I'd call BS on Apple.

Again, for 90% of the population, the MacIntels do game. And again, compared with what they usually get off the shelf at Best Buy or Circuit City, it games fairly well.
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EDIT: Am I the only one who thinks it's hilarious (at Apple's expense) that they're using the geek male cheerleader from Dodgeball to be the "hip Apple guy"? I mean, hello, it takes more than that wimpy goatee to shed the sound of Patches O' Hoolihan calling him "queerbait" all movie!