Apple obsession or delusion

[cornet]

I do wonder how many of the Apple haters have actually used a Mac for any length of time. I also wonder those saying "well you can get a PC for 1/2 the price" actually properly use all of their systems resources.

First off I'll start by saying I'm not an "Apple fanboi" or whatever you want to call it. The only Apple device I own is a Macbook Air supplied from work - I've also had an iBook in the past which I bought myself (and actually ran Linux on it for ages before switching it to OS X). I have an Android phone and my main desktop is Linux.

I've also not really used Windows on the desktop properly since XP aside from looking after the odd Windows 2003 server (which thankfully I don't have to do anymore). I've used Windows 7/8 in passing and hated it for various reasons.

Yes there is an initial learning curve, the problem is most people give up part way through and don't give the operating system a chance. If you've used windows for the last X years then switch to Mac then of course it's going to frustrate you to start off with because IT'S NOT WINDOWS! It is designed differently - whether it's better or worse is a personal decision but dismissing it because it doesn't behave as Windows does isn't fair.

A good proportion of Apple's market in the last few years is web developers writing software to run on Linux servers and Linux sysadmins (like me). They reason they go to OS X is because most of the tools that are available on Linux are available on OS X now via things like homebrew and macports. Most of them use a web browser, a text editor and terminals all day long. Because you have a real terminal and shell you can use scripting languages (bash, zsh etc...) and apple script is really powerful once you get used to it.

....and no cygwin on Windows is no substitute.

I still have a love-hate relationship with Apple and OS X.

Loves:

• The hardware - I've yet to see anything else that even comes close to Apple's attention to detail in it's hardware design
• Stability - My laptop hasn't been rebooted in 2 months - can't remember the last time it crashed and it gets used on a daily basis along with my Linux workstation
• The design and UX - personally I find it more aesthetically pleasing than Windows or Linux. It does exactly what you need and nothing more but you do have to learn to work with it rather than against it.
• It's unix underneath so I can use the same tools as on my Linux desktop or servers I manage.

Hates:

• Window management sucks. I use xmonad on Linux, a tiling window manage that places windows for me which I can entirely drive from the keyboard.
• Package management sucks. homebrew is ok but is basically a hack - nothing beats apt on Debian/Ubuntu for package management.

You can't dismiss something or call someone deluded for using X without using X yourself for a period of time (and I'm talking months, not weeks).


So far the only argument on this thread I see is cost which is a stupid argument. The difference in price, if there is one at all, isn't orders of magnitude different so really is a non-argument.

[WinstonWolf]

You forgot the trackpad, it's so much better than a mouse. I've also got a trackpad on my Win8 box, the Apple one is leagues better...

[130R]

cornet said:

A good proportion of Apple's market in the last few years is web developers writing software to run on Linux servers and Linux sysadmins

Almost as ridiculous as the post above yours

[All that jazz]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

This should be good!

[cornet]

130R said:

cornet said:

A good proportion of Apple's market in the last few years is web developers writing software to run on Linux servers and Linux sysadmins

Almost as ridiculous as the post above yours

I don't really think that's a ridiculous comment.

Went to Scottish Ruby conference, Velocity and Percona MySQL conference last year. I'd say about 80% of laptops at all of them were Apple.

Google said last year they were running 43,000 Macs in their company. Github employees mostly use Macs, as do Facebook ones. Most Linux sysadmins I know also run Macs.

[zippy3x]

cornet said:

* The hardware - I've yet to see anything else that even comes close to Apple's attention to detail in it's hardware design

• Stability - My laptop hasn't been rebooted in 2 months - can't remember the last time it crashed and it gets used on a daily basis along with my Linux workstation

You need to take a look at the surface pro 3 then. The kickstand hinge is worth a chapter in any product engineering text book. holds the device rocksteady through about 150 degrees. It also manages to fit what goes in a MacBook air into about 3 quarters of the volume. They also add a touch screen, probably the best pen experience short of professional devices that cost thousands, and a screen with about twice the resolution of the Air.

From and engineering perspective, it make the Air look very second rate.

Oh and for what it's worth, I develop on windows and use a pc for 8 hours a day, every day. I've been using windows 8.0 and 8.1 since they were launched. Never had a bluescreen in windows 8 at all.

[TheAngryDog]

And so the argument continues

[ZesPak]

cornet said:

I do wonder how many of the Apple haters have actually used a Mac for any length of time. I also wonder those saying "well you can get a PC for 1/2 the price" actually properly use all of their systems resources.

Same, I do wonder how many of the Apple aficionados actually have used a modern windows computer/laptop.

For these reasons:

cornet said:

• The hardware - I've yet to see anything else that even comes close to Apple's attention to detail in it's hardware design
• Stability - My laptop hasn't been rebooted in 2 months - can't remember the last time it crashed and it gets used on a daily basis along with my Linux workstation

I understand your personal reasons (aesthetics and the like), though these two strike me as odd. I have a two year old series 9 and it's every bit as lovely as the OH's MBA. It was also cheaper, has a larger screen, is thinner and faster.

I use it daily for +8h/day. It has never crashed (why would it?), and needs only reboots for Windows updates once every full moon.

Crashes I've encountered in the past five years have always been hardware related, most of the time HDD or RAM defects. And these affect Apple as much as other manufacturers, and the use of SSD's has reduced the number of HDD crashes significantly (honestly, HDD was never ment to be in a laptop).

[clonmult]

zippy3x said:

cornet said:

* The hardware - I've yet to see anything else that even comes close to Apple's attention to detail in it's hardware design

• Stability - My laptop hasn't been rebooted in 2 months - can't remember the last time it crashed and it gets used on a daily basis along with my Linux workstation

You need to take a look at the surface pro 3 then. The kickstand hinge is worth a chapter in any product engineering text book. holds the device rocksteady through about 150 degrees. It also manages to fit what goes in a MacBook air into about 3 quarters of the volume. They also add a touch screen, probably the best pen experience short of professional devices that cost thousands, and a screen with about twice the resolution of the Air.

From and engineering perspective, it make the Air look very second rate.

Oh and for what it's worth, I develop on windows and use a pc for 8 hours a day, every day. I've been using windows 8.0 and 8.1 since they were launched. Never had a bluescreen in windows 8 at all.

The Surface Pro 3 is achingly gorgeous, and I hate myself for saying this - it does strike me as being a very apple design.

Since Windows 7, I don't recall my last BSOD. Heck, I don't even recall getting any on Vista either. Nice to see people sticking with old stereotypes on both sides of the argument.

[ecs]

mph1977 said:

fashion victim; especially as Apple hardware is now indinstinguishable from high quality windows / Linux boxes - OSx is effectively just a nice UI'd version of one of the Unix flavours

Have you ever used Ubuntu for longer than about 10 seconds? A nice UI is very important.

[WinstonWolf]

The Surface Pro 3 is the device and platform Win 8 needs. I've gotta give MS credit for that, they've got it absolutely right with the 3

[Zod]

ecs said:

mph1977 said:

fashion victim; especially as Apple hardware is now indinstinguishable from high quality windows / Linux boxes - OSx is effectively just a nice UI'd version of one of the Unix flavours

Have you ever used Ubuntu for longer than about 10 seconds? A nice UI is very important.

I'd rather cut off my hands than use ubuntu over either OS X or Windows 8.

[ecs]

Ubuntu sucks - if you need a *nix operating system then OSX is the way to do it. You see loads of developers running Macs now because of this.

[ecs]

Both operating systems run on the same architecture though

[clonmult]

ecs said:

Both operating systems run on the same architecture though

Really? I always thought that OS/X and Windows were about as different as could possibly be ... they have roughly nothing in common.

[clonmult]

ecs said:

Ubuntu sucks - if you need a *nix operating system then OSX is the way to do it. You see loads of developers running Macs now because of this.

It may well "suck", but it does work well. My ex is running it on an old laptop, and it runs absolutely fine. She has no issues with the interface, performance is absolutely fine.

[Yazar]

clonmult said:

ecs said:

Both operating systems run on the same architecture though

Really? I always thought that OS/X and Windows were about as different as could possibly be ... they have roughly nothing in common.

Apple switched from PowerPC to Intels in 2005 hence why macs now allow dual booting into osx or windows.

[Zod]

Yazar said:

clonmult said:

ecs said:

Both operating systems run on the same architecture though

Really? I always thought that OS/X and Windows were about as different as could possibly be ... they have roughly nothing in common.

Apple switched from PowerPC to Intels in 2005 hence why macs now allow dual booting into osx or windows.

That has little bearing on the basic OS architecture.

[Zod]

Oh yes. Not sure what the point is though; any of them can be engineered to run on different architectures.

[ecs]

It was in reply to:

"...Perhaps Windows more so because of the damn near infinite configurations of hardware it can be used on.."

They both run on x64 architecture (OSX dropped x86 a while back, no idea about Windows), so it's not really a a good example to use when you're saying that Windows is more 'advanced'.