Why are we using MAC? Is it a religion or there is a true advantage?

[lroy]

When i looked for training on Photoshop, Dreamweaver, etc. all the

courses available were on MAC? because it?s better, faster, more

effective, etc.

 

I bought one, added 1 gig RAM, external faster quality hard drive. I

was expecting it to run like a Ferrari but it wasn?t, I am very

disapointed.

 

I have to admit, there is no spam or useless trashy softwares like on

PC, but that?s it!

 

For the rest, it?s not faster.

 

Some people told me that the colors are calibrated, on the other

side, all graphic artists have a monitor calibrator. Except the fact

of looking classy when I use it in a coffeshop (because it does cost

4 times the price for the same performance on PC), I don?t really

know the advantage of it.

 

If your are a MAC fan, please don?t be insulted, because

technological opinions are sometimes like religious beliefs.

 

If there is someone out there that can give me a good reason not to

do a garage sale, I would really like to know it.

 

Thanks!

[catchlight]

As a computer user forced to switch from Macs to PCs by a platform change in my work environment, I long for the days when I could use my Mac online and never think about constantly protecting my system and data against worms, viruses, and trojan horses, and other evil hacker threats.

 

That freedom alone makes Macs worth considering for someone free to choose. I'm too far down the PC road to change now, but envy the elegant high end Macs some of my friends have recently acquired.

[ducksquat]

It's all a personal pref. Many graphic artists that were formally trained were trained on Apples. Apples are good computers, no doubt. But I see little difference between using them versus a good PC. The best thing to do is go with what you know best and are most familiar with - not what brand junkies will tell you. PC vs Apple is no different than Canon vs Nikon. People just like to side on one brand over another for whatever personal reasons.

[jbq]

Mostly a matter of personal preference, though if you need a powerful laptop you'll find that the Apple's range is fairly limited.

 

My experience with MacOS seems to be far worse that most people's, and I'm looking forward to buying a PC to replace my Mac as I know that none of the problems I've had on a Mac would exist on a PC.

[kelly_flanigan1]

Photoshop started on the Mac; later a variant was made for the PC; at about version 2.5. Schools like Macs. Apple is often sold to schools.

[andrew_rodney1]

Lets separate the hardware here from the software (Operating System). This discussion

has cropped up this week due to Apple saying they will move to Intel based chips next

year. The discussions have been something along the lines of ?well where?s the Mac

advantage now?? or ?PC users will be able to run OS X? (Probably not).

 

Some have said ?PC?s are faster? (to some degree that may be true, the differences can be

counted in seconds at base, benchmarks are very ambiguous).

 

The bottom line for me is I don?t care which platform is faster TODAY or what chip set is

used. The primarily reason I run the Mac (and have since 1988) is the operating system. If

a Mac and Windows box run the same chip, there?s still a major difference in the operating

system. An Intel chip doesn?t change this. The fact that a PC might be slightly faster

(today0 running some Photoshop operations doesn?t change the facts that I can count on

one hand the minutes (yes mintues) I?ve spent since 1988 dealing with virus and worms

and the hundreds of hours saved not screwing around with the OS. I?d gladly give up a

second or two in a Photoshop operation for this alone.

 

The other issue is Apple has and will continue to control how the hardware in their boxes

operate. This makes them more expensive but there are countless ways in which this saves

me the user time and money. For example, from the perspective of a color geek,

calibration and video cards. Anyone can use any video system in a PC they want. As such,

ensuring that you?re able to use downloadable LUTs for calibration is iffy on a PC. It?s

absolutely guaranteed in every Mac since day one. Apple controls this. No garage built

Macs. Yes I pay a bit extra for this but then I expect ALL the components to work together.

That?s not 100% with Apple (everyone screws up) but the likelihood of this is much, much

higher with Apple. Take that and their very powerful OS and for many, it?s a huge

advantage we happily INITIALLY pay more for (but very soon gain back in spades).

 

IF speed alone is important to you, well today maybe the PC is slightly faster. But having a

car that can do zero to 60 in 4 seconds but can?t take a corner any better than a bus isn?t

compelling for many drivers.

[Brad_]

Three machines, three years, zero crashes and viri.

[michael_matsil]

Don is right when he speaks of 'personal reasons.' Perhaps it's a predisposition of the

creative ones amongst us, but personal reasons actually count for something. The devil

(and the angel) is in the details; or in other words, how things fit together. I have worked

on both

platforms and find that Apple's operating system and the way everything is integrated

together makes for a more stressless work flow. Hence the word "elegant," which we so

often see associated with Mac and is frequently dismissed as irrelevant by those who

find these details unimportant: back to 'personal reasons.' The iPod is a great

straigtforward example. Everything from the user interface to the case design to the

controls are in harmony...and as a result, it's beautiful, simple and performs. Vitruvius

called it "firmness, comodity and delight" in architecture. A Mac computer is the same

thing. Louis, if you are going to get the measuriing tape or the stop watch out, you will

find the two will be close. Your high expectations aside, speed tests have been done

comparing systems. It's the whole package I'm talking about. And don't

underestimate the value of not having your system thoroughly gutted by the latest virus or

worm, when you have important work to do. OR....whole system freezing, crashes, etc. I

push my mosest 833mghz G4 to the limit and I rarely hear a complaint from it. I'm talking

about running several jumbo applications at once, including PSCS (a 500mb file, perhaps?)

That's a testament to superior system

software design, which is after all, the whole ballgame.

 

Do I sound a bit snooty on this subject?....you bet!

[byronlawrence]

i prefer pc for those reasons stated and also i like building my computers. and as far as all the bugs on the internet go, newer programs like Mozilla firefox help, but nothing helps as much as just being smart on the internet (don't go to hacker sights and download their stuff, don't click adds, etc), not opening obvious junk emails, and yes firewalls and virus software become necessary. but for me that necessary extra stuff is worth having more compatibility with third party stuff. every body does pc and you can learn to program with it etc. macs are much more limited in my experience (this may not be true for all).

[erickpro]

People say they are exposed to viruses (yes, that is the correct way!) in a Windows than in OSX.

 

For 3 years I have only been infected 3 times. I never lost any data because I always kept my data on different drives and always backed up. People used to tell me that MAC's were faster, never crashed and just better overall.

 

Well, MAC's are not faster compared to PC's, it usually takes less time a newer chip under windows to process an effect that what it usually takes on a mac. So, which one is faster?

 

People say that the OS is faster and more reliable, maybe yes. There are many fancy ways in OS X that windows just doesn't have.

 

The only reason why I would suggest to keep buying Apple is because if its physical design and OS. Other than that, processing speed is better on a PC.

 

One thing, teachers always say that MAC's are better. I was told that colors in the MAC are way better in a MAC, that if you do a lot of printing is better in a mac. I told the teacher that the days where mac was better at creating graphics were gone because now you can do the same in a PC but she said that this is not completely true and that the mac is better because it displays better colors, she even told me that I should not calibrate my apple displays and I told her, whyyyyyyyyyyy? I find that all professional photographes DO CALIBRATE their monitors no matter what brand they have. And she said, don't change it.

 

Is she really smart or stubborn?

[byronlawrence]

also with pc if you are worried that much about viruses etc. windows pro xp with service pack two is much more secure than the windows predecessors that give it a bad rep. and with the new longhorn os comming out, windows will be even more secure, this has some programmers worried/talking about all the implications of longhorns new features. Secure is a relative word to though, while your mac may be bug free to your visible eye, that doesn't mean that it can't be hacked, I have seem my share of buggy Macs at school (all the pretty shiny lights help hide that they get slower and slower).

 

i don't hate macs. i think they are beautiful machines, just i prefer to have access to all parts of my machine.

[._kaa]

It's a religion.

 

From my point of view Macs are overpriced and underpowered.

 

Let me be more precise. There are three ways I use computers.

 

Way one is for work and work here means doing complicated things with data and code. For that Unixoid systems are by far the best and I generally use Linux for such systems (occasionally OpenBSD for high security).

 

Way two is also for work, but here we are talking about using standard applications, basically Office and Photoshop. These applications operate very similarly on Macs and PCs, so I don't care about the operating system, only the speed of the underlying hardware -- here generic Intel boxes win.

 

Way three is for entertainment -- mostly gaming -- and here Macs lose big time.

 

So from my point of view Intel boxes (running Linux or Windows) are better than Macs -- cheaper, faster, more flexible.

[oskar_ojala]

"Creative professionals" like to have good looking machines and separate themselves from the beige no-name PC or Dell PC. Don't lose sleep because of it, it's what you do with the tools, not the tools themselves :-)

[ellis_vener_photography]

<I>I bought one, added 1 gig RAM, external faster quality hard drive. I was expecting it to

run like a Ferrari but it wasn?t</I><P>Let's not forget that when talking abut how fast a

computer does a certain chore is alos somewhat dependent on the operators skill level.

[jtk]

Check various scanner and printer Yahoo Groups...you'll see heavy grief with Mac, especially G5, little discussion of grief with PCs despite the dominance numberwise of PCs due to vast prevalence of PCs in homes and offices.

 

XP is wonderful, rock steady. I doubt you can find better telephone support anywhere, or more physically beautiful computers fwiw, than Sony's (fwiw). Of course, one does pay more for better deals, not less.

 

Most Mac users got that way because they were given a Mac by parents who didn't use computers. Schools use Macs because (specifically) IBM formally cut Mac that slack in order to avoid monopoloy. Mac survived

till today out of kindness of Wintel strangers.

[barefoot]

I recently switched from pc to mac for no other reason than I am pig sick of windows. MS are

a company totally lacking in style.

[bwcombs]

I go back and forth on both platforms in my work. They both have

their strengths and weaknesses.

 

I do like the Mac just because it is not running Microsoft. When I

work on the PC, I spend half my time telling those dialogue

boxes that I just want to go back to what I was doing. I don't need

a reminder of what I just did, or need to be cautioned about what

I'm about to do.

 

For Microsoft applications, the PC is better. For Photoshop,

Quark, Illustrator and such, the Mac is better. For me.

 

Also, we've spent a lot of time fixing viruses for the PC. The Mac

never gets sick. I realize that this is a result of idiots writing nasty

programs to reach a majority of users quickly. But the day may

come when Macs are just as vulnerable.

 

This thread is like a Nikon vs Canon forum. There is no winner

or loser.

 

Tip for Byron. The shift key, located on both platform keyboards,

is for capitalizing letters. Try it sometime for, say, the first word of

a new sentence.

[._kaa]

<p><i>I recently switched from pc to mac for no other reason than I am pig sick of windows. MS are a company totally lacking in style.</i>

 

<p>LOL. Try some of Stardock's offerings (www.stardock.com) -- WindowBlinds, ObjectDesktop, Desktop X, etc.

 

<p>For a while I had a desktop much snazzier than any Mac -- custom-made window widgets, zooming/sliding icons, all that jazz. Then I decided that it all is just distracting fluffy chrome and turned it off.

[frankie_frank1]

The original question: Why are we using MAC? MAC came out at the time when PC (IBM) dominated the whole desktop computing market. MAC is graphical oriented while PC was text oriented for business office only. That was why MAC targeted at school. Apple donated a lot of machines to the schools. Since early-90's, PC Windows gradually has more graphical interface. As of today, we don't see much different between MAC and Windows. MAC survives so many years because there is a big pool of people hate Wintel, not because MAC is cute. MAC suffers less virus etc. because MAC is not a popular machine for hackers to have fun with, not because it has a better operating system. My Unix system never get virus attack too. MAC machine is stable because Apple doesn't build lousy machine. There are many good and lousy PCs around. The lousy built PCs corrupt the name of PC.

[byronlawrence]

i think Mac is still around (this is something i think i read a while back but it has been a while and i can't remember specifics) because Microsoft gave them money to keep from going bankrupt so that windows would not be a monopoly. Microsoft has supported other small software firms for this reason.

[tim_griffy]

John, not to burst your bubble but Consumer Reports doesn't quite agree with your

assessment of Sony's technical support. In the June '05 issue of CR Sony was found to be

substantially behind other PC makers such as Dell, Gateway and even HP. The leader in both

desktops and laptops by quite a substantial margin was, er . . . Apple.

[mark_a]

I just switched to a Mac from a PC. Why? Because I mainly use Photoshop and it takes

advantage of the dual processors in my Mac and... I find it more user friendly, easier to

upgrade or install software, faster at some applications but slower at others, no threats yet

from viruses, and it supports everything I need to do with it. I liked the G5 PowerMac so

much that I bought an iMac for my wife to use. I still have my PCs but they are only used

for the programs I can't run on the Mac (accounting program and web update program)

and as my "large CF card (tethered to camera) in my studio. Cost? About the same as the

comparable PC that I was looking at. Regrets? None. I like the Macs and am pleased with

the performance.

[kevin conville]

If all you want to do w/ your computer is run PS then either platform is fine. If you want to

do lots of different things including surf the web, you're better off w/ OSX. OSX is stable

and robust and (in three years) I haven't had any diseases.

 

I jumped the PC ship three years ago and it's the best (computer) decision I've made. Every

upgrade or peripheral I've added is true plug and play. No drivers to load, no manuals to

read, no tech support to call, no band aid work-arounds. NO BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH!

[dean_matsueda]

<p><em>I bought one, added 1 gig RAM, external faster quality hard drive. I was

expecting it to run like a Ferrari but it wasn?t, I am very disapointed.</em></p>

<p>

So, which Macintosh computer do you have? If you bought one of Apple's consumer-level

Macs, well this shouldn't be surprising, no? If you have the top-of-the-line dual G5

PowerMac, then I could understand your disapointment.</p>

<p>

<em>...because it does cost 4 times the price for the same performance on PC...</em>

</p>

<p>

I'd be curious to see your actual price-comparisons on a generic PC with <strong>the

same specs</strong> of any Mac that you did to come to this conclusion. Macs are a little

more expensive the for most part, but from my research, they're not 4x as much. You can't

compare a cheap, $400 Dell with a Powermac on price and features.</p>

<p>

<em>If there is someone out there that can give me a good reason not to do a garage

sale, I would really like to know it.</em></p>

<p>

Nope. This really is your personal choice. If you feel like your Mac isn't fast enough -- and

this is your one and only criteria for a computer -- then by all means, sell it and get

yourself another computer that you'll be happy with. I would only offer that you perhaps

quantify your expectations... what do you mean, by "fast as a Ferrari"? Are you working

with 200MB Photoshop files and it feels sluggish? What are you doing with your computer;

why doesn't it seem fast; and do you really think a PC will give you much more noticable

performance?</p>

<p>

Good luck to you, I really hope you find something you'll be happy with!</p>

[maiken]

As a pedantic nit, "MAC" is not the name of any computer system I'm aware of. Apple's personal computers were originally called "Macintosh"es, and have been contracted over the years to just "Mac", but spelling this word in all-uppercase implies that it's an acronym, which it's not.

 

I suspect the tendency to use "MAC" comes from the fact that the shorthand for a Wintel machine is "PC", which aside from being unfortunately over-generic, of course really is an acronym.