Should I buy a Mac or a PC?

[Molten]

Originally Posted by Willdabeast

Mac...can't get viruses

The above phrase I've heard dozens of times. However, I've yet to find truth to it. A friend of mine got a virus on a Mac and called Apple for help. They told him that he was wrong and then argued that viruses for Apple don't exist. This went on for 30 minutes and ended abruptly when he proposed a bet. If they were so sure a virus was impossible on Mac, he'd write one and send it to them. If he couldn't do it, he'd agree with them. They got off the phone pretty fast. This story is secondhand given that I wasn't on the phone with my friend. However, it is certainly illustrative of the situation. Mac's don't tend to get viruses only because people tend to not write them for Mac. Mac doesn't have a better security or anything, they just are less popular with the virus programmers.

If anyone can find something in a Mac that prevents it from getting a virus, I'll eat my words. Until then, I await.

[MrForbes]

Originally Posted by nitneylion452

Microsoft isn't stupid, though. They offer Windows and Office for Mac because Microsoft is making money on the Operating Systems and Office copies every time they sell one.

Apple is mostly a hardware company, and Microsoft is mostly a software company.

Microsoft makes operating systems to work on as many computers as they can. As a result they have to deal with making their software work with all kinds of third party stuff. It's a serious challenge, and they do a pretty good job of it.

Apple makes their operating system to work on their hardware only, so they have an easier time of writing drivers, etc.

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by nitneylion452

It's not that Macs can't get viruses, it's that there aren't many viruses written for Macs because the majority of CEOs and/or business executives run Windows, so it is more worth it to write a virus to extract information from what has a high probability of being a CEO's computer over an Average Joe's (lol...rhyme!) computer.

Most viruses aren't targeted at CEOs, or anyone in particular.

There are elements of truth to both sides' explanations of why Macs basically don't get viruses.

[nitneylion452]

Originally Posted by Molten

The above phrase I've heard dozens of times. However, I've yet to find truth to it. A friend of mine got a virus on a Mac and called Apple for help. They told him that he was wrong and then argued that viruses for Apple don't exist. This went on for 30 minutes and ended abruptly when he proposed a bet. If they were so sure a virus was impossible on Mac, he'd write one and send it to them. If he couldn't do it, he'd agree with them. They got off the phone pretty fast. This story is secondhand given that I wasn't on the phone with my friend. However, it is certainly illustrative of the situation. Mac's don't tend to get viruses only because people tend to not write them for Mac. Mac doesn't have a better security or anything, they just are less popular with the virus programmers.

If anyone can find something in a Mac that prevents it from getting a virus, I'll eat my words. Until then, I await.

This post = WIN

[-42-]

Macs have always seemed anemic to me, and I'm not even that terribly computer savvy.

I have cousins in the Film and Photo editing industry, and they swear by Mac, but I find that to be the biggest niche for Mac.

I use my Mac for everything.

Web browsing? Let's see a windows machine beat three browsers open on three different spaces hopping between them with Spaces hotkeys, all while chatting on an IM window that follows me across the spaces, accessed via Expose. Once Windows reaches that usability level, I will return to them.

Word processing? Microsoft Office has yet to beat the UI and usability of Pages or Open Office. No contest there.

Reliability? Don't even need to go into this one...

Battery Life? I get four hours of heavy use with WiFi on, and music playing with the screen on bright. And my computer is over a year old!

System Stability? I haven't even turned off my laptop for 26 days. No crashes, no failures, no problems. Bring it on, Windows. My record on my prior Windows Desktop? 9 days.

Usability? Can't beat Spaces, Expose, Quicksilver and Spotlight. Windows offers no native alternatives to features that I can no longer function without. Without a comparison to this, I won't change back. After becoming hooked on these (and multi touch), I can't even describe Windows as usable anymore.

Multi-Touch? Yeah. Can't live without this, too.

Nice quality screen? Yes please.

Power user tools? I have 96 distinct shell scripts that do different jobs for me. Windows is not Unix based. I use AppleScript on almost a daily basis for automated and bulk tasks. Windows has no alternative. I run Solidworks inside of a Virtual Machine for work, and all is lightning fast.

Windows cannot offer solutions for usability problems that I require. Until it can, I will not use Windows. That's all there is to it.

[ebarker]

Originally Posted by squirrel

Apple is mostly a hardware company, and Microsoft is mostly a software company.

I'll politely disagree. Apple is really (or is becoming) a 'media' company.

The O/S and hardware becomes a second tier product. It's there to support the media.

There is a revolution in the distribution and management of media content. Audio and video in your pocket. The media giants tremble.

Which BTW has implications for how we at FIRST get our message out.

[MrForbes]

Originally Posted by ebarker

I'll politely disagree. Apple is really (or is becoming) a 'media' company.

I think you're right. Things are changing.

But in the context of the attributes of the computer operating systems, Apple has traditionally been all about making their own hardware work well, and they have not had any interest in selling operating systems for off-brand computers.

Microsoft is the opposite.

Originally Posted by Willdabeast

I feel that a lot of people have been brainwashed by apple. Mac does have a lot of advantages, like they can't get viruses and the user interface is pretty nice. But I feel that they are very overpriced, especially laptops. And yes, Windows Vista is terrible, but the new Windows 7 is fantastic, speaking on behalf of 4 of my friends who have expressed similar opinions of it.

If you want a nice, inexpensive laptop that is powerful, you should go with a Asus.

I'll second the motion on Asus! I work in news and lately we got into live high end video streaming and encoding and when I looked around for something powerful I looked at what the gamers use and Asus came onto the radar and now my "desktop" is my older Asus G50v and my laptop is my new Asus G51 quad core.

Ok, maybe not as tough as a Thinkpad or Toughbook so you have to handle them with care but for what you get in terms of resources for the money Asus is awesome.

Only negative is the battery life but I really shouldn't even say that since I have only tested in performance power mode and 60 min is about what I get.

I looked at MAC but there were some things that may still not work like USB to serial programming cables for programming some radios that I use to monitor emergency services and scanners and that one thing is critical for me, even running windows on the mac there was some doubt this USB to serial interface would work.

I looked at the specs on the Asus and was blown away and when it came time for the new machine it was Asus all the way.

A lot of future proofing in these machines, I run windows 7 on them and as long as I don't drop one hard I probably will get 5-7 years out of them if I want to.

mark

Originally Posted by -42-

Macs have always seemed anemic to me, and I'm not even that terribly computer savvy.

I have cousins in the Film and Photo editing industry, and they swear by Mac, but I find that to be the biggest niche for Mac.

My one problem with the mac is parts and service if you need it, with a PC I can buy parts anywhere but not the same with apple.

Macs sure have their advantages in certain things like video and photo editing and I know of news papers and graphics departments who use Mac while the rest of the newsroom is on PC.

Also I am not such a computer expert myself and am trying to learn as much as I can and having to get in behind the scenes and under the hood on a PC helps me learn and keep my skills up, with the mac you can't really do much of that stuff, so having to do a bit extra maintenance on the PC I think is actually a good thing.

mark

Originally Posted by Chris is me

Most viruses aren't targeted at CEOs, or anyone in particular.

There are elements of truth to both sides' explanations of why Macs basically don't get viruses.

I use Avira premium on both my PC's as recommended by someone here on CD and I've never once had any kind of virus or security problem. Once installed and configured Avira works in the background, auto-updates and keeps things safe. Perhaps the people who get all these viruses on PC's and via email don't have basic protection turned on? Ever since I owned my first computer which I think was a 486? I have never got a virus, not once.

Originally Posted by Mark Rozitis

My one problem with the mac is parts and service if you need it, with a PC I can buy parts anywhere but not the same with apple.

Macs sure have their advantages in certain things like video and photo editing and I know of news papers and graphics departments who use Mac while the rest of the newsroom is on PC.

Also I am not such a computer expert myself and am trying to learn as much as I can and having to get in behind the scenes and under the hood on a PC helps me learn and keep my skills up, with the mac you can't really do much of that stuff, so having to do a bit extra maintenance on the PC I think is actually a good thing.

mark

OSX is a UNIX based operating system. This allows far more customization and "under the hood" work to be done by the average user. Windows is not.

Plus, why would you need to have parts for a mac? Mine's never broken... Heck, even if you do, just drop by an Apple store and they'll swap out the part in a day or three.

[MrForbes]

Originally Posted by CraigHickman

Heck, even if you do, just drop by an Apple store and they'll swap out the part in a day or three.

I guess you don't get the whole "playing with your computer hardware" thing.

Originally Posted by squirrel

I guess you don't get the whole "playing with your computer hardware" thing.

I completely understand the joys of playing around with it, but here's my point: Take a car metaphor. Do you really want to spend time rooting under the hood of your daily driver? What if you break something? Why not have a nice reliable car, and spend time under the hood of the weekend mobile?

Computers are like cars for me. The mac is some shiny european car: Harder to work on the hardware, don't break down too often, and a bit more expensive as a result. But boy oh boy do they drive nicely.

[MrForbes]

I guess you don't get the whole "build your car thing" either