InsideTech

Do you prefer Macs or PCs?

Macs are for nerd boys!

Everybody knows that Sun Microsystems makes the best computers and OS. Can't beat Snake Race.

Macs work too well - that is their problem. Since when is computing supposed to be a comforting and pleasurable experience? Only the American softies believe this. That's also why Macs don't sell in Europe.

PC for servers and workstations, but definitely Mac for laptops.

Even the best sony laptop isn't as all-over well designed as a macbook pro.

Apple's spent a huge amount to make a user friendly and attractive computer. They've succeeded as far as I'm concerned.

Give me a PC any day though, for a server, or a custom built workstation. There's a greater variety of parts available, and they're cheaper.

I'm such a Mac lover at heart I can't toss out any that I've bought in the past 20 years from my first one, the Mac 128K to the last iMac I pulled in -- they're basically just museum pieces wedged between the three PC desktops (I don't discriminate.. HP/Dell/Compaq) I've been using over the past 10 years. Every now and then I think about carting them up but I can't.

p.s. launchy is a fantastic quicksilver "clone" for windows xp. i use "clone" instead of clone because xp does not support application services the same way as os x, and thus the magic of quicksilver is lost. even so, launchy is a wildly useful “keystroke launcher” with a cornucopia of useful built-in applets.

MacOsX is the perfect GUI for UNIX, this is the reason why I have used OSX since day 1.
I leave my Macs on 24/7, rebooting once a month and I NEVER crash! It is always solid 100%.

Software Development is getting easier on a Mac with XCode, Eclipse, MySql all runnable on OsX.

I am forced to use a PC for work as a Software Engineer, if it wasn't for that I would have no need for Windows at all.

Seamus said:

The Mac is the Corelle dish of the computer world: Hardly ever breaks, but when it does, it's a Hell of a mess. I'd rather be able to customize and touch up my own system without having to worry about proprietary components, thanks.

slburkey makes some great points; someone mentioned Parallels and Boot Camp for x86 architecture, but they really don't do Windows properly. Parallels is pathetic and Boot Camp only loads a few necessary libraries, but not enough to call it "Windows".

For home use I prefer XP, and I think I'll avoid Vista until it either dies or they release SP2, though so far I'm not impressed.

Not really, if it breaks you take it in to a Apple Genius Bar and have it replaced or buy a new part.

If you like tinkering with machines and have the hours to be your own tech support, then go PC. I used to do that, but I don't have the time anymore, Macs are the supreme machine for productivity IMO.

Being in IT, Tech savvy and using a Mac is king of like being a mechanic that drives a BMW under warranty. I could fix it, but why when I could be stress free?

All you Pee Cee loyalists are just plain scared of the power of MAC. Did you know that Apple has sold millions and millions of servers for science. And also for those that built super computers? Many busienesses converted to Macs. Windows OS has sucked from day one! Plug and play on a Pee Cee is like a huge promise that always gets broken. Plug and play on a Mac means that you have two steps ie: Plug it in for power and use your hardware. No I/O conflicts or drivers that can't be found. Macs run like the hand built Rolls Royce. Why buy a computer that you seldom have problems with when you can buy a PC (Piece of Crap) like everyone else.

Chris -- Thanks for the tip on launchy. I'll give it a try. Personally, I'll take a Linux server over windows anyday. I'm using Vista in preference to mac, but that's just b/c I'm a creature of habit, and don't want to learn a new text editor. :) we'll see how the new mac 10.5 goes. Can't wait to install it at home.

Considering the most recent windows OS release, I'm starting to lean more towards apple. Unless microsoft does a total recall vista and the DRM, IRAA lawsuit machine I'm inclined to start opting to support another competing company. I for one don't really appreciate getting a "you can't do this with your device," list after spending thousands of dollars on a machine that I now own. It seems even linux is running down that road as well. Apple is to some extent, but it seems out of all of them apple is the only one that's fighting the DRM machine.

I for one don't appreciate being told what to do in my own home with my own property.

Given Mac vs Windows, I go Windows every time. Why? A few years ago when I was using Macs fairly regularly, I could freeze one up in 5 seconds flat (and I wasn't trying to). Granted, that was several OS's ago, but while everyone around me was preaching that Macs were impossible to crash and Windows computers crashed constantly, I was having exactly the opposite experience. I still rarely have a Windows crash and I have few complaints with either XP or Vista.

That said, I have recently had my first real experience with Linux (via Ubuntu running as VMWare on my Vista computer) and I've really liked it. It would be nice to use a computer running nothing but Linux for a while to try it out, but I don't want to risk messing up the stable Vista installation I have and I don't have another computer to run a different operating system on.

The Mac OS is way ahead of it's time, if you are a mac user and a geek you would know that it's like having 2 OS's in 1, The aqua graphical interface that's easy to use and for the geeks, the rock solid darwin Unix environment via the terminal. Even the most hard core Linux guys have got to appreciate the Unix core of Mac OS because after all Linux was modeled after Unix which has been around since the dawn of Computers. Just my 2 cents.

Cheers

I use PC (Windows Vista and XP), Apple (Mac OS X), Linux, and various other OS's but I prefer Windows Vista for gaming (DirectX 10). Apple OS X is a completely overhyped and very proprietory OS with so many restrictions.
The one good thing about the Mac is that the OS is very intuitive! But for a gamer and a hardware modder like me, Windows and Linux are preferable over the Mac OS.