Why do you guys believe Macs are superior so PC's?

[elphillo]

Honestly I'm curious why you believe that Macs are better than PC's?

For the amount of money you would spend on a iMac you could build a PC with twice the specs. Hell I bet my $900 PC could outperform any of your iMacs.

The design seems to be the main selling points for Macs, why? If you have any sense you would know that performance is better than design.

I'm not trying to troll or say that Macs are bad I'm just wondering why you guys think this.

[juanm]

OS X.

The design is a plus, but OS X is the real seller.
It's not just about specs. What use does it have to have the fastest rendering processor if every little step takes four more clicks and 2 more seconds to find what I need?

I'm equally savvy in Windows and OS X.
I work in 2D/3D animation and at my current job they have i7. I have a Lenovo killer PC (GTX570, Xeon at 3.33Ghz, 12GB of RAM, 30"screen, 23"screen)... Yet what computer do I use for everyday things? A five year old iMac or a 11" MacBook (in this case the design is as important as OS X.. it's so light!). Also, they are silent.
At work, in two weeks since I started, we've had two man/days of downtime only because of Windows.

And no, hackintosh is NOT the same. When I use a Mac, it's because I don't want to have to do maintenance.

I don't care what processor's inside as long as the result is speed.

[chaosbunny]

Originally Posted by elphillo

The design seems to be the main selling points for Macs, why? If you have any sense you would know that performance is better than design.

So why do people buy designer clothing, furniture, cars, etc.? These also perform just the same way as some cheap stuff from a garage sale.

For the most people who use their computers for browsing, pictures and music performance is irrelevant. My girlfriend doesn't notice any difference between my Mac Pro and my old G4 PowerBook when checking facebook.

[Ice Dragon]

I like the design and I (in only a week of using it) like OS X. I have no problem with Windows and no problem with PCs.

[elphillo]

Originally Posted by juanm

OS X.

The design is a plus, but OS X is the real seller.
It's not just about specs. What use does it have to have the fastest rendering processor if every little step takes four more clicks and 2 more seconds to find what I need?

I'm equally savvy in Windows and OS X.
I work in 2D/3D animation and at my current job they have i7. I have a Lenovo killer PC (GTX570, Xeon at 3.33Ghz, 12GB of RAM, 30"screen, 23"screen)... Yet what computer do I use for everyday things? A five year old iMac or a 11" MacBook (in this case the design is as important as OS X.. it's so light!). Also, they are silent.

And no, hackintosh is NOT the same. When I use a Mac, it's because I don't want to have to do maintenance.

If you take the time to learn the keyboard shortcuts then things are as fast as you can be. I rarely have to click to do anything

How is a hackintosh not the same? I've only had to perform maintenance on my PC maybe... once every 3-4 months (Assuming maintenance you mean physical maintenance) and even then it only takes half an hour.

[juanm]

Originally Posted by elphillo

If you take the time to learn the keyboard shortcuts then things are as fast as you can be. I rarely have to click to do anything

How is a hackintosh not the same? I've only had to perform maintenance on my PC maybe... once every 3-4 months (Assuming maintenance you mean physical maintenance) and even then it only takes half an hour.

I've had to perform maintenance on both my Macs... uh... never? (apart from repair permissions)
Just as an example, last week, my $5200, year and a half old Lenovo, updated Windows 7. Then, for some reason, it could only boot in safe mode. That day, I could produce nothing until I resolved the problem (take GPU out, boot, shut down blindly, reboot). Then, it had messed with something, I couldn't start software I use everyday. (I use AVG)

I know hundreds of keyboard shortcuts (OS X, W7, PS, 3DS MAX, RF, AE, FCP), I use 95% of the time an intuos to be even faster. It just doesn't compare. One example: Quickview.

[Glen Quagmire]

Macs are superior to PC's [sic] as they don't have a misplaced apostrophe.

And yes, you are trolling.

[Bernard SG]

Why do you guys believe Macs are superior so PC's?

We don't believe that Macs are superior to PCs, it's just that Macs ARE superior period.

[wordsworth]

The only way to truly understand is to use a Mac for a year. Then you can genuinely compare experiences for yourself. I've seen lots of my friends and colleagues go this route and they never go back to the Windows box. If you don't try you won't know. All the Apple evangelism in the world will make little difference. Suck it and see! After twelve months your MacRumors posts will look a little different.

[mrsir2009]

Why buy an iPhone instead of a Galaxy S2? The Galaxy S2 has a bigger screen than the iPhone, why does everyone think the iPhone is superior?

Why buy the iPad over the Samsung Galaxy tab?

Why buy an iPod over a cheap MP3 player that can store the same amount of songs for only a fraction of the price?

Why use iTunes over Windows Media Player?

Why?

[pctomac99]

[/COLOR]

Originally Posted by elphillo

Honestly I'm curious why you believe that Macs are better than PC's?

For the amount of money you would spend on a iMac you could build a PC with twice the specs. Hell I bet my $900 PC could outperform any of your iMacs.

The design seems to be the main selling points for Macs, why? If you have any sense you would know that performance is better than design.

I'm not trying to troll or say that Macs are bad I'm just wondering why you guys think this.

Have you actually tried one? Like for more than 5 minutes and not in a store? For someone to post a comment like this, it only signifies you've never used one. The mac is not about looks, it's about the operating system. With Mac there are no glitches, bugs, hundreds of buttons and settings, graphical eyes sores, UI inconsistencies, drivers errors, missing drivers, missing dlls, error dialog boxes, popup boxes, viruses, strange, odd or rediculous things windows users put up with every single day and have gotten used to. Macs are perfect, they work right out of the box, you dont have to work to make it work, or build the &$*#% out of it to make it work, that is the difference. Too bad the Mac is not priced lower and is not available to more people, because seriously I dont know how non-nerds can use windows. You litteraly have to be a nerd to use windows 24 7 if you want to keep using it, its rediculous.

[yegon]

I've got a dogs nads beastly PC for gaming, i7 2600k, 12gb ram, twin gtx580's, 2x256gb ssd's. Love it BUT I only use it for gaming - as much as Windows 7 is pretty good, I just massively prefer OSX for anything other than gaming. Despite those specs above, general os usage feels waaaay quicker on my 2011 MacBook air, hell even on my 3 year old MacBook pro with a ssd. I find even freshly installed Windows slightly less responsive than an old OSX install, more to do with windows legacy than actual specs.

That said, it's all about personal preference, I just happen to prefer osx's ui. The only thing I take issue with is like for like spec comparisons based on cost, completely ignoring matters of design, resilience, reliability etc. This last point is more applicable to laptops though really, silly comparing cheap quad core placky laptops with awful battery life to MacBooks. Compare higher end laptops with fast cpu's and good build quality and guess what? They're similarly priced to MacBooks.

[AlexBerkman]

I hate computers and do not want to spend any time at all getting it to work properly, mac sort out this for me and if anything gone wrong I have only one place to put my complaints and that is damn practical.

[miniConvert]

People will tell you stories until they're blue in the face, but you won't appreciate the advantages of a Mac over a Windows PC until you actually get one.

I started out with a Mac mini, and never looked back

[iSayuSay]

Oh no ... I hope this dont end into another mac vs pc debate. But despite your belief, since this is an imac subforum and I own one, I'd say iMac has excellent value compared to any other Mac platform.

In short, for Apple product, iMac packs a quite bang for your bucks. Tell me you can build an equivalent pc with half the price. What do u use? Have you include 27" IPS display with 2560x1440 resolution? Have you calculate any small peripheral? Webcam, bluetooth, Wifi, thunderbolt port (yeah its still uncommon, but whenever it comes to PC, it's going to cost a lot at first). All in all you gonna end up a little bit cheaper when you build equivalent PC.

So if it only comes a bit cheaper? Why would I pick Pc?

Plus you have hassle installing Hackintosh on your PC, while Macs can install windows just as easy as normal Windows PC.

[iMikeT]

I think a lot of people who come to an Apple centered site, infiltrate the forum, and bash users of Apple products are simply trying to justify their purchase of a cheap knock-off Windows-based PC.

What I think makes a Mac superior, or any other Apple product while we're at it, is the way Apple integrates the hardware and software into one product thus creating best user experience possible. One might argue that with standard PC hardware that you get more choices in what you want in your device, but more is not necessarily better. Try shopping for a beige box PC and you'll find that the shopping experience is just as terrible as using the thing.

To top it off, just look at the fragmentation in the market, the beige box PC market as well as the Android-based markets. Sure, it seems like you have a ton of choices but most of them are of poor quality and the best ones are horribly cheap knock-offs of Apple products.

elphillo, the thread starter, says he's not trying to troll or start a religious war, but in reality he is. If he thinks his cheap PC can outperform an iMac, fine, he's more than welcome to think that. There's no need for him to come to a forum and start a war with iMac users. Though, I am curious what the specs of his cheapo PC are... Care to back up your bark with a bite or are you like one of those tiny dogs that bark at things larger than itself, elphillo?

[Martyrd0m]

For me its the fact that both my 2 year old MBP and 1 year old iMac both run the same way they did when I first took them out of the box. None of that PC slowdown or shutter they all seem to develop over time. You can't even convince me that there is a PC out there that doesnt end up taking longer to open programs or even the start up of windows after months of use. Plus the ease of use of OS X is amazing. Its easy to find files or photos instead of searching folder after folder. Plus never having to see those "Missing DLL" pop ups or other annoying file errors.

[Abazigal]

My only one gripe with OSX is that MS Office for Mac doesn't seem to run as smoothly on it as it should. I am getting intermittent crashes and that beachball icon when editing documents of 50+ pages.

Should I switch to Iworks? It should run better, presumably being optimised for Mac, but I have heard there are compatibility issues (and my workplace uses only windows). How bad is this?

[juanm]

Originally Posted by Abazigal

My only one gripe with OSX is that MS Office for Mac doesn't seem to run as smoothly on it as it should. I am getting intermittent crashes and that beachball icon when editing documents of 50+ pages.

Should I switch to Iworks? It should run better, presumably being optimised for Mac, but I have heard there are compatibility issues (and my workplace uses only windows). How bad is this?

Hi!

When I worked doing translations, they made me use Office for Mac and I hated it.

NeoOffice isn't really Office, but it's as snappy as it should be, free, and it's not as "iOSy" as Pages... (I like the other iWork solutions, though). Give it a try.

[cytomatrix]

None of us believe that Macs superior to PC. Macs are better choice for most of us because of OS X and apple support. For me, UNIX side of the OS X is the reason main I use OS X. OS X's workflow is better for me. No more sshing into a unix box to use unix tools.

[MonkeySee....]

My iMac doesn't make me want to kill myself every time I turn it on.

This is a big bonus for me.

[thewitt]

Stick with a PC running Windows. Please.

[antivir]

I'm new to this whole Mac thing, but here are my "pleasant" experiences with my brand-new, 27" top-notch iMac:

- Lion just hang up on me on the first day (mid-August) of booting it up
- not being able to empty trash since then, my 250GB SSD has about 40GB of unusable trash on it right now
- hopefully my iMac was only upgraded from Snow Leopard (I just hope it was upgrade because of the Leopard DVD included, not clean install of Lion) and it might solve my problems
- Because of the above thing, I don't have a Lion purchase in my AppStore account, so no install kit to download
- I use PPPoE internet connection - the fastest and most reliable - but since this type of connection isn't supported by Apple, I have to find a way around it to try and re-install Lion in the hope of solving the instability issues
- brand new Duracell battery always low on both mouse and keyboard, disconnecting when I'd need them most. And it's not hardware issue.
- My 2008 PC (1200$) built around a Dual-core E6600 (65nm) and a 8600GT video card with regular HDD is almost as fast in Photoshop CS5.5 as my SSD-based iMac. You might not believe it, but in my experience editing an image take just as long on both machines. And it's not a hardware issue.

I don't know about you, guys, but my experience with MacOSX and the "reliable" Apple care was anything but good so far. I spent about 6 Hours with AppleCare trying to solve the above things and more, but no success. I maybe mistaken, since I only have my iMac for a few months, but I say that right now Lion is worse than Vista was back in 2008 - I never had problems like these on it. Don't know about Leopard, since I've never used it, but it seems that my expectations were far too high for Apple.

I can't say anything about the design and built quality - they are really exceptional, no PC can ever grow to this level, but given this experience, if things won't change drastically in the near future (tomorrow after a fresh install of Lion) I'll say I have a very-very-very expensive paperweight on my desk.

[MonkeySee....]

Originally Posted by elphillo

Honestly I'm curious why you believe that Macs are better than PC's?

For the amount of money you would spend on a iMac you could build a PC with twice the specs. Hell I bet my $900 PC could outperform any of your iMacs.

The design seems to be the main selling points for Macs, why? If you have any sense you would know that performance is better than design.

I'm not trying to troll or say that Macs are bad I'm just wondering why you guys think this.

http://youtu.be/xS2ZipMM2Oo

[BornAgainMac]

How is the performance of that $900 PC after 6 months of use? The iMac would spank it.