It's a personal preference thing, fragmenting the ecosystem and going multi-platform generally adds a layer of complexity people may not like, myself included. Though I do try to use apps not native to Apple to reduce my reliance, from MS Office (no issues despite not being on a native platform), Evernote for many notes, to using Skype and Hangouts for texting rather than exclusively iMessage. Some things annoy me though, such as having to pay premium to use Evernote on more than 2 devices, the lack of a real-time translator on Skype for the Mac (though they completely ripped this out on Windows as well with little notice, another reason Microsoft irritates me), but overall I'm taking steps to reduce my dependency on one specific ecosystem and eventually break up my hardware accordingly as well.
I have spent most of my college, grad school, and now-transitioning-into-professional-life, cross-platform. I have been totally invested in the Apple ecosystem a few times. I find that it is too expensive to get into, for what you get, and I always end up leaving it. Here is my set up currently:
-Apple Watch 3 (best smart watch/fitness tracker combo I have found)
-iPhone X (pixel or iPhone are the only phones I consider now. I only buy unlocked phones, and these two are the only ones that provide full functionality and great customer service). My wife went with the pixel XL (android auto is better by a long shot, and her car supports it). Both are great phones.
-iPad pro 12.9 2017. Honestly, no other company makes a pure table as good as the iPad.
-Apple tv 4K, Roku 4K, fire tv 4k, chromecast. They all have their advantages, and they were all picked up on promos or sales. The Apple TV is the fastest, but the Roku is close and offers more functionality.
-Google homes (promos, but I really enjoy them)
-Dell XPS 9560 (15in, quadcore cpu).Top of the line 4K model, with all the bells and whistles. I purchased a lower end, i5/4K model from the Dell outlet store. I had a minor problem with the keyboard, and they sent me the top of the line, $2800 (or whatever it cost) model as a replacement. I have no complaints. It is a great laptop, blazing fast, amazing great, good battery, etc. I paid barely over $1200 for it. I literally sold my 2016 MBPtb 13in for roughly $1400 (a $300 lose) after a few months. I was disappointed and frustrated with the MBPtb. I have always loved MBPs, but this new interation offered frustratingly low performance (ram bottleneck at 8gb) for the price. Even today, if you want to get 16gb of ram in a 13gb MBP, you have to spend 2k. You might as well go for the 15in, but you are really spending a lot of money for a laptop at that point. MacOS doesn’t offer the same advantages as it used to. Windows 10 is a really great operating system. The cost isn’t work the price on the current MBPtbs.
-Custom Built Work/Gaming PC. I won’t go into all the specs, but I built it about a year ago. For roughly $1300, including the diplay and mechanical keyboard, I got a PC that was way more powerful than anything you can get from Apple (until the iMac Pro), for a fraction of the price. It has an overclockable i7 sky lake, and a gtx 1070 for the gpu. It servers as a work computer, gaming machine, and a Plex server. It is the single most dependable machine I have ever used. When you combine powerful tech, with a well built, well cooled case...you will be surprised at what it can deliver.
Anyway, with the above, I never, ever feel disadvantages or like I am missing out on something. Here is my advice:
-Use OneDrive or Google Drive. I use OneDrive, and the complimentary X amount of terabytes of cloud storage that come with my office 365 subscription. It really is a great deal, for ~$8 a month, when you consider the cloud storage you get. OneDrive works great cross-platform.
-OneDrive photo sync and google photos. I use both, why not? Google photos in unlimited, but compressed (still high quality), and OneDrive is full quality and syncs with Windows 10. Windows 10 natively offers decent photo editing, and I believe google photos does too. I have photoshop for any heaving lifting, but there are plenty of free alternatives that are superior to iCloud photos. Gimp being a prime example, as well as other simplier programs.
-DONT USE AN ANTI-VIRUS. Anytime I have had problems/frustration on my windows 10 pcs, it has been caused by an anti-virus. You won’t know it either, and you will think it is another program. The updated version of windows 10, combined with the native anti-virus/malware is more than enough protection for 95% of users. You just have to be smart, and the same goes for macOS. I have malewarebyes, which doesn’t run in the background (free version), that I use once in a while to double check. I never find anything, but its an old habit.
-Messaging: I use hangouts, allo, Facebook messenger, and iMessage. Not having iMessage on my laptop/pc doesn’t bother me. I do use hangouts more than anything else, so that is a factor. Not having iMessage, again, isn’t a big deal to me. It might be to others, though.
-VLC player is a great option.
-Spotify, etc are great (often superior) alternatives to Apple Music/iTunes.
-Gaming may not interest you/you don’t buy a laptop with a dGPU. Even if both apply, the newer intel integrated graphics can play a lot of slightly older-older games at decent to good settings. It’s insanely cheap from the likes of steam/GOG, and there are 100s of high quality games available.
-I am sure there are other apps that I use. If you have a specific question/concern, I would be happy to offer my help.
The overall line of though here is that, unless you have a specific app/program that you cannot access/replicate the functionality on Window/Android/other platforms, then being cross platform is cheaper, more versatile, and can offer a superior experience. There may be a slight learning curve, but there is with all things, even Apple software.
