Long time Mac user switch back to Dell

[matthew24]

One last comment on the availability of 3rd party software for the Mac: there's stuff that I miss when I use the Mac, I'm sure that it happens the opposite when other people fire up a Windows/Linux workstation. I think you can't argue that the proportion is different though. Again, I think it's the lack of competition caused by the small market share that leads to the development of so much shareware to offer the basic functionality that you find for free elsewhere.

As a Mac user I am very sattisfied with the software-offering especcially for the home-market, are we missing out on some apps?
(Examples?)

 

[nplima]

As a Mac user I am very sattisfied with the software-offering especcially for the home-market, are we missing out on some apps?
(Examples?)

Openoffice is probably the strongest example of how the community of developers will give priority to other platforms;

Daemontools+DVDFab Decrypter+DVDshrink
is a good example of existing Mac apps having the same functionality but not freeware;

Tools to use your mobile phone with your Mac (sync address book, modem, mass storage...). A good example of how consumer electronics companies still feel that there are not enough non-Windows users out there. Nokia is an important exception to this *if* you have a high-end model.

and those are the examples I could find right now, I don't have my MacMini here...

 

[Fahrwahr]

Agreed. The first thing that I noticed is that the OP had already made up their mind (and IIRC, purchased), so it is all water under the bridge as far as the OP is concerned. I don't really know what he thought that his little "protest" message would accomplish, except perhaps for him to express some degree of frustration that he was experiencing from his personal life situation...which is not really any of our business, nor our responsibility.

Point being that no one here should allow themselves to feel any blame for one consumer deciding to leave the Macintosh community...it was their choice based on their personal elements which we were utterly ignorant of and never really afforded any opportunity before his decision was made.

Err… what exactly could we have done if we were afforded such an opportunity? Had the OP come here stating technical and financial requirements for a machine that Apple does not make, do any of us have any power to force Steve Jobs to make a machine to suit the OP's (or our own) desires?

I suspect that it was merely YA person frustrated by the lack of a $1000 Apple minitower.

Thus the purpose of the OP's message is to express dissatisfaction with Apple's offerings as a motivation to leave the platform. It may not be "our" business as the Mac community, but it does at least lend credence to the idea that Apple is leaving some customers behind (how many that is may not be quantifiable).

A fair point, although also in fairness, we should recognize that some arguements stem from people who can't be bothered to be objectively informed, and/or who find recreational entertainment in debate.

I hope this is not a response to the OP, because I don't see anything in the original post that suggests a trolling attitude. In fact, the OP states that if the money was available, (s)he probably would have stayed with the Mac platform. I understand your point here -- there are plenty of trolls on both sides of this and every other "platform war" -- but I fail to see that type of motivation from the OP.

 

[Fahrwahr]

I'd like to suggest that increasing market share is an important goal for the future quality of the user experience, and it goes beyond what may affect the Mac user of today.

It is IMHO the small market share that discourages the development of certain software to be ran natively on the Mac (and Linux) and helps perpetuate the dominance of MS Windows, with implications in other fields: have you noticed that job ads ask for people who know how to use MS Word, instead of asking for people who are proficient with word processing software?

Moreover, the lack of market share and the "alternative" status of the platform leads to bad decisions as clueless users will follow "the easy way" and make more decisions that favor proprietary solutions. just check out how many people post on this forum about using NTFS on drives meant to be shared between different types of computers.

Great post.

As part of a Computer Fundamentals course I teach at a two-year college, I created a discussion with a link to Apple's "Hello, I'm a Mac" commercials and asked if any felt that there is a superior platform among the two. Although several students had no experience with the Mac platform at all, several others were convinced that Macs are unduly expensive or that they are actually harder to use than Windows PCs. Dominance leads to familiarity, so anything that doesn't follow the same procedures as the dominant form seems difficult even if might have been more intuitive to them had the point of exposure been the same for both forms.

Many colleges and universities are locked into deals with certain vendors (mostly Dell) that would prevent the use of anything but Microsoft Windows and Office as the tools used to teach computer fundamentals. To some extent that makes sense -- since the majority of computers in the field will have those interfaces, it pays to know them right off the bat and not have to adapt immediately. However, we're already seeing the changing nature of interfaces in the transition from Office 2003 / 2004 to 2007 / 2008, so the more conceptual and broad-based computer education is, the better.

I was told that my predecessors had given some of the typical standardized tests that asked which menu or toolbar a certain item could be found on -- what difference will that make when the next version moves everything around or even eliminates some of the points of entry (such as menus)? What's important here is for the students to have a level of comprehension such that they feel confident in any operating system, word processor, web browser, etc., not that they know the placement of tools in one particular version. To that end, my tests have been along the lines of "create a document that has these features", or "modify this document to give it the following attributes".

I'd love to have a lab full of Macs in which to teach and to expose my students to computing, but I realize that it's not always in the financial interests of the school, so my goal is to make sure that they know that what they're using on campus isn't the only platform available. Hopefully they'll be afforded the opportunity to try various platforms and make up their own minds.

 

[seahawk09]

Wow this post makes me cry, after using a PC for almost a year I need to come back to Mac I am sad to hear that he couldnt afford a Mac My parents had Dell a couple of years ago and I was always over there fixing it😡 It's Mac for me or Bust😀 I really hope you dont have to replace your hardrive in a year or your processor😱.

LONG LIVE MAAAAC😀

 

[janey]

Daemontools+DVDFab Decrypter+DVDshrink
is a good example of existing Mac apps having the same functionality but not freeware;

Agreed, except dvdshrink is pure crap. And daemontools I really miss, but diskutility does the basic functionality I need for a Mac.

That's one application for which I keep my trusty little PC around though.