I hate where Tim is taking the company and all the screw-ups, real or perceived, in 2016. I really think Apple needs new impetus and some home runs with iphone, iPad and especially Mac. They need to think more about satisfying the customers and less about taking care of shareholders. They need to under promise and over deliver like they used to. I dislike the leadership and am constantly disappointed with the products and services. I feel like the Apple Stores are overcrowded and inconvenient. I'm just not enamored with the brand any more after over a decade of love for it.
On the other hand, against my expectations, I like Microsoft's current apparent humility. I like their creativity with regards to new products and services, including their attention to their products on iOS and OSX. I like the way they present themselves (other than Panos...I'm not a fan of his style) and I think Satya Nadella is a forward looking, open minded leader. The Microsoft Stores largely treat one with enthusiasm and respect. I like what I see and really want to switch.
Having said that...
Every time I dip my toe into the Microsoft ecosystem the reality never meets the hype.
Every iteration of Surface Pro I have had, including the 4, encountered weird bugs, erratic battery life and frequent hardware flaws. When they worked, they were OK but they always felt like a Heath-Robinson solution, especially on the lap, and usually let me down in some way.
The Surface Books were a bust from the start, even after the Microsoft Store insisted upon opening my first new book to install all the firmware updates before I left the shop. Just crashes, bugs, disappointment and hassle. When it worked it was OK but there was a lot of inherent issues, such as clipboard battery life, which let the whole package down. I just feel Panos totally oversold this product, it's battery life, it's reliability etc at the introduction.
I don't own a Surface Studio but both of the demo units I tried in the Microsoft Store were laggy in all but the lightest programs, the Dial slid down the screen and one of them completely froze when I was using it. And like the SP4 and SB, the pen wasn't a great experience for art compared with the responsiveness of the Apple Pencil.
Windows 10 is a mix of legacy and new which looks and feels like they have not thought things through. A lot of it works most of the time with a bit of maintenance but macOS, for me, works all of the time even when I neglect it. There are whole areas of functionality which lag way behind iOS/OSX and other parts where they have duplicated things like One Note touch and One Note in Office. The new stuff isn't great either...I mean they wrote Edge from the ground up and it's still a pain to use. I like the way a lot of it works but after a few days I was getting into maintenance and repair tasks which never or rarely interrupted my Mac use.
My Lumia 950 and XL had a great looking OS but were full of bugs, holes and inconvenience. I don't care about the lack of apps but overheating, unresponsive touch and mixed design metaphors let the devices down. Plus the crappy build quality.
My wife and I loved our Bands but they malfunctioned or broke too often. Ditto our Band 2s. After the 3rd or 4th replacement Band 2s for each of us we gave up.
Xbox Elite controller is genius but bumpers broke within a couple of weeks and it can't keep an audio signal to the headphones. One Xbox was already rattling when I opened it, another had terrible coil whine in sleep mode.
I went all-in several times to the Microsoft ecosystem and really wanted it to work but the reality is that, just like Apple, there is a lot of marketing, a lot of internet bias and a fair amount of undisclosed issues which may only come to light once you get up and running and the honeymoon period is over. It all looks great on paper but I was really disappointed in the hands-on experience.
As much as I'd like to see Apple getting a metaphorical bloody nose to get them to wake up, I fully expect quite a few people who have made the leap to be jumping back again.
TL;DR The grass isn't always greener on the other side, no matter how much I wanted it to be.
On the other hand, against my expectations, I like Microsoft's current apparent humility. I like their creativity with regards to new products and services, including their attention to their products on iOS and OSX. I like the way they present themselves (other than Panos...I'm not a fan of his style) and I think Satya Nadella is a forward looking, open minded leader. The Microsoft Stores largely treat one with enthusiasm and respect. I like what I see and really want to switch.
Having said that...
Every time I dip my toe into the Microsoft ecosystem the reality never meets the hype.
Every iteration of Surface Pro I have had, including the 4, encountered weird bugs, erratic battery life and frequent hardware flaws. When they worked, they were OK but they always felt like a Heath-Robinson solution, especially on the lap, and usually let me down in some way.
The Surface Books were a bust from the start, even after the Microsoft Store insisted upon opening my first new book to install all the firmware updates before I left the shop. Just crashes, bugs, disappointment and hassle. When it worked it was OK but there was a lot of inherent issues, such as clipboard battery life, which let the whole package down. I just feel Panos totally oversold this product, it's battery life, it's reliability etc at the introduction.
I don't own a Surface Studio but both of the demo units I tried in the Microsoft Store were laggy in all but the lightest programs, the Dial slid down the screen and one of them completely froze when I was using it. And like the SP4 and SB, the pen wasn't a great experience for art compared with the responsiveness of the Apple Pencil.
Windows 10 is a mix of legacy and new which looks and feels like they have not thought things through. A lot of it works most of the time with a bit of maintenance but macOS, for me, works all of the time even when I neglect it. There are whole areas of functionality which lag way behind iOS/OSX and other parts where they have duplicated things like One Note touch and One Note in Office. The new stuff isn't great either...I mean they wrote Edge from the ground up and it's still a pain to use. I like the way a lot of it works but after a few days I was getting into maintenance and repair tasks which never or rarely interrupted my Mac use.
My Lumia 950 and XL had a great looking OS but were full of bugs, holes and inconvenience. I don't care about the lack of apps but overheating, unresponsive touch and mixed design metaphors let the devices down. Plus the crappy build quality.
My wife and I loved our Bands but they malfunctioned or broke too often. Ditto our Band 2s. After the 3rd or 4th replacement Band 2s for each of us we gave up.
Xbox Elite controller is genius but bumpers broke within a couple of weeks and it can't keep an audio signal to the headphones. One Xbox was already rattling when I opened it, another had terrible coil whine in sleep mode.
I went all-in several times to the Microsoft ecosystem and really wanted it to work but the reality is that, just like Apple, there is a lot of marketing, a lot of internet bias and a fair amount of undisclosed issues which may only come to light once you get up and running and the honeymoon period is over. It all looks great on paper but I was really disappointed in the hands-on experience.
As much as I'd like to see Apple getting a metaphorical bloody nose to get them to wake up, I fully expect quite a few people who have made the leap to be jumping back again.
TL;DR The grass isn't always greener on the other side, no matter how much I wanted it to be.
