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Top 5 Reasons NOT to buy a Mac

Bern said:
The Mac version of M$ Office is fully compatible and mostly better to the window$ counterpart :rolleyes: So this would be a moot point I think.
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Weird how M$ puts more bells, whistles, usefull features, etc..., in the Mac version indstead of into the version that runs on their own OS. Perhaps, M$ realizes how crappy their OS truly is. :rolleyes:
 
Don´t buy a Mac if you want the *suddenly* excellent Intel processors. Steve used to hate them but know he loves them. :rolleyes:

Just buy a Dell and it might probably last you (if you are really lucky) until Apple ships the Mactels.
 
Willy S said:
Don´t buy a Mac if you want the *suddenly* excellent Intel processors. Steve used to hate them but know he loves them. :rolleyes:

Just buy a Dell and it might probably last you (if you are really lucky) until Apple ships the Mactels.
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Buying a Dell computer is like buying a lottery ticket - both are forms of gambling!
 
in the past there were two major reasons

1) macs cost more

2) there is more software easily available for the PC

but today, in 2005, the macs cost marginally more than a similar PC, and catalogs and the internet are a good way to get mac software...it's just that you don't get to drive down to the local computer store and see hundreds of titles like the PC users are used to when shopping for software
 
brianus said:
1. Web development. You CAN NOT develop for IE on a Mac unless you either have a PC or have memorized every conceivable compatibility problem between Explorer and.. everybody else
2. Mac versions of PC software tend to be kinda chintsy, at least in my experience. Office v.X is ok but there *are* certain quirks between it and the industry-standard PC version. And then there's the Mac IE.. *shudders*
3. Considerably less choice when it comes to hardware and hardware upgrades. But thank god for USB and Firewire
4. Price, of course; and related to that, 'bang for your buck'. My dad just bought a brand new 3.2GHz PC for $700, monitor included. That was a steal, but it's not unheard of. Apple doesn't even offer speeds that high, and to get close to it you'll have to shell out $3000. Blahblahblah, megahertz myth, come on: deep down you all know it's true that Apple's behind (as, indeed, the folks who've received the Developer Macintels have now confirmed...)
5. If you're expecting a cure to all that ails you in the PC world, think again -- Macs do crash, they can be painfully slow, and their software is sometimes buggy. The lack of viruses/spyware is true (then again, it's also true that it's very easy to run a spyware-free PC without much effort. The key: completely ditch Internet Explorer and any program that uses the IE browser control), but a lot of the other stuff you hear about OS X is just hype.
6. As far as software goes, backwards compatibility is practically a forbidden concept. By way of contrast, old shareware programs written for Windows 3.1 in 1992 still run perfectly fine on my XP SP1 laptop (and yes, I still use them, dadgummit!).
7. Every year and a half when Apple releases a new minor upgrade to OS X they treat it like it's a brand spanking new OS -- and expect you to pay for it. To a longtime PC user, this sounds utterly ridiculous and inappropriate. Tiger is little more than OS X Service Pack 4, with some cute bells and whistles thrown in.
8. iLemmings, and the possibility of being perceived as one
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Possible reasons to get a Mac:

1. Web development. You CAN NOT develop for Safari on a PC unless you either have a Mac or have memorized every conceivable compatibility problem between Safari and.. everybody else
2. PC versions of Mac software tend to be nonexistent.
3. Considerably more variation when it comes to hardware and hardware upgrades, resulting in less of a change that plug and play will work or that your separately purchased components will be compatible at all.
4. Price, when looking at total cost of ownership.
5. PCs do crash, more often than Macs, they can be painfully slow, and their software is sometimes buggy.
6. As far as software goes, backwards compatibility is practically a given. By way of contrast, old shareware programs written for Mac OS 7 still run perfectly under Mac OS X.
7. Every decade when Microsoft releases a new OS, it causes major pains for customers trying to upgrade. Mac upgrades are generally easy.
8. the possibility of being perceived as someone who must follow the masses

My point? The facts can be stretched either way when you make such generalizations.
 
Wow

Willy S said:
Yea, I bought on 5 years ago and it lasted for 1 year.
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That's one heck of a lottery ticket! Mine only lasts half a week!

And, hey, let's not knock black plastic laptops. You don't want to make us Pismo owners angry. We're a cult within a cult. ;)

Hehe.
 
sbb155 said:
3. Cheaper - this is a positive and a negative. Macs are actually just as cheap as Pc's , but apple makes a huge gross margin (>30%) vs dell which is less than 10%. You are not paying for quality - you are paying for profits for the shareholders. This is often misunderstood. Case in point: you can get 2 dell 24" displays for the price of 1 23" apple display... profits are amazing at apple for a reason.. gross margins!
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So you're saying the amount of money Apple pays for its products is around the same as Dell would pay for a similar product. That's untrue. And if it were, it still wouldn't take away from the fact that most Dells are cheaper than Macs for consumers (i.e., everyone on Macrumors) and that Dells are a better deal in the short run.

Apple's gross margin last quarter was not over 30%. It was a little bit less (29.8% or something). That's compared to Dell's 18% gross margin. So yes, Apple does charge a premium for their products. But those numbers also tell us that Apple does spend more money on one of of its 23 inch displays than Dell does on one of its 24 inch display. If you can buy two 24 inch displays for the price on one 23 inch Apple display, and one of the Dell displays costs the same as one of Apple's 23 inch displays (as you said, each of the products cost the same when the companies manufacture them), then Dell's gross margin would have to be negative...Dell would lose money if it sold such an expensive display so cheaply.

Of course, we have to assume that Apple has around a 30% gross margin on its 23 inch display:

So Apple's display (retails at $1500) gives Apple a profit of $450. Gross margin = 450/1500 = 30%. This means that that display costs $1050 for Apple to make (1500 - 450 = 1050).

There is no way Dell could sell two displays that cost $1050 for them to make for a mere $1500.

But if we assume that Dell has a 18% gross margin on its 24 inch displays...

...then Dell's two displays (together retailing for $1500 -- as you said) give Dell a total profit of $270. That means that Dell must pay around $615 to make one of its 24 inch displays ([1500 - 270] / 2 = 615). To check those figures: gross margin = 135 / 750 (<-- 750 = the retail cost of one Dell displays) = 18%.

So...there you have it. Dell's larger 24 inch display costs about $415 less than Apple's 23 inch display. PCs actually are cheaper than macs...lol

---

On a side note, if you look at the net income applicable to common shares for both Dell and Apple, Dell's shares' net income is 14.33% of Dell's total revenue and Apple's shares' net income is 11.18% of Apple's total revenue. So while you may think Apple makes more money than Dell for its shareholders based on its total revenue, it's actually the other way around.

That is, of course, because Apple spends an enormous amount of money on R&D. Apple spends a few million more on R&D than Dell does per quarter, and it's revenue is less than 1/4 of Dell's. Still, Dell gives more of its money back to shareholders. It is arguable that the money spent by Apple on R&D will lead to more profits in the future for Apple (and Apple could then redirect more money to its investors), but that's another story...

Essentially, you pay more for Apple products to ensure that Apple products will remain consistently great. Apple needs higher gross margins than Dell because it spends so much money on R&D for it's consumers, really. The higher gross margins are not entirely for the shareholders (it just lets Apple gloat about high revenues).

In case you're wondering where I got these numbers:

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=DELL
and
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=AAPL
 
Doctor Q said:
Possible reasons to get a Mac:

1. Web development. You CAN NOT develop for Safari on a PC unless you either have a Mac or have memorized every conceivable compatibility problem between Safari and.. everybody else
2. PC versions of Mac software tend to be nonexistent.
3. Considerably more variation when it comes to hardware and hardware upgrades, resulting in less of a change that plug and play will work or that your separately purchased components will be compatible at all.
4. Price, when looking at total cost of ownership.
5. PCs do crash, more often than Macs, they can be painfully slow, and their software is sometimes buggy.
6. As far as software goes, backwards compatibility is practically a given. By way of contrast, old shareware programs written for Mac OS 7 still run perfectly under Mac OS X.
7. Every decade when Microsoft releases a new OS, it causes major pains for customers trying to upgrade. Mac upgrades are generally easy.
8. the possibility of being perceived as someone who must follow the masses

My point? The facts can be stretched either way when you make such generalizations.
Click to expand...

Uh, they're not "generalizations", nor are facts being "streched either way." This thread is devoted explicitly to reasons why a PC person might think twice about switching to Macs. Most of your points would not even occur to a non-Mac person, making them kind of, well.. pointless. Like so:

1. Nobody cares about developing for Safari unless your audience is the (relatively small proportion of users who are) Mac people -- in which case, you probably already own a Mac. On the other hand, everyone who develops for a general web audience *must* keep IE in mind , whether they like it or not (and I do not).

2. Again, this is not a "why a mac user shouldn't buy another mac", thread it's "why not to SWITCH (from windows, linux, etc) to a mac." In other words, it's talking about PC users. In other words, people who really don't give a crap that, if they buy another PC, Mac software they have never used and have probably never heard of won't be available for it.

3. True enough, but again, for PC users who LIKE the variety, the Mac might seem a bit constricting.

4. "TCO" is highly subjective. What I cited is not.

5. Actually, I have not experienced a single XP crash in the 3 years I've been using it -- and I keep it on 24/7. OS X is another story; in fact, I just had one this morning (one of the much talked about 'wake up from sleep' crashes). This isn't something that can be evaluated objectively, since everyone will have their own experiences, but then, I wasn't saying one OS was superior to another -- that's the point. OS X is NOT crash-free, bug-free, etc or in any way especially better in this regard as some of its proponents claim. The "unstretched" fact is that both OS's are far more usable and stable compared to their predecessors, but are not completely crash-proof, so if a Windows person is moving to OS X thinking it will solve these sorts of problems, he or she might be in for a surprise.

6. Assuming you feel like firing up a damned emulator, that is (and a buggy, slow one at that - half the time it hangs). I wasn't even referring to Classic programs though -- there have been plenty of software compatibility problems just between the minor versions of OS X itself. Again, in my experience, this is *far* less common in Windows. It's a tradeoff, of course: Apple feels free to make major under the hood changes whenever it pleases if it thinks it'll help or if it will make some new feature possible, but this can introduce frequent incompatibilities. Windows on the other hand maintains excellent compatibility with older software, but at the expense of making significant overhauls.

7. False comparison. Again, Panther -> Tiger is like SP1 -> SP2, not WinME -> XP. And don't even try to tell me the switch to OS X was completely painless; my coworkers, most of whom have never touched a PC, will tell you otherwise.

8. Most people use Windows because it's cheap and works, not because they want to "fit in." Whether you care to admit it, Apple does have a sometimes disturbingly cult-like following that many find offputting. I would find it offputting (not to mention completely inexplicable) if MS had the same thing, but it just doesn't. It's just sort of "there".
 
brianus said:
1. Web development. You CAN NOT develop for IE on a Mac unless you either have a PC or have memorized every conceivable compatibility problem between Explorer and.. everybody else

5. ... (then again, it's also true that it's very easy to run a spyware-free PC without much effort. The key: completely ditch Internet Explorer and any program that uses the IE browser control), but a lot of the other stuff you hear about OS X is just hype.
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Unfortunately, as mentioned in your first point, if you are developing for the Web, you cannot ditch IE.
 
:confused: :( :mad: Really?? I cant believe Law Schools hate Macs, Im going to law school in two yrs and I had already decided to switch to a Mac, guess I'll rethink that??? :(
 
I went all mac for a while (6 months?), but ultimately I wanted my PC back. I'm a gamer at heart, and as much as I love my powerbook and Mac OSX, gaming is it's weak point (and that's putting it lightly). So I went back to a PC for gaming.

I guess you can go back after you go mac...

So ultimately, for me atleast, there aren't 5 reasons not to buy a mac. There's 1: Gaming
 
brianus said:
1. Web development. You CAN NOT develop for IE on a Mac unless you either have a PC or have memorized every conceivable compatibility problem between Explorer and.. everybody else
2. Mac versions of PC software tend to be kinda chintsy, at least in my experience. Office v.X is ok but there *are* certain quirks between it and the industry-standard PC version. And then there's the Mac IE.. *shudders*
3. Considerably less choice when it comes to hardware and hardware upgrades. But thank god for USB and Firewire
4. Price, of course; and related to that, 'bang for your buck'. My dad just bought a brand new 3.2GHz PC for $700, monitor included. That was a steal, but it's not unheard of. Apple doesn't even offer speeds that high, and to get close to it you'll have to shell out $3000. Blahblahblah, megahertz myth, come on: deep down you all know it's true that Apple's behind (as, indeed, the folks who've received the Developer Macintels have now confirmed...)
5. If you're expecting a cure to all that ails you in the PC world, think again -- Macs do crash, they can be painfully slow, and their software is sometimes buggy. The lack of viruses/spyware is true (then again, it's also true that it's very easy to run a spyware-free PC without much effort. The key: completely ditch Internet Explorer and any program that uses the IE browser control), but a lot of the other stuff you hear about OS X is just hype.
6. As far as software goes, backwards compatibility is practically a forbidden concept. By way of contrast, old shareware programs written for Windows 3.1 in 1992 still run perfectly fine on my XP SP1 laptop (and yes, I still use them, dadgummit!).
7. Every year and a half when Apple releases a new minor upgrade to OS X they treat it like it's a brand spanking new OS -- and expect you to pay for it. To a longtime PC user, this sounds utterly ridiculous and inappropriate. Tiger is little more than OS X Service Pack 4, with some cute bells and whistles thrown in.
8. iLemmings, and the possibility of being perceived as one

..oops, that was a little more than 5. Well, as you can tell I'm not totally enamored of Apple. Don't get me wrong: I could probably write a list thrice as long for reasons TO switch, as I myself will be doing just as soon as they can get their act together and release the next Mini. But let us not be blind to their faults.
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Wrong on every point. Bah. Join the National Inquirer.
 
dejo said:
Unfortunately, as mentioned in your first point, if you are developing for the Web, you cannot ditch IE.
Click to expand...

Well, I meant it should be ditched for ordinary surfing. I use IE to test out my own code; I *never* use it to visit a domain other than my own. I don't know if it's easy to uninstall -- I've heard that it can be done but there's no built in way -- but I think people who don't absolutely need it should seriously consider doing so.
 
- Games
- The fun of choosing what you want in your computer, not being stuck with the same manufacturer for almost everything
- The ability to constantly upgrade your computer in a relatively cheap way
- The lower price of PC components
- Solitaire (god I loved that one but it's true...... addictive as hell)
- The ability to install software that others use at school and at work instead of having to ask if this runs on OSX (which people never heard of or they look at you like you're out of this world)
- Software availability, there's so much more things for PCs than for Macs
- Piracy, do you really think that PC users actually pay for most of their software? It's easily available without those annoying features (someone said Windows activation?)
- Current hardware! I'm sorry but if a PC product hasn't been updated in 8-9 months, the company would go out of business. The iBook fiasco would never had happened, they would have done something to sweeten the deal!

Basically people would prefer to buy a PC instead of a Mac since a PC is cheaper and it's the industry standard. That way they can get more support if they run into problems, they know they'll be able to get more software and play games too.

That being said, I use PCs since I first touched a 286 back in the days, then got my first computer (an IBM 386sx 25mhz!!!) up to now (Athlon 64 3000+, 1gb of Dual channel RAM, GeForce 6600GT, double layer DVD burner, slot-loading DVD player, a very nice Antec case, etc...). I've been let down by Macs each and every time I tried to use one, part because I didn't know how to use them and also because that I hated how they looked (remember the original iMac, that atrocious piece of plastic), how they feeled with their 1 button mouse and I hated the OS with a passion (never worked on OSX yet but each time I worked on a Mac, I had a crash and couldn't find a way to kill the processes to resume work, I had to do a hard reboot).

Today, I'm receiving a 20gb iPod (with color screen) along with a 12" iBook and this is going to be my first real experience on a Mac after almost 15 years of using PCs. I bought this laptop for school so specs weren't all that important, the price was honest considering that to get an equally well built machine, I would have got an IBM (or Lenovo) for twice the price. Since I hear so much good things about OSX and the iBooks/Powerbooks, I decided to give it a try and see how it goes but I'm very confident that I made the right decision. I don't think I could ever switch completely because I like to game from time to time and the ability to upgrade for really cheap but I think that I won't regret having an iBook as my secondary machine...
 
Zukatah said:
Basically people would prefer to buy a PC instead of a Mac since a PC is cheaper...

...I bought this laptop for school so specs weren't all that important, the price was honest considering that to get an equally well built machine, I would have got an IBM (or Lenovo) for twice the price...
Click to expand...

?????
 
To match the quality of the iBook/Pbook, you just can't buy a Dell or HP or whatever since they're all competing for lower prices, not really putting the emphasis on durability and the quality of construction. The only other company that I trust is IBM for laptops and when I try to configure a T or X series with the same features that I get with the iBook, I'm nowhere near the iBook price tag! In fact, I got my iBook for 1354$ CAN (plus a little more because of the RAM I got from Crucial) and there's no way I'd get something similar under 2000-2400$!

Edit: If in fact you pointed out that this part made no sense, I'm sorry. What I was trying to say is that my other option was an IBM and it was far more expensive than the iBook..... English isn't my maiden language and it's 1:30 am here!

Edit 2: finally noticed what you meant! Okay, a desktop PC is cheaper, a laptop with similar specs is also cheaper but when you ask for the same quality, it gets through the roof on the PC platform. So, while a much cheaper alternative is available to you, it might not be a good decision to go for it since it wouldn't last all that long anyway!
 
Ok. Here is another point of view. Yes, you can buy a $400 Dell, but you have to dish out a ton of money for software. What, MS Office runs between $149 (excel, ppt, outlook, word) to $499 (access, excel, outlook, outlook w/ business contact manager, ppt, publisher, word (full versions for both examples, not upgrade)). So what you don't pay for in the computer itself, you do in software. And if for some odd reason you would have to buy a new OS cd, it can be either $299 (xp pro) or $199 (xp home) (full versions both, not upgrade)

With mac, you pay a little more for the system, but the software is quite a bit more reasonable. iWork with Pages and Keynote for $79! iLife installed on most computers automatically, $79 if not included. A new OS if a person chooses to upgrade, $129. Now, this is just Apple software. Things like PhotoShop are through the roof, but just company made software is a big difference. I guess it all eventually works out about even in the end.

My dad and I were just talking a little bit ago, and I said to him, I wonder how much Gates makes on average every time a PC (preloaded with windows) is sold. I would have to bet it is no more than $50 or $60. I could be completely wrong. Well, this is my rant. Sorry it's so long.

-Steve
 
brianus said:
Uh, they're not "generalizations", nor are facts being "streched either way." This thread is devoted explicitly to reasons why a PC person might think twice about switching to Macs. Most of your points would not even occur to a non-Mac person, making them kind of, well.. pointless. Like so:

1. Nobody cares about developing for Safari unless your audience is the (relatively small proportion of users who are) Mac people -- in which case, you probably already own a Mac. On the other hand, everyone who develops for a general web audience *must* keep IE in mind , whether they like it or not (and I do not).

2. Again, this is not a "why a mac user shouldn't buy another mac", thread it's "why not to SWITCH (from windows, linux, etc) to a mac." In other words, it's talking about PC users. In other words, people who really don't give a crap that, if they buy another PC, Mac software they have never used and have probably never heard of won't be available for it.

3. True enough, but again, for PC users who LIKE the variety, the Mac might seem a bit constricting.

4. "TCO" is highly subjective. What I cited is not.

5. Actually, I have not experienced a single XP crash in the 3 years I've been using it -- and I keep it on 24/7. OS X is another story; in fact, I just had one this morning (one of the much talked about 'wake up from sleep' crashes). This isn't something that can be evaluated objectively, since everyone will have their own experiences, but then, I wasn't saying one OS was superior to another -- that's the point. OS X is NOT crash-free, bug-free, etc or in any way especially better in this regard as some of its proponents claim. The "unstretched" fact is that both OS's are far more usable and stable compared to their predecessors, but are not completely crash-proof, so if a Windows person is moving to OS X thinking it will solve these sorts of problems, he or she might be in for a surprise.

6. Assuming you feel like firing up a damned emulator, that is (and a buggy, slow one at that - half the time it hangs). I wasn't even referring to Classic programs though -- there have been plenty of software compatibility problems just between the minor versions of OS X itself. Again, in my experience, this is *far* less common in Windows. It's a tradeoff, of course: Apple feels free to make major under the hood changes whenever it pleases if it thinks it'll help or if it will make some new feature possible, but this can introduce frequent incompatibilities. Windows on the other hand maintains excellent compatibility with older software, but at the expense of making significant overhauls.

7. False comparison. Again, Panther -> Tiger is like SP1 -> SP2, not WinME -> XP. And don't even try to tell me the switch to OS X was completely painless; my coworkers, most of whom have never touched a PC, will tell you otherwise.

8. Most people use Windows because it's cheap and works, not because they want to "fit in." Whether you care to admit it, Apple does have a sometimes disturbingly cult-like following that many find offputting. I would find it offputting (not to mention completely inexplicable) if MS had the same thing, but it just doesn't. It's just sort of "there".
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First of all, it is not fair for another poster to say "Wrong on every point" to your post, brianus, any more than it would be to claim the same of my post. We are discussing reasons that someone might want to buy a PC rather than a Mac, and you've brought up some points worth discussing.

My post wasn't "pointless", as you claim, even if you missed my point. My point is that the reasons you describe are not clear-cut factors that favor a PC, and that the same criteria can lead you to reasons to favor a Mac. I gave counterexamples (not proofs, because absolute proof is not possible here) matching each of your points to show that they are subject to interpretation and that either side (for those who insist on taking sides) can find factors in their favor. I think you took my comments to be blind favoritism for Macs (and off-topic), while in fact I can see both sides of these issues and hope others will too. Example: Looking for a quick purchase of a throwaway system? A PC will likely save you cash up front. Looking for longer-term investment? Consider whether Macs give you a lower total cost of ownership. Just because TCO is subjective doesn't mean you should ignore it.

In claiming that your experience, your coworkers' experience, or even my experience (I've had a PC and a Mac side by side for years) prove something, you are generalizing. I've upgraded from Jaguar -> Panther -> Tiger without a glitch. I just finished a frustrating two weeks dealing with a major SP1 failure that I finally traced to a driver that had to be upgraded before a seemingly unrelated Windows application installer could each launch. Does that show that Macs are better purchases? No. Does your personal experience show that PCs are better purchases? No.

Nitpicking the issues you brought up shouldn't be necessary for me to make the point that for these tradeoff issues either a PC or a Mac can come out ahead when evaluating price/value, stability, compatibility, etc., especially for the purposes a specific buyer has in mind. Perhaps you are making the same point.
 
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