What would you do if apple licensed OSX?

[snberk103]

Windows isn't unstable because of "random hardware". It's unstable because of retarded users downloading everything from the Internet.

Agree that random downloading/installing can affect OS X or Windows. Most OS X users with stability issues, in my experience, have installed multiple "OS enhancers". OS X without these additions is incredibly stable... if you ignore the .0 and .1 releases 😉

OS X is as unstable as Windows. I've had many issues with the whole system becoming frozen in my old MBP 2009 and MBP 2010.

If you OS X is unstable, then something is wrong with your system (or you have an early release), or you have a OS enhancer conflicting with something. It shouldn't be unstable. And neither should Windows on solid hardware.

Curiously, I've never experienced any kind of complete system freeze in my current desktop custom built PC.

MacRumors forums are full of fallacies. 😛

I agree here too...

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However, the limited hardware set that Apple provides gives Apple a huge advantage is in support. Because the options are so limited, if only one person is having an issue then it's either broken software - reinstall the OS. Or broken hardware - replace it. If many people are having an issue, it shows up quickly and can be reproduced easily by the Apple engineers, and a solution found and released.

What is amazing about Windows is not that it is unstable, but that it works so well on so many different hardware and software combinations. I agree that most Windows instability issues can be traced back to the user.

However, when you have a weird HW/SW conflict with Windows .... then you enter tech support limbo. Issues can be hard to figure out, harder to resolve, and often because it's a combination of at least 2 things (2 HW parts, HW & SW, or 2 SW modules) the vendors have a tendency to blame the other party... and can get away with that. This is another advantage of Apple's one stop warranty coverage.

When Windows and OS X are working well, there really shouldn't be any difference in stability. But when things go wonky, I'd rather have OS X. Fallacies and all.

 

[foodog]

Windows isn't unstable because of "random hardware". It's unstable because of retarded users downloading everything from the Internet.

OS X is as unstable as Windows. I've had many issues with the whole system becoming frozen in my old MBP 2009 and MBP 2010.

Curiously, I've never experienced any kind of complete system freeze in my current desktop custom built PC.

MacRumors forums are full of fallacies. 😛

Not even remotely close to being as unstable.

 

[davidcmc]

Not even remotely close to being as unstable.

I disagree.

Not willing to explain why.
OS X and Windows are both stable systems, provided the user has some brain and doesn't do ****.

As the user above said, the main reason of instability issues in my old MBP 2010 was probably because of the hardware.
The same fact can be applied to Windows based machines.

Most problems reside in cheap computers. People buy cheap computers from any crappy reseller and then complain that "Windows is unstable".
Then, they decide to spend more money on the next computer, buy a Mac and go around spreading **** like you do: "Windows is unstable. Macs are perfect.".
NO. WINDOWS ISN'T UNSTABLE. It's just that you bought a crappy machine with ****** parts.

My custom built PC is made of expensive parts, from good manufacturers, bought from trusted resellers and doesn't give me a single issue (freeze, malfunctioning, faulty hardware etc.).

The rule is simple: the more you spend on a product, the bigger is the probability that it won't give you problems. That's why Macs are expensive, because they're made to give you no stress.
You can't judge Windows based on cheap machines.

If you spend the same quantity of money that an iMac costs in a good PC, with parts of good manufacturers (GigaByte, Asus, MSI, OCZ, G.Skill, Antec, Corsair etc.), you're probably going to have no issues, ever.

 

[segovius]

Is there really any chance in a million Apple would licence it? I really wish they would but can't see it.

The sad truth is that Apple can no longer be trusted with its own creations.

 

[foodog]

I disagree.

Not willing to explain why.

Ask someone that has to support both which has more issues. As a Network Security Engineer I don't deal directly with desktops as a support person, but do deal with the people that have to support them. Windows desktops are much more likely to have issues to the point where the field support guys just reimage them.... while the Macs just hum along. I am using my observations of a 8,000 desktop company that has about a 60 / 40 mix.... I;m sure your one example of your desktop being ok trumps that.

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I disagree.
Most problems reside in cheap computers. People buy cheap computers from any crappy reseller and then complain that "Windows is unstable".
Then, they decide to spend more money on the next computer, buy a Mac and go around spreading **** like you do:

This was exactly my original point that you began your argument on. I said Windows is unstable because of all the random hardware it has to run on. Macs are more stable because of the known hardware.

Thanks for making my point for me.

 

[Mr. McMac]

Not even remotely close to being as unstable.

I've had way more stability issues with my macs such as kernel panics and freezing issues running Mountain Lion than I've ever had with my custom built PC's running Windows 7

 

[foodog]

I've had way more stability issues with my macs such as kernel panics and freezing issues running Mountain Lion than I've ever had with my custom built PC's running Windows 7

You guys and your home networks.... ML just came out as one other poster said earlier don't use OS's that are .0 or .1

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Is there really any chance in a million Apple would licence it? I really wish they would but can't see it.

The sad truth is that Apple can no longer be trusted with its own creations.

Doubtful. They did it once and it nearly bankrupted them.

 

[davidcmc]

Ask someone that has to support both which has more issues. As a Network Security Engineer I don't deal directly with desktops as a support person, but do deal with the people that have to support them. Windows desktops are much more likely to have issues to the point where the field support guys just reimage them.... while the Macs just hum along. I am using my observations of a 8,000 desktop company that has about a 60 / 40 mix.... I;m sure your one example of your desktop being ok trumps that.

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Now tell me what would happen if you work in the support center of a company that only sells powerful notebooks dedicated for gamers.
Are you sure you'd have to support people with problems like "Windows takes too long to boot"?

This was exactly my original point that you began your argument on. I said Windows is unstable because of all the random hardware it has to run on. Macs are more stable because of the known hardware.

Thanks for making my point for me.

I didn't say that Windows is unstable because of random hardware, but because of random CRAPPY hardware. I've tried to make this clear by putting words in bold, but it seems that you really want to misinterpret the words.

 

[snberk103]

I've had way more stability issues with my macs such as kernel panics and freezing issues running Mountain Lion than I've ever had with my custom built PC's running Windows 7

I haven't put my ML system into production use yet (just waiting for a quiet few days to transfer my account over) so I can't speak for ML specifically ... but....

Once I got rid of all the OS enhancers that I had plagued my 10.4 Tiger system with, I haven't seen a kernel panic since. Multiple Macs in the house, over many years. I have just figured out why my production 10.7.4 system freezes.... a wonky FW external HDD. Probably a combination of HW and OS issue, I will admit. The easy fix is to turn the HDD off and then back on. This has been the only freezing issue I've experienced since I can remember.

I am un-official support for a number of friends with Macs, and my experience is typical of the group.

If you are having freezing issues and kernel panics, then there is something particular with your system causing an issue. It may be a conflict with a piece of software or hardware that you would think OS X should support... in which case I would suggest you check for updates.

One of the other advantages of a closed system is that HW and SW developers can more easily test their bits and bobs for incompatibilities, and address the issues. And... if one person is experiencing an inherent incompatibility then many people will likely see it, and the issue can be reproduced and fixed.

 

[foodog]

Now tell me what would happen if you work in the support center of a company that only sells powerful notebooks dedicated for gamers.
Are you sure you'd have to support people with problems like "Windows takes too long to boot"?



I didn't say that Windows is unstable because of random hardware, but because of random CRAPPY hardware. I've tried to make this clear by putting words in bold, but it seems that you really want to misinterpret the words.

The stability issue isn't really a hardware problem as much as a driver one. Maybe this is splitting hairs but I've seen plenty of good hardware with terrible drivers. Windows runs great on high end PC hardware with good driver support, it runs terrible on random hardware.

My entire point is Mac OS is more stable because there is a finite amount of hardware it is required to work with. The drivers are all tested and included with the OS. So again thank you for making my point by pointing out Windows is unstable on crappy hardware. If Mac OS was easily able to be installed on any random hardware platform it would be at least as unstable as any Windows install on the same box.

 

[Yebubbleman]

Not only that I have used such systems but I have also built ten or more myself... And on a another note, if you do not have enough courtesy to engage in a normal conversation without being aggressive please don't engage in one at all.

Welcome to the Internets, on most forums when you say something flammable, you will be flamed for it. That's just how it works. The notion that Macs are, by hardware design, any bit better than a machine I can build in my bedroom, is such a notion, and I responded accordingly. I don't believe I violated the CareBears rules of this forum, though I invite you to report me if you feel so abused. In the meantime, check your facts in the future; even though a majority of the people on this site are regular addicts of Apple's Cool-Aid, know that there's a world outside of that reality distortion field. Doing so will prevent asshats like me from having any reason to be "aggressive" with you in the future.

I'm not so sure that they would actually follow through on that. It's not like the video card are falling all over themselves to offer drivers for the Mac Pro compatible cards. Professional photo printer drivers are often offered late to Macs, and then they stop development on the drivers early.


In which case the correct hypothetical answer would have been by using the transmorgifier - whereby you clone yourself. 🙂

But seriously.... when you start supporting your own hardware you'd soon see why Apple doesn't open up the platform. For your sanity, you'd standardize on a specific set of hardware parts. Then you'll go crazy when one of your customers opens the box and swaps out the video card for another one with flaky drivers... or one that pulls that just a little bit more power than the board can handle - even though the specs on the card say it should be within limits. You know the one that trips the safety circuits only when the system is below 16ºc because it takes just that much more power to start spinning up a cold fan on the video card.

Oy... and then the WiFi card you've been installing - same model number as you've always used - started shipping with a different chip on it that has flaky OS X drivers... (without telling you that they'v made the change)

Get the hypothetical Scotch or Bourbon and hypothetically get mortal, eh?

Heh...already enjoying myself a hypothetical Bloody Mary! In all seriousness, I think that the attention paid to keeping Mac drivers up to date has much more to do with the fact that there are only five product lines from only one manufacturer being produced per year. I think that if either number increased and if the population of OS X users thusly increased, perhaps there'd be an increased urgency about it. As it stands, NVIDIA only has about a dozen Mountain Lion compatible Mac video cards/boards/chips to keep track of; slightly more for AMD/ATI, but still, that's not a lot of hardware to pour software into relative to the zillions of other hardware that they put out that are employed regularly by PCs of all shapes and sizes.

 

[borostef]

Welcome to the Internets, on most forums when you say something flammable, you will be flamed for it. That's just how it works. The notion that Macs are, by hardware design, any bit better than a machine I can build in my bedroom, is such a notion, and I responded accordingly. I don't believe I violated the CareBears rules of this forum, though I invite you to report me if you feel so abused. In the meantime, check your facts in the future; even though a majority of the people on this site are regular addicts of Apple's Cool-Aid, know that there's a world outside of that reality distortion field. Doing so will prevent asshats like me from having any reason to be "aggressive" with you in the future.

I have said something flammable? Don't think so... Anyway, if you think you can build a better PC than Apple, Dell, Sony, Acer... etc. in your garage good luck to you... I have built many systems that work well, but I would not presume that my quality control is better than those companies mentioned before... That is just an arrogant statement by an arrogant man... But that's alright CareBear... I will give you an example... I was in a situation where I had to have three computers running three different video clips that would need to converge into one on the main screen at the exact same moment... Built three exactly same PC's, same components, everything to the housing... The same... Each of them developed some micro stuttering that resulted in timing differences... Put three Mac Pro's on the same job... Timing was perfect, flawless... So, go figure...

 

[philipma1957]

If apple sold mountain lion to work on any intel pc (death blow to amd)

I would build a high end killer pc and install it. Anyone that thinks windows 7 is not stable is allowed to do so. Anyone that thinks mountain lion has stable issues is also allowed to do so.

Anyone that thinks they could build a killer pc with all high end parts that would work well with windows or mountain lion can also believe that.


This is what I know that I can do I can make a mac setup that crashes mountain lion 5 or 6 times a day. I can make a pc setup that crashes windows 7 five or six times every day. I can also make a mac setup that rarely crashes and I can make a pc setup that rarely crashes. The mac setup will not be as fast since mac does not let me use the fastest cpus and the fastest gpus.


My current large pc has an i7 3770t and 2x hd7950 gpus and an intel ssd in an intel mobo. It is far quieter then my hex core mac pro was.

It smokes all macs with the exception of dual hex core mac pros. it runs 24 7 and rarely crashes. I would love to put osx mountain lion on it , but that has not happened and most likely won't.

At least not legally.

 

[snberk103]

...
Heh...already enjoying myself a hypothetical Bloody Mary! In all seriousness, I think that the attention paid to keeping Mac drivers up to date has much more to do with the fact that there are only five product lines from only one manufacturer being produced per year. I think that if either number increased and if the population of OS X users thusly increased, perhaps there'd be an increased urgency about it. As it stands, NVIDIA only has about a dozen Mountain Lion compatible Mac video cards/boards/chips to keep track of; slightly more for AMD/ATI, but still, that's not a lot of hardware to pour software into relative to the zillions of other hardware that they put out that are employed regularly by PCs of all shapes and sizes.

Your logic doesn't quite follow, though. You are correct that it appears that the Mac market share is not quite large enough for the video card manufacturers to spend lots of time on their drivers for OS X. However, where the logic fails, is that increasing the number of possible cards to support doesn't make it more likely they'll write drivers, but less likely. Currently, they can write top notch drivers for X number of dollars. If you double the number of types of cards they need to support, then it becomes X*2 dollars. But... unless the Mac market share also doubles, then the revenue the card maker gets is less than double. So, double the expense - but not doubling the revenue. They'll be more likely to abandon support on some cards.

 

[Yebubbleman]

I have said something flammable? Don't think so... Anyway, if you think you can build a better PC than Apple, Dell, Sony, Acer... etc. in your garage good luck to you... I have built many systems that work well, but I would not presume that my quality control is better than those companies mentioned before... That is just an arrogant statement by an arrogant man... But that's alright CareBear... I will give you an example... I was in a situation where I had to have three computers running three different video clips that would need to converge into one on the main screen at the exact same moment... Built three exactly same PC's, same components, everything to the housing... The same... Each of them developed some micro stuttering that resulted in timing differences... Put three Mac Pro's on the same job... Timing was perfect, flawless... So, go figure...

If I build the systems then I can personally inspect and attest to their functionality. Do note that as soon as Dell started moving their manufacturing to China, their quality went way down. That's not to say that all manufacturers that move to China suffer a quality loss, but when you are trying to keep costs down, quality suffers. I am not going to China anytime soon, so if I were to start building and selling computer (with or without a hypothetically licensed non-Hackintosh version of OS X preinstalled), my product would be superior to that sold by the likes of Dell, Lenovo, HP, and the like. The fact that you built three identical PCs that had the same problem either meant that you didn't know what you were doing when you built these machines and thusly made the same mistake thrice, or it meant that you used a part that sucked thrice. Which one it was, I don't know; I prefer to give you the benefit of the doubt. Do note that Apple had a similar problem with MacBook Pros from mid 2007 through late 2008 that shipped with the GeForce 8600M GT, a mobile discrete GPU that was flawed by design and afflicted said MacBook Pros as well as various PC laptops throughout the entire industry with all sorts of logic board failures costing tons of money. And yes, these were all on name-branded machines. Just because your Mac Pro tower is super reliable, that doesn't mean that all Mac Pro towers are or will be, nor does it mean that Apple is free of the issues of which you assume a home-builder would face, because they are certainly not. Sometimes **** happens. As a hypothetical one-man operation, would I have the strength that Apple did when confronting NVIDIA on that issue, absolutely not. Would I have the financial resources to offer such a quality extension program, probably not; but as a one-man operation, I probably wouldn't have that many customers to start with, so it all evens out.

Your logic doesn't quite follow, though. You are correct that it appears that the Mac market share is not quite large enough for the video card manufacturers to spend lots of time on their drivers for OS X. However, where the logic fails, is that increasing the number of possible cards to support doesn't make it more likely they'll write drivers, but less likely. Currently, they can write top notch drivers for X number of dollars. If you double the number of types of cards they need to support, then it becomes X*2 dollars. But... unless the Mac market share also doubles, then the revenue the card maker gets is less than double. So, double the expense - but not doubling the revenue. They'll be more likely to abandon support on some cards.

There is one Mac model that can take a standard desktop video card. That model is the Mac Pro. That machine starts at $2499. At best, you could pick up a refurbished one for $1900, but still, that's a pricey desktop compared to the full range of desktops out there. Audience for a Mac video card, by that logic is very limited, and even then, it's not like NVIDIA or AMD really need to care about giving their Mac cards support for the latest DirectX/Direct3D drivers. If the number of desktops running OS X were to surge, I can almost guarantee you that NVIDIA's and AMD's give-a-crap about drivers and card offerings for the Mac platform would also surge accordingly.

 

[borostef]

Anyway... We are going sideways with this discussion... As I have said before, if Apple licensed their OS I would build a machine with that OS... But, if you ask me if I think that would be a good thing... I would have to say... NO.
I have built PC's all my life, mostly trouble free, but when there was trouble it was mainly because of the OS was having to cope with all sorts of different components with tens of possible driver versions for those components...
That is where I see the logic behind Apple's thinking... Hardware and software in the same, not so changeable package.
Sure... If I need a gaming machine, I could build a PC that would fly circles around any Mac... And I have... But that is not why I need or buy Mac machines...
Over and out 😉

 

[xgman]

Anyway... We are going sideways with this discussion... As I have said before, if Apple licensed their OS I would build a machine with that OS... But, if you ask me if I think that would be a good thing... I would have to say... NO.
I have built PC's all my life, mostly trouble free, but when there was trouble it was mainly because of the OS was having to cope with all sorts of different components with tens of possible driver versions for those components...
That is where I see the logic behind Apple's thinking... Hardware and software in the same, not so changeable package.
Sure... If I need a gaming machine, I could build a PC that would fly circles around any Mac... And I have... But that is not why I need or buy Mac machines...
Over and out 😉

Good point. I just wish Apple would spin off the desktop, or even the entire Mac division, to an entity that actually promoted them and kept them current, even if that entity is still owned and controlled by Apple.