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Why do you think Mac OS X is better than Windows?
- Thread starter bob7up
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Have you used Mac OS X for a considerable amount of time yet?
Anyway, my take: I am more comfortable using Mac OS X for its UI and general behaviour, though since the arrival of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion I seriously doubt the direction Mac OS X is going.
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Anyway, my take: I am more comfortable using Mac OS X for its UI and general behaviour, though since the arrival of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion I seriously doubt the direction Mac OS X is going.
____________________________________________________________
Maybe have a look at Advanced Search or MRoogle to find the hundreds of similar threads while you wait for more answers:
-Doesn't come with crappy trials (although that is really the manufacturers fault)
-Cleanliness of background processes, i know, and can stop anything running on my computer.
-everthing about finder work better for me, bar search, i prefer windows search.
-spotlight with cmd+space is a great tool from ANYWHERE
love that one.
-boot up time (+shutdown times)
-safari on mac (not so good on windows)
-quick view is also really nice.
-also like full screen apps (safari+xcode)
-GESTURES!
don't like: dashboard, mission control, lanchpad, finder search (love spotlight),
-Cleanliness of background processes, i know, and can stop anything running on my computer.
-everthing about finder work better for me, bar search, i prefer windows search.
-spotlight with cmd+space is a great tool from ANYWHERE
love that one.-boot up time (+shutdown times)
-safari on mac (not so good on windows)
-quick view is also really nice.
-also like full screen apps (safari+xcode)
-GESTURES!
don't like: dashboard, mission control, lanchpad, finder search (love spotlight),
Actually, I'm not sure that I do. I haven't used Windows for about 8 years, but something I'm realising is that it pays to not become too blinkered. I intend to try out a Windows machine in the coming months before blindly upgrading my Mac again.
The open market is there to be consumed.
The open market is there to be consumed.
No not really, tried one in a apple store and was alright, although I still prefer building my computer. I have to say that the OS looks pretty nice but for me would take a bit to get used to.
A very wise approach.
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No not really, tried one in a apple store and was alright, although I still prefer building my computer. I have to say that the OS looks pretty nice but for me would take a bit to get used to.
So you don't own a mac? You have to live with a mac for a while and use it a lot before I would ever value your opinion on this matter.
I've been using os x since 10.1 or whatever it was. The best version has been 10.4, imho, but I think it's a step backwards with all this Lion malarky. I haven't used Windows since XP, I couldn't comment on whether it's better or not, but I'd imagine there isn't much difference between the two these days.
Ray
Ray
No not really, tried one in a apple store and was alright, although I still prefer building my computer. I have to say that the OS looks pretty nice but for me would take a bit to get used to.
It takes almost everyone some time to get used to it, due to its different approach of performing tasks. Many are easier, some a bit more difficult.
Just compare System Preferences with Control Panel.
Okay.
I find the UI a bit better and easier to use.
Games!
If you build a PC you no bloatware crap.
Customizable (Background, Gadgets (Don't use them though), Custom Themes, Put the taskbar wherever, etc)
Looks cleaner (To me)
All I can really think of right now, it's around 6AM in the morning and I'm rather tired.
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I might buy one possibly, since I'm doing a computer repair service and it would be benificial to have both Windows and Mac OSX so I could help with problems on both OS's.
You could always look into Hackintoshing:
Because you're used to it.
I have used Windows and Mac machines for hours every day, for years and this is what pisses me off about windows.
-driver issues.
-complete removal of software.
-having to run AV software to get on networks
-Internet explorer
-autoruns and startup item ambiguity.
Wow. This thread.
Any way. I'm a late adopter to OSX (2010). its an absolute joy to use and its an experience.
Logging onto windows everyday at work makes me cringe.
Any way. I'm a late adopter to OSX (2010). its an absolute joy to use and its an experience.
Logging onto windows everyday at work makes me cringe.
^ this.
I must admit that my work PC is encumbered by McAfee Enterprise and literally dozens of other IT installed apps that make the PC so unstable I have to "power button reboot" the thing more than once a week.
The last time I ran Windows at home, it was XP. I had few problems with my machine but my wife's machine kept freezing and wiping out her firefox profile. My daughter's machine kept losing the ability to print and my son's machine kept falling off the network and losing the ability to print. I have had home built, low end and high end Windows boxes. The high end boxes were better but not much better. I ran avg, zonealarm and other free antivirus on the machines. Many of the problems we had were related to drivers. For instance, the Windows driver that comes with the HP PSC 2510 was a 700 meg download. The OSX driver for that same printer was only 30 meg.
Most recently my daughter had a Win 7 laptop that was mandatory at her school. We had to spend over 2 thousand dollars on the thing and less than 3 years later it was worth less than $50. Meanwhile, the iPad I purchased around the same time for a mere $500 was worth over $300. That school now requires their students to use iPads.
Mac gear generally costs more up front but works better and holds more value. Apple still offers a lower cost option to get a Mac: the Mac mini. You can use your leftover monitor, mouse and keyboard. If you're thinking about a Mac but aren't sure, the mini is a great little machine.
As for the differences in the OS, I suggest you take a longer look at those screen shots for system preferences and control panel. Both are searchable but control panel seems to be thrown together and to me it seems that unrelated items are nested under ambiguous categories. Also note that system preferences is already in the "show all" view while the control panel screen shot is a simplified view. In the "show all" view, MS throws everything at you with no categorization while Apple found a way to group icons by category in their show all view. This is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the thoughtful design of OS X versus the legacy baggage that forces Windows 7 users to contend with user interfaces that were past their prime 20 years ago.
Attachments
I get to work and sit at my desk. Accidently kicking the tin box under my desk. I turn it on and it boots up with Sophos Encryption that adds another 20 seconds to the boot time. (sophos also has decided to disable all USB ports whilst it boots up) then once the OS boots up I load Safari (i know on wondows. yuck) and I'll do a bit of work then it will crash and the "windows recovery" thing that I told NOT to run when a tab crashes in safari, runs anyway and closes the browser.
To top it all off I had the "Blue Screen of Death" yesterday morning.
Don't even get me started on windows "trying" to fix an issue by itself. 99% of the "Windows was unable to fix teh issue"
Pile of ****.
Thats what happen when you don't have you're own hardware
For me, I moved to mac (in 2009, after being a PC user since 1992 - Amiga before that) because
- the hardware is nice. trackpad works
- multiple desktops
- unix shell (i'm a unix admin amongst other things for my day job)
- it's NextSTEP reborn
- I was a Linux / Solaris / FreeBSD admin, love unix and saw it as "unix with actual commercial software support"
I'd been wanting one since OS X was announced, but wasn't willing to jump to PPC as I wasn't sure.
As soon as the intel switch happened, I was very interested. However I'd just built a new gaming PC and didn't get around to trying a mac until 2009 when I got my first mini.
There's a heap of stuff OS X does better than Windows imho - tools like Automator for creating folder actions (amongst other things), systemwide applescript (a hell of a lot nicer than VB), better use of hardware accelerated video, headless apps, etc.
I run windows at work because I have to. I run windows if i want to play some PC games because I have to.
I enjoy using OS X. Often, when trying to get something done i'll discover something and go "oh, that's cool!", rather than when i'm using Windows and end up getting annoyed because something doesn't do what I want it to do, let alone do it easily.
I mean, lets take the command line for example. Windows has either cmd.exe (garbage in 1990, and still garbage today) or Powershell (new to Vista / 7). Powershell can do some neat stuff, but the syntax is overly wordy, and it runs SO DAMN SLOWLY. It's also buggy - I did the microsoft powershell course recently and during the class found a number of bugs where "weird stuff" happened while completing a lab. Googled it, and sure enough I'd run into various powershell bugs.
The Mac has bash, just like a proper unix box. Commands can be piped, you have tools like grep, awk, etc. And yet the GUI (with automator) is just as powerful in many ways, and often faster to get complicated tasks done.
People who think macs are shiny toys and not usable for serious work really haven't tried to get things done on them. The UI looks like candy sure, but its just the surface....
You need to give it a couple of weeks use to see some of the cool stuff. If you're just going to sit down at a mac for a few minutes/hours expecting it to work like windows you'll just get annoyed and write it off as bad. It took me at least a week or so for everything to start to "click". Spending a little time with it in a store without anyone to show you something cool will just feel awkward if you're used to Windows.
edit:
Also, in terms of getting things done day to day, you don't need a lot of additional software.
CD burning? built in. DVD authoring? Built in. PDF viewing/creation? Built in. Web page editor? iLife is included. Same with Garageband for music creation. Facetime for video chat (no Skype!), etc.
I have ZERO warez on my mac, and i've had to spend very little to get a machine that does exactly what I want it to do.
A dev account for OS X / iOS development, a copy of iWork, a copy of Ableton Live Intro and that's basically it as far as productivity stuff goes. Everything else shipped with the machine...
Compared with windows where i'd either need to buy half of those apps for $$$ or put up with nagware crap with advertising banners, etc - the "inflated" price of a mac really isn't....
- the hardware is nice. trackpad works
- multiple desktops
- unix shell (i'm a unix admin amongst other things for my day job)
- it's NextSTEP reborn
- I was a Linux / Solaris / FreeBSD admin, love unix and saw it as "unix with actual commercial software support"
I'd been wanting one since OS X was announced, but wasn't willing to jump to PPC as I wasn't sure.
As soon as the intel switch happened, I was very interested. However I'd just built a new gaming PC and didn't get around to trying a mac until 2009 when I got my first mini.
There's a heap of stuff OS X does better than Windows imho - tools like Automator for creating folder actions (amongst other things), systemwide applescript (a hell of a lot nicer than VB), better use of hardware accelerated video, headless apps, etc.
I run windows at work because I have to. I run windows if i want to play some PC games because I have to.
I enjoy using OS X. Often, when trying to get something done i'll discover something and go "oh, that's cool!", rather than when i'm using Windows and end up getting annoyed because something doesn't do what I want it to do, let alone do it easily.
I mean, lets take the command line for example. Windows has either cmd.exe (garbage in 1990, and still garbage today) or Powershell (new to Vista / 7). Powershell can do some neat stuff, but the syntax is overly wordy, and it runs SO DAMN SLOWLY. It's also buggy - I did the microsoft powershell course recently and during the class found a number of bugs where "weird stuff" happened while completing a lab. Googled it, and sure enough I'd run into various powershell bugs.
The Mac has bash, just like a proper unix box. Commands can be piped, you have tools like grep, awk, etc. And yet the GUI (with automator) is just as powerful in many ways, and often faster to get complicated tasks done.
People who think macs are shiny toys and not usable for serious work really haven't tried to get things done on them. The UI looks like candy sure, but its just the surface....
You need to give it a couple of weeks use to see some of the cool stuff. If you're just going to sit down at a mac for a few minutes/hours expecting it to work like windows you'll just get annoyed and write it off as bad. It took me at least a week or so for everything to start to "click". Spending a little time with it in a store without anyone to show you something cool will just feel awkward if you're used to Windows.
edit:
Also, in terms of getting things done day to day, you don't need a lot of additional software.
CD burning? built in. DVD authoring? Built in. PDF viewing/creation? Built in. Web page editor? iLife is included. Same with Garageband for music creation. Facetime for video chat (no Skype!), etc.
I have ZERO warez on my mac, and i've had to spend very little to get a machine that does exactly what I want it to do.
A dev account for OS X / iOS development, a copy of iWork, a copy of Ableton Live Intro and that's basically it as far as productivity stuff goes. Everything else shipped with the machine...
Compared with windows where i'd either need to buy half of those apps for $$$ or put up with nagware crap with advertising banners, etc - the "inflated" price of a mac really isn't....
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For me it's the file system. Going through the C drive and D drive and.... wait what? Yeah... it's so confusing, I hate it. Knowing that all my stuff is in my Applications folder is just so much easier.
I'd played with Linux before getting my first Mac and went to OS X for the same reason: The availability of commercial software.
My reasons:
I bought Windows laptops for my wife and mother. There were constant problems. Things I can fix without much thought, but very difficult to do over the phone. I bought them Mac laptops, and the frustrated calls have stopped. Badda-bing!
Next, networking a home works right out of the box with a Mac. File sharing, media sharing, phone sync, network backup all work straight out of the box without any hassle.
Next, the hardware is way better
Last, for me, I'm a sudo-scientist.
I bought Windows laptops for my wife and mother. There were constant problems. Things I can fix without much thought, but very difficult to do over the phone. I bought them Mac laptops, and the frustrated calls have stopped. Badda-bing!
Next, networking a home works right out of the box with a Mac. File sharing, media sharing, phone sync, network backup all work straight out of the box without any hassle.
Next, the hardware is way better
Last, for me, I'm a sudo-scientist.
More data...
I just completed the Stanford Human Computer Interaction class over at coursera.org. One of the items we got early on was a list of 10 usability heuristics one can use to judge a piece of software.
It's not always a pure win for OSX. There are a couple of areas where Windows enjoys an edge, for instance flexibility. Apple tends to hide settings. Take for example the 2880x1800 pixel display setting for the new Retina Macbook Pro. You need third party software to get that one. But if you run Windows under Parallels or Bootcamp, it shows right up in Control Panel. To me this is not exactly a big win because Apple is pretty good (most of the time) in picking the things I care about.
To do the evaluation, pick a couple of tasks and do them on each OS. For instance, change the desktop background on OSX and then on Win7 or join a wireless network on each OS or send an email. What's that? No email client came with Win 7? There are a number of free ones but if you want an outlandishly bloated and expensive option go with Outlook.
I just completed the Stanford Human Computer Interaction class over at coursera.org. One of the items we got early on was a list of 10 usability heuristics one can use to judge a piece of software.
It's not always a pure win for OSX. There are a couple of areas where Windows enjoys an edge, for instance flexibility. Apple tends to hide settings. Take for example the 2880x1800 pixel display setting for the new Retina Macbook Pro. You need third party software to get that one. But if you run Windows under Parallels or Bootcamp, it shows right up in Control Panel. To me this is not exactly a big win because Apple is pretty good (most of the time) in picking the things I care about.
To do the evaluation, pick a couple of tasks and do them on each OS. For instance, change the desktop background on OSX and then on Win7 or join a wireless network on each OS or send an email. What's that? No email client came with Win 7? There are a number of free ones but if you want an outlandishly bloated and expensive option go with Outlook.