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Why do you use a Mac?

N

NorthDakota91

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 3, 2011
86
0
Italy
Hello people! I am very curious about the reason you bought your (first) Mac. Did you get your machine for a particular task (maybe because this task is only possible/easier with OS X)? Because of the battery (Only for macbook owners of course)? Was you upset with malware? Because you already had an iPod/Pad/Phone? Was you just curious about how a mac would perform for you or was it just because "macs are cool"?

As for me, it was a "random" purchase. My old laptop fried and my choice was between a Sony Vaio and a Macbook (same price, higher specs on the Vaio). But in the end, I'm much happier with this Macbook than with any other PC and I would never come back.
 
I bought an iBook because it allowed me to be less angry about Windows, and while it was slower than my Windows desktop computer regarding the specs, I hardly touched my PC after I purchased the iBook.

Though the iOS-ification seen in Mac OS X 10.7 Lion and further, makes me rethink future purchases, as Spaces and Exposé are too useful for me to give up on.
 
I was curious about OSX, I had fiddled with it a little here and there, but never used it day to day. I have been using DOS/Windows machines for about 20 yrs and wanted to know that 'the other side' was like. I built a hackintosh and decided that I would try using it for a whole month, to see if I could do all my 'day to day' things with it. I was surprised to find that it could handle all my tasks and that it was actually fun to use. For me, using a Mac is so much simpler then using Windows, everything you need is at your fingertips, the OS just works, no hangs, some beach balls, but not too many. The OS simply seems to be intuitive, as if it knows what your doing and what you want. If only Windows came with all the built in programs OS X does. It seems funny that XP came with Outlook Express, a fairly capable email program, Vista has Windows Mail and you could not import your Outlook Express email into it, nice! Windows 7 has no email program but offers the option of Windows Live mail, no thanks!! While I don't use the native email program in OS X I know its very capable, even supporting Microsoft Exchange, I use Office 2011 for the Mac.

I think most people would love to switch from Windows to a Mac and find the experience pleasantly surprising, however I know there are those who are simply used to using Windows and could never change.
 
NorthDakota91 said:
Hello people! I am very curious about the reason you bought your (first) Mac.
Click to expand...

I'm an old UNIX hack and am perfectly comfortable within said environment. I actually prefer it to something like Windows. I spent a lot of effort making Linux work on laptops and desktops back in the late 90s/early 2000s from an application perspective. I eventually just got tired of constantly fiddling with it on my desktops and laptops, and made the jump to OS X.

With OS X, I have the UNIX underpinnings that matter most to me, along with a way to natively run the applications that matter for my day to day work activities. No more struggling with emulators or APIs or whatever to get Windows-based applications to run on Linux. All I have to do is install the OS X version of Office, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, etc, etc, and everything just works.

An acceptable UI with a proper operating system underneath it. That's why.

jas
 
I got a Mac at first because futzing around with DOS seemed like such a hassle. Computers were supposed to make work easy; DOS seemed like it was designed to make things hard.

Yeah, that was a good while ago. :)
 
I bought a Mac simply because of my original iPhone. I was using an HP laptop at the time and didn't like how I had to load photos from the HP onto the phone. I kept hearing how easy it was to use iPhoto to load photos on the phone. A week after buying my iPhone, I went to BestBuy and bought a MBP. Since then, I bought another HP laptop to use and ended up smashing it on the basement floor a few months later.
 
Bought an iPhone - bought an iPad - bought a 27inch 2011 iMac to try for 15 days - loved it - so I kept it.
 
A couple of reasons: I've been a unix nerd for a long time (mid 90s?) and as soon as OS X came out i was impressed that there was actually a commercially supported desktop unix available.

However, it wasn't to be, being PPC only was a bit of a leap of faith (way slow to run DOS or Windows on). Then the intel switch happened and i was sorely tempted.

And then I happened to buy an Airport Express. I was impressed at how it "just worked". Then i got an iPhone, and was impressed with the build quality and high level of polish on the UI.

And so I bought a Mac mini. At the time I had a quad core Q6600 PC with 4GB ram. The mini was a core2 duo 1.8 with 2gb of ram. I ended up spending more time using the mini.

Once the second generation sandy bridge machines were out, my decision was made. I needed a proper mac. After much agonising over MBA, vs iMac vs Mac Pro vs Macbook pro - i ended up with a 15" Pro as a "do it all" machine.

I'm very happy with it :)

----------
jasonvp said:
With OS X, I have the UNIX underpinnings that matter most to me, along with a way to natively run the applications that matter for my day to day work activities. No more struggling with emulators or APIs or whatever to get Windows-based applications to run on Linux. All I have to do is install the OS X version of Office, Photoshop, Premiere Pro, etc, etc, and everything just works.

An acceptable UI with a proper operating system underneath it. That's why.

jas
Click to expand...

Exactly my thoughts as well...

As far as the UI goes, I think Windows or Linux is actually superior in some ways. However its the back end stuff that makes OS X work so well. Spotlight, time machine, objective-c observers (so windows, etc never need to be "refreshed" as they are told when to refresh by the objects they display), etc.

It "just works"...
 
I use the Mac because I love the hardware and software and as the cliche goes, it just works.
 
Two platforms diverged in a computing world,
And sorry I could not manage both
And be one user, long I stood
And suffered Windows as only one could
To where it crashed in the undergrowth;

Then bought another, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was shiny and wanted wear;
Though as for the computing there
Proved their usefulness about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In pretty new desktops for the mac.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I could ever go back.

I shall be typing this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two platforms diverged in a computing world, and I—
I took the one less computed by,
And that has made all the difference.
 
throAU said:
...objective-c observers (so windows, etc never need to be "refreshed" as they are told when to refresh by the objects they display), etc..
Click to expand...

Really? :) Did not know that, I'm learning obj-c and cocoa right now and every piece of knowledge I find around is greatly appreciated :)
 
iBlue said:
Two platforms diverged in a computing world,
And sorry I could not manage both
And be one user, long I stood
And suffered Windows as only one could
To where it crashed in the undergrowth;

Then bought another, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was shiny and wanted wear;
Though as for the computing there
Proved their usefulness about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In pretty new desktops for the mac.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I could ever go back.

I shall be typing this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two platforms diverged in a computing world, and I—
I took the one less computed by,
And that has made all the difference.
Click to expand...

Did you just write that!? If so, wow!
 
NorthDakota91 said:
Really? :) Did not know that, I'm learning obj-c and cocoa right now and every piece of knowledge I find around is greatly appreciated :)
Click to expand...

Yeah, i'm learning objc myself.

But yes, an object can list itself as an "observer" of another object, and be updated when the other object's status changes.

I'm guessing this is why finder windows, etc never need the user to hit refresh in OS X (vs windows where you always need to hit F5 if you've deleted/moved something in the window you're displaying whilst in another window :D) - amongst a great deal of other examples of OS X just "knowing" when you've changed stuff and not needing to apply settings, etc.

Change a widget in a config box, and the setting updates. Not ALL config boxes do that (some of the more "dangerous" settings have an ok/cancel button before they take effect), but the ones where the option is "safe" to change do... :)
 
I've always wanted a Mac, from when I was about 6 years old. I still know the IKEA store had these dummy iMacs in bright orange; of course I didn't know that they were iMacs but I thought they were really cool and I really wanted one.

The main reason I bought my Mac is the operating system: I just hate working with Windows. It's slow, buggy, cluttered and it crashes all the time. A friend of my father's had a 24" iMac back then and that was my first experience with Mac OS: it was fast, very intuitive and it had a beautiful GUI.

I also bought my Mac because I really like its all-in-one design: the all-in-ones by HP, Acer or Packard Bell are just plain ugly.
 
iBlue said:
Two platforms diverged in a computing world,
And sorry I could not manage both
And be one user, long I stood
And suffered Windows as only one could
To where it crashed in the undergrowth;

Then bought another, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was shiny and wanted wear;
Though as for the computing there
Proved their usefulness about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In pretty new desktops for the mac.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I could ever go back.

I shall be typing this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two platforms diverged in a computing world, and I—
I took the one less computed by,
And that has made all the difference.
Click to expand...

;) Very good indeed. Take a bow, bravo. (Cue sound of applause).

iBlue said:
Well, sort of. I butchered Robert Frost's most famous poem.
Click to expand...

I recognised the poem - and the 'butchery', but it is a very well done 'butchery'. Must admit to chuckling when I read it. ;)

Re Macs, I switched after my experience with iPods. It was not just that I loved the form factor of the iPod and thought it was simply gorgeous, (being able to carry your entire music library with you is extremely useful as I'm often abroad for months at a time), but, above all, the excellent customer care. Two iPods died (HDD failure) in rapid succession, and both were replaced by Apple without a whimper, or an attempt to seek refuge in contractual small-print.

So, excellent customer service was one major reason I switched.

The others were the fact that Apple computers are beautifully designed, - especially the MBA which I have at the moment - the resolution on the screens is excellent, I like OS, but also the fact that Apple Macs seem to be far less prone to attacks from spyware/spam/viruses/malware of the sort that used to plague me when I worked with Windows machines - and this despite having bought the most robust anti virus/spam/malware software available when I had Windows computers.
 
It was the start of a love affair.

17 years of Windows and computing and I never once felt like the machine was an extension of me. It all changed with the Mac, although it was the 3GS which drew me into the ecosystem.

A white macbook, 13" mbp, 2 15" mbps, 2 iMacs and a Mac Pro soon followed.

It was just, right.
 
I use a Mac because of my familiarity with them, I actually grew up using Macintosh computers since I was a young kid! I'm just more comfortable with the interface and workflow of the Mac. I could easily use a PC for the kind of work I do, which is mostly digital graphics, but I'm not very familiar with the Windows OS, whereas I know OS X like the back of my hand.
 
I got my first Mac because I needed a computer for school…it was pretty much essential when I was going into high school. Well, unless I wanted to type up all of my papers on the computers in the school library.

I picked a Mac because I fell in love with them. I started with a Commodore 64 which we had at home and also in my grade school’s computer room. Then, my grade school upgraded to Apple II’s. That was my first exposure to Apple. Then, a friend got an Apple IIgs. I was jealous. Though, my Commodore 64 had way better games. Eventually, I began to love Apple at school…they updated to other Apple models at some point. Though, I don’t remember when I tried my first Macintosh branded computer. It must have been at school. Anyway, in 8th grade, it was time for me to get my own computer. We went to CompUSA and I picked out a IIsi. Sadly, my mother wouldn’t get me a Quadra….which is what I really wanted. I think it was something like $6,000 at the time. My IIsi cost about $3,000, not including the monitor and printer (I think I remember it being like $4,900 with those included). This was back when Apple still sold $10,000+ computers. Its crazy to think about how much home computers used to cost.

I actually didn’t use my first PC until High School. I hated them, though…the times I was forced to use them. Compared to Apple, the PC’s looked cheap and were ugly. DOS seemed archaic and backwards to me. It looked like something that belonged in the Commodore days. And Windows…it didn’t seem to work as well or look as nice as the Mac OS. In my eyes, PC’s and Windows were junk. The Macintosh and OS 7 were amazing. :)

Once you go Mac, you never go PC. :D

...The first computer I bought with my own money was also, of course, a Mac. I loved Apple. So, I wouldn't consider anything else.
 
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