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Blastfrog

What's so great about Macs?

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No, really? I've been a PC user my whole life, and I've been using a Mac in my art class for the past year or so, and it doesn't seem like anything special. I've asked the teacher about it, and she couldn't come up with any reasons why Macs are allegedly better than PC other than "Oh, uh, I guess that since Adobe's programs started on the Mac, they run smoother or something". Which is bullshit, as Photoshop runs just the same between PC and Mac.

Plus, you can get more software for the PC, as it is the standard. And PCs are actually more secure, because they're used to viruses. The reason Macs have no viruses are because nobody bothers writing any viruses for it, and if they did, it would be easier to damage a Mac than a PC.

I mean, is there an actual legit reason for using Macs, or is it just as it appears, blatant fanboyism?

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DuckReconMajor said:

You might just, you know, like Macs better?

But why is it adopted as the standard for the graphic arts and music industries? You can do everything on PC just as well, and besides, PC is the standard everywhere else.

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I remember visiting some tech school back in 2001, and they said they used macs because they were a lot more stable. Moments later, one of the macs crashed.

Since Apple's rise in market share, safety by obscurity no longer really applies. There's an increasing number of Mac-targeted malware appearing, and loads of people are falling for it because they think they're somehow immune to them.

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DuckReconMajor said:

You might just, you know, like Macs better?


Probably this. Think about it, you've been a PC user your whole life and you've never seen a reason to look back. You like PCs!

My aunt has been a Mac user her whole life and she's never seen a reason to look back. She likes Macs!

The whole PC vs. Mac debate is silly. You use what you prefer.

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Sodaholic said:

You can do everything on PC just as well, and besides, PC is the standard everywhere else.


ding ding ding

Macs have absolutely no advantage over PCs in terms of audio or visual production. And I say this as a two-year student from art school.

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I'm pretty much being forced to get one because I go to an art school, it's not something I'm particularly looking forward to because of the cost. Macs do some things really well, other things not so well, just like any operating system. I know when I get one I'll be dual booting to give myself as many options as possible because I am not a fan of Apple's "walled-garden" nature.

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I think the main problem I have with Macs (Beside the obnoxious advertising) is the excessive cost and lack of any modularity to assuage that.

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Did I imagine it or is it not possible to run OS X on x86 hardware these days, making the need to splurge on a Mac kind of redundant?

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Mr. Freeze said:

Macs have absolutely no advantage over PCs in terms of audio or visual production. And I say this as a two-year student from art school.

And I'll say the same thing after writing music on a PC for 10 years plus a period where I tried both.

I think they may have had an advantage in some areas back when they ran on PowerPC chips, but anymore it's more about the software. Like OP's teacher was saying, Adobe was out first on Macs and so they just got the reputation as being graphic design machines first. But these days, use what works best. If what you use is on Mac, go for it and love it. Like I'd probably choose Final Cut Pro over other video editing suites, while I'd choose Sonar over other DAWs. At least until something comes along for Linux 'cause I'm a zealot fangirl like that.

As for the hardware, after owning a MacBook, I can't find any advantage in Macs over buying a "PC". This thing has been as big of a piece of crap as some of my other computers. They use the same chips that are found in other machines, and some things are a generation or two behind.

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Krispavera said:
Probably this. Think about it, you've been a PC user your whole life and you've never seen a reason to look back. You like PCs!

Indeed, most product choices are highly habit-based, because people can't go all over the place trying everything throughly enough. It makes things easier for people that just want to get going, instead of nitpicking technical qualities all the time. Many graphic designers use a Mac, for example, does it mean other operating systems aren't any good for it? Doubtfully, but since there's a habit among the trade for some historical reason, this itself encourages Apple to keep supporting such usage, and it all keeps going in circles, more or less.

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myk said:

Many graphic designers use a Mac, for example, does it mean other operating systems aren't any good for it? Doubtfully, but since there's a habit among the trade for some historical reason, this itself encourages Apple to keep supporting such usage, and it all keeps going in circles, more or less.


This is exactly the position I'm in. I've been able to do my work perfectly well using Windows, but because the industry is predominantly Mac, it ends up effecting my ability to be employed! It's just one of those things I suppose.

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Sodaholic said:

But why is it adopted as the standard for the graphic arts and music industries? You can do everything on PC just as well, and besides, PC is the standard everywhere else.


Originally (in the 80's), the Mac and Amiga were the main choices if you wanted a bitmapped display. They literally had no "text mode", so even text got rendered in the framebuffer, just like any image. Of course, that made it easy to support graphics in software packages, especially since the programmer didn't have to guess what hardware he was banging on.

The machines also had direct support for MIDI or 4-channel audio, without 3rd-party sound cards (so again, no guesswork or complicated driver situations).

Basically, they were multimedia machines from the very beginning, with OS and software support to match (including good multitasking capabilities). The lower-end Amiga machines were significantly cheaper and also doubled as game consoles (with true arcade-smooth 2D parallax scrolling, as in Shadow of the Beast, etc.) PCs eventually got better, but that took a long time.

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I don't think Macs are much better... They just seem more compact than Windows, less buggy and user friendlier, but I have a feeling Microsoft is catching up anyway.

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There's a monopoly effect about it. There are certain fields where Macs have become so standard that you'll get major compatibility issues (or irritations) if you don't have one, even if a PC is completely capable of getting the results you want.

I recall as far back as the mid-1990s, designers would tend to look down their nose at anyone using a PC, despite them being half the price and just as capable.

The developer tools for iPad programming are only available on the Mac (there's no fundamental reason otherwise why the programming couldn't be done on any computer), so that basically forces you to get a Mac if you want in on this.

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Grazza said:

I recall as far back as the mid-1990s, designers would tend to look down their nose at anyone using a PC, despite them being half the price and just as capable.

Actually, I think that era (or a little before) is where we can trace the Mac dominance of graphics (and similar) markets. At the time, the Mac interface was already a reasonably well established GUI whereas the "PC" was still, by default, running a text based OS with graphical elements sitting on top of it and many PC programs - even the big name word processors at the time - were mainly text based programs. Once the Mac was established and was well known as a "good tool for graphics" my guess is that the reputation kind of stuck even though, now, there is really nothing to choose between a mac and a PC as far as such capabilities are concerned.

As an aside for a while, in the UK, it looked as it Mac would dominate education too. Apple had done an excellent sales job giving special "educational discounts" to students and educational establishments. Every school, university and college I visited in the early 90s used Macs. Having gone into education from business where the "PC" was the standard, this felt quite odd. However, for one reason or another, that stranglehold slipped and nowadays, the only Macs you tend to find in schools are in the art department - often just gathering dust.

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Several computer engineering/science professors at my university use Macs. I think it has to do with their Unix upbringing and a desire for an operating system that can run mainstream applications.

The reason I won't buy a Mac is because I don't want to support Apple. They encourage religious fervor among users and are aggressively closed. If the company changed its attitude, I would probably buy one of its products for the reason listed above.

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Enjay said:

As an aside for a while, in the UK, it looked as it Mac would dominate education too. Apple had done an excellent sales job giving special "educational discounts" to students and educational establishments. Every school, university and college I visited in the early 90s used Macs. Having gone into education from business where the "PC" was the standard, this felt quite odd. However, for one reason or another, that stranglehold slipped and nowadays, the only Macs you tend to find in schools are in the art department - often just gathering dust.

UK school is very different than around here, it seems, at least at the pre-college level. Every school I have gone to has primarily used macs, with there being no PCs at all in my elementary school, a limited amount in the tech labs at my middle school, and many but only for special purposes (cad, programming, ect.) at my high school. These days, my high school is now experimenting with giving iPads to students to use in various classes. I don't actually see the point of this yet, because the only thing I've seen the iPads used for are playing games and the like. I guess in the actual class itself they might have more use, but I'm still not sure what said use is.

When I was younger, my dad always commented "we should get a mac", possibly halfway-sarcastic. This never came to be, and I'm assuming my dad realized one thing after a while -- he doesn't actually have a need for one.

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Macs are computers for people who don't know anything about computers. I'm fine with that. I get really annoyed when people say Macs are better, though.

The reason I'd never get a Mac is because you're essentially paying at least 50% more for something that AT BEST is just as good as a PC. All the things I've heard Mac users say never happens on a Mac that happens with a PC/Windows I've actually seen happen on a Mac. Random crashes, viruses, memory slog, hardware failure, etc. I've all seen on either type of system. In fact, at least Windows gives you a blue screen or an error message. When Macs crash, they just reset and act like nothing happened.

Hell, when I was in college the computers we were using for my recording class were all Macs (and I was told by some of the techs there that the college went with Macs despite the warnings from the techs just because Apple gives discounts to schools who buy their shit). These piece of shit machines would crash every ten minutes, so I lost my work innumerable times, resulting in me quitting the class in frustration and thus dropping out of college because it was the only class interesting me. And there was nothing the tech department could do about it because they were all cutting edge Macs with proprietary hardware that they knew nothing about. Way to go, Olympic College administration.

In short, PCs are just fine. At least when they go wrong I can troubleshoot them fairly easily.

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exp(x) said:

They encourage religious fervor among users

Indeed!

Back in the days, people had to use Macs for graphics and publishing because that was were the best software was. They built a reputation which they have kept mostly out of inertia..

In those days, likewise, everyone knew that if you wanted a computer to do MIDI music, you had to get an Atari ST. What is the difference between the Mac and the ST? Well, the PC managed to crush the ST (as well as the Commodore Amiga and the Amstrad CPC) but Macs survived, probably because of the religious factor.

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Macs are cool because I happen to have a broken one I'd rather not use most days. :p

The one thing I do find cool about them is they do things a few years ahead of PCs. You can look at a Mac and usually find some features that are between 1 and 5 years from standard on PCs. Some of these are initially hated by PC users, like the removal of floppy drives.

Of course they cost twice as much and are always looking for ways to restrict you from doing what you want. Main reason I won't use a Mac? Can't change the menu fonts. Some of us don't have 20/20 vision. I run XP on my Mac, which I purchased second hand for a damn good price.

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Mac - mostly new wave fags.
Also some good things about Macs, but I strongly dislike its "sex appeal".

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Danarchy said:

In fact, at least Windows gives you a blue screen or an error message. When Macs crash, they just reset and act like nothing happened.


You mean they did away with the "sad Mac" crash screen?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7zJlwzdoDo

That's like my favorite system crash screen ever. Right up there with Amiga's Guru Meditation Error, and OpenBSD's ddb (with built-in hangman "game").

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I'm pretty sure Sad Mac has been removed for quite a while now. on OSX the only crash screen I'm familiar with is just a grey box with the universal "power" symbol in the background reading "you need to restart your computer" which leaves some confused when they first see it (then again, sad mac is mostly the same).

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Macs are more stable than PCs, but otherwise there's no difference. I prefer PC over Mac any day. It's all preference. I just hate that colleges seem to force Macs on to you for Graphic Arts, though.

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If we restrict the conversation to modern Macs, hardware-wise, there's nothing too exceptional. In fact, they're less exceptional than ever before, seeing that they use almost the same exact hardware as IBM-PC compatibles now. They are priced more or less like premium, big-name PCs from Sony, Dell, etc.

With that out of the way, Mac OSX is really a good Unix-based OS, at least once they got off those semi-broken 10.0 and 10.1 releases, which lacked way too much stuff.

Now, if we take the conversation BEFORE the Intel transition....depends. Sometimes they had something innovative to show, sometimes not. E.g. a Mac G4 is about the same class with a Pentium 3 @ 800-1000 MHz. Sometimes it blows it out of the water, sometimes it doesn't, depending on the task and what OS we are talking about (stuck with a G3/G4 and Classic? Good luck with that). They were a mixed bag at best, and Mac OS Classic pretty much got its ass handed to it ever since Windows 95.

In any case, they make for great Veblen goods ;-)

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I think attacking Mac reiteratively as "religious" tends to get cheap pretty fast, in the context that it's the only commercial OS that rivals Windows to any significant degree. Apple doesn't have Microsoft's true hegemony, which gives MS much more feedback and financial power by which to take advantage in many areas at the same time, so it may require a "packaged product" presentation to get anywhere and have character in a Microsoftian landscape. I mean, Apple isn't like it is due to some silly notion they acquired after they didn't study science enough and read the bible too much.

I'm sure a big factor behind Mac people getting a reputation of being "religious" is that they are outnumbered by PC people and critics, and this makes them (and their product) develop a colorful, boastful character for defensive purposes. Minorities are more easily stereotyped and they become rather sensitive of their condition. Much of the same can be said about "Linux kiddies"

In any case, all successful commercial products, all widespread things people do and use create behavior akin to "religion". I bet that many people could come here, read many of our posts and feel we're a bunch of hopeless zealots. I would understand them to some degree, yet I don't think all of that "religious" behavior here is undesirable. Since this sort of habitual and perhaps ritualistic behavior is so widespread in so many activities, why call it "religious"? Dogmatic insistence and conservative practices precede and exceed religion. Calling religion "blind dogma and obstinate zeal" is a "religious" misuse of the term. There are more accurate terms that not always apply to religion such as "brainless follower," "zealot" "zombie" or whatever. If this phenomenon appears in religion, and the practitioners of the religion feel it's unwelcome, what would they do? Say "hey, brother, stop being so religious," to each other?

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Krispavera said:

Probably this. Think about it, you've been a PC user your whole life and you've never seen a reason to look back. You like PCs!

My aunt has been a Mac user her whole life and she's never seen a reason to look back. She likes Macs!

The whole PC vs. Mac debate is silly. You use what you prefer.

This is how I look at it. I've always used Macs and so most of my software is for Mac, as is the hardware I use with it (like my video capture device), as is the way I use my computer (for instance, expecting to do lots of things via drag-and-drop between applications, rather than heading to right-click contextual menus first). Switching to another OS would be largely pointless for me. I'm used to the way the OS works and it makes sense to me; I'm not under any illusions that one or the other is objectively any better or worse.

I do dual-boot Windows to do Doom editing stuff, which is fine, though my iMac from 2006 doesn't have nearly enough ram installed to run Vista smoothly. I'll eventually be replacing it entirely with a newer one, and I'm hoping to then be able to transition over to virtualization so I can use OS X fulltime for web browsing, instant messaging, and so on, and only bother with Windows when I'm in Doom Builder or whatever.

So, yes. The debate is silly, and delusions of righteousness on either side are misplaced and annoying.

I think it can be safely assumed that the vast majority of people using either Mac or Windows or whatever else (well...within reason) are using it because they like it and it works well enough for whatever their needs are, in a way that they've become accustomed to. A decent analogy to the assumptions made in this thread's opening post would be "Why do people bother to prefer ports other than ZDoom? They must just be hopeless fanboys."

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There was a time back in the 90's when graphic design software was considerably more optimized for use on Macs than PCs. That time has long since passed, but established trends are hard to break.

For what it's worth, I'm doing a graphic design program that has us jumping between Macs and PCs throughout the classes, and in addition to there being no performance difference between OSes on the same machines, the Mac interface is incredulously more irritating.

But I'm glad they have us sample both, because now I know to run screaming from any employer that uses Macs.

I also took a music class that had us use a Mac-only program. It offered absolutely no superior interface or performance improvement.

Stuff at home runs exponentially better despite a negligible MHz/RAM difference.

<3 PCs.

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