Bad stuff is bad stuff, no matter who does it.
From your post 288:
Beowulff, in post 238, noted
So, basically, at least one Mac user and iPod supporter defends iTunes as being necessary to do a bunch of things that me (a non-Mac user) and you (a Mac user) both agree are pointless or useless to the average user. So you’re defending Apple by criticising the “features” of iTunes and I just don’t see how you can insist that Macs are awesome (and they are good machines) and then insist that even though iTunes does largely useless things for most people that it’s still superior to drag and drop.
And handwaving away the fact that getting music (let’s say public domain recordings of classical music, to keep it all above board) from a non-iTunes user’s computer is only possible provided you jump through a lot of complicated hoops just reinforces my earlier point that Apple really don’t want to make it easy for people to get music from anywhere except iTunes or CD.
Clearly there was a misunderstanding. Like I said, I don’t know what metadata is. I thought you were complaining about a feature that some other mp3 player has, but Apple doesn’t. No, I like the way my iPod works. I like the way I can make playlists. I do think most people want to be able to make playlists, in fact, I assume that any high end mp3 player would do that.
As far as transferring music goes, I get most of my music from my own computer. I’ve traded music with others using a thumb drive. It isn’t complicated. I’ve downloaded music from sources other than iTunes. I don’t see any barriers. Like I have been saying, if you don’t like it, don’t buy an iPod.
The whole debate seems to be straying from the question. As I understand it, it is whether the choice for Mac computers are (mostly) about image and status. So it doesn’t matter whether iPods or iTunes are good or bad or expensive, as these aren’t Mac computers. Furthermore the whole debate whether Apple does bad or stupid things is completely beside the point, as is the question whether Mac computers are expensive. The question is why people (rationally or irrationally) do buy Mac, not whether they should rationally buy Mac/Windows or hate Apple or Microsoft.
For what it’s worth, here’s my take, having switched to Mac some 6 years ago, but still using Windows at work.
- Mac and Windows are mostly interchangeable with respect to features.
- Mac and Windows both have some irritating features or limitations
- Mac and Windows both have some irritating bugs. My old iBook ran pretty well uninterrupted, but my MacBook with Snow Leapord has suffered from programs ending, programs hanging, and even the whole computer stopping. Same as Windows.
- I do like the look of Mac computers.
- I do prefer OSX for useability. There are several tiny things which do make the experience smoother, such as being able to remove a USB-drive with one mouse-click in the Finder, going to sleep by simply closing the lid, connecting to WiFi (admittedly I compare with Windows XP, but in 2004 already OSX connected easier for me, maybe Windows has caught up by now).
- In 2004 my new HP laptop on Windows XP couldn’t play music/video smoothly while using Word; indeed Word would frequently suffer tiny pauses if I was only typing text without any other program running. My iBook in 2004 could easily do this without such pauses. This led me to believe that at that time OSX was better for concurrently running programs. This may well have changed since then, though.
- OSX is on the surface more difficult to customise (tinker with) than Windows, as it only offers limited options in its settings.
An important aspect for me is useability. Even though objectively, in terms of basic functionality, there is not much difference, OSX offers to me a smoother user experience. For some reason Apple seems to understand better what a user really wants, while Microsoft tries hard but doesn’t manage this. You may find the differences I mentioned above insignificant, but for me these insignificant details are what drives my buying decision. Windows 7 may have caught up by now, I dunno, and I don’t care as I see no need to switch. Although Windows computers may exist that give me what I would like, or Windows may be able to do what I like if I tinker with it sufficiently, I don’t want to spend the time to get there if I can simply buy the Mac ready to go. If I had plenty of time to tinker, I would use Linux.
If you want Mac to do specific things which Windows does, you will always be disappointed, but if you switch you’ll find that the whole package does offer what you want, albeit in different form. For example, backups of music in iTunes are done with the built-in backup of Time Machine, so you don’t need to know where iTunes specifically stores the music. Still, I also make manual backups of folders (just copy the music folder for backup, which works fine).
So for me the answer is:
- possibly part of it is status (it still has the image of being more cool and I like that), but I wouldn’t buy a computer solely for this reason.
- useability, which is admittedly subjective. This is my main reason.
- some (rational or irrational) hatred of Windows for the disappointment with Win XP.
There are countless arguments against buying Apple, which have been mentioned in this thread eloquently, but these are for me not sufficiently weighty (which doesn’t mean I think these arguments are bad). In particular the price difference to me is not sufficiently great to change my decision, I prefer paying somewhat more and saving time. I don’t believe Apple is intrinsically a friendlier company than Microsoft; both make questionable decisions limiting user choice, but then, I don’t need to be friends with my supplier.
The rest of your post is quite good, but this part is likely to be trounced. So I’m gonna do it quickly.
On Windows, you don’t even have to click to remove a USB-drive, as long as the light is off. That’s why they put them on there.
My Dell from 2004 did all the other things you mentioned out of the box. Granted, it pulled off Wi-Fi by using Intel’s own software instead of Microsoft’s, but it did it.
I’m sure there are other little features you found better, but these are a poor example.
I have lots of USB drives that don’t have a light.
One single click? Really? That’s all? What do you click on? The USB icon? What happens then? Does the single click eject it? On every MacOSX computer i’ve ever used, ejecting a USB key involves one of the following:
[list=a]
[li] Click on the USB drive in Finder and drag it to the trashcan.[/li][li] CTRL-Click on the USB drive and select Eject from the context menu[/li][li] Select the USB key in Finder and then go to File > Eject[/li][/list]
All of those involve either multiple clicks, or click-and-drag. Still, you are right that it is very easy to remove a USB drive on a Mac.
Here is the unbelievably complicated procedure for removing a USB key on Windows. You can do either of these, but whichever you choose is probably going to eat up most of your day:
[list=a]
[li] Click the icon in the System Tray, then click the little pop-up box that says Safely Remove USB Mass Storage Device - Drive (F:)[/li][li] Right-click the USB drive in Windows Explorer, and click Eject[/li][/list]Isn’t that so much harder than doing it on a Mac? I don’t know how we Windows users ever get any work done.
As for putting a laptop to sleep by closing the lid, my $300 netbook running Windows XP and Ubuntu 9.10 does this just fine with both operating systems.
Oh, and one more thing about USB keys: in Windows you can make it so that you can simply pull them out without even a single click. All you have to do is disable write caching on the USB key. Not sure if you can do this on a Mac, but i wouldn’t be surprised if you can.
Nope.
If the USB icon is mounted as a removable drive, there is an eject icon next to the drive in the Finder sidebar. Clicking on it ejects the drive. End of story.
Actually my understanding is that it’s OK to yank a USB stick straight out so long as it isn’t transferring files at that moment. That’s what I do and I don’t have any problems. My Windows 7 laptop does go to sleep automatically when you close the lid and is very easy to connect with wifi.
Overally I find Macs usable enough but not quite as good as Windows . There are a few small things which I find fairly annoying about Macs. The small buttons on the top to close, minimize windows take just waste that split second so I don't press the wrong one. The Windows buttons are nice and big with the close button conveniently in red. Right click is generally more useful in Windows and Macs famously didn't even support two-button mice for a long time. I also like being able to maximize windows so that they occupy the whole screen which is easier to do in Windows. Finally I prefer the Windows taskbar to the Mac dock.
IMO the only big advantages of Macs are greater security out of the box and a better multimedia suite out of the box. Not insignificant but relatively less important for me.
Well, as I said, Windows may have caught up.
With respect to USB-drives: all Windows computers I currently encounter require you to click the icon and don’t allow to directly click an eject option (no tiny popup with the drive letter, I know, I always try as I know my older computer did have that). I have to double click, a new window opens, I have to select the right drive, I have to click that I want to eject. Maybe these computers have been incorrectly installed, but I can’t change that as they aren’t mine. And this experience does nothing to enamour me with Windows. It’s not complicated but it requires a lot of clicks and is irritating.
I haven’t personally encountered a Windows laptop that did sleep automatically upon closing, but I agree that Windows 7 has - as far asl I’ve heard - made great strides. So apparently such laptops do exist now.
Again, as I said, it is very well possible that you can change your Windows installation to work like you want or that there exist specific computers which do have the functions I would like. But I don’t want to have to tinker. I pay people to fix things in my home that I conceivably might do myself, but don’t want to spend the time for. The same applies to my computer: I prefer that it does it without me having to find out how.
Indeed, as I indicated my recent experiences with OSX have not been all positive. And I regularly see Windows computers (HP, Lenovo, certain Netbooks) which as hardware do seem appealing. But my older and recent experiences with Windows XP/Vista are frankly disappointing and withhold me from switching back, I’m still quite happy with OSX. Windows 7 may be better than its predecessors, but I don’t want to spend the time to switch again to a different system.
Again, I don’t say these are objectively good reasons to switch, but they were my (stupid, silly ignorant) reasons. And they have nothing to do with status or image. Maybe Apple is only for dummies like me. 
I should add:
actually, these are some reasons why I currently prefer OSX. If they are not according to the facts, that means that I have a few less reasons for that preference. The primary reason why I switched back then was the very disappointing performance of a brand new laptop running XP, which performed worse than my 5-year old desktop running Windows 95 (which version I always liked). And the experience of OSX at that time was very good, comparatively.
OSX seems to excel in adding tiny things that actually help the user, such as the introduction of Spotlight (full indexed disk search, extremely quick) in 2005?6? Windows mostly seems to lag with such improvements, having added such quick disk search only recently (after Google, i believe). Because of this thread I’m thinking over why I have this impression and to what extent this is true. I guess it is hard to do because part of it is due to the ‘style’ of how programs present themselves and are used, which seems smoother or more responsive. A lot of Windows programs seem clunky in comparison. Or maybe it is Microsoft; I notice it even with Powerpoint and Word on OSX.
Trying to think of a few more things which I like and color my preference for OSX:
- Software update manages to install quite a lot (seems like 50%) of updates without having to restart the computer, in XP it seemed like you had to restart almost every day.
- You can easily create your own key shortcuts for all programs: it is a feature of the OS instead of the individual programs.
- the track pad gestures: I feel seriously incapacitated without them
- the backup facility of Time Machine
I’m not saying everything is good about OSX, but the OP asked for positive reasons for prefering Apple, so I’m not dwelling on the negatives. And I’m also not saying that these little things should win you over.
To close, I don’t believe these are reasons that are going to convince any of you that you should prefer OSX, and frankly I don’t care. If you’re happy with Windows, who am I change your mind? Maybe objectively Windows is a superior system. But several years back it certainly wasn’t superior in my experience. And for my personal use, I currently prefer OSX.
And BigT: didn’t know that Windows allows you to yank it out directly without ejecting, may try that one time. Although I once did ruin a drive by taking it out too quickly, so am a bit hesitant.
Tusculan, you’re welcome to your Mac/OSX preference. I’ve already said multiple times in this thread that i think Macs are great computers, and OSX is a great operating system.
But all your Windows comments demonstrate is that you apparently have no idea about Windows. Ejecting a USB key (on WinXP or Win7) requires basically exactly the same amount of effort as ejecting one on a Mac. Laptops will sleep on closing with WinXP and Win7. And all computers, Windows or Mac, have the potential to fuck up your data if you remove a USB key while data is being transferred.
Quoth WarmNPrickly:
Metadata is what makes it possible to set playlists based on year, artist, etc. The data is the music itself, and in most formats, that’s all that’s stored in the MP3 or whatever file. The metadata is secondary data which describes the main data, and (for a music file) includes things like the artist and album. The metadata isn’t usually stored in the file itself, but in some sort of database that goes along with the file. So if you just drag-and-drop music onto the player, then you lose that metadata, and can’t organize by anything but the names of the files (which are probably but not necessarily the names of the songs).
It doesn’t “allow” you to. It just works (most times).
Unless something has changed, if you do this, you will get a stern warning about removing a UDB device without stopping it.
That assumes you have finder open. If you don’t, then you need to open it.
Anyway, positing the USB eject feature as a reason (even a small one) to prefer Macs is simply retarded.
The Finder is always “Open.”
Do you mean a Finder window?
Besides, you can always right-click on the drive and select “Eject.”
I will agree, that this is a stupid argument, but the has been so much stupidity (and ignorance) in this debate, that what can a little more hurt?
Yes, a Finder window. If it’s minimized, or hidden behind other windows, you still need to click to get to it. How many people work on their Macs with the Finder window always in the foreground, do you think?
Which is precisely what you can also do in Windows, if you have an Explorer window open. And if you don’t, you click the green icon in the System Tray and then click again to remoe the drive. The most it takes in Windows to eject a USB key is “Right click then select Eject” or “Left click then left click again.” All of which negates Tusculan’s argument that ejecting a USB key is one of “several tiny things which do make the experience smoother” than Windows.
I guess. But this just seems of a piece with so many critiques that some Mac users make about Windows. Those critiques might be rooted in a good understanding of how OSX works, but they are also clearly often based on complete ignorance of any Windows developments after Win98 or WinME.
(My bolding) My drag n’ drop windows-based MP3 player retains all the metadata when I copy music from my PC onto it, and I can organise it on the MP3 player by album, artist, or genre, so I don’t think your assertion is correct.
I would be very curious to learn how they managed that. Where does the metadata even come from in the first place? Most CDs don’t have any metadata, so there has to have been some other program involved somewhere along the line. And then, how is the metadata stored, and how does the OS know what meta is associated with what music file?
I suspect that the answer will turn out to be that the criticism of “need a music manager program to transfer music onto player” actually applies to all MP3 players, and that it’s just that the necessary program is integrated into Windows.