All I can say is that I’ve been using computers for over 20 years now, with more than half of that time devoted to making a living working with and programming them. And even after logging 8-10 hours in front of Windows NT every day, I still prefer to use my Mac – it’s faster, easier to use, easier to maintain, is more reliable, is more flexible, and removes a zillion productivity obstacles that Windows leaves all over the place.
As for MacOS X, that is going to be a major milestone in the history of computers – an industrial-strength UNIX-based OS for the masses that’s easy enough for Grandma to use. Apple has delivered what Microsoft and Linux have been promising for years…
>My PC doesn’t need to run 4, 5, or 30 OSes at the same time. You know why? Because
>I have ONE OS that has all the functionality I need to run all the software I want.
>Why would I want to run Mac OS 9.1? My Windows 98 SE has more functionality than it.
>Mac OS X? Don’t make me laugh. Windows 2000 is just as stable as OS X, and can also
>utilize DVD and CD-RW’s. Give OS X a year, then you can compare it to Windows XP.
You know, that’s funny, Windows XP is still in Beta, OSX is shipping, I generally don’t compare shipping OSs with vaporware. If the best criticism you can come up with is that OSX doesn’t support DVD and CDR yet, then you’ve been drinking too much of Microsoft’s Koolaid lately. Apple won’t ship CDR support until it can burn without coasters, something that Windows still has problems with. And I don’t have a problem rebooting into Mac Classic on the rare occasions I watch DVDs.
You are obviously not a computer professional. If you work in professional production jobs, like running Photoshop all day long, as I have, then the dramatic performance advantages of a Mac pay for themselves in a few weeks. For that productivity boost, I’d gladly run Windows a little slower in emulation, in a second window inside MacOS.
Please, refresh me of the exact circumstances of that incident, and when it took place. Then, maybe you can look at the measures enacted to prevent it from happening again.
Microsoft screwed their own nameservers due to technical incompetence. To remedy the problem, they subcontracted their DNS system to Akamai. I laughed and laughed when I heard that, Akamai’s largest investor is Apple. I guess when Microsoft has to do something right, they go to Apple. Even Windows XP is a blatant ripoff of Aqua.
>You make a very horrible lawyer. You are sadly
>mistaken if you think the DoJ came up with reams of
>damning documentation. Just because MS is a large,
>successful company doesn’t mean it’s a monopoly.
>The only reason it was found to be a monopoly is
>because the judge Penfield Jackson is largely biased
>against MS. Now that he’s removed from any further
>proceedings, I wonder what will happen?
IANAL, but at least I know that you should read the briefings in full before commenting. I have. Even Microsoft admits that they are a monopoly, they stipulated to it in court. They admit to being a monopoly because that in and of itself is not illegal. It’s what you DO after you become a monopoly that is the core of the lawsuit. Nobody with two functioning brain cells could dispute that Microsoft is a monopoly, and has used that power to illegally suppress competition.
I haven’t compared OS X to Windows XP. I said to compare them in a year.
:rolleyes:
I can say the same about you if the best criticisms you can come up with are the “Start” button and “dissappearing” menus (Which don’t exist in 98, ME, or 2000). I have yet to have one single screwed up CD-R on my computer. When it does happen, it’s not a problem with the OS. It’s either a problem with the burning software, the burner itself, or cheap CDs.
There are other problems to OS X as well. Classic programs running slowly is one of them. There is also no way to uninstall it either, and the process of removing it is far more complicated than a Windows format.
Quite right. I’m not a professional, I’m only 17. However, I know enough about programming, IT, graphics, and hardware to know when something is genuinely good and genuinely bad. You just take you biased opinions to display Macs as all good, PC all bad. That’s just so professional.
I never once said Macs don’t have good uses. In fact, more than once I’ve openly admitted to desiring a G4-strength processor for my PC. Since what I do with computers involves many non-specified areas of operation, a Mac won’t cut it, even if it is running an emulated OS (I’ve heard more horror stories about emulation than praise).
That article you linked said nothing about any of that. Give me a real cite.
I have read all the briefings, and have gone over it in school with lawyers. You’re right, I was wrong in stating they weren’t a monopoly. However, there is enough evidence to support MS side that they did not abuse monopolistic power. Otherwise, there would have been a ruling that wouldn’t be based on biased opinions that has a high probability of being overturned in the appeals process.
Forgive me if I sound incredulous… OSX is a shipping operating system, yet does not support the new standard for recorded media? You mean it’s only Alpha version software, right?
About your remark on “coasters” - are you alleging that Windows machines have an inherent flaw in the OS that causes bad CD writes? If so, then I do not think you understand the process of CD burning very well. I supervised the burning of many hundreds of CDs with the only “coasters” being due to user error - such as trying to burn shared files on the network, or forgetting to add all the files - something that no OS is going to help with. And you say that OSX does not support this either?
Does it support 3D graphics? Sound? Scanners? DDR-SDRAM? I mean really, what else is missing? And no, this is not an argumentative question, I really am ignorant about OSX. If it does not support DVDs and CD-R, then … would it not be fair to call it “crippleware”? I could not do my job without access to either of these features. And sure, you say you can just boot to another OS if you need to see a DVD - tell me, just how many operating systems is the average user expected to have to get the job done? I already need 2 to do my job (Win NT and OS/2), and it’s a pain in the ass.
And I notice no one has really addressed the issues of games on the Mac platform.
So, because I’m 17 my arguments automatically have no merit? Because I’m proving that Macs are not the all-powerful, perfect machines you think they are, that my arguments are wrong?
Your post just now was far more immature than anything I have yet posted. Why don’t you visit the links I posted? They PROVE exactly what is wrong with OS X. It is exactly what I was saying. Therefore, YOU ARE WRONG.
As for my credibility with computers, who are you to judge me? You don’t know what experience I have. Debate the argument. Prove me wrong, if you’re so sure of yourself. You think I don’t know what I’m talking about? Then show me you know more. You think you’re more mature than me? Then don’t try and discredit me because of my age. I’ve researched this, I know what I’m talking about. I’m not biased like you are.
And I’m being mature? I’ll let my fellow dopers decide. I’ll be expecting your apology.
Well, it’s based on BSD Unix and they have always had problems with device drivers, particularly CDRs etc, but nobody goes around accusing BSD of being an incomplete OS. Due to the BSD issues, it’s not surprising that this didn’t get finished in time. Neither did Internet Explorer 5.1. But you have to realize that OS X is TWO OS’s, it ships with 9.1 as well, so no essential features are lost. It’s not like you CAN’T burn at all. The rumor mill is saying that the fix is already done and just waiting for a week or so after the initial release to settle down.
Nah, the biggest problems I’ve seen come from buffer underflows due to the CPUs not being able to send data fast enough. This is the DISadvantage of having a multitasking multithreading OS, you can’t monopolize the CPU and devote it to just one task like CDR burning. On some CPUs, all you need to do is launch another app and the CPU is bogged down and you get a coaster. Of course, you can always overkill the problem with an insane fast CPU but then, that is my objection to Windows in general, it is so inefficient, both in the internal code as well as the interface, so it is easy to bog down the CPU. Why do you think that the new Burn-Proof CDRs are making such a big splash? You could burn a CDR on an old 286 machine that couldn’t even keep up with a 1x CDR, if you have burn-proof.
DDR SDRAM isn’t a software issue. It supports sound (including surround sound), OpenGL and lots of nice 3d hardware including all the most popular PC cards so you can play quake at twice the frame rate the human eye can percieve. It does all that stuff, except native OS X printer drivers aren’t plentiful yet. I’m doing OK with postscript printers. Nothing else is missing. If anything, there is too MUCH stuff in there, I’m still trying to sort out Java2, the GNU Tools, TCL, and a whole CD full of developer tools.
Yep, the lack of games on the Mac is largely due to the MS monopoly and the “barrier to entry” for developers. The best Mac developer, Bungie, was bought out by MS, in a deliberate attempt to humiliate Apple. Bungie showed their wares at each MacWorld convention, and then MS buys them out and made them divest themselves of hot properties like Oni, which were sold to other developers and released essentially unfinished. There won’t be any more Mac games from Bungie, they’ve sold their soul to BillG, and they will be doing nothing but XBox. And when XBox fails, as it is doomed to, Bungie will finally realize what happens when you sell your soul to the devil. I’ve seen it happen before, like Atomic Games.
But there is a brighter side. Where John Carmack goes, others follow. Carmack likes the Mac, and likes MacOS X. I’d rather have a few excellent games written by the stars like Carmack, than a horde of mediocre crap like you get in the Windows world.
Chas.E, after reading this thread, all I can say is that Monster at age of 17, knows more about computers, computer hardware, and OS’s than you do at whatever age you currently are. Oh, and BTW, this is from someone who programmed Macs professionally for 4 years writing wafer mapping software, programmed Amiga’s professionally for three years, and has been programming PC’s for the past 6 years professionally. I’ve worked with VMS, Unix, CPM, Dos, OS/2, AmigaOS, MacOs, and several others. So yes, I know what I am talking about.
Precisely. You have no experience, no ability to evaluate the situation clearly and logically, you have only the bravado that the ignorance of youth brings. You get your kicks from dragging people, especially those with much more experience, into lame arguments. I could refute you endlessly but there is no point.
Oh boy, this really has turned into a pissing match, hasn’t it? FYI, I was writing 3D mapping software for the USGS back in the days of FORTRAN II, about 10 or 15 years before the Amiga ever existed.
If you want to discuss the FACTS, or if you can show I’ve made a factual error, please proceed. There are several people who put up a good argument, and I’ve let their arguments stand on their own without my response. But if someone wants to spew egregiously incorrect PC propaganda, I will refute it… up to a point. If someone is an obvious troll, and can cite only information from paid PC propagandists like CNet (paid for by Intel) then I’ll give it the consideration it deserves: none. After all, that’s the consideration my argument is getting from the little trolls, despite scrupulously accurate web cites, patent docs, etc etc.
ChasE, why don’t you take this to The Pit, since you are already throwing insults? You are making a fool of yourself and your blathering is not conducive to a true debate.
Because you had no response other than “Ha! You’re younger than me so you obviously can’t be right!”
…They’d be just like you spewing your eregiously incorrect Mac propaganda (man, you’re making this too easy for me).
I wouldn’t be throwin’ around accusations of trollery, boy.
Life’s easy when you train yourself to cover your ears and huddle in a corner whenever someone proves you wrong, isn’t it?
You’re gravely mistaken… although you live in such a convoluted world (Mac is the more compatible system?!? Yeah, and Hansel and Gretel drive Hondas) you wouldn’t know a cogent argument if it lent you money for cotton candy.
When you post an accurate cite, we’ll let you know.
I think people like ChasE explain a LOT of the animosity towards Mac users.
I prefer PCs myself. They are more versatile, and better at what I use my computer for (gaming, mostly). They are cheaper, and I like being able to dig around in their guts to squeeze out a bit more speed. There are very few things you can do on a Mac that you can’t do on a PC, and I have no real interest in any of those things. On the other hand, there are a lot of things I like to do on my PC that can’t be done on a Mac. I have worked with Macs, even did tech support for them for a while, and they frustrate me. I find their interface unintuitive, and I admit that is mostly due to lack of familiarity, though even when I was getting more practice working with them and got the hang of it, doing certain things required a lot more steps than on a PC.
I don’t hate Macs themselves, however. The guy I game with has a few Macs. He recently got a G4 Powerbook, very pretty. He works in graphic design and that was the platform he was trained on. Most of the programs he uses are available on a PC as well, but why learn a whole new interface, especially when many of his programs were written for Mac first and run quite a bit faster on one? He uses his computers for one thing, basically, and they are good at it. He doesn’t try to tell me his computer is superior to mine.
Some people, for whatever reason, take their preference for Macs WAY too seriously, develop delusions that their system is the Alpha and Omega of home computing, and will attack viciously anyone who dares to argue with them. It’s kinda like ‘Console Wars’, the stupid debates that begin when someone who spent their allowance on a Playstation tries to convince the kid who spent his allowance on a N64 that he wasted his money.
Since these people stand out a lot more than your typical non-zealot Mac user who usually doesn’t even get into these debates, many PC users start to think of them as the typical Mac user. This is what gives Mac users a bad reputation.
Kids, you might want to sharpen your knives over at http://www.arstechnica.com , where this sort of debate perpetually continues, particularly at the Battlefront.
(See all the pretty flames?)
Really, you’ll like those guys. They’re all about fighting ignorance, too, but with much more of the same sort of smack I’m seeing laid down here.
Actually, I don’t have that much hostility towards macs. It’s the asinine arguments of people like Chas.E that put me in this mode. Speaking of which, I’m through with that guy in this thread. No data + no logic = no interest for me. But Stoid, I am disappointed that you’re backing his drivel. There are plenty of good arguments to be made on the mac side, and Chas.E is just not someone you want in your corner. It’s pretty clear to anybody with a bit of experience on either side of this issue that he just doesn’t have relevant knowledge here.
Stoid, I honestly don’t understand what you’re saying here. Are you saying that I’m not a radical in other aspects of life? Or that I’m overly radical in this argument? Or other?
I really doubt the Mac would be faster in this case, but I can’t tell… in all the benchmarks tests I’ve seen, they always compared a 400-Mhz G4 to a 400- or 500-Mhz Athlon or P-III. Never the price (the G4 is much more expensive than an Ath or P-III/IV with double the Mhz). Although I’ve stopped caring about benchmarks a while back, so I don’t know how up-to-date this info is (YOU try finding this stuff week after week on a 26400 'Net connection and a shitload of college work to do).
In either case, I can put together a IBM-Compatible (I remember when PC’s were called that, and that both IBM’s and Mac’s were called PC’s, but nevermind…) that’ll run Photoshop very decently (read: will perform most major functions on a large image in just a couple seconds) for around $500-$600 (not counting monitor, of course). And it’ll be more compatible with the majority of software titles on the market. AND it’ll be easier for me to maintain. AND it’ll be easier for me to upgrade.
See, for someone like me, a dual-G4 tower is complete overkill… like buying a $2 million Ferrari (yes, I AM admitting that Mac’s have more sheer raw power… I always have, and I always will… doesn’t mean I want one). If I ever got into design business professionally, I might actually invest in a G4 (though that’ll be a long way off, I know it). Note the word “invest”… if you buy a powerful Mac, you’d better be ready to hold onto it for a while (unless you can throw money out hand over fist).
