Anyone who wants to read more about the history of Macs/PCs/GUIs in general could do worse than to read the following:
http://www.cryptonomicon.com/beginning.html
Enjoy…
Ah, I understand better now. The points you make make sense.
It certainly isn’t, it is a chipset issue. I must have been drunk for that one sentence.
Well, I will agree that IMO I think the XBox has a high liklihood of failure. But MS has signed up a lot of hard-core people to support it, and is piling dump trucks full of money into the project. So…it may be a commercial success after all, even if it is not as good as competing platforms.
Well…I have to disagree a bit. I’ve read lots of Carmack’s logs over the years from links on Stomped, and while he does like many, many things about the Mac, I believe he also is more than a little upset about the secrecy of writing the necessary hardware hooks for game acceleration. And, he wanted the option to go open-source or licensed source, and my understanding was that Apple shit eggrolls over the possibility of device drivers and network stacks for their OS being open source…which is their right, but it different than what Carmack is used to. I understand that they have most differences worked out. I remember reading in his logs that the programmers and tech Gods at Apple were really sharp, unthusiastic guys who felt continually oppressed and limited by the secrecy and non-openess. Perhaps that changes with OSX…?
But, FTR, I think Carmack is pretty overblown. Quake and Quake 2 sucked IMO, but Half Life built on top of Quake ruled. You can say he wrote the foundation for Half Life, but my understanding is the guys at Valve essentailly re-wrote from scratch about 60-70% of the game, including many core parts (like a skeletal animation system). I would give the Mac more hope if people like Valve started supporting it.
Basically, a Mac is awesome fo graphical design. Unless you are planning on working heavily with Photoshop or a 3D design studio, then I suggest you go with a PC. PCs are particuarly great for the everyday user because of the software titles that are available. My grandparents have a Mac, and they hate it beacause they can’t use any of th bloody software on the shelves… sigh…
I’m going to agree with Bill H. here. Chas.E has just proven his inability to debate properly, and could not refrain from personal attacks and slinging insults when I disagreed with him. I provided cites, which he claims are false because they are “paid for by Intel”, which is not the case. They did hands-on reviews of Mac OS X, and came to the conclusion that it is not worth buying yet, but Chas.E claims that no such testing has occurred and that it is all just lies. :rolleyes:
This is the type of Mac user which gets PC users mad. One who cannot refrain from personal attacks during a debate is hardly credible.
Perhaps one of the few who’ve tried to use this as an argument of Apple inferiority would care to present “teeny-tiny” in the form of a market share percentage value among hardware manufacturers within the desktop segment?
Comparing that market share value to that of competing hardware manufactures such as Dell, Compaq and Hewlett-Packard will demonstrate the quoted text above to be useless drivel. Apple is a hardware manufacturer. As such, its success in the market should be gauged in comparison to like companies. It is remarkably foolish to compare Apple, the company, to Microsoft, the company, as they are in different businesses. The fact that Apple happens to sell software designed to run on the hardware they manufacture does not put them in the same boat as Microsoft.
[/quote]
At the office, I use Microsoft operating systems and applications on hardware manufactured by my company. Microsoft applications and Intel chipsets serve my purposes and only rarely limit my productivity. Outside of my office, I try to use Apple operating systems on Apple hardware whenever I am able. I don’t do this because I believe Apple products to have some amazing advantage that will make all else obsolete. Rather, I just like my Mac.
In my mind, the only substantial difference between established Microsoft and Apple operating systems is the feel. Ultimately, the operating systems accomplish the same things in remarkably similar ways. The differences between Windows and Mac OS performance are insignificant. The most important differences between the two operating systems boil down to a question of personal style.
In short, Mac users have a sense of style. Windows users do not. Nyah!
The X-Boxed doomed to faliure? I’ll take a $100 bet on that if you like. I’m serious.
Hmmm…
As to whether Microsoft copied Apple’s interface, it’s pretty common knowledge that they did. But copying is no infringement of copyright unless what you copy is within someone’s exclusive rights domain. You can’t stop someone from using a rectangle to contain text and images, just like Lotus couldn’t stop Borland from using rows and columns.
As to whether Microsoft is a monopoly, there are arguments pro and con that have merit. But if Government calling Microsoft a monopoly isn’t the pot calling the kettle black, I don’t know what is.
As to Akamai’s largest investor being Apple, has anyone yet topped Microsoft’s $150,000,000 investment in Apple?
Finally, I don’t think we’re allowed to call people names like “little troll” here in Great Debates.
Errr… thats supposed to be X-Box.
I will throw a couple little other points in here too.
CD-Burners. I, as a test, burned a CD while playing Unreal Tournament on the Net… just to see if I could. No problem.
Chas.E, your main “gripe” appears to be mostly with the Windows OS than anything else (if it was with the hardware of a modern x86 PC I would be concerned, they are unarguably incredibly fast…any real world application a top-o-the-line AMD TBird would slaughter top-o-the-line G4 at 1/3 of the price).
I can say that myself, speaking as an average Joe user, have not encountered a Virus and extremely rarely a BSOD or lock-up. As a matter of a fact, I cannot remember the last time I did. Most importantly, I can go to any store (short of a Mac store) and buy any software title and it will run on my PC. That is whats important to me. That is whats important to most people.
Would it be worth anything to point out that just because Chas E. has chosen to behave boorishly in this thread does not mean that all Mac users behave boorishly?
(Though when it comes to spending my own money, I’ll definitely pick Macs over PCs any day of the week. Yeah, Apple charges a bit more, but I find it an acceptable price for
[a] supporting their R&D department
** getting a hassle-free computing experience
[c] Hi Opal! 
)
rjung wrote
Absolutely. I like to think Chas.E is to Macintosh as the Taliban is to the Muslim religion.
Actually Chas.E, I was merely pointing out that unlike Monster, I can not be dismissed because of age, and that I have more than enough credentials to back my claims. And that said, I still think Monster has a better grasp than you. As for error’s in your statements, others have pointed them out enough that I need not.
Mac’s have their place, for the at home nonpower user, it is a decent system. I find it too limiting and confining for my tastes, and I crash it about three times more often than I do either my win2k, Linux, AmigaOs, or AmigaDE boxes in the same amount of time. And I will say that MacOS does seem to stick to it’s rules more than Win does, but its inheirent UI choices cause it many problems.
In my previous posting to this thread, I attempted to describe some differences in the user-experience between Windows and MacOS from the most neutral position I could manage. In this posting, I’d like to enlarge upon Stoid’s point, which was that Macintosh zealotry has a lot to do with us (Mac users) trying to defend and preserve our user environment in which our platform is threatened, a situation not symmetrically reproduced for Windows users who really prefer the Windows user experience (no accounting for taste).
I know Windows well enough to get by, as I said. I am not able to come up with the perfect Windows tool or add-on or technique so when I am in Windows I klunk along doing things the “simple” (slow, often awkward, no shortcuts) way. I readily grant that a Windows-proficient user having to make do with a Mac could experience similar frustrations and irritations and confusions, but with really rare exceptions they don’t have to worry that their manager is going to take away their PC and force them to be part of a Mac-only environment. Even so, in the following description of a tiny fragment of a workflow, the Windows user trying to cope with the Mac experience will be able to obtain some useful clues…
The Work-flow: I have a pair of archived letters and some notes from which I want to assemble a set of new letters and then save them to a networked volume. One of the archived letters is a plain text document on a PC-standard ISO 9660 CD-ROM; the other is a WordPerfect 7 (PC) formatted document on a detached internal PC (FAT-32) ATA hard drive that was once the C drive of an expired computer; and the destination networked disk is on an NT Server down the hall, about 6 folders deep inside the share (a subproject folder within a project folder within a division folder within a financial quarter folder within an activity category folder within the overall shared drive). A similar six layers’ worth of folder hierarchy lies between the root of one of my hard drives and a folder full of notes on this particular project.
The Work-flow on a Mac: First, I go to the Apple Menu, select DAVE (NetBIOS domain logon for the Mac) and log on so that I can have access to access-restricted NetBIOS (i.e., PC Network) volumes. Then I go to the Chooser and go to DAVE and find the volume on which I will be saving my work, and mount it on the Desktop. (DAVE is a 3rd-party add-on from Thursby Software Systems. It implements NetBIOS over TCP, which is what the typical PC-centric corporate workplace uses. A more cross-platform corporate environment would have AppleTalk [=Services for Macintosh] implemented on the same server). If I’m on a PowerBook Mac, (I am, in real life), I remove my auxiliary hard drive from my Expansion Bay hard drive and attach an extension ribbon cable to the ribbon cable that normally goes between an internal ATA laptop hard drive and the connector that goes to the PowerBook. The unaffiliated 4 pins go to a power connector, so I open the old desktop Mac and shut it down and swipe the power connector that goes to the CDROM and splice in an attachent cable and run it over to the ATA drive’s pins. Boot the Powerbook and the PC hard drive is mounted on the desktop. If I were on a Desktop Mac to begin with, I’d simply swipe the connectors that go to the Zip Drive unit and boot and again, the PC hard drive is mounted on the desktop. Lacking WordPerfect 7, I select the files and control-click them collectively and send them to DataViz MacLink Plus, indicating that my word-processor of choice is, of course, Nisus Writer, by selecting it from the drop-down menu list. I have MacLink put the translated documents on my Desktop by going Command-D. I then insert the ISO CDROM and it mounts on the Desktop as well. I launch Nisus Writer by going to my custom-configured OtherMenu on the menu bar (good shareware, been around forever) slide to Word and Text Processors, subitem Nisus Writer. Command-O to open. Click the Default Folder menu of drives and go to the CDROM. Type first two letters of the folder containing the folder I want to open, and return. Repeat for correct subfolder. Repeat for file, which opens. Command-O again and a click on the Default Folder “favorites” icon (the application-specific one) lets me quickly pick my folder full of notes and I open the notes files in Nisus. Command-N for new document. I Command-Alt-click the sections of text I want to swipe from each Notes document, then drag to the new document (noncontiguous text selection). Command-O, Command-D for Desktop, type first couple characters of name of folder into which I saved the converted WP dox, return, down-arrow key to grab the first, return to open, Command-Option select needed passages, drag to new doc. Repeat for other WP dox. Command-’ [which is Save As in all applications, thanks to QuicKeys] opens the Save As dialog box, from which I select the mounted NT Server volume. Type first couple characters’ worth of folder name & hit return, repeating as I drill down for the first time to save location, and tab once to file name box to enter proper file name (including PC 3-letter extension), set Save As dialog box to save as Microsoft Word 5 for PC, hit return to save. Return to notes folder (Command-O, favorites-for-Nisus menu), notice that a file name by which I saved an existing file in this folder is confusing and misleading. I do a Command-I for Get Info on it and change its name and Finder Comments and/or File Type and Creator if necessary. Anway, continuing…Open additional notes, make new noncontiguous text selections, drag to active doc, make necessary edits. Save As. Default Folder, select from Recent Folders menu the folder where I saved previous finished document. Save as MS Word 5 PC.
Workflow II: The Mac Person Tries to Use the PC–Well, I don’t need to mount the shared NT Server volume, that’s cool, I had to log in when I booted up the PC so I don’t need to do that either. OK, first for this bloody hard drive. Fooey. If I were a PC person I might know how to attach this used-to-be-a-C-drive to my PC, but that’s my entire point, isn’t it? I can’t do it like it was a Mac and Mac is what I know. Something about “slave” drives, right? I need to attach it as a slave? How about if I’m on a notebook PC? OK, one call to tech support: “I know the Mac but not the PC so well, how do I attach this here ATA hard drive so as to access its contents?” So, via processes that I can’t describe cuz I don’t know them, tech support sets me up and my ATA drive is my E drive, at least for the time being, thank you tech support. I insert also the CDROM. On the PC my preferred word processor is (of course) Lotus WordPro. First the damn WP files–I right-click on them and select the PC equivalent of MacLink (PC Link? another DataViz product) and send the files to Lotus WordPro format. The interface and dialog is confusing (not like the Mac version) so I do not know where the hell I just saved the translated files. I go to Start menu, Find, type a fragment of the file name, (noticing how totally klunky and foreign the PC Find is compared to the Find File / Sherlock dialog box I’m used to). Around lunch time I realize it is searching the entire #^#@@ network and cancel and fortunately it has found the files on my C drive. I double- click the folder icon and it opens. Soon I’m selecting text to incorporate into my final document, but I can’t select noncontiguous text. Have I chosen a bad word processor? How would I know from PC word processors? So I drag each selection separately. I also go to File and Open to open the files on the CD. Don’t know the keystroke combo to switch drives, so I use the mouse. Guess it is the F drive now that the foreign ATA drive is the E drive, yes? Double-clicking, I drill my way down the folder hierarchy to get to the CD file and open it. More editing. Soon it is time to save the document. Save As. Hmm, OK…up, up, up…Network Neighborhood. Select from list of 173 servers and workstations. Double-click to open. Drill down through layers of folders. Find appropriate save-to folder. Save document. OK, time to edit for second document. I need to go back to the deeply buried location on my computer containing my notes. File, open. Select C drive. Navigate the hierarchy with a long series of clicks and scrolling-downs, thinking all the while that the typical PC user probably knows exactly which shareware to install to give the PC a menu of where you’ve been recently…but I don’t! I go to open a file and notice that the file name by which I saved an existing file in this folder is confusing and misleading. I right-click it. Change its name. Open file, continue edits, and soon I am ready to save changes. Go to Save As. Uh, yeah…work my way back to Network Neighborhood. Locate the server amongst the pack. Drill my way down through the folder hierarchy. Land, finally, in space where I saved previous file. Save.
NOTE: I do not by any means intent to imply that the MS Windows OS lacks means of quickly moving around or that there’s no simple way of accessing a derelict hard drive on short notice. If you tell me that they are, and that they are as follows {your description}, I will readily believe you. The point is, I know how to get around on the Mac and I’m clueless on the PC, and your telling me the answers pertaining to this brief little workflow clippage won’t change that.
That is why we tend to defend the Mac and complain about the PC that is the thing most likely to be imposed upon us if they decide to disallow our continued use of what we know.
Wintel person here–I prefer PCs. Largely this is because of my infamiliarity with the Mac (haven’t used one since high school). I did have to use one in a previous job, and while I did fine, I did find the interface counter-intuitive and difficult to use. I suspect this is largely due to my familiarity with the Windows conventions. For example, I hated that clicking on the box in the upper left didn’t quit the program. I hated not knowing how many programs I had open. The Mac hid these things from my immediate view; the Windows Start bar shows me immediately. Again, these are due to my Windows familiarity and show no disparagement to Apple–if you like 'em, good for you.
I do fear where Apple’s going–it seems like they like design simply for design sake. Check out this article:
http://www.iarchitect.com/qtimeno.htm
It seems the user-centered design they are lauded for (and rightly so, I think) may be slipping by the wayside. As a usability freak (I’m a technical writer), this can’t be a good thing.
Snickers
(Monster–you’re doing great. And to all the others–wow. That’s a whole lotta knowledge. I bow before your consummate skills. Great posts, all.)
Uh, Chas, I’m as big a Mac supporter as you can find, but you’re messing with the wrong guy - Monster104 has a lot of time logged in here at the SDMB, and is fairly well-respected. I’d tread a tad more respectfully if I were you. IANAT*, but I’d say he’s calling the shots just as accurately as you are. Oh, and calling someone a troll is nigh near a bannable offense - the Mods do not look kindly upon it. Fair warning, there, bud…
Esprix
[sub](*I Am Not A Techie)[/sub]
You know, that doesn’t really ring true for me. We’ve locked horns (in a far more gentle way) on the Mac/PC thing before and I came away with the distinct impression that you had more than a bit of hostility towards Macs. Or, rather, that you could not resist “tweaking” Mac users. I think you you claimed that you were not being “serious”, but you managed to be a bit insulting to me, and other Mac users. You said that Mac users don’t do “real” work, or something? (You did later apologize, which I appreciate.) I’m sorry, I think you have more of a chip on your shoulder about Macs than you are willing to admit.
I would like to reinterate Stoid’s question in this. (Who would have thought - but when Stoid is right, she’s really right!) WHY do you give a damn about Macs or Mac users? PCs are the vast majority, we should be nothing more than a bug on a windshield to you. Just ignore us, and go on with your MS lovefest - that would make much more sense!
Also, I know full well that I haven’t the ability to come off as some irritating smug Mac person that deserved “tweaking” from any anti-Mac people. I have far more experience with PCs, started out with them, and still use my PC regularly. I am a Mac newbie, and I just happen to like using it, especially for Photoshop and other graphics. (OH MY GOSH. The nerve!) So I don’t think I have ever prompted or deserved such an anti-Mac “attitude”, yet I still get it regularly. It’s like some of you just can’t stand that we like Macs! What gives? Are we taking money out of your pocket? What?!? I’m really curious.
yosemitebabe wrote
I believe you’d be referring to http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=50098, wherein I posted such gems as
and
yosemitebabe continued:
All right, you got me; there is a bit of a chip there. But it wasn’t the chip that brought me here. Please see my first posts in this thread as evidence of attempted neutrality.
Bill H., you did the legwork that I was too lazy to do, quoting your own posts from a previous thread! Glad you admit the obvious, you do have a chip on your shoulder about this issue.
You wrote earlier in this thread:
But obviously you do, so my question in my last post was - why? Why do you care? Why not ignore us? After all, we are only a small minority of (crackpot) people who use shiny plastic appliances and don’t do “real” work. So, WHY give a damn about what kind of computer we use? We are obviously nuthin’ in the broad scheme of things.
We knew that (although you get points for copping to it). What still plagues me is…Why? (I have my own theories, but I don’t want to muddy the waters) Oh, and I don’t think I can accept the answer that it’s because Chas was annoying or chippy himself, since we’ve seen the chip was pre-existing.
It’s possible, even likely, you’ve never stopped to think about why. So that’s what I’m asking you to do.
stoid
Thanks Snickers and Esprix.
Chas.E is the first Mac supporter that has attacked me like that. Do I think all Mac users are like that? Nope. I get along well with Mac users. I try to argue neutrally, pointing out flaws and benefits of both systems. I prefer PCs, but I know that Macs are better in many ways. I just find the PC to be better in ways that appeal to me, such as system customizability and such.
Do I dislike Chas.E personally for attacking me? No, not at all. However, I do dislike being criticized and called “immature” and being taken for granted because I’m only 17. You don’t know me, so how can you judge me?
If Chas.E is willing to apologize for attacking me in the wrong forum and for behaving so crudely during the debate, I’m perfectly willing to continue debating properly. However, if he continues to act that way, nothing will come out of this other than insults.
Stoid, I obviously can’t speak for all Windows users or BillH, but the reason I tend to get hot under the collar during Mac/PC debates is because it almost always involves a zealot spouting off flame bait. And the point of flame bait is to piss off the other side, and that’s why I, personally, get involved and almost angry during these debates. I’d like to think that I speak for at least a few more users than myself when I say that I could care less about the differences between Macs and PCs, but that when I see someone like Chas shooting off as he has, that I feel that some retaliation must be had, lest the voice of irrationality reign supreme. Isn’t that what we’re here for, after all?
Personally, I think the Mac/PC debate is a bunch of hooey, and my reasoning for this can be found on this page (sorry, link-directly-to-post URLs elude me). Watching these debates can be painful, kind of like watching your parents fight. You know they’re both right, in their own little ways, but it’s a fight to the death when all you want is for them to hug and make up. I mean we’re all otherwise smart and rational individuals, but have one discussion about the relative advantages of operating systems and hardware and it turns into this mess. [insert disgusted emoticon here]
In addition to what I said in the post I linked to, I personally prefer PCs because I like the idea of being able to put together a fully loaded 1.5 GHz PC (overclocked) for less than $1500. That being said, I also love the Mac OS (though I’m just one step above a pure novice at using it), and that G4 proc doesn’t sound all that bad either. (That reminds me, anybody got a G4 vs. Athlon cite?)
On another note, I don’t come to GD because of its prohibitive length for at-work board browsing, so I’m not familiar with the term “fundie.” Tell me, is Chas exhibiting fundie-like behavior?