A Month with a Mac: A Die-Hard PC User's Perspective

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Anand Lal Shimpi of Anand Tech spent a month with a Dual 2Ghz CPU MAC G5. Ever wondered what is was like on "The Dark Side of the Force"? Well here is your window into the world of MAC:

A Month with a Mac: A Die-Hard PC User's Perspective (http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=2232)

Richard

P.S. That should give the PPRuNe Militant MACers something to think about. :cool:

[Daysleeper]

interesting article. Gotta agree with most things he says.
I do think Mac is easier for non computer people to pick up and use. Perhaps an article taking 2 computer novices and comparing how they do in a month on a PC and a Mac might be interesting.

Overall I think we Mac types come out of it quite well :p

[goates]

That should give the PPRuNe Militant MACers something to think about.

Don't forget all of the PC users who dismiss Macs based on decade old stereotypes. If only more people could be more objective on all sides.

goates

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

goates,

But one very old Stereotype did not go away. On the contrary, it was very much reinforced. There is very little value for the money. $3k with a Radeon 9600 in it and slow RAM. :rolleyes:

Just imagine what kind of Dream Machine you could build for $3k. (And that did not even include Monitors either.) :eek:

Take Care,

Richard

[goates]

Richard,

It all depends on what your values are.

At home I like to tinker with my computer and play the latest and greatest games, so I built myself a PC with Windows XP Pro. Sometimes it also has Linux on it. It was also in my price range.

Although lately a Mac and an XBox have seemed pretty attractive.

On the other hand, for work I would much rather be using a Mac if possible than Windows. I can't think of a way to accurately describe it on a web forum, but the Mac tends to keep out of the way better. Windows loves to let me know that it is there. Linux is even worse and practically uses a 2x4. Meanwhile the Mac just seems to disappear into the background.

Yes Macs are expensive, but so are Porsches and Bombardier Global Expresses. For the home user who drives a Civic and flies Southwest, a Mac is expensive. On the other hand, graphics pros who depend on the computer for their jobs, the Mac could quite possibly be a better value (look at the $10,000+ Sun workstations some used to use).

When I have the money, I know I will have a Mac sitting next to my Windows box. Choice and competition are good for us all.

goates

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

goates,

When I have the money, I know I will have a Mac sitting next to my Windows box. Choice and competition are good for us all.

But with MAC they stifle the very competition you are talking about. :rolleyes:

The first thing I quickly realized was that justifying Apple's pricing wasn't something to do - just bite the bullet and try the experiment. It's all about supply and demand, Apple has around 2% of the computing market. Compare that to the rest of the pie that x86 makers get to share and you can quickly see why the economies of scale don't play in Apple's favor. If you look at the brief spec list above, however, you'll see that the memory, hard drive and video card are fairly mass produced components, but then you have to take into account that the chassis, processors, motherboard, power supplies and basically every other component in the system are not. Then, keep in mind that the video card has to be specially made for Apple and the memory is also the slowest DDR400 that you can find on the market today, so even the mass produced components aren't all that mass produced. The system is expensive; you can get much more PC for the same price, but the point of this experiment wasn't to discover what we already knew.

Then there was:

As I mentioned before, the 2GHz G5 processors that were in the system didn't "feel" slow, but they definitely didn't feel like the fastest things out there. The system itself could use a little kick in the pants. I'm hoping that the new 2.5GHz system will alleviate some of that feeling, but at another $3000, it's difficult to justify the upgrade.

Take Care,

Richard

[goates]

But with MAC they stifle the very competition you are talking about.

I was talking about competition between Windows and the Mac. Yes, Apple keeps tight control over the OS and hardware, but that results in a very stable platform (and a more expensive one). Without someone else developing new interface ideas, we would still be using Windows 3.11 or maybe 95. Linux certainly isn't competing in this area.

It's not like Mr. Gates is any better. He wants everything to run using his products and will do everything he can to lock everyone in.

Look at what has happened with Internet Explorer. Microsoft disbanded the development team a couple of years ago and only fixed security holes when they came up. Nothing new was added or developed until very recently. And that was only to add a pop-up blocker and more control over ActiveX controls. Now that FireFox is gaining ground, they are planning on bringing the team back together.

It's all about what you find easier and what you value. In other words personal preference. If the Mac doesn't do what you want, why does it matter of others do find it a better solution?

goates

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

goates,

I find MAC to be far worse than M$ since there is more options out there for PCs than MACs.

But 2% of the people out there like their MACs so more power to them. :ok:

Take Care,

Richard

[Evo]

On paper, the Mac isn't such a good deal, although it's more accurate to say that the PC offers stunning value for money at the moment - even in expensive Britain £340 all-in will buy you a brand new PC that IMHO is suitable for everything the average user will want to do. The cheapest Mac I can find costs £200 more, has the same disk and memory but is slower (whatever you make of the G4 vs. x86 argument, i'm betting a 2400+ Athlon is going to be faster than a 1GHz G4).

At the high end, the difference looks even bigger. £1200 buys you a 1.6GHz G5, 256Mb DDR RAM, 80Gb Hard Drive and an old 64Mb Geforce FX5200 Graphics card. No monitor, that's extra. The PC you could build for the same money will totally destroy the Mac in every area. As we're talking no-monitor, I'd guess that the £500 PC that I was looking at here the other day (3GHz Athlon with a gig of memory and a 9800 Pro) would still beat a Mac more than twice the price. On paper, it seems a no-brainer for the power user.

However, very few users are real 'power users' any more. Most people just want email, internet, word processing and the ability to plug in a digital camera and mp3 player, so I recommend a basic Mac to probably 80-90% of the friends, family etc. who ask for advice on buying a computer. It's always been the right choice. At the risk of being slightly tongue-in-cheek, anybody who has worked in IT knows that support costs more than hardware, and Apple have got ease of use down perfectly - it's amazing how many non-technical people can sit down with a Mac and do what they want to do, when they're baffled by Windows XP. And if they can do it themselves, I don't have to help :)

I only ever recommend a PC to the 10-20% who have a real need for more power than a bottom of the range Mac provides, and that's normally just the games players.

As for work, goates wrote

On the other hand, for work I would much rather be using a Mac if possible than Windows. I can't think of a way to accurately describe it on a web forum, but the Mac tends to keep out of the way better. Windows loves to let me know that it is there. Linux is even worse and practically uses a 2x4. Meanwhile the Mac just seems to disappear into the background.


It's interesting how we get used to things, because I have exactly the opposite view. My very non-technical wife has an iMac (see, I follow my own advice ;) ) and, while i'll occasionally use it for the camera or to surf, I couldn't do work with it (although it helps that i've finally found a Unix console hidden in there!). I use Linux, for exactly the same reasons that goates uses a Mac - I can get it to do what I need instantly, and the rest of the time it's hidden behind the scenes. But then again, I still like emacs, and think that C-x C-s C-x C-c is a sensible way to save my work and exit, so maybe it's just old habits. Emacs is for people who don't know how to :q! ;) :O

As an aside, AAPL seems to be trading on a P/E of 70, good old .com boom values. I guess that's the iPod effect, but with the competition catching up fast and lack of anything too exciting at the top end of their core business, I'm not sure where they're going but down :ugh:

[PPRuNe Towers]

Richard - each to their own.

We know exactly, I mean exactly how many mac users are on PPRuNe each moment of every day. This forum is (mute) testament to how effective users find them.

Setting aside the powers tuners, speed demon aspect of this forum consider how many times you have ever seen a problem or query on any of the common day to day themes here?

There are a significant proportion of PPRuNers who get something very special from a mac - it works and they aren't troubled by anything on the stickies at the top of this forum - or within the rest of it.

This is very valuable to them and they respectfully ask you to stop publicising a system which remains free of the plagues the rest of you suffer. :E

Regards
Rob

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Rob,

I was wondering how long that article would take to flush you out.

I posted it because I had not see you around here in a while. ;)

Take Care,

Richard

P.S. TCS, like I told you before, "Just like shooting fish in a barrel." :cool:

[Memetic]

>I mean exactly how many mac users are on PPRuNe

Can you tell even if the browser is set to report something other than the actual OS / Processor combination that is installed?

[expedite_climb]

Used to be an avid Mac'er myself, but converted to the 'dark side' of windoze due to costs.

Just interested,We know exactly, I mean exactly how many mac users are on PPRuNe each moment of every day. Go on then, how many !:D

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Memetic,

Most forums collect browser version information (and OS info) from each comp that access the forums. From there you can get all the stats you need.

Something like this:

Guest[1] 64.56.245.109 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1;... 09:31 Main Page (http://forum.msi.com.tw/index.php)

Guest[2] 213.139.171.100 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; rv:1.7.3)... 09:31 Thread: K8N Neo Platinum - Same audio from all 5.1 speakers (http://forum.msi.com.tw/thread.php?threadid=63528)

Guest[3] 152.131.9.4 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1;... 09:32 Forum: AMD64 nVidia Based board (http://forum.msi.com.tw/board.php?boardid=28)

Guest[4] 210.64.17.49 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1;... 09:54 Thread: New Bios For MSI K8N Neo Platinum [ 1.55] (http://forum.msi.com.tw/thread.php?threadid=62439)

Guest[5] 200.47.7.197 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; rv:1.7.3)... 09:31 Thread: km4m v shutdown problums (http://forum.msi.com.tw/thread.php?threadid=61850)

Take Care,

Richard

P.S. Those are not from this forum so do not go looking for the threads. ;)

[goates]

Evo,

You can get emacs for OS X, and many other Unix programs too. Check out the links below.

Emacs for OS X (http://www.porkrind.org/emacs/)

Fink (http://fink.sourceforge.net/)

When I was talking about getting more work done on a Mac, it was because for what I was doing it was faster. For other things, Windows or Linux may be better. Although with OS X being Unix based, it can usually do pretty much everything Linux/*BSD systems can.

TCS, like I told you before, "Just like shooting fish in a barrel."

What do think people are going to do? Let others continue to highlight nothing but the flaws in Macs and give those less knowledgeable a very one sided view? I would say the Mac users around here are very mature, compared to some of the more vocal zealots (of all types) elsewhere. ;)

goates

[Danny]

It's a bit like the story in Animal Farm after Napoleon has taken over... you start to distort history so that the masses never quite remember what the actual events really were. In this case, I remember the early days of Macintosh when the Gates brigade poo pooed the windows interface. After each and every improvement to the Mac OS there has come one from the Gates stable, and quite and improvement it has been. What the flock tend to do though, is forget how crappy their OS was before the latest release and concentrate on how good the new one is when compared to the Mac.

Water off a ducks back though. Us Mac users know how good the system is and are quite happy with it. It obviously irritates some PC users that the probable ratio of satisfied users to confused/unhappy ones for the Mac far outshines the figures for Bill Gates brainwashed flock.

Don't even get into the argument when it comes to 'power users'. As was pointed out in the article, the worst bit of software for the Mac turned out to be none other than Bill Gates own software. Hmm... didn't seem to register with the reviewer that there were some other suites of software that were infinitesimally better than anything that could ever come out of the M$ stable.

For me the moral of the story was that the Mac OS was a bit better than the Windoze version and everything was quite good except for the M$ products that were available for it. In other words, if its Microsoft then it sucks. :}

I shall now sit back and wait for the sheep to start bleating the equivalent of "two feet bad, four feet good" which would probably sound something like "Mac bad, PC good". :rolleyes:

[Daysleeper]

Just to pick up on the ease of use part, my parents are of that generation where a telephone without a wind up handle on the side is a mystery. 6 months ago I bought them an iMac and they are now able to video conference with their 9 month old grandaughter over iChat using iSight cameras.

I knew that it would be worth the 1200 quid I paid (including 2 cameras) just to get rid of all those panicked phonecalls "our PC's got another virus" but even I am stunned at how much they are able to do with the iMac in such a short period of time. The fact that they live 7 hours away from us and are able to get to see their grandaughter pretty much every day has just been fantastic.
Now Im sure it could all have been done with windows but there is no way it would have been as easy as it was on Apple.

In short , if you haven't a clue about computers and quite frankly dont want to have a clue about computers then these are definately the computers for you. :8

[Memetic]

Richard said:
Most forums collect browser version information (and OS info) from each comp that access the forums. From there you can get all the stats you need.

Yep...but I asked...

Can you tell even if the browser is set to report something other than the actual OS / Processor combination that is installed?

For example if i'm using my Linux machine and have set Konquer to declare itself as a Mac running say safari when it issues a get request how would you ever know? - oops given it away now. :D (It's actually reporting what it really is to PPRune as PPRune works well with standartds based browsers.)

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Memetic,

I have not tried to spoof a Browser before, I do not know.

Danny,

You should send Anand an email and offer him better options than the M$ garbage he was trying to evaluate on the MAC. Here is his email:

[email protected]

Take Care,

Richard

[Ridley]

Wow, I spotted this article and just had to respond.

Having worked with Microsoft in the early years, and having some experience helping develop some of their core products (again in the early years, so as not to mislead), I have some heartfelt feelings about Mac and PC. (And about Microsoft, which may become evident.)

I’ve written a worldwide bestselling book on the subject of web design (8 years ago), still used as curriculum at several universities, helped develop several web, wireless, financial and software technologies over the past 13 years, and for all intents and purposes, should be a die-hard PC user. I have a lot to say about where this thread is going.

Let me first comment on the article at Anandtech.com:

First of all, after reading the article, its very clear that if the writer isn't making at least 90% of his income from inside Bill Gates cavity, he will be shortly.

This is a very biased and completely inaccurate post. In his first few paragraphs he states how wonderful XP is, and how great it is that it came along. Well, here's where I start to see red.

I found that Windows XP was just as stable as any other OS that I'd ever encountered. My personal machine would go months between reboots without a single problem.

Hmmm, this could only be true if there isn't a single application running on it. Because as all of us people who use an 'app' stronger than outlook express will tell you, certain software, graphics drivers, audio drivers, codecs, DLL's, tray apps, even huge corporate anti-virus programs will make you have to reboot eventually, sometimes infrequent, sometimes often. Maybe not as often as Windows 95, but then no one should have to wade through life remembering that hell, but we still have to reboot a lot. (even if it is to install something as simple as a screensaver, Microsoft Products almost always require rebooting.)

Side-note: The words Stable, Reliable, Secure can NEVER EVER BE USED WITH A MICROSOFT PRODUCT!!!

Why do I have this view? Because as has been written times before from people much closer to the pearly white gates of redmond than me, Microsoft could patch and fix all of their bugs, security holes, and kernel issues in a 24-48 hour period.
Why would a company choose not to do this, if it was possible? Because of the one thing that motivates Microsoft and nothing else. Money.

You wouldn't need to purchase a new OS, download a new driver, use Automatic Updates for your software, buy a license to get the newest virus signatures, etc if they did fix those problems.
Bill Gates has never been a guy to invent something that you could use and walk away with. Every product he creates must become the technological equivalent of crack. If you buy a Microsoft product, you will become dependant on that company from that point forward.

Gates wants the whole world to have to pay a monthly fee to Microsoft. In fact, this has been and remains one of his earliest visions, and the way things are going, it won’t be too long until we all pay a weekly fee for the privilege of using his software. (he has stated several times that an OS should be an essential service like Gas, or Water, this is his vision.)

Microsoft has interests in every available field of security, from software and hardware firewalls, to anti-virus. And is one of the worlds largest spammers, thanks to that disclaimer you sign and agree to in Hotmail (a microsoft owned company, and the worlds largest database of email addresses) you can and will be spammed. (not just your hotmail address, but also your email address used to sign on to hotmail) As they announced, they have had several Hotmail database break-ins that surprisingly coincided with companies tracing their spam back to employees hotmail accounts. (how strange)

What many new users of computers don't realize, is that before microsoft, you only upgraded if you wanted NEW features, not because you wanted your APP/OS/Hardware to WORK.

What the article on Anandtech fails to explain to the reader, is that his use of the machine is innocuous. He wants to do what he does on the PC on a MAC. It’s not a gaming machine, it won’t emulate all the same software properly, and it doesn’t have the identical apps. It’s an unfair comparison. It’s like comparing a Porsche to a lawnmower, and expecting the Porsche to trim around the hedges. (although I’m sure it can do this, it won’t be pretty)

I could go into detail on why this article is so biased, and probably will later, but for now, its clear from even a cursory look, the article is tainted. (kind of like mine)

On to the discussion of Macs.

Mac users, and this comes from working with, watching and witnessing the quiet rebellion to Mac, of and by Mac and PC users, are extremely happy with their operating system, their hardware, software and lives, and are extremely proud to be Mac users, and will probably die Mac users. Which needs to be noted! As this cannot be said about almost all PC users. PC users don’t have this kind of loyalty, happiness, or lifestyle. PC users are always grumbling about something about their OS, drivers, software, etc.
(unless they lie and sing the praises of Microsoft because that’s the side their
bread is buttered on.)

Why use a Mac?

I do want to make it clear, that if you want to emulate PC apps, get into gaming, or want to do heavy (and I mean heavy) 3D graphic design with a Mac, your probably not thinking very clearly, at least for right now.

Mac's are not for gamers. Period. While there are some great games that work for Mac's, its a far too expensive machine to play games on. (and besides all the driver hell you might go through, like the Anandtech article talked about, just might happen.)

For people that game, buy an Xbox (I prefer the PS2, you usually don't have to pay for the live service, like you do with Xbox live. A useless reason to extort money from gamers) or a PC.

Mac's are perfect for anyone wanting to do real work. Web design, eCommerce development, wireless development, graphic design, animation, audio and production audio engineering, etc.

For people that do heavy 3D graphics design, buy an SGI if you don't already have one. (if your using your PC for lightwave and Alias, chances are its a pirated copy, and your only having fun with it. Or your trying to learn it. In any case, keep quiet.)

For people that Code heavily, it all depends on what OS you code for. For the most stable environment, develop for Unix (Linux), or Java.

For people wanting to browse, get email, chat online, do the occasional word processing, do a spreadsheet, do your taxes:

YOU CAN: Get a PC.
But be prepared as you should do the following if you buy or own a PC - Buy a router with a built-in firewall, buy a software firewall, download all of Microsofts latest patches (in safe mode with netoworking), and download every other developers patches to keep up with microsoft, make sure you constantly update all of your printer drivers/graphics driovers/audio drivers/mother board drivers/mouse drivers/keyboard drivers/monitor drivers/misc hardware drivers, and whatever else I've missed because you will surely come across a Microsoft patch that affects one or many of these things in a bad way, and download every newest virus signature along with your virus softwares engine updates since viruses come up every day (after all it’s a billion$+ industry), also don't forget to manage your start menu, and your startup processes so you don’t overload your memory and/or your system (you don’t want your system to become sluggish), and if you can, optimize your interface for your video card and memory (be careful as you may have to tweak things on a regular basis if you go from game to game), and of course reboot when you have any problems (although XP will do that for you.)

OR: Buy a Mac.
you can spend a little more and buy a MAC, and do very LITTLE, if any of the above. Anyone who tells you otherwise is a liar! Run away from them.

Remember, I'm a PC user, who has developed a ton of applications, from web server technologies, to financial software, wireless applications, and more. Unfortunately I have to work in the Microsoft environment. And I hate every stinking second of it.

I look forward to the day I can develop all that I want on a Mac. I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel, and I'm looking forward to that day. But if you don't need to be in the Microsoft arena, then get the hell out.

The difference between Mac and PC can be broken down to three things.

1. Price (PC is lower)
2. Apps (PC has more)
3. Pain and suffering. (PC is all about the pain)

The Pain you experience with a PC will far outweigh the savings you get over a Mac.

My advice, if you can find the Apps you want on a Mac, you can afford it and your not a gamer, then go for and stick with the Mac. You will never be sorry.

If you work on the PC like me, and because of the Apps, you don’t have a choice. Then please drop me a PM, and we can console each other.

Ridley

[StevenPJ]

Right on, Ridley.

Additionally Mac OS X can run both 32 bit AND 64 bit apps on the new G5 chip. Not much of an issue now but as apps get rewritten it will become one (a positive one that is)

Re cost: this is an old chestnut. Yes Pee Cees are cheaper compared to Macs, but then start to match up a dull with identical hardware & software specs. Macs ARE cheaper. Don't forget we have iMovie, iTunes & iPods, iPhoto & iDVD, GarageBand etc & all apart from the iPod comes free with any new Mac.

I've had Macs now for 4 years. I have had No virii. I went to the Symantec site tonight & checked out my laptop for security. All ports are in stealth mode. ie can't be seen. Try that on a Windoze Box even after SP2 has been applied. But do visit the Register for their take on SP. Its still a dangerous system to surf with.

Finally, I have trouble shot my Macs myself - zero calls to anyone.

My oldest Mac (aG4 450 Mhz) can run the latest system Mac OS X 10.3.5 with no problem and even earlier Macs can do the job too. Can the same be said of XP?

Nuff said!

[Evening Star]

Interesting article and find myself agreeing with what Ridley says about where the writer hopes to seek his income.

Took the plunge last year and got a Mac for home. Fine, had teething troubles in making the change, mostly I now realise because after Windows I expected computers to have problems and I tried too hard in setting up instead of letting the Mac do things perfectly. Says it all really, and once I learnt to trust the Mac never looked back for all the reasons given here. Still use a PC at work and hate every minute of it. Fighting to change that but meeting entrenched Windows thinking from a few people (the "brainwashed flock"!) who convince themselves that standardisation is more important than productivity.

Interesting comments here about the cost aspect. Mac can cost a bit more, but did not realise until pointed out here how much I am already taking for granted in terms of marvellously functioning software that comes with the Mac. Only extra software I have on the Mac is Office .... and guess which is the most problematic software on my Mac! Anybody here use Openoffice?

Right, fine, call this the zealous ramblings of a convert. Not worried in the slightest, found out that life is too short to live with the pain of a PC.

[PPRuNe Towers]

Writing from a Middle Eastern hotel via a wireless network. Except the hotel doesn't have a wireless network.

I've connected via the cable to the wall and clicked on my room number to accept the daily charge. So far very familiar to many ppruners I'm sure except I then disconnected the network cable and plugged a unit the size of a cigarette packet into the wall power socket. The ethernet cable has now gone into a port in it. The printer has been plugged into a usb port on the same wall unit as has a mini jack going to some powered speakers.

The entire crew are now surfing wirelessly from one paid connection, printing wirelessly when they need it and listening to one of my iTunes playlists over the powered speakers.

No-one has entered an IP address or configured anything at all - just entered the name of our company as a password.

That was just over one minute to get everyone on line including the initial cable swaps. With this ease of use in an operation that that so often preoccupies these pages for a one person setup at home is it any wonder that there is now only one remaining PC holdout amongst the crew?

The unit - Airport Express - 129 bucks. The cig packet sized travellers' friend.

Regards
Rob

[Mac the Knife]

Well, far be it from me to contradict Ridley, and everyone here knows that I'm not a Microsoft lover - very much the reverse in fact since my "real" OS is SuSE Linux 9.1 and the superb Mepis Linux [ http://www.mepis.org/ ] which I cannot recommend too highly.

Actually it isn't the quality or security of MS products that repels me but Microsoft's attitude and business practices. I'm not going to go into the details (it would take far too long) but the subversion of standards, the vendor lock-ins, the lies, the deceit, the relentless destruction of anyone who dares to challenge their hegemony, the eternal lawsuits that only they have the money to fight and most recently the covert campaign against Linux using the repulsive SCO as a stalking-horse just turn me right off. Nope, MS is a convicted monopolist who wants to own the whole sandbox and won't play nice with the other kids.

Maybe it's because I'm a bit of a nerd at heart but I have to confess that I've had very little trouble with my 2 installations of XP (I didn't have much trouble with 98 either, but that's another story). Of course, I have hardware and software firewalls, adware scanners, malware scanners, antivirus software, snoopers and update and patch things regularly. Not to speak of backups, registry savers and the like. They all run as cronjobs and rarely require any active intervention - though the compulsory reboots are annoying. I run all sorts of apps., including games, heavy duty graphics processing, rafts of free software or shareware and download tons of stuff to try from the Net. Hard lockups? Perhaps 6 in the last year. Bluescreens and Stops? Never had one. Application crashes? Sure - mostly Explorer barfing for some reason. Security issues? Lots of fruitless knocking on the hardware firewall door, that's for sure. Driver issues? Yeah, sometimes (never did get that USB modem working) but a lot less headaches than in Linux. Well, they do say your mileage may vary....

All in all I don't think that XP isn't so bad (though it's horribly overpriced and fenced in by draconian EULAs). From the point of view of OS design it is quite insecure, but that in a way is the price of maintaining the extraordinary compatibility with older iterations and DOS apps. Sure they could have made it more secure, but that would have broken a lot of older stuff and produced howls of indignation.

I can't say much about Macs except to say that any BSD based OS can't be all bad! But I can talk about my beloved Linux and more specifically Linux on the desktop. Linux has pretty much won on the server platform - everyone know that Apache makes IIS look like a pile of poo. On the desktop Linux has arrived at a bit of a crossroads and is having to do a lot of growing up very fast. Hardware drivers are a real pain (of course Apple never has that problem) partly because Linux is newish to the desktop, partly because closed source drivers don't sit very comfortably with the GPL and partly, I suspect, because MS leans on manufacturers who might be thinking of releasing Linux drivers (they've done it in the past and will continue to do it until the DOJ grows some balls and teeth). Application installation, even with binaries written for your distro, can be painful. Windows had DLL hell, Linux has dependency hell. Sure, you can compile source yourself but most people are intimidated by this and it still doesn't solve everything. Red Hat's RPM format is, in spite of it's deficiencies, becoming the norm (sorry Debian users) but package management just has to be made better. Adoption of the Linux Standard Base http://www.linuxbase.org/ will go a long way towards addressing such problems. Applications? Well, apart from games (and Doom III for Linux has been released) there ain't much in it these days and it's getting better all the time.

The good thing is that all these criticisms are being addressed right now. Every month brings improvements in smoothness, interoperability and ease of use. Sometimes it's hard to keep up!

The worst that could happen would be for MS to release Microsoft Linux! But I don't think they ever will.

[Daysleeper]

Towers

That is very cool. I would have never thought of that.
Now all I need is a larger crew than the 2 of us on the freighter to make it worthwhile.

Whats the range like on the express in a hotel enviroment with all the reinforced concrete and the like.

[Evening Star]

MS to release Microsoft Linux!

Mac, go and wash out your mouth with soap and water ... NOW! How you could come up with such a repellent idea beats me :yuk: ... and I thought you such a well brought up person ... :8 :ok:

[Oggin Aviator]

The unit - Airport Express - 129 bucks. The cig packet sized travellers' friend.

Correct me if I am wrong, isnt this just a mini 802.11g router able to handle usb devices and audio as well? Not that I am against it - it looks awesome. As this is a Mac vs PC thread, the product spec says it will work with any 802.11g device, so I assume that means a 802.11g enabled Windows Laptop as well.

I have always used PCs with Windows due to cost and software / hardware availability issues and have never really had any problems (except when I was running Windows ME - horrible, horrible OS). XP has been absolutely fine.

Oggin

[redsnail]

My cute lil 12" iBook from Apple works every time.

FRED, my Windows PC has taught me a lot about software, hardware, virus protection, system crashes....

I run both. I know which one I prefer to use if I want to keep my blood pressure low.

[PPRuNe Towers]

Oggin, yep 'g' standard router in base station mode. Remembers five configurations so you could use one slot as relay rather than base. This means you can use it on a home or commercial wifi system to act as a repeater to extend the range of your regular base station. Our centrino tablet PC is on the aircraft so haven't tried linking it yet - we like to keep it out of our sight until we have to do perf calculations:} :O

Daysleeper: The iBooks seem to be able to suck a signal from just about nowhere which isn't fair. Therefore we had our 17 inch Powerbook man roaming - the metal casing makes reception far more problematic. No problems for adjacent rooms in a modern concrete palace but, as you'd suspect, the rebarred concrete floors prevented reception above and below the room where the Airport was plugged in.

However, our remaining PC stalwart isn't on duty at the moment but we're looking forward to his return as he has an outstanding USB external antenna ( a Linksys product I think) which might do the trick on floor to floor reception.

Finally, and as we're talking comms for RoadWarriors, firewalls. Prime PPRuNe audience don't have the luxury of a known and trusted hardware firewall much of the time so here's a recommendation for the Mac contingent. You're working on a unix software base which the masters of the command line can configure for protection in incredible detail. There's a utility out there now which will give you a very usable point and click version of what they can manage. Search on 'BrickHouse' and give it a trial. My lot have found it very useful indeed while out on the road.

Regards to all,
Rob

[Oggin Aviator]

Rob

you could use one slot as relay .... can use it on a home ... wifi system to act as a repeater to extend the range of your regular base station.

Think I will invest in one for the house - I get quite a bit of attenuation in various house locations due to walls etc. Does it just plug into an electrical wall socket and bobs your uncle? As previously stated, my hardware / software is all from Bill Gates but is all 802.11g capable.

Cheers

Oggin

[PPRuNe Towers]

That's right OA,

Worked straight out of the box. Easy enough to find a picture of it. The 'cigarette packet' has two or three prongs on one end corner for connection to the mains. For road warriors the corner removes so you can slot in the correct prongs for the power system in the whichever part of the world you find yourself.

Plug in and at the bottom you have three ports. Ethernet, usb and stereo mini jack. Finally there is a LED window facing the room cycling between yellow and green to let you know when connected and working/transmitting.

In addition to creating an instant wireless network with remote printing/scannning or whatever you've got usb wise there's one other aspect that might appeal with regard to your thoughts on extending range around the home.

For music fans the software adds a new function to iTunes ( comes with all Macs but a free download for you PC people) which gives you a drop down choice. Normal output or the names of any wireless networks available. Select the network name and the music is silenced on your system and piped to the mini jack on the Airport Express. Pop it into a socket near your stereo, connect a lead to an aux input and voila.

We really rather like it!

Regards again
Rob

[Ascend Charlie]

My first computer was an Amstrad, then an Apple II greenscreen, then onto the PC lines, with 286, 386, 486, pentium and so on.

Then my son put me onto Mac. What a difference.

I now run an iMac for everyday stuff and a G4 Powerbook when I want to get fancy.

I needed a software update for the Powerbook. Easy. While visiting my son's office, I put it on the desk, turned it on, no cables needed for anything; and it connected to the AirPort server and downloaded the goodies from broadband in no time flat. Needed some bits from son's machine - connect via firewire in target mode, drag the desired bits onto my hard drive, thank you very much.

Update my mobile phone's address book via bluetooth.

Create home movies with iMovie, link it with a slideshow of digital photos from iPhoto, put them together with a very professional front page with iDvd, burn it, and life is easy.

Convinced a musician friend to make the change to Mac after he saw my setup. Last weekend he and a friend performed their first paid gig in an electronic music festival using GarageBand, a month after first seeing the program. He is ditching his PC and expensive software for the Mac and its included goodies.

I have a PC in a corner of the office, only because I haven't yet bought a copy of Virtual PC for OS/X, and I need to run some software which the Oz gummint hasn't seen fit to write for Mac - the eTax software.

[Danny]

Virtual PC for the Mac... DON'T BUY IT!!!!

Guess who bought the company that originally produced it? Yep... Micro****e and they have ruined it. It will run Windoze XP but it is utterly useless unless your metabolic rate is the same as stalactite.

M$ tweaked the product and it is now useless. I wasted money on upgrading the old version. I needed access to a Windoze environment to run Explorer as some dorks decided to make the company intranet accessible ONLY to the Windoze version of Explorer.

Thankfully I married a lovely wench who has her own Dell laptop. Now I just use that for work access to my roster. Everything else is Mac.

Just to point out some more of the complexities, I purchased a Netgear wireless router for the home and a card for the laptop. Trying to set up the router using the PC was tedious and not very clear. So, ethernetted into the router with the Mac and set it up using just a few clicks and voila... home hot spot. Discovered a neighbour had one too and hadn't protected it and thought about getting rid of my broadband but on second thoughts gave him some friendly advice about protecting his network.

Just ask PPRuNe Towers about some very important people who run unprotected networks. Probably because they are such a pain to set up using 'Doze systems. :rolleyes:

[Evo]

Virtual PC for the Mac... DON'T BUY IT!!!!


Oh, fsck. I've just ordered a pair of G5 iMacs, one for Mrs. Evo and the other pour moi. Still, there's a few pieces of PC software that I can't live without, so Virtual PC was the plan. D'oh.

[Daysleeper]

I've just ordered a pair of G5 iMacs

Show Off :D

Let us know how it goes there are probably a lot of sales resting on your opinion.

Danny needs to kick someones bottom about the windowfication of his company. My company intranet is only avaliable on Explorer, but at least its usable on the MAC version and we forced them to re-issue our cd ops manuals in a MAC friendly format. :ok: