Mac vs PC = Smug vs Stupid?

Pirillo.comMac vs PC = Smug vs Stupid?I knew the Leopard vs Vista post would spark a discussion. The top 10 list (THANKFULLY) never made it to Digg or Slashdot. Even so, Don Mitchell made the following outlandish remarks which I… well, just read what he wrote in the comment thread:

“[...]UNIX, an operating system that is woefully obsolete today.[...]”

Hahah-.. wait, he wasn’t joking? what an idiot! I like how THE perfect PC has “DirectX for advanced 3D graphics and games”!! :D Obviously, he uses his own interests in constructing a system to suit everyone, but it does not work that way, Daniel, everyone uses their system for different things. For instance, I rarely play video games on my computer, and I like a system that does not require a 5 foot thick iron wall to keep malware out, and so, for me, Unix is the obvious choice. Perhaps someone this narrow minded should be culled from the pool of techies, we really need less people with mindsets like this scumming the place up.

Whoops, misread, and I think you did too, Chris. His name is Don, not Dan. Sorry Don. :)

Well, not really.

Apple/Mac has a different philosophy than the windows world….in a basic level their users generally don’t care about what graphics card is in their computer and if they can put a new one in or not. They just want it to work so they can get their work done. As far as your claim the UNIX kernel is crap and wasn’t meant to do these things, I would like you to show me some proof. UNIX has survived 30+ years of evolution and for me that says a great deal. Give me that “tried and true” UNIX over the bug ridden NT Kernel anyday.

I have to lol at this because I’ve literally been dealing with this subject my entire adult life.

The Mac OS has always been superior to anything MS has ever put out. The Mac’s biggest shortcoming has been its long-standing relationship with Motorola. That’s now been corrected.

For many years, the Macintosh hardware has been one-step behind IBM PC compatibles. Intel has innovated a lot of great technology; AGP immediately comes to mind. It was painful to watch how much faster video was on a PC in 1998. When we finally got 2x AGP on our Macs at the end of 1999, PCs had 4x AGP slots.

Now that Macs run on Intel chips, the hardware *and* the software are state-of-the-art. There’s no more hardware envy to be had on the Mac side of the computing community.

Apple is going to re-capture the market share it lost during the dark years of the early and mid-’90s. (I still have not forgotten the horrors of the Performa-infomercial years).

Now with regard to Don’s post:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeXT
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Software_Distribution
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X

All of Windows is one big continuous kludge (as I’m typing this on a PC running Vista).

There is no operating system in the world that compares to Mac OS X… except for OS 9 which I stubbornly refuse to give up. :p

!

I’ve been a Systems Engineer since the 70’s, worked on, configured, cursed at, prayed for guidance with most truly common hardware and OS platforms in that time.
I have NEVER seen anything quite as hair raising as the kludge (or more accurately the abortion) suggested by Dan.
For that matter I don’t think I’ve ever seen as ill-informed an opinion about Unix either.

I have noticed a general degradation in the vocabulary used on some of the posts here.

Ex: Oh god, Dan… where do I begin to point out just how (deleted) stupid you make the rest of us look?

Is there really any need for this? maybe most of the United States population thinks nothing of this type of filth but I am still quite offended by it. Our schools need to do a better job of teaching people that there are plenty of proper English words capable of conveying strong emotion without the need to resort to this deprecating slang.

Well, I’m reminded of the comic strip a few years back with the animals in the tree. One of them is presenting the most reliable hardware system for data in the world; it had hard copy and no OS problems.

… Then he pulled a blanket off …

… A 1926 …

Underwood.

I’ve never been a big fan of MS and it’s “there will be one and it will be use” philosophy. On the other hand when I rely on one company to provide ALL the hardware AND the operating system I have only one place to go when something goes really wrong.

I like the ability to deal with my own hardware issues and choose what I like best for what I want to do. I used Macs plenty and had just as much trouble with them freezing up (just no blue screen). I guess that has improved nows that they ditched their old OS and designed on top of UNIX but until they offer that OS free of their over priced hardware,I’ll pass.

To Mark – I think you have a good point about the hardware, Apple being more on the same page and all…

But I still don’t think that’s completely true. You still need to pay a lot more for any hardware component’s mac equivelant, including generally buying a system from apple (look at the macbook, 1100 dollars, 5400 rpm hard drive, 2 GHz core 2 duo proc, 1 gig DDR667 RAM – that cannot compete with any PC vendor).

While I really like OSX and Apple’s “just work” ideas to some extent, I think Apple needs to be much more competitive with their hardware – Apples are so expensive to begin with, and you most def don’t get that back in hardware – I would rather buy an Apple without OSX on it with more competitively priced hardware and pay for the OS seperately.

Oh and what’s up with it costing 150 dollars to add another gig of RAM to your configuartion? Whens the last time a gig of RAM was 150 dollars??? And why is it so hard to get a decent hard drive at a decent price? 7200 hard drives are so standardized and Apple is selling them as the “high performance” drives when in the PC world the 10k is the new cup of tea.

I don’t have anything against Apple, I hate the Apple vs. PC argument, but I just cannot bring myself to buy an Apple because of the high price for less-than-expected hardware.

If apple hardware were only a LITTLE bit more expensive, like 10%, I would buy, bootcamp for some gaming also. If that were true Apple would be the end-all computer. But it’s just too expensive for me.

Hmmmm…maybe Mr. Mark L. Anderson has been unduely-influenced by the fabled & feared “Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field” device imbedded into every Apple product.

To be genuine and honest, *every* OS since the code that ran on IBM & CDC Mainframes and Supercomputers is nothing more than an idea built upon another idea…which is nothing more than a kludge. Linux was meant to work like UNIX, which was meant to function like Multics, etc, etc, etc. Windows and the Mac OS were designed to work like Alto, and so on and so on and so on.

Reality-check: when was the last update to the UNIX kernel, folks? I’m not talking about FreeBSD or OpenBSD, I’m talking about *the* UNIX kernel. I’m sorry if I’m dealing with semantics, but AFAIK there hasn’t been a UNIX kernel update in ages, and any additions would also imbue levels of kludginess.

Now, if you want to see some truely revolutionary OS bits, search for “Singularity OS” and see what comes up.

OMG. ‘Where do I begin’ all right. This could be an illegitimate offspring of John Dvorak. This is so awesome I’m submitting it to our quotes section. Gold! LOL

This is an ongoing moronic debate . Many people like the Apple system, that have the “advantage” of being integraded because Apple dictates design. Microsoft has the “disadvantage of being chaotic because it is “essentially” a software and hardware democracy. In the end people who like “Macs” use them “if they can, ” while people who like pc’s use those. Some, especially “Mac” users, complain that the have to use Microsoft because they have a “monopoly’ that prevents people from freely choosing what they really want. Now how do you suppose a monopoly is generaed and sustained? Yeah, EVERYTHING I want to do I can do with XP (haven’t gotten there with Vista) so that’s what I use.

my thing is this I dont care how the system is built or what code was used, what i want and expect is an OS that works for me!
My experiance of both mac OS and Vista are soooo different.
I live in Japan (yes these days lots of people do live in different countries)! when i got my macbook pro it asked me what language i wanted i said English and bingo its in English… always..in English, like what i asked it
with vista it asked me what language i wanted and bingo its in english..until i conect to the net, try and download, or access anything, and then bingo japanese!.. when i start up, try to contact anyone, japanese..and absolutely no f#$#$#in way of being in english..ever..even though thats what i want!!

theres the difference, mac allows you to be in control,with windows you never really are.

Now how do you want to live your lives?

Oh, Lor, where do I start? So much disinformation, so little time.

Sorry ScottK, but there isn’t such a beast as “the” UNIX kernel; the closest you’ll get to the original UNIX kernel is some IP that Novell and SCO have been squabbling over for the last few years. Almost all of the UNIX system vendors out there (including Apple) have written their own kernels from scratch using either the AT&T reference platform (System 5) or the Berkeley reference platform (BSD 4). All of them use contributed software for the “userland,” that is, the libraries and common CLI utilities that most people expect from UNIX.

The UNIX trademark is owned by The Open Group, a consortium of vendors that puts forth standards for userland interoperability (which most people consider the key power of UNIX). UNIX ‘03 is the latest standard; Apple has submitted MacOS 10.5 for compliance testing after a minor legal squabble over advertisements that implied OS X “had the power of UNIX.”

OS X’s kernel is called Xnu, and it’s a hybrid of CMU’s Mach 2.0 kernel and a new C++-based driver architecture called IOKit. On top of the Kernel sits the BSD 3.4 userland and high-level network drivers, some GNU-contributed tools and libraries, and the proprietary application frameworks CoreFoundation (C/C++), Foundation (ObjC), and AppKit (ObjC) that Apple inherited from NeXT.

http://developer.apple.com/DOCUMENTATION/Darwin/Conceptual/KernelProgramming/Architecture/chapter_3_section_3.html

Claiming OS X is dated because the original AT&T kernel is moribund is like claiming Vista is crap because the DEC VMS kernel hasn’t seen an update in a decade.

Freedom of choice.
I could give a crap who uses what.
I just get a kick out of the Mac Cult and the Unix Priesthood thing.
Members of the Mac Cult just sound like a bunch of far left liberals, they know what best for all of us and if you do not agree then your are an idiot, which proves the point.
The Unix Priests deserve the title, before the plethora of Unix GUI’s it was mostly command line, cryptic and complex as get out.
Seems like most complaints about the Windows PC is by people who can’t find a job where the company uses the PC and OS of their choice.
Again, who cares. Get back to work.

gorgeous ninja that was the most absurd statement

you have one issue with Vista and you decide that mac allows you to be in control and you’re never in control with windows??????

with mac everything is proprietary, how is that in control??? with a pc you can generally do what you want (regardless of how much of an idiot you are, not talking to you here im speaking generally) and with a mac you do it the mac way – everything integrated.

that said OSX is a fine operating system, but you’re statement is ridiculous

Apple guides its 3rd party developers with the following statement: “Empower, don’t try to anticipate.”

Those of you that have experienced, for example, building Automator workflows and using a 10-page built-in Microsoft Wizard will know what Apple’s saying.

traumaknows

i might have fired off a rather hasty and sweeping statement but then i had just spent 40 VERY frustrating minutes trying to get a brand new OS (vista) that I had just installed to try and do what i wanted i.e. not doing everything in a different language to my own.

unless you have experianced this particular gem of a problem i wouldnt be so quick to diss me..

Having only a week earlier bought a macbook pro that has worked seamlessly from the off, it was easy for me to make a comparison based on my user experiance, which is surely is what counts.

having said all that, and ignoring the fact that it still locks me into japanese only websites/downloads, i actually quite like using vista!

imho microsoft should get rid of their winNT kernel or switch to unix if the don’t want to fall into oblivion, but that’s REALLY science fiction

Blabbering about Mac OSX and then saying it’s based “Upon The Unix Kernal” which has never changed requires you in the same statement to say that Windows XP/2003 is based upon Wndows NT 3.5 (as perfected by the DEC OS people Microsoft hired) which has never changed. It betrays ignorance in all matters, especially the fact that none of this stuff has stayed static and that this year’s vmunix/ntoskern/vmlinux is exactly the same as last years. Sorry bud, but it’s a moving target, no matter what OS you’re using.

As an OS agnostic who uses Microsoft/Apple/Unix/Linux in my day-to-day work, I hear a lot of nitpicky wasting of breath on the OS religiosity. It bears pretty much no relation at all to me getting my daily work done and earns instant dismissal as to the person’s usefulness as people who tend to get that rabid about it are usually cocksure ignorant fanboys who waste my time.

At the bottom of this page it asks, “What do you Think?”. I think that after fifteen years I am sick of being a part time PC technician. My chosen field is that of Facilities Engineer… I’ve spent far too much time on this “forced hobby” of board changer and driver chaser. I just wonder if I will miss it, no kidding.

What do I think? I think I’ll give Mac a whirl; would sometime next month be a good time with Leopard coming out? Does anyone know if historically Apple has “bumped” the hardware up at the time of an OS evolution?

I’ve decided the existing software problem is gone… for me now, maybe not everyone, with all I’ve heard about Parallels etc. So, yes I’m going to give her a whirl. I’m already convinced she jiggles nicely and has a pretty face. I’ll let you know if she can dance.

Just a little shakey about tangoing with “Mac”. Guess I’ll have to give it another name….

Raincheck,
I use Mac’s and PC’s, quite often. Don’t believe the B.S. about not having to driver chase on Macs. My mother just got an iMac and I not only had to driver chase for both her EPSON printers, it was more than an issue installing them. And if thats not enough, you don’t get the custom printer gui, which shows you the ink levels, special formatting, etc… you get the apple one, and if you want to check your ink levels, well, thats another program.

As for Parallels, again, another mind f@@k… when I tried it out, it wouldn’t get on the internet, took 1/2 hour to figure that out, then it wouldnt’ find my MP3 player via the USB, NEVER figured that out and tech wasn’t any help either… totally useless although it does run windows fairly well and fast… it’s nothing to call home about. I ended up using Boot Camp… so, I have an overpriced PC that can also run OSX… well… OSx86 — I dual boot on my Athlon 64 XP and OSX 10.4.10 just fine, without the cost of the mac :)

If you are looking to get away from the headaches, I can assure you, Mac won’t help as much as they claim….

Although I’ve been a Mac user since theres been a Mac I have also looked at this whole argument between Mac’s and PC’s for years. To get down to the basics the two widely different approaches to PC’s boils down to how Microsoft started and differs from Apple. Since MS basically decided to be a software company every PC hardware company was free to put together whatever components they felt like using as long as it worked with the main processor and OS. This then, ever since has appealed to many tech folks who like to customize there computers. It also led to software and hardware that was confusing for less then highly qualified tech users. Apple on the other hand has always looked at how people actually used there computers and tried to make it easier and more fun to use. Apple has made a lot of mistakes in the past by having to much proprietary hardware which ran up the cost in comparison to Wintel. The cost difference has now nearly gone away with Apple (Apptel) computers essentially having the same chips, hard drives and graphics boards as Dell’s and HP’s. It also get’s down to when people spend years learning the in’s and out’s of an operating system and they are looked upon as “experts” it becomes hard for them to be non biased in there assessment of the “other” OS. To those who just want to get there work done and don’t really care about all of the technical stuff, they just want an OS that’s easy to use and works without frequent problems. The company that does a better job doing this for the huge number of non/semi technical people will increase their market share.

–As a computer engineer:
I think that Apple was very smart in getting rid of Motorolla. It allows people to compare operating systems. I do not use vista cause it is not ready which happens to be a large flaw with MS. I have used plenty of Macs in my time. I find them to be a bit jeuvenile Yes everything is easier on a mac, but you cant do the things you really need to on one either. They still crash frequently. I consider them computers for the not so intelligent.
So the smug vs. stupid I dont get. Mac users are stupid. Pc users arent very smug they are the first to point out problems with PCs. As for Macs being more secure as they proliferate so will the amount viruses written for them. It has been proven that Crapple software has tons of holes in it too. Check bug releases for today. LOL Please show some intelligense when critisizing what someone else writes. He is absolutely correct on the video card thing. Thank you.

I have both. I’m lucky to say I have been using vista since it’s release and I have experienced ZERO problems. I know it sounds unbelievable but it’s true. I build a brand new computer JUST for vista and it’s been running like a dream. as for OS X, it rocks as well. I’m currently trying to see if I can install OS X on PC hardware from some hack OS X article. Both serve their purpose, the way I see it they are tools. My Vista machine gets used for Pc Gaming, and Mac for doing my work. Saying one is better than the other is just another way to conform with some sort of ideology that best suits you but neither one is better than the idea.

Take this idea for example and see how bickering back and forth is really silly sometimes. There are some screws that have the slots in it for Flat & Phillips Head screw drivers. Imagine how stupid it would look watching to 2 guys in the Home Depot arguing which is better to use to screw it in, when it doesn’t really matter. Now in a world where there you can do most things interchangeably between Mac and PC; it comes to a matter preference really. Each serve their purpose.

i think that vista is the most annoying operating system iv ever used, im only hoping that mac os x is as good as people are making it out to be. but either way iv still got a xp pc, and ill be putting it on my macbook.

I have never had an driver chasing issues with printers on MAC or lost any features of the printing software…maye you just bought a crappy printer. I have been using windows since 3.1 and after using Vista for several months I made the switch to a MAC book Pro and the OS X 1-.5 Loepard. I have never used a more reliable, stable, and smoothly running OS. For me this is a switch I should have made around the time windows 98 was going to launch.

I always find these apple vs windows debates interesting. Let me get somethings off my chest. I think that a lot of windows user are suspicious of apple because it means that they might get locked into having less choices. I also think that people like Tony assume that an OS can’t be both smart and attractive at the same time. Some people look at OS X and think well it just looks fancy, but what can it do. The truth is that most major software packages and particularly the good and well developed ones are available for OS X. On the PC you have more choice as far as software goes but usually there is a clear leader in terms of quality which is usually available on both platforms. In fact in my opinion apples only problem is that it isn’t number one already. If it was everyone would write software for it. If that was the case there would be no competition at all. I also think that Tony was being condescending when he said that Mac users aren’t very bright. I switched to OS X because I didn’t like having to tweak my OS all the time just to get it to work. By this I mean defragmentation, running spybot, anti-virus, turning of programs running in the background which turn themselves on automatically, bloatware, having the OS get slower for no good reason, mysterious errors that come and go, you get the idea. I’ve been using OS X for 4 years now and haven’t had to do any of these things. Non whatsoever. I’m not dumb, I just want to be able to live with my computer without having to do so much maintenance and you shouldn’t have to be a expert user to get things done. Personally I think that apple should release OS X for PCs and partner with all the major hardware and peripheral manufacturers to deal with compatibility issues. That way you could build our own PC and install OS X. That my friends would be the best of both worlds.

Kami84,

Application- wise, yes both are pretty much equal. As far as malware goes, you can’t fault Microsoft for that. It’s the retards that create that garbage that are to blame. It also has a lot to do with ones web surfing habits and how their system is configured (browser settings, etc.). I manage 56 Windows XP systems in a very mission critical web hosting environment, and we never have any problems. As for bloatware, it only comes from OEMs like Dell, and HP, etc, and can easily be uninstalled. I build my on systems, so I never run into theses issues. If Apple released it’s OS in the same fashion as Microsoft (Which will never happen as long as Jobs is alive), you will be back to square one again. You could almost guarantee a plethora of malware of all sorts plaguing the OS, not to mention the rampant piracy that would ensue. Hackers have already managed to get OS X to run on PCs now that Apple switched to Intel. It’s only a matter of time before some sort of activation scheme will be implemented. Also, Apple would get eaten alive because it would never be able to compete in the same arena as Microsoft. Pray that it stays a niche product for as long as possible. If MS saw Apple as a threat… well the phrase hostile takeover comes to mind…

A friend/manager of mine last week said he doesn’t hate linux.. he hates the newsgroups.. Thinking about that I can see the point.

I’ve been in this business writing code for CP/M, Mac, Windows (all of them), Linux, OS-X, Solaris, BSD.. I even did one program for a VAX and one for an HPUX. Every one of those systems had some incredible strenths.. and some areas that kinda suck. Threads are great on Windows.. but Processes suck.. Processes are great on *NIX, but IPC is “not so much”. I’ve always loved writing GUI on Mac.. much easier, and much quicker (both to develop and to execute). DOS and CP/M were great.. couldn’t do anything so you couldn’t mess it up :)

The main thing I learned through these 25 years of cutting code and managing projects… It isn’t about _ME_.. it is about the user.. and what the user wants to do.

Personally, I prefer Linux.. my Wife prefers XP. And I just bought my son and daughter MacBooks for School. Geeks care about the hardware and Kernels, and Threading, and Fibers. User care about features and functionality.

Most people do not buy a toaster because of the type of element.. or a refrigerator because of coils and cabinet insulation. Those are important.. but they are more important to a refrigerator repair man than the user.

The people who frequent these blogs and threads get excited about the ‘Geek’ related issues in hardware (and software) which are important, but they are important mostly to us, the geeks.

As painful as it may be for any of us to recognize.. in ALL cases.. the market has decided what people will pay for. And the market will continue to make that decision. I will continue to use Linux.. Mac will continue to grow.. Windows will adopt more Mac or Linux features.. Linux will adopt some more usability from Mac or Windows.. and with that usability will come a price tag, which will irritate many a Linux biggot. We will all continue to learn, grow, and adapt to …(ta-da).. our users… or we will cease to exist.

As fun as the ‘flame wars’ are.. they serve neither to strengthen our platforms of choice, nor to diminish the religious bigotry of those who dislike the OS we like.

In the words of Tiny Tim… ‘God bless us, every one!’

MAC? Use a real computer please.

God damn these debates are stupid.