PC vs. MAC

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All wooden chairs are made of the same components too - but some are better made than others. There's a lot more that goes into a computer than just the components - build quality, QC, smart design, etc. All contribute to the overall longevity of the product. And, anecdotally, I have had the same experience Max000 has - my Macs have consistently lasted much longer than non-mac systems. And I've had plenty of both throughout the years.



Actually, they do - they just mask the button by including it into the cutout for the drive itself. Pretty smart design, eh?

More because Macs hold their value longer.

That's right I bought my machine as XP and upgraded to Vista when Vista came out because I had to have the latest and greatest For many consumers the UAC was very annoying and there were a lot of hardware compatibility issues in the original version of Vista. These issues were fixed and the later service packs of Vista are fine but permanent damage had been done to Vista's reputation because most consumers are NT's and with most NT's first impression is the permanent impression. When WIN 7 came out I was broke enough so buying the latest and greatest when my machine was fine seemed stupid.

All of the above is a distraction from the real issue that you have not provided any evidence other then personal experience that Apple machines are longer lasting. Even if Mac hardware is better it is how often, how hard, how smartly the individual user uses their PC's (Mac's are PC's) that determines longevity.

They hold their value longer, because they last longer. Nobody in their right mind would buy a used PC. Because it is crap by that time. I have had several people give me a couple of old Dell laptops, There was nothing I could do to fix them. Even with the help if PC fanboy friends, I couldn't get them running decently. Give me an old Mac thats not working, and I'll get it running again.

Thanks for the Access answer!

Regarding Apple vs PC - I don't consider myself an apple fanboy er girl, by any means, don't have an iPhone. Don't just automatically buy everything Apple, but individually every time I have bought something Apple it has lasted longer and better and been built stronger. iPods, my poor iPad which I throw around in a backpack mercilessly. That really is why i was willing to spend so much on an Air that I can't right now even put all my programs on. They are quality machines.

My absolute preference is WindowMaker. It is pretty light-weight and is available on a wide range of Linux and Unix operating systems.

I have two laptops. The newer dates to 2005. The older is considerably older than that.

For my desktops, my primary development computer is an IBM PC that I bought in an online auction that featured PCs that were no longer in their main product lines. That was in 1999 or 2000 and still runs beautifully.

I recently retired one 125 MHz computer that was built in the early 1990s, not sure what year. . It was being used as a firewall and still runs fine, but it could no longer keep up with the required load.

At work, most of the people here use Macs. We have had a number of Macs that quit and some were not very old.

I personally prefer Macs. I always used Windows before and they always broke. My mother now has a Win 8 laptop, and it is frustrating to use. I was a newbie hacker with Vista, but these new systems are intolerable and if I'm not going to hack, I'd rather not have a machine that seems to open up programs by itself just by clicking the mouse the wrong way.

I find Mac OS more visibly pleasing to work in--something that has held true through many iterations, overhauls and complete replacements of the OS. In some applications (like photo retouching) there is no comparison--the Mac is completely superior- the rendition of color and tonality on Macs is that much better than on Windows machines. When I am working ink curves to set up duotones or tritones, for example, the display on the windows machine always looks a bit wrong, so I have to rely on my experience and knowledge of what values the curves should have to get the effect I want. Then I can open the file on a mac and see what I was expecting.

There are many cases in which I want to work with a piece of windows software--and the mac makes a great (if expensive) windows machine. I also like using text editors to write. Having Bash available opens all sorts of possibilities. For reasons I can't quite explain, there are certain things I do in VIM, certain things I do in EMACS (Org mode is part of this) and certain things I do in text wrangler or sublime text. Macs with bootcamp or VMs running the other OS's are the most versatile, useful machines. Other factors (like budget) may come into play and there may be other reasons to get another machine (maybe something specialized like a Raspberry Pi or Chromebook for education)

If I need to get a general machine, it will be a Mac.

Out of how many? What was wrong with them? I didn't say Macs were perfect. If you have a lab with a hundred brand new Macs, of course a certain percentage are going to have problems. Thats what warranties are for. But from my experience, if a Mac gets past the warrantee period, chances are it will be totally obsolete before it breaks down. A PC will most likely break down long before it becomes obsolete.

It's a small company. Out of seven employees, five use Macs. The now deceased former president of the company also used a Mac.

In spite of the fact that most people here use Macs, we have more PCs with Linux and OpenBSD.

With the exception of one old, still working PC that I took out of production a couple of weeks ago because the load had increased too much for what it was doing, the last time I had to throw a PC away was about ten years ago and it could hardly be considered new. And the one I took out of production will likely be running again for a different use within a week or two. On the other hand, we do have at least a couple of Mac desktops physically in the building that are no longer working as well as three Mac laptops (someone asked me about them just a couple of hours ago) that are no longer working, all newer than the newest PC in the office.

So don't tell me this crap about how Macs will last forever. They are well made computers, but so are a number of PC brands if you are careful to buy good equipment.

I know this is an old thread but here goes:

That could be because the Macs you have at work are off a lesser quality than Max's G5. Anyway that was made before Macs started using Intel so there's no longer as much difference between the two.



I've seen people using very old PCs that worked fine. And anyway Macs don't last forever. My grandfather bought a Mac in 1986 and it broke down in 2006 whereas my Pong machine is nearly 40 years old and it still works.

The same tired arguments of Mac vs PC have been repeated ad nauseum but for me it's the little things. It's not which one is more powerful, which one has more games or which one is more expensive. It's just all the little details in OSX that make me think Apple have no idea about ergonomics. It always takes more clicks to do the same thing in OSX compared to Windows 7.

I think it all comes down to design. Take for example the design of the Mighty Mouse. I have to use one at work. I waste time by using the scroll bars on everything because the scroll ball is clogged up to the point where the rubbing it on paper trick no longer works and back when it did work it only solved the problem for five minutes. How did something like this ever make it through product testing? If I could just remove the ball I could take the gunk out of it but it's hermetically sealed.

They dumb down their computers to make them easier to use but they're not easier to disassemble. When a guy has a broken screen on his Macbook and he take it to the "genius bar". He gets it back and the "genius" tells him in order to fix it they had to erase the hard drive. Really they just tossed it and gave him a new one. Apple make disposable computers.

That could be because the Macs you have at work are off a lesser quality than Max's G5.

We have at least one G5. I don't think it's used much any more.

For me it's more like Windows vs Ubuntu Linux. I use both. Now I am completely on Linux and I am happy with it. I had some problems with configuring WiFi connection specific to my PC.
But speed way better then Windows. I use Virtual Box, it's free and even better with performance then VM Ware.

It's also nice to use trial programs, I have template with Windows. When trial expires I just clone VM and install program again. Each program works on it's own VM. It's also better for security.

Windows was too distructive... I probably a compulsive gamer I just stick with some activity... I think like for 5-10 mins but it may take hours or even several days without sleep. So with Linux it's programming and work... Which is better then time wasting on games.

With Linux it's way esier to install and configure development environments then with MacOSX IMHO... But anyway you may use VM with Mac... So it's just a personal choice...

I leave in Ukraine and here Apple doesn't have good customer support and 2 times expensive then US. So using PC just money saving and easier.

And of course it didn't occur to you that it's illegal to do that, and posting about it on a public forum is probably idiotic.



Not really, no.



Can't argue there.



Not really. Honestly, it's about the same, depending on what development environment you're talking about you either install Xcode (or gcc utils on linux), you install netbeans/Eclipse/<insert java IDE here>, or you install apache (or just enable it on OS X).