Mac vs. PC
Jan 09 '02 (Updated Feb 22 '02)
The Bottom Line While I use both I choose to use Mac
Why are there more shops selling pc parts? maybe that's where the money is, I know people that have had Macs for years and never had any part failures. As far as places to buy them, well I must be lucky there are 4 stores that sell Macs within 20 miles (one being an Apple Store, and the other an Apple only dealer). Now let's talk customer service, with a Mac you call Apple, with a pc you may have to make a few calls. I for one bought AppleCare®, if it does break they (Apple) will send someone right to my house to fix it, and it won't cost me a penny (pc's can't beat that). And tech support, well there again Macs rule Microsoft charges for tech support (even on new products) and with AppleCare®, you get 3 years of toll free no charge tech support (up from the 90 tech support)
Software, I haven't had any problem finding anything I want (there are some 50,000 software titles for Mac OS out there), and with OS X you can run Linux/Unix titles too, and even windows it the mood strikes you (again pc's can't beat that). Most Software vendors write titles fr the pc first due to market share, unless they're bound by contract, if it sells well they make a Mac version. Intersting note here, Microsoft writes versions for the Mac first (Exlporer, Office) then adds the features to the Windows version later (Don't ask me why they just do, and that's from someone in the Mac apps division at Microsoft)
Speed, well you can either measure that by mhz/ghz or a better measuring method thru put (I think that's measured in flops, instructions per second). Again Macs are capable of doing more per cycle than a pc, and there's less overhead in the OS. So while the pc may boast a faster mhz rating (and run quite a bit hotter) the Mac does the same task as fast or faster using less clock cycles.
Graphics, I have seen both, and right out of the box Macs have some really good graphics cards. You can get an nVidia Ge force 3 with 64 MB DDR RAM in it right from Apple. And with the ADC connector you have a 100% digital connection to your monitor, where 90% of the pc world is still using VGA, analog (the flat screen monitors are digital but the signal has to be converted).
Expandability, with the exception of the iMac, G4's are hands down the winner here. Mine has gigabit ethernet, 2 hard drives, 1 gigabyte of RAM, 11 mb wireless, a 56k modem, digital sound a Zip 250 drive, 2 firewire ports, 2 USB ( 2 more on keyboard, one has mouse plugged into it, and 2 more on monitor). Now with all that I still have 4 PCI slots for expansion, so in the future I won't have to remove one card to add something else. As for ease, well I haven't seen a pc that even compares to a Mac for ease of upgrading
Reliability, seems Apple spends more to build them and it shows in the quality and dependability of the machine
Price, well this is a tricky one. If you configure a pc to the same level as a Mac the price argument goes away quickly. I have seen a few pc's that are similarly but not exactly configured to a Mac and they are quite costly, and when configured as such they have little or no expandability left. Apple puts so much on the base system you don't need to fill up the PCI slots with common things (modems, ethernet cards. 802.11b adapters, sounds cards Firewire (Sony calls it iLink). Yes you can buy a cheap pc for less, or you can buy a top of the line pc for a similar price. But please don't compare a $400 pc to a $2400 Mac only on the basis of price, look at what you are getting for each. If you must compare then look at what the computer has and doesn't have. No sense buying a computer for cheap money then having to sink a ton of money into it just to use it. Another price point, while the "upgrade" to Windows xp only cost $99/$199 (home/Pro) the full installs are $199/$299 (again home/Pro) while a full install of Mac OS X is only $129. If you have more than one processor you have to buy xp Pro for either $199 (upgrade) or $299 (full install). Windows has been priced higher than Mac OS from day 1, and will always cost more, another thing to think about.
I am qualified to write this because i use both a Mac and a pc. I use the pc at work because I have to, but at home I use a Mac (G4 digital Audio) because I choose to. One point people seem to miss is that the desktop. On a Mac you can put what you want on it while there are icons you can't delete from a pc. Another point is that you can't remove programs that Microsoft, in it's infinite wisdom has decided you "can't live without" i.e. Explorer, Outlook (why do these programs "need" to be tied to the OS?). And if you don't use them why can't you delete them? And as for resources, why is windows xp 2.5 gigabytes?
Here's also something interesting. MediaPlayer 8 sends files to Microsoft. As reported on the AP wire, seems as though Microsoft tracks what you play in MediaPlayer 8. "If you don't want your wife to know what DVD's you've been watching, don't give her your password " (David Coulton lead program manager for Windows Media) "There's no easy way to clear this log, Microsoft said without crippling MediaPlayer. The only way to keep MediaPlayer from going to the Microsoft site is to make the player think you don't have an internet connection, which can be tedious if the user switches between watching DVDs and listening to Internet radio stations. As part of the downloading the information about songs and movies the program also transmits an identifier number unique to each user on the computer. That creates the possibility that user habits could be tracked and sold for marketing purposes" (From the AP wire). While they (Microsoft ) say that they aren't at this time selling that information, in the future they may. "If users tell us that they want the ability to get recommendations, that's something we could look into on behalf of the users" (Jonathan Usher Windows Media executive, also on the AP wire). Sounds to me that Microsoft is into profiling users, note Apple doesn't do this. Yet another reason to not use windows. If you don't mind, someone watching everything you do, and letting Microsoft have a higher level of control over your computer, than you do, then fine use windows. I for one will never buy anything that has windows installed on it.
I have no problem with people using one system or the other. I do hate when people say things like "Macs are not expandable" or "Macs are too expensive". Read this and decide for yourself. I did quite a bit of research before I wrote this. I expect there's some people that will condemn me for writing this but what I wrote is true and it is a free country after all.
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