Why buy a Mac over a better spec PC? Advice on purchase needed

Gazamonk said:
No doubt you can and I'm sure it works for you, i think the biggest one for me is no right click menu which is such a boon in windows.
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There is a secondary click menu, which fills exactly the same job as a right mouse click under windows, and funnily enough is activated with a right click
 
Gazamonk said:
TSR programs
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Maybe in 1990. Terminate and Stay Resident was the name a specific int 21 interface into MS-DOS (from v2.0 I think, I don't have my reference here any more to check).

mov ax,3100h
int 21h

The int 21h interface last did anything useful in Windows Me (and Microsoft tried to hide it as much as possible in that one), the NT kernel kind of implemented it as a compatibility layer but it wasn't useful to achieve anthing. From Windows 3.1 onwards your TSRs weren't guaranteed to get the interrupts that they thought they were servicing as in extended mode the interrupt could be handled from the IDT before the IVT in v86 mode that the TSR hooks even got to see it.

So, I don't think Packard Bell et all install TSRs on any computer that they sell.
 
I haven't seen Terminate and stay resident for a LONG time. :D

Marc - does anyone actually use an Apple Mouse? ;)
 
purpleclouds said:
Yes, I get that.. and no, it doesn't have a hybrid system. A quick Google suggests SSD write speeds are unto 4-5x faster. That doesn't account for the 10x longer it took to do a basic install.
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I'm not going to even scratch the itch that is coming to me on the Macs vs PCs debate ;) but...

The reason SSDs appear way faster is because their access times are incredibly low when compared to HDDs. In fact, they are of the order of 100x or quicker at accessing different file locations When you are installing, you will be doing 100's of file creations which involve lots of seeking.... SSDs will feel hugely faster on installs, even if the write benchmarks would make there appear to be little difference.
 
Lol, excuse my old fashioned terminology, when i spoke of TSRs I was referring (with as pointed out, the wrong terminology :eek:) about all the garbage that runs in the background on some OEM laptops and desktops from the likes of Dell, Asus, HP etc. which in many cases increases the startup times to ridiculous levels. Not to mention the obligatory pre installed trial versions of stuff you dont want.

As for the right click, I was using a macbook with the touchpad. I knew about that menu and wasn't suggesting it didn't exist but I just don't think it is as good as the windows menu and Im not keen on the ipad like finger gestures and much prefer a tactile click. Interesting info about the non apple mouse though.
 
Gazamonk said:
Lol, excuse my old fashioned terminology, when i spoke of TSRs I was referring (with as pointed out, the wrong terminology :eek:) about all the garbage that runs in the background on some OEM laptops and desktops from the likes of Dell, Asus, HP etc. which in many cases increases the startup times to ridiculous levels. Not to mention the obligatory pre installed trial versions of stuff you dont want.

As for the right click, I was using a macbook with the touchpad. I knew about that menu and wasn't suggesting it didn't exist but I just don't think it is as good as the windows menu and Im not keen on the ipad like finger gestures and much prefer a tactile click. Interesting info about the non apple mouse though.
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I know what you meant by TSR - all computers (including Macs) have programs that don't release memory after closure and run in the background, and if you want best performance then working from a fresh boot is the only way.

And trackpads - they can be set up to offer a right click too, and function as an acceptable mouse replacement. Possibly the very best feature of a Macbook is the trackpad, and although the default settings in OSX are poor, with adjustment it can work very well indeed.
 
I buy macs so I don't have to use that ghastly bloated operating system that M$ produce.

Sure I can get get faster hardware for the money, but for me it's about the overall experience. Ever since switching to Mac I've never had to worry about device drivers, device conflicts, rebooting every time I install a small update or some new software, my mac updates now and then whereas my old windows PC updates almost once a day.

Let's face it M$ take one step forward and two steps back. They've been doing that since windows 98

Win 95 - step forwards
Win 98 - step forwards
Win ME -two steps back
Win 2000 - step forwards
Win XP - step forwards
Win Vista - three steps back
Win 7 - step forwards
Win 8 - three steps back
 
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ancient_mariner said:
I know what you meant by TSR - all computers (including Macs) have programs that don't release memory after closure and run in the background, and if you want best performance then working from a fresh boot is the only way.
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Thanks Toni for a less pedantic answer, :agree: And before anyone says it, he means boot from a fresh install........but you all knew that. Right? :coat:
 
ecoleman said:
I buy macs so I don't have to use that ghastly bloated operating system that M$ produce.

Sure I can get get faster hardware for the money, but for me it's about the overall experience. Ever since switching to Mac I've never had to worry about device drivers, device conflicts, rebooting every time I install a small update or some new software, my mac updates now and then whereas my old windows PC updates almost once a day.

Let's face it M$ take one step forward and two steps back. They've been doing that since windows 98

Win 95 - step forwards
Win 98 - step forwards
Win ME -two steps back
Win 2000 - step forwards
Win XP - step forwards
Win Vista - three steps back
Win 7 - step forwards
Win 8 - three steps back
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Totally agree with the one step forward and two steps back scenario, however as problematic as some hardware and drivers can be, the large majority work without issue and its the sheer variety, diversity and clever creative innovation that is available from 3rd party developers and manufacturers on a , to all intents and purposes, open source system.
 
Gazamonk said:
Thanks Toni for a less pedantic answer, :agree: And before anyone says it, he means boot from a fresh install........but you all knew that. Right? :coat:
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Actually I meant a freshly started machine. For example, Firefox would leave around 600-800Mb of data in memory after closing the program on my Macbook. When editing images, performance was better when the only thing ever opened after starting was Lightroom, than if I'd used another program, closed it and then started editing.

But yes, if you have a lot of junk slowing the machine then a fresh install (minus junk) is going to make a huge difference
 
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Having actually got a Windows 8 laptop recently, it is not three steps back but sort of sideways.
Underneath the dumbed down start page (which is actually kind of useful when you realise it is more or less the old start menu) most things are much the same as Windows 7 - except it boots from fully off to a usable state in less than 10 seconds.
You can soon set it to boot up and look practically the same as W7.
 
I tried to be impartial as possible with last post.
Mac Os is Unix based and to be short everything else is an application, Windows has registry and is dos based, it will slow up. In the years I have had my iMac it has never slowed up or crashed I have up graded it a couple times at little cost last one free. In the end it up to you and what suits you
 
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ancient_mariner said:
Actually I meant a freshly started machine. For example, Firefox would leave around 600-800Mb of data in memory after closing the program on my Macbook. When editing images, performance was better when the only thing ever opened after starting was Lightroom, than if I'd used another program, closed it and then started editing.

But yes, if you have a lot of junk slowing the machine then a fresh install (minus junk) is going to make a huge difference
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It really is unbelivable the stuff these companies ship (laptops in particular) there PCs with. It doesnt show off there product at its best. I dont know if ot still is but it used to be almost impossible to buy one that didnt have MacAfee AV and nearly everything that Norton ever sold pre installed. :mad:
 
Don't forget mac resale values are silly. They may cost more to buy in the first place, but you'll get a hell of a lot more back on resale than a windows laptop.
I recently sold my 2011 macbook pro for £800. An equivalent windows laptop wouldn't have got near that.

And yes I also have windows laptops and a huge spec windows pc alongside my new Macbook pro retina, so Im not an Apple Fanboi.
 
ajax_andy said:
Pretty much any of the higher priced laptops kill the MBP for specs in terms of RAM, storage etc and are much cheaper. I'm talking 15" not 13" versions btw.
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So I've used this time a chilblast photo OC and specced it up as good as I can the same, still doesn't have retina, nor light weight, nor battery life, nor thunderbolt connectors, nor pcie flash etc...but include a second hard drive...And comes to £2173.....Ok a tiny bit cheaper but not much at all...
 
ecoleman said:
I buy macs so I don't have to use that ghastly bloated operating system that M$ produce.

Sure I can get get faster hardware for the money, but for me it's about the overall experience. Ever since switching to Mac I've never had to worry about device drivers, device conflicts, rebooting every time I install a small update or some new software, my mac updates now and then whereas my old windows PC updates almost once a day.

Let's face it M$ take one step forward and two steps back. They've been doing that since windows 98

Win 95 - step forwards
Win 98 - step forwards
Win ME -two steps back
Win 2000 - step forwards
Win XP - step forwards
Win Vista - three steps back
Win 7 - step forwards
Win 8 - three steps back
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Sorry but this post is so full of rubbish I don't know where to start.

Bloat? Eh? If you mean slowdowns as a result of installing tonnes of junk over time? Yeah osx does that too.

Drivers? Really? Let's discuss the incredibly poor choice of reliable printer drivers out there for OSX..

Updates every day? Not sure what you were doing but ms release updates every other Tuesday. And apple updates still need restarts the same as windows when affecting core files.

There haven't been any step backs since ME. Vista was poorly supported by hardware vendors from day 1, that's what gave it a bad name. The x64 version was actually just as bombproof as xp (more so than xp x64). W8 is just misunderstood because people dislike change. I actually look forward to when apple change their platform beyond adding a "dark mode".. Then we'll see who gets the most abuse. But then I guess mac fanboys will proclaim it a visual delight no matter what it looks like.

:D
 
neil_g said:
Sorry but this post is so full of rubbish I don't know where to start.

Bloat? Eh? If you mean slowdowns as a result of installing tonnes of junk over time? Yeah osx does that too.

Drivers? Really? Let's discuss the incredibly poor choice of reliable printer drivers out there for OSX..

Updates every day? Not sure what you were doing but ms release updates every other Tuesday. And apple updates still need restarts the same as windows when affecting core files.

There haven't been any step backs since ME. Vista was poorly supported by hardware vendors from day 1, that's what gave it a bad name. The x64 version was actually just as bombproof as xp (more so than xp x64). W8 is just misunderstood because people dislike change. I actually look forward to when apple change their platform beyond adding a "dark mode".. Then we'll see who gets the most abuse. But then I guess mac fanboys will proclaim it a visual delight no matter what it looks like.

:D
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Looks like there's only one fanboy here. But that's your opinion and you are entitled to it, as am I :)
 
I do not get on with Apple OS and only use it when I have to. I believe custom built PC will far outperform any Mac given a specific budget. Having said that I am very tempted to buy a new MacPro purely because of its size. I would still use Windows with it though.
 
neil_g said:
I actually look forward to when apple change their platform beyond adding a "dark mode".. Then we'll see who gets the most abuse. But then I guess mac fanboys will proclaim it a visual delight no matter what it looks like.

:D
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It will be a very cold day in hell when that happens. When OSX becomes one with iOS that is. I hope Lightroom and couple other bits will run on Linux by then
 
tommmy.star said:
I do not get on with Apple OS and only use it when I have to. I believe custom built PC will far outperform any Mac given a specific budget. Having said that I am very tempted to buy a new MacPro purely because of its size. I would still use Windows with it though.
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just like you can sleep in the tent in your bedroom :)
 
wave01 said:
Windows has registry and is dos based
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No it isn't. Windows is based on NT, not DOS. NT was a new OS (back when people wrote new OS's) and was originally written by a group hired from Digital who had written VMS. Yes, it has a DOS shell (which is pants if you want to do anything at the command line by the way), but it isn't DOS based - it is a true multi process OS which has the same sorts of elements as Unix (and many other modern OS's). It is interrupt driven, supports reentrancy and has user & kernel separation as well as support for multiple processors at the same time (SMP). Also, it isn't the registry that slows Windows, it is bloat/crudware that people install and then don't uninstall at some point. OK, a lot of manufacturers install bloatware as standard, but you can normally just uninstall these.

wave01 said:
In the years I have had my iMac it has never slowed up or crashed
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Ahh, you have the same experience as I do with my Windows PCs. The machine I'm on now is on 24/7, used daily and currently been up for 3 weeks - the last reboot was probably a system update and I think my works PC was last rebooted around 2 months ago when a system update was rolled out by the IT department. The laptops we have are the same. They get used daily but only get rebooted when updates are installed. Windows has never needed reinstalling (the main laptop hasn't had a reinstall since it was new in 2011, my current PC hasn't been reinstalled since it was built in Jan 2011 and has been on 24/7 since then) and they are as quick as they were on day 1 (well, the laptop is quicker as I upgraded the disk to an SSD a couple of years ago).

wave01 said:
In the end it up to you and what suits you
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Yes, this is very true, but it's always better to state that after extolling the virtues of all the competing systems rather than sewing a good bit of FUD on the competition first ;)
 
There is nothing practically different between OSX and Windows. Nothing different that matters to anyone but tedious fanboy loud mouths from all sides of their dogmatic battleground.

Modern OS and hardware has got to the commodity stage, the OS is just a launcher for your apps. The hardware is so far ahead of 99% of use cases these days it doesn't even matter if the OEM puts a ton of background apps on.

Macs are pretty good value if you want the portability and finish standard Apple provide. Equivalent form factor Macbook Air\Pro kit from PC OEMs usually ends up costing more.
 
neil_g said:
There haven't been any step backs since ME. Vista was poorly supported by hardware vendors from day 1, that's what gave it a bad name. The x64 version was actually just as bombproof as xp (more so than xp x64).
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The other problem with Vista was the number of mouse clicks UAC required when something had to run elevated. It did not make for a good user experience and defeated the point of UAC as people just blindly clicked through without reading / thinking . W7 rationalised it and made for IMO a much more useable OS.

The big change in Vista for me was making drivers run at ring 3 rather than ring 0 so they theoretically couldn't bring the OS down, trouble was this implementation and support as you say, which actually led to more BSODs.
 
neil_g said:
no. facts count.

my opinion has very little baring on incorrect "facts" being quoted.
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To be fair and balanced ;) Your facts are based on your experiences within your work environment. I can fully understand why your opinion based on your daily experiences may seem like fact to you....I'm confident you realise the world is a much bigger place than that, and many more experiences exist...

I'm not disagreeing that it isn't possible to have a stable windows build and some organisations and individuals are very good at it. Unfortunately all too often it can also be fully screwed up for all sorts of 'good' reasons, nevertheless screwed up...

For someone who keeps on stating he wants to bring some balance I think it is actually rather one sided, single instance view.....But hey we all have our own experiences, lets just not pretend that one is better than the other and fact ;)
 
dejongj said:
To be fair and balanced ;) Your facts are based on your experiences within your work environment. I can fully understand why your opinion based on your daily experiences may seem like fact to you....I'm confident you realise the world is a much bigger place than that, and many more experiences exist...
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im not sure what your point is. i think you're saying working with around 200 users daily on both platforms isnt relevent?

I'm not disagreeing that it isn't possible to have a stable windows build and some organisations and individuals are very good at it. Unfortunately all too often it can also be fully screwed up for all sorts of 'good' reasons, nevertheless screwed up...
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and the same can be said for macs. a good example is that here neither platform users have (local) admin access on their machines to stop them filling them with crud. we've had to rebuild many a system on both platforms over the years for this reason.

For someone who keeps on stating he wants to bring some balance I think it is actually rather one sided, single instance view.....But hey we all have our own experiences, lets just not pretend that one is better than the other and fact ;)
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and you'll see i started very neutral, only shifting to defending one platform when a load of "facts" were stated :)

ive said several (hundred) times on here, use whatever feels the most comfortable. im not going to dictate to someone what platform to use. i just take exception to people claiming a mistruth is fact.

but apparently that makes you an over opinionated fanboy.
 
:popcorn: Who would have guessed where this would have ended. Having just purchased a new iMac I thought I'd put my bit in. Firstly this is my first dip into Apple computers, although I have an iPad and until recently an iPhone. I am by no means an Apple Fanboi (just switched to Android). My decision came down to wanting something that would do what I want for as long as possible, and every experience I have had with PC's and laptop has been that after a couple of years they become slow and even after reformat, they never seem particularly stable. Over the years I have spoken to numerous people with older Macs that still work as they used to. Somebody did give me a technical reason but it went over my head.

After speccing up numerous PC's to similar specs to my iMac, I found that there was only a couple of hundred quid in it, coupled with the reliability reports I went for the more expensive option with the belief it will last longer. Whether it will only time will tell. BTW I'm loving the simplicity of use.

In a nutshell only you will decide whether it is worth it. Everybody will have there own opinion, but it's your money. The Mac v PC debate will run forever with no ultimate outcome, just as will the Canikon and Raw v JPEG :D
 
neil_g said:
i just take exception to people claiming a mistruth is fact.
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That tends to be the only time I weigh in on these threads these days too...

neil_g said:
but apparently that makes you an over opinionated fanboy.
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Ahh... you're forgetting that the very people who claim to be all for choice and equality for everyone tend to be those who get most upset when they come across people whose views don't match their own..... ;)
 
arad85 said:
That tends to be the only time I weigh in on these threads these days too...

Ahh... you're forgetting that the very people who claim to be all for choice and equality for everyone tend to be those who get most upset when they come across people whose views don't match their own..... ;)
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i like to think i take the moral high ground these days and only fire once fired upon :D
 
neil_g said:
im not sure what your point is. i think you're saying working with around 200 users daily on both platforms isnt relevant?
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Of it provides you with some experience, however that is experience in one place where things get done in a certain way. Surely you agree that that doesn't have to be representative for how things like machine builds, users act, consumer experiences etc happen elsewhere.

neil_g said:
and the same can be said for macs. a good example is that here neither platform users have (local) admin access on their machines to stop them filling them with crud. we've had to rebuild many a system on both platforms over the years for this reason.
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Of course it can happen with Macs as well. Especially pre-OSX days, I think the changes made over the years have improved it considerably...but absolutely they'll gather extensions, launch agents, deamons, corrupt plists you name it...And they also have hardware failure just like any other computer...

neil_g said:
and you'll see i started very neutral, only shifting to defending one platform when a load of "facts" were stated :)
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Agreed, lets just not forget that a consumer perspective and experience can be rather different than as a corporate user. I also think it can be hard to 'compete' at the higher price levels for PC manufacturers...However before I fully switched I really did like my high end Sony laptop, their factory build was rather good. Also before the Dell take-over, Alienware did everything they could and out of the box you had a great working system....Heck even today some of the workstations from HP and Lenovo for laptop and desktops are very good and stable as well. But unfortunately ordinary people don't seem to be willing to spend the same level of money to get truly comparable like for like quality.

neil_g said:
ive said several (hundred) times on here, use whatever feels the most comfortable. im not going to dictate to someone what platform to use. i just take exception to people claiming a mistruth is fact.

but apparently that makes you an over opinionated fanboy.
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Unfortunately I guess the passion took it slightly too far the other side, hence it came across like that....Anyway who cares...You are absolutely right, it is all about what people are comfortable with, and what matters most to them....

Both systems can be very good and do anything people want it to do....If at the time I was fed up with Windows and switched Windows 7 or 8 were out, things could be very different for me as a personal user....But I'm happy with the OS X way, and fully integrated with other iOS devices etc.....I've got VMWare for anything else :)
 
In the PC world, I think its personal preference and budget.

In the mobile world I think its different.

Ive been looking for a photo editing laptop and im finding it hard not to go for a Macbook retina because of the lack of decent panels on windows laptops.

Unless im doing something wrong, there doesnt seem to be much in the market to compete with it?
 
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depends if you like working on a mirror (personal opinion)

edit: in the interest of balance before i get hounded again.. i hate ALL glossy screens and i love the macbook touchpad.

:D
 
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neil_g said:
depends if you like working on a mirror (personal opinion)
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Actually I think it depends on whether you can find anything to match it.

I know there are some new contenders coming out (zenbook, new xps 15 etc) however they are brand new and still command silly money. Plus they dont touch the mbp for battery life.

In my budget (under 1k) im looking 2nd hand and there I cant see many other options. (Would love to be shown some decent alternatives though)
 
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