Why Mac OS is better than Windows XP
I know this is still a volatile subject, even though it's more obvious now than ever. Microsoft has given us their best attempt at a professional operating system in Windows XP Professional. I use it every day; I know it well.
On the other hand, Apple has done their best with Mac OS X 10.4. I'm not even using it yet; I'm still on 10.3. I am probably going to upgrade this weekend, but for now, here we are, not even with the current version of the product.
I think if I just do a list of some specific factors, it will paint the picture that I see when I sit down at one computer vs the other. I don't want to give a lot of commentary on the subject, just the subject.
1. The price. Windows XP costs a lot. It's $299 to buy it, if it didn't come on your computer. Why? Because Mr. Gates and his gang really, REALLY, like to make a lot of money. Who doesn't! I mean, I do too! Or I would, I should say. I would like to make lots of money. But you guys who buy these products are giving it to him, I don't know if you realize that. For comparison sake, Mac OS X costs $129. That's for a full version! Hell, if you have a few computers at home, you can buy the family pack for $199, which lets you legally install it on 5 computers (if you're all the same family in the same household). That's just a really big difference in price, and it's part of the leverage that Microsoft uses to get the hardware vendors to sell their hardware with Microsoft's operating system pre-installed (instead of, say, Linux); if it costs so much to install a new version of the OS onto a consumer's existing hardware, why bother? Why not just buy a new computer that already has the newest? That's one reason why it's not uncommon to find old-ish Macs out there running Panther or Tiger. It's all about the economics of the situation.
2. Windows XP allows no satisfactory user control over what is to be the foreground and what is to be the background application. For example, I have a scanner attached to my computer. The scanner has a sheet feeder, and I often scan multi-page documents. When it finishes the stack, it pops a window up on the screen to ask me if I want to scan more, or if not, to name the file (if I'm scanning to pdf). Now, let's say that while it was busy scanning, I was busy doing something else. I'm creating a Word document. I'm busy typing, possibly reading text from some other source, and didn't see the window pop up. When I look back to the screen, ughhh, I see that I've been typing into the name field of this document I've just scanned. I have to stop everything I'm doing, delete what I had typed into that field, correct the name, save it, let it finish its post-processing, and then can finally go back to my document. This is just one example. The difference here is that in Windows, if a background process needs attention, Windows makes it the foreground application without any notice. It just happens. In Mac OS X, the OS instead notifies the user (by means of a bouncing icon in the dock or other form of alert) that there is a background process that needs attention, but it doesn't make it the foreground app. It leaves this control with the user, where it belongs.
3. At work, speaking of pdf's, people are always asking me if I can create a pdf for them. We only have a few people with the full version of Acrobat, and so I, being one of them, often have to respond to this. I'm so unaccustomed to this being an issue, because the Mac OS has had the ~native~ capability to produce pdf's for 3-4 years now. It's amazing to me that people don't demand from Microsoft what they would get for free from Apple.
4. If I have a computer that was originally set up with, say, Windows XP Home, maybe one that someone bought themselves and then brought in to the office, I know how to get them connected to the various network devices that they'll typically need. It's a little awkward, but since they can't join a domain with the Home edition, you have to work it out a different way. If we decide however to put them on the Pro version, and make them part of the domain, what do we have to do? We have to transfer all of their data, their email, their web bookmarks, all of their data files, to a new domain-based user ID. It's not a simple matter of connecting to new external resources and continuing to have access to the old local resources. It's as if we're creating an entirely new user. It is such an unrewarding process to go through, that I am loath to do it. I would rather make the user suffer continually until we replace computers than to do this. Something always will go wrong, will always be missing, will be different from what it was before. It is just not worth it.
5. Did I mention viruses? Spyware? Pop-ups? Other forms of malware requiring anti-virus, anti-spam, popup-blockers, firewalls, etc? Believe it or not (it's your choice to believe any of this, of course, but I tell you what I have experienced without any particular bias), you don't need to know about these things on the Mac OS. Yes, ok, you should know a little bit about file permissions (what the concept means), and particularly the wireless security issues (since someone unknown to you could be "tapping in" to your broadcast wireless connection. That's part of any shared computer environment. But in the Windows world, where Microsoft offers wide open doors for aliens to gain access to parts of your computer that you'd really rather they not have, and where the software vendors all seem to offer partial solutions requiring one vendor's piece to attempt to work symbiotically with another vendor's piece, but which seldom actually turns out that way, well, you're really hung out to dry even after spending a considerable amount of money to protect yourself. In the Mac world, I have operated most of my life without anti-virus software. And presently, the only reason I do have anti-virus software on my computer is because of the occasional macro-based virus, worm, Trojan horse, or whatever, that I could only have received via an infected Word document. And Word, of course, is another Microsoft program apparently designed for virus propogation. Question: have you ever coded or debugged or even used a macro in Word? Neither have I. Nor do I ever expect to.
I could go on, but I've already gone on longer than I'd have liked. I have much work to do. But all I want to say additionally is, don't get bogged down in things like the showroom cost of one vs the other. There are a lot of other pieces of the puzzle that add up to a delightful user experience or a marginally adequate one. When all the costs of extras like anti-virus software and firewalls and operating system upgrades and maybe even technical support time are added together, there is really little comparison. The Mac gives you more, makes it easier for you to do what you were going to do, makes it feel less like you're operating a piece of machinery, and more like you're using a natural extension of yourself.
6. Ok, one more thing, in parting. Every Mac application has a menu at the top. In that menu, there's always the application's named menu. For example, I'm in Safari right now, and at the top, the first menu is called "Safari." And in that first menu is always where you'll find the preferences, options, settings (as they are variously known in Windows applications), and they're always called preferences. Did you catch that? There's ALWAYS a set of menus at the top of the screen. And in the first menu, that's ALWAYS where you'll find the preferences for that application. There are other menus that are always there too; File, Edit, Help, etc. But on Windows applications, the standards are, well, there are no standards. There are so many applications that don't have menus at all, that instead rely on you taking the time to visually scan the work surface to find the icon that you're supposed to click on to do what you want to do. It would all be so much easier if there were the kind of consistency that would allow you to not have to guess or search for what you already know you want to do.
That capability is given to you by the Mac OS. Every computer. Every program.
If you want a real, professional, powerful, but still seductive and human-scale user experience when you're working with a computer, you owe it to yourself to use a Macintosh. Use it for at least 21 days continually, to get yourself really acclimated to it, and then sit back and ask yourself how your whole computer experience is... I'm betting you'll never go back.
On the other hand, Apple has done their best with Mac OS X 10.4. I'm not even using it yet; I'm still on 10.3. I am probably going to upgrade this weekend, but for now, here we are, not even with the current version of the product.
I think if I just do a list of some specific factors, it will paint the picture that I see when I sit down at one computer vs the other. I don't want to give a lot of commentary on the subject, just the subject.
1. The price. Windows XP costs a lot. It's $299 to buy it, if it didn't come on your computer. Why? Because Mr. Gates and his gang really, REALLY, like to make a lot of money. Who doesn't! I mean, I do too! Or I would, I should say. I would like to make lots of money. But you guys who buy these products are giving it to him, I don't know if you realize that. For comparison sake, Mac OS X costs $129. That's for a full version! Hell, if you have a few computers at home, you can buy the family pack for $199, which lets you legally install it on 5 computers (if you're all the same family in the same household). That's just a really big difference in price, and it's part of the leverage that Microsoft uses to get the hardware vendors to sell their hardware with Microsoft's operating system pre-installed (instead of, say, Linux); if it costs so much to install a new version of the OS onto a consumer's existing hardware, why bother? Why not just buy a new computer that already has the newest? That's one reason why it's not uncommon to find old-ish Macs out there running Panther or Tiger. It's all about the economics of the situation.
2. Windows XP allows no satisfactory user control over what is to be the foreground and what is to be the background application. For example, I have a scanner attached to my computer. The scanner has a sheet feeder, and I often scan multi-page documents. When it finishes the stack, it pops a window up on the screen to ask me if I want to scan more, or if not, to name the file (if I'm scanning to pdf). Now, let's say that while it was busy scanning, I was busy doing something else. I'm creating a Word document. I'm busy typing, possibly reading text from some other source, and didn't see the window pop up. When I look back to the screen, ughhh, I see that I've been typing into the name field of this document I've just scanned. I have to stop everything I'm doing, delete what I had typed into that field, correct the name, save it, let it finish its post-processing, and then can finally go back to my document. This is just one example. The difference here is that in Windows, if a background process needs attention, Windows makes it the foreground application without any notice. It just happens. In Mac OS X, the OS instead notifies the user (by means of a bouncing icon in the dock or other form of alert) that there is a background process that needs attention, but it doesn't make it the foreground app. It leaves this control with the user, where it belongs.
3. At work, speaking of pdf's, people are always asking me if I can create a pdf for them. We only have a few people with the full version of Acrobat, and so I, being one of them, often have to respond to this. I'm so unaccustomed to this being an issue, because the Mac OS has had the ~native~ capability to produce pdf's for 3-4 years now. It's amazing to me that people don't demand from Microsoft what they would get for free from Apple.
4. If I have a computer that was originally set up with, say, Windows XP Home, maybe one that someone bought themselves and then brought in to the office, I know how to get them connected to the various network devices that they'll typically need. It's a little awkward, but since they can't join a domain with the Home edition, you have to work it out a different way. If we decide however to put them on the Pro version, and make them part of the domain, what do we have to do? We have to transfer all of their data, their email, their web bookmarks, all of their data files, to a new domain-based user ID. It's not a simple matter of connecting to new external resources and continuing to have access to the old local resources. It's as if we're creating an entirely new user. It is such an unrewarding process to go through, that I am loath to do it. I would rather make the user suffer continually until we replace computers than to do this. Something always will go wrong, will always be missing, will be different from what it was before. It is just not worth it.
5. Did I mention viruses? Spyware? Pop-ups? Other forms of malware requiring anti-virus, anti-spam, popup-blockers, firewalls, etc? Believe it or not (it's your choice to believe any of this, of course, but I tell you what I have experienced without any particular bias), you don't need to know about these things on the Mac OS. Yes, ok, you should know a little bit about file permissions (what the concept means), and particularly the wireless security issues (since someone unknown to you could be "tapping in" to your broadcast wireless connection. That's part of any shared computer environment. But in the Windows world, where Microsoft offers wide open doors for aliens to gain access to parts of your computer that you'd really rather they not have, and where the software vendors all seem to offer partial solutions requiring one vendor's piece to attempt to work symbiotically with another vendor's piece, but which seldom actually turns out that way, well, you're really hung out to dry even after spending a considerable amount of money to protect yourself. In the Mac world, I have operated most of my life without anti-virus software. And presently, the only reason I do have anti-virus software on my computer is because of the occasional macro-based virus, worm, Trojan horse, or whatever, that I could only have received via an infected Word document. And Word, of course, is another Microsoft program apparently designed for virus propogation. Question: have you ever coded or debugged or even used a macro in Word? Neither have I. Nor do I ever expect to.
I could go on, but I've already gone on longer than I'd have liked. I have much work to do. But all I want to say additionally is, don't get bogged down in things like the showroom cost of one vs the other. There are a lot of other pieces of the puzzle that add up to a delightful user experience or a marginally adequate one. When all the costs of extras like anti-virus software and firewalls and operating system upgrades and maybe even technical support time are added together, there is really little comparison. The Mac gives you more, makes it easier for you to do what you were going to do, makes it feel less like you're operating a piece of machinery, and more like you're using a natural extension of yourself.
6. Ok, one more thing, in parting. Every Mac application has a menu at the top. In that menu, there's always the application's named menu. For example, I'm in Safari right now, and at the top, the first menu is called "Safari." And in that first menu is always where you'll find the preferences, options, settings (as they are variously known in Windows applications), and they're always called preferences. Did you catch that? There's ALWAYS a set of menus at the top of the screen. And in the first menu, that's ALWAYS where you'll find the preferences for that application. There are other menus that are always there too; File, Edit, Help, etc. But on Windows applications, the standards are, well, there are no standards. There are so many applications that don't have menus at all, that instead rely on you taking the time to visually scan the work surface to find the icon that you're supposed to click on to do what you want to do. It would all be so much easier if there were the kind of consistency that would allow you to not have to guess or search for what you already know you want to do.
That capability is given to you by the Mac OS. Every computer. Every program.
If you want a real, professional, powerful, but still seductive and human-scale user experience when you're working with a computer, you owe it to yourself to use a Macintosh. Use it for at least 21 days continually, to get yourself really acclimated to it, and then sit back and ask yourself how your whole computer experience is... I'm betting you'll never go back.
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