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Editorial: Windows or OS X? | |
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| Time: 13:50 EST/18:50 GMT | News Source: E-Mail | Posted By: Robert Stein | ||
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"It’s been a while since we had a discussion about Windows & Mac users hasn’t it? Ok well I guess it hasn’t as every Mac or Windows news site under the sun seems to be running some sort of “Mine is better than yours” argument each day. I guess the question still remains, which one is best? Or is there even a “best OS” out there?" | ||
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| #1 By 2332 (65.221.182.2) at 5/8/2003 2:23:58 PM |
| I don't even know where to begin... so I'm not gonna bother. |
| #2 By 1868 (141.133.155.28) at 5/8/2003 3:06:34 PM |
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Its a damn near shame that Microsoft didn't put animated backgrounds in Windows XP, I know atleast 7 people who moved on to macs simple because they liked the animated backgrounds(life a waving american flag).
I loath Macs from a technical standpoint, but its kinda eary because everytime I look at one I go "damn that's pretty"--and then I remind myself about the interface and I totally want to smash the damn thing. MY cry to Microsoft: MAKE LONGHORN DAMN PRETTY. Oh and btw MS: Get rid of that stupid, hideous side toolbar--It's terible. If they change the interface and force me to use another tool bar, I may just move to a mac. This post was edited by Zeo01 on Thursday, May 08, 2003 at 15:08. |
| #3 By 2459 (69.22.78.22) at 5/8/2003 3:15:50 PM |
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With Active Desktop, you can make animations or UI elements however you want. Animated gifs, flash, whatever. You could even have an embedded Windows Media Player playing video or use DirectX.
Depending on your implementation and hardware specs, some methods may drag system performance. This post was edited by n4cer on Thursday, May 08, 2003 at 15:16. |
| #4 By 1868 (141.133.155.28) at 5/8/2003 3:24:50 PM |
| N4cer, now I'm interested, because I didn't think it was possible. How pray tell would you embed http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/downloads/bliss.asp into the desktop. |
| #5 By 14158 (170.12.2.132) at 5/8/2003 3:51:29 PM |
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Now we are onto some Myth’s that people like to spread around, the first one is the price of a Windows PC compared to that of a Mac, now I paid for my iMac a few months ago, it was over £300 cheaper than a quite high range PC, so for those out there who keep telling me (and do you need to when I know what I paid?) that the Mac is always far more expensive than a PC, well you need to look around more.
Sorry, no. Compare a Mac to a comparibly equipped PC, and the PC is always much less expensive. If you compare a $1600 PC gaming system, then you're out of the Mac league anyway. As far as the crashing and the slickness of the OS, I completely agree with this article. Many users find it much easier to use a Mac over a Windows PC, and Apple does this part right. I'm even using a Mac MSstyle (SmoothStripes 2.8) on my home and work PCs because I like the overall appearence of the Mac. As far as software goes, it's just no contest. Mac has much less support from the programming community right now, but who knows what the next couple of years will bring. OSX vs. XP? If OSX was ported to the x86 platform, I would dual boot. Otherwise, I'll stick with XP. This post was edited by Glen on Thursday, May 08, 2003 at 15:53. |
| #6 By 135 (209.180.28.6) at 5/8/2003 4:37:20 PM |
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Byron - You're following the way of the zealot. You're taking the points people make about MacOSX personally, and in so doing this is fueling an internal desire to rebel even further. Been there done that. Don't let it eat you up. Again, I'm going to point to the wonder book by David Brock as an example of the mindset this can lead one to. Ignoring the politics, it's a good book about human psychology.
The key thing to keep in mind here is that no product is better than the other in any general way. The products are simply better than the other for particular circumstances. Microsoft has chosen a more general set of circumstances, and Apple has focused on a niche. I could go point by point through your article and explain why it's wrong, but most of the reasons why I feel it's wrong are simply because the Apple product does not suit fit my needs/wants/desires. We can have the same argument regarding cars. I can argue for days on why a BMW is a better vehicle than a GMC truck. But that isn't going to help you if you really need/want a vehicle capable of hauling around 20 bags of concrete while towing a 20" SeaDoo has higher priority than safety or handling. |
| #7 By 3 (62.253.128.4) at 5/8/2003 4:51:56 PM |
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Just getting comments going actually, seems to work too!
#3 - Review is coming, its just taking longer than the rest because its something I paid for. If I were you though, I would currently wait for a month or so as the new PowerPC chip will launch next month and performance equals that of a 3Ghz Pentium yet is running around half the speed. #6 - I'm just going by UK prices, no clue about the American ones. #8 - nah I'm not taking them personally, just trying to get across the stupidity in the way that people go around defending what they use and not give credit or acknowledgment to others who use something different for their own reasons, I've said it before, I don't care what anyone else uses if they are happy with it, the people who complain about each others OS's are either envious or have little better to do with their time. I simply see good in both OS's, my personal choice currently is a Mac, and its likely to be that way until Longhorn comes along. |
| #8 By 116 (66.69.198.173) at 5/8/2003 5:11:53 PM |
| Byron has officially joined the dark side. |
| #9 By 7754 (216.160.8.41) at 5/8/2003 5:12:45 PM |
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Byron, great editorial--I think you make many excellent points from a UI perspective. I agree that OS X is pretty, and for a lot of people that means much (and there's the other side that hates anything besides a CLI...). I appreciate your more rational approach to "OS advocacy" than what I've grown accustomed to in working with many Mac fanatics over the years.
I've used Macs myself off and on from before Mac SE to OS X (and even supported them for a number of years), and personally I feel that Macs are a bit confining. Like an itchy sweater, they may look nice, but after wearing for awhile you start to want out. It has gotten much better, but there are still elements that bug me to no end... and the same is true of Windows, as well. I think for me that it's not so much a matter of which OS you like more, it's the one that bothers you least. I got to spend significant time with a Jaguar 10.2.3 system lately, and it was a mixed experience. The UI itself was very pretty throughout, although I'm not sure it's as functional as the Windows UI. The Dock is very fun to watch--every time I hopped on the machine, I'd whisk my mouse pointer back and forth across the dock several times, admiring the magnification and transparency effects. I liked the arrow that showed which application was active. It's a different metaphor than the taskbar, but I agree that it looks nicer. From a usability standpoint, I don't think it's on the same level--for better or worse. However, the number one complaint that I had was overall performance--the system was very slow. Starting apps was painfully slow, and overall app performance left much to be desired. I'm sure Apple will continue to address this, but at the moment I know it would be a huge productivity loss to switch (assuming all the apps I needed were available, of course). As for system stability, I can't corroborate your experience. I have not found significant differences in stability personally. It's a win for the consumer--they're both very stable. As far as unstable apps... well, that's not necessarily an OS issue. I think that one very large bonus that Windows has over the Mac is .Net. Besides that, the manageability of Windows on a corporate network is very nice--Group Policy provides centralized, granular control over OS and application settings. Application availability notwithstanding, there are many other reasons that Windows is advantageous over OS X, but like you say, if it works better for you, why not use it? You can always reevaluate at another point in time, and it doesn't preclude you from using both. Even though I'm often critical of Apple (although usually it's more about criticizing Apple fanaticism than Apple itself), I appreciate what they do and that they're staying in the game. |
| #10 By 3 (62.253.128.4) at 5/8/2003 5:26:10 PM |
| #12 - I've had some problems with programs loading slowly, but they are mostly the intensive ones like iDVD, iMovie and such like, but nothing bad at all. As for stability, I can safely say with my hand on my heart that the only crashes I have had on the Mac have been with Internet Explorer, MSN Messenger and once with Word, so far no crashes from other programs apart from beta 1 of Safari which was even back then far better than Internet Explorer. |
| #11 By 3465 (68.50.165.209) at 5/8/2003 7:29:58 PM |
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Byron has officially joined the dark side.
Yep, he joined the Windows users. |
| #12 By 13997 (68.7.81.55) at 5/8/2003 7:44:43 PM |
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My favorite line of misinformation was the one about "You won't find tools like a defragmenter on a Mac, because unlike Windows, it doesn't need one." LOL
I wish he actually knew what he was talking about and the differences between the NTFS file system and the 'new' (haha) OSX file system, he would feel like such a stupid ass at this point. Made a great laugh... Yeah, the Mac doesn't need one where Windows does. The Irony NTFS is less prove to fragmenting and peformance loss due to framenting than the file system in MacOSX. |
| #13 By 116 (66.69.198.173) at 5/8/2003 8:25:04 PM |
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Preach on to your Mac faithful... However I find this article on ActiveWin to be in the wrong place. You will get no respect from me by posting this stuff on ActiveWin.
I appreciate all the hard work you put into ActiveWin and you have generally been enjoyable to talk to. However with that being said you are in serious danger of becoming just like all of the other apple groupthink zealots that go on and on about their macintoshes in a distorted reality. Thats great. Good for you. But honestly no one cares what kind of computer you use, and the fact that this is linked here tends to bother me. No hard feelings dude. I just hate to see a website I really enjoy be corrupted. Peace, RA This post was edited by RedAvenger on Thursday, May 08, 2003 at 20:26. |
| #14 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 5/8/2003 8:37:50 PM |
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Let's do some parsing:
"But honestly no one cares what kind of computer you use" --therefore, someone else's opinion shouldn't bother you, cause concern, or raise comment... "...and the fact that this is linked here tends to bother me." It does bother you that other people uses other systems. It particularly bothers you that a core member of ActiveWin has converted. Huh. Brilliant exposition there, Red. |
| #15 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 5/8/2003 8:55:49 PM |
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"Windows PCs perform much, much better than Macs. And as Byron knows, using both as I do, Macs are just lagging behind more and more each month."
Wasn't Byron's point to get away from the sweeping generalization's, that for particular usages a particular platform has advantages? The fact is the Mac (and its underlying architecture) still does kick the crap out of the ever advancing x86 world: MUSIC -- low sound latency allowing live sound processing, low-level audio APIs that kick the crap out of the PCs (did everyone miss Bias's announcement that Peak and maybe other products in the future will be OS X only?); SCITECH/vector-computation-intensive applications -- a small but key market; VIDEO -- yes, in this sector it is more about the applications than the architecture, but clearly it is the platform built for media, emphasizes such necessary features as Gigabit networking and FireWire That's three. And, yes, of course, windows has markets where its software and architecture excel as well: BUSINESS and GAMING... But to say that the underlying platform is way behind Wintel in every respect is simply wrong and counterproductive. |
| #16 By 116 (66.69.198.173) at 5/8/2003 8:58:54 PM |
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LOL.
Thanks jerk! Glad to see you back in action... Truth: I don't care what computer Byron uses. Truth: No one else does Truth: I think its blatantly obvious this "News Posting" doesn't belong on ActiveWin. Why not branch off and start up ActiveMac? Who knows... Maybe byron just wants closure to his ActiveWin days. Congrats to Byron on leaving ActiveWin. We wish you well. Peace, RA |
| #17 By 3653 (209.149.57.116) at 5/8/2003 9:02:20 PM |
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We are down to THREE macs at work (and 300+ PCs). And I haven't allowed any OS X in either.
Just another year or so, until I'm Apple free. I appreciate your applause. |
| #18 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 5/8/2003 9:11:25 PM |
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You're welcome, Red. Glad to see you are as arrogant as ever: propounding your opinions as truths.
Personally, I see just as many references to "PCs" and "Windows" in this article as "Mac". Could it be that he is exploring the issue of the platform debate, comparing OS X to Windows, documenting his experience as a Windows-to-Mac switcher? |
| #19 By 16302 (207.195.39.195) at 5/8/2003 9:12:45 PM |
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It is a very sad thing when someone writes an article with such a superficial understanding of the topic. The scope of a modern operating system is not limited to how cool it looks, or the applications that are bundled with the operating system for free. The topic is WAY bigger than that and should include everything from APIs, hardware and software vendor support, integration with servers, networking capabilities, supportability, usability, security, stability, and many other topics.
The author completely discounts the fact that there are very few commercial applications available, making a blind assumption that the one or two apps that he needs should be sufficient for the rest of the world. I just don't get why these Mac zealots keep saying that installing apps on the PC is a big problem; I usually just download and click install; a couple of questions later, the app is running. I have only used NT technology (since March/93) and have stayed away from the 'other' Windows line. I cannot remember the last time my machine crashed; I just installed Windows 2003 server on my workstation after more than three years on a single installation of Windows 2000 installing and uninstalling hundreds of applications with NO operating system instability. The Mac guys that say that Windows crashes all the time are simply out of touch with reality. I wish that ActiveWin would screen its articles and only post ones that are well written and researched. An operating system evaluation should be considered from many angles, and should be written by someone who understands the topic, not just an artsy person who likes to click on pretty icons. |
| #20 By 2 (24.54.154.185) at 5/8/2003 9:15:47 PM |
| Byron wanted me to post this to see how flamed he'd get. well.. :) |
| #21 By 135 (209.180.28.6) at 5/8/2003 10:04:52 PM |
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Oh oh! 48 responses!
http://www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=3499 LOL! :) |
| #22 By 11888 (64.230.33.240) at 5/8/2003 10:17:00 PM |
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Remember when Windows vs. the Mac OS wasn't even worth discussing? I haven't seen this much "debate" in years. Apple must be doing something right. Many people around me now have switched to a Mac. And love it.
And to the dude who is phasing the Macs out of work. . .you seem to be a rarity. Where I work there are more Macs all the time. Especially since the release of OS X. |
| #23 By 1868 (141.133.156.221) at 5/8/2003 10:33:41 PM |
| Discussing the OS interface, does anyone know where to find the old photo's from the Microsoft Neptune Program? http://www.mhhe.com/cit/uit3e/pages/chap11/discover11.html there is a grainy photo there, but Dvorak had like 6 or 7 when he previewed the copy back in 1998/99. If anyone has any links, fire them up, because that is one interface I wish would get rolled into Longhorn, it's just looked so much cool that Mac'[s interface & it blew the start menu away. |
| #24 By 2459 (69.22.78.22) at 5/9/2003 12:00:14 AM |
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Zeo01, here's probably the quickest way of getting bliss.avi on your desktop. There are other, arguably better ways. For instance, some media players (NVIDIA's NVDVD for example) support displaying video on the desktop.
Take this code and put it into an html file, then set the html file as your desktop background. Make sure you put bliss.avi and the webpage in the same directory. <HTML> <HEAD> </HEAD> <BODY scroll="no" style="background-color:black"> <SCRIPT> var sw = window.screen.availWidth; var sh = window.screen.availHeight; document.writeln('<IMG DYNSRC="bliss.avi" WIDTH='+sw+' HEIGHT='+sh+' loop="infinite">'); </SCRIPT> </BODY> </HTML> The drawback to this method versus some others is that your background color will show through in the icon text area, and you can't right-click on the desktop to get the usual display properties context menu. RE: This thread Here's some comic relief: http://yocum.org/video/bitch.mpg (Don't worry, it's Apple related :-)) |
| #25 By 2332 (65.221.182.2) at 5/9/2003 1:34:25 AM |
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#8 "But that isn't going to help you if you really need/want a vehicle capable of hauling around 20 bags of concrete while towing a 20" SeaDoo has higher priority than safety or handling."
I can do that in my Volvo 240 wagon, and I'll be safer at the same time. :-) |
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