MAC vs PC - What do you Prefer?

[Apokalipse]

Ok, first off, EVERY computer crashes at some point. Even the multi-million dollar server systems made by companies such as Sun Microsystems crash once in a while, and theyre built for stability, not ease of use like most home computers.

Macs prolly do crash occasionally, but the amount they crash is far less than on PC's, my laptop that has had a fresh hard drive, format and install of XP, crashed on its first day running on its new HDD

Windows 2.0 (and up to 3.11, especially 3.11) were VERY stable operating systems. But when it comes to stability, it all boils down to the user who is operating the computer.

Windows 3.11 didn't run very much software AT ALL, I think if you tried to run as much software as the average user, using 3.11 it can and will crash, and more people need to run more software now

A Mac is built to be very user friendly, which in turn lowers the ammount of "tweakability" of the operating system. They dont let you do that much on the OS itself, so there arent many ways to get yourself in trouble with errors and lockups.

I bet if people knew about as little of Windows as most people know of Macs you'd say this about Windows. Mac's OS's have soooo many hidden settings, like XP, that just haven't been discovered by the average user.

Windows XP has been more like a mac in the way that everything is all colorful and automated, and "easy to use" but you can turn all that off and make it useable for a person like me who does more than check their email, chat, and play some games all day, which is what a majority of the computer owners in the US do. Period.

there is some other matter, why is XP less stable than 2000? because of its extra "features" but the extra features on the Mac's haven't make them less stable

All the regulars on the forum use a computer much for much more than that, and thats when a mac's little colorful dialogs and help systems (and windows xp's crap it has, also) just get in the way.

you're saying XP does this too, then why are you bashing Mac for it? and actually for the most part these little helpings are actually used by advanced Mac users

Another thing is that the majority of the computers out there are built by companies such as Compaq, HP, Dell, Gateway, Emachines, etc. and all of them have personalized software with the company's name on it and many extra "helpful" things thrown in. in my experience (except with Dell PCs, as theyre not quite as bad) this just is more crap that these computers have to deal with , and that they always seem to lack in memory just makes it all worse... again. the hardware used in a compaq is not near as good in quality as a ASUS or Abit product, hands down.

I agree with you there on this one

Much of these PC's reliability issues are from their crappy equipment. Its like they all use ECS motherboards.... ( )

actually it is a lot more software-based, XP actually runs faster on my PC than 98, still crashes a lot but not nearly as much, and I do have for the most part fairly good quality hardware, just not very big performancewise

Any person who builds a homebuilt PC correctly with quality parts, and a stable OS like Win2k, WinXP PRO, (NOT HOME as it is not near as reliable) or a Linux system will have wonderful compadability, reliability, and an all out good experience with their PC.

originally posted by me
I'm sick of people saying the Mac's aren't compatible with anything, the Mac's are in fact even more compatible than the Windows computers, the upgrades: AGP, DDR RAM, USB, speakers, IDE, SATA, are all the same as Windows PC's, PCI-X is the only real different expansion slot. also the software itself is no problem, like I said before, WINDOWS EMULATOR, among with - you may or may not realise - the already abundant software for Mac's (not all of it is on the shelves) it can also run Windows programs, although most people don't need to!

I know it isn't very important, but Linux, 2000 and XP still crash more often than Mac's Os's

Ok, I guess what it all boils down to is, the user, the quality of parts, and the edition of OS.

yes, and the Mac's Os's, built on the very stable Unix, and all the quality parts built by Mac, make it sooo stable, well I can't even think of an example for this, that's how stable they are.
also, Mac makes its own hardware AND its OS's, so they can optimise both on each other.

Any person who has went thru a lemon of a PC has learned probably more from it then any other PC they've owned. Even if PC's arent as reliable, what doenst kill you will just make you stronger, right? So when a PC crashes REAL bad, (which again is probably a user-related Fault)
they will learn about it and be a stronger, smarter user. a mac person who doenst go thru any problems will never learn about the computer itself, how it works, why it works, why it doenst work, and how to fix either your own, or a freinds.

I agree with this, but this is just saying: how many people need to fix a Mac?

one more bone to pick... WHEN does the AVERAGE computer user EVER need 8 GB of ram? Having more ram in a mac doenst make it better, it probably means that it needs more ram to do the same thing a PC can do...

actually, the 8GB of RAM is an OPTION, it DOESN't NEED it, but it shows what it is capable of. and people do use it for heavy photo editing, and it's very good in the Movie industry where they may require that much software and images open

still have problems with some programs that arent specifically made to perform good on a mac. Max PC (magazine) Benchmarked the HELL out of the most powerful AMD, Intel, and Mac "consumer" pcs out at the time (P4EE, AMD 64 FX-1(?) and G5 dual 2.0ghz proc.) and the mac was WAY behind on most tests, except of course for the mac original sofware that is built to run great on a mac, and only had windows ports out (i.e., Quicktime conversions) ... ALL this and it has TWO "incredably powerful" procs? wow! id just have to say PWNED at that mac...

and just how reliable is this benchmark, how do you know they aren't biasing it?
actually the Mac G5 did HEAVILY outperform the P4's, yes it DID outperform the P4 extreme. prolly the only CPU's now that only slightly outperform it are the Athlon 64 3400+ and/or the FX, and like I said before, the amount is just a catchup, and now Mac should have something else well under development, which would be the reason they are discounting now.

 

[mac_mogul]

Mac makes its own hardware AND its OS's, so they can optimise both on each other

This was the only part of your statement that I had a problem with... Apple doesn't 'make' it's own hardware. But each mac has it's own kind of 'special' hardware that makes it just-for-mac whereas the PeeCee world uses 'universal' hardware that can be put into nearly any PeeCee. Apple actually makes about 30% of each computer by themselves.... everything else is either IBM/Motorola or Samsung or TexasInstruments and many other companies. And most Macs are not even assembled by Apple.

 

[alecjahn]

you dont think therefore you type therefore i efficiently counter.

Macs prolly do crash occasionally, but the amount they crash is far less than on PC's, my laptop that has had a fresh hard drive, format and install of XP, crashed on its first day running on its new HDD

yes, and that was probably your fault that it crashed. admit it! i know when my computer crashes, it usually is my fault cause im trying to multi-quadrouple-task,

Windows 3.11 didn't run very much software AT ALL, I think if you tried to run as much software as the average user, using 3.11 it can and will crash, and more people need to run more software now

Really? you think today's software is compatable with 3.11?
3.11 was a DOS-based OS, so nearly EVRERY DOS program worked on it. do you have any idea how long DOS has been out? it was about 4-5 years ago when they stopped using DOS as a base for their OSes.

I bet if people knew about as little of Windows as most people know of Macs you'd say this about Windows. Mac's OS's have soooo many hidden settings, like XP, that just haven't been discovered by the average user.

check your sentances. first you say "I bet people" then at the end of the sentance you say "...you'd say this about..." are you talking about the general population? if so i would have to agree.

I dont know that much about Linux, but In my experience ive never been able to lock a Linux system up doing basic operations on a stable-hardware computer. am i saying this about linux? no, yet i dont know that much about it.

plus, i know more about apples than you probably think.

there is some other matter, why is XP less stable than 2000? because of its extra "features" but the extra features on the Mac's haven't make them less stable

actually thats exactly why XP isnt as stable in the average working environment. Theres too much running, too much taking up valuable CPU cycles and memory, and too many things to go wrong.

you're saying XP does this too, then why are you bashing Mac for it? and actually for the most part these little helpings are actually used by advanced Mac users

Im not that fond of XP actually, and as you should have noticed i stand by 2000 and would take it any day over XP. Its tried-and-true reliability will outlast XP in the long run.

The key to relability on anything (not nessisarily computers) is simplicity. Not ease of use, because things are more complicated and in-depth in the long run when theyre easy. ASK ANYONE: have you ever crashed DOS? not a DOS program, but acually DOS, at a drive prompt, running a DOS command. The WILL say no, about 99.999% of the time. why? because its simple. hard to understand to the average dunce, but very reliable.


actually it is a lot more software-based, XP actually runs faster on my PC than 98, still crashes a lot but not nearly as much, and I do have for the most part fairly good quality hardware, just not very big performancewise

98 had one of the biggest memory leaks in windows history... (although 95's might have been worse)

you would have to restart your machine about every 2-3 hours just to keep the speed up to a toleratable level, and thats rediculous.


I know it isn't very important, but Linux, 2000 and XP still crash more often than Mac's Os's

And where did you get this information? did you poll every computer user in the US? i thought you would have more sence than to make up some phony statistic like this. you dont know how all computers run. you dont know why they crash until you become a tech like many of the people in the room (such as me)

You have to understand how a computer works, and why it crashed, and have to have worked with and repaired at least hundreds of computers to get general useage statistics.

yes, and the Mac's Os's, built on the very stable Unix, and all the quality parts built by Mac, make it sooo stable, well I can't even think of an example for this, that's how stable they are.
also, Mac makes its own hardware AND its OS's, so they can optimise both on each other.

This is anothe example of false information. They dont make that much of theyre computer. Who makes their "oh so powerful" G5 that seems to be the bane of all mac users's existance? IBM. Who made the first PC? Wait, that was IBM also. IBM could drop their support with Apple at any time, kind of like when Mac relied on Microsoft's office suite... got dropped like a dead rat. IF this did actually happen, who would make their procs? I know AMD and Intel arent gonna do it, and i doubt others like Sun etc will want the job either.

I agree with this, but this is just saying: how many people need to fix a Mac?

plenty of people. if you could see the number of dead IMac corpses at my old school, you'd probably vomit (being a mac person) another example of these "oh so stable!" macs crashing and burning under even ordinary usage. dont say anything about the IMac not being a good example, because it was a best seller aparently. Seems pretty commonplace to me.

actually, the 8GB of RAM is an OPTION, it DOESN't NEED it, but it shows what it is capable of. and people do use it for heavy photo editing, and it's very good in the Movie industry where they may require that much software and images open

Having more memory capablityies means they plan to use more memory than the average computer. Does photoshop use 8gb of ram? im pretty sure it doesnt. i doubt whether half that ram will ever be used unless the computer is doing some major multitasking combined wiht encoding and ripping, aka putting a computer through HELL.

and just how reliable is this benchmark, how do you know they aren't biasing it?
actually the Mac G5 did HEAVILY outperform the P4's, yes it DID outperform the P4 extreme. prolly the only CPU's now that only slightly outperform it are the Athlon 64 3400+ and/or the FX, and like I said before, the amount is just a catchup, and now Mac should have something else well under development, which would be the reason they are discounting now. [/B

They used Well know benchmarks, such as Seti@Home, and counted the FPS on common games. the mac only outperformed on the things that the magazine put in there just for macs, such as Quicktime conversions, and some Mac Addict-picked photoshop tasks. They did every filter photoshop has on a 2mb jpeg, and mac did way worse than the PCs...

I need a reply from someone who has read the Maximum PC article from the December 2003 Issue. You cant argue with numbers.


"Counter Terrorists Win!"

 

[Stupid]

This is the BIGEST topic I've ever Seen.

 

[Tetsusaiga]

ever been to bit-tech forums???

those are BIG topics

there was one case project that was over 90 pages long with replys/updates

it was CRAZY

 

[alecjahn]

Yeah, i hate arguing with mac people about macs... it never seems to go anywhere...

Stupid - nice setup you got there.

Yes, HoOrAy for Mozilla, except that my new post dialog box is really skinny...

 

[Apokalipse]

Re: you dont think therefore you type therefore i efficiently counter.

Macs prolly do crash occasionally, but the amount they crash is far less than on PC's, my laptop that has had a fresh hard drive, format and install of XP, crashed on its first day running on its new HDD

yes, and that was probably your fault that it crashed. admit it! i know when my computer crashes, it usually is my fault cause im trying to multi-quadrouple-task

ummm, I do know exactly what I did, install one thing at a time, Norton, Foxtrader then MS office XP, then a couple of drivers, restarted, went to Norton, and it crashed. about it. call me a liar but this is exactly what I did no matter what you say

Windows 3.11 didn't run very much software AT ALL, I think if you tried to run as much software as the average user, using 3.11 it can and will crash, and more people need to run more software now

Really? you think today's software is compatable with 3.11?
3.11 was a DOS-based OS, so nearly EVRERY DOS program worked on it. do you have any idea how long DOS has been out? it was about 4-5 years ago when they stopped using DOS as a base for their OSes.

actually it's the opposite, you need compatibility mode on newer OS's to run a lot of software because it is DOS based!

I bet if people knew about as little of Windows as most people know of Macs you'd say this about Windows. Mac's OS's have soooo many hidden settings, like XP, that just haven't been discovered by the average user.

check your sentances. first you say "I bet people" then at the end of the sentance you say "...you'd say this about..." are you talking about the general population? if so i would have to agree.

yes I am talking about the general population, maybe I should have said just "If people" because it is far from a bet

I dont know that much about Linux, but In my experience ive never been able to lock a Linux system up doing basic operations on a stable-hardware computer. am i saying this about linux? no, yet i dont know that much about it.

believe me, I know people who have crashed Linux

plus, i know more about apples than you probably think.

I don't think that's relevant

there is some other matter, why is XP less stable than 2000? because of its extra "features" but the extra features on the Mac's haven't make them less stable

actually thats exactly why XP isnt as stable in the average working environment. Theres too much running, too much taking up valuable CPU cycles and memory, and too many things to go wrong.

I did say that Macs have a lot of similar features, but are much more stable

you're saying XP does this too, then why are you bashing Mac for it? and actually for the most part these little helpings are actually used by advanced Mac users

Im not that fond of XP actually, and as you should have noticed i stand by 2000 and would take it any day over XP. Its tried-and-true reliability will outlast XP in the long run.

The key to relability on anything (not nessisarily computers) is simplicity. Not ease of use, because things are more complicated and in-depth in the long run when theyre easy. ASK ANYONE: have you ever crashed DOS? not a DOS program, but acually DOS, at a drive prompt, running a DOS command. The WILL say no, about 99.999% of the time. why? because its simple. hard to understand to the average dunce, but very reliable.

simplicity will not work in future, people are requiring computers to do more and more complex things. I think Microsoft understands this, but has not made their OS's nearly as stable as they could have been. Macs are a lot more complex than you think, yet they are still that reliable

actually it is a lot more software-based, XP actually runs faster on my PC than 98, still crashes a lot but not nearly as much, and I do have for the most part fairly good quality hardware, just not very big performancewise

98 had one of the biggest memory leaks in windows history... (although 95's might have been worse)

I admit Microsoft has made 2000 more stable after 98, but XP is less stable than 2000!

I know it isn't very important, but Linux, 2000 and XP still crash more often than Mac's Os's

And where did you get this information? did you poll every computer user in the US? i thought you would have more sence than to make up some phony statistic like this. you dont know how all computers run. you dont know why they crash until you become a tech like many of the people in the room (such as me)

ummmm..... did you really say that? Macs might crash, about once in 10000000000000000 BOOTS, I personally have never heard of a Mac crashing at all, ok there might have been some crashes but I have never heard of any
why do you think there are so many jokes about Windows and crashes?
I don't think you've seen my poll on THIS FORUM that shows the majority of people agreeing to Macs being more stable

You have to understand how a computer works, and why it crashed, and have to have worked with and repaired at least hundreds of computers to get general useage statistics.

oh I understand why PC's crash, a lot of the time it is a piece of misprocessed data, sometimes a fault in RAM, sometimes it's a particular corrupt file, sometimes it's a driver, there is more than one reason, and most of them are to do with Windows

yes, and the Mac's Os's, built on the very stable Unix, and all the quality parts built by Mac, make it sooo stable, well I can't even think of an example for this, that's how stable they are.
also, Mac makes its own hardware AND its OS's, so they can optimise both on each other.

This is anothe example of false information. They dont make that much of theyre computer. Who makes their "oh so powerful" G5 that seems to be the bane of all mac users's existance? IBM. Who made the first PC? Wait, that was IBM also. IBM could drop their support with Apple at any time, kind of like when Mac relied on Microsoft's office suite... got dropped like a dead rat. IF this did actually happen, who would make their procs? I know AMD and Intel arent gonna do it, and i doubt others like Sun etc will want the job either.

false information? since when was "Macs were built on the very stable Unix" false?
ok, Macintosh is one company, and there are many PC companies each with their own Powerful computer, although it's funny how the smallest group makes the most powerful system. the G5 is about 1 1/2 years old roughly and only now the Pc's can slightly outperform it. Mac has no dependance on Windows, and the G5 is built on being independant from Windows. right now, Macintosh would prolly be making an even bigger system. as I said before, Athlon 64's are only a catchup.
and as I recall it IBM wanted to kill Microsoft, not Mac, now Mac and Microsoft are the bigger competitors

I agree with this, but this is just saying: how many people need to fix a Mac?

plenty of people. if you could see the number of dead IMac corpses at my old school, you'd probably vomit (being a mac person) another example of these "oh so stable!" macs crashing and burning under even ordinary usage. dont say anything about the IMac not being a good example, because it was a best seller aparently. Seems pretty commonplace to me.

ummmm..... I'm talking software here, Hardware is always going to die sometime or another, exactly the way on a Pc too, you don't know how many dead PC parts/whole systems are in my school

actually, the 8GB of RAM is an OPTION, it DOESN't NEED it, but it shows what it is capable of. and people do use it for heavy photo editing, and it's very good in the Movie industry where they may require that much software and images open

Having more memory capablityies means they plan to use more memory than the average computer. Does photoshop use 8gb of ram? im pretty sure it doesnt. i doubt whether half that ram will ever be used unless the computer is doing some major multitasking combined wiht encoding and ripping, aka putting a computer through HELL.

wrong, it means that people who do need it use it, and people who don't need it don't buy it, what about making popular movies where they require several terabytes of hard disk space? 8GB of RAM is just a start there! the G5 is designed specifically to withstand being "put through hell"

and just how reliable is this benchmark, how do you know they aren't biasing it?
actually the Mac G5 did HEAVILY outperform the P4's, yes it DID outperform the P4 extreme. prolly the only CPU's now that only slightly outperform it are the Athlon 64 3400+ and/or the FX, and like I said before, the amount is just a catchup, and now Mac should have something else well under development, which would be the reason they are discounting now. [/B

They used Well know benchmarks, such as Seti@Home, and counted the FPS on common games. the mac only outperformed on the things that the magazine put in there just for macs, such as Quicktime conversions, and some Mac Addict-picked photoshop tasks. They did every filter photoshop has on a 2mb jpeg, and mac did way worse than the PCs...

oh you mean they emulated Windows progs or something? running non-native apps? NO WONDER! the G5 is better on Mac progs than a P4 3.2C or extreme system is on windows progs!

I need a reply from someone who has read the Maximum PC article from the December 2003 Issue. You cant argue with numbers.

yes you can:
if the numbers are a result of a BIAS
if the numbers were miscalculated
if somebody just made them up

If I recall it is Windows who stood on Mac's ground - Mac made their GUI and windows copied it - so Mac is the counter-terrorist fighting off Microsoft

 

[crisag88]

I have win xp pro, P4 2.0 Ghz, 256 PC133 SDRAM, 40 GB 5400 RPM HD, 32MB video, COMPAQ DVD-ROM, OPTORITE CD-RW 40X 40X 12X

and I may have 8 IExplorer windows opened, Media Player, Word document and even Flight Simulator 2002 and I don't have any problems with my computer colapsing

the only exceptions happened 2 or 3 times when I was burning a CD but that's all,

Windows PCs are the best!

 

[Shroud]

I prefer PC however I work alot with MACs and they are ok now that they utilize FreeBSD. I don't have to deal with the GUI so its all good.

 

[Apokalipse]

try burning a CD, having a game open, having 3 antivirus progs running, 2 firewalls, over 10 IE windows open, AND Kazaa all at the same time on 500MHZ
my computer crashed like 10 times on XP when I did that, so I decided to do one thing at a time, it still crashed about 3-4 times after that, when I only had Kazaa, 1 AV and 1 firewall