Why buy a Mac?

Energize said:
I take it you've never heard of "automatic updates" or a virtual machine then?
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No, having an MCSE and being an infrastructure architect for a living I've never heard of virtual machines.

I don't want a virtual machine, it's extra software, slower, more hassle. It's lovely for testing software and demoing new platforms but it's not something i'm messing around with to browse the web.

Automatic updates are lovely, until they break my software without warning and decide that my computer absolutely must restart now in the middle of an encoding job.

I spend plenty of time at work designing systems, I spend enough time at home testing things in labs and preparing for exams. I don't want to start my computer, start a virtual machine and then browse the web - I want to wake my mac from sleep and be browsing the web in 10 seconds while not worrying about security.
 
I think the only downside to having a mac is playing directx games, but that's easily sorted by using bootcamp and installing xp

As said above, you rarely have severe problems with a mac and you don't have the worry of spyware/virii etc.
sdfuk said:
all she'll need it for are photos/email and some business apps such as word excel etc.
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I think for this a mac would be perfect, altho if she has used windows for a while it might take a month or so to get used to OS X.

bigredshark said:
Automatic updates are lovely, until they break my software without warning and decide that my computer absolutely must restart now in the middle of an encoding job.
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I agree :) windows annoys me and falls over itself a lot.
I don't like the way it tries to do things without you asking it to, often putting something you've done back to how it want's it to be :(

You could get a cheap Mac Mini just to try it out before spending loads aswell :)
 
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WotDa said:
Ok then.

Longer, yes, it applies updates differently to Windows, that's why. More often? Maybe. But at least it doesn't pester you with a pop-up every 5 minutes asking you to reboot...
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you simply change how it reminds you and you dont get the pop ups. you then restart when your ready (when your encodings finished or whatever)

im interested in these replies simply as ive never got used to a mac. but i do wonder what you people are doing with your PC's that need such constant fiddling to make it "work". my mum has a PC, not that good with it but its been running fine for years, as does mine, i simply can turn it on and look at my emails or browse or whatever.
i have a update thing once a month on my PC and its done it doesnt pester me once its downloaded.

i do everything you can do with a PC apart from heavy photowork/design stuff, how would you convince me to get a mac?
 
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Adrianr said:
If she wants something for general computing use, IE no games, small scale photo editing, IE not medium format TIFF files, and doesnt mind spending a bit more.. A Mac would be a good choice.
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1. No games for the Mac is a myth. There are less but you can play WoW so, hey, who cares? ;)
2. Small scale photo editing? Are you on crack or something? Photo editing is available out-off-the-box and big apps such as Photoshop run better on a Mac, never mind that Macs are standard in the design industry.
3. Again it is a myth that Macs are expensive. Name a small, lightweight laptop with long battery life that you can get for £650. You can't do it. All you end up with is large, heavy rubbish.

For non-techies who just want to get stuff done a Mac makes a lot of sense.
 
Hobgoblin said:
you simply change how it reminds you and you dont get the pop ups. you then restart when your ready (when your encodings finished or whatever)
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Please fell free to tell me how I stop Windows nagging me every 5 minutes when it feels the need to restart...
 
Hobgoblin said:
you simply change how it reminds you and you dont get the pop ups. you then restart when your ready (when your encodings finished or whatever)
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But I don't want to change how it reminds me, I just want it to work. This is exactly the kind of messing around that I can't be bothered with when it comes to a home PC.
 
I got my MacBook for writing essays, internet, email, music, photo's, downloading and watching video files. I don't do any editing or anything particularly intensive.

I used to build my own PC's, and I got into a bad cycle of buying and selling hardware with no real benefit or point, something that is probably familiar to a few people on these forums. Now that I own a MacBook, I wouldn't consider going back to PC's and Windows. The software is fantastic, it meets all of my needs. The OS is more efficient, streamlined, less annoying and better looking.

Some people say that you pay a premium for Apple hardware, but comparing a 2.16ghz c2d Acer with a MacBook is not really fair. If you only look at amount of ram, CPU speed etc then of course a MB is going to look expensive, but you get so much more for your money than just a load of silicon.

With a 13" screen it's not quite an 'ultraportable', but it's a hell of a lot more portable than any 15 or 17" laptop, and I do think that this should be taken into account. Of course some people want a larger screen so this point wouldn't be relevant to them.

In short, it looks great, it's easy to use, it won't annoy you half as much as a windows machine, it's more portable than most and (as already mentioned) the 3rd party software is generally of a very high standard. Just don't bother with Office on it, use Pages, Numbers and Keynote.

*edit* In my opinion, the main reasons not to use Apple would be - you can get something basic that will 'work' for less money or you need Windows for some special piece of software, or games I guess but I doubt this apply's to your wife.
 
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J1nxy said:
Sorry but how exactly did you work that out?
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Nothing to work out. With a sandbox installed programs automatically start up in a protected environment, no data gets out of there so no viruses can affect the system.

Some of the comments I hear sometimes makes me think people haven't used windows since 95.
 
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Energize said:
Nothing to work out. With a sandbox installed programs automatically start up in a protected environment, no data gets out of there so no viruses can affect the system.

Some of the comments I hear sometimes makes me think people haven't used windows since 95.
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Good theory, but to most home users if data cannot get out, it is totally useless to them. There is no point in a home environment to a sandbox tbh.

IIRC Sandboxes are used in order to test things that you may not be sure of, either a web site you don't know, or a new program, so if you do get any infections or corrupt a system it is only your sandbox.

This is completely impractical to use for any purpose other than testing.
 
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JUMPURS said:
Good theory, but to most home users if data cannot get out, it is totally useless to them. There is no point in a home environment to a sandbox tbh.

IIRC Sandboxes are used in order to test things that you may not be sure of, either a web site you don't know, or a new program, so if you do get any infections or corrupt a system it is only your sandbox.

This is completely impractical to use for any purpose other than testing.
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Quite, the idea that people should routinely use a sandbox at home is laughable
 
Energize said:
Nothing to work out. With a sandbox installed programs automatically start up in a protected environment, no data gets out of there so no viruses can affect the system.

Some of the comments I hear sometimes makes me think people haven't used windows since 95.
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Are you for real? Seriously.

So my wife could either use the MacBook (as she does) or setup a Virtual Environment on her PC and set it up so it is "protected" to the point of being useless (I.e. won't let any data out).

I'd use the big rolleyes that spews rolleyes but you get the point!
 
JUMPURS said:
This is completely impractical to use for any purpose other than testing.
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You must be kidding me, I use it all the time for browsing. No spyware ever gets through. Google sandboxie, it's specifically designed for regular home use.

LordSplodge said:
Are you for real? Seriously.

So my wife could either use the MacBook (as she does) or setup a Virtual Environment on her PC and set it up so it is "protected" to the point of being useless (I.e. won't let any data out).
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I suggest you actually try a sandbox first before commenting. You can still move files out of the sandbox....
 
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Energize said:
You must be kidding me, I use it all the time for browsing. No spyware ever gets through. Google sandboxie, it's specifically designed for regular home use.

I suggest you actually try a sandbox first before commenting. You can still move files out of the sandbox....
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You're proving my point, to safely browse you switch on your PC, fire up a virtual environment and then use that. I'll settle for waking my mac from sleep and openning a browser window.

Why on earth would anyone want to use your solution? Seriously, yours is a long winded solution for the technically minded - it's not for average home users.
 
bigredshark said:
You're proving my point, to safely browse you switch on your PC, fire up a virtual environment and then use that. I'll settle for waking my mac from sleep and openning a browser window.

Why on earth would anyone want to use your solution? Seriously, yours is a long winded solution for the technically minded - it's not for average home users.
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There's nothing long winded about it at all. When you open firefox or internet explorer it opens just as normal with the sandbox running silently in the background, you don't need to configure anything. If you tried sandboxie rather than just making false assumptions about it you'd see what I mean.

Anyway my original point was that in this day and age spyware is not a problem for competents, you can even install noscript and no spyware or viruses will get into your system via firefox.
 
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Personally I would prefer to jump through as few hoops as possible when using my computer and for it to be reasonably well protected from malicious influences.

I think most people would feel the same.
 
Actually you're right I can't read, I just mashed the keyboard until words came out and clicked post.

You brought up the whole VM issue as a counter to someone saying they don't want to have to keep software up to date so they don't get owned by the latest flavour of the week script, then suggested it was a viable solution for home users.

The original point was that you can unbox a Mac and use it securely without having to dick around with it. That point still stands.
 
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Energize said:
There's nothing long winded about it at all. When you open firefox or internet explorer it opens just as normal with the sandbox running silently in the background, you don't need to configure anything. If you tried sandboxie rather than just making false assumptions about it you'd see what I mean.

Anyway my original point was that in this day and age spyware is not a problem for competents, you can even install noscript and no spyware or viruses will get into your system via firefox.
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Well I'd try it but I have a computer which isn't riddled with security holes so turns out I don't need to go to such ridiculous lengths.
 
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