In article
<meetme-4E0A14.13351716052008@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
David Alison <meetme@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Common Myths for the Macintosh
>
> There are lots of reasons that people don't want to switch from Windows
> to Macintosh. I assume the most common reason is simply because Windows
> works for the people that are using it. The old adage "If it ain't broke
> don't fix it" tends to apply here. These people are not upgrading to
> Vista either, they're staying with Windows XP or even Windows 98 and are
> just fine.
>
> There are however an increasing number of people that are moving to Macs
> now - many of them people like me that hated Macs at one time. I believe
> there are lots of reasons for this, not the least of which is that
> people that are running Windows XP are faced with an upgrade to Vista as
> their next logical step and feel that maybe it's okay to consider a Mac
> since they have to go through a full operating system refresh anyway.
>
> One of the reasons I was not interested in Macs for a very long time was
> that I clung to many facts about the Mac that I felt eliminated it from
> contention. Well, as with many things in life it turns out the facts
> that I knew about the Mac were either hopelessly outdated or simply
> myths. What I wanted to do was tell you the ones that I was aware of and
> often cited when I dismissed Macs in the past.
>
> *Mac's only use a single mouse button
> I'm not a Mac historian, my history with the Mac being very recent but
> I've read that Mac multi-button mouse sup****t has been around for some
> time. You may look at the MacBook keyboards and only see a single mouse
> button or a Mighty Mouse and think that it's not sup****ted. The reality
> is the MacBook track pad has an ingenious way of sup****ting right mouse
> clicks that I find better than having the extra little stub that is a
> right mouse button.
>
> You simply press two fingers to the surface and click the button and it
> emulates a right mouse click. While the Mighty Mouse (which I personally
> detest) only appears to have a single mouse button it does indeed
> sup****t right clicking. I just plugged in my Logitech mice and happily
> right click whenever I need to.
>
> *There are not that many applications for Macs
> Windows does indeed have far more applications written for it than are
> available for Mac. What you have to do is look at the quality of those
> applications though. Many of the hundreds of thousands that are cited
> for Windows were written back in the 90s and few have been updated.
> Sure, most still work but that doesn't mean they are still relevant. I
> have found no lack of software for my Macs - virtually anything I have
> needed is available in native Mac format.
>
> Frankly, as a Mac n00bie I was shocked by the volume of quality Mac
> software available, especially on the consumer front. The number of Mac
> titles for business software, especially in the vertical markets for
> small businesses, is much smaller though.
>
> *Macs are closed machines that cannot be expanded
> I have personally swapped out the memory in my MacBook inside of about 5
> minutes. I upgraded my MacBook's hard drive in another 5 minutes. That's
> about all you can physically do with any laptop, whether it's a PC or a
> Mac. My Mac Pro upgrades were even easier. That machine is designed to
> make expanding common hardware about as easy as it gets. It took me less
> than a minute to install a 1TB hard drive - so little time I grabbed my
> video camera and filmed how easy it was:
>
> Sure, I could overclock my processor and the number of graphics card
> drivers that are sup****ted by OS X is significantly smaller than Windows
> but to say I can't put non-Apple replacement parts into my Mac is just
> not the case. The Mac Mini and iMacs are limited in their upgrade
> options, but the same holds true of the Windows machines from Dell and
> HP that have the CPU and display all packaged together.
>
> *Macs don't work well with Windows machines on a network
> I've got a GB switch at home and a variety of Windows XP, Windows Vista,
> Ubuntu and now Mac machines on it. Sharing files between the machines is
> very simple. My Macs can see my Windows shares and my Windows machines
> can see my Mac shared folders. I shared my printer attached to a Windows
> machine with my Mac and it was able to use it just fine.
>
> *Macs are more expensive
> This is the one that I struggle with a bit. Yes, the Macs are slightly
> more expensive than PCs in general, but you have to look at what you are
> or more im****tantly not getting when you buy a Mac. Low cost PCs are
> often subsidized by bundled application software that is included with a
> new machine. When I recently bought a little HP that would eventually
> serve as my Ubuntu workstation it came so loaded with crap and Windows
> Vista that it barely even ran out of the box. The average consumer that
> isn't a techie would be hard pressed to clear up all of the stuff that
> bogs down the average new PC.
>
> For techies it's a different story. You can go to places like Newegg and
> build a high performance system that has exactly what you want on it -
> nothing more, nothing less - and adjust expectations on price
> accordingly. But doing that means you are your own technical sup****t
> clearing house. When the motherboard in my newly built gaming rig
> wouldn't post I had to call the manufacturer and work through a series
> of steps before we found that the board was shorting out. I needed to
> RMA it myself and undergo the same process when the replacement arrived
> days later. It took me the better part of two working days to build up
> that machine.
>
> That said, I did that because I enjoyed doing it, however that time
> comes at a cost. Is your time worth anything to you? If it is and you
> don't find joy in doing this kind of technical troubleshooting then
> getting a fully tested and serviced machine that works out of the box is
> incredibly valuable. You get what you pay for in this case.
>
> *Macs can't run my Windows software
> Well, that of course is not the case. I can take a legal copy of Windows
> XP or Vista and without spending any money use Bootcamp (which comes
> with OS X) and boot into Windows if I have to. It's standard PC hardware
> so it runs great. Better yet, grab a copy of VMware Fusion and run the
> Windows applications side by side with your Mac apps.
>
> I haven't tried playing any high-end games on my Macs yet. This blog has
> burned up my remaining free time so they are out for now, though that's
> the most common complaint I've heard that I can't refute. Perhaps
> someone can jump in here and clarify that one. Can you play high end
> games like Crysis on Mac hardware and get decent performance?
There are YouTube videos showing Crysis running like a charm on a dual
core iMac.
>
> *Macs are mouse centered machines. You constantly have to grab the
mouse.
> Macs not only have excellent keyboard sup****t, the use of shortcuts is
> profound. About the only thing I've found that doesn't work as well as
> Windows is the use of mnemonics in dialog windows that make it easy to
> jump to a field in a large form with lots of items in it. When a dialog
> pops up inside of a Mac I find that I generally grab the mouse.
>
> On the other hand shortcuts on the Mac are consistent between
> applications and liberally sprinkled throughout. If you have ever seen
> someone that really knows the Mac well use a keyboard to do some work
> it's an exercise in humility. It's like productivity++.
>
> So there you have it, the myths that I clung to that kept me from
> seriously considering a Mac for so long. I'm sure there are other
> reasons that people think switching from Windows to Mac is a bad idea -
> I've seen enough flame wars on the topic to know that it's a religious
> issue for many.
>
> http://www.davidalison.com/2008/05/common-myths-for-macintosh.html
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