Mac VS PC: ultimate face off!...

[9to5cynic]

os x licence ?

So you have more features or it just runs better on mac or do you have apple ariving on your dorstep suing you for patient fragmentation ?

I think it's because you can only legally run os x on a mac. So, I would say, it doesn't have more features, and only probably runs better -- but, it is the only way to *legally* run the os on your computer (a mac).

That being said, I am not aware of the licenses agreement and all that jazz.

 

[mrspeedmaster]

i agree this is gettein no where.

ya but to get facts and not opinions....thats the thing, then lets question the following:
responsiveness (impresed with mac but havent compared with windows right next to me)

time to boot up (my windows laptop from 2006 takes about 45min- 1 hour to start up, mac i am unsure but i sure it can beat this.

time it takes to open programs ( havent timed boath of them but i here that mac is better on this one)

Whats the point in these questions. With a dual SSD raid, I've gotten (all different kinds of) OSes to boot in less than 15 seconds, 5 different major Adobe apps launch in 3 seconds on both platforms. There are plenty of youtube videos to prove this point. Ubuntu 11.04 boots in 10 seconds even on a 7200 rpm spindle drive.

What is the point of your requirements?

People will have a preference regardless of the specs. People use what they want or what fits their needs.

I would choose an Atom based laptop running Debian over a Hexacore Xeon running Windows because I prefer a *nix based OS.

If there was no mac osx, I'd run linux. If there was no linux, I'd run BSD or OpenIndiana. Simply because I prefer Unix based/derived OSes.

which one can operate on the smallest processor and least ram and do so without lag. (never tried)

If you want efficency and small footprints. Nothing beats linux.
I have it running i calculators and even my bedside alarm clock (Chumby One).

A $35 alarm clock w/ USB, I've turned into to a full blown wifi based hotspot for my car (usb 3G stick) and a small linux distro (check out chumby hacks). The chumby is a 400 mhz ARM cpu which is an iPhone 1st gen / Google G1 class CPU / 64MB ram.

Our public wifi-router/firewall runs off a pentium pro 200 mhz, 60 GB drive. The os itself only takes up 64MB and serves over 200 unique wifi guests a day running Smoothwall linux distro. I think I have a dns server running off a 100 mhz mips class cpu somewhere w/ 8MB ram/20GB drive.

Define lag? I spend 80% of my computer time in the console. You can spawn processes into its own thread (aka multi-tasking).

If you can just answer the question for the os you use.

I'm platform agnostic. I use whatever works.

I use Windows 7 to rip blu-ray movies and Netflix. For non-work.
Linux/MacOSX/Solaris for work/programming and to pay the bills/raise my family/further my career.
I have a preference and it is my own preference. People will pick and choose what they like. E.G. I like English sports cars over german. Nothing is gonna change that opinion.

My wife prefers Ubuntu and she isn't techy. Go Figure.

 

[mrspeedmaster]

That seems WAY too long. My windows laptop from 2004 was much faster than that. Five minutes tops! I would definitely say there is something bad going on in there.... Might be time for a re-install?

My 2008 laptop (xp) - 0:45 - 1:00
2009 netbook (ubuntu and arch) 0:30 - 1:00
minutes, not hours. Even our old desktop from 2001 was faster than that... and that thing loaded a bunch of crapware from HP.

I heard that a lot of why macs power on so fast is because they instead will go into hibernate mode... now, I don't own a mac, so I can't verify that... but it is what I heard.

The boot time depends on what is loaded. It will be longer w/ more services running.
If you run a lot of dameon proccesses, it will be longer. E.G. Databases, Firewall, Web Server, File disk checks, etc...
I have a IBM $150,000 server that takes 20 minutes to boot (dual brick).

For normal users,

A lot of new laptops w/ SSDs will boot a full OS in less than 20 seconds. Certain linux distros will do it very fast.

Ubuntu boots in 10 seconds on a Thinkpad W520 mobile workstation. Win7 45 seconds on a Corsair F120 SSD. The newer SATA 6 drives will cut that down by 1/3. Ubuntu has Apache/mySQL and lot more stuff than the plain jane vanilla W7 Pro. I'm certain anyone can streamline their installs to boot fast.

OSX Snow leopard w/ SSD is about 30 seconds w/ similar daemons services loaded.
Lion has been between 20 to 40 depending on the laptop and SSD drive.

I never shut down my laptops. I only close the lid. They normally wake up in less than 10 seconds. OSX and Ubuntu seems to be good at getting out of sleep.

 

[andruoid]

I do the same, open the lid on my dm1 which has a very modest E-450 (dual 1.65GHz) with 8GB DDR3, 7200RPM HDD and it's instantly on the login screen. Boot time is about 30 secs, haven't clocked to the second it but is seems very quick.

 

[EarlyMon]

os x licence ?

So you have more features or it just runs better on mac or do you have apple ariving on your dorstep suing you for patient fragmentation ?

Like so many that produce software (or other soft components) for a living, I rely on licenses and the legal mechanisms backing them to safeguard my commercial rights.

I could hardly claim such protection for my works without defending the same rights for others.

I may (and do) dislike the predatory legal practices of the many superstar corporations in this business, but whether I use their products or not (and I obviously use quite a few), that's no excuse for me to do less than stick up for the stated rights of others.

In plain English, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. (*)

If you ask me how to run OS X, I'll ignore the Hackintosh and say buy a Mac. I pass no judgment on others. I simply advocate license adherence when the situation permits.

We choose to use these products and work outputs, no one forces us.



* for my traditional pals, sauce for the gander.

 

[9to5cynic]

The boot time depends on what is loaded. It will be longer w/ more services running.
If you run a lot of dameon proccesses, it will be longer. E.G. Databases, Firewall, Web Server, File disk checks, etc...
I have a IBM $150,000 server that takes 20 minutes to boot (dual brick).

For normal users,

A lot of new laptops w/ SSDs will boot a full OS in less than 20 seconds. Certain linux distros will do it very fast.

Ubuntu boots in 10 seconds on a Thinkpad W520 mobile workstation. Win7 45 seconds on a Corsair F120 SSD. The newer SATA 6 drives will cut that down by 1/3. Ubuntu has Apache/mySQL and lot more stuff than the plain jane vanilla W7 Pro. I'm certain anyone can streamline their installs to boot fast.

OSX Snow leopard w/ SSD is about 30 seconds w/ similar daemons services loaded.
Lion has been between 20 to 40 depending on the laptop and SSD drive.

I never shut down my laptops. I only close the lid. They normally wake up in less than 10 seconds. OSX and Ubuntu seems to be good at getting out of sleep.

I get that the more services that start during the boot process will make it take longer, but even your server boots faster than that 2006 laptop, I just think there has to be something else going on there...
I have to agree with what you said about ubuntu waking up from a sleep. Very speedy.

 

[Rudedawg]

That's why the A is better the B argument dies every time. Its always about your own personal need. I've got a fat Alienware desktop replacement because i love my gaming but am never always at home. I can throw it in the car and take it to work without having to worry about weight. I wouldn't buy one to edit photos or do spread sheets on the train.




EDIT : Sorry i forgot to quote Slugs post :-D

 

[SamuraiBigEd]

Whats the point in these questions. With a dual SSD raid, I've gotten (all different kinds of) OSes to boot in less than 15 seconds, 5 different major Adobe apps launch in 3 seconds on both platforms. There are plenty of youtube videos to prove this point. Ubuntu 11.04 boots in 10 seconds even on a 7200 rpm spindle drive.

Good point, my Win7 boots in approximately 20-30 seconds but a big chunk of that is the Bios, from the Windows splash screen to the login screen is 10 seconds (12-14 from the start of the blank screen). I am running a P8Z68 Pro, I7 2600K, 6G ram and an OCZ Vertex 3 120GB SSD. With that setup I experience similar times as mrspeedmaster with Adobe apps which used to take 60 seconds or more with a conventional hard drive.

 

[johnlgalt]

My new machine build has a Marvell SATA 3 controller, built in RAID, and performs a memory check on every boot. From a cold start, from me pushing the power button I'm at a login screen in 27 seconds flat.

Oh, and I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1.

Last time I had speeds like that was running FC2 on a Pentium 200 MHz machine with dual 7200 rpm 20 GB HDs...then again, this machine also has a Intel X-25M G2 80 GB SSD for system (and main apps) as well as 12 GB of DDR3 RAM, so that makes for a bit of difference....

 

[9to5cynic]

My new machine build has a Marvell SATA 3 controller, built in RAID, and performs a memory check on every boot. From a cold start, from me pushing the power button I'm at a login screen in 27 seconds flat.

Oh, and I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1.

Last time I had speeds like that was running FC2 on a Pentium 200 MHz machine with dual 7200 rpm 20 GB HDs...then again, this machine also has a Intel X-25M G2 80 GB SSD for system (and main apps) as well as 12 GB of DDR3 RAM, so that makes for a bit of difference....

Show off

 

[mrspeedmaster]

Show off

You want fast. We had a Pegasus R6 Thunderbolt raid and we loaded it up 4 Corsair SSDs. We were able to measure over 1GB/sec transfer rate.
I was able to copy a 120GB file in around a minute.

Anandtech was able to reproduce the same results:

AnandTech - Promise Pegasus R6 & Mac Thunderbolt Review

I can only imagine a boot-OS and launching apps would be insane fast.

 

[A.Nonymous]

I just put an SSD in my computer and it now boots in less than 30 seconds. A lot of that is the BIOS looking for stuff. It used to boot in about 90 seconds without the SSD. I'm happy with the boot time. I can wait 30 seconds. If I could achieve a 15 second boot time, I can't imagine what I would do with the extra 15 seconds of my life.

Every time I've tried out Mac I have found myself insanely frustrated with it. It seems with Mac that you can either do something or you can't. It's that simple. With Windows there are few things you truly can't do. If you can't do it, you can hack around, screw with the registry, jack this and that and usually do what you wanted to do. With Mac, it's just cut and dried. Either you can do it or you can't. As a power user I find that frustrating. I also can't bring myself to spend $1k or more just to try out an OS and try to learn it. If I could run it virtually like you can with Windows, I'd do it. Legally you can't. It irritates me.

 

[mrspeedmaster]

Every time I've tried out Mac I have found myself insanely frustrated with it. It seems with Mac that you can either do something or you can't. It's that simple. With Windows there are few things you truly can't do. If you can't do it, you can hack around, screw with the registry, jack this and that and usually do what you wanted to do. With Mac, it's just cut and dried. Either you can do it or you can't. As a power user I find that frustrating. I also can't bring myself to spend $1k or more just to try out an OS and try to learn it. If I could run it virtually like you can with Windows, I'd do it. Legally you can't. It irritates me.

Your frustration is due to lack of familiarity. You've been ingrained or trained to do things a certain way and changing that habit is disorienting.

There is no registry but there is the /etc/ directory which is the normal UNIX way of doing things. Your lack of knowledge makes you frustrated so you blame the OS.

I'm the complete opposite. I find I can't do things on Windows that I can on the mac.

Maybe I'm wrong but I'll give some examples.

-In Win,I can't label files/folders color coded them for importance and search by labels = "Hot, need to do today, In-progress, leave to do when I have free time, low-importance" This is inherent in Macs since the 80s.


-In Win,I can't name files naturally like this. "#1 report 01/03/2011, for John @ due at 4:00pm"

I can't do that in Win but I can in mac. Thaty file name seems more natural than 01032011_john_430pm.doc

-In Win,I can't rysnc my partition from my laptop to a USB drive, take that drive and boot on my desktop and continue working like I left off from my notebook. Cloning and making cross-boot drives is natural on my mac. No 3rd party apps, no special boot disc. I do it live while I'm running. Hot-clone they call it in Windows without any software.

In fact, I can press a few keys at boot and my laptop becomes a portable boot-USB drive that my desktop can boot from or copy files from. Pretty nifty.

-In Win, I can't seem to do AWK and advance shell processing of files without downloading third party shareware that is half bake. I can't seem to log in from my phone via console and set up a firewall rule or set up a host file.
I can't seem to find certain photos taken with a certain camera with a certain shutter speed/f-stop in a DOS command shell. E.G. find files by meta-deta EXIF attributes.

I can't seem to extract page 56 of a PDF into an email I want to schedule to send myself at 6AM. I'm in bed with my tablet and it is fare more natural to do it in the shell.

-In Win, I can't seem to make 256 bit encrypted AES disk images that I can store hidden files from my wife only that I can unlock remotely using encrypted shared keys from anywhere in the world; including my phone.

See what I did there? It is all about familarity. Maybe you can do those things in Windows but I consider myself a very techy/power user guy but can't seem to do them. When I plug two ethernet cables between PCs, I get the "Duh, I need cross-over cables but on macs, they auto-sense I don't need cross over cables to copy files"

Even novice mac users I know do the above I mention: target boot, file labels, natural file naming.

 

[A.Nonymous]

Last time I used a Mac I struggled with the following

- Ejecting the CD drive. No buttons you can push to eject the disc. WTF? took me ten minutes to figure it out and I had to ask someone how to do it.
- Finding the IP address. Couldn't find it from any icons. Tried to get to a command line, but couldn't find anyway to do that. Took me fifteen to twenty minutes to figure this out.
- Installing software. Accidentally exited the autorun installer. Couldn't get it started again. Took about five minutes to figure this out.

All of this was just ridiculously simple stuff that should be simple to do, but I couldn't figure out how to do it. So I gave up on it. The learning curve is just way, way too steep.

You don't need crossover cables to network two PCs. No one uses a command line to search for files because you don't need to. It's clunky and you won't find what you're looking for because no development for that feature has happened for probably 10 years. I can remotely access my computer from my phone and change the host file or the firewall rules with no issues.

You can't have one drive be bootable on multiple computers. I'll give you that. I can't say I've ever heard of anyone actually doing this and I've never had anyone ask me how to do that. You can easily sync a drive and take it from computer to computer, but it won't be bootable on multiple computers unless they have identical HALs.

There are 3rd party tools that will easily encrypt files though I question why you're hiding things from your wife. I've got an entire drive that's 256 bit AES encrypted. It's got all my financial data, personal files, etc.... on it.

 

[EarlyMon]

Last time I used a Mac I struggled with the following

- Ejecting the CD drive. No buttons you can push to eject the disc. WTF? took me ten minutes to figure it out and I had to ask someone how to do it.

For some time, there's been an eject button on all Mac keyboards. You've not used a modern one for quite some time. As in - a lot of years, maybe 10? Not sure when they standardized that, but it's been a while.

- Finding the IP address. Couldn't find it from any icons. Tried to get to a command line, but couldn't find anyway to do that. Took me fifteen to twenty minutes to figure this out.

Not different from the number of windows you used to have to jump through on Windows before seeing it. System Preferences (in the Dock), Network -> it's on the top line. Or click on the network icon on the top bar and choose network preferences.

- Installing software. Accidentally exited the autorun installer. Couldn't get it started again. Took about five minutes to figure this out.

Ditto on Windows if you're unfamiliar with installer packages.

You don't need crossover cables to network two PCs.

But at a time when that's exactly what you needed to do with two PCs, you didn't have to with Macs. So, I'm not sure the point here.

No one uses a command line to search for files because you don't need to. It's clunky and you won't find what you're looking for because no development for that feature has happened for probably 10 years.

The Spotlight magnifying glass icon in the upper right of the desktop performs all searches. Same icon as the front of my Android phone.

And those familiar with unix searching will find files quickly via command-line searching. Everything else is your cartoon to help you with the search syntax.

Cartoons? We don't need no stinking cartoons!

I can remotely access my computer from my phone and change the host file or the firewall rules with no issues.

Ok. And you think this is unique to Windows?

You can't have one drive be bootable on multiple computers. I'll give you that. I can't say I've ever heard of anyone actually doing this and I've never had anyone ask me how to do that. You can easily sync a drive and take it from computer to computer, but it won't be bootable on multiple computers unless they have identical HALs.

The bootp protocol is part of the rich tradition of unix, it's very effective.

Maybe no one's asked you because they didn't know it was possible on some systems?

There are 3rd party tools that will easily encrypt files though I question why you're hiding things from your wife.

Lma0 - why?

It's his wife.

~~~~~~

You keep saying in your post things to the effect "you can't do this" where this simply takes some training - and yet, you're claiming to do equivalent things in Windows requiring the same training.

It's very possible that your intense dislike of Macs (you on record for that in a thread here last year) is leaving you in a state where it's harder for you to learn the system than it would be otherwise.

 

[A.Nonymous]

For some time, there's been an eject button on all Mac keyboards. You've not used a modern one for quite some time. As in - a lot of years, maybe 10? Not sure when they standardized that, but it's been a while.

Yeah, it was there. I just didn't think to look for it. I was used to pushing a button on the front of the drive and having it eject. There's also an eject button in the Mac version of My Computer. Can't recall what they call it now. Finder maybe?

Not different from the number of windows you used to have to jump through on Windows before seeing it. System Preferences (in the Dock), Network -> it's on the top line. Or click on the network icon on the top bar and choose network preferences.

That was ultimately where I found it. I'm just used to windows where you click Start, type cmd and you're at a command line where you can punch in ipconfig and it displays it.

But at a time when that's exactly what you needed to do with two PCs, you didn't have to with Macs. So, I'm not sure the point here.

I'm not sure what the OPs point was either. He claimed something couldn't be done when it really could be done.

And those familiar with unix searching will find files quickly via command-line searching. Everything else is your cartoon to help you with the search syntax.

He complained that they didn't have robust command line search in Windows. You don't need it. Windows creates an index of all your files. I once searched a 500 gb hard drive for files with certain keywords in about 5-10 seconds. That was on a computer running just 1 GB of RAM too. Windows search is very, very good if you use. If you stick with a command line search, you're using a method that MS hasn't supported or done any development on in a decade.

Ok. And you think this is unique to Windows?

Not at all. The OP implied it was difficult at best. In fact, when you RDP into a Windows session you can do virtually everything you can do as if you were sitting in front of the computer. It doesn't restrict access to anything.

Lma0 - why?

It's his wife.

I'm just suspicious in general of people who go to great lengths to hide things from their spouses that's all.

You keep saying in your post things to the effect "you can't do this" where this simply takes some training - and yet, you're claiming to do equivalent things in Windows requiring the same training.

It's very possible that your intense dislike of Macs (you on record for that in a thread here last year) is leaving you in a state where it's harder for you to learn the system than it would be otherwise.

The thing is, you can't get that training on a Mac. If you're using a Mac and contemplating a switch to Windows, you can buy a copy of Windows 7 for ~$200 and fire it up on a VM on your Mac and figure it out. You can spend days or weeks or months if you want. It's completely legal and completely supported by Microsoft. You can't do the same thing on a Mac. You want to learn Mac. Fork over $1k and buy a Mac. That's what I hate more than anything.

 

[mrspeedmaster]

It *boils down to familiarity.

For example, your ip address issue.
Linux/OSX/ BSD uses ifconfig (interface config) which changes more than the ip address in the terminal.
Whereas windows uses ipconfig

Both do the same thing. Funny how Microsoft changed the command from winicfg to be more like UNIX in 1997 with ipconfig.

Connecting 2 pcs directly with Ethernet without a hub/switch without a crossover cable is news to me. My brand new think pad w520 and 8 month old think pad x120e still uses crossover cables.

 

[A.Nonymous]

Honestly, my biggest bitch about OS X is that when I use it I feel like a complete and total moron. I can't accomplish the simplest tasks like installing programs, opening programs, navigating the file system, or opening the CD drive. And no matter how much I use it, that never changes. I still struggle to do the simplest things. I work on computers for a living. I'm the sysadmin on several networks that run 20-30 computers or more easily. I do everything from build servers from the ground up to remove viruses from user's computers. Yet for all of this, I would not be able to sit down on a Mac computer and create a Word document without struggling to do so. Also, no matter how many times I do it, it's still the same. I still struggle. I hate sitting at a computer and feeling like a complete moron

Also, gigabit ethernet eliminated the need for crossover cables.

 

[mrspeedmaster]

Also, gigabit ethernet eliminated the need for crossover cables.

You are right. I asked my network admin but he said it depends on the NIC card if it supports mdi/auto-mdix. I'm running 64-bit Ubuntu and the drivers doesn't support it w. the realtek cards I have.


As far as command line searches. i find it invaluable. All OSes indexes files. OSX also search indexes (spotlight) in the terminal which is a big win.

I had to clean up my mp3 collection to upload to both Google Match and iTunes Match.

It is easier for me to grep/awk/pipe and search files because I can post-process the files w/ my query.

E.G. Search for all files <320 kbps or not FLAC && not bought from Amazon store and put into a csv file for me. If the files have a genre of reggage or classical, do not copy. Also, copy all albums and music with no album art into a second .csv spreadsheet.

No Graphical search is going to do that for me. Search, move files, and save the results into a spreadsheet.

 

[EarlyMon]

A.Nonymous -

It's not about giving you a hard time, honest.

It's about Mac users feeling 100% the same about Windows.

It's for this reason that I stress that neither is best, it's that it's about the individual and what works for them.

Both sides - you and your counterparts - feel they can prove their side is logical and easy to learn. And both sides feel stupid when confronted by the other side.

When you see both sides clearly, you see why I insist that both sides are getting it wrong, and you may become an equal-opportunity hater like me. That's not about being patronizing or not getting the real issues or not really understanding both approaches.

It's about understanding that both make it fundamentally wrong to do obvious tasks.

The vast majority seems to have trouble with the other side. Now look at Android. For the vast majority, things just work, it's a step up.

That's why I said what I did much earlier.

 

[mrspeedmaster]

It's for this reason that I stress that neither is best, it's that it's about the individual and what works for them.

I believe it is all boils down to preferences and pre-existing prejudices. All modern operating systems are pretty to use. My wife who is completely computer illiterate uses Ubuntu. She can dual boot into Windows 7 Pro but prefers not to. The only exposure my kids have with computers are with Linux. Yes, Linux. There are kid-specific distros out there.

There is no right or wrong or which one is better. You use what you like or what your work requires of you. My work requires i use a mac and I prefer to use it as well but I can easily switch sides easily. I was Windows NT 3.51/4.0 certified MCSE in the 1990s so I can easily switch back if my company decided to defect to Microsoft. Will I like it? Probably not but I can adjust.
I've adjusted from

Amiga > OS/2 > Win3.11 > Win NT4 > Unix > Mac & Linux.

The thing is, you can't get that training on a Mac. If you're using a Mac and contemplating a switch to Windows, you can buy a copy of Windows 7 for ~$200 and fire it up on a VM on your Mac and figure it out. You can spend days or weeks or months if you want. It's completely legal and completely supported by Microsoft. You can't do the same thing on a Mac. You want to learn Mac. Fork over $1k and buy a Mac. That's what I hate more than anything.

You don't need to spend $1K on a Mac. Mac mini start at $500. But besides the point, you can buy a used on off craigslist for $150 with OSX (maybe a few generations back) but you can learn the fundamentals. You can get a 1-2 year old mini for $300 if you look hard enough.

When I got a job administering SGI Irix in the mid 90s, I ,too, was overwhelmed. The servers cost almost a million dollars. I wanted to learn Irix back in the late 90s so I bought me a used indigo on craigslist for around $600. You have to remember back then, SGI workstations were a minimum $7-8000. It wasn't the fastest or the newest box but it got me where I needed to go.

At first, I hated it. I was a Windows NT developer. I developed 2 intranet apps written in Visual Basic that I sold for around $30K each which was lot of change back then. I also wrote some Pocket PC apps as well. I was high on my horse that I think I was the only guy running NT4.0 server on a Thinkpad 600e when everyone was running Win98.

So when I got my job administering Irix,I hated it too, but I knew there had to be something there because every UNIX admins I knew made twice the money as comparable NT guys so I stuck with it. I'm glad I did.

if you want to learn a mac, the barrier of entry is not that high. Not as high as compared to something like in the past. Kids nowadays have it easy. They can learn Solaris with OpenIndiana.

 

[johnlgalt]

I followed this page very carefully (OK, who am I bullshitting, I skimmed it!), but as a person who is proficient with Windows, who can easily maneuver around in MacOS X and who generally knows enough about *nix to get most jobs done, I can truly say that what both Mrspeed and Early are saying is 100% true - it's all about familiarity.

Analogous (and in no way metaphorical) is the difference between a Commercial class drivers license, a passenger car drivers license and a motorcycle drivers license. They're all based upon the same principle - acceleration, braking, turning, etc. - but there is a world of difference between any two of them. Although modern semi rigs do come with neat automatic transmissions, most of the ones on the road are still manual 18 gear transmissions - you really have to know how to use them and carefully. Even having a manual in a car is not enough training for you to jump into a rig and start driving.

Motorcycles opens a new chapter - there's the whole issue of balance and gyroscopic sensitivity that you don't need to deal with with cars, but there is also balance of a completely different nature in semis.

What I'm saying is this - If you jump into MacOS without some training of some sort, you're gonna feel like an idiot when you try to do things that you're normally accustomed to doing in Windows. Particularly when you try doing them the Windows way.

The only thing I hate about MacOS vs *nix vs Windows discussion is the same thing I hate about iOS versus Palm versus Blackberry versus Android discussions - they quickly devolve into which is better than the other, with the user base trying to one up the other OSs involved.

Truthfully, if I were not an avid PC Gamer, I'd have Windows only in a VM. As it is, though, my vice keeps me Windows running and MacOS free. And I'll never pay the price of a Mac computer, nor iPhone no iPad, nor iAnything. If I could get MacOS and put it on my own machine, I'd do it for my folks and convert to *nix myself.

 

[A.Nonymous]

*nix systems I can negotiate for the most part. I've toyed with them. I can install programs on them and do actual work on them. I've used an Ubuntu box as a virtual host for several virtual machines before. I find the experience clunky because I often end up in the command line doing things, but I can do it. I'm far from an expert or even a power user really, but if I was forced to work off a *nix box I feel like I could. OS X I can't get no matter how many times I try it. There is something about the OS that fundamentally makes no sense to me. I can't pick it up and do basic things on it no matter how hard I try. The hardware is pretty. That's about all I can say about it. If I was forced to work with OS X, my productivity would go down the toilet.

 

[EarlyMon]

Perhaps the next time you or anyone here is on a Mac and doesn't know where to start, open the Finder (the Mac smiley face in the Dock) and then at the top of the screen, select Help. It includes a simple table of contents as well as a nice search widget. Or, using the magnifying glass icon at the upper right, search for what you want from there, that often works as well. (As I recall, Help comes on new machines in the dock by default, or at least it did.)

I believe that Windows must still have similar constructs. I remember using that on Windows many years ago. And someone had to tell me to look for that. Later I told someone else.

And for all systems, I have forgotten probably a great majority of what I once knew because I know that I can Google for it, because no one's built-in help is 100% accurate or complete all of the time, and because I have better things to do with my mind.

And when in doubt on either system, try the right click.

I don't believe that anyone wakes up one day and just knows how to use things.

 

[A.Nonymous]

On Windows, all you have to do is click start and type in what you need help on. Type in "Change wallpaper" and it shows you how to do that. Type in "Connect to Internet" and it shows you how to do that. It's an OS built for dummies really.