The words you are reading, along with all the others written by Your Correspondent since years came with a '2' in front, were typed on a Mac. A MacBook 2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 2GB SD RAM, running OSX Leopard, to be precise. All I've owned for the last ten years have been a series of Mac laptops. My honours and PhD theses, various research papers, job applications, wedding invite lists, all the bits of In The Worst Possible Taste which I've read and you haven't, all were written on a Mac.
Add to that a series of iPods, and a minor but persistent case of tech-widget-droolage whenever Steve Jobs and his experimental bionic liver unveil the latest and greatest out of Apple HQ in Cupertino, and you could safely presume that as the ad campaign runs, I'm a Mac.Except I'm not.
Because I didn't choose to be a Mac. And more to the point, I didn't actually pay for any of those Macs. This one was bought off the grant which employs me. Its predecessor, a G4 iBook was a handover from DMDY, procured under similar circumstances. Before that it was a G3 MacBook inherited from my PhD supervisor - it was higher-specced than the base model he was offering to sort for me, and had a swag of not-entirely-paid-for software licences for useful apps like the full version of Photoshop, not that *cough* that would be of any use to someone preparing scientific data for research paper figures.
In fact, the last time I spent any of my own money on a 'puter, to wit the proceeds of selling my first car en route to uni, it was a PC. Pentium 166 MMX. Big fuck-off graphics card. Old-school. 1997 in the house, y'all. And of course there were a couple of workplace interludes on PCs.
So yeah, Apple FanBoi Numero Uno I ain't, or at least ain't got the credentials for. Still, if there's a Mac-PC stoush in the offing, I'm keen to assist. Not because I love Macs... just because I hate PCs. Just because I genuinely do not believe any appliance supposedly designed to make our lives easier could have had more of a history of doing exactly the opposite than the Wintel PC. Think back through the endless, endless catalogue of clusterfucks, of bug-filled beta releases.
And because I was on the losing side on the last big war of the OSs. I'm not a Mac, nor am I a PC. I was an Amiga. Fucking brilliant platform. Fucking boneheaded company. When Amigas were taking it to the PCs - not in terms of market share, though Macs are similarly 'selective in their appeal' (thanks v. much Spinal Tap) to this day - Macs were an afterthought, found only in primary school classrooms, design studios and sheltered workshops. Most of the Mac-PC dynamic echoes the Amiga-PC battlefronts. PCs were computers for all, particularly the stupid. Amigas were for gamers, graphic artists, discerning creatives. They had better graphics, better sound, better processors for gaming applications. But they had thumbless muppets running the company and went tits up. Consoles and dedicated PC gaming systems claimed the Amiga's gaming market, while the reborn Macs -
starting with the first of the 'lollipop' designer iMacs in the late '90s, on which my honours thesis was extruded - claimed the creative market. Or the smug wanker market, if you prefer.AJ, my former fellow soldier from the Amiga-PC wars, is claiming Win7 is all gold and Snow Leopard is a confection of arse. I've pointed out his obvious conflict of interest, given his modelling appearance in the ad campaign above, which is why he's not talking to me at the moment, but to be honest, I don't rate either system. As Leopard has developed from Tiger, so has OSX morphed more into Microsophistry, with second-guessing checkboxes and annoyingly-querying dialogue boxes getting in the way of what used to be the Mac's strongest point: shit just WORKS. Straight off. Out of the box. Without needing to download drivers, consult online help and call tech support in Mumbai. That said, Vista was and is fucking appalling, like drag-racing a road grader with the handbrake on. The most pleasant, workable, flexible and intuitive system I've used in the past six months was a CentOS Linux install on a bioinformatics workstation. Then again it was running dual quad-core processors, had more memory than God and needed a Rolls-Royce Trent XWB jet engine as an cooling fan, so it did have a bit of toe to cut down spinning-pizza-of-death related downtime. But there's that certain whiff to Linuxites, that whiff of... I don't know what you'd call it. Anorak. Parents' basement. Lynx Africa. Really, they're just as dull and punishing as the PCistas, just with that alluring dash of proto-anarchic 'I'm bringing down the system from within, really quietly, so like totally up yours Uncle Bill' which pulls all the chicks. For sufficiently low levels of all.
So, in short, (a) I'll use whatever I'm paid to, (b) Mac users are smug and PC users are dull, bollocks to the lot of 'em; and (c) no matter which platform you use, Microsoft Office will still perform to its key performance aim: to shit you to fucking tears.
The Doctor is OUT.
14 comments:
Yep, free is good. I had to buy a laptop once for work and have vowed to NEVER AGAIN! Mainly because the effing thing cracked the motherboard 1 week after I left the job.
I too would like to be a Linux, but my brother is a Linux and he has double the geek points of any other human being on Earth.
So I end up a whatever I need to do the job the best way possible at the time.
But I do love my iPhone.
Seeing as I resemble these remarks - I may as well have a reply.
I'm different - I'm definitely PC - have been since the afforementioned Amiga got replaced with a Cyrix 150 with the UBBBBBER l33t Diamond Virge 2meg 3d gfx card.
However - in the instance of fairness - for a period of 12 months - I got a Macbook - and put it through its various paces.
Here's the thing. It worked - and probably quite well - but it shit me to tears. It does stuff I'm sure makes sense to Mac people - but as I'm PC - it's just wrong. Little annoying shit too - like - when you drag a folder onto another on a PC - it copies everything from the source folder to the destination - and if there's conflicts - it asks you overwrite or skip. A Mac? Oh no - it REPLACES the directory you're dragging onto - rendering anything you had in there .. GONE. You've NO idea how much time that piece of Mac logic took me to figure out why the fuck something wasn't compiling.
I understand why Mac people like Macs. As stated, they work. It's one set of hardware - so the base system they're working from is identical EVERY time - give or take a graphics card here and there. PC can be whatever the fuck you like - I could still be running my 10 year old 2mb graphics card in this machine - and it would still boot and do its thing - albeit with shit drivers and horrendous speed - but it'd work.
What I don't like? Mac users pay for this "convenience". A similarly specced Mac to PC is almost double. As an example, my Macbook cost $1500. 2 years later - I sold it for $1300 - good resale value. I then went out and bought the EXACT same specced PC laptop - a Dell of course - for - $799. I in the past week sold it for $500 and bought for $500 a similarly specced netbook.
Get my point? I've never found the fact that PC caters to all and sundry a hindrance - I think it's what makes us embrace it. Mac's work because people buy the brand, and because they haven't got the time to invest in sorting the shit out so it works for them - because in Mac's case - it works for everyone out of the box.
End rant - remember - I own an IPhone now - and the c&&**s just disabled 3G tethering - so something I could do with my 3 year old $99 Nokia - is now no longer attainable on my $1000 3GS.
Thanks Apple :P
I have very little idea about what you said & no idea at all about what AJ commented!
My brother is pretty hip (baby! Frank Bennet) and he has i-phones and macs, so I suppose that is where it is at.
I make a pretty mean martini though!
Mac = EWWWWW.
We have a PC in the house and I use a Macbook. I love the Mac for one thing - I don't have to run bullshit nagging bloody virus software. In the 3 years I've had this machine it's had one virus from off a DVD burnt by a PC. It did very little damage and was eradicated easily. The PC however, has to run clunky antivirus bullshit and is constantly nagging hubs about security and it still gets infected every few months. Also, the PC's video card and motherboard melted in last week's heatwave whereas the Mac is still going strong.
IMHO the Mac works and PC doesn't, and I don't give a crap about anything else.
Oh yeah, and most geeks these days are condescending smug bastards no matter what OS they're wanking on about.
Naut - my sentiments exactly. And I want an iPhone. I don't care that they're expensive as hell or will blow up in my face. I WANTS IT.
AJ - all of that makes sense - I think you've also got to factor in the 5% of people who choose Mac over PC, they're the 5% of people who don't want to be in the 95% of people if you follow. They kind of self-select for wanting to be different, for valuing design and image over pure content. Same people would buy a Volvo or an Alfa when a Corolla or a Mondeo would do the same job. It's down to the fact they see a value-add in buying what they perceive as a higher value product (not necessarily higher performance of course, we're talking intangible sense of value here.) Personally, if I actually had to pay for the stuff, and couldn't get the educational discount (which are and always have been considerable), I probably wouldn't spend the extra to get Macced up. But if the bucks were comparable I'd go Mac. The fiddleable qualities of Linux appeal from an AmigaDOS perspective - the front end I was using even looked a bit reminiscent of Workbench - but as Naut points out its NERD NERD NERD all the way there.
For the record AJ does not in any way resemble the gentleman in the image above. He's considerably more svelte and is often better dressed.
Lerm - 'Puters are good. People who obsess about them are losers. That's pretty much the story. And Frank Bennett was cool.
Jen - will file PCs along with 2 1/2 Men, having 5 TVs in a 3BR house and eating popcorn for dinner under 'Stuff Americans Like Which We Wish They Didn't'
Maenad - hi and welcome - the point about viruses is a good one, although I think this is starting to catch up with Macs, the virus making emo teenie gits from Scandinavia (for some reason they're all from Scandinavia) are beginning to target Macs on account of the perception of smugness around the brand (and a bunch of other stuff not unassociated with aforesaid hackers being dateless losers with spots on their faces.) PC antivirus software and Windows 'security updates' seem to be the greatest factor in the boat-anchor performance qualities of most PC systems.
And geeks are geeks, this is true.
Ask anyone who has some tech knowledge to help a mate/coworker/family member to help trouble shoot a vista problem.
I just gave up and forced my boss to buy macs, the degree of stupid irritating saturday phone calls has completely dried up.
Hey jenniki, my mac IS my tv!
Apple was always a bit different-but often as not ahead of its time.
I did a bit of work with Apples. Yes sir. The Apple ][ Plus. 16k RAM, dual floppy drive, and a COLOR screen! Top that.
The Amiga was a good platform from what I've seen and heard. I hear there are still a few Amiga usergroups out there soldiering along with their ancient machines.
Beeso - Vista is GOD AWFUL. Can't believe an OS can actually get worse the more updates it gets. However your Apple fanboidom has been noted as a pre-existing condition on your claimform.
YDog - used to have a bit to do with IIes from school, C64s from mates who had them (cassette drive FTW!) but my first hands on computerage was the Amiga. There's still a community out there keeping the flame alive with emulators etc, but to be honest the story ended (or should have) in the mid 90s. A pity.
Bloody Vista, I'm in the midst of fixing up an almost niece's laptop with Vista just have the issue of a Dell install disc on a Toshiba laptop.
I just this minute hit the Pay button to buy my 4-yearly puter upgrade. After reading your rather eloquent praise of the Mac, I looked into it. But, I ultimately decided the bulltwang was not worth the coin or the hassle.
The sooner we realise that the PC vs Mac (or, indeed, any "vs" relationship with any tool or device) is a sad by-product of some emotive attachment we build into inanimate objects to fuel some abject purpose to our otherwise dreary lives, the sooner we can get to deciding the real things in life... like which is the arse-ist of all low-carb beers.
Right on, Comrade.
Just because i have an iPhone and three macbooks and a mac mini with a 24inch cinema display doesn't make me a fanboy.
Anyway i've given up converting people, i need someone to laugh at.
Bangar - the war stories sound familiar. They seem to want to do anything but make things simple.
ALB - I suspect you're right - and my vote for most arsescent low carb offering is Pure Blonde
Beeso - just keep telling yourself that mate
Never have used an Apple, but like you, by fuck I'll get meself one of them fancy Iphone things one day. They be the business. As far as laptops, desktops or other electronic abacus thingies go, I wouldn't have a fucking clue. as long as they get me onto the intermaweb to read Worst Possible Taste, all da blogs round here and catch up on some porny stuff and sports stuff then I'm happy. Whatever you do don't look at the cup chicks. Couldn't be arsed putting in a link. Its fucking really off anyways.
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