It's a small group of people who desperately want to be different somehow, but can't think of anything more original to do.
And just like being Goth severely limits your dating options, owning a Mac severely limits your software options.
Posts: 5383 | Registered: Dec 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
The tough one is remembering all of the lyrics to that song that begins, "Big Mac, McDLT, Quarter Pounder with some cheese..."
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Macs do stink. Can't get any software for them.
When was the last time you used a Mac? I use Mac OS X, Windows XP Pro, and Linux on a regular basis. When it comes to free and/or open source software (usually the best kind, with several notable exceptions), the unixes are far ahead of Windows. Even if you use cygwin (which I do). Of course if you want crappy software with poor user interfaces and no scriptability, Windows is where it's at. Oh yeah, viruses too.
posted
I've been trying to switch to full-time Linux on my home computer. Here are the reasons I haven't finished the transition yet:
I'm not as fully versed in using a Linux system as I am a DOS/Windows system. Sadly, this is probably the main factor. I've read a few books and understand some, but I just haven't completely wrapped my head around many aspects of Linux administration, even things as simple as the file system.
Games. More developers write games for Windows than any other OS. There are very few high end games being written for Linux.
Drivers. Linux doesn't support all of my hardware. As far as I know, no one has developed a Linux driver for my winmodem, and I have neither the time and skill to develop my own driver nor the resources to buy a real modem (much less a real computer). Some of the hardware that is supported by Linux didn't seem to configure properly when I installed Linux, and I'm not terribly certain how to fix that.
But everything else seems to be just dandy.
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
You know, L&F, Apple's hardware doesn't suck anymore. It's sucked for the last 3-4 years, but they caught up last fall.
Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
If I wasn't stuck on dial-up, I would swith to Linux, except for when I need to kill me some aliens.
Posts: 331 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:You know, L&F, Apple's hardware doesn't suck anymore. It's sucked for the last 3-4 years, but they caught up last fall.
Suckage is a relative term. I am quite happy with my 3-and-a-half-year-old G4 400 tower (and even more happy with my new 12" powerbook, but hey). But then, I don't play many games that tax either my cpu or my graphics card. Isn't that what consoles are for?
Posts: 1810 | Registered: Jan 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
The PC world article has awful benchmarking. Premiere is notoriously crappy on the mac. That's why everyone uses Final Cut Pro. FCP will do the same jobs faster, and faster than a PC using premiere or Avid. It's not the same program, but then Premiere really isn't quite the same program. Microsoft Word. Hm.... It IS microsoft, though a lot of mac people use word, the program again, isn't at the same level of optimization. And who really has problems on either the Mac or the PC side with office's speed? Photoshop IS pretty well optimized for both (though the altivec and G5 optimizations are quick hack jobs, it is a lot more fair of a test than the others.) If you look at Virginia Tech's research on why they chose to use G5s in their supercomputer you'll find a much less biased and better researched opinion.
Bare Feats. There are some more benchmarks that show the opposite of the PC world benchmarks (the surprising thing being the G5 did the WORST on Photoshop.) The Opertron does consistently win on games, but again, games tend to be ports on Macs, and you probably won't buy a mac if that's why you want your computer. More later, I have to meet with a professor.
Posts: 5 | Registered: Jan 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
We're all out of orange, but I could mix sprite and tangerine altoids if you'd like. *Hands over large carton of fries only filled half way*
Posts: 331 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Yes, the Opeteron is indeed faster than the G5. By L&F's metric, a dual P4 Xeon system also "sucks," because the Opteron is faster than that, too. Suggesting that Mac hardware sucks as a result of the Opteron being faster is patently absurd.
I don't think that the G5 is the world's fastest personal computer. But it sure doesn't suck.
Those PC World benchmarks don't disclose a whole heck of a lot about the harware configurations used on the PC side, which is disappointing. Apple tends to do the same thing in their own benchmarks, of course. Though I could peruse the individual vendors' websites and probably find what I want to know...
The PCs in the PC World benchmarks are also markedly more expensive than the G5 systems, which is ironic.
Why do I get the feeling that L&F feels he has been wronged by Apple in the past?
quote: Yes, the Opeteron is indeed faster than the G5. By L&F's metric, a dual P4 Xeon system also "sucks," because the Opteron is faster than that, too. Suggesting that Mac hardware sucks as a result of the Opteron being faster is patently absurd.
The mac sucks because it doesn't have many games, is overpriced, and is slower than an athlon 64. The Xeon sucks because the athlon/opteron is faster.
[ January 23, 2004, 03:36 PM: Message edited by: Liquor and Fireworks ]
Posts: 331 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote: That's why there's Final Cut Express.. Still better than Premiere, at half the cost.
Of course, there is no way of using that as a benchmark against a PC, as it isn't available for PC. You have to use something to compare them, and as that wasn't the only benchmark used, it's not that much of a problem, although the review probably could have used more programs.
Posts: 331 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
>> The mac sucks because it doesn't have many games, is overpriced, and is slower than an athlon 64. The Xeon sucks because the athlon/opteron is faster. <<
It's slower than a more expensive Athlon 64. How is that "overpriced?"
The only overpriced systems in the current Mac lineup are the iMac and eMac.
Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote:So when is Windows getting a *real* command line?
It's already there, but if you treat it like DOS, you're going to think it's weak. However, if you like to have Unix commands in the command line, then Services for Unix, which is free, gives you everything the Windows CLI has plus the good stuff from Unix. The only reason cygwin has more "support" right now, if you can call it that, is because SFU never used to be free. Now it is, and it will most likely be standard in the next Windows by default. But twinky is right, the new PowerMacs are very much on par with Windows machines now, and any real comparisons of them is going to be over semantics. Neither is totally better than the other for every situation any more. Now all Apple has to do is get their laptop line running the new G5 processors. Some say it'll happen by the year's end. That should prove very nice for the Apple crowd.
Oh, and neither Virginia Tech's "research" nor the BareFeats site are going to give unbiased opinions. BareFeats is the worse of the two by far, though, comparable to Paul Therrot's Winsupersite. VT has to keep each of those Macs in its own separate refrigerator, because the PowerMacs they bought weren't built for clustering. The new XServe would work better, but I'm still pretty sure that a room of 1100 of them would require some heavy cooling.
quote: But Win XP Home Edition crashes all the time. So make sure to get Win XP Pro. Works great.
That statement screams to me: "I have XP Pro and I'm better than everybody who has XP Home even though it's illogical to think that!"
You know that XP Home and XP Pro are exactly the same if you just take away the networking tools in XP Pro right? They both freeze as often. I have never had my XP Home freeze. Maybe you have a poor computer that is too old to run it or it's poorly manufactured (eMachines, Compaq ect). Unless you're going to use those tools, you're wasting an extra 70-100 dollars.
That said, I have something to say to the mac-users here as well.
I don't like macs, and I don't like haughty mac-users that say their computers are superior when they're not. It's a matter of PREFERENCE, not superiority.
Posts: 4229 | Registered: Dec 2002
| IP: Logged |
quote: Of course, there is no way of using that as a benchmark against a PC, as it isn't available for PC. You have to use something to compare them, and as that wasn't the only benchmark used, it's not that much of a problem, although the review probably could have used more programs.
That's one of the things inherently wrong with benchmarking. If you use Premiere you're using something that is functionally similar, but optimized only for one system. It also isn't the best tool for the job. Using Final Cut, there is no exact equivalent on the PC side, but it will do the same things as premiere, and it will do it faster and easier. Because you can't necessarily put those into numbers doesn't mean you should use something else that is just as inherently flawed. These Benchmarks do not show what the G5 is capable, only what the system is capable on badly written apps (Photoshop being partially exempt). and there are 3 little letters that in themselves should end the whole Mac vs. PC debate. That's OS X. There's no better operating system.
Posts: 5 | Registered: Jan 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote: The PC world article has awful benchmarking. Premiere is notoriously crappy on the mac. That's why everyone uses Final Cut Pro.
If it is, as you say,"notoriously crappy" on macs, then perhaps we'll toss that aside, now, explain why the mac loses in the other benchmarks.
Posts: 331 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote: If it is, as you say,"notoriously crappy" on macs, then perhaps we'll toss that aside, now, explain why the mac loses in the other benchmarks.
I did. Read my original post again. I also provided benchmarks that show the G5 beating an Opertron that cost 600 dollars more. The G5 won in all apps tested except photoshop and gaming which I already discussed.
Posts: 5 | Registered: Jan 2004
| IP: Logged |
That one little thread doesn't really do much to say that OS X is worse than windows. http://www.xvsxp.com/ That's a bit more comprehensive. Yes, the person does use a mac himself, but read it, he seems to check his biases at the door.
Posts: 5 | Registered: Jan 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Holy wars are so much fun to watch. For a little while anyway. Eventually it gets tiresome to watch people running around in circles and beating their heads against the wall.
Final Cut Pro is a great piece of software, and if I had the money to get myself a digital video camera and all that stuff, I'd want a Mac to do the editing. But I don't have the equipment or the money, which I constantly regret. Especially the money part.
So, do they write a lot of games for Mac these days? They didn't back when I still had money for games, but I haven't been keeping up lately. For me, a computer has three uses:
1.) Mundane stuff like checking email and Hatrack and word processing. Pretty much any modern computer should be up to this task.
2.) Playing games. As far as I know, people still aren't writing as many games for Macs, so I'd want a PC for that.
3.) Developing my website and other software. UNIX and Linux are my choice for development. I really don't see how either MacOS or Windows can even come close.
Really what I'd like to do is have three computers. A Mac for the video stuff, a PC for games, and a Linux box for development. So who wants to get in line to donate to the Buy Saxon Three Systems fund?
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
>> I don't like macs, and I don't like haughty mac-users that say their computers are superior when they're not. It's a matter of PREFERENCE, not superiority. <<
By the same token, PC users who bash Macs for no good reason get under my skin. I don't like them, particularly the uninformed kind.
I have not once claimed that Macs are superior, simply that they don't suck.
saxon, the current version of the Mac OS is actually a Unix variant. Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
I was actually aware of that, my man. What are the major differences between OS X and a major Linux distro, say, Debian or Red Hat? Will OS X run Linux software?
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote: I did. Read my original post again. I also provided benchmarks that show the G5 beating an Opertron that cost 600 dollars more. The G5 won in all apps tested except photoshop and gaming which I already discussed.
You provided benchmarks from a mac fansite, which could quite easily be biased. As for explaining away the other benchmarks, what about quicktime?
Posts: 331 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:That one little thread doesn't really do much to say that OS X is worse than windows. http://www.xvsxp.com/ That's a bit more comprehensive. Yes, the person does use a mac himself, but read it, he seems to check his biases at the door.
That thread shows that Panther has quite a few bugs in it that show OS X is not, in fact, superior to Windows, which can do what is needed in the thread without a problem. And that xvsxp site is totally biased, and I've seen debunking of it done by plenty of equally and more qualified people than the owner of the site. I agree with twinky in that there is no superior system. I switched to XP because it was better for me. Trying to tell me OS X is superior when I already know XP is better for me is just silly, and showing very little understanding about how different people are, in fact, different.
Posts: 346 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
>> I was actually aware of that, my man. What are the major differences between OS X and a major Linux distro, say, Debian or Red Hat? Will OS X run Linux software? <<
All right, I'm going to have to stop posting after the post after this, so if you want more info, you've got my email addy.
OS X is a hybrid between BSD and Mach, called Darwin, with a bunch of custom Apple additions (for example, the display engine). However, Apple has ported X11 to the Mac to save you the trouble of recompiling all of your Linux apps to run on OS X (you can get it here. Now, I'm not sure just how far-reaching compatibility is -- there may well be some issues that I'm not aware of, as I've never used X11 for anything, so I won't say it's fully compatible. But at least they're trying. Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Evil]](graemlins/evil.gif)
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
consoles, that's a whole other fight.
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
