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Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

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Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#51

Post by lostlogin »

linkmotif wrote: post #45
freehunter wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree but I would strongly hesitate to say "basically indestructible". Macs are incredibly destructible. They have a very thin glass screen, you could bend the chassis with your hands if you wanted to, and they're not even a little waterproof. How I would describe a MacBook is "quality". It's not especially durable, it just doesn't break down over time. Other laptops break in stupid ways. The hinges snap because it…

The first few months I owned this MBA, I was still getting used to having a computer so thin and small. One day as I was packing up, I closed the computer and tossed it into the air, setting it rotating on its axis, as one might do with a notebook or folder. Immediately shocked by what I had done, I froze and watched it rise into the air and then fall. In full rotation, one of its corners impacted my Ikea desk. The d…

Why not ever airborne, mine has been trodden on. The lack of a glass screen is very helpful. Fantastic machine. My only wish is that the power button wasn't by a useful key.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#52

Post by pythonistic »

Ex-IBMer here: until 2015, Macs weren't an option for people upgrading their PCs. They're deploying new Apples as laptops age out, and employees will then have a choice of a MacBook/MacBook Pro (depending on job role), a Lenovo laptop (configured for job role), or for the special snowflakes with sufficient budget, some custom configuration. BYOD is alive, well, and encouraged at IBM.

Most IBMers with Macs were using their personally owned hardware (as was the rare IBMer using a Microsoft Surface). Early adopters (before the end of 2014) were supported internally through the community, and starting in 2015 we were required to install a configuration program that would add an IBM app store and configure the machine so it complied with the internal security rules. Many of the day-to-day headaches on the Windows machines (e.g., printing) were eliminated with the IBM development Mac tools, but other things were impossible or required a VM to do, like using an IBM internal SOCKS proxy application to connect to customer sites.

IBM has a very active and dedicated Linux community as well. I can't speak to support numbers, but the tooling was more mature and more tools were available on the RHEL distribution.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#53

Post by slantyyz »

TYPE_FASTER wrote: post #43
gramstrong wrote: post #4

*for a corporation. For a single user who knows their way around a Windows machine, they are not.

I do not agree. My 2009 MBP lasted much longer, and required way less maintenance time, than any PC I've owned or used.

Of all the laptops I've had, and PC laptops vastly the outnumber Macs, I've only had one fail catastrophically. And that is my 2011 Macbook Pro, which failed right after its AppleCare expired. It had already had its logic board replaced once under AppleCare.

Thousands of 2011 Macbook Pro owners had the same, now infamaous, problem, and Apple pretty much pretended the problem did not exist (until after my AppleCare expired and forced me to buy another laptop, which was not a Mac).

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#54

Post by xenadu02 »

patwolf wrote: post #9

I'd like to know what percentage of help desk calls are related to hardware vs OS vs software. I can believe that the Mac hardware is more reliable. However, a lot of help desk calls I remember making were because some legacy software wasn't working which wasn't directly related to Windows, e.g. I can't read my lotus notes mail because there's a problem with my remote mailbox configuration. I'd like to know if those…

This isn't just for technical people. IBM has been talking about this for a while and giving updates as the deployment proceeds. Machines are cheap enough that TCO is dominated by other factors so even a 50% reduction in support requests can save more money than the cost of the machine.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#55

Post by slantyyz »

mschuster91 wrote: post #30
werdna123 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you pay $300 to fix a 5yo MBA? Just dump it on eBay or CL and buy a new one...

Because new MBPs have their RAM soldered and instead of SSDs weird NVMe sticks which you can't just put into an old Mac Pro/iMac and keep on working (or trivially upgrade). Oh and you can't just simply swap the battery (I needed Thanks but no thanks, I'll stick to my trustworthy Fall 2011 MBP.

>> Thanks but no thanks, I'll stick to my trustworthy Fall 2011 MBP.

You're very lucky you don't have an early 2011 MBP. Infamously untrustworthy. If I had waited a few months to get your model or the 2012 model, I'd probably still be a Mac user.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#56

Post by dwidget »

busterarm wrote: post #46
jgforbes wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There could be other biases too. For instance, if the Mac users at IBM were in largely technical roles (e.g. working on their MacOS integration service) vs large non-technical departments working on Windows machines (e.g. HR and accounting). It wouldn't be very surprising that technical departments had less help-desk complaints than non technical departments.

Not always. One of the software/hardware architects at D.E. Shaw Research (with a Ph.D. from MIT) was _legendary_ among our support team for filing and expecting followup on scores of internal support tickets for minor and often non-reproducible issues like the behavior of his laptop touchpad buttons or weird one-off website behavior. He filed tickets for everything and almost always for things we couldn't do anythin…

He probably just figures it's delegating minor roadblocks so he can get to the 'important stuff'. If I could get a whole team dedicated to smoothing the highway in front of me of every little thing I probably would stop differentiating what was a pebble vs a tack. If he's the source of enough funding to pay for more than all of the man hours then it's more or less justified even if frustrating/frivolous. He's a cog and tripping up the workflow costs money.

Idk, I've seen a lot of dev guys try a lot of fruitless troubleshooting on systems when it would have been better to blow away the entire install and load up only necessary components...the troubleshooting cost a lot more because of the disparity in their paycheck and the revenue they brought in vs. the IT departments. The IT department should want calls since it reduces the disparity in earned department revenue, better showing the value of IT staff. Unless there isn't interdepartment accounting, in which case 'screw those time wasters, lol'.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#57

Post by jordache »

linkmotif wrote: post #2

Don't know about the stats, but this has definitely been the case for me. My late 2010 MBA worked for 5 years then broke one day. Apple fixed it in under 24 hours for $304.80 (that's with 8.75% NY tax) and I'm typing on it as we speak. PS the thing is basically indestructible... I have no excuse not to buy another some time in the future. Can't wait to try the 12" MB.

what was wrong with it? mechanical failure or failure of the logic board?

I've opened up my MBA 2013. It's basically a large battery, smallish logic board, speakers and CPU fan.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#58

Post by lostlogin »

Institutional computer usage seemes designed to cost the institution money. I have to log jobs for basic installs, have 2-3 follow up calls and emails to clarify what I want. Then I wait for the team who install that category of software to be free (usually the person I need is on leave). It's easier to find a workaround, even if it makes the job take hours rather than minutes. Random machines can't access the internet for updates even if the admin password was available - internet access is an attack vector to be minimised. Maybe other large institutions are better. I see the odd Mac user and I'm sure it's cheaper for the department as Mac users get an admin password and a "dunno how to help you, youre on your own". I want this too.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#59

Post by slantyyz »

mschuster91 wrote: post #27
freehunter wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree but I would strongly hesitate to say "basically indestructible". Macs are incredibly destructible. They have a very thin glass screen, you could bend the chassis with your hands if you wanted to, and they're not even a little waterproof. How I would describe a MacBook is "quality". It's not especially durable, it just doesn't break down over time. Other laptops break in stupid ways. The hinges snap because it…

> The logic boards stress with the constant heat flux and end up breaking. Oh no. Macbooks do suffer from this! Remember the NVIDIA lead-free-solder fiasco or the issue affecting a boatload of MBPs with Intel GPUs? At least they fixed my Fall 2011 MBP free of charge (logicboard swap). Getting my old Windows laptop fixed with the NV disaster was a whole other story.

And more recently the spring 2011 MBPs with bad AMD GPUs, and that experience soured me on Macs about a decade after switching back to Mac.

Re: Macs are 3 times cheaper to own than Windows PCs, says IBM's IT guy

#60

Post by Shivetya »

Sorry, but Apple still needs a dedicated docking station solution provided by them. It can simply connect through a single port (USB3/Etc/Etc). I use my current work laptop for home and work and have full setups at each and its a simple one step to activate it all.

Now what I am curious about is being able to do pushes that are corporate team just loves to do and ease of connection to to z, i, and p, systems. IBM recently moved 5250 emulation to a pure JAVA solution that works on Mac/Linux and I am sure z 3270 has its solution too. A lot of IBM system admin tools have been moved to JAVA just so it would be platform independent

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