I recently picked up a Dell 9365 2in1 for a portable person computer. After some rough edges I am pretty seamlessly switching between my Apple work laptop and new PC through the likes of WSL & Vagrant.
Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
111–120 of 790 posts
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cheaper and faster, broadly, which has been the same for as long as I remember: for an equivalent price, you can get a much more powerful PC than you can a Mac (though there are exceptions: the surface book matches up closely with a 2015 macbook pro I believe). After that, it depends on what you are doing. I develop using a PC, macbook (for iOS builds usually) and a Linux machine (running mint). Linux is best for Nod…
> Cheaper and faster, broadly Presumably the author has already purchased the Mac, in which case, s/he's already obtaining the benefit from that purchase. To rationally justify the replacement cost (which is not just the cost of the hardware itself, but the opportunity cost of learning the new platform, purchasing new software, etc.), the benefits of switching have to be greater. It's those benefits--not necessarily…
My reading of the author was that he (Owen Williams) switched when he needed to upgrade. He had a Macbook which suited him for a few years, and now needed to decide to go with the late 2016 models or buy into PCland (which gave him much more bang-for-buck).
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
Despite my bellyaching, Windows is built on much more solid ground than macOS is these days. All the new stuff introduced in 8/10 - Metro stuff, control panel stuff, etc. - can be wacky, but the core OS is strong. It works, it doesn't crash, it acts the way you expect it to. That's all I really want from a desktop OS, and given that Apple has total control over their ecosystem, they are frighteningly bad at providing…
I find W10 lacking in consistency. Poke around in the settings for a while and you will find remnants from the NT days. The dark theme is another example, it works for a handful of their own apps, not even half of them. Half baked and unpolished. I'm a daily W10, macOS sierra and Fedora Linux user. I develop on all the OS:es and play games mostly on W10.
Yeah, that's exactly the problem.
Happily, though, the inconsistencies don't reach as far down as the kernel level. W10 looks weird and sometimes acts strangely when you try to use the new stuff, but its bones are stable, which is all I really need.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#114It is so funny to read these Apple vs. Windows discussions when you live outside of North America... The truth is that, for the rest of the world, "Apple platform" means only iOS, only the IPhone, nothing more. In Asia, Africa, Latin America and some parts of Europe, Macs and OSX are a rare species, most people spend years without even seeing a Mac computer "in the wild". They are used only for graphics editing and I…
Uhm no. Here in Norway Apple is huge. Go to a major Asian city and there are Macbooks everywhere. Sure there is higher percentage of Apple among some devs and for places with higher income, but to call a major product from one of the most valuable companies in the world "exotic" is absurd.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why not spin it around the other way? What advantages does Mac now have over Windows, in a world where Microsoft is catering to developers from both sides?
I work on Windows and have a Mac at home. Windows looks cool at first but when you actually need a workhorse the MacBook is still the best option in my view. Windows 10 and the Surface Book look really nice on paper but once you start using them they have a lot of little problems that make an unpleasant experience. So in my book the Mac is still best but I also agree that the direction Apple is going doesn't look too…
I too use both. OSX at work, and Windows (7) at home. They are both bad, neither is the best.
I remember spending time trying to figure out how to disable the animation that plays when switching OSX virtual desktops - only to find out that you literally can't without code injection or a third party app - rendering the virtual desktops on OSX entirely useless.
The fact that this a) is the default behavior and b) is not configurable, is just another in a long line of awful OSX UX and it only gets worse with every update. El Capitan changed terminal font smoothing to something woeful which was also a struggle to revert.
Honestly the only way I have found development possible on native OSX and Windows is by stretching a terminal(/putty) to the full size of the desktop and handling all window management with tmux.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#116It's quite obvious that Apple is slowly converging iOS and OS X even as they say they are different beasts at the moment. Maybe that's why some power users's expectations are frustrated atm?
But that is also precisely why Apple is still WAY ahead of Microsoft and co. They will be able to make the desktop and tablets converge where you can carry your computer in your bag, and when you're home you put it in a dock and you have a full blown powerful desktop with the 5K Retina screen and maybe even a dedicated GPU in the dock fit for triple A gaming. I'm pretty sure that is where they are headed, since obviously you can't make a single "form factor" for both uses. And for people who don't need the full blown desktops you won't even need the dock, external screen, just the keyboard and you'll be able to do most computer tasks.
And that will be possible because they are already thinking ahead, while Microsoft will be stuck with their turd of a desktop and making funny hardware that kinda works for some uses, but can't quite decide what it does.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#117I'm in the same boat (with everyone, it seems). One remaining big differentiator, for me, is the resell value and service support of Macs. I can use a Mac for three full years, under warranty, and then turn around and sell it used the day AppleCare expires. And, I can regularly get 50-60% of original sale price (realizing that I've also sunk $300 for AppleCare and taxes). After three years, you'd be hard pressed to g…
If you spent a comparable amount on a PC as you do on your mac, I guarantee you would not have a hard time selling it in three years.
I don't care about this whole windows/mac debate, as I run linux, but my 4 year old Asus gaming machine is still quite a powerful machine and hasn't been updated outside of SSDs. It would fetch a few hundred bucks, probably 40% of its original price, and it doesn't have a cult following willing to pay a premium for...whatever it is.
Used Macs remind me of used Jeeps.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#118I'm not 100% happy with where Apple is at, but I don't think I ever was. But I'm not going to switch. I get the slickest hardware, great battery life, the best touchpad and keyboard, and a hi-resolution screen that doesn't have battery life, flicker, tint, or scaling issues. Windows is still...Windows. The bash subsystem is half-baked. Windows itself is still the same mess. Docking is still a joke. Performance is ter…
The bash system is incomplete when compared to native Linux, but it's still really good for anything that is purely userspace. I haven't had a userspace issue in many months, and it's only getting more complete over time.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#119After 15 years of using a Mac exclusively for my audio recording/editing/mixing tasks, I'm going to probably build a small Windows system for Ableton Live and Protools for at home. Concerts will still use a Mac, but for having an actually powerful and expandable desktop? There simply isn't an option anymore.
Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up
#120I wouldn't say it's panic time yet, but I do get the feeling that Apple isn't terribly interested in desktop Mac hardware and software. Microsoft could have been said to have been there a few years ago, but they seem to be doing rather better on desktop now.
This article actually prodded me to try out the Windows Subsystem for Linux, and so far it seems pretty nice. Everything I've tried to install has worked so far, and worked fine with my standard Unix config files.