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Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

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Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#191

Post by alanfranzoni »

klurriplurrr wrote: post #107
ivraatiems wrote: post #81

Earlier 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.

I agree 100% with that. Microsoft stacked new features without deprecating old ones. Nowadays you can do things in 32 different ways; some ways are the same as they were in Windows 2000 and XP, but maybe some "advanced tweaks" are not available in the "old interface", so you need to struggle to find two different interfaces that achieve the same essential function.

This is, IMHO, a backlash of Microsoft's long update cycle. The yearly update Apple pushed to MacOS, along with free updates, allows for an easier deprecate-then-remove approach that gently transitions users from the old to the new approach. It's hard to do the same when people got used to an OS for many, many years. Maybe W10 with its "rolling" approach will suceed, btw.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#192

Post by wvenable »

quinndupont wrote: post #34

I'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…

This makes sense when the difference between a 3 year old Mac and a new one isn't that great.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#193

Post by johncolanduoni »

AsyncAwait wrote: post #75
bluedino wrote: post #41

I'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…

> Somehow I shut my laptop off and it booted backup to a failure message, I had to make another bootable USB and go online to find out how to do a fsck. I was using external monitors without issue for a month, and then one day the configuration changed to a point where I couldn't even use the laptop with it's built-in display. The sound and volume controls are a joke. I was prevented from installing any packages beca…

> These problems sound more like inexperience in using Linux to me than anything else. ... unless you somehow broke a whole lot of other stuff by deleting dependencies without really understanding what you were doing.

That's the problem right here. There's a vanishingly small percentage of people who can afford a laptop who are also willing and able to spend the time to gain "experience in using Linux". Sure it's much easier than it used to be, but it used to be a completely unmitigated disaster (I remember things like having to teach myself enough C to fix a wireless driver that didn't want to compile under a newer gcc version) so that's not saying much.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#194

Post by protomyth »

kharms wrote: post #180
protomyth wrote: post #44

Unlike the article, I'm not as interested in new features. I really want to stop having to type killall Finder because I dragged too many files. Its like Apple doesn't actually use its own products for day to day work. The whole "Save As" fiasco really screwed a lot of workflows which they sort of fixed later but not for Preview. Networking has also been a constant issue. I just wish I didn't keep putting in radars "…

>I really want to stop having to type killall Finder because I dragged too many files. For what it's worth, I think this will be addressed by the switch to AFS.

I don't think its the filesystem. Finder itself seems to be the problem and it started with Mavericks about the same time as AppleScript stopped updating the Finder windows without a close/open.

Another fun problem is copying a bunch of files out of a directory that Finder has currently opened and watch Finder go catatonic. I get the feeling someone did a lot of programming in Finder without proper testing.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#195

Post by otterley »

grub5000 wrote: post #165
otterley wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

Gaming, VR, upcoming 3D and Cortana are a few reasons I can think of why someone might pick Windows over MacOS. I think you're discounting the performance aspect as well - if workload X is too slow on the fastest mac, it may well still run on a windows machine since they can be specced higher. Cost isn't a factor for everyone - sometimes you literally just need the fastest possible machine, in which case Windows can…

> As a non-game developer...

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#196

Post by anonymoushn »

rayiner wrote: post #167
jmcdiesel wrote: post #17

I used to be hardcore windows guy... Then 10 years ago I got a mac. I never went back.. But what am I saving money for right now? To build a nice PC again. Mostly because of the exact reasons in the article. I have a fondness for apple... but they have definitely lost their way. First, they were a computer company driven by a man who loved computers ("first" here is the Jobs return era) ... then they became a Compute…

Buy a breakable USB cable? I've had MacBooks for 10 years, and I'm ecstatic to see MagSafe gone. Apple chargers have always been shit, and Apple laptops have never been compatible with off the shelf battery packs. Moving to USB-C and detachable, replaceable cables, is a huge step forward. Also, what PC alternative has a MagSafe equivalent?

Can you recommend magsafe-like USB cable that works with 2016 MBPs? When I looked for something like this I found only a cable made for the 12" macbook that could not charge my machine.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#197

Post by Mithaldu »

jorvi wrote: post #153
smt88 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure you're working off of recent, in-depth Windows experience? > 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. None of these things are universal among Windows machines. I can't remember which model, but a Verge review recently said that a Windows laptop had surpassed the best Mac (…

> None of these things are universal among Windows machines. I can't remember which model, but a Verge review recently said that a Windows laptop had surpassed the best Mac (in terms of hardware quality). Doubtful. Apple does crazy stuff like custom ACPI for Thunderbolt controllers so they can be very efficient. Or having each of the fins on a fan be at a different angle so they have a different pitch and fan noise i…

> Doubtful.

Honestly, it depends on what you're looking at.

In graphics power for example ALL macs suck. Even when you spend 5000$ on a workstation you barely get something that can hold even with top-of-the-line pc hardware.

MBP: 2977 - http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=Radeon+Pro+450...

iMac: 5714 - http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=Radeon+R9+M395...

Mac Pro: 5178 - http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=FirePro+W9000&... (in D700 variant)

Mind, the last one is a high-accuracy cad work graphics card, but if you're looking for raw graphics performance for 3d development for example, all of those are easily outperformed by a piece of kit costing 190$:

Any PC: 8508 - http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+GTX+10...

And thanks to Apple being Apple, upgrading is not an option.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#198

Post by toyg »

bradgessler wrote: post #164
jmcdiesel wrote: post #17

I used to be hardcore windows guy... Then 10 years ago I got a mac. I never went back.. But what am I saving money for right now? To build a nice PC again. Mostly because of the exact reasons in the article. I have a fondness for apple... but they have definitely lost their way. First, they were a computer company driven by a man who loved computers ("first" here is the Jobs return era) ... then they became a Compute…

I too have become annoyed recently at really basic stuff not working in macOS, like I can't drag and drop a picture out of Photos app into Pixelmator to edit. In fact, dragging and dropping a picture out of Photos into any application is completely broken and doesn't work. Its as-if the Apple QA team no longer tests to make sure their applications play nice with each other in a way that has been fundamental to deskto…

Photos overall is a trainwreck. Options are hidden and hard to find, anything beyond "tag this image with your auntie's name" is way harder than it should be... and this without ever mentioning the dreadful "I'll quit when I want to, not when you tell me to" backend process.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#199

Post by wvenable »

wtbob wrote: post #83

If someone wants a good development platform and is leaving the Mac, why not switch to Linux rather than Windows? Windows is IMHO not pleasant to use: the ads, the UI, the lack of speed. Linux is ad-free, pleasant & beautiful (with StumpWM anyway; Unity, GNOME & KDE aren't so great), and blazingly fast. Plus it's free software.

I've never seen an ad in Windows 10 -- but I installed a start menu replacement. Linux just simply can't support the hardware in my laptop appropriately, I don't do much gaming but I appreciate the option, and the subsystem for Linux is actually good enough for my needs. There are plenty of small issues that make Linux as-primary-OS not a great solution.

Re: Why I left Mac for Windows: Apple has given up

#200

Post by joombaga »

michaelmrose wrote: post #79
jmcdiesel wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says a lot. The desktop isnt a phone. Forcing phone features into a desktop and slowly turning the desktop into iOS is not a good thing. We were just fine without an app store. Just fine. I cant think of any of the "use this mobile feature on your desktop" that provides any real value...

If the mac allowed the "store" to have more than one source, allowed usage via cli and gui and didn't require a 30% cut most of your software would probably come from the store and it would be a good thing.

They'd have to remove the account requirement too. Just `appstore install foo`.
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