Why buy a Mac?

[Chip Fossa]

But no one, yet, has specifically stated why a Mac is better or worse than a PC; and viceversa.

What I mean is - specifics; average Joe terms;

Give some REAL examples. Try to keep the computerese to a minimum. Tell it in real language.

Thanks, all.

Chipper

[Randy Phelps]

-no known successful viruses.
-easier to use.
-higher ratings for apple tech support than any pc company (5 years in a row)
-ilife software is included and simple for people to use photos, music, movies, podcasts
-macs last a long time and run the latest OS. machines that are 4 years old still -can run the latest released software.
-apple consistently wins every industrial design award available in the computing industry
-simple backup and restore
-cost effective
-comes ready to use no adding a bunch of hardware or cards or drivers
-all major third party printer drivers pre installed plug in the printer, select it, print.
-built in camera to make those groovy youtube videos and 'web chats!'

[Wiz Feinberg]

-no known successful viruses.

Wrong! See my post about the Zlob Trojan, with a Mac browser exploit and Mac installer.

[Randy Phelps]

Wiz,
This is FUD on a whole bunch of fronts.

If one compares the virus, trojan horse, malware threat on the Windows platform to linux, macos, beos (since you referenced it in your other thread) and all others... lumping the others in with Windows as needing virus protection is actually laughable statistically. Like buying tornado insurance in California... Sure, there has been 'A Tornado' but we don't have tornadoes in California.

Even the case you cite is a 'theoretical' exploit not a known exploit. These are generally posited as 'public service' measure by the good people who.... SELL VIRUS PROTECTION software. The poster asked for quick, non technical reasons to buy a mac, I would submit that Macs do not have a virus problem... and if you go hunt the 'net or your customer base you'll find that mac users DO NOT complain about virus problems. Heck, you can scour the net to find someone whose user experience was hampered by malware, viruses, trojan horses on a mac... on a pc you won't have to leave your block.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fasterfo ... ks_li.html

[Dave Potter]

The poster asked for quick, non technical reasons to buy a mac

And your response, at least on the surface, made some sense to me. But I remain unconvinced.

Aside from all the alledged "advantages" of switching from a PC to a Mac, the over-arching issue remains; why do Mac users remain a small minority of the total universe of personal computer users?

If Macs are superior in so many ways, why doesn't the marque simply eclipse the PC, and become the majority machine? It ain't happening. Why not?

Are we "PC users" just so incredibly unenlightened we can't appreciate the "obvious advantages" of switching? A direct yes/no answer is OK, long as you provide a little substantiation.

[Randy Phelps]

Okay, this will be my last post in this thread....

First, I wasn't trying to convince you of anything. I was just giving you as clear of information as I could with the requirements you set forth and I took it that you are a novice who wanted straight information without the minutiae (wiz's 1 trojan horse = virus threats) I had no idea you were trolling.

BMW represents 2% of the world market in automobiles. They are generally regarded as a very fine car maker. Why don't they dominate the market? There are vast flame wars over this topic. The answer is that it is a complicated calculus that determines that and not simple math. In recent news apple's market share has increased in the US from 2.7% to 8.0% for an established market any businessman would tell you that is a remarkable sign of growth. Successful businessmen would say unprecedented.

As for success: Apple now has a larger Market Capitalization (would be worth more if they sold themselves as a whole company) than Dell (Apple is twice as large now,) HP and so on. They are closing the gap with Microsoft.

As far as the 'unenlightened' part of your post, I think you are making the issue emotional when it needn't be. There are many books and resources about what took place from say 1975 to the present and there are a variety of reasons why windows became the dominant OS. As far as hardware manufacturers go we've watched as great companies have had success, stumbled, got up, and moved on. Of the hardware manufacturers, Apple has the longest string of profitablilty of any of those manufacturers, they have been consistent. At some point, Dell will make a comeback although they have had to significantly restructure and will continue to have to do so, if they are to succeed and not end up the way Gateway has.

All the consumers arguing on message boards is beside the point. Unfortunately, the average consumer will make choices and form opinions but those opinions are not the whole story by any stretch... I have seen items in the paper where a conclusion has been drawn based on faulty information and thinking... and a lot of the time the need for reductionism, the need to make the issue so simple (or the perception that things needed to be simple) lead to a whole bunch of incorrect conclusions. In Wiz's statement that Mac's like windows get viruses... it is a classic case of information that is correct but creates a conclusion that is incorrect. The number of Macs which have contracted the virus? well, none. But they could.. so we should be scared and we should conclude... yup, computers get these dang viruses. Compare that to the amount of time a windows box needs to be on the internet without virus protection before it gets a virus. At maximum, a few minutes. To make an analogy it would be like telling people do you have a bathtub? You could drown in the tub, it could happen... vs. Are you in a 15' sailboat with a hole in it in a big storm? Can you drown in your tub? sure. but it is not as likely as the second scenario. The good news.. most people don't drown or they reformat and go on... when it gets bad enough and enough metrics come together we will see even more dramatic changes.. until then we'll muddle along.

Everyone in business knows that whoever wins in China will have installed base but could still lose in the market cap arena which is the one that matters. Stock price is the key in the business, market share and market growth drive that number but it is growth year over year that actually matters. If you hold MS or Dell stock the past 2-3 years have been pretty slow years... even scary years based on performance.

It is not about being unenlightened at all. People ought to have choices and some folks will choose a premium product and their needs will be met by Apple. for others PC's are fine and windows work great or at least well enough... others want linux and they should have it. I NEVER tell people what they should buy... if they ask what I would buy I'll tell them that. If they ask why I make the choices I do, I'll share that.

As to your last question I'd answer it this way. For some folks as long as a commodity is 'good enough' and meets their perceived needs.. it is good enough and they need not look farther. The list of needs for people is different. For a large majority of people they have been exposed to windows and they find it good enough and they accept it and use it and are presumably satisfied enough. Now, since I work in the industry and am around users of all kinds all day I can tell you and you can probably verify this... a good number of people are mildly to greatly unhappy with their windows experience... but not enough to change. So, they stay with it...

there are not very many unhappy mac users... certainly not the ratio that exist in the windows world of total users to unhappy users. Since we have seen the market share shift by so much in the past year it stands to reason (and research) that there are a number of folks who have finally had a mac experience (via the ipod) and want to expand it.

I hope I didn't imply that the reasons people choose their computers is simple by any stretch... it is complicated and has a long history. People do get really emotional and upset about all this... I have worked with a lot of scientists, engineers, musicians, writers, film makers, essentially creative people and it is my experience that the preponderance of them are mac users. It used to be that macs were more expensive and that was the reason. The price of macs has dropped significantly in the past two years and now if you take like configurations and compare among manufacturers the price is pretty close.

Historically, there used to be software that was available on the pc that was not made for the mac. That made the choice for a lot of people. But, that too has changed...

After this I think I will try not to read the computer section of the forum... I honestly thought you were looking for help not a debate. oh well.

[Joe Butcher]

The poster asked for quick, non technical reasons to buy a mac

And you gave some that, and your response, at least on the surface, made some sense to me. But I remain unconvinced.

Aside from all the alledged "advantages" of switching from a PC to a Mac, the over-arching issue remains; why do Mac users remain a small minority of the total universe of personal computer users?

If Macs are superior in so many ways, why doesn't the marque simply eclipse the PC, and become the majority machine? It ain't happening. Why not?

Are we "PC users" just so incredibly unenlightened we can't appreciate the "obvious advantages" of switching? A direct yes/no answer is OK, long as you provide a little substantiation.

Dave, I've chatted with you before, you seem like a good guy, and I'm not trying to bust b***s here, but you asked this same question once before, and had it answered.......dont know why you would ask it again.

[b0b]

I use both, and the main difference I see is that my PCs are cluttered with little junk programs that run in the background. Most of this is stuff that I didn't ask for and don't know anything about, and it slows the computer down. You have to be really vigilant to avoid all of the crap.

Most of the software on my Mac was written by Apple. The exceptions are Firefox, BIAB, Eclipse and Dreamweaver, all very reputable programs that I installed quite deliberately. There's no extra 3rd-party hardware drivers with bundled "convenience" software that may or may not conflict with the video card, my camera, my PDA or my sound card.

I don't know why, but it seems that every piece of PC hardware includes a whole bunch of unnecessary bundled software, and it's all crap. You have to install the driver, and all this garbage comes along with it. I swear, some of these programs try to "phone home" every 5 minutes. I get prompts to update software that don't even tell me what software is being updated. Prompts to update stuff I never heard of. Stuff I never use.

This simply doesn't happen on a Mac. Not yet, anyway.

[Dave Potter]

you asked this same question once before, and had it answered.......dont know why you would ask it again.

It's rather simple, actually, Joe.

I ask it again because it keeps coming up again and again, and the Mac users keep trotting out all the same subjective reasons they like their Macs.

Preference is fine, but it doesn't tilt the scale and speak to the question when someone asks if they should buy one or not, based on *objective* reasoning. My favorite "reason" for owning a Mac is "they don't get viruses". Hell, the reason they don't is there aren't enough of 'em out there to make it worth a hacker's time to write the code.

You will note that I've neither made any positive comments about Windows-based machines, nor any negative ones about Macs. I simply asked direct questions, questions which seem to strike a sensitive nerve among Mac users anytime anyone challenges their sacred cow. I find all the quasi-religious fervor within the Mac community mildly amusing.

[Dave Potter]

I use both, and the main difference I see is that my PCs are cluttered with little junk programs that run in the background. Most of this is stuff that I didn't ask for and don't know anything about, and it slows the computer down. You have to be really vigilant to avoid all of the crap.

Some of what runs in the background on a Windows box is required by the OS, as you probably know, B0b. Some Windows "services" are essential, and some aren't. Those that aren't can be disabled. If what you're referring to are the application "try-out samples" that often come installed on a new PC, I totally agree with you, they're crap, and I get rid of them first thing. I've been building my PCs for years, and I make the decisions as to what software gets loaded, so I don't have that problem.

I don't know why, but it seems that every piece of PC hardware includes a whole bunch of unnecessary bundled software, and it's all crap. You have to install the driver, and all this garbage comes along with it.

That's not really true. Nearly always you're given an option to install only the drivers, if that's your preference. If you decide later to add other "features" included with the package, just re-run the install program again, and you'll normally be offered that option.

I swear, some of these programs try to "phone home" every 5 minutes.

Well, "every 5 minutes" is probably an exaggeration, but the "call home" activity can usually be controlled in a setting somewhere.

I get prompts to update software that don't even tell me what software is being updated. Prompts to update stuff I never heard of. Stuff I never use.

I never have that problem on my system. Again, automatic updates are optional; you don't have to allow them to take place. But, any update that I permit always tells me what it is, and my preference is to have it ask me if I want to download/install the update before it does it. It strikes me as odd that you get update activity you can't identify. I wouldn't want that either, and if it happened to me, I'd find out what it was and stop it.

[Wiz Feinberg]

When I posted the link about the malware threat to Mac computers I wasn't trying to pick a fight. My business revolves around fixing virus and spyware problems, like the Zlob trojans. The question as to whether this exploit is just theoretical or actively being exploited in the wild should not detract from it's seriousness. I consider Mac OS to be a strong contender because one does not run as root, except when required to install or remove something system-wide. The same applies to *nix systems. But, if a Mac user is tricked, by social engineering, into allowing the elevation of privilege to administrator/root level, this type of malware will install itself and take control of his computer. That is why I issued my warning to use caution, even if you use a Mac computer. This new variant of Zlob has a Mac installer and it will invade if allow to run.

That said, I too would become a Mac user if all of my regularly used applications would run on that OS; but most of them won't. This is a problem that can only be solved by the software companies involved in writing those programs. Unless they write Mac compatible installers and support files I am forced to use a Windows OS.

Should that day arrive, when my preferred applications are rewritten to run on Macs, I may consider buying one. I admire their stability.

[b0b]

Some of what runs in the background on a Windows box is required by the OS, as you probably know, B0b. Some Windows "services" are essential, and some aren't. Those that aren't can be disabled.

How is the user to know what is essential and what is not?

If what you're referring to are the application "try-out samples" that often come installed on a new PC, I totally agree with you, they're crap, and I get rid of them first thing.

Why should someone who buys a new computer have to wade through all of that crap, making decisions on each piece of foreign software?

I've been building my PCs for years, and I make the decisions as to what software gets loaded, so I don't have that problem.

Most people don't know how to build their own computer.

Nearly always you're given an option to install only the drivers, if that's your preference.

There's no consistency at all. The options are meaningless because the user doesn't know what the software is, and whether he needs/wants it or not. Most often, the default is to install everything. How is a user to know what is necessary?

If you decide later to add other "features" included with the package, just re-run the install program again, and you'll normally be offered that option.[

There's no consistency on what is "normal" behavior for bundled software. None. It's up to the vendor.

Well, "every 5 minutes" is probably an exaggeration, but the "call home" activity can usually be controlled in a setting somewhere.

If you know that it's happening, and if you know what program is doing it.

I never have that problem on my system. Again, automatic updates are optional; you don't have to allow them to take place. But, any update that I permit always tells me what it is, and my preference is to have it ask me if I want to download/install the update before it does it. It strikes me as odd that you get update activity you can't identify. I wouldn't want that either, and if it happened to me, I'd find out what it was and stop it.

Of course, but why should a user have to roll up his sleeves and dive into the computer's innards to figure this stuff out?

My daughter had more than a dozen little icons in the bar at the bottom right of her Windows XP computer. I asked her why she had all that stuff. She said "I don't know what they are, and I'm afraid that if get rid of any of them something will break." The computer finally got to be so slow that it was painful to use. She bought a Mac, and now she's very happy. No more crap.

Where did all of that stuff come from? Web sites, mostly. Active X games, social software and media player gadgets that installed via IE's open door, with big hooks to marketing organizations pitching ads at her. Yes, she should have been more vigilant, but her computer allowed these invaders with a minimum of action on her part.

One final example. I was at The Weather Channel's web site the other day. They told me that I could install a little icon in my tray that would show me the temperature outside here in Cloverdale. Cool, I thought. I'd like that. I pushed the install button.

Five minutes later I had a full-blown app installed that opens a Window with a myriad of options and advertisements. This is the "Control Panel" for the 64 pixel square in the system tray? It runs every time my computer starts, to make sure that I see the ads. I uninstalled it, of course. The gadget doesn't need it. But my point is that a typical user wouldn't know how. Multiple items were installed when thought I was only consenting to install a little RSS-driven thermometer. I was lucky that the software included an uninstaller at all.

Maybe things like that are possible on a Mac, but I've never had it happen. Invasion attempts are "the norm" on PCs, and "the exception" on Macs. It's not subjective, religious fervor that makes me prefer Apple computers. It's my accumulated experience of using both systems every day for several years.

[Jack Stoner]

A comment on one reason MAC's only have a niche market.

I used to work for a large Federal Goverment Agency and managed one of 7 Network and hardware help desk sites across the US. Being in the Management/Technical position I was in I got a lot of info, and even had some input and did some hardware evaluation, when it was decided to upgrade the "dumb" terminals at the agency's field and teleservice center offices to PC/LAN systems. A lot of very detailed investigation and testing was done just to determine what type of LAN protocol was best for our Agency's requirements. Token Ring was selected over Ethernet for many reasons, but primarily because it was more orderly and had more network management supervisory capability. Ethernet is more widely used, but for that agency the Token Ring LAN archetechure was rated best by a very large margin (Token Ring in LAN archetecture is sort of like the MAC in the PC world).

They also did a very in depth study of PC platforms and for the Agency's mission Microsoft's NT4/Microsoft Office was selected over MAC, Unix, etc for the Agency's PC platform (the contract that was eventually awarded called for 55000 workstations (PC's), along with the Microsoft Client Server platform for the Server at each office (1500 LAN systems). The Microsoft Client Server won out over Novell, which we had some interim sites running on (and I was Novell 3.12 CNE certified at the time).

Had the MAC been in the "mainstream" of commercial office use (and not just to the one Federal Goverment application I mentioned), we may well have seen a much larger piece of the PC 'pie" or even the predominant PC's, rather than just occupying a small niche.

[Joe Butcher]

woops

[Dave Potter]

How is the user to know what is essential and what is not?

B0b, it's been my experience that if I try to disable an essential Windows service, a prompt appears advising me to that effect.

Why should someone who buys a new computer have to wade through all of that crap, making decisions on each piece of foreign software?

I suppose that would fall under the mantle of free enterprise, commercialism, whatever you want to call it....software houses, Microsoft included, are free to push whatever they have to offer to the public, just as any other advertiser does. You don't have to like it, and you don't have to accept it. Deal with it, and get rid of it, if that's your preference. But, that's the way of the world. People try to sell you things, using whatever means they have available.

Most people don't know how to build their own computer.

You may be right - most people don't know a lot of stuff. But for those who want to know, the information is easily accessible on the web.

There's no consistency at all. The options are meaningless because the user doesn't know what the software is, and whether he needs/wants it or not. Most often, the default is to install everything. How is a user to know what is necessary?

B0b-please believe me that I'm being sincere here. I stand by what I stated on this. Maybe it's that I've developed a sense for which options to check during these Windows-software install routines, and you haven't, coming from the Mac environment. I just don't know. But I install "drivers only" when that's what I need, and I install more than that when I know I want other functionality. I don't know how to say it better than that. It works for me.

The Windows "Add/Remove" programs applet (or whatever it's called in "your" version of Windows) also commonly provides the ability to add/remove features of Windows software when there's more than simply drivers involved. It takes a little experience, but there are user-options available once something is installed, either entirely, or partially. It's not a lost cause.

There's no consistency on what is "normal" behavior for bundled software. None. It's up to the vendor.

I'm not going to get into what's "normal" for every vendor on the planet, B0b, but, suffice it to say, IT CAN BE HANDLED. A savvy Windows user who knows his way around the campus isn't flummoxed by this sort of thing.

Of course, but why should a user have to roll up his sleeves and dive into the computer's innards to figure this stuff out?

For more gracious living?

My daughter had more than a dozen little icons in the bar at the bottom right of her Windows XP computer. I asked her why she had all that stuff. She said "I don't know what they are, and I'm afraid that if get rid of any of them something will break." The computer finally got to be so slow that it was painful to use. ....Yes, she should have been more vigilant, but her computer allowed these invaders with a minimum of action on her part. She bought a Mac, and now she's very happy. No more crap.

Well, that calls for a happy meal, doesn't it? Problem solved. I'm sure the question of PC vs Mac will forevermore not appear here on the forum.

Not. But that brings us back, full circle, to the question of why are so many people in the world (yes, the world) using PCs? Why can't they understand the obvious and overwhelming advantages of switching to a Mac? Inquiring minds want to know.

Where did all of that stuff come from? Web sites, mostly. Active X games, social software and media player gadgets that installed via IE's open door, with big hooks to marketing organizations pitching ads at her. Yes, she should have been more vigilant, but her computer allowed these invaders with a minimum of action on her part.

All "that stuff" came from naive and indiscriminate access to web-based content without the requisite knowledge to understand what to permit, and what to deny. It's that simple, B0B. Most knowledgeable Windows users aren't facing those kinds of issues every day. We know better. We know what not to do. It's about internet sophistication.

I was at The Weather Channel's web site the other day. They told me that I could install a little icon in my tray that would show me the temperature outside here in Cloverdale...Five minutes later I had a full-blown app installed that opens a Window with a myriad of options and advertisements.....But my point is that a typical user wouldn't know how.

In all avenues of life, there will always be those who "don't know how". That's a non-player.

Maybe things like that are possible on a Mac, but I've never had it happen. Invasion attempts are "the norm" on PCs, and "the exception" on Macs. It's not subjective, religious fervor that makes me prefer Apple computers. It's my accumulated experience of using both systems every day for several years.

As I've stated in other posts, my opinion is that the reason things like these are less likely to occur on a Mac (including virus/trojan attacks, etc) is simply that Macs are so much in the minority of the personal computer population that the malware-coders simply don't want to waste their time on them. If the proportion of Macs ever gets anywhere competitive with PCs in terms of percentage, get ready for an onslaught of all the same web-based threats we PC users have to deal with, and that goes for the software issues you point to as well.

[Joe Butcher]

I ask it again because it keeps coming up again and again, and the Mac users keep trotting out all the same subjective reasons they like their Macs.

And you keep trotting out the same question, which has been refuted more than once, though YOU'VE NEVER ADDRESSED THE REFUTATION. Your argument is known as the "appeal to popularity" argument, which is pure logical fallacy. Feel free to address the refutation at any time.

My favorite "reason" for owning a Mac is "they don't get viruses". Hell, the reason they don't is there aren't enough of 'em out there to make it worth a hacker's time to write the code.

I think being virus free is a great reason to own a computer. The reason why they are virus-free is not very important to me. And it is only ONE of many reasons to own a Mac. You seem to have singled out this ONE reason, as if it were the ONLY reason given. There were several other reasons stated. There are many more.

You will note that I've neither made any positive comments about Windows-based machines, nor any negative ones about Macs.

But you did take the time to make a snarky comment about Mac users here:

I find all the quasi-religious fervor within the Mac community mildly amusing.

and here:

I simply asked direct questions, questions which seem to strike a sensitive nerve among Mac users anytime anyone challenges their sacred cow.

I actually havent seen any "sensitive nerves" struck here. Randy Phelps made some deftly executed and very logical statements, and he sure didn't seem to be appealing to emotion.

Besides, this was a conversation about Macintosh computers. The topic was a guy who was considering switching to Mac.
It wasn't "I hate PCs because Macs are better"
You decided to chime in with your argument, for what reason I cant imagine. Again, if you are happy with the machine you use, why should you care about what other people are saying? Maybe you have a sensitive nerve about PCs??

By the way, I spent YEARS using windows based PCs before I switched to Mac. How much time have YOU spent using a Mac?? You've mentioned subjectivity several times, so how can you form an objective argument about something that you have no experience with?

[Joe Butcher]

Not. But that brings us back, full circle, to the question of why are so many people in the world (yes, the world) using PCs? Why can't they understand the obvious and overwhelming advantages of switching to a Mac? Inquiring minds want to know..

It seems it dosent matter how many times that question is answered for you, Dave, you just keep on asking it anyway.

[Andy Sandoval]

Does a Mac have features such as "defrag" "system restore" or "disk cleanup" like a PC? Is it possible to reformat the hard drive on a Mac? or do you ever even need to? I've learned enough about PC's to keep mine goin pretty good with regular maintenance and an occasional reformat but find the Mac's an interesting alternative.

[Jude Reinhardt]

I'm like a kid in a candy store. Keep finding neat things that I like about this thing. I've been playing with it since Friday morning and have been able to solve any problems that cropped up. I could receive email but couldn't send, fixed that ok and had a cd that wouldn't eject. Had to go to the little book "Everything Mac" for instructions to remove the cd. A couple of easy steps and it was out. The only maintainence instructions I've found so far is how to use the neat little "Apple embossed" cleaning cloth to clean the monitor screen. Got the printer (Samsung) installed today, no problem. Got a several year old H-P scanner that I'm going to try and install tomorrow. At this point I have no "buyer remorse" about the extra dollars spent to have a Rolex instead of a Timex, oops, I mean a Mac instead of a PC. A little humor there, very little for some I imagine.
I didn't mean to ruffle any feathers with my original post, was just curious. My question was answered to my satisfaction and I'm happy with my decision. We can let this puppy wander off the bottom of the page if you want. Or not.

Jude

[b0b]

B0b-please believe me that I'm being sincere here. I stand by what I stated on this. Maybe it's that I've developed a sense for which options to check during these Windows-software install routines, and you haven't, coming from the Mac environment. I just don't know.

I'm not "coming from a Mac environment". I've been developing applications for Windows since version 3.1. I've used an MS-DOS or Windows computer nearly every day for the past 22 years. So, I stand by what I've stated as well. If you haven't used a Mac in the past 5 years, you really can't understand the difference.

The Forum runs on a Mac now, BTW. I switched it to a Mac Mini last December, with a 500 GB RAID drive. It's been trouble-free.

[Jon Bergh]

I can do essentially anything I want on a Mac, or in Windows, or with some flavor of Linux.... but it all comes down to what really matters:

I use a MacBook Pro because it looks so darned cool.

[Don Walters]

I'm posting this strictly for information. It represents my first foray into the world of Apple/Macintosh. I have 25 years experience with PCs, DOS, Windows (all versions), Linux servers, Novell Netware, etc,etc, blah, blah. Prior to buying an iMac a few months ago, I had a total of 1 hour on a Mac. I had no need for Mac because I had no customers that owned Macs.

On June 5th of this year my new iMac arrived. I quickly learned to love the GUI and OS X! In fact the first thing I did that pleased me was open a terminal window and SSH to a remote server I still manage. Piece of cake! Great stuff!
BUT

Aug 13th I went into my office and the screen was black. "Cool ...power saver must have kicked in". Nope. No video. Took it to the shop. They fixed it ... got it back 12 days later.

Sept 13th (BTW I'm not superstitious ) went to the office ... no video. Took it to the shop ... got it back 21 days later.

Last Friday, Nov 2 - reading SGF, suddenly it shuts down, no power. Try to turn it on, it powers up .... OK good .... works another 3 minutes, powers down, won't start up again. Took it back to the shop. Tech guy calls me an hour later, it started fine for him, but he'll let it run over the weekend. Calls me this AM (Monday 5th) "seems to be working". I took it home, started up fine .... browsing the net (actually reading SGF) .... whole system locks up! Power down, restart, desktop comes back, my aliases (shortcuts) are there, the Dock is there, menu bar at the top, mouse works fine .... nothing is clickable! The only thing "live" is the mouse pointer.

OK, enough! This time I call Apple Care. On hold for 15 minutes until "first level" support took my call. Spent 20 minutes going over the issues with the tech guy. He was very courteous and professional. After the 20 minutes of discussion and him (apparently) making detailed notes about everything we discussed, he asked what resolution to my 3-time problems I would prefer. Took me about a microsecond to say "I want a new machine". Then he said he will pass the issue to a higher up, after indicating he thought my chances were very good! And that's where it stands right now. As I post this, he and I are on hold waiting for the next person to answer. We're about 25 minutes into a predicted 40 minute wait for the new guy "they're very busy with Leopard issues" ... that's the new OS X version.

I'll let you folks know the final resolution to this. If it's to my satisfaction, I will be sold on the Apple company. I could have waited before posting this, but I needed something to do while on hold.

[Joe Butcher]

I'm like a kid in a candy store. Keep finding neat things that I like about this thing. I've been playing with it since Friday morning and have been able to solve any problems that cropped up.

Really glad you're digging your machine Jude. If you ever have ANY questions at all, or just want to know some fun things to do with your iLife apps, hit me up.
Be creative and have fun!!!

JB

[Dave Potter]

The Forum runs on a Mac now, BTW. I switched it to a Mac Mini last December, with a 500 GB RAID drive. It's been trouble-free.

OK. It's a done deal then. Macs forever more.

Damn, I'm tired of all this "my stuff is better'n your stuff" crap.

[Joe Butcher]

Dont know how many of you have switched to Leopard yet, but I have and I'm curious to hear what others think. So far I love it, but there has been an occaisional problem with a "dissapearing pointer" which I can overcome by activating expose.
Im sure theyll issue an update soon.

I think "spaces" is cool, and time machine is super easy to use, but I am gonna get a virgin HD before using it. There is some new eye candy that I like too, like in iChat, whcih now allows you to share desktops with other users, as well as share movies, slideshows and other files with fellow iChatters. Oh and there are some cool improvements in Mail too, mostly fun stuff like templates.

There was no real need for me to install leopard......Tiger was just fine.......guess I just wanted the wow factor, plus its always fun to see what new things theyve come up with.