Ahhh. The distro wars. I remember my time fighting in them. My standard issue carbine could shoot holes in a GUI with lethal precision.
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PC Users Switching to Apple Silicon
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Ahhh. The distro wars. I remember my time fighting in them. My standard issue carbine could shoot holes in a GUI with lethal precision.
Crashes? No, not usually.
If you run a machine learning algorithm or certain kinds of statistical tests on an amount of data that large however, it will inevitably take the computer some time (usually a few minutes) to perform the calculation (although my Mac Pro's 12 threads help with this as my packages are decently multithreaded). During this time I can still usually do other tasks such as browse the web on the computer without it running to a halt though.
The only exception is I remember doing some more intense algorithms in my undergraduate classes where you'd basically have to leave them running overnight - these types of algorithms aren't as useful in contexts where you're trying to figure something out scientifically however. They're more useful for prediction, but they're generally unable to explain why they're predicting what they are. These algorithms are generally preferred by engineers and software developers who don't need to answer why.
Hi...
I’ve been using PCs exclusively since the late 80s and have never touched a Mac. I mean it. I genuinely have never laid a finger on a Mac of any kind.
My primary use is for business apps (O365) along with some light image/video editing.
i chose to change out my workhorse Surface Pro for a MacBook Air as I have been waiting for a mainstream ARM-based system capable of running a premium OS, so, when Apple announced Silicon I got very excited.
The reviews that I’ve read/watched confirmed what I have always believed... that ARM is the logical next step in personal computing.
I’ve been using PCs exclusively since the late 80s and have never touched a Mac. I mean it. I genuinely have never laid a finger on a Mac of any kind.
My primary use is for business apps (O365) along with some light image/video editing.
i chose to change out my workhorse Surface Pro for a MacBook Air as I have been waiting for a mainstream ARM-based system capable of running a premium OS, so, when Apple announced Silicon I got very excited.
The reviews that I’ve read/watched confirmed what I have always believed... that ARM is the logical next step in personal computing.
A complete beginner does not know what a computer or a mouse or a keyboard is. A complete beginner knows nothing.
The better way of saying this is it takes a lot less training for a complete beginner to learn to use MacOS to a satisfactory standard vs the same standard on Windows.
Also if you think of a physical office with physical files, maybe a filing cabinet and a trash bin. . . all these things exist in the same logical way on MacOS. They also existed on System 1. The same premise has not change in decades.
My own personal experience is back in the day as a littrle child using the MacOS System 5 and prior, I had zero issues learning it really quickly. From then till now, zero issues understanding what the different MacOSes need me to do. Windows on the other hand took a lot more effort to properly learn. Having to go through file manager and the recycle bin for starters and not able to just take a file on the desktop and move it to where I wanted to because it's a shortcut. Also things like memory management, not an issue today but back in the day it was an issue for Mac OSes and Windows. It was so much easier to just Get Info on the application to choose how much RAM to allocate it and also to go into the system preferences to choose how much of the HDD I wanted allocated to virtual memory (often called the swap disk or swap memory today). Much more complicated to do all of this on Windows.
The same base elements exist on MacOS and Windows. MacOS just makes them a lot more intuitive by relating them to every day things that people actually use. So much so that I've taught people 80+ years old to use MacOS for the first time. Some of them were post OS10. Others were preOS10, still on classic OS because that's the Mac they had at the time. As long as I made sure they had a list of what to do (which I wrote up) they were all good to go on their own. Trying this with Windows, still possible but much more complited and would have taken them much longer to use.
Though these days the gateway drug so to speak is iOS. Legit anyone can use iOS with little issue. Even someone who doesn't know what an iPad or application is. They can read the little sheet that comes with the device and fumble around for a bit and they'll eventually get it. Because iOS is a mostly closed sandbox, they will not screw up anything too major that can't be used.
Once they have mastered iOS, then the move to MacOS is a breeze. Will take some time, but it's not learning what everything on MacOS is as they know it from iOS. It's more learning the slightly different ways to do things. The Windows world doesn't have such a gateway OS. Android sure but Windows is functionally quite different and also Android is not as new user friendly because it's not a totally closed environment.
If you know what you are doing and have the time available to dedicate to it, I agree.
However if you do not know what you are doing, are new to computers or don't have the time to dedicated to this, pre built computers are great too. Build yourself is not better than pre built. Both are just different options which are both good for different people.
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I think this bit speaks much more to how greatly computing has advanced in general. I think we can all agree that memory management should be something the average use should never think about. Windows 98 / Mac OS 8 were both buggy, crashed a lot, and were very easy to mess something up. Today computers are pretty rock solid and both Apple and Microsoft have done a lot to make getting started using the computer much easier.
Likewise, Apple has done a lot to prevent users or bad software from doing things it shouldn't. In some ways certain customers hate this (e.g. Gatekeeper, mac app store, etc.), but it does help novices from making mistakes. Windows has made some steps in the right direction but is behind Apple on this. I'd argue if Microsoft did the same as Apple in this way, there would be much more backlash. Just my thoughts.
I know that feeling all too well, 30 odd years I’ve been waiting for the revolution. Ever since Acorn launched the Archimedes in the late 80’s. Well, closer to 20 years I suppose, when Acorn made the last RISC PC. Still have, and still use my A4000 with its, pretty decent at the time ARM250. Showing my age noo
Well just search for it then using spotlight. Top right in the menubar.
I realise this, but apps on Windows often leave crap all place when you do use the uninstaller.
The point is, no operating system is truly intuitive but I would argue that macOS is at least more consistent, both in design and functionality. Want to change a setting in Windows? Do I do it in control panel? The settings app? How about “Administrative Tools” (which looks like it’s straight out of Win2k), or should I directly edit the registry?
8 years after releasing the settings App with Windows 8 and its still not feature complete with control panel. This alone disqualifies Windows from even remotely being called “Intuitive”. Sorry, but this is just crazy.
Besides all this “intuitive” is subjective, meaningless and relative. I’ve been around long enough so that I distinctly remember the concept of using a mouse to navigate around the GUI to perform tasks being described as unintuitive by some.
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If I need to change a setting, I use google to tell me how to change it. This goes for macOS, iOS, Windows, Linux or any other operating system. Operating systems are too big to know how to do everything and nothing is intuitive because you need special operations to do all of that stuff.
Then get the New Book from David Pogue Mac Unlocked: Everything You Need to Know to Get Cracking in macOS Big Sur and it will be a great resource book to get going on the new Mac OS for the first time! It will make you almost full Mac Tech!
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That's the equivalent of buying a Corvette, wearing a polyester shirt unbuttoned to the waist, and sporting gold chains around one's neck.
Or just install Linux on it.
I know that feeling all too well, 30 odd years I’ve been waiting for the revolution. Ever since Acorn launched the Archimedes in the late 80’s. Well, closer to 20 years I suppose, when Acorn made the last RISC PC. Still have, and still use my A4000 with its, pretty decent at the time ARM250. Showing my age noo
Funny you mention that but I also have and occasionally use my old A4000. Obviously it's purely a retro machine now! I did however use RISC OS 5 as my only desktop OS until now. Not on an Acorn era machine though, but on a tiny little cube called the "mini.m" by Rcomp. Okay it's actually just a rebranded Cubox-i4 Pro.
Unfortunately RISC OS struggles with almost everything invented later than say 1994 so mmmh. You simply can't do everything on iOS, hence my move to this Mini m1.
So yeah: FINALLY a modern day OS that's not too terrible and quietly runs on ARM hardware.
This! When I was catching up on this conversation, this is exactly what that came to my mind.
As an example from my use, if I want to change mouse settings, I either go to the Setting app or to the Control Panel.
If you have used Windows before and are comfortable with it, then you can search and get to what you want (like changing the mouse pointer scheme or size). For someone new to Windows? I am sure they can figure it out (being new to someone doesn't make you less intelligent), but I can't see this leaving a good impression in anyone.
I use Classic Start to get the old Control Panel. I'm sure that tens of millions of others use it as well. You can get XP, 7 or hybrid mode.
Windows has a new task bar with weather, stocks, news in it which sounds great to me.
It will use Edge if you click on items. I think that Edge is fine but I prefer Firefox - why don't they let you use your own browser? Because the monetize your search commands.
I use Windows because I don't like Apple's hardware offerings for my workload right now. But, as has happened through Apple's history, it can change.
That's the thing with operating systems, it probably comes down to one of three things (well, maybe more) that dictate which you use. 1. Necessity, if the software you must run is only available on one operating system, go for that one. 2. Personal preference, we've all probably got one we prefer for one reason or another. 3. Price, the mass market probably just use whichever operating system comes with the computer they can afford - and lets be honest, looking at yearly PC shipments, that's low to medium cost Windows PCs.
I still run both, I have a Windows server still, just because and there's the occasional app I run on it which won't even work in parallels. Bootcamp yeah, but I don't use BootCamp, don't know why. I have a couple (ok, 44) of Windows laptops dating all the way back to DOS for old apps I use.
Then there's macOS, I love macOS, just a personal preference. I got so sick and tired of working with, programming, maintaining and updating Windows systems at work - and after work for half the bloody town - that I just couldn't face* using my own for work, and more importantly, pleasure that I decided to jump to the Macintosh a loooong time ago. Although the oldest working Mac I still have, and still use is my iMac G4 - loved that design.
So, I've evolved along with both Windows hardware and software since I was a kid, and with Apple, and therefore both ecosystems, since I was a young man - which was a long time ago.
They both have their ups and downs, but overall, for a system that's easier to use, work, and live with, the Mac gets my vote. Microsoft, in my humble opinion, have a long way to go still with their interface to catch up to Apple - though big changes are on the way, so we'll see what happens over the next year or two.
That's more than enough pointless waffling I think, morphine, medication which is essentially amphetamines and gallons of energy juice, is probably a bad combination
*I said face, but I wanted to write something that would show as a line of asterisks, so use your imagination
That's the thing with operating systems, it probably comes down to one of three things (well, maybe more) that dictate which you use. 1. Necessity, if the software you must run is only available on one operating system, go for that one. 2. Personal preference, we've all probably got one we prefer for one reason or another. 3. Price, the mass market probably just use whichever operating system comes with the computer they can afford - and lets be honest, looking at yearly PC shipments, that's low to medium cost Windows PCs.
I still run both, I have a Windows server still, just because and there's the occasional app I run on it which won't even work in parallels. Bootcamp yeah, but I don't use BootCamp, don't know why. I have a couple (ok, 44) of Windows laptops dating all the way back to DOS for old apps I use.
Then there's macOS, I love macOS, just a personal preference. I got so sick and tired of working with, programming, maintaining and updating Windows systems at work - and after work for half the bloody town - that I just couldn't face* using my own for work, and more importantly, pleasure that I decided to jump to the Macintosh a loooong time ago. Although the oldest working Mac I still have, and still use is my iMac G4 - loved that design.
So, I've evolved along with both Windows hardware and software since I was a kid, and with Apple, and therefore both ecosystems, since I was a young man - which was a long time ago.
They both have their ups and downs, but overall, for a system that's easier to use, work, and live with, the Mac gets my vote. Microsoft, in my humble opinion, have a long way to go still with their interface to catch up to Apple - though big changes are on the way, so we'll see what happens over the next year or two.
That's more than enough pointless waffling I think, morphine, medication which is essentially amphetamines and gallons of energy juice, is probably a bad combination
*I said face, but I wanted to write something that would show as a line of asterisks, so use your imagination
This is really well said. We all have our preferences, indeed. I find macOS to be snappier and faster for many tasks, but very unintuitive (again, personally). I'm much faster using Windows and so many things now are muscle memory where I still have to stop and think for macOS. It's like if someone switched your keyboard to Dvorak, yeah you could still type, but it's harder and frustrating. Once you learn, I'm sure it's better.
I wish people were more less political about tech. Unlike politics most people don't believe that using the "other" tech is somehow bad for society. In fact, everyone should want all companies to do well because it forces competition. 10-20 years ago chip innovation stalled because Intel didn't need to innovate, AMD was in the toilet, IBM didn't care to really optimize PowerPC and ARM was just getting started. Look how things have changed with AMD ousting Intel for x86 performance and these M1 chips totally destroying Intel. I'm happy to see and hope Intel catches up because we get more choice!
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Well put, and completely accurate. Competition isn’t just good, it’s absolutely essential to the continued development of the products we love. Whoever makes them.
I’m old enough to remember the stagnant computer situation 30 or so years ago. But a few short years later, with Apple releasing OS X and the iMac. Things slowly started to change. Things got interesting again, the market advanced and the technology started developing at a much higher pace, whichever side of the fence you were on.
I kind of have that feeling again with the release of the M1. It’s such a drastic departure that Intel and even AMD, who are, as you mentioned, putting out some excellent chips just now, will have to push their own limits.
This is so true. I haven't been excited about technology in a long while, but the M1 is really lighting a fire in computers again. Likewise for phones, I think the experimentation with dual and foldable screen devices is starting a trend of wild innovation again.
All in all, I love the M1. This coming from a PC user who hasn't bought a mac laptop since the PowerBook G4. It really feels like the future and I'm really excited to see where it goes from here.
Enjoy Dependency Hell!
And sh!tty power management performance on notebook computers!
And that world-class end user documentation quality that Linux is so well known for!
Since it's not apparent to you, one can actually use multiple systems sorta like legal polygamy. And just base usage on what you need to accomplish at that moment.
Yeah, I used Windows at work and Mac at home for 20+ years. Today I have both in my house as well as a Raspberry Pi 4 that can run Linux (which I despise as a desktop OS).
There are mobile devices as well that are neither Windows nor Mac.
Someday I will likely buy an Apple Silicon Mac but I'm not willing to put up with the early adopter nonsense right now. I'll wait for the hardware and more importantly the software to mature.
One thing for sure, it's doubtful that I will ever play a Resident Evil game title on an Apple Silicon Mac. Half-Life: Alyx? Forget it. But yes, I will upgrade my Mac mini 2018 (running Mojave) to ASi someday. Just not today. Nor tomorrow.
It's not a binary decision despite what you might believe.
