As someone who has moved from Mac to windows for my professional work I thought it worth mentioning a few things for others. My newest machine is a dual Xeon dell with 64gb ram, 1tb SSD and Nvidia 1080ti. My first modern pc was a custom build a few years ago at the end of 2014 as a transition to see if I could deal with windows - its a i7 4790 32gb 256gb ssd GTX 780 while I was still using my 5,1 hex mac pro thats in my sig. At the time the 6,1 had just been announced and I thought I cant wait 4 years for a new machine... so the transition started.
I have been pleasantly surprised with Windows 10, I wouldn't say its a joy to use but there are a number of features that make life very easy like the screen window management and dual monitor implementation. You can get third party plug ins for the mac which I ended up doing for my macbook because Ive got so used to it. Otherwise its mostly just slight differences in the way you use the OS its really not night and day like it used to be.
Both have similar features and work very similarly. There is an app selection window in the task bar where you can put most used programs just like the Mac OS dock, you can drag and drop files onto program icons etc etc its really not a clunky experience and being a mac user for the last 13 years I was up and running in a few hours. Barely any issues at all.
Windows 10 still isnt as reliable or as simple to use but on the odd occasion its nice to have a few more non dumbed down options.
With Adobe CC (which is my main use case) being multi platform its just a case of moving your preferences over downloading the programs and off you go, there is no user difference to using the software on either paltform. I find the suite runs faster on windows too especially lightroom, premier and after effects because you can tailor a machine to ensure these programs work optimally. Unfortunately apple dont supply these components so your stuck with ATI for graphics instead of CUDA.
Things I do miss are the continuity of the mac, iMessage etc etc and just the general lightness and ease of use of the mac. Things I dont miss, slow performance in the apps I use most and I saved some money. The saving allowed me to advertise my business more than I would and also the money went further so I ended up buying a new lens too. Regardless of how you look at it if you can get money to go further the earning potential is higher if you can get the same work done.
Ive been a mac user since 2005 basically since I started uni. Back then I was using custom built PCs and was really into building computers. I haven't used windows since XP and remember being so frustrated with it, super buggy and unreliable and it crashed a lot and the reason I moved to the mac was mainly because of this, spending hours on work then loosing half of it through software glitches. But I was a geek and liked to mess about with my machines which is the reason I didnt like the closed system of the mac.
As soon as I realised that I was tinkering more than working and I was starting a career where I relied on the tech to earn money I saw the value in the mac. Back in the day the software was so tailored to the machines that lower specs with OSX ran programs as well if not better than they did on my PC.
I made the move when Apple finally had a comparable machine with the Core 2 Duo machines and bought the most powerful top end 17" MBP at the time which i loved but was short stayed.
I thought I wanted a desktop replacement that I could take with me. I was blown away that I could have a laptop that outperformed my PC that I could dock with a 23" cinema display and take with me. I loved the way it looked and felt the performance was also good at the time but I hated how heavy it was and ended up not taking it to uni often as I had to walk about 3 miles and it was a real back breaker, add a drive the power brick and my books... it was heavy.
In the end I sold it and bought a 13" unibody macbook and a 2008 mac pro so I had the best of both worlds and tbh this was absolutely ideal for me. Since then I sold the 2008 MP in 2013 and swapped it for a 5,1 thats in my sig and upgraded it as far as it would go. This was because I was desperate for a new one. The 2008 got old really quick towards the end of its life and it was slow with slow PCI and Sata connections upgrading it was more difficult.
I was waiting for the 6,1 and was so so so underwhelmed when it was delivered I bought a 4,1 quad upgraded the firmware and put a hex in it. They were within 10% as fast as the hex 6,1 and I could put pereferals in it that was no possible with the 6,1. I ended up paying about £1200 all in for the machine which was a quater of the price at the time. I also dont remember TB2 being a big deal either, here in the UK you literally couldnt find any TB pereferals at all only the odd lacie HDD or spend a fortune having them imported by OWC.
I also sold the macbook for an 11" mba and absolutely loved that too, but it was stolen unfortunately in early 2017 and the 2016 macbook pros seemed an expensive joke that were the same benches as the 2015 model. I ended up getting the macbook as i was desperate for something and didnt really need the power just something I could use for data management.
Anyway back in 2005 there was such a shake up with the Intel switch and Mac OS was miles ahead with the built in productivity apps iMovie, iPhoto, iWork, also Aperture and Final Cut. Apples store presence in the UK was gathering pace too and everyone I knew used macs at uni including the uni, just made sense.
Apple offered so much cool unheard of stuff back then that essentially made the mac a go to for creatives. Now iMovie has sort of been left by the wayside, iPhoto and Aperture merged into photos which isnt really a replacement at all for anyone even slightly serious. Then of course the Adobe suit which ran super smooth on the mac and the light airy feel of OSX was so refreshing, I remember opening the laptop for the first time and Tigers opening sequence started and it was just like nothing I had ever seen, instant love for it.
There was some magic, I dont know whether its me getting old but the mac products feel a bit meh now, maybe because the market is so mature but nothing interesting is happening in the Apple camp and there seems to be innovation in other markets that apple is ignoring. The iPad still is essentially the same as it was in 2010 its still not a macbook replacement and the post PC era products seem to have started to decline because they haven't inovated the mac and ipad line together. Its been time for a long time.
Especially with iPads hitting the £1000 mark and being powerful they are held back by IOS and lack of pro apps and support with desktop apps.
There was always a lust for the apple products since I got the macbook pro and there was a time I bought every product and there was always a machine that almost seemed built for me, whether it was a powerhouse or a portable laptop. Now its not the same, everything has built in obsolescence and you have to pay more to get something similar as SSDs and ram are BTO. This has made similar products to the pre 2013 era roughly 30-40% more expensive and they arent any different they all have the same use case, just speed increases and things that really made the mac different like port selection and mag safe are gone.
The days when macs lasted for years is disappearing. My 2015 macbook struggles to run High sierra even youtube maxes it. Thats 3 years old and you can do nothing to improve it. Probably why they arent keeping their value, mine was 50% cheaper and a year old with 23 cycles. Ridiculous.
I feel like the transition to the compact obsolescence for the 6,1 had a bit of a ripple effect throughout the industry, it did especially for me. That one product that I was waiting for was such a disappointment and I think it was the beginning of the end, i was astounded at how they got it so wrong. Since then I haven't bought a new Mac at all. Its like once you cut the head off the snake everything for me lost its appeal.
The 5,1 was preowned because I couldn't get a new one, the macbook air was stolen so I bought a preowned macbook to cover me for a short time waiting for a better MBP.
Honestly I haven't wanted to part with my money because I haven't felt the products are worth it. The price hikes and every product is a BTO, nothing can be upgraded to extend the life of a product.
You look at a 2012 macbook pro, it was the last products you could upgrade and although they are a little long in the tooth now you can still use them with ram and SSD upgraded and it makes a huge difference, what happens in 6 years time for other products? When new tech comes along they will be literally useless like the standard 2012 does with a spinner and 2gbs of ram. My macbook will be useless come the next OS as it already struggles.
I would love to come back to the mac but there is nothing to come back to. Now I dont live in a bubble, breaking away from the closed system and opening my eyes and seeing what else is around has been really fruitful.
The iMac pro looks great but I wont buy a non upgradable machine for £5k to start, they are having an absolute laugh with that. My dell workstation isnt as fast but its within 10% and it was significantly cheaper and has dual cpus and I can upgrade them... same with everything else, it has 8 PCI, 8 ram slots, 4 for each CPU. It has 6 drive slots all internal storage no need to spend another £500 on a TB3 HDD enclosure because its all internal neat under the desk, same with the GPU and can just put another in... Instead of again adding another £500 for a GPU enclosure.
Nothing in the mac world can come close to that sort of upgradability. There are downsides to not using the mac but at the end of the day for a work machine I cant ask for more and the savings for my business means there is money for other aspects.
The iMacs are like toys in comparison with the only saving grace for me being the screen. Even so, once the macs life is up so is the screen so in my mind your better off investing in dedicated monitors.
I still use a mac as a personal machine as I love mac OS but for the time being im moving further away and cant see a product that will pull me back unless they make a hybrid like the surface book 2 or make the iPad a usable machine thats integrated into the mac ecosystem so I can use the pen like a wacom with a mac desktop.
It really wouldn't be that hard the tech has been available for years. Tim Cook has his head stuffed so far up his ass that hes blind sided, it will only have a ripple affect. If pros stop using the mac they will stop using IOS too and sales will reduce. They cant keep putting prices up to make up the deficit for market shrinkage forever...
The behavior of apple toward the mac has been shocking over the last 3 years, these users arent stupid and these products arent cheap. The fact they had no contingency plan, the iMac pro is a parts bin special, granted a very good parts bin special but its a reaction, not a well planned product and I dont think it would have been the same a few years ago. It should always worry potential buyers if a product was developed so quickly simply because its likely it will be the only one with no upgrade path. Its a stop gap to keep pros nothing else.
So basically a stop gap until the Mac pro is delivered. All this talk of you 'should buy it now' dont wait its not coming... marketing gimics to make people part with £5k now rather than later.
Its certainly an expensive stop gap.
The possible integration is years away and unfortunately I have moved on and many of my professional colleagues have too. Apple should be desperately trying to sort this storm out.
With all the above products its probably about £15k of investment for each pro customer, it will be hurting apple and I hope it does to make them realise. How ever doubtful that is.
I hope im wrong and this year sees the return of kick ass pro products. Until then there has been no option for a lot of people.
