Why use Windows

[belvdr]

The fact that one box has shiny stickers on it and goes "woosh" when he opens it really isn't relevant.

Amen. This statement has made my day.

 

[EricTheRed71]

As a matter of fact, I did try, Oh the wizard popped up, then the installer. Oh boy, the wizard, showed it face again. What a f..ked up sytstem, I have been on a Windows machine for 2 weeks,how do you guys stand it? What a piece of sh.t, operating system. Slows down when more than one app open, that closing of apps when hitting the 'X' in the window, boy that is innovation. The file system is weak, the hours trying to figure out XP and using the 'find" function. Who thinks like this? I guess is you have used Windows and nothing else then it works. What a piece of crap. Oh I am not 12 yrs old thank you, EricTheRed71.

[shakes head....]

If the wizard "popped up" then it means that a piece of hardware wasn't installed correctly. Surely you can't blame Windows for wanting to correct an error?

Maybe if you calmed down & ranted a little less you would not run into so many problems in Windows.
For what it is worth, I think OSX is great.... but there are things in Windows that would improve it, & things that have been in Windows for years that are only just creeping into OSX......

boy that is innovation.

Indeed.

 

[Dane D.]

EricTheRed71:
Maybe if you calmed down & ranted a little less you would not run into so many problems in Windows.
For what it is worth, I think OSX is great.... but there are things in Windows that would improve it, & things that have been in Windows for years that are only just creeping into OSX......

You're right I need to calm down, but you sit in front of a PC and try and do work on it. After 16 years of nothing but Macs, I think I can rant. If I could, I would use my Macs to do the work, but the client insists on PC only, and PageMaker to boot (program is worthless). I have PageMaker for Mac but when they issued their orders for no more Mac produced work that just took me over the edge.
I started this thread knowing I would incur the wrath of Windows users and some Mac users. I still maintain my original assumption that for the average home user, Macs are better. As for the original question "Now without including games and MS Office, tell me why would any sane individual use Windows." I still don't understand why people would use a PC. I realize cost is a factor in many cases, but the cost is only piece of the equation. Games, I wanted to throw that out because that is all I see when PC fans respond to threads. MS Office was not allowed because I believe most people don't buy the full suite. And it takes MS apps out of the process of answering (not a fan of MS or B. Gates, history's greatest snake oil salesman).
I have another example of why I wouldn't own a PC. My brother-in-law (non-computer person) picked-up a used PC from a local college professor. I was given the task of getting it to work. Well I did get it to work (re-formatted and clean install) for about a month. Then one day a week ago I was over there and went to shut down the computer, it tells me I have 2 people logged-on it, wtf, then I remembered, I didn't install the anti-whatever software, doh. Now on bootup, it does nothing but show the old DOS flashing cursor. I told him find somebody that knows PCs and maybe they can waste their time on it. Of course, I said this in a nice manner, and dropped a hint to look for a used Mac. Even his own son told him he should of got a Mac, I loved it.

 

[zephead]

then I remembered, I didn't install the anti-whatever software, doh.

LOL. Sorry, that just strikes me as funny. Windows without anti-whatever software?

 

[Mav451]

After 16 years of nothing but Macs, I think I can rant.

Dude you have no reason to use Windows. Your experience with Macs is nearly 3x longer than my experience with Windows, much less computers in general. Of course your habits, conventions would make this difficult. That said, I got it much easier, coming from Windows to OSX, hehe

 

[EricTheRed71]

You're right I need to calm down, but you sit in front of a PC and try and do work on it. After 16 years of nothing but Macs, I think I can rant. If I could, I would use my Macs to do the work, but the client insists on PC only, and PageMaker to boot (program is worthless). I have PageMaker for Mac but when they issued their orders for no more Mac produced work that just took me over the edge.

Dane,
I sit in front of a PC every single day & work on it. In fact I have 11 PCs here that have just finished an overnight 3dsmax render of thousands of frames. I haven't had to re-install XP on any of them in the last year. They don't nag me for updates - just switch the option off. No viruses, spyware etc - although that is probably because I have a hardware firewall. They just work with zero maintainence.
Sure if you have used nothing but Macs for 16 years then you will find it tough at first but it isn't because "Windows Sux", it's because it's unknown territory for you.
I've been using a Mac for 18 years (started with System 6) & have spent a lot of time & money on them. About 10 years ago I was forced into a situation where I had to use software that was only available on PC & ever since then have been using both. 11 PCs running XP, 1 G5.... I think you can guess where I spend most of my time working?

But like I said, chill out, take a deep breath, just accept that using a PC is a new experience for you & try not to get wound up by every little thing that's different to OSX.

 

[darkcurse]

...tell me why would any sane individual use Windows...

To remind myself how much I love OSX

 

[computadorian]

I stumbled on this thread looking for some info on OSX 86. Trying to get Mac to boot on a PC. I personally thing Mac OS is a wonderful OS, but the ignorant things I see Mac people post sometimes makes me want to reformat and go back to windows on that machine and forget about Macs. If you know how to use Windows you have no problems with it. If you know how to use Macs you have no problems with them. People who don't know enough about one of them... have problems. That's the basic problem here. For the one guy complaining about Dell.. you should never take a system straight from one of those "PC" companies and use it and compare it to a mac. If you want a comparison install 40 programs on a mac, start them at once and edit your startup so they do the same thing at startup, and now you have an idea what Dell does to the PC's they sell. First thing you do on one of those PC's is a fresh install of windows and then it's magically more stable and MUCH quicker. Also, if you build a PC yourself you get much higher quality components with much better performance. I just built a Core 2 Duo PC for a total $750 that will blow any Dell or "brand" machine out of the water. Anyone who knows about PC's knows those companies use stripped down, weaker, lower-quality parts, and acheive "stability" by disabling features. You can't compare systems like that. You need to compare to a PC running quality hardware (which can be had much cheaper if you build yourself than buying a Mac). In terms of OS's they are freaking the same. They do the same thing and they have slightly different interfaces. Both are reasonably stable now if you have any idea what you're doing and both can run efficiently or very bogged down. Some people like one interface more and some like the other more - find one more intuitive. That's wonderful, but that doesn't make one better or worse than the other. And fyi, I've met a lot of "common joe" users of both who have trouble with them cuz they don't know what they're doing. If you know a decent amount about computers, you should know enough to get either OS working well with ease. If you don't, don't blame the OS. And if you like one more than the other, that's called preference.

 

[weg]

An example, I had to copy four folders into the Shared Folder so I could access them. They totaled just over 5GBs, it took 23 mins to copy them, the drive is 50% open, with about 20 GBs left.

I'm not an expert on Windows (using OS X and Linux, mainly), but as far as I remember you can allow other users to access your user's data.
Your ranting sounds very much like "****ing Toyota, I had to push that car all way up that hill, in my Mercedes I can also drive uphill" - well, you can do that in a Toyota, too, but if you're too stupid to use the ignition key, it's your fault.

 

[FadeToBlack]

I stumbled on this thread looking for some info on OSX 86. Trying to get Mac to boot on a PC. I personally thing Mac OS is a wonderful OS, but the ignorant things I see Mac people post sometimes makes me want to reformat and go back to windows on that machine and forget about Macs. If you know how to use Windows you have no problems with it. If you know how to use Macs you have no problems with them. People who don't know enough about one of them... have problems. That's the basic problem here. For the one guy complaining about Dell.. you should never take a system straight from one of those "PC" companies and use it and compare it to a mac. If you want a comparison install 40 programs on a mac, start them at once and edit your startup so they do the same thing at startup, and now you have an idea what Dell does to the PC's they sell. First thing you do on one of those PC's is a fresh install of windows and then it's magically more stable and MUCH quicker. Also, if you build a PC yourself you get much higher quality components with much better performance. I just built a Core 2 Duo PC for a total $750 that will blow any Dell or "brand" machine out of the water. Anyone who knows about PC's knows those companies use stripped down, weaker, lower-quality parts, and acheive "stability" by disabling features. You can't compare systems like that. You need to compare to a PC running quality hardware (which can be had much cheaper if you build yourself than buying a Mac). In terms of OS's they are freaking the same. They do the same thing and they have slightly different interfaces. Both are reasonably stable now if you have any idea what you're doing and both can run efficiently or very bogged down. Some people like one interface more and some like the other more - find one more intuitive. That's wonderful, but that doesn't make one better or worse than the other. And fyi, I've met a lot of "common joe" users of both who have trouble with them cuz they don't know what they're doing. If you know a decent amount about computers, you should know enough to get either OS working well with ease. If you don't, don't blame the OS. And if you like one more than the other, that's called preference.

I'm not sure if you're talking about me or not, but I was complaining about the Dell that I had, so I figure you might be.

I definitely see what you're saying about Dell not using quality parts and bogging down their systems with a bunch of bloatware.

As a matter of fact, the guy I sold the Dell to ended up having nothing but problems out of it and traded it for a home-built PC and as far as I know, he's happy with it.

As far as OS X Vs. Windows, I just don't like the way Windows works. I just prefer OS X. Yes, Windows XP is pretty stable from my experience. I never had any problems with crashing or anything on my Dell. It was just way too slow and the Windows interface bugs me.

I just prefer Macs. I like the way they work. I like how most of the freeware/shareware you find is excellent. I like the dock. I like being able to install and uninstall by drag and drop. I like it when I put my flash drive in, it comes up on the desktop and doesn't pop up those little alerts and bug me. I like Dashboard. I like Spotlight. I like having one menu bar and not having to dig for the stuff in the actual app window. I like consistent keyboard shortcuts throughout just about every Mac app. I like Activity Monitor. I like being able to leave applications open and just hide them, rather than having Windows' crowded task bar. I could go on and on, but I think you see my point.

Bottom line is: if you prefer Windows, use it. If you prefer OS X, use it. I just can't stand Windows and prefer OS X. It's all good either way.

 

[hulugu]

...If you know how to use Windows you have no problems with it. If you know how to use Macs you have no problems with them. People who don't know enough about one of them... have problems.

This is oft repeated, but untrue; I've Windows for years and I've edited the registry, installed a new RAID array, etc. and yet, I still think Windows is a dog.

In terms of OS's they are freaking the same. They do the same thing and they have slightly different interfaces. Both are reasonably stable now if you have any idea what you're doing and both can run efficiently or very bogged down. Some people like one interface more and some like the other more - find one more intuitive. That's wonderful, but that doesn't make one better or worse than the other. And fyi, I've met a lot of "common joe" users of both who have trouble with them cuz they don't know what they're doing. If you know a decent amount about computers, you should know enough to get either OS working well with ease. If you don't, don't blame the OS. And if you like one more than the other, that's called preference.

First, I think anyone who think Windows is the same as OSX has problems differentiating between a hammer and a rock, but I digress. This whole thread is primarily about preference which remains important no matter how often you try to wave it away.

 

[ChrisBrightwell]

An example, I had to copy four folders into the Shared Folder so I could access them. They totaled just over 5GBs, it took 23 mins to copy them, the drive is 50% open, with about 20 GBs left. This is way too long.

Try copying 5GB from one place to another on a hard drive using any OS and it's going to take a while.

And the whole Shared Folder concept, what a crock. I work in a small business, when we want something from another Mac, we connect as the owner of the Mac. This way I can see and use everything, not just some Shared Folder.

Sounds like you don't "know" Windows, IMO.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_shares

Oh and copying to external ZIP drive on a PC, USB connection is dog slow.

USB or USB2? Of course USB is slow, but that's not Windows' fault.

I could go on and on about Windows methods, but you get my point. Now without including games and MS Office, tell me why would any sane individual use Windows.

There are a zillion reasons, but I get the impression that you're not terribly interested in an answer but are more interested in simple ranting.

 

[Dane D.]

ChrisBrightwell
Try copying 5GB from one place to another on a hard drive using any OS and it's going to take a while.

Doesn't take that long on a Mac.

Sounds like you don't "know" Windows, IMO.

You're right I don't, just started using a PC this year for one client. Never wanted to learn Windows or use Windows, but was forced to.

USB or USB2? Of course USB is slow, but that's not Windows' fault.

Just discoverd that the ZIP drive is a 250MB drive and am using 100MB ZIP discs, not a good mix. The USB is v2, even transfering files and folders over the network is slow IMO. From one PC to another PC.

There are a zillion reasons, but I get the impression that you're not terribly interested in an answer but are more interested in simple ranting.

That is my point of starting this thread, why use Windows when I can do anything on my Macs without the hassle. I have another example of PC madness. I setup a former employees PC that was passworded on login. O.K. how do you get rid of the password and change the former user. I Googled my question and found the answer. To paraphase: Insert WindowsXP install CD, boot off CD (F12), run repair and wait for Windows to re-install. Then at a specific point during that process hit Shift-F10, takes you into where you can change the user settings. Re-boot, log-in with new user name no password. That is BS, on a Mac maybe takes 5 mins. to do same thing in whole lot less steps.

 

[ReanimationLP]

Windows XP is odd.

The word start disappeared out of my start button when I rebooted.

 

[FadeToBlack]

Windows XP is odd.

The word start disappeared out of my start button when I rebooted.

Yep, that's weird. Back when I was ready to sell my Dell, I re-installed Windows and the this happened after using it a little while:

I think it fixed itself when I rebooted.