Posted on 10/24/2009 4:16:49 AM PDT by Swordmaker
The one I want (15” non-glossy screen) is $1700 and change. Maybe they’ll come down some for Christmas. Don’t need it right away, so might as well wait and see.
Most of the programmers, DBAs, and system administrators that I know are perfectly able to maintain their own computers if they are given administrator logins and in small companies, it's not like people have a dedicated IT department to call. All of those job functions are also generally listed in any list of IT (aka "Information Technology") jobs or roles that I've ever seen, from job search sites to applications to receive free IT industry magazines. Of course that all begs the question of why anyone should have to spend any significant amount of time getting desktop computers working unless the problem is a hardware failure or maybe setting up a new PC. They should just work.
The correlation with cars is not that IT people like working on cars, too, but that some people enjoy spending time tinkering with pieces of technology and it the difficulty in doing maintenance is considered part of the fun. I'm talking about the people who get a gleam in their eye when they talk about defragmenting their hard drive, hacking their registry, or overclocking their CPU.
No, I'm not excited about the new Office 2007 interface, for example. I find it annoying that I have to spend 5 minutes finding a function that used to be easy to find in a menu in earlier versions. And, frankly, a lot of the fluff in the Mac OS doesn't excite me that much, either. I'm still running OS X 10.3 (two versions old) and the 2004 version of Office for the Mac on my own Mac because I just don't have a compelling reason to upgrade.
I use my computer at home to do email, web browsing, word processing, and graphics and I use my computer at work for email, web browsing, software development, project management, and database work. Fiddling with the OS is a distraction from what I really want to be doing on a computer. It's like consciously thinking "breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out". It's something I don't want to have to think about and if I do find myself having to think about it, it generally means I've got a problem and things aren't working correctly unless I'm an athlete at the cutting edge of physical performance.
I’d be surprised if I ever saw anyone in IT actually do anything besides sit around and drink coffee. At least you have the initiative to put your feet up.
Just sitting here typing this on the 17" MBP, I can't think of anything else about it I would change -- except its honkin' big size and weight. One thing I hadn't counted on: carrying cases for the 17-inchers are real beasts. The 15s are much nicer if you are ever going to lug them around.
A prediction: you will absolutely love the MacBook Pro! Enjoy the anticipation!!
~~~~~~~~
Indeed, we have gotten our money's worth... :-)
My boss uses a Mac for work (I used a Lenovo Windows XP laptop at work) and he said the same thing about Office 2007 for the Mac. Yet another reason to avoid the upgrade.
What a lot of people miss is that Apple thinks of themselves primarily as a hardware company, not a software company. The biggest thing software companies like Microsoft fear is that people will decide that the software they have is good enough and will stop upgrading.
Thanks.
My point was, there’s seldom any need for Windows programs on a Mac, although it can be done. Microsoft Office for the Mac isn’t for Windows, though obviously there is a Windows version.
The image link I posted above heads off to the website showing a program that doesn’t require Windows at all (Intel Macs only), being a Mac-specific version of WINE. Ergo, no need for any purchase of Windows.
Must be one hell of a great dollhouse (speaking of insults, and “due respect”). Apple users pay a premium for a better OS and hardware, although that premium has shrunk. Meanwhile, really basic laptops and netbooks have had an impact on Wintel laptop manufacturers, who were already functioning on very thin margins (I’ve seen it compared with the retail margins on bananas, found in the produce sections of most food markets), and Apple’s sales have risen in a down economy.
Thanks, at age 51 I haven’t been ‘carded’ in a long time. ;’)
I bought an Apple II in 1984, the same year the Mac came out. I’d actually messed with a 128K original Mac at Computerland before this, but wound up getting the //e at Schaak Electronics.
“Microsoft user for 20 years now” — that puts it at 1989.
Sorry but Apple prices are an insult. Especially for their absurd 13.3” laptops. The only way this flies is that many people think desktops and laptops are inherently expensive. Fact is they are not these days. Hardware and laptops have gotten cheaper and cheaper and cheaper
So I’m using Windows 7 right now on a computer (self built/assembled) with modest specifications (e2180 processor) and I’m loving it. This computer is a good hackintosh candidate with its Gigabyte motherboard but I find no reason to load the Apple OS. I like to fool around and if I did want a hackintosh I could make this one into a dual boot 0SX/Windows7.
Also have Windows 7 on a laptop I obviously did not assemble
That is what Apple means to me— not very much
Its a fad like the hula hoop and the twist (dance)
Sorry but Apple prices are an insult.Really? You don't have any interest in Apple products ("I find no reason to load the Apple OS."), so how could a *price* of an Apple product (or any other product) be an insult to you?
Yeah, that's the ticket! Using a Mac back in 1979. Why I got you beat there, I was surfing Free Republic way back in 1973. That's right, 1973. Tough year to be a conservative I tell you, with Watergate, Spiro Agnew and all those gas lines. But I was on the Free Republic fighting the battle with my trusty PC and cable modem...
Yes definitely buy a toy 13” laptop for $1000
hole were punched by a punch machine, which of course had a keyboard, but not a crt, the punched cards had to be feed and read by a reader, so the input did not come straight from a keyboard like now but you know what I was trying to say, or not? really is hard to communicate to people on an apple thread, why are people so defensive?
apple II your right, then mac came out and the microsoft IBMs too and the later as we just called them PCs even though both IBM and apple produced PCs, but if I had said i switched from a mac to a PC, probably somebody would have a issue with that too, saying well, apples made PCs in such and such a year,
The Apple Mac, released in January 1984 retailed, over Steve Jobs' objections (he wanted to price it at $1699), for $2499. The IBM-PC AT on release was $4000-$6000. The Mac with a 10M HD, was $500 cheaper. Essentially, the Mac and the PC were competitively priced.
One brand? No one is advocating that. However, the vast majority of Mac users, unlike PC users, have experience in BOTH Windows and Macs, and have found that one offers a clearly better computing experience than the other. Perhaps you should open your mind and expand your experience to also include using a Mac and you might find that what the Mac users have been saying is true.
Now, it seems to me that you were referring to the obvious benefits of having a display providing instant feedback (output) from keyed input... (As seen on the 40-column Apple ][+ ca 1979...)
I realize there was no display on a card punch, but -- after inputting your data via a keyboard you could read the printed value atop each punched card column.
Sorry, your writing was/is so unclear as to cause an I/O error... ;-)
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