A diehard Mac user switches to PC

Business Insider ^ | 07/11/2018 | Steve Kovach and Clancy Morgan

[SeekAndFind]

The Mac used to have numerous advantages over the PC, but with Windows 10 the PC has now closed the gap.

These days buying a PC gives you many more options compared to the Mac, which continues to stagnate. Business Insider's senior tech correspondent, Steve Kovach, switched his Mac for a PC to see what Windows 10 really has to offer.

Following is a transcript of the video.

Steve Kovach: I've been a Mac user for over 15 years. I hated PCs. They came loaded with a bunch of software that slowed down my machine, and they caught viruses way too easily.

Ad: Last year there were 114 thousand known viruses for PCs.

PCs, but not Macs.

Steve: Then I discovered the Mac. And it had everything the PC didn't. But lately, I've grown frustrated with the Mac lineup. And while Apple has let its Mac lineup stagnate, Windows 10 computers have gotten really good. So I decided to make the switch back for a few days and tested Huawei's new MateBook X Pro. Which runs Windows 10 and starts at about $1200. Some have called it the best laptop you can buy. And guess what, Windows is actually really great. And I may even like it better than my Mac.

Windows 8 tried to be two operating systems in one. One for desktop and one for mobile. And it failed at both. It even got rid of Windows' iconic Start menu. But Windows 10 reversed a lot of those mistakes. The Start menu's back and it works great on the desktop. Windows 10 comes with Cortana. The Microsoft Digital Assistant. It can dig through files on your computer and even search the web. It's almost as good as Google Search.

Windows 10 also has a lot more hardware options.

[Osage Orange]

How...do I do that?

[Drew68]

Windows 10 is many things but it is NOT better than Mac OS. Period.

I agree.

This being said, long-time Mac users (like myself) will find Windows 10 very familiar. It is the best operating system for Mac users that Microsoft has come up with.

I know this to be true as I recently found myself in need of a dirt-cheap laptop. Apple does not make dirt-cheap laptops. A <$300 Lenovo running Windows 10 impressed me very much. I was very pleased at how easy it was to adapt to.

[sportutegrl]

Just #Walkaway from Apple

[entropy12]

dBase V lol
because I am so familiar with it, and even can make
an executable of any of my programs.

[Bikkuri]

I have played C&C Generals and Zero Hour for years on Linux, with no problems..

[Bikkuri]

OH.. there is another game that is real similar (and 100% free) that is easy to set up on Linux (also Win and Mac versions too, I believe);

Warzone 2100

[Bikkuri]

And Mac is still crap.
(I hate Windows almost as much, btw).

[Bikkuri]

Just #Walkaway from Apple

+1

[Bikkuri]

My dad is a fan.

He still has time to ask for forgiveness.

;^)

[minnesota_bound]

We know know that Steve Kovach is Swordmaker : )

[minnesota_bound]

#44 Chrome doesn’t work because it has some proprietary flash-type player

Menu (in upper right corner) Settings> scroll down to Advanced> Content settings. Make sure Flash is enabled ‘Ask first’ and then add the website address to whitelist the site so loads Flash each time automatically.

#51 (stupid fan freezes up and it’s easier to just replace the whole thing).

Cat hair. Give up the cat!

[InterceptPoint]

dBase V lol
+++++++++
I hereby declare that you qualify as an official “Database Old Timer”.

What’s your programming language of choice?

For me it’s PHP and Visual Basic (don’t laugh). At one time I wrote basic programs and very carefully typed the code into a punched tape machine. The code ran over a telephone line to some big GE computer.

Times change.

[Deplorable American1776]

Chrome OS...I first computer I had to program...it ran CP/M...

[SunkenCiv]

There are no low-end Macs; there are no highest-end Macs (merely highest-priced Macs); if Apple wanted my business (they don't) they'd make a reasonably priced version of the MacMini, that's not only the only thing missing from the Mac lineup, it's also missing from component-style CPUs in general, so Apple would clean up, and knowing how good they are at juicing their margins, they'd be selling a slightly-higher priced product that would be more than worth the difference.

I'm a huge Mac fan, I'm using a 20+ year old PM 7600 (souped up a little), and I don't have any use for these kinds of silly articles (they've appeared multiple times every year for 30 years), and my remarks are my own, and not in support of the bashing. Thanks SeekAndFind.

[SunkenCiv]

:^) S-50 or S-100 bus?

[Swordmaker]

Business Insider writer pretending to be a pro Apple Mac user claims he switched to a $1200 Huawei MateBook Windows 10 notebook and found it superior to Apple after using all Apple products for fifteen years. Only problem is the guy is known for writing FUD articles on Apple all the time. . . as is Business Insider. —PING!

Apple v. Windows Ping!

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.

[Swordmaker]

I’ve never owned a Mac for two reasons: Price and only one mouse button. A friend of mine, a graphic artist, has used both for a couple of decades. He sees them both as having their strengths and weaknesses.

Uh, Cuban? How about coming into the twent-first century? Macs have had MORE buttons and mouse functionality than Windows mice for twenty years. Current Apple mouses not only have multiple button areas, but their entire upper surface is multi-touch sensitive for multi-direction scrolling, drawing, one, two, and three finger taps, etc. Every Mac except the Mac mini, comes with a wireless touch-sensitive rechargeable Bluetooth mouse.

Even the first one-button mouse Macs supported multiple button mouses, rollerball mouses, trackpads, pen input devices, and many other types of input approaches long before PCs did. . . all without installing driver’s. You just plugged them in and they instantly worked.

[Swordmaker]

Businesses don’t use Mac products because they are very expensive when compared to a PC.

You’re wrong. Every study done has shown that Macs in the enterprise have a lower total cost of ownership than PCs. IBM discovered this and is converting all 400,000 of the employees world wide to all Apple. They found just in in-house service calls for their IT department, they are saving almost $50 million a year over what PCs had cost to keep operational.

When IBM first started installing Macs and had a mere 135,000 installed base, the IT staff servicing that number of Macs was just 34 engineers. Of all those Macs, only 5% generated any service requests at all in their first year and 98.7% of those were resolved on the first call. On the other hand 40% of the PC users generated service calls and each usually required multiple calls to resolve if not complete reimagine of the computer. IBM found they required one PC Tech staffer for every 400 PC users, but one Mac Tech could service 5,345 Mac users! That made for significant IT savings.

In the following year, IBM found the saving were even greater:

"The icing on the user preference cake is that it turns out there are solid business reasons to encourage staff to move to Mac. Not only has the company been saving between $264-$535 for each Mac deployment over four years, but just 3.5 percent of employees using a Mac will call the company help desk, he said. “Give employees the devices they want, manage those devices in a modern way, and drive self sufficiency in the environment,” Previn (IBM VP of Workplace as a Service, Fletcher Previn) explains."

Many major banks in Japan use Macs, and Alphabet/Google is primarily Apple Mac.

[TXnMA]

You should check to see what machines and OSes IBM is now installing as its primary employee infrastructure.

[palmer]

Linux is great (I'm using it as I type this) but has been unable to attract much in the way of commercial software

True for desktop, but Linux owns the commercial server software market. Sure Microsoft dabbles on the server side, but they were never a serious server OS.