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I want two things...smooth, elegant, reliable, and simplicity.

I’ve used Macs and Windows machines for over 30 years in both work and home environments. Right now, I’m at home using a 2014 MacBook Pro. A couple weeks ago, I bought an HP Windows 10 machine to run some health apps that don’t run on my Mac (no, I didn’t want to use Boot Camp or Parallels for many reasons).

I’m amazed at how crude and clunky Windows feels to me. The basic Windows platform has not improved or evolved from that clunky, poorly designed feeling in 30 years. The hardware/software integration still seems primitive. The Win10 UI is an indecipherable mess with inconsistencies in every context.

What should be simple is extremely hard - for example, just try renaming, rearranging or removing your pinned items on the left sidebar in File Explorer. I gave up on that and just live with an aggravating mess I created.

The Mac just works and I never have to “get under the hood” to fix something or make it operate the way I want.

I know many or most will disagree with me and that’s no big deal. Fighting over what’s best is a silly, childish game from decades ago. I’m just writing about what works for me.

Good luck in your decision.

PS. If you want simple, get as far away from Linux as you can, especially if you don’t want to invest scores of hours to become an expert to make things work. I’ve got Linux running on probably 15 to 20 home appliances and smartphone things, so it does run reliably and well. I just don’t want to have to spend the time to figure out how to use it as my “daily driver” when the Mac (and IOS devices) work so well and are so simple.

JonPreston, based on my own experiences. I can second ProtectOurFreedom's comments.

I am a web developer by trade but also handle all the "normal" IT stuff for the non-profit I work for. This includes end-user tech support, desktop and app support, servers, networking, other hardware like printers, buying and setting up new hardware and software, supporting remote users and road warriors, and so on. I've even had to support a Linux machine for some weird mapping software a guy wanted to use.

Like ProtectOurFreedom, at this moment I am typing my post on my 2014 MacBook Pro. I bought it in April 2014. I bought the top one they had. You are right, they are going to cost more than most of the Windows computers you see advertised. But take a close look at what you are getting -- does the Windows computer come with a solid-state drive, for example? What about screen quality? How heavy and clunky is it, compared to a Mac?

But here I sit with a six-year-old laptop, which is my daily driver and handles every task I need it to do. I do not do heavy video editing or 3D modeling, but I do run some pretty heavy-duty web software including servers and IDEs, all of which run in virtual machines.

If you want a fast, clean, elegant machine that works very well and does not have a bunch of stickers and weird buttons all over it -- one that is not made of plastic but is trim, lightweight, and still pretty tough and robust -- do take a close look at Macs.

And yeah I am totally with ProtectOurFreedom on Linux too. I run OpenSuse on my home "lab," mostly to wrangle a bunch of virtual machines I run on another server. I really like OpenSuse, it is fast and stable, it is totally free, and I like learning about how to operate it and get it to work well with various other systems.

But when it is time to cut a board, I do not want to learn about the inner workings of the saw, you know? And I've had to do that a few times too many with Linux to use it as a daily driver. :-)

I would be interested to know what you end up with! Good luck!