A VERY cool Mac thing....

[HardDrive]

I am the biggest Mac hater around, but this is SO cool.

http://www.apple.com/ilife/iphoto/books/

Basically you can put together your photos, and they make you a book. And its cheap. My sister just gave us a book of the first 2 years of my daughters life. Priceless.

[speeder]

Just curious as to why you are a Mac hater(?)

I am not the most computer literate person around, (bought my first box in 2001, a PC), I now have a Mac G4 Powerbook and like it a lot. It took some getting use to, but now I prefer it. I jump between the two effortlessly, however. I guess i don't see such a huge difference between the two format/systems, but the Mac is simpler and does more once you know all of its cool shortcuts. There are a couple things that my PC does easier, though, like the photo editing program that I have.

Just wondering.

[HardDrive]

1) Expensive, proprietary hardware.
2) Limited # of applications available.
3) OS makes troubleshooting difficult. Mac users enjoy the simplicity, but from a support perspective you are often flying in the dark.
4) Lack of support for Enterprise management tools.
5) Total lack of enterprise level support.
6) The constant droning of Mac using a55holes who feel the need to inform you and the rest of the world that Mac users are genetically superior, and that we are all mindless drones supporting the evil Microsoft Depots. Yeah, thats right, Microsoft has 95% market share because we are all victims of their brain washing....

Mac has done an amazing job of connecting with the consumer market, and I would consider purschasing one just for the multi media capabilitys. But the network engineer in me will never take them seriously as a viable desktop OS in the work place.

I wonder how many people are aware that Microsoft owns 20% of Mac?

[techweenie]

Originally posted by HardDrive
I wonder how many people are aware that Microsoft owns 20% of Mac?

Presumably very few, since it's an urban legend.

[HardDrive]

Microsoft did not purchase $150 millions dollars of Apple stock in 1998?

[HardDrive]

This article is a lie?

http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9807/10/microsoft.apple.idg/

[svandamme]

what we really need now to complete the thread, is a couple of linux/unix geeks, and an old geezer who still runs OS2Warp

[techweenie]

Apple had $5 billion cash in the bank when Microsoft bought a token $150 million in non voting stock, which it has long since sold.

[motion]

As I recall, it was a token purchase to go along with their commitment to port Office over to the Mac.

[nostatic]

Originally posted by HardDrive
1) Expensive, proprietary hardware.
2) Limited # of applications available.
3) OS makes troubleshooting difficult. Mac users enjoy the simplicity, but from a support perspective you are often flying in the dark.
4) Lack of support for Enterprise management tools.
5) Total lack of enterprise level support.
6) The constant droning of Mac using a55holes who feel the need to inform you and the rest of the world that Mac users are genetically superior, and that we are all mindless drones supporting the evil Microsoft Depots. Yeah, thats right, Microsoft has 95% market share because we are all victims of their brain washing....

1. that's about to change. But the flip side is that expensive propreitary hardware also tends to be more trouble free, and you don't have all the driver conflicts like you do in the windoze world.

2. Right. Do you really need to choose between 45 different spreadsheet programs? The only area where there is any real dearth of Mac apps is in niche markets and games. And both are slowly changing. Plus, there are Mac apps that have no equivalent in windoze (ie subethaedit).

3. Umm, its unix. There are some things that are moved around, but if you know unix you can administer a mac under the hood.

4. OS X Server (though it is far from perfect)

5. OS X Server (though it is far from perfect...but neither is winServerStuff)

6. Can't help it. Confused lemmings following what everybody else buys. Hard to keep the tongue in check

[techweenie]

The key benefit to OSX is that it's FreeBSD at its core -- a well proven OS.

And although there have been theoretical vulnerabilities found, all were immediately patched by Apple, and no virus, worm, spyware or other malware has affected OSX in the 5+ years it's been out there.

17% of major corporations have Macs in place. IT people generally badmouth Macs because they only require 20% of the support of Wintel machines. IOW, keeping Windows the dominant system is nothing more than pragmatic job security.

[BlueSkyJaunte]

Originally posted by techweenie
17% of major corporations have Macs in place. IT people generally badmouth Macs because they only require 20% of the support of Wintel machines. IOW, keeping Windows the dominant system is nothing more than pragmatic job security.

This is more true than you know.

[stomachmonkey]

Hardrive,

1) When you compare spec to spec a few Macs models cost slightly more, most cost the same or less than a comparable PC. As a general statement it's just plain incorrect. http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/36120.html

2) Limited # of apps available. I've asked this before, give me one consumer retail software package that is either not available for a Mac or does not have comparable alternatives.

3) What support issues. It's common knowledge that Mac support costs are lower than PC's. Lack of support usually comes from close minded IT groups that don't take the time to understand what they are dismissing.

The rest of your issues deal with enterprise. Since that's a broad catagory it's hard to talk about but I'll give it a go.

General enduser, MSFT suite of Word Excell, etc.., not an issue.

MSFT exchange, Entourage supports Exchange servers so again not an issue.

Networking, Macs support AFP, SMB/CIFS, WebDAV and NFS file services running on Mac OS X Server, AppleShare, UNIX, Linux, Novell NetWare and Windows NT, 2000 and XP servers. We've got built in VPN with PPoE and IPSEC.

Printing, not an issue.

Anything more specific that I can address?

Scott

[techweenie]

Originally posted by BlueSkyJaunte
This is more true than you know.

Actually, I've been following the computer market for a while.

I built my first computer before I even met this guy:

[svandamme]

to bad there isn't any Zenworks for Mac... i wouldn't mind having some high powered mac thing on my desk... and can't persuade my boss in to buying me one when we don't support it

[stomachmonkey]

Originally posted by motion
As I recall, it was a token purchase to go along with their commitment to port Office over to the Mac.

I think that was the "cover" story. The real buzz was that it was a payoff for Apple to drop their Quicktime lawsuit. Remember that one? MSFT were working on Windows Media Player, but when you looked under the hood the code was a cut'n'paste from Quicktime.

[MichiganMat]

The Macs have all kinds of neat little tricks under the hood. Theres even a plugin for iPhoto to export photos directly to my homepage Gallery setup. I agree though, the book feature is a really kickass option.

As for the points you mentioned, I only have this to say. The current breed of Mac works kinda like this: You only see what you want to see. If you want to see a "Playschool" kiddie computer, thats what you see. If you look a little deeper and you start investigating a bit you'll find everything you're looking for and more When you get really good though you can really do some awesome things with these machines.

[HardDrive]

*SIGH*

Yeah, your all right. Macs are superior.

[snowman]

What about VMS?

I want my old CDC6600 back as well, you know that old fashioned 64 bit room heater. Almost 40 years later and neither IBM or MAC are up to an equivalent 64 bit system yet.

OH the memories of a cybrgrapics terminal running at 50K baud or was it 500K baud, I forget. Then mac and ibm mucked things up.

Oh my I just forgot an even better system the Commador Vic 20.

The only things worse than windows os and mac is Solaris, pick your version.

Come to really think about it

Thank God for Bill Gates.

[SLO-BOB]

Originally posted by HardDrive
*SIGH*

Yeah, your all right. Macs are superior.

Lol! Boy do I feel your pain. Btdt!

DO NOT mess with the 5 guys who like Macs! I even got a PM with personal insults from someone over this issue.