[RKDinOKC]

Okay, I gotta get in this Apple thing. I have owned and used Apple since the Apple ][ and it ran DOS 3.1. Not Windows or Mac, but Microsoft DOS. The difference in Apple was they had their own BASIC programed in the roms, you did not have to load it. If you wanted to get into machine language programing you used Microsoft's Assembly Language Compiler.

When Apple came out with the Lisa, then Macintosh they changed to the GUI environment. To manage all the GUI stuff they used ROM routines like their Apple Basic in the Apple ][. It was called the toolbox and was one of the first computers to use object oriented programming to access those routines. At the time many software developers scoffed at the added complexity of object oriented programing. NOW you can't hardly find a programmer that doesn't use it.

One of the things about the toolbox and the object oriented environment is that it standardized the user interface and peripherals. If you didn't follow the Apple guidelines for using the toolbox routines, chances were very high that your software would break on the next system update. One of the reasons that Mac software is less problematical than Windows. Apple controlled the environment so the software just worked. There was a saying I saw happen so many times...With Windows you spend your time getting your computer to work, with Mac you spend your time doing your work on your computer.

When they went came out with the iPhone they took the toolbox idea a step or two further by sandboxing (locking ) settings and screening software to insure not only that software developers followed the guidelines, but they also wanted to insure that the software made available was both kid safe, and did not violate copyright laws. The latter a legal thing to keep from being made responsible in a law suite because they were part of the distribution.

Before I got an iPhone I had several different Smart Phones. None of them worked as well as my iPhone does in ease of making calls, and managing email (what a smart phone is for.)

So, if you like to fiddle with computer stuff, get something else. If you just want to use your devices, get Apple.

And yes, I have both Windows XP and 7 running on my Mac. I only use them when troubleshooting Office problems for users I support.

Oh yeah, and before you get all anti-apple just think about this...
Apple set the specifications for Word, Excel, and Explorer when they contracted Microsoft to write them. That was before those programs of even Windows 1.0 existed and because of the work Microsoft did for Apple in writing Office for Apple for the Mac, that is where they got Windows from.