Is anyone else sick of Apple?

[MayheM]

First off yes OSX Leopard is pretty and apparently runs well, from a software standpoint Apple seems to be pretty concrete. My beef is not with the products, but more with the marketing and company itself.

Ask a PC person what they like about windows and they will tell you from experience what they like about their OS of choice, Ask an Apple user the same question and they will switch to repeat mode and spout off every marketing bit that pops into their brainwashed gray matter. Things like "Well my Mac doesn’t get Viruses!" or "The graphics capabilities are far better." etc...

Let’s touch on this…

1. Anything that connects to the internet is susceptible to computer viruses. There may not be as many viruses out there for Macs but they can get them. Apple, stop lying to you customers…
2. I have a background in Graphic Design, so it theory I should be on the Apple ban wagon. It was over priced products that mad me buy my first PC instead of the Mac I wanted at the time. Now, I have worked on all design programs, Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, PageMaker, Quark and countless others. I have worked on them using both Mac and PC, and I can tell you. They are the same. Only with windows when I want to right click and don’t have to hit the freaking command button… Mac got the name for being good with graphics because early on the design programs where not available on PC, those days are gone and Mac is left insulting Windows to try and keep up… This in fact leads me to my next point…


Then you have the Advertising, Why is it that Windows does not advertise and bash Apple, yet for some reason it is deemed necessary for Apple to bash Windows in every Ad they do. They do it is such a way that makes me loath every aspect of Apple as a company.


Next, there is the issue of the company itself and their Apple Store Communist Regime. If a person buys an Ibook and later wants to upgrade the hard drive to a large or faster one, don’t try to do it yourself. You have to go to the Apple Store where they charge you and hourly rate of $100 to do it for you. If you buy a product from them and get the warranty it seems to never cover the issues you have with the thing. I bought a New ipod nano a few weeks back, I like it don’t get me wrong, but as I was talking to the sales twit, I asked about the charging they iPod before use, which she told me it came fully changed. She was wrong, it did not. When I spoke with her about older style click wheels, basically the first iPods, when you did not charge them all the way before using them they often had hard drive errors, she looked at my clueless and as if I was speaking a foreign language. They obviously do not hire people who know anything, and do not even attempt to train them to know the product beyond, look at the picture quality, and oh it stores this much...

I work in a school, in the tech department. I have personally taken an iBook apart to take out the hard drive to put in one of the Dells we now use. It took me 30 minutes to take the iBook apart, and when I say take it apart I mean break it apart. Over 50 screws and crap held that thing together like a steal trap. I tried to open it without harming it, but after I could not find any more screws I had no other choice but to crack the cheap plastic case. I think flipped over the Dell, which was to receive the parts from the iBook I just violated, and removed the old hard drive, and replaced the old one with the new hard drive in under two minutes, powered up and was installing windows. WTF, why do they feel the need to make their products impossible for the average person to work on themselves? The only answer I can think of is for the money.

Finally, you have the new Mac Air, OOOOO AHHHHHH, the lightest laptop in the world, made of crap plastic which will stain on the first touch, (ever notice hope dirty iBooks get?) No peripheral drives, you need to buy them separately. The battery is soldered in, so if the thing dies, well shit you have to go to the Apple Store to have them take it apart and put in a new one. Ram is not upgradeable either. This is a product that is loved more for its look then for its use. Not to mention, Sony and IBM are releasing the same thing as far as case size soon. So Apple had it first, who cares, they didn’t even build it, Intel did...

Anyone else have thoughts on this?

[Wills]

I'm a graphic designer, and I totally agree. When I meet other designers I get funny looks when I say I use Windows and PC's exclusive. Print company reps are the worst. They have this attitude of "he must not be very good then/in the 'know' then". I don't have any real issue with Macs as such, but PC is just way more flexible and the software more reasonable.

I use the entire Adobe suite on a daily basis, but I also use programs like 3Dmax and other render programs for video work on occasion. To use the same type of programs on a Mac wouldn't be cost effective for me. Apple Shake? Forget it. Final Cut Pro, bit pricey, and interoperability between those and other programs is just not gonna happen.

As much as I hate the negative effect Apple has upon PC users, they've done it remarkably well, and I have to give them credit there.

As far as I'm concerned, if you can't keep your PC stable, go use a Mac, they are (not being mean) idiot proof... Otherwise, with a bit of knowledge, experience, care and organisation, you can have a perfectly stable PC.

[ShaDoW]

You've got some pretty good arguments there, but I don't know...

I've always loved and used both PC's and Macs, I've owned several of each.

1. You are right, while anything that connects to the internet is susceptible to viruses is true. But honestly? In all my years I've never had a single virus on a Mac, and I've never had to troubleshoot a Mac that had a virus. I realize there are viruses that attack OS X, but honest to god I wouldn't know how anyone could catch one. Not many people bother making viruses for OS X either. Much easier to program something that attacks a platform that has a 90% larger user base.

But, I haven't had a virus on my PC in years either. So... thats just me being on top of things probably.

2. You left 2. open for some reason. :)

3. I'm a professional designer (print & web). :) But yes, its true. At home I have my PC, at work I have a Mac and a PC. Both run the Adobe Creative Suite 3 at the same performance. Why did people start using Macs for graphic design? It was the first platform to make proper use of clean typography, etc... but thats all in the past now like you said. I think the main reason a lot of graphic designers want to have a Mac in their office, is to make everything look nicer. I don't blame them. Lots of bad ass looking PC's I wouldn't mind having in my office either though, heh.

And hey, advertising is advertising. One company does it more aggressively than the other, some just have plain annoying advertising. "Its gunna taste great! Its gunna taste great!" anyone?

Seriously though. I think people should use whatever they are comfortable with. Macs are great computers (and incredibly idiot proof like mentioned above), hell they're not even much different from a normal PC these days (and yes, they have two mouse buttons now). Sure, its not so easy to upgrade often. But we're all computer professionals here. A lot of people in this huge world wouldn't know the first thing about opening up a computer, and I would rather have them walk into an Apple store than have Geek Squad or whatever it is in the USA look at it and rip them off.

As far as I'm concerned, if you can't keep your PC stable, go use a Mac, they are (not being mean) idiot proof... Otherwise, with a bit of knowledge, experience, care and organisation, you can have a perfectly stable PC.

Nicely said. :)

[srredfire]

Let’s touch on this…

1. Anything that connects to the internet is susceptible to computer viruses. There may not be as many viruses out there for Macs but they can get them. Apple, stop lying to you customers…
2.
3. I have a background in Graphic Design...

You seem to have misplaced my 2nd point, please return him to his rightful spot.

[Penney]

Woah you must have been all flustered and frusterated writting that thing, but I'm with you

My father, co-worker and I dabble a lot now in graphic design and find it's so much easier to use PC's over macs, I guess mac's are just for dipshits who don't know computers and were raised on apples, but for me it's oranges all the way, plus you can get wayyyy better juice from oranges then you can apples, Follow me?

[Sorrow]

What I love about the apple commercials is how they treat you like a moron: "I couldn't even find the on-switch!" Nah I'll stick to windows thx very much, Apple has become "trendy" which is just for sad people.
That and you can't play games on macs, yeah well not entirely true but sucks nonetheless.

[ghost12332]

I can't stand apple. Their not compatible with anything, can't play games, etc. About the only thing that a mac has which appeals to me as a musician, is garage band. Besides that, a Windows can do everything a mac can do, plus a hellllll of a lot more.

[Deus_Mortem]

This brings to mind a quote I found on bash.org

"Tell me ONE thing your PC can do that my Mac can't!"
"Right click."

[nub]

I've never owned a MAC. The only Apple product I own is an iPod Touch. It's great, but Apple is a freaking whorish company. They try and sell you packs of 4 little applications that are virtually useless for the common person for around 20 US dollars. I decided to screw them and Jailbreak my Touch to 1.1.1 and just download the AppTap program "installer" and just install 3rd part applications from anonymous sources.

It's unfortunate that Apple has to be such a freaking hard ass about their products. I would prefer them to be more like Valve with their games and such. Hell, if any company was like Valve they would be awesome.

Not trying to kiss Valve's ass by the way, just telling it like it is. We all know how cool Valve is.

Anyway, before I was forced to move in with my dad and change schools again for the 7th time, I had a Graphics class in which every student had a PC and a Mac at their seat. The PCs they had were pretty high quality, you could run Inventor on them without lag! The Macs looked pretty cool, but I could just tell that the all-in-one design they've got going is for the worse. I mean think about it, overheating and hardware limitations due to extremely constricted space is the worst you can get with a system. That's just some models though, I know they have models with a separate tower for all the hardware.

Sure they can support 32gb of RAM and much more, but I mean...that's for like professional movie production and shit, like CG companies such as Pixar and Blue Sky Studios. No normal user is gonna use all 32gb to their advantage, hell I wouldn't doubt if those movie producers even use all of it. But I guess that I'm pulling this out of my ass as I go. I'm sure that Apple targets big companies for that kind of power. But I mean...the PC is just...hell, it's better. I like Windows XP a lot. After all, it IS the most used OS out there. Vista sucks though, but hopefully it will stop sucking once Service Pack 1 releases. I think there's already leaked Vista SP1 installations out there.

I don't like Apple's advertisement. It does get kind of annoying. I just hate the representation, really. It's like they not only insult Microsoft, but also the people who use it. They make Windows look like it's for idiots, when it really takes common sense to use. Some of it may be a bit advanced, but for basic usage--common sense. Shit, my grandma knows how to install Microsoft Office without screwing it up. And OS X is made for simplicity, right? So I'd call that an OS for idiots... (no offense to users of OS X)

I mean I'd rather have it be as easy as possible, but I do find it fun to learn how to do something new with Windows. I know probably 3% of what windows can do, and here I am making levels and music and other things with Windows. I think that's worth the challenge.

[Jman]

[Athlete{UK}]

Do I get kicked in the face again for saying I love linux?

[rb_lestr]

Do I get kicked in the face again for saying I love linux?

No way.
But linux isn't a company with a marketing team.

[MayheM]

no way man, linux is solid, nothing wrong with that I jsut hate Apple, and from the looks of it I am nt alone... I am working on some sketches I will post when they are finished. I want to make anti Apple Tee shirts. It will be fun.

[ghost12332]

To clarify my previous statement, apple sucks balls.

[rb_lestr]

Only their marketing.
The quality of their products are far better than Microsoft.