PC or Mac

[Grizzly]

Cripes! I can't believe I haven't posted yet! I'm Mac all the way. SlideMeister on my Mac Mini, lots of my music stuff ("my" meaning my choral compositions and arrangements) on my Macbook Pro. Some crossover, but not much. I've never even owned a PC or clone.

This may tip it towards Macs, huh? (OTOH, mebbe I voted without comment. I'll check…)

Tom

Oops. Reply #5. Back to even.

T

[Bluesy]

Doh! Tied up again

Mac for me. I used to be "Mac or Die!", but lately I'm gravitating to more of being on the fence.  I'm becoming fed up up with Apples "Upgrade until it's not supported" game plan to drive up sales.  If your going to make the hardware last 10 years, please support the software that long.

We have a pc for the little guy, dealing with the spyware/adware/virus is a serious pain in the butt.

Your screwed if you go one way or the other...

I agree wholeheartedly. Along with some other apps, my old 'Pages' won't work on Yosemite and I can't transfer writings from the old Pages to the new, the new OS (Yosemite) won't remember log-ins and passwords, and when I open something in 'Preview", 3 or 4 other unwanted preview files open on top of it.
What are we to do? Windows is clumsy, Macintosh won't support older OS's.

Bluesy/

[Grizzly]

Thanks for the caution regarding Yosemite. I've found that there is some incompatibility between the Mini's Power PC processor and the Macbook Pro's Intel. One great annoyance is that the 'book doesn't support Midi files. And the crossword puzzle doesn't load anymore on the Mini, a minor annoyance. But the Pro is a very nice machine. Still getting used to the trackpad.

Tom

[wheelz421]

Thanks for the caution regarding Yosemite. I've found that there is some incompatibility between the Mini's Power PC processor and the Macbook Pro's Intel. One great annoyance is that the 'book doesn't support Midi files. And the crossword puzzle doesn't load anymore on the Mini, a minor annoyance. But the Pro is a very nice machine. Still getting used to the trackpad.

Tom

I've had it on my mind to get a mini, almost got one a few years ago but I picked up the macBook pro instead.  How has your experience been with the mini?  How long have you had it?  I hear ya about the track pad, I'm still trying to get used to it after almost 2 years.

[Grizzly]

My Mini is around 5 years old, and has the older processor, pre-Intel. The hard drive crashed a couple of years ago and had to replace it. It's been fine ever since. Sometimes music files don't load correctly the first time; it will have ampersands. (@) for note heads, or no note heads, but load okay when I close the file and reopen it. I can't think of anything else that has gone wrong.

We've had at least 6 Macs going back more than 15 years, and have had few problems with them.

Tom

[SlideMeister]

Got my mac mini in 2007 (a 166 intel) It's now officially described by the Mac site as "Ancient." It's maxed out with Snow Leopard and can't run the newer stuff (which sux socks) I fried that lame 90 gig 5200 rpm slug of a hard two years ago and replaced it with a SSD, and the crazy thing just about doubled its performance. I only use the thing for Garageband cuz I hate the idiotic window sizing from just the one corner. Until they admit windows does it better, I'll never switch.

[Grizzly]

My Mini must be older then, possibly ~10 yr.

T

[SlideMeister]

When I got mine, the non-intels were still available so it may be around the same age as yours.

[opendoorharps]

Both- more Mac lately.  For audio recording, and music production, video editing projects- MAC.  For game implementation and interactive apps, working with programmers- PC/ Windows.  Also my wife's PC is MS Surface Pro. 

Heavy lifting in my recording studio is a Mac Pro Tower.  Remote and mobile pref. would be a Macbook Pro. 

[Raven C]

PC.
Low cost yet good performance.
I am not picky about user interface.

[English]

There are, of course, At least two other options. LINUX and chrome OS. Before I got my Mac I used LINUX exclusively for a decade. There is little that cannot be done on LINUX, and often more because of the open nature of it. Many people are still clinging to the belief that it's only for geeks, and that it's too complicated. Those days are gone. For most everything that people need to do, LINUX does a great job, and the price is very attractive! Also, if you have an older machine that is struggling under Windows, converting it to LINUX will breath new life into it because it's much less resource hungry.

Having said that, for music applications, it may not be the best choice—mostly because the hardware manufacturers don't release drivers for LINUX, so it's down to the open source community to reverse-engineer. There are, however, some pretty good notation software packages and midi applications available on LINUX.

Likewise for Google Chrome OS. For what most people do with a computer, Chrome is a very good choice, and many would be surprised just how much you can do on it. A friend of mine is running a full CNC router on Chrome OS.

If it wasn't for the fact that I had shelled out lots of money for this Mac (I had to because the people running a project I was working on insisted on using proprietary apps), I would happily be doing everything I need on LINUX. When/if this dies, I will probably be back to open source.

Alan.

[Edward Brock]

Just plugged in my PC status. This old thing keeps hanging on and so do I.
I like my I-what's-it thing and hope if Santa gets stuck in my chimney
this year I'll hold him up for a Little-Mac.

[Bluesy]

Thanks for the caution regarding Yosemite. I've found that there is some incompatibility between the Mini's Power PC processor and the Macbook Pro's Intel. One great annoyance is that the 'book doesn't support Midi files. And the crossword puzzle doesn't load anymore on the Mini, a minor annoyance. But the Pro is a very nice machine. Still getting used to the trackpad.

Tom

Won't a mouse work? I use the little wireless ones for everything.
Thomas/

[Edward Brock]

I use that little wireless mouse all the time.
I think it's a great invention.
The rat with no tail.

[Grizzly]

Thanks for the caution regarding Yosemite. I've found that there is some incompatibility between the Mini's Power PC processor and the Macbook Pro's Intel. One great annoyance is that the 'book doesn't support Midi files. And the crossword puzzle doesn't load anymore on the Mini, a minor annoyance. But the Pro is a very nice machine. Still getting used to the trackpad.

Tom

Won't a mouse work? I use the little wireless ones for everything.
Thomas/

Of course. Just one more piece to keep track  of.

T

[streetlegal]

Just back online after wrestling with my Windows Vista PC. This happens from time to time. My fault of course - I was trying to get it to start up faster yesterday and changed a user setting without knowing what I was doing. Took me a good couple of hours to work figure out what I had done and how to fix it. Still the old girl is now back in business again. I bought it six years ago as a base unit refurb and then connected it up to my TV with long cables - old school. So now I'm just hoping that it will keep on running at least until Windows 10 comes out. Maybe then I'll get a laptop...

[Tukker]

iMac for home for me.  I'm an IT nerd and have been for over 20 years.  The last thing I want to do when I get home is remove spyware and viruses off my computer that my kids some how got on it (I have 4 kids - if it can be broken they will break it lol - this our 2nd iMac and neither has had a problem ever).  I use PC's all day at work and I do have my iMac running dual-boot with Win7 on the partition if I need Windows apps (turns out this is mostly games lol that don't have a mac version).   

[English]

Thanks for the caution regarding Yosemite. I've found that there is some incompatibility between the Mini's Power PC processor and the Macbook Pro's Intel. One great annoyance is that the 'book doesn't support Midi files. And the crossword puzzle doesn't load anymore on the Mini, a minor annoyance. But the Pro is a very nice machine. Still getting used to the trackpad.

Tom

Won't a mouse work? I use the little wireless ones for everything.
Thomas/

I haven't used a mouse since the day I bought the MacBook. The pad on that thing is a joy. I even connected one once to try it, but it was just not necessary. This includes writing two non-fiction books on it, heavy with illustrations and highly detailed, photo-realistic drawings. All done with nothing but the pad on the Mac.

Alan.

[Keith]

I have only used PCs (since 1995) & run Linux (since 1999) or BSD (since about 2010).

F.O.S.S. all the way! 

(Free Open Source Software)

[Corinto]

Mac since 1986.

Still have a MacPlus 4 mb RAM & external Apple HD 20 mb, system 7.1,
and a Mac SE/30 16 mb RAM & internal HD 500 mb system 7.5,
both working !!!
And a few more, also the iMac G4 dome-shaped still in use for music, very good speakers. 

[BigDaddyT]

Well, my ChroMACtic Pro will beat your PConic any day:) I think it's pretty much the same discussion as chromatic vs. diatonic. Both have their strengths and weaknesses, and depending on the task and/or user, one or the other will be the better tool!

I prefer Mac, simply because there are certain software programs I find extremely useful that aren't available on the PC. However, in recent years Macs have fallen behind the curve in technology. They still don't offer a laptop with a touchscreen. Really! REALLY!

[Keith]

Macs are running on Intel systems nowadays so they are basically a PC with FreeBSD, plus a top coat of Aqua. 

They have some nice software, by all accounts, but I'm happy with F.O.S.S.

[SlideMeister]

I've recently come to realize I haven't liked PC's since they got rid of XP OS. I don't like Windows 10 (can't even burn files to disk without an act of Congress) and I Never had much use for OSX or Macs, period!(except for GarageBang )  Even the upgrades for GB are a pain in the shorts anymore. My 2007 Mac mini Intel 166 is maxed out with an SSD, 4Gig/RAM, two external storage drives and SnowLeopard and I'm stuck in a time warp with old versions of software. Can't run iReal Pro or the new version of GB. I may hafta say faghettaboditt and look into a dual boot hackintosh mod for my PC i7 and and cheat! or maybe just go linux. (whatever that is )

[deepsouth]

Goes without saying, I reckon, but this obsolescence by design is obviously deliberate....
Stringing us along to sell us the same product we already have, which still works fine, except it's now been rendered incompatible with current versions, so hey -
you need a new operating system and new software, and new outboard hardware, and aw, still doesn't match up?  You need a new computer.

AVID, the company that now sells ProTools studio software, actually had language that said basically, "hey, you've got three years of service out of the product you bought from us -  we believe it's time you should invest with us again."  Never mind that what you've got is still wholly operable.  We've arranged so that if any component of your system requires upgrade or replacement, you'll find it necessary to overhaul the entire system, at ever increasing expense.  Unless you play our game, which is... subscription.  That's right, a protection racket.  You pay us a (considerable) yearly fee for the privilege of continuing to use what you've already paid for, and avoid the consequences of not cooperating.  Be a shame if you's to have to upgrade that entire setup again, eh?

Apple and the others work a similar hoodoo with their constant unnecessary reinventions.  Ten years ago they were heralding Mac OS as "the most advanced operating system on the planet."  Yet somehow they've continually found it needing repairs and fixes and improvements, to the point that if you do buy a new unit, you can fully expect its operating system to become "an older version" within months of your purchase.  When it was a matter of innovating for the purpose of persuading customers to choose their products, manufacturers needed to impress the user and took his interests and preferences seriously, incorporating them into hardware and software design.  Now that the world is dependent on computers, they're in a position to manipulate the marketplace and the whole direction of development to benefit not the user, but their corporation's economic dominance.  It's all about the stockholders and growth, and ways to milk the same customer base to make the numbers continue to increase.  That's why the contorted maze of compatibility issues fouls the customer experience.  Policies are implemented to coerce the public into accepting what's not in their own interests.  It doesn't have to make sense, just has to make money.

Forgive verbosity.  I use a Mac Mini.  Prefer it over Windows, but Apple has just become dishonorable in my observation.

[Willi]

I use a GNU/Linux operating sistem installed on a desktop PC built with parts of my choice (intel motherboard and cpu).
I do not like to use proprietary software. The last time I used windows was like 15 years ago and it was windows 98.

[Crawforde]

I liked windows 98.
After a while I went over to apple for dependability. Have been happy with macs for a while.
Now I have Microsloth at work and an ancient but upgraded MacBook at home.
I'm not a fan of the upgrade racket and hate the new windows, OSX seems ok, but both companies seem to be playing dirty and I'm not confident enough in my computer knowledge and am totally ignorant of the alternatives,  it am starting to consider checking out Linux or whatever the next time I need a mandatory upgrade.

[Ed McCullough]

I use the IBM system (PC), and dislike the "new and improved" operating systems and the "new and improved" MS Office programs at least as much as anyone else. I only use the Microsoft programs since so many of my clients use them. A client needs to sit at my computer and use it instantly.
    When I retire from this place, I will likely learn to use Linux and some nonmainstream programs. We have things to do, other than spending more money and time to learn "new and improved" programs. 
          Crotchety old Ed

[SlideMeister]

I have a copy of Linux Mint Cinnamon that I downloaded a few weeks back, and have absolutely no idea what to do with it! I was kickin around the idea of installing it on one of my machines on one of the spare hard drives I have lying around. Looking back I think I just chickened out or somethin.   If I lived in the city, I'm sure any pimple-faced seventh grader could have me up and running in no time, but alas! I live out in da boonies, so that's not gunna happen. Hey! Maybe I can get an Amish kid to  . . . . Nah! Bad idea!

[Willi]

I have a copy of Linux Mint Cinnamon that I downloaded a few weeks back, and have absolutely no idea what to do with it! I was kickin around the idea of installing it on one of my machines on one of the spare hard drives I have lying around. Looking back I think I just chickened out or somethin.   If I lived in the city, I'm sure any pimple-faced seventh grader could have me up and running in no time, but alas! I live out in da boonies, so that's not gunna happen. Hey! Maybe I can get an Amish kid to  . . . . Nah! Bad idea!

Nowadays GNU/Linux operating systems are very easy to install and much more easy to use. I've instaled Linux on both my parents computers because I was tired of fixing theyre PC's (they got them full of virus's all the time). I installed them ubuntu with an xfce front-end which looks and behaves almost like windows xp. They're super happy with linux since they don't have to worry about virus's anymore.
I use Linux since 2007. In my own PC I use Gnome 3. Currently on Ubuntu, but I fliped over the years between Ubuntu, Debian and Fedora. The three are very stable and functional OS.

[SlideMeister]

Which should I try? (as a noob) So far, I like the sound of Fedora