Last week at Terminal 5 duty free shop on my way out to my Pondacherry office - I bought my older daughter the brand new PowerBook and I had a week to properly compare Mac OSX with Windows 7. I was going to write a long blog about my experience, However, because there are 100s of good blogs out there like this one which is well written, and detailed, so will I just talk about my own point of view which is very short one so read on...

I just don’t see what the diehard AppleFanBoys are on about. I have a few friends that belong to the club and every time see me work, start the usual stuff about how bad windows is and how amazing Mac is. The problem is that I think their last experience with windows is VISTA and they most certainly have a point there. But Windows 7 is another story and in the week that I have been using PowerBook most of my everyday usual tasks were happening a lot faster on my Sony Vaio than trying to do it on the power book. I am not talking about working with Adobe CS4 or writing code as at application level any comparisons are not fair since you have a layer on top that obscures the OS itself - I am talking about basic operations like browsing, bookmarking, copy and paste between emails or doing standard project management stuff on BaseCamp where for me productivity is much better with my Vaio/Windows 7.

One might argue that it is because I don’t know the short cuts or I have forgotten them. But I was a Mac user all of 90s and switched to Windows in the previous decade so I found my way back into Mac fairly quickly. Also, recently, I have been contemplating switching back to Mac so I was really looking for good reason to tell my wife that I have a business reason for wasting £2000 on a similar specification PowerBook to my Sony Vaio.

In the past year, occasionally I played with my Dad’s iBook, and I was not too impressed specially because my dad phones me at least couple of time a week asking me for help. I normally remote access his iBook and help him out so it is obviously not that user friendly. My sister told me that this is probably because I don’t remember all the short cuts and my Dad age has made him forgetful and therefore, he is asking the same questions over and over again.

I agree that this new Power book is 10 times faster and maybe with 10 times the amount of functionalities o the one I owned almost 20 years ago. However, the heart of it is basically the same as my old PowerMac back in 2000/2001. Now days they have proper multitasking that does not crash and has a great app launcher when you open it and "that is it!" You can see that it is not enough reason for wanting to switch over. It also has some disadvantages.

I would probably do it if there was no price difference between the equivalent Vaio and Mac OX. But the PowerBook is more expensive. The other deal breaker, NOT! for me is the mouse pad. I just cannot get used to it. Having a separate right and left hand click is essential for me. A lot of times these days I have my 5 month old daughter ‘Eden’ in one hand whilst trying to use just one hand to navigate and do things on the laptop. Try and do that on a Mac brand new PowerBook, Not easy! most short cuts need two hands.

I will have to wait another couple of years before I switch. I dream of a Future OS, that is closer to iOS so I can have a really good reason to switch. There may also need other surprises like proper 3D Navigation and other good UI improvements by then and who knows, may be Windows 8 or nine with Kinect built in or a brand new Chrome OS is there to compare.

Comments

ByAbi @ Wednesday, March 09, 2011 12:25 PM

In response to your post (being the daughter in question)... I am yet to get my hands on the latest Macbook Pro to give a well-informed opinion. However, I will say that as I am a web and graphic designer I am very aware that the creative sector is dominated by Mac. Having been a Windows user for my whole life (and having always been anti-mac) I was speculative over jumping on the bandwagon... The prices are ridiculous and stationary - you're never going to get a good deal with a Mac. But I had to ask myself WHY does everyone have one? Why do my friends look shocked when I pull out my Toshiba (5 years old - sad to say goodbye...) and why do they start yelling when they are occasionally forced to use Windows?

I don't know a single person who has complained about their Mac, other than the costly repairs. They are aesthetically beautiful and clever in usage and implementation of current technology. As easy as it is to condemn the Mac world, how is it that Windows is constantly competing yet never beating them? I am yet to see something innovative and groundbreaking from the Windows world... and I have paid my dues in waiting!

The latest Macbook Pro is super fast and I have spoken to numerous developers who have admitted that they are far superior to Windows - let alone the full endorsement from graphic designers. Even the geekiest guy on my course (not to stereotype - but your quintessential Windows anorak) pulled out a Macbook Pro during lecture.

As I said, I am yet to experience the mac for myself so my comments may well be hypocritical... But I will say that my dad is a Windows veteran of over 30 years - so it is unsurprising to me that the Mac OS has disconcerted his opinion of the awe of a Mac.

I will be experimenting with the Mac this weekend... So watch this space.

By Salar Golestanian @ Wednesday, March 09, 2011 12:42 PM

Just to correct you, I was a Mac veteran for 10 years during 1990s. I switched to Windows in 2000s mainly because Mac OS in those days constantly crashed on me. 10 years later now I am just trying to find reasons to switch to something different. Not exactly because I am not happy with Windows 7, but so to explore why some people think it is not as good as Mac OSX? The Problem is that I could not validate these claims so I will stick to windows 7 for the next 2 years.

ByJoe Brinkman @ Wednesday, March 09, 2011 1:56 PM

@Abi - Ouch. A 5 year old Toshiba. You should have your dad buy you a new PowerBook - I hear they are wonderful for graphic design. I mean really, what kind of father would make his child use a 5 year old Toshiba, running Windows no less ;)

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