But the real issue is, when will OS X be good enough to not need to run Windows at all? That ability to boot up XP is not so much a Mac victory as it is Bill Gates' triumph. And it's really cool that Macs run Windows XP. The Mac is a fine, high-end Windows machine. Just in case you want to run your world business with a healthy dose of cheap labor from Pakistan (or, with the declining dollar, Alabama), just remember that it'll be Windows you'll need to run it on. Sure, Macs have fewer viruses, worms, and crapware - but they also have expensive, difficult-to-mod machines that become obsolete in a few short years.
Waiting for a Mac patch of a file-sharing program, cell phone patcher, or whatever your freedom-cherishing heart desires can feel like exile.
That's not appealing to most people - but there are amazing things you can do on PCs with homemade software that usually isn't OS X-compatible whatsoever.
Hacking a Mac feels like rape to fanboys, and it can be done, but with a trip to Fry's Electronics and a little lunch money in the PC world you can basically soup up your own Windows roadster. They're like fancy sports cars run on a single computer chip, fixable only at your dealer for a set price. You can't build a Mac easily, and you can't really customize them, either - not unless you want to invalidate your warranty. Families, non-nerds, and most of the adult world need less-expensive options, and for $500, the only thing Apple sells that has a screen and reads email is an iPhone or an iTouch.Īpple Is Fascist.
Yes, they're different in quality - but an eight-year-old who needs to plunk out a book report doesn't need 0.13 inch-thin wafers of aluminum.
You can get a PC laptop for $500 at Best Buy. Apple's cheapest laptop is still more than $1,000. The Apple Stores and have created a one-world pricing universe for all things Mac, while in the PC world there are multiple manufacturers, tons of retail stores, loads of sales and rebates, and plenty of cheap refurbished parts on the market that people can use to make their own dream machines. And if you don't, then you've been hypnotized, too. For how much Macs cost, you'd think they could bundle one in, right? Yeah, I know there are third-party DVR options for the Mac.
Apple TV, a set-top box that should have been a DVR, instead locks you to an iTunes account enslavement and a media-purchasing DRM-rental-blindered idea of "fun." It may be easier to use an iPod and a Mac to download TV shows, but you're also stuck with one media store, no recording options, and no way out once you're completely sucked in. Steve Jobs prefers Front Row, Apple's happy little interface that has no TiVo magic whatsoever. Windows Media Center has been a DVR replacement for years now, streaming all the video content your torrenting heart desires to boot, because Bill Gates swings that way. Fuck you, Macs can do everything with media in the entire universe! No, they can't. I can see the Mac owners already bleeding out of their earholes over this one. And so it goes, until you want to tear your hair out. GameTap works on Macs, but only Intel ones - and not for all titles. GameTap and Steam make the PC a gaming-on-demand service with hundreds of retro and current titles there for the taking. Add to that the cost and difficulties Macs have in swapping out graphics cards, which is necessary if, perhaps, you actually wanted to keep playing modern games. Meanwhile, the Mac makes you feel like a Soviet searching the bread shelves for crumbs of entertainment that may be released on the whim of cruel developers. For PC owners, having a top-of-the-line computer means being able to buy an assortment of titles so large you'll never really have to pick up a videogame system. Macs have, for some reason, have never been very good to gamers - games on the Mac have largely been an afterthought while Microsoft is balls-deep in its Xbox experiment. Because, for all the ads, all the self-celebratory Apple press conferences, all the sparkling-pretty Apple stores, there are still a lot of reasons why Macs still suck. That's not to say I'm drinking the Kool-Aid.
Oktay Ortakcioglu Ratoath IRL/iStockphotoįirst off: I'm a Mac user.