Rather late to the debate, but am a 20 year Windows user who has just made the move to Mac (Macbook Pro latest version with Snow Leopard). So far I like what I've seen, but with several caveats. One of the biggest is Finder. It speaks volumes that there are commercial alternatives out there that do what Finder doesn't. I was mortified not to find the option to 'cut' when right-clicking and frankly this has really slowed me down; so far CMD+X as an alternative is not working for me so need to fix that. Other bug-bears; renaming files can be frustratingly slow, and no support for batch renaming has also spurned commercial alternatives. For me this basic functionality in 2010 should come way before a pretty GUI and beautiful design, and I have the feeling that I'll be paying out quite a lot of cash to get my MBP to where I was with Win XP functionality. I'm sticking with the Mac and am slowly weaning myself off Parallels 5, but am frankly so far underwhelmed by my initial experience. My overriding impression is that Macs are more suitable than windows based machines for those with limited technical knowledge, although from what I've read they are also highly customisable by more experienced users. Other negatives I've found; - after only a week or so of owning my sexy MBP, installing a mobile broadband USB stick killed my system and I had to pay someone to get it back up and booting. As a newbie I didn't have the knowledge to fix the problem, but this should NOT EVER happen on any OS - and I never paid anyone a penny in 20 years of using Windows OS. - the 1 year warranty is a big putoff and that needs to be changed sharpish to increase consumer confidence in the product and to reward the faithful. - there is much less available freeware for Macs - the virus thing is a non-argument and I never had a virus on Windows. Those who open every attachment they receive and download everything that shines deserve what they get. Keep boasting about how virus-free Macs are, and hackers will soon write something to piss on your bonfire.
I hope you read this Steve (my cup is half full) and take on board the comments. Meantime, I'm sticking with it and I have to say that your pad thing is simply EXCELLENT ... always plugged a mouse into machines before, but this is a joy to use - cheers.
p.s. you need to spank someone in your organisation for not having sufficient magic mice available for Christmas. Despite your good recent results you lost a shedload of sales over here in Europe for that reason... and pissed a lot of people off.
One of the biggest is Finder. It speaks volumes that there are commercial alternatives out there that do what Finder doesn't. I was mortified not to find the option to 'cut' when right-clicking and frankly this has really slowed me down; so far CMD+X as an alternative is not working for me so need to fix that.
Other bug-bears; renaming files can be frustratingly slow, and no support for batch renaming has also spurned commercial alternatives.
For me this basic functionality in 2010 should come way before a pretty GUI and beautiful design, and I have the feeling that I'll be paying out quite a lot of cash to get my MBP to where I was with Win XP functionality.
I'm sticking with the Mac and am slowly weaning myself off Parallels 5, but am frankly so far underwhelmed by my initial experience.
My overriding impression is that Macs are more suitable than windows based machines for those with limited technical knowledge, although from what I've read they are also highly customisable by more experienced users. Other negatives I've found;
- after only a week or so of owning my sexy MBP, installing a mobile broadband USB stick killed my system and I had to pay someone to get it back up and booting. As a newbie I didn't have the knowledge to fix the problem, but this should NOT EVER happen on any OS - and I never paid anyone a penny in 20 years of using Windows OS.
- the 1 year warranty is a big putoff and that needs to be changed sharpish to increase consumer confidence in the product and to reward the faithful.
- there is much less available freeware for Macs
- the virus thing is a non-argument and I never had a virus on Windows. Those who open every attachment they receive and download everything that shines deserve what they get. Keep boasting about how virus-free Macs are, and hackers will soon write something to piss on your bonfire.
I hope you read this Steve (my cup is half full) and take on board the comments. Meantime, I'm sticking with it and I have to say that your pad thing is simply EXCELLENT ... always plugged a mouse into machines before, but this is a joy to use - cheers.
p.s.
you need to spank someone in your organisation for not having sufficient magic mice available for Christmas. Despite your good recent results you lost a shedload of sales over here in Europe for that reason... and pissed a lot of people off.