Mac or PC - The BIG Question

I just read an article on MacDailyNews about choosing either a Mac or a PC. This argument comes up quite often as I am one of those people who uses both Macs and PCs for home and work. What is the answer? In this blog I go through how I use Macs at work and home while identifying what I like and hate about both platforms.

At work I have a multitude of computers including; 4 Dual Xeon and 2 Intel PCs and on the mac side I have 1 powerbook, 1 G5 and access to 2 G4 macs. Also at home I have an iBook and an AMD Athlon PC, so as you can see I am surrounded by both Mac and PC hardware and operating systems.

My work requires me to operate in a number of roles including; software developer, systems architect, web developer, graphics artist and project management. To support this work I use a very wide variety of applications from Java Development to project management and document creation. At work it is about 99.9% windows so I have to work in their environment with all my macs. I currently use Apple Mail that connects up to the Microsoft Exchange 5.5 servers using IMAP (I have also had it connected by SMTP before). I especially like to use IMAP as it allows me to access my inbox “live” from both the powerbook, G5 and any of the windows computers using outlook. For calendar functions I use Apple's iCal program and have a WebDAV server (Apache) running on the G5. With the WebDAV server I can publish my iCal calendars to the G5 and then use PHP iCalendar to display the calendars as a website. By using PHP iCalendar I can then access all of my calendars from anywhere on the work network or allow others to view my calendars. For address book functions I store all my contacts in Apple Address book, then connect it to the exchange server via the LDAP connection built into Apple Address book. The LDAP connection allows me to find email addresses from the exchange global address book.

Ok so now that I have explained all the ways that I have integrated all my macs into the windows centric world at work, I should also describe the parts that do not work. Calendar integration with exchange is nonexistent which makes it very difficult to integrate with the windows users when they invite you to meetings or you need to access a shared calendar. The way that I get around this is that I either use a Citrix client or use Microsoft's Remote Desktop to connect to another windows box and use the normal exchange client, not the optimal solution I know. At work we have just moved the whole Microsoft Network to Active Directory, OSX is supposed to support Active Directory and actually has an Active Directory plugin for their Directory Access but we have failed to connect any of the Macs to the Active Directory network. From reading the forums on the macwindows.com website I am not the only person who has had this problem. The only other problem is that there are still some programs (or equivalents) not available on the mac, most notably is Altova's XML Spy and Microsoft Project.

Now that we have the gripes out of the way you are probably wondering why I put myself through the pain of using Macs in a windows environment. The reasons are many, the most important is the OSX operating system. OSX is arguably the best operating system on the market today, it is robust, stable, flexible, easy to use, and to top is off is absolutely gorgeous to look and use. However looks are not everything, OSX has been designed with the user in mind which means that everything is just easy. The best way to explain this is to actually use my mum as an example. My mum used to have a PC and hated to use it, she would loath having to use it for anything. About 1 1/2 years ago I convinced her to replace her PC with a new iMac and she has not looked back. My mum now has actually bought her own Multifunctional printer/scanner/fax, digital camera and uses it for everything, she has even found out that she can dial people using her address book as it connected to the telephone line. Now she uses her mac for email, internet, scanning, photos, creating documents to help her run the small business that she owns. To top it all off is that she no longer rings me up complaining that everything has crashed and she does not know what to do as she has taught herself everything (well with some help from me).

As a mac and windows users I much prefer using macs for the following reasons:

• Applications developed to the Apple are generally much easier to use with a clean easy to understand interface
• Apple is working hard to integrate the applications and provide operating system wide services to allow application developers to integrate with the apple applications and other OSX applications
• Installing and removing applications is much easier in OSX (Drag and Drop or a simple installer package). Compared to windows installing and removing applications is an absolute dream.
• Networking is much simpler and easier to set up, for instance to share an internet connection on one mac all you have to do is check a checkbox in the sharing preference pane (windows is a very lengthy and time involved process to achieve the same results, that is if it works the first time).
• Apple provides a free set of Development tools to create applications (called Xcode), you have to buy the Microsoft Development Tools
• As the operating system is based on UNIX you can run all the normal UNIX applications (eg, grep, locate, tcsh, etc.) or you can download and compile opensource unix software (for instance I have compiled and use ht-dig to provide search functions on my work websites). It is also possible to compile and run any X11-based graphical applications as Apple provides an X11 implementation so you can run applications like GIMP
• There are many productivity enhancements to the operating system including exposé, fast user switching, multiple views of files in finder and many more coming in Tiger.
• Easy setup of wireless networking
• Integration with windows networks (with support getting better with ever OSX release)
• Many required applications come with the operating system (mail, internet browser, document editor, music player, chat, photo manager, movies, DVD, music development (Garageband)), some of these are provides in the Apple iLife bundle which now comes with new macs. Many more applications can be download for free of the Internet.
• Microsoft Office is available on the Mac or if you prefer a free option OpenOffice is being actively developed although a native version is not complete (current version requires X11 graphical component).
• To top is off OSX is a clean well designed operating system from every way you look at it, system, user interface, applications, connectivity or design.

Most people after I have explained all these reasons why I like using my macs then retort saying that Macs are more expensive, well it depends on how you look at this. When comparing anything you should always compare items that are equivalent and it is no different when comparing computer systems. Therefore this price argument must use two or more systems that are equivalent so it does not make any sense to compare a home built PC box with an Apple box as this is not a fair comparison. The best way to compare is to take systems from major PC manufacturers like Dell, Sony or Compaq and then compare their products with an Apple Mac. During the comparison you also need to take into account what you plan to use the computer for and how well the hardware and software provided by each system compares. From my studies into this I have found that Apple systems are very competitive on price especially for the laptops Apple produces. In the desktop line I believe that PCs are cheaper and I have found it very difficult to compare the iMac and eMac product lines as there are not many similar PC products.

So which is it PC or Mac? Well I choose Mac it is easier, gives me less frustrations and allows me to use the saying “it just works!”. If you really like to bang your head against the wall and live with badly designed and unfriendly applications then by all means use a PC. However if you are like me and want an elegant operating system that allows you to easily set up and use applications while still retaining the power to delve deep into the depths of the operating system then use a mac.

July 06, 2004