Benefits of a Macbook over a PC

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Hi everyone,

I'm in the process of buying a laptop, and I'm still hanging in the balance as to whether it should be a PC or a Macbook.

I have 3 burning questions:

  1. What sets the Macbook apart from the PC apart from aesthetics? One can easily find another notebook with the same (if not better) tech specs.
  2. And what exactly is the reasoning behind the cliché that "Macs just work"? If this is referring to Mac OS X specifically, So what are the major benefits of Mac OS X?
  3. What makes Macbooks more 'stable' than its competitor notebook counterparts? Is it purely the OS?

I'm sure these three questions are all related. I'd appreciate it if anyone could critically shed some light on any of this. I did a quick search around the forums and I couldn't find any threads that really answered my questions. I apologise if I've missed them, so redirect away if necessary.

Thanks, guys!

Cheers,
Joel
 
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The OS and the fact that apple build their own hardware which can't be said for a PC/Windows. If you know the capabilities of the machine inside out I'd say you got a much better chance of making the machine work properly.
 
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I have 3 burning questions:
And they all have the same answer:


The only thing that separates a Mac from a Windows machine or any other personal computer is the Mac OS.



A Mac is still a computer that can have its OS fail or have its hardware fail.
It is no more stable than any other well-maintained computer.

The Mac OS is just a different way of achieving a task on the computer.
Just like any other OS other than Windows... be it Linux, BeOS, BSD, etc., etc., etc.

The only advantage or benefit is a matter of personal opinion and preference for a certain OS.
 

cwa107


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The OS and the fact that apple build their own hardware which can't be said for a PC/Windows. If you know the capabilities of the machine inside out I'd say you got a much better chance of making the machine work properly.

I think you mean that the OS is tied to specific hardware platforms. Apple actually contracts the manufacturing operations to other Chinese companies.
 
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I think you mean that the OS is tied to specific hardware platforms. Apple actually contracts the manufacturing operations to other Chinese companies.

Yes under Apple's guidance and design teams.
 
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Yes under Apple's guidance and design teams.
Just like Dell/HP/Sony/Gateway/Compaq/VooDoo/Acer/Alienware/etc have design teams that offer guidance to their contractors when building the computers in their lineups.
 
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Just like Dell/HP/Sony/Gateway/Compaq/VooDoo/Acer/Alienware/etc have design teams that offer guidance to their contractors when building the computers in their lineups.

Haha, exactly! It's not like Dell just tells the factories in Taiwan to just build whatever they feel like and ship them over.
 
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@Joel -

Some clarification is needed regarding your third question. If you compare a Mac running OS X to a PC running Windows, then you could definitely say that the Mac is more 'stable' than a PC. OS X uses a Darwin kernel that is derived from FreeBSD (a Unix-like operating system). Unix is inherently very stable, which allows you to operate a Unix computer for a very long time without every having to reboot it. This makes Unix ideal for servers. The same thing can be said about OS X -- a lot of Mac owners never turn off their computers. However, a Mac isn't any more stable than a PC running Linux, which is also derived from Unix.

The other major advantage of OS X over Windows is that there are currently no viruses for OS X in the wild. The same thing applies to Linux as well. So you can compute without worrying about your Mac becoming infected or having to install a lot of anti-virus and anti-spyware programs. Apple does release security updates from time to time, but these are almost always for eradicating trojan horses that users were tricked into installing.

So as D3v1L80Y said, the differences are really all about the OS, and not about the hardware.
 
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I think one of the major benefits is that mac hardware is DESIGNED to work with Mac Software...their development happen simultaneously. with Windows, it always seems like the "square peg round hole" phenomenon - windows was designed for "hardware"...

to me it's the seamless integration between hardware and software that makes such a difference. That and OSX is based on a unix platoform that is super study to begin with...
 
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Also, You can't say "well for $999 I can get a Intel C2D p8600, 500GB HD, 4GB of RAM, a ATI 3650 Dedicated video w/ 256MB of ram. Why are Apple's specs so much less for the same money" (this was just an example). When considering the OS, hardware isn't compared "apples to apples" because OSX is so much more efficient. An iMac will run noticeably faster on the same hardware than windows.
 
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Also, You can't say "well for $999 I can get a Intel C2D p8600, 500GB HD, 4GB of RAM, a ATI 3650 Dedicated video w/ 256MB of ram. Why are Apple's specs so much less for the same money" (this was just an example). When considering the OS, hardware isn't compared "apples to apples" because OSX is so much more efficient. An iMac will run noticeably faster on the same hardware than windows.

That's not true. On equally fast hardware, Windows is fast, and OS X is also fast. And if you're talking about software other than the OS, that's dependent on how well the software is written (which has little to do with the OS) and what hardware you have. If you go to encode a video on a Mac and then encode the same video with the same settings on a much higher spec'd Windows machine, the Windows machine will do it faster. Same with any other demanding task.

I know what you're getting at, though. What makes Macs faster isn't that OS X uses the hardware so much more efficiently. It's all because OS X is simply better laid out and leads to a more efficient workflow for the user. Mac users don't work faster because OS X draws windows or loads folder contents faster than Windows... those differences would be minor at best, and are largely affected by hardware. They work faster because OS X is easier and simpler to use.

Compare a Mac newbie to a Windows pro using equal hardware and I am sure the Windows user will probably accomplish his tasks faster. But if you compare newbie to newbie, the Mac user will likely figure things out faster.
 
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I don't know. I've got a buddy with a Vista Machine with a nVidia 7300GT and a Mac Pro w/ the 7300GT. The processor is roughly 15% faster in the windows machine and has 512MB more RAM. The Mac Pro encoded the file he was working on about 15 seconds faster than the PC. I mean granted their are exceptions to every rule. And I don't really know how well maintained the PC was.

But I get what you're saying as well. I was referring to every day tasks, opening programs, etc. My eMac G4 1.25Ghz w/ 1gb Ram opens Safari just as fast as my Dual core 2.4Ghz Windows box w/ 3GB Ram opens Firefox and loads the pages as fast or not significantly slower for me to notice. It loads and starts Adium as fast as windows loads MSN Messenger. But when it comes down to encoding, rendering, etc, it would make sense that "hardware is hardware, and faster is better"
 
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That's not true. On equally fast hardware, Windows is fast, and OS X is also fast. And if you're talking about software other than the OS, that's dependent on how well the software is written (which has little to do with the OS) and what hardware you have. If you go to encode a video on a Mac and then encode the same video with the same settings on a much higher spec'd Windows machine, the Windows machine will do it faster. Same with any other demanding task.

I know what you're getting at, though. What makes Macs faster isn't that OS X uses the hardware so much more efficiently. It's all because OS X is simply better laid out and leads to a more efficient workflow for the user. Mac users don't work faster because OS X draws windows or loads folder contents faster than Windows... those differences would be minor at best, and are largely affected by hardware. They work faster because OS X is easier and simpler to use.

Compare a Mac newbie to a Windows pro using equal hardware and I am sure the Windows user will probably accomplish his tasks faster. But if you compare newbie to newbie, the Mac user will likely figure things out faster.

i agree. i bought my first mac about two weeks ago. prior to that, i had only used a friend's mac to look something up on the internet. i found that i had a much easier time learning how to use OS X than i did with Windows.
 
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I don't know. I've got a buddy with a Vista Machine with a nVidia 7300GT and a Mac Pro w/ the 7300GT. The processor is roughly 15% faster in the windows machine and has 512MB more RAM. The Mac Pro encoded the file he was working on about 15 seconds faster than the PC. I mean granted their are exceptions to every rule. And I don't really know how well maintained the PC was.

But I get what you're saying as well. I was referring to every day tasks, opening programs, etc. My eMac G4 1.25Ghz w/ 1gb Ram opens Safari just as fast as my Dual core 2.4Ghz Windows box w/ 3GB Ram opens Firefox and loads the pages as fast or not significantly slower for me to notice. It loads and starts Adium as fast as windows loads MSN Messenger. But when it comes down to encoding, rendering, etc, it would make sense that "hardware is hardware, and faster is better"

I agree. But the only way to do a true "apples to apples" (no pun intended) comparison of OSes is by running all of them on the same computer. This makes the hardware differences irrelevant. Generally, CPU-intensive tasks, such as multimedia encoding, will be equally fast in Windows and OS X because the CPU is doing the bulk of the work. And you won't see too much of a difference when running video games, because the GPU does the 3D rendering. But as soon as you start running multiple applications at the same time, OS X (and Linux) will really outperform Windows.

Of course, speed and ease of use also depends heavily on user experience. Naturally, a Windows "power user" will do things much faster on a Windows computer than a complete novice on a Mac. A newbie versus newbie test won't mean much either, because: a) nobody stays a newbie for long, and b) there really aren't many people who haven't had at least some exposure to computers and who could be called true newbies. If you want a real test, put a Mac expert against a Windows expert.

It all boils down to personal choice. I've used Windows since Windows 3.1 first came out, and DOS before that, and I programmed mainframes before that. I've been using Linux for about 3 years, and started playing around with a used iMac G3 less than a year ago (and I'm still learning how to use a Mac properly). Each OS has it's own strengths. I prefer my PC over my iMac simply because it's much newer and more powerful. But a new Mac would perform just as well as my PC.
 
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i agree. i bought my first mac about two weeks ago. prior to that, i had only used a friend's mac to look something up on the internet. i found that i had a much easier time learning how to use OS X than i did with Windows.


I totally agree. I also got my MB 2 weeks ago. Spent first couple days playing around with it and reading up on this forum (tons of knowledge shared on this site btw). I also went and got Pogue's "Missing Manual" book. At this point, I'd say I am quite comfortable with Leopard and adding stuff to my MB. Very user friendly and easy to learn. :Blushing:
 

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