MBNick, here are just a few reasons why you should LOVE your Mac: try getting your Windows machine to reproduce any of them:
* Solid. The stability and "just works" nature of OS X constantly amazes me. Many Linux distributions are very solid (think Debian or SuSE), but few could honestly be described as easy to configure and use (Ubuntu may be an exception to this rule!). Not so for Mac OS X. It is solid as a rock, and configuration for those things that need it is extremely straightforward. Everything just works!
* Safe! No virus', no trojans and no serious attacks from the dangerous world of the net.
* Widgets! FABULOUS! If you haven't checked out Dashboard yet, do so as soon as you can. Konfabulator and/or Super Karamba may provide similar functions in the Linux world, and Vista with its warmed over imitation, Gadgets, but there is nothing like Dashboard and its thousands of available (and mostly free) widgets.
* Superior application model. A facet of this is the fact that you can close an application window and still leave the application loaded and waiting. Closing the window doesn't close the app. What a great idea! Subsequent uses of the application just "snap" into being . I LOVE the responsiveness.
* Spotlight Integration. Spotlight is a great search tool, and it is tightly integrated into lots of Mac OS X operations. My favorite? The Spotlight integration into the "File Save" and "Save As" dialogs. Notice the little Spotlight logo in the upper right corner of these dialogs? Instead of painfully navigating to your intended folder, just type in a few letters of its name, and Spotlight guides you there effortlessly. You can save a file anywhere on your system with only a few keystrokes instead of all that tedious navigation through the file system that Linux or Windows would impose on you.
* Open Source and Unix! Mac OS X is built on a FreeBSD base, and thus supports a huge array of Open Source Software, via the DarwinPorts or Fink bases. I switched from Linux to Mac OS X and now have the best of both worlds, having installed all my old Linux favorites via DarwinPorts, plus having access to all the Mac OS X software.
* Encrypted virtual volumes. It is DEAD EASY to set up an encrypted virtual volume (an encrypted .dmg file) in which to keep your sensitive records - financials, wills, etc. Setting up the equivalent in Linux is an interesting tromp through the world of loopback volumes and encryption - anything but easy. And of course, it costs big money to get a program to allow you to do this in the Windows world. Mac OS X supports it "out of the box".
* Included Software. iLife is wonderful. Even the basic image viewer, Preview, is rich and feature packed.
* Spring loaded folders. What a GREAT idea and so easy to work with. To see this in action, drag an item and hold it over a folder icon. After a few seconds, the folder will spring open and you have suddenly descended into that folder. Do this repeatedly until you get to where you are going. This is a great way to move things to where you want them in an interactive way.
* Unsaved changes alert. The next time you are working on a document, take a look at Red "close" dot in the upper left corner of the window. Notice the little black dot that show up inside? This indicates that you have unsaved changes. Now save your file. Notice how the little black dot disappears? Isn't that neat? Its a little thing really, but really, really nice.
* Installing apps. Apps are basically self contained packages on Mac OS X. Installing is simplicity itself - just drag the .app file to the Applications folder. Thats it, all done! ...and applications don't strew hundreds of .lib.so.x and other support files all over your disk. Much, much more sensible!
* Application Integration! It all just works ...together. The integration between Safari and Mail is an excellent example of this. I LOVE the ability to email an entire web page (not a link, but a copy of the full content) with a single command. Did you know about this? Go to a web page that you would like to email to someone and type CMD-I. Boom! Mail opens up and presents you with a message ready to be mailed, whose content is the page you were just looking at. This is GREAT for mailing travel itineraries, or even just a story you saw on a web page that you wanted to share.
...OK, I will stop there. Just a few things to think about. Your Mac is much, much better than you are giving it credit for.
...and remember, back in the day when "horseless carriages" (now known as cars!) were breaking onto the scene, might some people have asked "what is so great about them? I see horses everywhere!"
