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The End of my Macbook Pro Experiment

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wraith808:
I started out on a great adventure a few years ago.  At least, what I term a great adventure.  After my Linux foray and failure (or rather, not failure, just finding out it wasn't practical for me), I figured since MacOS is based on BSD, I'd try it.  Also to see what the big fuss was.  I'd started on Apple (back with the ][e) and worked at a place where I had to use one.  But that was back in the 90s, and I thought with all of the hubub, I must be missing something.  And admittedly, I wanted to make money on the App store.

So, my adventure, and what I learned.  All of this is personal, but it is my experience.  So, I purchased one a few years ago (a MBP i5 late 2011) to see if I'd like it and to hopefully develop iOS apps and get rich.  I found out that it takes a lot more than development skills to get rich making iOS apps, so I gave that up.

1. I don't like Macbooks. 

Though there are a few cool things about the Mac and its software (I'll miss Typed, Ulysses (although I just found out they have an ipad version, so I'm happy again), Storyist (although I still have it on my ipad), and Marked (though I did make my own barebones alternative)), even after 3 years with it as my only laptop, I still am not comfortable with it or the environment.  I even tried loading a couple of different options for running windows apps on it, but those virtualized environments were slower- don't let them tell you different.  And since I still was working in windows on my desktop and at work, I noticed it.

2. Macbooks keep their price pretty well- if your next purchase will be a PC.

I think that's because they're overpriced.  People say all of these advantages why they're willing to pay a premium.  I call BS after using it.  There was no reason for me to pay that much for that machine.  But here, three years later, I ordered a new Dell for only $40.  I used my proceeds from selling it to pay for the rest.

3. The days of getting rich off the app store are over.

I noted it above, but Apple has skewed the app store so that the only people that make money are those that already have it.  It's still possible for those that don't have the money to pimp their software to make it... but that's more happenstance than by plan.  I think that's explained on Cliffski's blog (he makes some indie games, and tried to dip into the app store with mixed success) in the article Implications of a global market on random success.

Depressing.

4. You can get a lot of money off just for calling the company.

So, I ordered the computer from Dell.  With the standard support + accidental damage for 1 year, the version I wanted was $800.  I was able to find it on the microsoft store (and if you haven't looked into their signature editions, it's a good way to go... the same computers without the bloatware) after a special promotion for $40 less.  That didn't include tax, so it would have been a bit less, but it included 2 years of enhanced support and accidental damage, and it was going to ship out and be to me within 3 days.  Dell was a couple of weeks.  So I called and explained to the guy in retention (it says a lot that they have to have a retention department).  He said he couldn't give me the extra support (didn't really want it anyway), but he could give me $75 off.  I said, that would only make up for the difference in price... not the timeline nor shipping.  So he made it $100 off, with a 50% chance at expediting the assembly, and FedEx overnight shipping.

All that just for complaining?

The squeaky wheel really does get the oil.

In the end, after trying a Mac, and trying Linux, I just prefer Windows, for all its warts and problems.  It works better for me, and I'm more productive on it.  Who would have thought?

Renegade:
I guess I'm not very surprised.

I sold my iMac a few weeks ago after a few years with it.

I never got into it. My first experiences were that if I wanted to do anything, I had to drop down to the command line. Yuck. That's what I wanted to avoid, and the Mac has no options to avoid it, unlike Windows. I thought Apple was better than that. Despite the nice smooth graphics, they really don't work on making anything much nicer in the OS.

There were other things as well, but overall, I just didn't like OS X.

Now, I do have to grant it to Apple that they make damn good hardware. No complaints there. Their hardware is far superior to the beige box Windows PC you get from other companies. Even my Dell laptop is nowhere near as good as my iMac hardware was.

However, that doesn't make up for how stubborn OS X and Apple are in so many ways. There's the "Apple way" and the highway. I'm unlikely to get another Mac unless I really really need it for work, which is highly unlikely.

wraith808:
However, that doesn't make up for how stubborn OS X and Apple are in so many ways. There's the "Apple way" and the highway. I'm unlikely to get another Mac unless I really really need it for work, which is highly unlikely.
-Renegade (May 29, 2015, 08:54 PM)
--- End quote ---

Same here... and the hardware *is* really nice, though PC manufacturers are catching up.

Just one example of how frustrating it is... how hard is it to make the buttons on the window frames consistent in their operation across apps?  And why when I maximize do I have to reserve space for the dock?  Only if I go fullscreen is that not a problem... but sometimes(most of the time?), you want that extra real estate, but don't want to go full screen. 

Innuendo:
Macs are unique beasts. People talk about the Apple eco-system and how your iPhone, your iPad, your Apple TV, and Mac are all connected as one and work as one. To a large extent that is true, but again....Macs are unique beasts.

Macs (and their OS) do things differently than any other computers on the planet. Some things better and some things worse...even if you run Windows on your Mac using Boot Camp, you'll still be doing some things differently than you would on a 'real' Windows machine.

When it comes to Macs, it really is a case of either you get it or you don't. I don't get how Macs work, have never gotten how Macs work, and will never get how Macs work. Every time I use one I get this claustrophobic feeling of being trapped in a box with arbitrary rules. I'm not in Apple's target demographic, though, and I'm fine with it.

As for quality of hardware, you can find some wonderfully built laptops that can rival a Macbook, but you won't find Dell selling one and you will pay just as much for it as you did that Macbook Pro. They are rare, but they are out there....up to each person to decide if they are worth the price or not.

Tuxman:
OS X is the living proof that it is possible to create a UNIX which sucks even more than Linux. (Although, technically, "MacOS is based on BSD" is not as true as it sounds, given that there was NeXT before and Darwin is more like a Frankenstein's Monster made of SysV and BSD/4.3 ingredients with an awfully fucked up kernel.)

I welcome your decision, anyway.

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