iElegance? The first week of my migration to a MacBook Pro

By now, you’ve already been inundated with the Mac vs. PC ads:

The truth is that I’m not sure that they nail what it is that Mac users enjoy. No doubt all of the iLife, iMovies, iTunes, etc. are great to use. Also, it’s no surprise that creative folks love utilizing a Mac. Some of it could be that folks like Adobe and programs like Quark got their start on a Mac.

The element that I believe Apple is missing from these commercials is the elegance of the user interface. Though Windows has evolved and actually mimicked many of Apple’s traits, they still have yet to really capture the ease of use.

I’m going to show my age here, but I started in this industry by programming ladder logic in Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs), moved to DOS, integrated PLCs to DOS, and developed, integrated and implemented applications on Microsoft Windows, IBM OS2 Warp/Warp Server, etc. It’s never been simple, but I’ve always challenged myself at reading and experimenting to automate and integrate more and more. I’ve got a lot of experience, and you might say I’m a ‘Microsoft Guy’, having used it as my primary tool in my jobs my entire career.

OSX (Mac’s Operating System), is less cluttered, simple to use, easy to manipulate, customize, integrate, etc. To tell you the truth, one of the funniest moments I had was when I couldn’t figure out how to install a program. I didn’t realize that I could simply drag it to my Applications folder. Don’t you wish it was that simple on Windows? Sheesh.

As for interactivity at work (we’re a Microsoft shop), I have had no problems. No problems getting on the network, accessing wireless, utilizing Office and sending and sharing files. It’s been quite painless. I do have Parallels running ‘just in case’ I need to run XP… but I run it out of a Window on the Mac (it’s awesome). There I have Microsoft Access and Microsoft Visio.

So… my first word would have to be iElegance. Apple does a fantastic job at a beautiful, simple interface that runs quite perfect. When I have switched from PC to PC in the past, it’s honestly taken more time than it has to switch to the Mac. I’m impressed.

http://www.littmagi.com/martweiss.com/wordblog Martin Weiss

Welcome to the wonderful world of Mac

I’ve had my first Mac exposure in the early 80s, when I saw a demo that stressed the fact that Macs were friendly (as in “Please insert the disk” as opposed to “insert disk”). When I spent a year in the US in 1986, the shool had only Macs. They were so easy to network, and what a charm to do graphics (today, one would call that “graphics”). For some years I worked with PCs, mainly for the reason that as a student one couldn’t afford a Mac at the time. Then again I had a beautiful Mac (5200), which was a predecessor, albeit not-so-sucessful, of the iMac. Then again, when Windows XP came out, I was tempted to buy a Sony Laptop. Not only did the tech support suck, at that point I started making money with video, and having to re-boot your PC every hour with the client sitting next to you, was not a good experience. So we jumped onto the Final Cut bandwaggon, already with 1.25 version. Haven’t regretted it once. Today we are 2 in the office, and have 5 Macs; everything from a tiny Mac mini, an oldish G4 tower (can you imagine a 7 year old PC that still looks good, and is still workable?) up to a G5 with 4 processors.
Bottom line: Macs may cost more in the initial phase, but they save so much in productivity costs, are fun to work with, safe from viruses. They just work.
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