Filed under: Humor, Switchers, Cult of Mac
On drinking the Apple KoolAid
WFAA has posted an article about the fundamental dualities of the world: Ford vs. Chevy. Coke vs. Pepsi. Mac vs Windows. It's not a very deep article or a long-one, but several quotes (particularly those from WFAA's online operations manager--and Mac aficionado--Doug Boehner) made me laugh out loud. "It's strange and cult-like...Once you kind of drink the Kool-Aid of the Apple product you realize: Oh my gosh, this is what a computer should have been doing all along." I personally didn't know that retailer JC Penney was switching from Windows to Mac. Good for them!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Caesartheday said 4:18PM on 3-08-2007
Tying to the article in question, has anyone ever done an analysis of cost of ownership of Mac vs. PC? I'd love to know. Is Mac really more expensive when you add the support costs, help-desk, anti-virus licenses, other protective software and man labor to fix the PC's? I'd love to be able to present some statistics to my company who has currently only about 20% of Macs (creative team) and is exploring the next step in evolution: vista.
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Michael Vega said 4:22PM on 3-08-2007
WFAA Channel 8 (Belo) in Dallas-Fort Worth recently upgraded their whole website (as well as also owned Dallas Morning News)and now their web site is much more Mac friendly with "videos" that work. At least the story is fair - note that fun stuff on the Mac laptop like iPhoto, Office 2004 and look at the PC pull up "Powerpoint" -- ohhh aahhh.
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Billy K said 4:25PM on 3-08-2007
Nowhere in this article does it say JCPenney is switching. It just says they have an "investment" in Macs. Which they do. The Creative departments have long used them.
Bad reporting from both WFAA and TUAW. This is how unfounded rumors get started.
(Caesartheday, I suggest you get your Google on. These kind of analyses have been done numerous times.)
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Ned said 4:32PM on 3-08-2007
"Bad reporting from both WFAA and TUAW. This is how unfounded rumors get started."
Billy, I find that happens far too often here.
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Dave said 4:46PM on 3-08-2007
@ Billy K: Nice interpretation... but.. the article makes it pretty clear, and I quote: " Nevertheless, some companies are making the expensive switch from Windows to Mac. Plano-based J.C. Penney says it has been thrilled with its investment."
How else would you read that? Go drink some more windows kool-aid.
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Reality Check said 5:24PM on 3-08-2007
I've recently switch from Windows to Mac, getting a Macbook.
Overall, I like using the Mac better hands down, but it is not without it's flaws. It's not as stable as Windows. I see alot more crashes, and I have to reboot much more often. I've been keeping a log of the issues I'm seeing.
But yeah, my apt./house will prob. be a Mac outfit from now on, though I'll prob. keep a Vista machine around for good measure.
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Gruff said 5:40PM on 3-08-2007
@Reality Check: "It's not as stable as Windows. I see alot more crashes, and I have to reboot much more often."
Something is very wrong then. Macs are known for being rather more stable than Windows. I work from home and use my system 8+ hours per day and very rarely have issues.
An easy thing to check -- if your system is plugged into a UPS or power strip, try plugging the system directly into the wall. The UPS or power strip may not be providing the needed power level and not warning you of that; quite common with some low-end UPS systems.
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Alex said 6:40PM on 3-08-2007
I like the last paragraph which I see way too often...
"If you're in the market for a new computer, a Macintosh computer with features and software similar to an equivilent PC will be priced about $100 to $200 more than a Windows machine."
Why do people continually think that a Mac costs more? It really doesn't. I thought members of the press were supposed to do research for their articles, not just go on what the word on the street is...
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Autonerd said 6:52PM on 3-08-2007
Caesartheday,
In my "past life" as an IT guy, I used to support both Macs and PCs. Initially the Macs were much more expensive since we were spending tons of money on "certified" Mac techs who kept finding new things wrong. Once I took over the costs plummeted -- once I convinced the users not to install anything but the software we bought for them and made sure they all had the latest OS, the problems magically went away. The biggest problem was crashes: They tended to take out a lot more work when something went wrong, whereas with Windows you have a better chance of not losing everything.
I now have a Mac laptop and a PC desktop. No one believes me when I say this, but the PC is generally more stable than the Mac. My PC *never* crashes. Ever. It's all a matter of regular software updates (just like a Mac), not installing anything and everything under the sun (just like a Mac), and regular disk defragging (oops, Mac won't let you do that). Quality on our iBook G4s is horrible -- my wife's HD died and my system has a bad inverter (flickering screen -- known problem but since I didn't pay $250 for AppleCare tech support won't talk to me; I'd have to hang around the Apple store and hope it happens when a tech is watching. What a waste of time!)
The Apple is more fun to use, and I love the long battery life and quick wake-up. But the warranty is useless and the idea of Macs being inherently more stable than PCs is a myth. Windows runs on an infinite number of hardware combinations. Apple controls all the hardware and they STILL have to issue regular updates. I'll always have a PC on the desktop; next laptop will probably be Mac again. Again, I like the Mac, but refuse to drink the Kool-Aid. Everyone loves to hate Microsoft, but the fact is that Windows is far from horrible and Mac OS is far from perfect.
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bill said 9:10PM on 3-08-2007
i'll tell you this... yould chop your IT team down to 1 tech per 2000. and they will be 10x more productive cause there is no worry of updating. it's easy to install the updates automatically. alternatively, you can turn off checking altogether cause the updates don't fundamentally change anything. the rule of thumb in IT update when it promises something it currently doesn't do that you need to do. otherwise, don't update anything except security updates, which we get 5 a year maybe if that on Mac. someone said something about "virus license" no such thing. norton antivirus is uneccessary on mac. it only stop you from spreading viruses to Windows users. But if it's an urge you can't fight, it's 14 bucks year per machine. prob get vol discounts as a company. Maintenance on Macs is Nill.. repair permissions every update which along with software updates can be down from Mac OS X Server.
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Dave said 10:00PM on 3-08-2007
@ Billy K again... Do you have a link to show that they haven't switched recently and have been "using macs for years" outside of the art and/or advertising department? Call it a hunch, but I'd be willing to bet that J.C. Penney's has other computers besides the ones in the "creative" department. Sorry Billy, but I'd rather trust WFAA and TUAW then some guy who calls "bad reporting" without backing anything up.
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itguy06 said 10:05PM on 3-08-2007
For Autonerd: If you're Mac is less stable than XP you have something very wrong. My previous iMac, iBook, and current PowerBook all manage 60+ day uptimes without fail and constant sleep/wake cycles.
This is infinitely more reliable than any of my XP machines have EVER been. And I'm in IT and certainly know how to manage a computer.
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Autonerd said 10:17PM on 3-08-2007
5 updates a year??? What are you smoking? I've had four since the last week in Feb. Wife's iBook had to download 11 to bring my last OSX reinstall up to date, then another 9 for iTunes, and it looks like there are 5 more since my last check (odd, since I have it set to update weekly).
BTW, Windows also does automatic updates, also supports pushing from the server, etc.
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Billy K said 12:16AM on 3-09-2007
Dave,
Are you even reading the article and what I wrote?
You're right - JCP does have other computers outside Creative - all WinTel boxes. They've had Macs in Creative departments for many years (no, I can't give you details), but nowhere else. None of this has changed in years, nor is it about to change.
WFAA was inaccurate, and Sadun is wrong. So are you. Just accept it.
And if you have that kind of trust in a crappy, unsourced local news story, then best of luck to you, my friend. I suspect you'll need it.
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Dave said 2:09AM on 3-09-2007
See billy? there's the problem. You cant give details and nothing to back up what you say. How on earth can you say they are all wintel? If JCP just made an investment and you dont work for their IT department, how do you know better than WFAA and TUAW?
And thanks for wishing me luck, but I don't need it. I do quite well as it is. Thanks though. ;)
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Biffo said 5:00AM on 3-09-2007
@Steve in Denmark - sorry man, you're going to have to get in line... ;-)
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Stealth43 said 9:35AM on 3-09-2007
Wow folks. Lets all mellow out.
I'd like it too if Erica dug a little deeper for her articles, but this *isnt* the NYTimes. For the most part I'm happy with TUAW's reporting, because I don't have unreasonable expectations...cept for itunes political statements *cough*.
TUAW as a blog reports on the bleeding edge of the news cycle (thats what blogs do) and as such, sometimes the stories go out the door before all the facts can be checked. I hate to break it to folks, but CNN does the same freakin thing. Watch their reporting on the next national disaster, terrorist attack...et al. The death toll numbers flip around wildly as competing information comes in. On 9-11, one of the firgures spec'd on death toll was 25,000 at GZero alone. Its not just TUAW or CNN though. It has to do with the format. The reality is that we seem to like this style of reporting, and so we should be careful not to be too harsh in our critcisms when there are mistakes.
They just need to be corrected. What I would like to see, if anyone at TUAW is reading this, is for if there is something that needs to be corrected, for it to be done at the bottom of the blurb, or right after the error, rather than have the mistake be deleted and rewritten.
On a different note, where I work, we have a G3, G4 sawtooth and Quicksilvers, G5 towers, and my pride and joy, a CUBE running as servers. They have had absurd uptimes over the time I've been here, only being taken down twice (both times for moves). Beat. That. :D
evaD
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