I’m a recent Mac switcher.
The trick was done with the iPod nano I got as a gift for my graduation back in 2006. Since then, I’ve bought my first laptop ever (a Macbook, 1st gen), replaced my ageing PC this year with a shiny new iMac and recently bought an iPhone 3G.
Am I an Apple fangirl? No.
I just happen to love Apple products. Really love them. Not all of them, but most.
When people ask me “Hey, why should I get a Mac?”, I shrug. I don’t know the answer. I just tell them that they improved my quality of life, and that’s proof enough for me.
How can an Apple product change a life, you ask? A step at a time.
Get simple with an iMac
You get a thin as stick iMac, no buzzing boxes with whirling blue LEDs, no cable mess, nothing. Just a keyboard, a mouse and a screen. The archetype of a computer – I happen to love this.
The iMac helped me discover I don’t need a mess of things to make my life better. God knows how much life clutter I threw away during my Mac switch. Simplicity even in features and so-called “specs”.
Get efficient with a Macbook
It’s insane how much work I’ve done (and keep doing) working on a Mac. For some weird reason I’m 10x efficient when working on a Macbook – not to mention more content and at ease.
At first people stare and you and wonder, how on earth can you do work on a Mac? They are all bells and whistles, right? Well, right. They just make your efficiency go turbo too at the same time.
Get greedy with an iPhone
Is greed a virtue? Yes it is, if you learn not to settle for anything else than a sexy cellphone that even by lacking features, it made all other “smartphones” pale in contrast.
You work hard, you strive to learn, you never settle down with what you already know – hey, you need to pamper yourself sometimes with a piece of sex, why not?
Get patient because hey, MobileMe is down again
MobileMe is by far the most buggy Apple thing I’ve ever used and I don’t recommend it to anyone not patient enough. The web interface doesn’t work almost half of the time but hey, at least syncing works most of the time.
Will I go on and rave and fill the internets with my endless rage? No. I’ll just wait till things settle down. I paid for it, yes, but it’s not that I’ll lose my temper because something does not yet work as expected – then I’d have to get anger management classes with what I see daily.
So the Apple way of life is not for everyone. I don’t go around preaching my way of working and having fun, I just like the way it goes. If you wanna try it too, just start small: an iPod, some iPhone, or even a Mac mini should suffice.
So why you should get a Mac? Still don’t know. But they made me happy alright.
12 comments on this post
pkontopoulos #1
03.Sep.08
Your post was a great opportunity putting down some of my thoughts.
- Agree on simplicity. A friend called me complaining about iPhone 3G incapability to stop showing SMS as soon as they are arrived, or the fact that you can’t delete a photo uploaded from iTunes. I simply hadn’t noticed any of them. My experience is that you get used to work with what you have and not asking for more. Big buttons, large fonts, white space its certainly one point of view. Either like it or hate it.
- Disagree on productivity. As far as I stick with web related work it’s Ok, great colors, crisp fonts, but when you go for applications, hm, I had some hard times. Maybe because most of them coming from PCs, competing to get as much as of my space providing useful? functionality, don’t know.
Conclusion, Apple is for people believing that Less is more, even better, Enough is more.
Jimbo #2
03.Sep.08
almost loved you… :p
No need to add anything. This post describes my thoughts in a weirdly accurate way…
jimeh #3
03.Sep.08
I totally agree. In the end it comes down to personal preference. And personally i find myself a lot more productive on a Mac, not thanks to the lack of viruses, or expose, and others, but because of _all_ of it. Pretty much _all_ features of the OS work together so smoothly, and most add a little extra which other OS’s can’t do.
All of these things working together, improving my ability to multi-task, keep all my tasks organized, and even find boring and annoying things fun sometimes, is what makes a Mac my computer of choice above all others.
Sugar #4
03.Sep.08
@pkontopoulos
I never had any problems fishing for useful apps on the Mac (on the contrary for PC).
Maybe it’s the fact that I’m a web worker and things are easier on this side.
pkontopoulos #5
03.Sep.08
Definitely the fact that most of Mac people work over and for the web is critical.
And I believe that much of recent Mac popularity increase is due to that, more and more applications in the cloud.
Things get really different when you have to work with business applications or develop them.
dimitris @ insideabox #6
03.Sep.08
@Sugar:Great Post!
@pkontopoulos: I’am a project manager (mac On), and i don’t have application problems either.
I have also Keynote for presentations, Daylite+Billings for monitoring my business, Numbers for cool spreadsheets and Merlin for project management… also some other great little-tiny apps that make me productive.
think different!
Sugar thanks for the space.
barak #7
03.Sep.08
As long as Visual Studio is considered by far the best IDE for application/web development the whole “productivity” issue is out of context.
Sugar #8
03.Sep.08
@barak
One can be productive without coding in Visual Studio you know.
Not all of us are badass programmers.
Really, didn’t you hear?
P.S. Plus you can get Visual Studio working through some virtualization app anyway. Point dismissed.
barak #9
03.Sep.08
Pardon me but the irony is also out of context.
stelabouras #10
03.Sep.08
@barak
I really don’t think that Visual Studio can be considered “the” best IDE for *web* development.
There are a lot of IDES out there specifically for this kind of job (cross platform [Aptana, Dreamweaver, Netbeans], Mac only [Coda] etc).
Personally, I prefer Visual Studio only for [windows] application development.
Sugar #11
03.Sep.08
@barak
I really don’t know what is the context here. You really believe that people using Visual Studio for web work are the majority?
And to what app development you refer to? Because I have the feeling you only refer to the Windows sort.
Your point me struck me as completely irrelevant and I acted accordingy. Please don’t play the “Oh the irony, I’m insulted” game here.
Svelon #12
03.Sep.08
And what? You want to end the flame “Mac vs PC” with just one post? You think that now I will not continue to bug you about it? You think that now everything is clear and no further discussion issues are left?
HA!