PC or Mac

The great thing about computer geeks has to be the passionate way that they can either loyally defend or implacably slate a particular system; fanatics are polarised so much by two competing platforms that only very rarely can some kind of sensible middle ground ever exist.
I remember when I was younger, talk in the playground often turned to which console was best, your Sega Megadrive or your mates Super Nintendo - You can guarantee that if I were a fly on the wall in a school today, that the same kind of discussion would still be raging between the X-Box and Playstation gamers.

A similar kind of discussion, 'which is superior, the PC or the Apple Mac?' has been burning between adult computer users for several decades now. Personally I don't have the time to worry about the issue a great deal, nor do I feel the need to militantly argue my points in forums all over the Internet but clearly many enthusiasts do; a simple Google search for 'PC vs Mac' returns hundreds of thousands of matches.

The debate has been taken to a new level by a series of adverts recently commissioned by Apple in which the two comedians Mitchell and Webb take on the rolls of the two systems; Mitchell acts as a PC and Webb as an Apple Mac.

In these adverts the two 'systems' compare their features and of course, PC comes off looking like a a boring, inefficient dinosaur while Apple Mac humiliates him and generally comes off looking a little too smug. I'm not certain that any of the adverts would tempt me to move over to the Apple Mac platform but I suppose the real question is, if you look behind the advertising, is the Mac really better?

So we can understand the two platforms a little better we should probably look at how they have developed and changed over the years. Hopefully this will somehow justify Apples name calling and rationalise them insulting pretty much everything about the machine that the large majority of us use on a daily basis.

What most users would come to term 'PC' refers to one of the many machines evolved from the original IBM Personal Computer which was introduced back in 1981. The success of this machine can be predominately attributed to the fact that IBM decided on an open architecture so that other manufactures could produce and sell peripherals and software for the machine. The rather loose copyrighting and availability of technical specifications meant that it didn't take long before other manufacturers reverse engineered the BIOS to produce their own legal IBM PC 'clones'. This lead to the PC standard being adopted and developed by a number of competing companies which of course had a positive impact on the range of devices and software available for the machine as well as reducing prices.
Nowadays IBM, the original founders of the platform have relatively little influence on the development of the PC as it is continually evolved by the thousands of companies who manufacture the computers, peripherals and software which are compatible with this open standard.

On completely the opposite end of the scale is Apple who released their first Personal Computer, the 'Macintosh' back in 1984. Since this time, Apple have been the only company to manufacture, sell and support the Mac which of course means that they have full control over the brand including the Hardware and Operating System.
Whilst retaining complete control over your platform would appear to be a good idea, especially when it comes to monopolising on sales, it has certainly hurt the popularity of the machine in the industry. With so many more companies supporting the PC it has certainly dominated sales over the past twenty years which has resulted in Apple Mac being regarded as very much a niche machine by many.

Fortunes may be about to change however; a partnership with Intel, a new Operating System on the horizon and compatibility with Windows means that many now consider Apple to be a viable option again. Join me again next week to hear my opinion on whether your next computer really should be a Mac.....

Computer Articles 2007
Today

I started last week talking about the recent resurrection of the Apple Mac and whether your next computer really should be a Mac or whether you'd be best off sticking with the trusty PC. Unfortunately my article is restricted to approximately 700 words so I got as far as to looking at both systems historically and had to leave the conclusion for this week.
It can't be denied that by all major benchmarks the Mac has improved a great deal in the past few years, and certainly for this point Apple should be congratulated. That having been said, I can't help but think that I'm missing something when it comes to the argument of why I should abandon the PC and switch over.

Those who have read this article for a while will know that I am a firm supporter of the underdog and so on this account I should certainly be using the much smaller Apple platform but it's not quite that simple. My problem stems from the fact that I'm very much against the way that all Macs have to be made by Apple, and that the majority of the software that you will use on the machine will also be developed by them.

I enjoy the fact that PC's are manufactured by hundreds of different companies and that you can even buy all the parts yourself and make a PC based computer from scratch - when was the last time you heard of someone building their own Apple Mac?

From a software standpoint you are given no option as to the Operating System you use and a large majority of the software that you use will be forced on you from the outset. Approximately half of the fifteen reasons for switching over to a Mac from the Apple website centre around the argument that there is a large amount of software built in to the Operating System out of the box. You could argue that this is convenient for the end user but remember that Microsoft have been sued for countless millions for shipping Internet Explorer with Windows. No one has even questioned the fact that Apple ship their own photo, video, music, chat and the heavily iPod biased iTunes software with their machines.

Stability makes up another couple of points on their list, however these are highly debatable. Yes, Macs suffer from far fewer viruses and security attacks but this isn't down to the 'rock solid' Operating System as Apple claims; it's simply that with such an insignificant market share, no bugger can be bothered writing viruses for their machines. Windows based machines do have a large amount of viruses and security scares but that's primarily due to their popularity rather than the fact that the idea of a PC is inherently flawed. Do remember that unlike Mac users, those that run PC's have the choice of alternative Operating Systems such as Linux which again very few people tend to target for attacks.

The remainder of these fifteen official arguments focus on compatibility which again I don't quite understand; the fact an Apple Mac can run Windows Vista or utilities an Intel chip isn't a reason to make a switch. Granted, if these obstacles did exist then it would be a reason to stick with using a PC but the fact that they don't exist doesn't constitute a legitimate reason to spend half a grand switching over.

Don't get me wrong, I actually have nothing against the Apple Mac as a machine but it's just that I've been used to living in a world where if I want a new PC I pick who makes it and what software I put on it. If I want to upgrade it I take the side of the case off and stick a new graphics card, hard disk, processor or even motherboard inside and these can be made by a manufacturer of my choosing.

I don't like the idea that to make the switch over from the PC I will only have the choice of giving my money to one company, and then when I want to upgrade a few years down the line they would have a complete monopoly over my business for a second time around. For me, at least, subscribing to such a system wouldn't feel like supporting the underdog but rather more like selling my soul.

Computer Articles 2007