Reader Comments

For the record. I currently own a 500 MHz dual-USB iBook (384 MB RAM) and a 1 GHz 17-inch flatpanel iMac (1 GB of RAM). Yes, I purchased these machines myself, and yes, I use them every day. In the past, I have tested other desktop and notebook Macs, including a 500 MHz PowerBook G4 (mid-2001) and an 800 MHz 15-inch widescreen iMac (mid- to late-2002), both of which I had in-house for several months. My standard desktop is a 1.8 GHz Pentium 4-based Dell Dimension 4400 with 1 GB of RAM, and I test one PC notebook computer every month for the magazine. Needless to say, the Dell (which is a far cry from the 3 GHz screamers available today) outperforms the Macs by a wide margin, across the board. It's not even close.

Well, there is an interesting point about this issue on http://www.oscast.com/stories/storyReader$216 which refutes many of the claims in the report. While your experience may differ in general, there is little to suggest that Apple's tests are less valid than the tests in the article. Apple states that its results use "nine commonly used actions and filters that stress overall system performance--including processor, memory, system bus and hard drive--in [Adobe] Photoshop" as you state, while the other article makes reference to a couple things done in After Effects, and doesn't state that they are representative of common actions or that they "stress overall system performance--including processor, memory, system bus and hard drive." However, even if this was an oversight, all this would show is that for some things the PC is faster, and for others the mac is. Mac users tend to use macs because they prefer the way the mac works and believe its OS allows them to be more productive, not simply because they may believe the processor is faster. There is strong evidence to support these feelings, bit regardless, the fact that the original article was written by a guy who has always actively done whatever he could to shoot down macs makes his test somewhat suspect, not to mention that he misrepresented the price of the PCs, didn't bother mentioning the price of the new dual processor model he just received, and used PCs using processors within a week of their being released, and compared them to six-month old macs (two days before new models were expected to be released (Macworld Expo) makes his test almost laughable. If you prefer your PC for whatever reason, great. But this Adobe page (which also includes completely misrepresenting graphs that seem to forget that there are only 60 seconds in a minute) should not be a significant point to either side. Though I suppose if you follow the adobe store link to buy the Dell they refer to, I suppose maybe it helps their bottom line). Editor's note: Someone else posted this URL, and I'll leave in here in the interests of fairness, but Adobe gets nothing out of slamming Apple, and certainly many sources have backed up the performance claims cited on the Adobe site (including a hilarious Maximum PC writeup that cannot be reprinted here, sadly). Are the opinions of a Mac fanatic somehow more believable than those of one of Apple's closest partners? I don't think so. And, as I said, my own experience confirms what Adobe published. The short answer is that Apple has been touting performance improvements that exist only in specific components of PhotoShop that were specially written for Altivec, while most of the nonpartisan performance comparisons simply discuss actual real-world performance. Apple's systems are great, don't get me wrong. But the performance line coming out of Cupertino has been suspect for years, and I think it's about time someone called them to the mat on that. --Paul

Why do you use the Mac machines? Interest? Curiosity? Is there something in the overall experience? Do you have too much money and don't know what elese to buy? Editor's note: I write about non-Windows issues for Connected Home Magazine, and that was the primary reason I got the iBook about a year and a half ago. There are two reasons I got the iMac: First, I needed a more powerful Mac for a book I'm working on (an educational title that covers about 70 percent Windows, 30 percent Mac). Second, I want to be able to write about SuperDrive-related topis such as CD/DVD burning and iDVD, and my iBook only has a DVD drive. From a more abstract standpoint, it's important for me to actually have experience with the topics I'm writing about, and I also maintain a Linux box, which is less stable because I'm always updating it with the latest distribution. But the idea is the same: If I don't actually use this stuff, how could I possibly write about it? There are plenty of people that do that, and I don't want to be lumped into that crowd. --Paul

I agree that Apple needs to move quickly, and they are. Top of the line PowerMacs have moved from a max of 1 GHz to 1.42 GHz in the last year. Bottom of the line machines have moved from the just introduced G4 iMac with 800 MHz to the 1 GHz model available now. In the same time, Apple has moved it iBook from 600 MHz to 800 MHz, and it's PowerBooks from 667 MHz to 1 GHz. Across the board that's an average speed increase of about 40% (in raw numbers). Meanwhile, they have slashed prices an significant amount across their entire product line. How can you say that they are not moving to attract new customers? They have done all this while producing and perfecting a new OS - which is unique in it's combination of killer UI and stable under-pinnings. They have also pushed technology faster than any other computer manufacturer in the industry: FireWire, Rendevous, Bluetooth, and USB are all firmly integrated into the product line. Yes, you could possibly get all of these technologies on a PC running Windows. But the Mac had them first, they come standard on the newer machines, and they are integrated much better. PS2, anyone? Serial? Why do most OTC Windows machines still come standard with these antiquated ports? Granted my new Dell running Windows 2k (at work) works very well with a USB mouse, a first for me on a Wintel. The Mac that I bought almost 4 years ago did this with no difficulty because Macs have had USB starting in 1998 with the first iMac. You state in your article that Macs have long been dominated by PCs for resource intensive tasks. I can think of no more resource intensive task than gaming, of which I am a hopeless addict. I have always been much happier playing games on my Mac than on the PCs I have owned. Fewer freezes, easier installs, and better graphics are the norm on a Mac, at least in my case. And the number of games (at least the ones I am interested in) on the Mac platform is finally starting to catch up. If Adobe cleans up its Apps, and finds ways to use the OS X architecture to their advantage, I am sure that this experience will be the same for the users of their products on OS X. Editor's note: Come on. Game playing on the Mac is a joke, and that's not even debatable. As for your performance statistics, I'll just leave you with this thought: It's easy to make a 40 percent jump when you're starting in the basement. PC's hit 1 GHz years ago and kept going. Are 3 GHz PCs over twice as fast as 1.42 GHz Power Macs? No way. Are they faster? Yes. Are they cheaper? Yes. Are they more versatile? Oh yeah. And so on. --Paul

wanker Editor's note: Well said! --Paul

Interesting. I run my own media production company in Portland, OR. For the past several years I have been using a combination of Lightwave, Video Toaster, (Amiga and PC), Aura, and some After Effects from time to time. I say time to time, in that I try using After Effects from time to time, but the performance is so poor compared to other NLE/compositors/effectors that I really cannot recommend it. Recently I purchased a powermac 1.25Ghz with Final Cut Pro 3. This system completely blows me away with what it can do. It is fast, fun and affordable. I have been doing more and more lightwave work on the mac, along with doing a lot more video post/compositing in FCP. I can say with utmost confidence that FCP on my powermac is much faster at rendering effects, editing, and just simply using the product than After Effects ever was on my various PC's. Typically, I use mostly Xeon-based systems, but have several 2+Ghz P4 systems as well. All in all, I find the powermac much more enjoyable to use than any PC (or Amiga!) that I have ever used. It is fast(!!!), stable, reliable (something that I cannot say about my Video Toaster PC's, which blue-screen quite frequently (Windows 2000). MacosX has been, quite frankly, bullet-proof in the six months I have been using the system. While I probably will not change my workflow from Video Toaster to FCP (depending on what the new Toaster and FCP releases look like at NAB this year), I will most definately incorporate more powermacs running Lihtwave and FCP into my studio. After Effects will always warrant a look as the product develops as a semi-usefull tool for some tasks, but over all, I'll pass on it. As for photoshop, I use it sparingly, which is to say I use if for light tasks. Generally speaking, I have found the photoshop/powermac combination to be on-par with my fastest PC's for most things I do, if not slightly faster. Automating workflow on tha powermac, however, leaves the PC in the dust. I am still learning Apple script, but have already automated several tasks for manipulating digital still frames using Photoshop, Debabelizer and FCP in ways I simply could not have done on my PC's. My next tool in the chain that I am looking to learn and add is DVD studio pro. This looks to be a simple matter to automate as well, although I haven't tried it yet. All in all, I would not judge a platform by how well it runs After Effects. In my opinion, nothing run After Effects very well because the application is simply poor. For most tasks, the powermac is head and shoulders above My PC's it useability, automation, reliability, and just simple enjoyment. Sorry if this is rambling, I have a deadline today, but thought I'd put in my $.02 Ed Editor's note: It's appreciated, and though I don't have any experience with applicatons such as Lightwave (or AfterEffects), I'm an Amiga old-timer myself, so I appreciate your background. --Paul

I am a 100% MAC user since the original 128k machine introduced in 1984. I thought your article was quite fair and balanced...and in many respects reiterates the concerns of many MAC users, who hope that the 64 bit PPC G5 970 arrives this summer before any more high-end customers 'switch'. Editor's note: First of all, thanks for that. I'm really trying to be honest about this issue, which I do think is important. And as I've been saying, I buy Apple products, so I have a stake in the company being successful. I hope the Mac thrives, but Apple needs to do more to address some core issues, and performance is probably at the top of the list. --Paul

Consider the source... Adobe's statistics not only skewer results grapically to accentuate a larger difference than these results supposedly show (ie. 47 seconds is not .47 minutes - look at the charts), but the Adobe author is longtime anti-mac pundit Charlie White - see the OSCast story http://www.oscast.com/stories/storyReader$216 Editor's note: That doesn't change the statistics. The Apple is slower and considerably more expensive. Only an Apple fanatic would try to pick apart these results and suggest that there is some bizarre conspiracy going on here. Again, if you've used both, you know. The Mac has strong points, and a certain elegance. But it is slower--and much more expensive--than a comparable PC. --Paul

I read this back when it was new, and there's actually a more recent comparison between a 3Ghz Pentium 4 and a Dual 1.25Ghz G4. Not unlike this test, the Pentium 4 was approximately twice as fast. It was also a full THOUSAND DOLLARS CHEAPER. Bang for buck Apple is in iTrouble. Considering the sheer grunt needed by todays machines in the markets Apple target most heavily, and still hold by their fingernails, Apple needs to be competitive. I often think of Apple in very similar terms to Sony. Sony make nice products, well designed and often very "lifestyle" based. Yet despite the Sony brand success their actual products are usually not as good as cheaper competitors, with less "fancy" designs. A good example is that when I was shopping for a stereo micro system a while ago we looked at a little Sony system, with capacitance buttons, gentle blue glowing lights, slot loading glass fronted. It was a very cute little unit. But for about $500 less there was a Panasonic that had NOTICABLY better sound. It was simpler, and had some extra features. We bought the Sony. The difference here is that Sony are the largest consumer electronics company in the world, thanks to extensive branding and marketing. Apple are 2.4% and shrinking. Anyway, I'll end my two cents with a quote from the recent article comparing Apples with Oranges. "Apple is right. 'Megahertz doesn't matter!' But Gigahertz does."

One issue that's consistently ignored in these discussions is relative cost of systems. While a Dell 3GHz may be price equivalent to a PowerMac 1.42GHz, I have a wide range of choices other than Dell and can get an equivalent PC for much less. With Apple, I have one price and one choice: Apple. Editor's note: Right. I bought a 17-inch iMac earlier this month for about $2150, including an upgrade to 512 MB of base RAM and a three year warranty. Add another $160 for another 512 of RAM and the price was about $2300. What kind of PC could you get for this money? Right: A total, top-of-the-line screamer. The iMac is nice, and as one reader said earlier, fast enough, but it's not a top-of-the-line Power Mac G4, which could cost twice as much money. This is a huge problem for Apple. --Paul

Well I do network support for a living. I run a 733 mac G4 with a 7600 server and variously have NT, Lindows, Linux, Win9x, WinXP boxes on my own network depending on what 'issues' I am facing with my customers. Finally in total spam frustration I am moving my email accounts over to my G4 and that is the way it is. I just find my Mac experience more pleasurable. Its fast enough. James Editor's note. That's a good way to put it, actually. The Mac is, indeed, fast enough. But the bigger issue here is the constant stream of BS coming out of Cupertino, and I've long believed that Apple should stop touting non-existent performance advantages. It's dishonest, and for a publicly-held company, a potential issue for the lawyers. --Paul

Yawn. Why do professional designers choose Macs over PCs when they have deadlines to meet, and intensive graphics and video work? Oh, I forgot? designers are only concerned about 'pretty colours'. Windows bigots are the dullest? (they're slightly worse than the Mac ones). Grow-up, children. Editor's note: Increasingly, professional designers are actually choosing Windows, not the Mac. It's not 1995 anymore. And I'm not a bigot. As I stated earlier, I use both platforms daily. --Paul

As a dual OS user, I like different aspects of both Windows 2000 and Mac OS X. Overall, I believe OS X is superior b/c of the UNIX features. However, Apple is falling behind - unfortunately for Apple, this is due to Motorola's and IBM's inability to manufacture PowerPC chips at increasing rates. Editor's note: Frankly, the opinion of someone who uses both platforms, as you do, is far more valuable to me than that of the average Mac user. Like you, I use both daily, though I wouldn't clasify OS X as "superior" because of its UNIX underpinnings, but rather as a "viable contender." In addition to the performance issues in the underlying platform, I think Apple has other problems, such as its GUI, which is "nice looking" (to some people) but no advance whatsoever over previous desktop-based UIs, from a usability standpoint. One of the best things about XP is its task-based user interface, where the shell can change to match the type of data you're viewing. OS X has nothing like this. There are other issues, of couse (lackluster help, relatively high prices compared to PCs, and so on) but those two are the big ones. Thanks. -Paul

Good article! You'll no doubt get slammed by the avenging Mac crowd for your honesty. I've been a Windows user since the 3.11 days and have always watched the Mac camp with the expectation that some day they'd make "my Mac." Alas, I'm typing this on a home-built XP Pro machine that does everything I could hope to ever do. When you have this kind of functionality with the ability to swap out and upgrade hardware - and make it inexpensive - I have to reach the obvious conclusion and come down off the fence... and put my feet on the Microsoft side. I suppose one day Linux my become a desktop threat but until then, I'll be using what works for me.

I remember the first time I saw a direct comparison between the PC and the Mac where the PC won. This was in boot/Maximum PC (I don't know if this is the one you were referring to) with the then new PIII-450 processors vs. a similarly clocked Mac G-Series. In it, the PC won everything that could be run on both platforms including the covetted Adobe benchmarks that they created. I thought it was interesting, and then didn't put much more thought into it. Later, I kept seeing more and more Mac people getting very upset when more comments about the PC being faster than the Mac were surfacing. Later, you see Adobe putting more interest in getting Photoshop 7 out the door for PC users than Mac users (something that even Steve Jobs commented on during a conference), and that should have been a sign of things to come. With all these things happening, and RISC development dragging to a halt as compared to what Intel and AMD are doing, you would think that Apple would be more concerned about application efficiency and hardware speed. Instead, you get greeted with much "prettier" machines and a spiffy *looking* OS that's based on someone else's underpinnings (all the UNIX stuff; so much for being original, eh?) rather than a machine that is genuinely worth the price you are paying for it. I mean, if the tech is stalled in development, then it can't cost *that* much more to produce it 2 years after it was introduced, so why not drop the prices all the way around and get more machines out into the population? Now, for application speed and stability that seems to be coming up, I would like to point out that a ported application is never as stable as its native version. You see people talk about how their Mac version of an application is so much more stable than the PC version, and that the PC keeps crashing or whatnot. Well, I have used and administered a great deal of PCs, and the primary things that make them crash are drivers and poorly written applications. If the application has been ported AND has drivers for its own hardware to be used, then you could be begging for problems no matter what platform it was ported to. That will happen regardless of the OS. When running applications that you normally see running in Windows being reworked for Linux, I have regularly seen X crash out of nowhere due to the application (for me, it was Mozilla and a couple of others) and this app has a native version being developed for Linux. If a company thinks most of its users are Mac guys, how much money do you really think they will put into PC development? I think the problem is that desktop computers are still considered to be general systems that are here to do everything the user wants. In fact, there are some system combinations that do things much better than others. I like using Linux for network administration, while I use 2000 and XP for desktop stuff and gaming. I think the Mac looks great, and would probably be wonderful at sound and video production with the apps that are native to the Mac platform. If people would start seeing this, they might not be so touchy anymore.

Gee, seems to me that Apple would make more money if they started making PC processors and make all of the cool Apple hardware available to the PC crowd. I would buy a MAC if is was a PC clone, just because the design of the machines are cool.

To be honest, I don't think that what ails Apple can be fixed by a platform switch, if it can be fixed at all. I'm not about to say anything you don't know, but I think that its about time somebody added up two plus two and told the world it really does add up to four. That, while everybody was looking at the celebrity endorsements and cutesy ads, Apple went out and made itself irrelevant. Is Apple hardware slower than Intel hardware? Short answer: Duh! Yeah! Longer answer: Who cares? Detailed answer: Apple's problems competing with Intel hardware are far deeper than how well a handful of niche functions can be optimized to the hardware available or whether available Macs are fast enough to run Adobe software. Apple's biggest challenge these days is just finding ways to be relevant. (2% market share, remember?) Just look at all the meaningful debates and ongoing developments in the industry; web services, security, DRM, hardware-based security, meta-computing platforms, modular computers, natural-language input, XML-development, etc. It is all being carried out on the Intel side of the equation. SUN and IBM are still trying to promote their UNIX RISC boxes but realistically they both know the final showdown of the current computing generation is going to be Windows Vs Linux and both run on Intel. Apple? Their big news for 2003 is a four pound portable and a large screen laptop nobody can actually buy. Oh, yeah; and a Powerpoint wannabe. Real cutting edge, stuff, no? Heck, even Microsoft has something halfway innovative on the horizon with OneNOTE and InfoPath and they didn't even buy them! While the industry burns in fire and brimstone over Windows and LINUX development, AMD versus Intel, JAVA vs .NET, PDAs vs SMARTPHONES, and consumer electronics vs PCs, the best anybody can say about Apple's technology is that it is fast enough to run Adobe software. Not much debate going on about what Apple might contribute to the future of the industry, is there? No alarmed notice about Apple patenting Web services protocols or advanced 3D graphics rendering techniques or quitting standards bodies or even speculation on what their future boxes will be like. That is because APPLE simply doesn't play in the arenas where the future is being molded. And where they do play they are quite simply an also ran. Yes, Macs are fast enough. So are eMachines' $400 boxes. So are the $200 LINDOWS boxes and $800 SOTEC laptops at Wal-Mart. If the best you can say about Macs is that they are fast enough to do email, web surfing, and run MS OFfice, you are essentially condemning the whole platform to the dustbin of history. Because those are all last century applications. The future of computing is being explored by other companies and other markets that have nothing to do with graphic design or publishing. Or word processing or speadsheets, for that matter. The world zigged just as Apple zagged. Apple's strengths have become irrelevant while their weaknesses have become show stoppers. Apple products are slower, more expensive, less supported by specialty software, and in most growth markets, simply missing. If Apple wants to go anywhere outside their noisy but tiny niche of graphics designers and publishers they need to start selling something other than their two laptops, two desktops, and one wannabe server. They need to take a look at the calendar and realize its no longer 1984 and that PCs are not just document processing boxes. And that just calling a MAC a media hub doesn't make it one for real. They completely missed the internet era of server sales and are missing out on the early stages of the digital media era because of their lack of DRM technology. Their best media Codecs are a generation behind the best. They have virtually nothing meaningful to offer in natural language processing. To say nothing of metacomputing or Web-services. What does Apple offer customers for 3D graphics? last year's ATI video cards and OpenGL. For digital music? MP3. For video? MPEG4. Electronic documents? Adobe PDF. They don't even have anything unique to say about eBook publishing! Even in areas that spring directly out of their stronghold of publishing and graphic design, they have nothing unique to offer. Nothing that PCs can't say, "Me, too. But cheaper and faster." The company that practically created the Not-Invented-Here syndrome is reduced to peddling UNIX and MPEG-based solutions licensed from others or picked up for free from the Open Sourcerors! "Me, too" products in nice FROGDESIGN packaging. Lets face it, Apple has always been a software company masquerading as a hardware company but their software is no longer compelling and the hardware isn't even vaguely competitive with the state of the art. This, at a time the PC platform itself is splintering into dozens of specialized products, that each, in different ways, completely outclass Apple's four and a half products. Can you buy faster hardware than Apple's for the same price? Without question. And the ratio isn't just a few percentage points; in most markets we're talking at least a whole order of magnitude. And that's just speed. What's the lightest MAC out there? Four pounds? That's a whole pound heavier than the class leaders on the PC side. (See Fujitsu and Sharp.) Battery life? Centrino rules. And if not, there's also Transmeta. And Electrovaya. All Intel, all the time. What's the fastest portable MAC? 1 GHz? Check out Toshiba and Dell's models with 1600 by 1200 screens and 3GHz cpus. Unique form factors? Check out the Sony VAIO W or the dozens of LCD-based single piece computers that came out long before the iMAC and are sprouting like weeds all over. (See Gateway and IBM for quick samples.) Or how about OQO and the other modular PCs on the horizon? Apple Tablets? Apple PDAs? MIA. How about servers? POS systems? Wearable systems? Embedded controls? Media Centers? Can you buy smaller, lighter PCs than Macs? Of course! Can you buy longer battery life? Without question. Can you buy features and functionality Apple can't match? Of course! Just take a look at variety of Intel-based hardware out there, folks. Sony Vaio W, Toshiba and Dell Desknotes. Tablets. Media Centers. Servers ranging from a pizza box to a thousand CPU supercomputer. Apple owns a very loyal 2% of the market. They will stay with them through thick and thin so Apple won't actually die. Good for them. But if I'm running a business, I'd rather have a slice of the other 98% of the market. The part that is actually growing. Apple used to matter. I don't think they will much longer.

I actually own both. I have 2 Macs and about 8 Windows / Linux machines at my house. At work I also have both on my desk but primarily use Win2k for everything. So while I have nothing against Mac I will not argue the current Steve Jobs arguement for them being faster. Now what ole Felix didn't do research on is why this was even posted by Adobe in the first place. I don't recall seeing in this message where those results came from. The site they came from released the article months ago. I remember reading it and the guy was blatant on the fact that he was for PC's. Specifically Dell, which if you follow PC's I would have to say Dell Computers are fast but would I use one in a comparison test? Not a chance myself as well as others would most likely test with something from ie. Alienware. The site was ripped apart by a lot of people who knew the proper ways to benchmark a system, mainly from the PC arena. I am pretty sure the guy ended up making some changes with some of the negative input. Now, the political reasons actually had nothing about speed of the computers Intel or PPC. It had to do with many internal battles between Adobe and Apple. We will mainly focus on the current one. Final Cut has killed Adobes market share on Mac. Who makes Final Cut? Apple! This is an attempted punch back by Adobe. Apple has done some pretty interesting things, from rewriting a pdf engine into OSX from the open specification so that they wouldn't have to pay Adobe royalties for every copy of OSX sold, to taking over Final Cut and crushing everything about After Effects. Here was Apple's response: From - www.osnews.com "In a statement given to MacCentral in response to the recent page posted on Adobe's site showing that Adobe After Effects performs better on a PC than on a Mac, Apple states that After Effects is slower on the Mac compared to Apple's own Final Cut Express, and that comparable effects in FCE perform better than After Effects on a PC or a Mac" So Apple spanks them right back. Nothing like telling everyone Adobe can't write software other than Photoshop and Illustrator. It seems that everyone is going after Adobes markets these days. Microsoft with X-Docs (Adobe Acrobat) and Apple with Final Cut Express (After Effects). Addressing the Microsoft market attack Adobe is scheduled to release "all" new versions of their software with better PDF support. Don't go out and buy that copy of Photoshop 7 just yet. Photoshop 8 is about to be released. I think we are going to see some great fights in the future from these two companies. Now to address some speeds. Remember that CPU crowns in the x86 world has changed a couple times. It isn't going to be all that hard for any computer to be faster than another PC or Mac. From the reports / rumors I have heard IBM appears to be taking over Apples high-end PPCs production. From - haxor.dk/articles/ppc.html "G5 - The Next Generation: With the failure of Motorola to produce their G5 chip (which is rumored to have been scrapped by Mot management), Apple has turned to IBM for the PowerPC 970, a 64-bit CPU with AltiVec support. It is based on IBM's POWER 4 chip, and is expected to be announced in Apple's product line at Seybold, autumn 2003." -david

I'm a long time mac user (1984) and recenlty (last 6 months) had to use XP to run some software not avialable on the Mac. I approached this situtation with an open mind and thought that if the experience was Ok, I might as well make the big switch. The laptop running the software crashes at least once per week and "hot swappable" USB peripheals - forget about it. My My mac laptop and dual 450 mghz tower have been running 10.2 since September 2002 and not a single crash yet. The desktop is on 6-9 hours per day and I frequenly have Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Keynote, SAS, SPSS, Kalliedgrah, Safari and occassionaly IE open simultaneouly. Switching between applications is flawless. True hot swapping for USB and firewire peripheals. I recenlty created a dummy data set with over 5,000 observations for a repeated measures ANOVA and both (laptop and desk) machines completed the calcs in less than 1 second. getting the results in 0.6 seconds is not worth dealing with crashes on XP. Yes, Macs do cost more and Windows machines are faster. I move Word, Excel doxuments between my machine and Windows machines every day without problem as long as I remember ot include the .extension so the windows machines would know which application to use when opening the document. Most of my coworkers don't even know I use a Mac. A C class Mercedes costs more than a 5.0 Liter Mustang, and isn't as fast, but for the TOTAL user expereince, the cost differntial is worth it to many users. The urge many Windows users have to assimilate Mac users is puzzling. MS has never innovated, with the exception of multi button mice with roller wheels which are great & work on OS 10.x Mac. Editor's note: I wouldn't place your experience with one XP PC too highly. I use XP daily, on several devices, and through an unbelievable amount of drek at my daily workstation, and its very stable and reliable, and, again, performs better than any Mac. Incidentally, the PC box I use is a Dell Dimension 4100 1.8 GHz, which I purchased last March for just $600. Yes, I added RAM and a monitor, but come on. $600? --Paul

After reading Ed's comments, I get the feeling he doesn't undestand the purpose of After Effects. AE is not the same kind of application as FCP or Video Toaster (i.e., an NLE), so if that is the comparison for performance, then it will definately come up short. I use AE daily for motion graphics and compositing, and have had to switch from PC based systems over to Macs for a new position. It has been like swimming in slow motion. There is definately a performance hit going from my middle of the road Dell Precision Dual 2.0 Xeon to my semi top-of-the-line Dual 1.25 PowerMac. (I'd have a 1.4, but it took Apple 8 weeks to ship my configuration, and I still haven't got it yet) I also am now using Lightwave 3D on the Mac, and while the interface seems pretty responsive, despite the low-end OpenGL cards, the rendering performance doesn't match my WinXP box. I will say I haven't run any specific tests, these are just my subjective experiences. I do like OS X, for the most part, despite a few annoying bugs. However, my WinXP box has always performed well, and before turning it off (becuase I really should be saving the power) the other day I checked uptime and it had been up for 17 days. (the only crashes I've ever had was when experimenting with dual screen drivers for my video card) But the Mac is pretty.... ;)

Apple's stuff looks good to the eye :) Editor's note: True enough. --Paul

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20030328/RO4TECH/TPBusiness/ROBM 'nuff said. Editor's note: Yeah, this changes everything. LOL. You can always find something to back your claims, no matter how ridiculous, but this article is horse-pucky. A few issues: - Interestingly, this writer has exactly the same hardware as I do, an iBook and a 17-inch iMac. (Note that the prices are in Canadian in the article you site). As I've said before, I spent over $2000 on the iMac. If I spent that much on a PC, I'd have a top-of-the-line Dell screamer. There is no contest. Yet he says the "Mac costs more" argument is deceptive. It's not. Instead, it's so very true. - He cites the existance of Virtual PC as a reason that it's OK to move to the Mac. Too bad Virtual PC only runs fine on OS X if your hardware has L3 cache, a feature missing from both of the machines he's using. - He says Windows breaks down frequently. That's odd, because I run XP full-time on several machines and it never breaks down. Ever. I've crashed OS X--hard--more than I've crashed XP, and I only run OS X on two machines that I'm not sitting in front of all day long. Like many people trying to make a point, he cites surveys. I cite real world experience, which is far more valuable for obvious reasons. - He says the photo and movies apps in OS X will save you time, which would be nice if they performed acceptably. They don't. The photo and movie features in XP will save you more time, as they do for me. Given the choice (and yeah, I do have the choice), I choose to organize, edit, and process photos and movies in XP, not OS X. There's a reason. He also draws a bizarre inference that a photo editing app will cost "$45 to $75" (CN) on the PC, but iPhoto is free on the Mac. Again, you paid a LOT more money for the Mac, so it's not really free, now is it? - iTunes is nice and very simple, and I like it. Windows Media Player is more versatile and powerful. Because I have an iPod, I do use iTunes more regularly than I would otherwise. The author incorrectly states that the closest app to iTunes on the PC is MusicMatch. The best music playing apps on the PC are free, so this is a pointless debate. No one is switching platforms to run iTunes. Instead, you use what's available on the system you did choose. - I agree that Safari is better than IE for Mac. However, it's not as good as IE on Windows, and isn't that the comparison he's trying to make? Odd he doesn't mention that specifically. There is no contest between Web browsers on the PC and Mac. The PC wins every time. - He gives a one-liner about Keynote, suggesting he hasn't used it. Here's my one-liner: It's not as powerful or full-featured as Powerpoint. - His conclusions are completely bogus, predictably. There are many reasons not to switch to the Mac. Gaming, which he mentioned. Years or decades of compatible document types and applications. The slew of PC-compatible hardware you have that won't run the Mac OS. The unbelievable expense of the Mac itself and all the software you will need to buy to replace the stuff you use on Windows. The fact that OS X is harder to use than XP, and all the little issues that are different in the UI. The fact that Windows XP is, in fact, way better than this guy gives it credit for. The fact that you can walk in any retail store anywhere in the world and buy software, immediately, that solves a problem you have. The fact that cheap PC hardware outperforms expensive Macs. And so on. We might say the reasons not to switch are legion. And this is just the debunking I can do off the top of my head. God forbid I actually think about it for a few minutes. In short, 'nuff said indeed. --Paul

Funny... We Mac users have faced condescension and insult after insult re comparative speeds between Wintel-based machines and Macs. Yet, somehow, we function very well. A rail dragster may be great for pure speed but "fast" isn't everything. It's cramped and holds only 1 person, is terrible in the rain, uses expensive fuel and is just plain costly to operate (especially with all those high-paid "mechanics" and support people). The Mac may not get there as fast, but other usability factors often (usually) more than make up the difference. TCO studies have always, and still do as far as I've seen, favour the Mac vs Wintel. (Another funny... for years, in various forums, I've asked Wintel supporters to produce a TCO study that favours Wintel (and not from MS) and they've yet to find or produce one. I'm not saying one doesn't exist, but it must be as rare as hen's teeth.) Now, with the introduction of the Centrino line of processors at 1 and 1.6 GHz, Intel is claiming, as have Mac users for years, that raw "speed isn't everything". Gee, I wonder which is the truth this week... speed is all that matters... or it doesn't? (At the same time Intel dismisses speed issues in it's Centrino line, there's an ad passing as a news story/article (small line at top of page... "Special Advertising Section") that hypes a Mac user switching to Windows-based machine due to speed (re, using After Effects). Strangely, there's no "sponsor" noticeable at all other than mentioned in molecular sized type at the bottom of the page mentioning Intel and Dell. Another Apple rip off re "switcher" ad? (like the MS fraud of last year... supposed woman switcher was stock photo and actual woman works for MS marketing firm.) Why the secrecy and attempt at deception? What is there to hide or be ashamed of? Why are Intel and Dell not up front with this piece? Oh, wait... the Advertiser Index indicates it's paid for by Adobe... never mind. Payback for Final Cut Pro killing Premiere in the video market? :-) Editor's note: For whatever it's worth, you're making a few common mistakes. Intel isn't saying "speed isn't everything." They're saying that a 1.6 GHz Centrino often performs as well as a 2 GHz Pentium 4-M, and since I've got two Centrino laptops here right now, I can back up that claim. What you're mixing up is the so-called Megahertz myth. Apple has long claimed that the MHz gap between PCs and Macs was misleading because top-line Macs performed as well (or better, in Apple's claims) than top-line PCs. This, however, is not true. So don't mix up the facts: Centrino and Pentium 4 machines outperform similar Macs. --Paul

"He says Windows breaks down frequently. That's odd, because I run XP full-time on several machines and it never breaks down. Ever. I've crashed OS X--hard--more than I've crashed XP, and I only run OS X on two machines that I'm not sitting in front of all day long. Like many people trying to make a point, he cites surveys. I cite real world experience, which is far more valuable for obvious reasons." Errr... no. I have an OS/X PC and a Windows XP PC, both of which are fairly highly specced. Both get about the same usage hours, and XP is far more unstable. This is not the fault of the kernel design, XP is extremely stable by design, it is all the stupid bloat which MS crammed into the kernel, against the advice of its chief architecht. Hard crash wise it is about 3 WinXP BSODs vs. 1 Mac crash. However, since I installed SP1, XP has slowed down considerably with some apps, enough to actually make the XP machine slower than the Mac in some previously not-so areas! - Hence I installed MS' beta patch, which did remedy the situation slightly. Most Windows BSoD are caused by bad drivers, not bloat, whatever that is. It's amazing how many people have opinions about the NT kernel. But how many people actually understand the kernel at a deep level? I don't, certainly, but I've spoken to the people at Microsoft repsonsible for it, and the kernel was designed for extensibility and they're not just comfortable with the way it's evolved, they're ecstatic about it. Like I said, I use XP all day long on several boxes, and have no system crashes ever. I've crashed OS X hard several times in light use over the past year and half. My conclusion? They're both stable and reliable. XP doesn't get enough credit for this, however, despite the fact that it's in use on far more systems (and far more disparate systems) than OS X. --Paul

I have just one word to say: VIRUS. As a Mac user I don't run virus scanning software, I don't worry about worms or trojan horses, etc. I never see an unwelcome pop up message. The reallity is that the argument regarding speed is irrelevant to the vast majority of computer users. By far, most users have enough computing power to do what they need to do. The quality of the computing experience therefore is more concerned with factors such as stability, viruses, etc. Here, the Mac wins hands down. Editor's note: When there are more than 6 active Mac users, maybe virus writers will start targeting that platform. The meantime, robbers continue to target banks, because that's where the money is. --Paul

I use both Mac and Dell systems. I prefer the ease of the mac system, but I must admit that the faster dell systems, although they crash more, seem faster. I am still less frustrated with the mac.

mac 4 ever

Macs are great but only for making Windows based systems look better.

Guess it's time for me to bump this age old debate up a few notches on google. =P I've been running a digital design firm since 1994 and have done so on a purely PC based network until earlier this year when I merged with another partner who brought the mac platform over. Honestly, as someone whose always been pleased with aesthetics, I was happy to seem some beautifully sculpted hardware sitting in my studio next to my horrific looking PC's. (No my PC's are neither clear cased nor does it have neon or some bizzare robotic shaped tower cases, they're just a little "too" on the utlitarian side) With powerbooks to G5's galore, our office is an ebbing, blinking show that is only rivaled by some "real world" scenes in the matrix. However, none of this has actually "increased" our productivity. Nor has it taken it away. It's simply "more hardware". I'll echo many of the praises, concerns, and truths that have been said thus far... 1. The PC's still hold their own. Even with G5's sitting in here (albeit the G5's are wicked fast), are cheaper, do NOT cost any more to maintain (maybe just hard drives for the servers). 2. OSX is BEAUTIFUL and super slick. Taking advantage of Video Card processing that only Longtime, I mean Longhorn is catching up with. However, the eye candy doesn't may you more productive. And when you're sitting in front of 3 or 4 of the same apps everyday (Flash MX 2004 Pro, Photoshop, Indesign, After Effects), OSX loses it's advantage. 3. Speed is still relative and short lived. Every six months to a year, one camp will be faster than the other with the top-of-the line shoot out taking place. So anyone's comments here are short lived as well. Making most of these arguments, irrelevant at best. 4. Even with the G5 significant powerboost, apple still needs to make the Mac platform cheaper, or make the hardware "signifcantly" faster in order to meet an acceptable price/performance ratio. 5. Apple Innovates, Wintel copies... is another one right? Mac users tout this all the time. You know what? I'll bet 99% of all Mac users own TV's made by Sony, Phillips, Mitsubishi, etc. But none own a Zenith. Surprise! You're just like a wintel groupie! GE "innovated" the commercial TV. And you're riding on the benifts! But WHO CARES? Innovation isn't about "I made this!!!". It's always been about persistance of something better. And btw: Apple made some innovations, not you. All in all, this debate will keep going. I hope this debate continues. I hope so because I hope it forces Apple to becomes more competitive in the market and seek real world market share. I hope it drives Apple's prices down, and innovation up, so that Wintel can copy and persist that innovation and price drop, to the point that my NYC school teaching girlfriend can finally afford a Mac instead of "wishing" it was something in her league (and no I don't mean the entry level laptops). Innovation and competition is good for everyone, so Apple, get to it!

I use both platforms. A 7 year old G3 400, 512 Meg Ram, 10000 rpm LVD Uwide Scsi running Panther at home and a brand spanking new 3.8 Gigahertz, 10000 rpm serial ATA, 1 Gig of Ram monster PC. XP sucks big time. The interface slows me (and my employees) to a grind. Everyday someone can be heard complaining about their PCs. We do graphic design, I am a marketing manager. I prefer by far my trusty 7 year old Mac because the speed difference is BARELY noticeable, and the interface is so much more efficient. I run mainly Adobe CS suite of applications. Oh, because of the nature of my work, I need to use the internet for research a lot. No comparison there, Mac is insanely superior. One more tidbit: Looking for a file on my Mac takes about 15 seconds. 15 minutes on the PC. I actually timed it. Unbelievably ridiculous interface. XP is a waste of time, period. This is a real-world account, Dudes. Open your eyes. A souped up Cavalier will never come close to a BMW. Apple designs well, and I'm not even talking about the box, just the software.

I have been using both platforms since the 80's and think this debate is pointless with such a generalized unfocussed approach. Each system has its strenghts and weaknesses and are better or worse for different purposes. My primary system is a custom built P4 desktop and my portable system is a G4 powerbook. I went with this hardware configuaration because intel based desktops have become so powerful, affordable and reliable that I have no reason to spend the extra cash on a mac desktop. Portable computing is a different matter I have owned several nec, tosiba, compaq, hp, IBM, Dell and generic clone laptops and have found that all PC brands have the same reliability and lifespan problems. Powerbook has been by far the least expensive and least frustrating portable computing for me in terms of TCO. Right now I have found that a G4 powerbook is the only reasonable solution available for uninterupted portable computing. The only place mac wins in my mind is in terms of the cool factor and quality of hardware build/reliabilty. So far as the security and software arguments go I find both platforms similar in terms of truly practical use since all the tools I use are available for both platforms.

Alienware PC's own MAC's even though they run in WIN XP :D

Took me several hours of searching to find a forum like this. Finally a forum without ONE flame and little or no grammatical errors. "Dude, you suck...Mac/PC rules" Intelligent people say things worth listening to. Thanks to all of you, if for not settling the debate, then for at least keeping it civilized. I WOULD like to know what the other anonymous user of Nov 10, in the following comment means: "Looking for a file on my Mac takes about 15 seconds. 15 minutes on the PC. I actually timed it" There is a way to be more specific in your search parameters when using XP, yes?

Rather than dispute, why not agree that each of us will choose what is most valuable to us as diverse, individual end-users? Some want "Artic White", others want to upgrade cpu's or memory modules in a ten minute at-home process. The technical and practical realities of this argument have certainly been well represented by the previous posters. I would like to add a current price/value reality check taken from today's Apple and Dell ad copy. Each offers a $3,000. machine. The Apple contains a $130. video card and the Dell a $300. one (Pricewatch-OEM). The Dell includes a 3-year warranty while Apple offers one year, etc.. A few years back, before I started building my own workstations, I went in to buy Apple's then-current 21" flagship monitor and a G3. The monitor was undoubtedly one of the finest money could buy, but the best price I could find was still around $1,500.. Being a Mac user (then), I decided to bite the bullet and pay the man. I literally had the box on a dolley going out to my car when I asked what the warranty was. I was told that it was 90 days! No sale, and I never went back. Although Apple has since blessed their faithful with a one year warranty, Sony and the other contender's all offer 3-5 year warranties. Hard drives, same story, eg., my (retail, NOT OEM!!)IDE drives all have 3-year warranties and my SCSIs have 5 year warranties. All (4) have functioned flawlessly for 8 hours a day for 2-4 years. Perhaps this next bit should be considered as hearsay, but I have also read and heard that PIXAR has ditched their compliment of MACs and will not go back. They were a drag on production. Take a look at some of the least manipulatable "speed" tests (both sides are guilty of this) based on simple, real-world tests of image/video file editing, compositing, rendering etc. If a current PC does it in one minute vs. a Mac at 2 mins., you are talking about shortening production of a film like "Toy Story" by months, not minutes or hours. However, this "speed" difference would be irrellevant and undetectable to the vast majority of home computer users (except gamers) who simply want to need to know and learn as little as possible about their computers when using them. Also, a comment re: each individual users' product experiences via a reference to the Nov.28 poster who said,"Took me several hours of searching to find a forum like this.". On my antiquated, 4-year old 'internet PC' running Win '98 on a 1.4 GHz Athlon, I typed "Mac vs PC", into Yahoo's search engine (DSL). In less than 2 seconds I had voluminous search results with this forum listed as no. 7. My time to find this forum was about 20 seconds total. See what I mean? Many variables and much subjectivity is involved in these personal experiences which have nothing to do with the competency or speed of the hardware and operating system being used. I once read a "major" magazine's comparison of Intel vs AMD CPUs which used both 3D Studio Max and Lightwave for "speed" comparisons. The AMD ran 3DSM WAY faster than the Intel, and the Intel ran Lightwave WAY faster than the AMD. Why? One difference was that one program relied most heavily on integer processing tasks and the other relied most on floating point calcs.. Each cpu was better at one of those two processing jobs than the other one was. Another difference would be the extent that each software's code has been optimized to the instruction sets, architecture, etc., of each platform/manufacturer (cpu). The most intelligent choice might be one based on the applications which are your "bread and butter", and finding out which platform/cpu/video card combination is a "match". If I made my living with Final Cut Pro, I would buy a Mac. If I made my living with 3DStudioMax, I would buy an AMD rig, etc.. I hope this has added something useful to the discussion.

Took me several hours of searching to find a forum like this. Finally a forum without ONE flame and little or no grammatical errors. "Dude, you suck...Mac/PC rules" Intelligent people say things worth listening to. Thanks to all of you, if for not settling the debate, then for at least keeping it civilized. I WOULD like to know what the other anonymous user of Nov 10, in the following comment means: "Looking for a file on my Mac takes about 15 seconds. 15 minutes on the PC. I actually timed it" There is a way to be more specific in your search parameters when using XP, yes? in response... I wrote that original search comparison and since then found out that a search will be faster on XP when one does NOT refine/limit the search. It will search much faster without restricting parameters, for some reason, but in the end it will be at least 10 times slower than a Mac. Again, I am comparing with a 7 year old G3 400 using Panther. Apple does NOT support Panther on such an old Mac. I must assume that the results would be even greater on a supported Mac. Try this: search for a picture on XP, ONLY looking in the file name. The frustration is unbearable. Alas, the PCs are finally being replaced by Macs in my office... good times ahead when we will be focusing on work instead of hardware problems.

hey i'll tell ya what kids. Heres the biggie of all mac vs Windows killer.. Minimal virus and SPYWARE activity on a mac.

Are PCs REALLY cheaper than Macs? Find it out here: http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/36120.html

I think you might be reading into this too much... I am a soon-to-be switcher, with my Mac Mini on the way. I am currently on a 2.6GHz Celeron machine with Win XP Pro. What gets me is with all the extra power that my PC apparently has over a Mac, why is Windows still sluggish? Why does it take up to 2 minutes to start up Outlook and press Send/Receive? Why does Windows come up with excessive ammounts of error messages at startup and shutdown? Why do I have to constantly remove spyware and adware? Why do I have to wait for menus to pop up long after I've pressed a button? Why do I have to reformat and start from scratch every 6 months? I mean geez, all I wanna do is send/receive email, browse the web and chat on MSN. So for me, the Mac is perfect. But for the people who are going on and on about processing power, PLEASE by all means stick to your PC's. But just let me say that what Mac has is quite enough.

PS forgot to add to the above comment... My copy of Windows is illegal. As is my photoshop, office, etc. etc. If I paid for them, I would easily have spent as much on a PC as I did a Mac. So think about that. (It's a relief to be moving to something a bit more, ah, legal. I'll sleep better at night!)

You guys preach macs are better than pcs because they have minimal virus and spyware activity??? Wanna know why theres not as much spyware and viruses? I'll tell ya, it's because no one would have any fun attacking 1,000 computers :/. PCs are what like 85% of the market...OF COURSE they are gonna get attacked more. And listen...Anonymous switcher, it takes your comp 2 minutes to open outlook cause you got it filled with garbage. COMPUTER MAINTENANCE, you keep your comp clean it runs like a dream.

I've been an avid PC users for 10+ years, and even when I started doing graphic design about 3 years ago, I told every Mac user I knew in the industry that I am happy with Windows based machines and I see no need to switch over. Things have changed however. Even with constant maintenance, clean ups and defrags, and upgrades, my PC is getting too slow for the work I am doing. Running the amount of applications that I need to be running at once with my PC has been causing my system to consistently crash, and if it's not crashing, it likes to slow down and cause errors. Being fed up, I finally gave in and switched to a Mac. Whether or not the Mac is indeed faster in processing information, I find the stability and less slowdown to be more efficient in the long run, as I spend less time 'fixing' my Windows PC (so far I have lost about 6 days of work in the last 2 months trying to clean up and fix problems with my machine as they occur, and I have an up-to-date PC). Efficiency equals better productivity, which means more work done, and more money in my pocket. I am not completely for either side, as I find Windows and Macs both great systems for their own purposes, but I think it's best to judge for yourself what works best for you in whatever situation you may be in. In my case for the work I am currently doing, a Mac works best for me. PS: I do have a Windows-based notebook as well, so I still use both types of machines.

Think abput this. What do children have to use in schools? MACS! & of course, and yet of course, they are so slow. They are cheap macs, and for the same price, u can get a better p.c. for the same price, or less. So in some cases macs are better than p.c.'s!

I have had my Mac G4, without any virus protection or firewall, actively engaged in internet activity as well as file sharing, for something like a year and half. It has crashed ONCE in all of that time. I write/record music in DigiDesign's ProTools 6.4. I make short films using the included iMovie software. I do graphic design of all types in Photoshop, using countless layers, effects, filters, etc. Ask ANY PC user how often their computer crashes and WHAT they were doing when it crashed. Compare to my story. Point: regardless of the stupid processing speed - Macs are faster. Speed isn't just determined by a processor or a couple of tasks. A computer's true speed is determined by the overall productivity it provides. Not crashing, not worrying about viruses eating your hard drive, not having to load drivers in order to get pictures off a camera, not loosing work due to application crashes and the time saved by having a inuitive GUI make the Mac faster any day.

Okay i have a PC... and ive used Macs.. but really ive notived that the PC run so much smoother then Macs. yes PC has more things to worry about but thats because so many people have them and more people would rather infect more people then.. only the Mac users. My friend has been telling me that PC's suck and i keep telling him only on some things they do but MY PC never gets errors... thats probally because i have so many things blocking virus's and Spyware. I NEVER get ads when i am on internet explorer or Firefox ect. I have a Mac and when i run photoshop for it the filters take so long while my 2.8 ghz PC can do that filters in less then a second. Also whats a PC without the right click button when i use a make i continually look for the right click button i go crazy lol. Idk about you guys but i think windows is more of a professional way of doing things. Macs seem like a family computer while if you want your own computer to do w/e i would get a PC cause it seems like you have more freedom. IDK if anything i said makes sense.. but i just want to get this out of my system. thanks - Bob P.S - Great article it was very useful