Why mac os. Mac Pro: a computer for those who understand why they need it

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The list consists of 15 items. In my opinion, this evidence is simply undeniable, so there is no reason for holivars. Mac users rejoice, and the rest shake their heads.

I will not translate the entire article. I will only note the key points.

1. Reliable sleep mode

You can't argue with that. You can only put a Windows machine into sleep mode by crossing your fingers. In addition, the recovery time to working condition is much longer than that of Macs.

On the latest MacBook Pro, Mac OS X boots completely from scratch in just 25 seconds.

3. High quality iron

It’s also hard to argue with this. Apple equipment can be purchased from eyes closed, being confident that you are buying a quality product. Finding a decent PC build can take hours.

4. Fewer flickering lights

Here you can without unnecessary words make do.

5.OS X+ Windows is better than just Windows

Even if you don't Apple fan, it’s hard to deny the fact that two are always better than one.

6. B Mac is easier understand what the problem is

Both Macs and Windows have built-in applications for system monitoring, but it is often simply impossible to understand what Windows shows to the average user.

7. Culture of creating quality free software

It’s common knowledge that almost all programs for Mac OS are easy to use and usually very High Quality. Perhaps due to the fact that Apple provided a good example third party developers. There are significantly more applications for Windows, but it is very difficult to find anything worthwhile among them.

8. More useful pre-installed applications

Applications with similar functions are available for Windows, but they need to be downloaded and installed. However, there are no guarantees that the system will not collapse. Again, this is not a task for ordinary users.

9. Organized and convenient settings systems

In Mac OS, all system settings are made in one place. In Windows they are scattered wherever possible.

10. Apple doesn't stuff its system with crap.

Of course Apple also offers paid services, which are integrated into the OS, but they do it much less intrusively.

11. Hundreds of minor reasons in favor of Mac OS X

There are really hundreds of small advantages. We list only the most striking
Ability to take screenshots of the entire desktop, separate windows and regions
The built-in picture viewer can open PDF files. Moreover, it allows you to perform basic operations on photographs: resizing, cropping, rotating, tightening colors.
Expose allows you to quickly switch between desktops and windows
The dock can be used much more efficiently than the starting one Windows menu and the notorious taskbar.

12. No need to install security software

Everything is clear here too

13. Fewer stupid ideas

Apple doesn't waste time inventing desktop slideshows, releasing dozens of identical OSes under different names, or inventing a format (XPS) that directly competes with PDF.

14. Power command line Linux coupled with Photoshop CS4

15. Sharing files is much easier

It's difficult to say anything here. Just try transferring data from one PC to another, and then do the same on two Macs.

As a conclusion

As a rule, articles comparing Macs and PCs (Mac OS and Windows) are hotly condemned and discussed by opponents of change. Before you rush to defend your beloved PC, read this final word.
I'm not saying the Mac is good for gaming. If you are an advanced gamer, then most likely the Mac is not for you.
I'm not saying Macs don't have problems. Of course there are problems too
I'm not saying there are no hardware compatibility issues. There are a lot of devices that are not supported by Macs (no drivers)
I'm not saying that the Mac is for people who like to tinker with hardware and build the most powerful machines at the lowest price.
I'm not saying that with by Apple nice to work. If only that were the case...

In general, Macs allow you to get things done, while Windows often gets in the way.

Since the author of the article on the Apple resource doesn’t boom boom on MacBooks, we’ll explain.
1) Questionable portability? Do you know of something with the same performance, screen and price that lasts longer? I didn't find something. And the fact that you don’t use all the features of the touchpad is your problem personally, because it completely replaces the mouse, and force touch allows you to quickly search for information in the same browser without opening hundreds of tabs.
2) Versatility, multitasking - do you seriously consider Macos single-tasking O_o?
A wide range of supported applications - if you run Windows, then why the hell do you need a Mac? And if you are a generalist like a web developer, then there will be no problems on a Mac.
Expandable platform - 8-16 GB of RAM is not enough for you? Or a terabyte SSD? Everything else, I’ll be surprised, is wired into your Windows laptop.
3) Yes. You can watch videos on it AND ENJOY. The reason is trivial - no matter how many laptops on Windows I tried, all of them had glare. And in dark moments in films they are very disturbing. It was especially sad to see them on a gaming Asus for 350k. That is, Asus was unable to cram a matrix of at least the same level into the top-end laptop that Apple has maintained since the first retinas in 2012. As for “an iPad is suitable for everything else,” I laughed. Good luck quickly transferring a document or music to a friend, good luck writing an article. The iPad was and will be a beautiful photo frame with access to the Internet. No serious person will use it for work or study as their main device.
4) How did you screw up this Siri... Have you used Cortana on 10k? And after that you call Siri bad?! Why are you all waiting for that voice assistant will predict your desires and fulfill everything you want?! Folks, this is a voice assistant, not an AI, yikes!

@Mes Zadrot, don't touch the iPad. with proper skill - a very useful thing)

@pifag0r, I touched it, even groped it - I decided to hold out without a MacBook for two weeks and took a 12.9″ pro from a friend. Honestly, I couldn’t stand it. As a bedside tablet, the iPad is ideal, but nothing more. And taking into account the fact that Apple has a 5.5″ plus, the meaning of the iPad is completely lost.

@Mes Zadrot, my iPad was just collecting dust for the first six months after purchase... now I use it every day) I just really like it) if I have free funds, I’ll buy a new one)

@MesZadrot,
1) what kind of performance are we talking about? For the sake of relative noiselessness, the processor severely overheats and drops frequencies. No video card - fact. Regarding the screen, any laptop with a Samsung 156 matrix, of which there are many, is, if not better, then no worse, and the contrast will be even higher. Regarding the charge, maybe not more, but there are models with 8-10 hour work, why more? Are there really so many work scenarios that the spinners need 12 hours without charging!? And even then, at maximum brightness and under load, the Mac doesn’t hold up that much.
2) I generally agree, but most people only need a Mac for office/safari/movies... and just a brand
3) most likely we are talking about Asus g7.., probably the matrix was tn, one laptop is not an indicator, I described an example of matrices earlier, it is not alone, there are many laptops with luxurious matrices from LG, Philips. If the issue is resolution, then gaming laptops most often do not have 3K and 4K resolution - I think it’s clear why.
That's right with the iPad.
4) never used either one or the other

Many have heard about Mac computers that they are better than their Windows counterparts. Often such reasoning lacks specificity, so in this article we have collected 10 reasons that can motivate a reluctant Windows user to switch to a Mac.

10 reasons to forget about Windows forever and switch to Mac OS X

1. Single manufacturer of hardware and software

Yes, this is Apple’s main trump card and its path, chosen by Steve Jobs at the dawn of the company’s founding. Of course, the way to license your OS to different manufacturers hardware is more economically profitable - and we saw this with the example of Microsoft. But when it’s not about benefits, but about user convenience - choice Apple is better for everyone: and for users who do not need to worry about program compatibility and do not need to rush between service center hardware manufacturer and technical support of the OS developer if something doesn’t work.

Apple has been accustomed from the very beginning to keep everything in its hands

One company is responsible for all your mistakes - Apple. This is also convenient for the manufacturer himself - again, he doesn’t have to worry about supporting “Chinese” hardware that is unknown to nature, he doesn’t have to rack his brains about what unimaginable combinations a very competent user would think of connecting expansion cards in, and he doesn’t have to release a million patches to correct the compatibility problem with some rare application.

2. Autonomy of MacBooks

As strange as it may sound, OS X is much more energy efficient than Windows. This means that a computer running OS X consumes much less electricity. Here MacBook Air Issue 13 of the second half of 2013 works up to 12 hours - and this is without any “turn off everything you can, set the backlight to minimum and sit without moving or breathing in front of the screen,” but in normal mode work. Yes, Intel processors Core 4th generation, on which they are made new Macs, consume less energy than the 3rd and 2nd (and earlier, of course), but that’s not all: PC laptops based on Haswell have already been released, but they still work for 5-7 hours.

In terms of battery life, Apple computers are always ahead

But even if you are only interested in desktop computers, benefit from Mac use is: when the author of these lines changed his desktop Windows PC to Mac mini, electricity consumption in his one-room apartment fell by a quarter.

Moreover, Mac mini is not some kind of stub of a computer, as some people think, but a full-fledged desktop on full-fledged desktop processors. Except that, graphics system he has a typical one.

3. Versatility

Sometimes it happens that you need to use several operating systems on one computer. And don’t think that this need arises only among Linux users and Mac users. At my previous job, the author of these lines was faced with the fact that an employee was required to work in both Windows and Mac. And while it’s easy to work with Windows on a Mac, the opposite situation causes many problems.

Even grandma can easily master Mac OS X

Certainly, virtual machines available for any system. But as effective as Parallels Desktop - only for Mac. You can work with any Windows applications as if they were written for Mac. But on Windows there is no such thing. Well, which system is now more functional?

By the way, the myth about the limitations of OS X is just a myth. Often people who talk about some kind of banal fencing in OS X confuse this operating system with iOS.

4. It's Unix

The OS X kernel is called XNU, and XNU is essentially a modified FreeBSD - a Unix-like operating system, like GNU/Linux, for example. Operating systems, called Unix-like, are characterized by increased stability and high performance due to optimal interaction with computer resources. Additionally, any Unix or Linux user will feel right at home by launching OS X's "Terminal".

5. Cheap and high-quality software

When you install Windows for yourself (or buy a computer with Windows), what programs are at your disposal, besides the OS itself? Well, there’s Notepad, Clock, WordPad, Calculator... There’s also a set of programs Windows family Live (film studio Windows Live, Windows mail Live), which expand the functionality of your computer, but not many of them you really want to keep, and they need to be installed separately and spend time on it.

In general, Apple believes that the user should not waste his time setting up his computer - and we completely agree with this. “Working on a computer” is not “working on a computer.” The user needs to write texts, read and analyze data, compose music, draw, edit videos, and not install programs and patches or delve into configuration files.

To get more from a Windows computer, you need to install additional software, part of which costs a lot of money. For example, if you want to seriously study music, you will have to buy some Cubase for over 800 dollars. If photography: Lightroom for 5,500 thousand rubles and Photoshop for 22 thousand rubles. It seems a bit expensive.

You won't go broke on apps for Mac OS X

Office applications are also not cheap. Minimum set Microsoft Office it will cost from two and a half thousand rubles, or 250 rubles per month by subscription.

But if you buy a Mac, it's different. Just by turning on the computer, you get the opportunity to use both a full-fledged office suite from Apple and an application for working with music Garage Band (which, in fact, is enough in many cases, but if you need more - Logic Pro, a full-fledged music studio with a large set of high-quality effects, virtual instruments and presets cost only $200). There is also an editor iMovie video, the functionality of which cannot be compared with the simple “Windows Live Movie Maker”. Moreover, all this is already installed on your computer and ready to work.

Additionally, you can buy (literally in two clicks in Mac store App Store) batch RAW converter, part-time cataloger Aperture - only 2500 rubles, which is more than half the price of a similar Lightroom. And the Pixelmator application, which will be sufficient for the vast majority of Photoshop “masters,” will cost only a thousand rubles.

Unfortunately, stealing applications under OS X is also, as a rule, easier than under Windows - apparently, there are more honest people among OS X users. On the other hand, what is the point of spending money on developing serious protection against pirates if the majority necessary programs affordable even for a student?

6. Single logical interface

Microsoft still can't seem to decide which is better: the newfangled tiled Metro or the classic Desktop. Users suffer from this: as soon as you get used to the tiles, as soon as you launch an application that does not support Metro, you have to return to the old one. It is especially inconvenient for tablet users: in the classic interface, working with your fingers is a complete torture.

There is no such problem in OS X. Apple did not mix entities: a tablet is a tablet. It works under control mobile iOS and is controlled by fingers. And a PC is a PC, it runs “adult” OS X with the usual graphical interface: cursor, windows.

The Mac OS X interface can be taught as a logic textbook

Don't think that we are against innovation - perhaps one day a touch interface will appear in computers. It is even possible that Apple will also produce such PCs. But it must be a well-thought-out interface, such that if not every application, then at least 90% of all programs support it.

By the way, the same top panel with a menu for all programs in OS X - also very convenient thing. All settings are always in one place.

7. Updates

OS X, unlike Windows, will never say when turning off or, more importantly, when turning on the computer: “Hey, user, I don’t care about your business, I need to update here, so wait a minute. Or 10 minutes. Or half an hour, well, you understand, right? Go for a walk". Of course automatic updates Windows can be disabled, but why, because having an always up-to-date OS is convenient and safe?

Most OS X updates are installed in background and don't even require a reboot. And if a reboot is still required, the OS will ask whether you want to perform it right now or wait until you finish your work.

After all, the OS is for the user, not the other way around.

8. You can forget about viruses

No, of course, companies that make money by selling antiviruses will scare you: you, the user, will not be able to feel safe anywhere! You are attacked by malicious viruses from all sides, both on OS X and iOS, and even your Digital Watch Casio is not protected from the evil infection!

Antivirus companies can understand: the growth of the PC share is gradually declining, while the growth of the Mac share is rapidly increasing. So they panic. Only, firstly, official representatives of these companies often act ugly, calling any malware a virus, although they themselves know very well (they should know if they are truly specialists and not impostors) that this is not so. It’s just that people are used to being afraid of viruses, that’s why they use this scary word.

Evgeniy Kaspersky is very pleased so far

And secondly, there was, in fact, only one epidemic on OS X, and it affected a relatively small percentage of computers, or rather, even one subnet. By the way, specialists from anti-virus companies also understand perfectly well that what needs to be measured is not the number of infected computers (in that story there were about half a million of them - this is also scary), but the number of infected subnets. But they will never tell you this either and will keep pointing at you with this old story, convincing no, not to postpone the transition to Mac, but to acquire an antivirus license. Well, let's say for a year. And then renew the license.

So - go to Mac and forget about viruses and antiviruses. May your OS X always receive current updates(after all, this will not bother you at all, as we have already found out) - and Apple will take care of you. Because, unlike Microsoft, it has no one to blame, in which case the user will come to complain to them.

9. Expensive Mac? Cheap Mac!

There is another myth that computers Apple expensive. People who believe in this myth either have not studied the market themselves, or they believe that a computer consists of a processor, hard drive, motherboard and memory sticks. And the screen (if we are talking about a laptop), battery, case - all this, it seems, does not matter.

Well, perhaps someone really doesn’t care what size a laptop or desktop PC is, how much it weighs, what quality the screen is and what it all looks like, in the end. But no matter what the user’s priorities, everything costs money - there’s no escape from it. Two different computers with the same performance will cost different money if one of them is more compact. Compactness costs money because many computer components (for example, a hard drive) take up a lot of space. Cramming all this into a compact body so that nothing overheats is not so easy - this is a serious task for engineers who need to pay money. And if a company is not satisfied with the first solution it comes across, like Apple, and is ready to revise the concept over and over again until optimal, close to ideal, proportions are achieved, this also costs money.

When looking for a MacBook alternative, you need to be patient and have money.

When you buy a car, not only the engine and not only the presence of a built-in audio system are important. Silence, convenience, design - all this costs money. Everyone understands perfectly well why two cars developing the same maximum speed, can differ in price by almost an order of magnitude. It's the same with computers.

If you try to find MacBook Air competitors in all respects, you will find that these competitors cost as much as the MBA itself, if not more. And competitors MacBook Pro and iMac you won't find at all in price, performance and size. Some manufacturers (let's not point fingers again) sell huge, heavy boxes for the price of an iMac, with a much lower quality screen.

And don’t think that the desire to buy beautiful computer- "show off". Why is buying beautiful furniture, beautiful wallpaper, a high-quality and attractive kitchen set for your home not a “show-off”, but a computer is a “show-off”? Is it really worth spending a lot of money on beautiful furniture, only to then have a computer standing among this furniture that looks like an ancient toolbox?

10. Ecosystem

We left the most obvious for a snack. The author of these lines has many friends who use Apple products only for the sake of the ecosystem. Even if other arguments in favor of the Mac haven’t convinced you, this one simply must.

All Apple devices They have a similar design, operating principle, and most importantly, they interact perfectly with each other literally at the press of one button and completely wirelessly. For example, you can easily connect to a working Macbook desk, standing next to your iMac, and transfer files from one desktop to another as if it were one computer. A portable devices: iPod, iPad and iPhone can also be synchronized with your computer by pressing one button. Just mark what songs, movies and programs you want to see on your device.

All Apple devices are extremely easy to integrate with each other

Of course, there are some analogues of such an ecosystem under Windows, but, alas, everything is not so well thought out and in order to make it all work, sometimes you need to press not one, but a lot of buttons. I also constantly “google” on the Internet - which button to press, otherwise I did everything according to the instructions, but it doesn’t work. And Microsoft itself is constantly changing solutions: it either releases Zune for synchronization, or replaces it with Windows application Phone.

Android is even more complicated: the ecosystem exists, but the best integration of “Android phones” is achieved only with the operating system Chrome system OS, which, by the way, we recently wrote about.

They say that computers Mac is better their Windows brothers. To make this kind of reasoning more specific, in this article we have collected 10 reasons that can motivate an inveterate Windows user to switch to a Mac.

1. Single manufacturer of hardware and software. From the very beginning, Apple was accustomed to keeping everything in its hands.

Yes, this is Apple’s main trump card and its path, chosen by Steve Jobs at the dawn of the company’s founding. Of course, the path of licensing your OS to different hardware manufacturers is more economically profitable - and we saw this in the example of Microsoft. But when it’s not about benefits, but about user convenience, the choice of Apple is better for everyone: and for users who do not need to worry about program compatibility and do not need to rush between the hardware manufacturer’s service center and the OS developer’s technical support if something is not works.

One company is responsible for all your mistakes - Apple. This is also convenient for the manufacturer himself - again, he doesn’t have to worry about supporting “Chinese” hardware unknown to nature, he doesn’t have to rack his brains about what unimaginable combinations a very competent user would think of connecting expansion cards in, and he doesn’t have to release a million patches to correct the compatibility problem with some rare application.

2. Autonomy of MacBooks. In terms of battery life, Apple computers are always ahead.

As strange as it may sound, OS X is much more energy efficient than Windows. This means that a computer running OS X consumes much less electricity. Here, the MacBook Air 13 released in the second half of 2013 works up to 12 hours - and this is without any “turn off everything you can, set the backlight to minimum and sit without moving or breathing in front of the screen,” but in normal operation mode. Yes, processors Intel Core The 4th generation, on which new Macs are made, consume less energy than the 3rd and 2nd (and earlier, of course), but that’s not all: Haswell PC laptops have already come out, and they still work equals 5-7 hours.

But even if you're all about desktop computing, there are benefits to using a Mac: When this author swapped his Windows desktop PC for a Mac mini, his studio apartment's electricity consumption dropped by a quarter.

Moreover, Mac mini is not some kind of stub of a computer, as some people think, but a full-fledged desktop on full-fledged desktop processors. Except that it has a standard graphics system.

3. Versatility.. Even grandma can easily master Mac OS X.

Of course, there are virtual machines for any system. But as effective as Parallels Desktop - only for Mac. You can work with any Windows applications as if they were written for Mac. But on Windows there is no such thing. Well, which system is now more functional?

By the way, the myth about the limitations of OS X is just a myth. Often people who talk about some kind of banal fencing in OS X confuse this operating system with iOS.

4. This is Unix.

The OS X kernel is called XNU, and XNU is essentially a modified FreeBSD - a Unix-like operating system, like GNU/Linux, for example. Operating systems, called Unix-like, are characterized by increased stability and high performance due to optimal interaction with computer resources. In addition, any Unix or Linux user will feel right at home by launching OS X's "Terminal".

5. Cheap and high-quality software. You can't go broke on apps for Mac OS X.

When you install Windows for yourself (or buy a computer with Windows), what programs are at your disposal, besides the OS itself? Well, there’s Notepad, Clock, WordPad, Calculator... There is also a set of programs from the Windows Live family (Windows Live movie studio, Windows Live mail) that expand the functionality of the computer, but not many of them you really want to keep, and you have to install them separately and spend money on it time.

To get more from a Windows computer, you need to install additional software, some of which cost a lot of money. For example, if you want to seriously study music, you will have to buy some Cubase for over 800 dollars.

Office applications are also not cheap.

But if you buy a Mac, it's different. Just by turning on the computer, you get the opportunity to use both a full-fledged office suite from Apple and an application for working with music Garage Band (which, in fact, is enough in many cases, but if you need more - Logic Pro, a full-fledged music studio with a large set of high-quality effects, virtual instruments and presets cost only $200). There is also a video editor iMovie, the functionality of which cannot be compared with the simple Windows Live Movie Maker. Moreover, all this is already installed on your computer and ready to work.

Additionally, you can buy (literally in two clicks in the store Mac App Store) is a batch RAW converter that doubles as an Aperture cataloger that is more than half the price of the similar Lightroom one. And the Pixelmator application, which will be sufficient for the vast majority of Photoshop “masters,” will cost only a thousand rubles.

Unfortunately, stealing applications under OS X is also, as a rule, easier than under Windows - apparently, there are more honest people among OS X users. On the other hand, what is the point of spending money on developing serious protection against pirates if most of the necessary programs are affordable even for a student?

6. Single logical interface. The Mac OS X interface can be taught as a logic textbook.

There is no such problem in OS X. Apple did not mix entities: a tablet is a tablet. It runs on mobile iOS and is controlled with your fingers. And a PC is a PC, it runs “adult” OS X with a familiar graphical interface: cursor, windows.

A single top panel with a menu for all programs in OS X is also a very convenient thing. All settings are always in one place.

7. Updates. Reboot is a last resort method when completing a system update.

OS X, unlike Windows, will never say when turning off or, more importantly, when turning on the computer: “Hey, user, I don’t care about your business, I need to update here, so wait a minute. Or 10 minutes. Or half an hour , well, you understand, right? Go for a walk." Of course, automatic Windows updates you can disable it, but why, because having an always up-to-date OS is convenient and safe?

Most OS X updates are installed in the background and don't even require a reboot. And if a reboot is still required, the OS will ask whether you want to perform it right now or wait until you finish your work.

After all, the OS is for the user, not the other way around.

8. You can forget about viruses. Evgeniy Kaspersky is very pleased so far.

No, of course, companies that make money by selling antiviruses will scare you: you, the user, will not be able to feel safe anywhere! You are attacked by malicious viruses from all sides, both on OS X and iOS, and even your Casio digital watch is not protected from the evil infection!

Antivirus companies can understand: the growth of the PC share is gradually declining, while the growth of the Mac share is rapidly increasing. So they panic. Only, firstly, official representatives of these companies often act ugly, calling any malicious program a virus, although they themselves know very well (they should know if they are truly specialists and not impostors) that this is not so. It’s just that people are used to being afraid of viruses, that’s why they use this scary word.

And secondly, there was, in fact, only one epidemic on OS X, and it affected a relatively small percentage of computers, or rather, even one subnet. By the way, specialists from anti-virus companies also understand perfectly well that what needs to be measured is not the number of infected computers (in that story there were about half a million of them - this is also scary), but the number of infected subnets. But they will never tell you this either and will poke you with this already old story, convincing you not to postpone the transition to a Mac, but to acquire an antivirus license. Well, let's say for a year. And then renew the license.

So - go to Mac and forget about viruses and antiviruses. Let your OS X always receive the latest updates (after all, this will not bother you at all, as we have already found out) - and Apple will take care of you. Because, unlike Microsoft, it has no one to blame, in which case the user will come to complain to them.

9. Expensive Mac? Cheap Mac! All Apple devices are extremely easy to integrate with each other.

There is another myth that Apple computers are expensive. People who believe in this myth either have not studied the market themselves, or they believe that a computer consists of a processor, hard drive, motherboard and memory sticks. And the screen (if we are talking about a laptop), battery, case - all this, it seems, does not matter.

Well, perhaps someone really doesn’t care what size a laptop or desktop PC is, how much it weighs, what quality the screen is and what it all looks like, in the end. But no matter what the user’s priorities, everything costs money - there’s no escape from it. Two different computers with the same performance will cost different money if one of them is smaller. Compactness costs money because many computer components (for example, a hard drive) take up a lot of space. Cramming all this into a compact body so that nothing overheats is not so easy - this is a serious task for engineers who need to pay money. And if a company is not satisfied with the first solution it comes across, like Apple, and is ready to revise the concept over and over again until optimal, close to ideal, proportions are achieved, this also costs money.

If you try to find MacBook Air competitors in all respects, you will find that these competitors cost as much as the MBA itself, if not more. And you won’t find any competitors to the MacBook Pro and iMac in terms of price, performance and size. Some manufacturers (let's not point fingers again) sell huge, heavy boxes for the price of an iMac, with a much lower quality screen.

10. Ecosystem.

All Apple devices have a similar design, operating principle, and most importantly, they interact perfectly with each other literally at the touch of a button and completely wirelessly. For example, you can easily connect to the Macbook desktop next to your iMac and transfer files from one desktop to another as if it were one computer. And portable devices: iPod, iPad and iPhone can also be synchronized with a computer by pressing one button. Just mark what songs, movies and programs you want to see on your device.

Of course, there are some analogues of such an ecosystem under Windows, but, alas, everything is not so well thought out and in order to make it all work, sometimes you need to press not one, but a lot of buttons. I also constantly “google” on the Internet - which button to press, otherwise I did everything according to the instructions, but it doesn’t work. And Microsoft itself is constantly changing its solutions: it either releases Zune for synchronization, or replaces it with the Windows Phone application.

Android is even more complicated: the ecosystem exists, but the best integration of “Android phones” is achieved only with operating system Chrome OS.

Greetings to all!

Today’s article will be a continuation of the conversation about Apple computers, which we started in the previous review article of the iMac 27” computer.

Today I offer you not just an overview, but a kind of food for thought. Namely, I propose to look at Apple computers from a practical point of view, consider some myths and destroy many of them.

So, as I said in a previous post, Apple computers are getting cheaper. Today you can buy a desktop all-in-one iMac for up to 50 thousand rubles, with a diagonal of 22 or 27 inches. This price is quite comparable to the cost of conventional PC computers.

If we talk about laptops: yes, Apple does not have budget classes - only premium ones. But even here Apple becomes a profitable acquisition - their laptops cost around 50-70 thousand rubles. But this device is more high class in terms of reliability, time battery life and performance than the same Sony VAIO(games don’t count - we’re only talking about serious work) and others...

So, the myth about the price is destroyed by itself. Apple is not super expensive... Yes, they do not offer super-budget solutions, however, think about how much it will cost you to create a high-quality desktop workstation on the PC platform, and you will see that it is not at all more expensive than the iMac...

However, let's return to the main topic of this article...

A few words about the computer in general

So, when you turn on your iMac, it's ready to go. Mac OS X comes pre-installed and is ready to use. The only thing I had to do was: adjust the mouse cursor speed, adjust mail client, establish an Internet connection, install Adobe programs CS5, Final Cut Pro X, Aperture 3, etc.

The entire procedure for preparing a computer from the “from the factory” state to the “customized” state takes a maximum of a couple of hours. Maximum!

Why?!

Mac saves you time literally every step of the way. The procedure for installing a program here is as follows:

1. You insert the CD with the program for Apple (or download the distribution and open it).

2. Inside you see one single icon.

3. Simply drag it into the “Programs” folder.

All! The program is installed and registered in the system, and file associations, etc. have already been configured. The files themselves necessary for the application to work are located, as it were, inside the icon itself.

The executable file in the Mac platform is also a folder storing auxiliary system files necessary for operation.

You just click on the icon - and in a couple of seconds you are working in the program!

The removal procedure, by the way, is the same: just drag the program icon to the trash.

Here you also do not need to install any drivers on any devices; in most cases the computer picks them up on its own. And there is no such thing as a “driver” in the Mac platform at all.

Same thing with setting up cable or wireless network- it all comes down to entering the network name, login and password. Everyone else, even specific settings- Mas will exhibit it himself.

And there are a lot of such examples!

Mac truly saves the user's time. Working here you begin to understand how much routine and unnecessary actions and operations have to be done Windows user. Some of them seem to be small things, but when these little things are not there at all, work on computer is on much faster!

Well, now, let's dispel some legends and myths...

Myth One: Mac is not compatible with Windows

It is not true. Yes, Mac can't run executables Windows files, such as .EXE, .BAT and others. Apple has its own format executable files: .APP - but this means absolutely nothing.

On a Mac, you can also work in the usual Microsoft Office (documents created in the Mac environment will also be read in the office suite for Windows), create and read PDF, reproduce and process everything known formats video and sound - and so on.

Here's an example - Microsoft Office for Mac. As you can see, even the interface is identical:

Main window:

An example of an organizer from Apple - iCal:

Even Apple's own, extremely convenient and functional iWork office suite is compatible with Microsoft Office!

You can find an analogue of almost any Windows program for your Mac. Moreover, many manufacturers today release programs for both platforms, and both versions have the same interface and functionality.

Here are some examples (on the left - a program or software package for Windows, on the right - for Mac):

Microsoft Office 2010 - Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac
Adobe Creative Suite 5 - Adobe CS5 for Mac (all programs from Adobe)
ABBYY Lingvo x5 - ABBYY Lingvo for Mac
Camtasia 7 - Camtasia for Mac
MindManager - MindManager for Mac
VLC player - MDS for Mac
… and so on.

Not to mention the fact that absolutely all browsers today also have versions for Mac, as well as Skype, ICQ, Dropbox, Evernote and other useful small programs.

Regarding products such as recording software optical disks, codecs, players, DaemonTools and so on - all this is simply not needed on a Mac: these capabilities are already built into the operating system itself.

If there is no alternative...

Then the program comes to the rescue vmWare Fusion- the best Windows emulator program for Mas!

By the way, on this emulator I managed to run the once greatest masterpiece of the gaming industry - the game Midtown Madness 2 from Microsoft, which was released in 1999 and developed in 1998!!!

In those days, developers could not even imagine how a computer processor could be dual-core (what is that anyway?!), which RAM may be more than 256 MB, which HDD maybe more than 20 GB (which was just a huge amount of space in those days). And even more so, no one even guessed what Windows 7 and OS X Lion would look like...

But nevertheless - everything works!!! A game more than ten years old was launched in Windows environment 7 Fusion 3 emulator that runs OS X Lion on a 27” iMac…

See for yourself!(click to enlarge or view original):

This is the best proof that absolutely everything works on Mac. Windows programs, if you use such a great emulator as Fusion 3.

Myth two: Mac is not suitable for hard work

And a completely baseless statement!

The fact that the computer is assembled in a candy bar format does not prove that it can work for a long time and continuously.

After all, all PC laptops are, in fact, mobile monoblocks, but does this prove their low reliability?! Not at all…

Yes, an all-in-one computer has to work in conditions of elevated temperatures (cooling is not as good as in a regular desktop case), but with proper operation, no problems will arise.

Myth three: Mas is difficult to understand

This is partly true...

A typical Windows user, when sitting down to use a Mac for the first time, gets completely confused and doesn’t understand what’s what. This happens because in Windows we are used to doing a lot of extra and unnecessary steps in our daily work, which in Mac are simply not necessary...

Over time, after a couple of weeks, you begin to understand that in fact, Windows is designed extremely inconveniently. And only then do you realize how friendly and convenient a computer can really be.

However, for very beginners, books on working in Mac OS will help. The only difference is that when purchasing a PC you need to “purchase” a lot of books or training courses: on Windows itself, on the hardware, on configuration and administration, etc.; and to successfully master ALL(!) capabilities of the Mac, one thing will be enough - any tutorial.

As for setting up and maintaining Mac, there are no such concepts as such in the Apple environment. The computer does not require maintenance (disk cleanup, defragmentation...), and, in fact, there is nothing to configure in it.

Just take a look at the Settings panel in OS X Lion and compare it to the Control Panel in Windows:

By the way, Mac lacks such a thing as BIOS and registry. They simply don't exist. So setting up your computer from the BIOS or cleaning the registry is also worth forgetting about.

Myth four: there are no games for Mac

Indeed, for many buyers this, oddly enough, matters.

However, this myth is also unfounded. Yes, there are not as many games for Mac as for PC, but still it cannot be said that there are few of them.

Take a look here and see what you can play on your Mac right now: http://www.ozon.ru/context/catalog/id/1102638/

I think any comments are unnecessary here, especially since a Mac is first and foremost a COMPUTER, and not a game console...

Myth five: Mac performance is insufficient

The last myth we will talk about today. It also has no basis.

Yes, Apple does not equip its computers with the most “top-end” hardware, especially in terms of video cards, but this is not required.

As a rule, Mac contains powerful processor And fast memory in sufficient quantities - these are the main components that determine productivity at work.

The video card is installed in Apple based on practical SUFFICIENCY: so that the computer can display a picture on the screen high resolution, HD, etc., and not on the basis that the user will play Battlefield Bad Company 2 and the like.

Mac performance cannot be judged simply by reading technical specifications. That hardware, which is slow by PC standards, can simply fly on a Mac.

The reason for this is software optimization.

Mac uses hardware resources much more efficiently (tens of times!) than Windows. Thus, we can say that the efficiency of computer resources on a Mac is close to 100%, while on Windows it is much less than half...

Mac is used by specialists around the world in such fields as architecture, industrial design, medicine, construction, mechanical engineering, sound recording, etc.

All these areas require a lot of computing resources. And Mac not only copes with all this with a bang, even more: many specialists don’t have Mac computers at all latest generation(and, as a rule, 3-4 years ago), and they are all in no hurry to buy a new Mac.

Isn't this the best proof of excellent performance? Apple computers, is not it?