Mac vs Windows, the good.. the bad..

[Kristofer]

Right now I'm quite disappointed in my Macbook pro...

As a new Mac user I'm trying to learn how to use the MacBook Pro as effectively as possible. Of course my benchmark is windows xp. There a number of things i like with the Mac so far, but there are also a number of things that annoys big time me with Mac.

How you value certain aspects of an OS of course depends on what you mostly use it for and to some extent what your personal preferences are.

However, I think that "personal preferences" can never be a valid argument against lower productivity or efficiency.

Continued below...

/Kristofer

[Kristofer]

Many of the things that annoys we me with Mac is probably because I just haven't figured out how to do the task in question quickly on the Mac. So I welcome you to let me know how to do these things the fastest way. Many of the things that I bring up might not just be about the OS but also things about the programs running on Mac or Windows.

I plan to continuously post in this thread my new discoveries and insights on the topic of "the fantastic Mac"

[Kristofer]

Things I like with the MacBook Pro
- Looks good
- Good built quality
- OK battery life
- Very quick to bring back to work mode. Windows hibernation mode is inferior to Mac in this aspect.
-

Things that i dislike with the Mac
- Finder is slow and has many usability issues.
- I can¨t quickly flip between active documents. For some reason Mac flips between programs rather than documents.
- Office in Mac really sucks. s most people working spends most of their time in these progams Mac can hardly be an alternative as these programs work so poor, right? I'm using office 2008 which is supposed to be better on Mac than previous office versions on Mac?
- In general I believe that you are a lot faster with keys compared to using the mouse. So whenever you are required to use the mouse regularly to get somewhere or do something you lose valuable time.

To be continued soon

[Stefan]

Well, as an avid Mac supporter I agree with most of the points in some aspects. However in regards to switching different windows I use Spaces and Exposee a lot (with keyboard shortcuts) and it makes things quick and easy.

For me the biggest productivity booster in OS X (Leopard) is Spotlight. I never ever use finder to locate anything. I just press Apple+Space type a few letters and press enter and I'm just where I wanted to be. It really doesn't matter if it's a program or a document its super fast and easy.

When I find my self stuck with XP for some reason it takes me forever to locate programs or files. Going back to navigational search scares me to death since I find it too slow and unproductive.

And, It's not really Apples fault that Microsoft failed so miserably with Office 2008. It must be the biggest joke since Windows Vista.

I want to say something nice about Finder even though in general its flawed. So the biggest step up with finder compared to explorer is how easy it is to browse trough files and documents in a certain folder and see the quick previews or the enlarged quick view.

Another productivity booster, don't user an external mouse since it's to far away from the keyboard.

[Gatekeeper]

I've been hearing a ton of negative stuff about Windows Vista. Exactly what are the pros and cons?

So far what I've heard from Vista users are:

- the program has still tons of bugs
- your computer runs very slow
- Vista is all just hype
- beneath it all, Vista is just too damn difficult to understand
- Office 2007 is like a whole new world and you need to learn the basics...start from scratch