Today, someone (you know who you are!) was going on about how my MacBook isn't up to the specifications for the price. This post is going to briefly explain why this is not the case with myself and why I have stood by the use of my Apple computers.
I have known for a long time that FireWire was a part Apple "invention" (well no, it is actually not, but it was Apple who pushed it on to the market). But it had not struck me until now that I have been using FireWire as my favourite choice of connection to my external drive since about 2007 - way before I got my first Apple product. Now I have a MacBook Pro (and it is well worth the money, PCs have generally more issues and I know this because I am definitely still a PC user first and foremost), iPhone 5 and iPod touch. In the house we now have 4 iPhones and 2 Macs (soon to be three, I think).
I did not realise though that whilst I have been a proud fan of FireWire, what I was saying was that I was really a strong supporter of Apple. Nowadays FireWire is not as big as it used to be, and I have Thunderbolt on my MacBook which I intend to use in the future as it becomes more widely available (it is now available on some PCs and motherboards) and used.
However, it seems to be the build quality that makes me choose Apple. I like many PC manufacturers (not HP though - 3 broken machines due to overheating and not fixed under warranty - that's just saying something) such as Acer, Asus, Dell, Fujitsu, Samsung and a few others, but I never feel that the quality is any good - especially when someone else you know has a MacBook (I'm talking the Air or the Pro here) or just when you generally compare them side-by-side.
The price point puts people off, but it should not. At the end of the day, I'm still a huge Windows user, I write my software for Windows, not Mac OS X, simply because I have always preferred Windows. But if we are not talking about the software but the hardware, I believe that the quality of Apple's products is much higher than any other. Simple thing likes a magnetic (patented) designed power connection (to prevent pulling the computer off the table if you trip on the wire) are the kinds of things you can expect from Apple. PC manufacturers also put in tweaks, but they tend not to be consistent across the vast range of products (remember those little ExpressCard 54 remotes you used to get with your HP Pavilion notebook?). Another one had Windows SideShow where PC manufacturers would put a display on the outside of lid chassis which could display the song you are listening to or whatever and when the system was shutdown, the user could still use the computer using the outer LCD and could enjoy hundreds of hours of battery life by using the laptop battery but with the small footprint of the outer LCD. Where did that go?
My final point to make is that Apple products are just so much better thermally. My MacBook hardly ever gets warm (although when put under strain it will) but a PC I had would need its fans to run every 3 or 4 minutes when performing the exact same tasks. Why are most PC manufacturers so flimsy when manufacturing them? Apple puts a lot of effort into each product, hence why they end up being the way they are.
I am still though, a Windows user.
I now love Linux and OS X, and I am more of a Mac OS X lover.
