What separates a Mac from a PC?

[Zero]

I think you won already
(shhh people just give him a cookie and have him stand on the podium fo couple of minutes..)

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
At least we can agree that the site Agathon linked to is excellent. It has lots of cool graphics for you to pull out to support your weak arguments and it has an objective final judgement in favor of OS X for me to savor.

It's not excellent, only parts of it are.

For the most part, it's clear it's a Mac user with only cursory experience with XP.

He actually doesn't seem to care that OS X doesn't have fast-user switching (awesome for families), disk defragmenters, file cleanup dialog boxes, etc. He weights the fact that OS X supports 128x128 icons the same as the lack of a disk defragmentter in OS X. Give me a break.

[Drake Tungsten]

It's not excellent, only parts of it are.

Yes, the parts that you want to use are excellent. The rest is crap.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
Yes, the parts that you want to use are excellent. The rest is crap.

A lot of the other stuff they mentioned was excellent too (like some GUI inconsistencies in windows), but most of it was crap because the guy doesn't really understand what he's doing and relies on default values only in XP, while he customizes OS X to suit his needs...then weights things ridiculously.

[Zero]

Originally posted by Asher He weights the fact that OS X supports 128x128 icons the same as the lack of a disk defragmentter in OS X. Give me a break.

Os X cant defrag?

[Zero]

Originally posted by Asher

It's the little things that make Windows more enjoyable for me, like GUI responsiveness:




And efficiency in general (file deletion):

thats nicely on topic, but mine laptop seems to be lagging if I do it fast enough. Then again, I do have alot of applications running right now. (scrolling doesnt but resizing seems to lag just like the mac image)

[Asher]

Apple's GUI is unresponsive because:
1) Aqua is designed to be purty, not functional (how many times have I said this in this thread )
2) Apple's hardware is dangerously slow compared to the PC

Of course, Window's GUI can become unresponsive as well if you've got a slower computer and/or tons of apps running.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Asher

Well here in the magical land called reality, people generally consider things that require 0 clicks more efficient than things that require 1 click.

I fail to see how doing nothing counts as efficiency.

I guess I expect too much of you. I'll make a mental note to remember that.

Petulant insults will get you nowhere.

When did I say something like that was pointless that Apple did?

[in Steve Urkel's voice] "Oh this is just eye candy. What a waste of processing power, whine whine whine...."

That's not the same thing, Agathon darling.

Then why did you misread what I said?

The interesting thing about that article you linked to is it's obvious that the guy is mostly a Mac users rather than Windows. He's quick to point out that some of the dock annoyances can be averted by changing preferences, but he doesn't seem to understand that you can change preferences in XP to get around "annoyances" he had too (ie, disabling grouping)

Doesn't he mention that you can disable it? He certainly mentions other things you can change. It still remains that most of the criticisms you levelled don't have much going for them. I especially like the one where you complain about the mac menubar when it's known a matter of fact that having it at the top of the screen is more efficient than having it attached to separate windows, for the simple reason that accessing stuff at the edges of the screen is easier.

If you want to argue with the guy, send him an email or go to their discussion forum. He's pointed out that he'd like to hear from people. Indeed he has changed some of his results because of complaints from XP users.

The fact still remains that you still haven't managed to foil most of the stuff I've put up since you just don't seem to be familiar with the way X works.

Of course if this were to be a worthwhile exchange I would need to have a copy of XP to hand and we would, like the page I referenced have to go through everything (like the crappy font support of XP among other things). Unfortunately I don't, since our roomate (a man with an excellent degree in CS) runs 2000 because he describes XP as "pure sh*t".

[Drake Tungsten]

I'm reading the font comparison right now. Things aren't looking good for XP in that category.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
I fail to see how doing nothing counts as efficiency.

Is this a joke?
If I can just look at something and see it, without having to click to see it, the thing that requires no clicking is more efficient...

[in Steve Urkel's voice] "Oh this is just eye candy. What a waste of processing power, whine whine whine...."

I've no problem with eye candy, I've got a problem with excessive eye candy at the expensive of responsiveness, efficiency, and functionality.

Then why did you misread what I said?

I'm not sure that I did, perhaps you're using terms and you don't understand what they mean, which can be confusing?

Doesn't he mention that you can disable it?

Nope. He just said he found it annoying.

I especially like the one where you complain about the mac menubar when it's known a matter of fact that having it at the top of the screen is more efficient than having it attached to separate windows, for the simple reason that accessing stuff at the edges of the screen is easier.

"matter of fact"?
Agathon, think about it. If you only have one menubar shared between all the windows, you need to click on a window, then move all the way up to the top of the screen to access the menu. In Windows, the menu (quite logically) is drawn on the window it controls. Not only does this save clicking time, it saves space. Not a single Windows user I've ever seen had problems locating the menu bar because it wasn't at the very top of the screen.

The fact still remains that you still haven't managed to foil most of the stuff I've put up since you just don't seem to be familiar with the way X works.

I've foiled most of it, you just keep saying "No that's not what I mean!" or "No, you didn't foil it".

Unfortunately I don't, since our roomate (a man with an excellent degree in CS) runs 2000 because he describes XP as "pure sh*t".

Your roommate's a pretty bright guy.
We all know NT5.1 is worse than 5.0.

Your roommate probably doesn't realize that you can configure XP to look and behave exactly like Win2K, with added stability.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
I'm reading the font comparison right now. Things aren't looking good for XP in that category.

What's wrong with it?
As far as I can see, the fonts with ClearType (which he didn't calibrate, BTW, just blindly enabled to the default...but whatever) look great in comparison.

In fact, if you'll look closely, Apple has a hard time anti-aliasing fonts below size 8. His conclusion for that section was, once again, ridiculous.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Asher

It's the little things that make Windows more enjoyable for me, like GUI responsiveness:

Don't crow too hard. That was on a G3/300 which is slower than my machine (which is getting pretty old now). If you try it on one of the new G4s the result is rather different.

And efficiency in general (file deletion):

Again, this is a bit of a stretch. That is efficiency in deleting 1500 files where the files are selected as a group. If you moved them into a single folder and then deleted them it is instantaneous.

Given that instantaneous deletion is always preferable it would stand to reason that one would do the same in both systems. So what appears to be a massive advantage is really nothing much.

Why do you persist in cheap shots, Asher? It doesn't make you look good.

[Zero]

Well, if the defragging thing asher said is true... I can clearly see a problem with Mac OS.

But maybe OS X has features that XP doesnt that Mac users would be horrified by :shrugs:

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
Again, this is a bit of a stretch. That is efficiency in deleting 1500 files where the files are selected as a group. If you moved them into a single folder and then deleted them it is instantaneous.

Why does it matter? Why would Apple force you to move all of the files (how long does that take, btw) into a folder, then delete the folder, to get sane delete times? This is perhaps the best quote by you yet in this thread.

Why do you persist in cheap shots, Asher? It doesn't make you look good.

Cheap shots?
I don't know, GUI responsiveness and filesystem responsiveness are huge deals to me, why do you dismiss them as cheap shots?

Do you not like it when there's actual screenshots and benchmarks which make it rather scientific how much OS X has problems with?

And how do you explain the lack of a disk defragmenter?

[Drake Tungsten]

His conclusion for that section was, once again, ridiculous.

Only if you give XP more credit than it deserves in the anti-aliasing-sub-rendering section and completely ignore the font quality-quantity and font previewing sections.

Or course, you wouldn't want to put the information you pull from that site in the proper context, now would you? You didn't provide context for the graphics you posted earlier, so why start now?

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Asher

Is this a joke?
If I can just look at something and see it, without having to click to see it, the thing that requires no clicking is more efficient...

I think we're talking about different things here.

I'm not sure that I did, perhaps you're using terms and you don't understand what they mean, which can be confusing?

Can't resist it can you?

Agathon, think about it. If you only have one menubar shared between all the windows, you need to click on a window, then move all the way up to the top of the screen to access the menu. In Windows, the menu (quite logically) is drawn on the window it controls. Not only does this save clicking time, it saves space. Not a single Windows user I've ever seen had problems locating the menu bar because it wasn't at the very top of the screen.

Fitt's law.

[QUOTE]I've foiled most of it.[QUOTE]

Jesus, you are a serial bullshitter. Half the stuff you accused X of not being able to do it can do, and you employed your usual strategy of not talking about the stuff your beat at. My favourite is the "two icons take up less space than one" argument.

Your roommate's a pretty bright guy.

I should say so, a lot brighter than you...

Your roommate probably doesn't realize that you can configure XP to look and behave exactly like Win2K, with added stability.

I'd be willing to bet that he knows more about it than you do.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
Only if you give XP more credit than it deserves in the anti-aliasing-sub-rendering section and completely ignore the font quality-quantity and font previewing sections.

Huh??
What the end-user sees is after the anti-aliasing-sub-rendering is done. Why does he deduct marks before then? I don't understand why you think that's relevant or fair.

I also don't really get your font selection beef, because font install is painless on Windows and there's no shortage of .ttf files out on the 'net.

I would consider Apple's inability to anti-alias below size 8 font a big turnoff though, seeing as Windows handles it flawlessly.

[Drake Tungsten]

Don't crow too hard. That was on a G3/300 which is slower than my machine (which is getting pretty old now). If you try it on one of the new G4s the result is rather different.

Asher conveniently left out this disclaimer located right below the graphics he used:

"Keep in mind that these illustrations are generalizations. Both OSes do not behave as depicted above in all cases. For instance, my PowerBook G4 400Mhz was perfectly responsive when scrolling. And I have also witnessed XP being less responzive than depicted here. However in general the illustrations above accurately demonstrate a tendency in Mac OS X to be less responsive than Windows XP. "

[Drake Tungsten]

I would consider Apple's inability to anti-alias below size 8 font a big turnoff though, seeing as Windows handles it flawlessly.

There you go making stuff up again. It isn't that OS X can't anti-alias below size 8; on the default settings, the OS doesn't turn anti-aliasing at sizes that small. If you want the anti-aliasing on, you just adjust the minimum size cut-off.

Why don't you get your facts straight instead making up things?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
I think we're talking about different things here.

Only when it's convenient for you.

Fitt's law.

Oh, don't even try that. I know that you only know about Fitts' Law from what you read on that site (and it is Fitts' law, not Fitt's law, BTW)

And I don't understand why you think this illustrates your point. Fitts' law is a function of distance and size, and if you have to click on a window and then drag the mouse up to the top of the screen, the distance is going to be far greater. Fitts' law proves my point, not yours.

I'd be willing to bet that he knows more about it than you do.

That sounds like a challenge. Hook me up with his ICQ/MSN/AIM whatever, we'll have a little geekfest.

How much do you want to wager? You can paypal it to me.

[Zero]

My laptop has a problem with freezing up. But since XP technically "never freezes" up (well thats not true) it just runs realllllllly slow. (mouse pointer jumping to places and all). Ive never figure out if this is XP problem, vid card problem or CPU overheating or something. First I thoguht it was a vid card because the update in driver addressed a similar issue on the changes, but after uypdating the driver it still continued to freeze up randomly.

I just gave up on isolating the issue and just put my laptop on sleep mode and turn it back on. It happens very rarely (1~2 times a day) and takes about 10 seconds to fix the problem. (I close the laptop and open it backup so it can go into sleep mode and come back out )

If you guys can tell me if theres any issues related to XP that causes this problem itd be appreciated.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
There you go making stuff up again. It isn't that OS X can't anti-alias below size 8; on the default settings, the OS doesn't turn anti-aliasing at sizes that small. If you want the anti-aliasing on, you just adjust the minimum size cut-off.

Why don't you get your facts straight instead making up things?

Why do you think Apple disabled anti-aliasing below size 8, Drakey?

It's based on a primitive version of ClearType, it just looks like a blurry mess that small.

Try it yourself, take a screenshot & share with us.

[Drake Tungsten]

Why do you think Apple disabled anti-aliasing below size 8, Drakey?

It isn't disabled. You can turn it on anytime you want.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
It isn't disabled. You can turn it on anytime you want.

Disabled by default, silly. (That should have been painfully obvious that it's what I meant, since I told you in the same post to turn it on below size 8 and take a screenshot...but whatever )

And quit delaying, try it and take a screenshot.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Asher

Why does it matter? Why would Apple force you to move all of the files (how long does that take, btw) into a folder, then delete the folder, to get sane delete times? This is perhaps the best quote by you yet in this thread.

This is why you are full of sh*t - You deliberately ignored the context and then claimed victory. The point is that the comparison is between the two systems doing something that you wouldn't want to do anyway, for reasons of efficiency.

I'll spell it out so everyone can see how you ignored the context (and you didn't bother seeing the caveat about doing it from the command line either - since X whipped XPs ass on this one).

FACT: X is slower than XP at deleting large numbers of files when these are selected as a group.

FACT: Moving the same number of files into a folder in X is instantaneous.

FACT: Deleting a single folder is, according to the report, instantaneous on both systems.

CONCLUSION: since any idiot will want to delete them as quickly as possible it makes sense on both systems to move them into a folder and delete that since it's instantaneous in both cases. So the speed difference doesn't have any practical value.

I don't know, GUI responsiveness and filesystem responsiveness are huge deals to me, why do you dismiss them as cheap shots?

It's a cheap shot because the comparison was done on a computer which is at the very low end of systems that can run X. If you were to run it on a G4 the performance would be much better due to the fact that the system takes advantage of the G4 only features. Older computers like mine can't take advantage of this stuff.

And how do you explain the lack of a disk defragmenter?

Apparently it doesn't need one. At least I haven't seen scores of X users foaming at the mouth to get hold of one, which would indicate such a need. The system does various cleanups when you leave it on. There are free apps to do this sort of stuff if you don't leave it on.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten

Quote:

Don't crow too hard. That was on a G3/300 which is slower than my machine (which is getting pretty old now). If you try it on one of the new G4s the result is rather different.

Asher conveniently left out this disclaimer located right below the graphics he used:

"Keep in mind that these illustrations are generalizations. Both OSes do not behave as depicted above in all cases. For instance, my PowerBook G4 400Mhz was perfectly responsive when scrolling. And I have also witnessed XP being less responzive than depicted here. However in general the illustrations above accurately demonstrate a tendency in Mac OS X to be less responsive than Windows XP. "

Exactly.

[Drake Tungsten]

Why would I expend the effort to take a screenshot when you're the one who's wrong? You don't know what you're talking about and trying to score points by claiming I'm "delaying" because I won't post a screenshot won't change that.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
This is why you are full of sh*t

No, it's why you are. You once again swerved around the issue and blindly made other attacks.

CONCLUSION: since any idiot will want to delete them as quickly as possible it makes sense on both systems to move them into a folder and delete that since it's instantaneous in both cases. So the speed difference doesn't have any practical value.

CONCLUSION: You're avoiding it -- why is OS X so painfully slow at batch-deleting files and XP is not? Why don't you admit Apple has somw slow-ass code and save yourself, rather than finding excuses and ways to get around it?

I think it's ridiculous to force people to make a folder, move files, then delete the folder to get under 7 minute delete times when XP does the same operation in a matter of seconds.

It's a cheap shot because the comparison was done on a computer which is at the very low end of systems that can run X. If you were to run it on a G4 the performance would be much better due to the fact that the system takes advantage of the G4 only features. Older computers like mine can't take advantage of this stuff.

Bullshit, the G4 is a G3 with AltiVec, and stuff like window scrolling and resizing doesn't use AltiVec because it can't be vectorized. The only advantage is the clockspeed, so if you do use a high-speed G4, you would get better responses, I suppose.

But I've noticed the responses very slow on my friend's iBook, although that's a G3 too. So I don't see why it's not relevant, since Apple still sells G3s...

Apparently it doesn't need one.

That's a huge crock of ****. Every filesystem needs defragmenters if you ever delete files or not.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Asher

And I don't understand why you think this illustrates your point. Fitts' law is a function of distance and size, and if you have to click on a window and then drag the mouse up to the top of the screen, the distance is going to be far greater. Fitts' law proves my point, not yours.

No. It's easier to capture things that are at the edge of the screen. Go have a look at asktog.com. I did read somewhere a while back that having the menubar at the top was something that MS couldn't steal since the copyright was upheld.

That sounds like a challenge. Hook me up with his ICQ/MSN/AIM whatever, we'll have a little geekfest.

You think I'm going to set him up with you.

He's completed his degree with skyhigh marks, that at least is a prima facie case that he's better than you, Mr undergraduate.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
Why would I expend the effort to take a screenshot when you're the one who's wrong? You don't know what you're talking about and trying to score points by claiming I'm "delaying" because I won't post a screenshot won't change that.

How am I wrong?

Apple disabled anti-aliasing below size 8 because it looks like ass with their version of ClearType.

Is that why you're refusing to take a screenshot, to prove me right?