Mac vs Windows recent experiences

It has been a while since I have seen a Mac vs Windows debate.
I thought maybe we could get a discussion going with those that have bought the newer systems.

I had switched to Mac years ago and thought it was a better system for years, but with recent releases I have changed my position to neutral.

Now I will go with the system that is the most economical and fits my needs.

I have just bought a new 13" top off the shelf 13" Mac Book Pro, 3.1 Ghz Intel Core i7, 16gb with 512gb flash. A bit over $2,300 with tax.
I bought it for its size to travel with.

Last year I bought a ASUS laptop from best buy. 8 gb of ram, 17" Intel Core i7 with 2.6 Ghz and a 1 TB normal hard drive. It has a touch screen, running windows 10. $1500 and it weighs about 8 lbs. It is built for gaming and has a top of the line video card.

I expected the Mac to outperform the windows machine since it has a flash drive and faster processer. That hasn't been the case. The Mac is no faster than the ASUS and it has more glitches. Often it will be on a screen and it will just go dead and you have to close the app and start over. This usually happens during browsing. I expected it to be like all of the other Mac's I have bought in the past, plug it in and it automatically intergrate in to the system with almost no effort. That is not the case and I still haven't spent the time tying it in to the system. The only benifit it has is weight. The magnetic cord falls out far to easy, making it a pain to keep it charged if you ever get it down.

The ASUS has only one working problem. When I first bought it windows 10 was just released. I had to upgrade it for free myself. At upgrade something happens that disables the touch screen. Several times I have had to in and repair it. It is a minor thing, and really doesn't matter much because I seldom use the touch screen.

Using Light Room I see no difference in the two, other than the smaller screen of the Mac is harder to work with but that should be expected.

So the Mac was the right size, but in every other respect I feel like it dissapointed (as Mac reputation goes).

I've been running windows for years with no complaints. Lightroom works flawlessly. I am still considering the surface pro, and will likely go into Best Buy to check it out and if I like the feel, get it. Based on reviews I am likely to get the i7, 8GB, 256 GB hard drive.

I built my home system and it now has: AMD 8-core (4 Ghz per core), GT 430, and 8 GB RAM. Both Lightroom and photoshop can utilize all 8 cores on the AMD processor.

I still use my 2010 Mac Book Pro but with the large files from the 5DS R and the 5D MKIV some processes are very slow. Overall it has been a workhorse. I did put an SSD in it about 3 years ago because it was dropped (not by me) and the original HD was damaged. It was a simple fix and my time machine back up worked flawlessly. It just works and works without issues or any type of maintenance. Sorry to hear that a new MAcBook has frequent glitches.

Agree with Joel. My late-2011 17" MBP is still going strong. I swapped the 500 GB HDD for a 1 TB SSD mainly for more storage, but the speed boost was noticeable. I'm running the latest non-beta OS, it's generally stable (the exception is an occasional Aperture glitch, but since Apple isn't supporting it any more, that's not unexpected).

If the MagSafe is loose enough to fall out on its own, you might want to visit an Apple Store. IMO, it's a great feature – it's saved my Macs from tumbles several times when me or the kids trip over a cord (I killed a work-provided HP laptop that way once).

Like Joel, I also had an HDD die. That was in my 2006 17" MBP – I replaced it with the 500 GB drive from my 2011 model. Despite being two years older than my oldest kid, that 10 year-old Mac is still running fine for basic tasks like internet browsing, MS Office, etc.

I believe it depends on the Manufacturer. I left the MS world after the update to Win10. Bottom line Win10 destroyed two PC's leaving them useless even for surfing the net. It was not a problem with Win10, it was a problem with the design of the PC. It had been designed for marketing not computing. Yes 16 gig RAM, 2.6 MHz quad core processor, and 1 Terabyte hard drive sounded pretty good at the time and it ran fine on Win8. But once forced to upgrade upgrade to Win10 the hard drives were rendered useless. They ran at 100% for 100% of the time. Even bringing up one web page could take as much as much as five minutes. Most likely this was a driver issue the manufacturer was too slow to update, but it left me without a computer.

I picked up a 15" Macbook Pro, never looked back. I am extremely happy with my Mac. :) My PCs from work had to be upgraded and they work fine, but for home use I'll stick to my Mac.

The new Macbook Pro replaces the wife's 2009 13" Macbook Pro. My experience with it is similar to Joel's and Neuro's. It still handled the 5Ds R ,albeit slowly, and I would have stuck with it except the hard drive is just too small.

Lumens, I believe you are right it does matter who makes the machine. The laptop I have from ASUS is an ROG and built for gaming, it has a quality video card and I think that helps. It was a pain working with 10 at first but once I figured out how to get back to a more conventional desktop screen I have to say I have had not problems.

Kayaker, when you buy your new 5D IV or 5Ds R you will regret getting a surface pro with just 256gb.


Two of the problems with the new Mac that were bugging me last night:
Occasionally when reviewing files in Adobe Bridge, the delete button would just completely stop working. I would have to shut the program and restart.
If I open Google Earth and minimize the pointer will not recognize the icon on the taskbar and will not open it.
I may take it back to the apple store and see if they can reload the operating system.

When Windows 8 came out I switched to Mac. I actually bought a copy of Windows 8, but, based on the Surface RT Microsoft had given me at a conference, I couldn't bring myself to install it on my main computer. My 27" iMac and 15" MacBook Pro, both refurbs, both still work great. As I still use Windows daily at work (Win 7), I'm not living in a Mac only bubble. There are annoyances and surprising omissions on each OS, but I prefer the Mac, and the Unix based OS X.

As for performance, you may have mis-read the specs. The 13" size doesn't just affect its portability, but the level of technology that can be crammed in there. The 13" MBPs use 2-core i5/i7 chips, while the 15" MBPs use 4-core. While it has more "GHz", the CPU will be much slower. I would never expect to do serious work on the 13". On the other hand, the 17" gaming PC, being a gaming model, likely has a not only the 4-core i7, but probably slightly overclocks the CPU, RAM, and GPU. The high-end graphics card is likely helping the PC too in certain tasks.

I don't know your exact CPUs, but I expect something like these two laptop CPUs:
2.6GHz quad core (CPU core of 9446) vs. 3.1GHz dual core (CPU score of 4899)

The fact the 2-core MBP is matching a much beefier 4-core gaming PC would be a win for the Mac in my eyes.

David,

I thought the ssd would have made more of a difference with the Mac.

It might be a win for the Mac, but the same ASUS ROG sells for about $1k now vs 2.1K for the Mac. Like I said in the op, now I will go with the system that is the most economical and fits my needs. I would probably still buy the Mac for its size and weight but no other reason.

Not trying to sound like the Nikonians and Sonyians trolling CR with doom and gloom statements every time Canon posts an announcement. But as a consumer the level of quality and satisfaction I came to expect from Apple over the past 8 years or so doesn't seem to be there.

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Originally Posted by HDNitehawk

Kayaker, when you buy your new 5D IV or 5Ds R you will regret getting a surface pro with just 256gb.

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That is the debate. I read a couple of reviews of people with D810s that were happy with the 256 GB. Maybe I'll jump to the 500 GB. But I do travel with a 2 TB hardrive. Also, this is not meant to be my main processing machine. That is my desktop at home. I will likely be upgrading my monitor at some point to that as well.

I want something for travel. My company is security conscience and I have to work through an IT admin to install software on my company laptop. I just heard back from them and they'll install Lightroom for me, but no updates. Plus that machine is i5/128 GB/4 GB/32 bit. I am thinking that might get frustrating for photo processing.


Overall, I think the lack of debate is because both windows and apple are working well. Perhaps, as is mentioned above, the issues are no longer Windows vs Mac, but rather specific machines.

The SSD will only help disk performance. Any operations occurring in RAM will be hindered by the slower CPU.

I chose Mac because they are built better than the common PC / laptop. They have longer support (Good luck getting a driver for a new version of Windows on a 2-3 year old PC laptop). They tend to actually last longer. They have a really nice IPS screen, at a decent resolution. The trackpad is higher-end than anything I've used on a PC laptop. The software I need is available on it.

Yes, I'm paying a premium for it to last longer, to have a nice display, and to have well functioning input. When comparing Dell's laptops with high-res displays and SSDs, and matching CPUs, yes the Apple was more, but not by *that* much. Apple's refurb pricing (15-20% off) typically brought it to the same price point as the Dell, but I'm willing to bet the Apple one is better built, and will have longer support. The ultra-cheap PC laptops were typically missing something I felt was important.

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Originally Posted by Kayaker72

That is the debate. I read a couple of reviews of people with D810s that were happy with the 256 GB. Maybe I'll jump to the 500 GB. But I do travel with a 2 TB hardrive. Also, this is not meant to be my main processing machine. That is my desktop at home. I will likely be upgrading my monitor at some point to that as well.

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I didn't need the extra hard drive on the last trip, but with 9 days of shooting ,with the 5Ds R for five days and the 1D IV for 4, of 512gb I had 50gb of space left when I got home. For the last few years I have been traveling with the external, but it is nice to have all the pictures on one machine so you can easily edit while sitting at the airport, on the plane or wherever. You can do it with the external to, but IMO it makes it just a bit more cumbersome.

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Originally Posted by DavidEccleston

and to have well functioning input.

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David, this is the big thing I see is missing with the new Mac. I doubt it is a hardware problem, probably the latest OS. Tonight I may see if there are any upgrades or fixes to the OS, if not I am going to take it back to the store and have them check it out.

As far as Dell, I have to go with Kayker's last post and his comment about specific machines. I have yet to have a great Dell experience.

I've been considering the idea of purchasing a refurb MacPro tower (since most of my processing s done at home) and keep my MacBook Pro for travel


http://www.macs4u.com/mac-pro-2-4-gh...ktop-computer/

Joel,

I have a MacPro that I bought before the laptop. I guess it is about 7 years old now.
I do not process on it anymore, I upgraded all the hard drives to 2tb and I use it as the server for the house.
When any of the Mac's are on I can access them either through the router or the wireless and the tower gives me about 6tb of free storage to use.
I can save to any of the hard drives from my laptop or download from the tower or external that is attached to airport.
While it is to slow to download massive files wireless, it is convenient if you want to grab one specific picture in your archive.
Anymore I do all my pp on a laptop sitting in the lazyboy in the front room.

The tower will not gain you any significant speed over the the high end laptops. It will make file storage a convenience. The internal hard drives are plug and play and easy to change out I have several that I loaded with info and stored away.

It is an excellent idea if you need a server type machine.

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Originally Posted by HDNitehawk

David, this is the big thing I see is missing with the new Mac.

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I *do* have two input issues with Apple.

One applies to all their computers... The "natural scrolling", aka backwards scrollwheel. Thankfully, is really easy to turn off. It's only natural if you are using a touch device, and imagine that you're pushing paper around. Scrolling a wheel down should scroll down the screen.

The other issue is the magic mouse. My iMac came with it, and I can't stand it. Every time I grab the mouse it imagines that I've swiped it somehow. If it was less sensitive, it may be okay. It also doesn't like Eneloops. After looking online, I see Eneloops are slightly smaller than normal batteries, and a paper shim in the battery compartment is required to make the Magic Mouse work. After that, it would drain the batteries every couple of days. It was so infuriating that I took my old wired mouse from my old PC and I'm using that.

Their touchpad though, it's nice. I haven't tried their newer force-touch pads, so I can't comment on those.

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Originally Posted by DavidEccleston

I chose Mac...They tend to actually last longer.

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During the 5-year period of time the 2006 MBP was my main personal laptop, I went through a total of six work-provided Compaq/HP Windows laptops...one broken from a fall (that a MagSafe power connector would have prevented), three just flat out died (motherboard failure, HDD failure, etc.), only one made it to the 3-year corporate EOL policy. Of those 6 Win laptops with a standard corporate build, only the last two were similar in spec to the older Mac.

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Originally Posted by neuroanatomist

During the 5-year period of time the 2006 MBP was my main personal laptop, I went through a total of six work-provided Compaq/HP Windows laptops...one broken from a fall (that a MagSafe power connector would have prevented), three just flat out died (motherboard failure, HDD failure, etc.), only one made it to the 3-year corporate EOL policy. Of those 6 Win laptops with a standard corporate build, only the last two were similar in spec to the older Mac.

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My old MacBook pro has lasted since 09, it had one backlighting issue and a software issue in that time frame. It still works. I am on my second Dell at work.

But then I still personally use the iPhone 3gs and last year the case had worn out and I dropped it and got a very small crack in the corner of the screen. I think 6 or 7 years that is very good durability. I also carry an iPhone 6 for work. Three times in the last few months I have had to replace the screen. The iPhone 6 is puny. So we can discuss reliability of the machines a few years ago and they have proven themselves IMO. The question for me today is how about the quality today and the MacBook Pro I just bought?

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Originally Posted by DavidEccleston

The other issue is the magic mouse.

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I used the Apple mouse for a few months when I bought my first machine. It was a joke. In 9 years I have bought several iMac's and have several unused mice and keyboards stored somewhere in the garage.

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Originally Posted by HDNitehawk

The question for me today is how about the quality today and the MacBook Pro I just bought?

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Well, I'll let you know my opinion on that...if and when I need to replace my current (but 5 years old) model. :cool:

Actually, I did have a company provided 2014 MBAir that worked nearly flawlessly (the only issues were software related and specific to the security interactions with the corporate network environment).

I am currently running following combination on my windows 10. MSI 970 gaming motherboard with 8core amd 4.2 prosessor, 32gb memory, ssd for windows and software and 2tb hdd for everything else and amd radeon r9 series display adapter. Only thing that i have to nag is that when in development mode on LR the images load up bit slow (ok over 2seconds per image but still) so might actually get another ssd for the developmen use and then save to hdd.

With windows system in use naturally would looove the retina views from mac but have coped that with pretty awesome monitor Asus 27" MG279Q IPS can highly recommend, image quality is pretty darn good.

I would love to get myself the microsoft surface book, just not available in finland....that would fill all my traveling needs for editing and posting pictures.

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Originally Posted by DavidEccleston

The other issue is the magic mouse. My iMac came with it, and I can't stand it. Every time I grab the mouse it imagines that I've swiped it somehow. If it was less sensitive, it may be okay. It also doesn't like Eneloops. After looking online, I see Eneloops are slightly smaller than normal batteries, and a paper shim in the battery compartment is required to make the Magic Mouse work. After that, it would drain the batteries every couple of days. It was so infuriating that I took my old wired mouse from my old PC and I'm using that.

Their touchpad though, it's nice. I haven't tried their newer force-touch pads, so I can't comment on those.

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I far prefer the touchpad to a mouse (any mouse). I have a Magic Mouse, it's ok but sits in a drawer. Instead, I use a Magic Trackpad when working with an external display/keyboard. I tried to replicate that with my work-provided PC laptop using a Logitech trackpad, it's kludgy compared to Apple's trackpad, particularly for drag-and-drop.

I bought a 2015 15b inch maxed out Macbook Pro recently and... Well, I should have stuck to PC. It's great and all, but editing 5ds photos it slows down a bit. You click on a photo and it takes about 4-5 second to render it clearly. Mind you, I switched to Mac to become more productive (not as many games) so on that front it's worth it.

Squidy, did I read this right? The Mac has fewer games to distract you it has helped you exercise self control and stay focused on the task at hand.

You know you can run Boot Camp or Parallels an Mac and you would have Windows and your games? I hope I didn't ruin your Apple experience by telling you this.

Hahahaha I don't want to run bootcamp and start playing games again, I'd much rather focus on photography. Besides, I don't think the mac itself is fast enough to play the games I'm used to

Just to add, after our cruise in January I'm thinking of actually getting rid of my laptop altogether

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Originally Posted by Squidy

Just to add, after our cruise in January I'm thinking of actually getting rid of my laptop altogether

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I'm thinking about it too. My 2010 iMac is still running well and I'm trying to limit the amount of screens around me.