What computer do you have?

[johan]

The only reason I use them is because they cost anywhere from about the same price to maybe twice or three times as much as a pc of comparable spec, but its been my experience that they last about 5 times longer. If my experience changes, I will seek other options. Shrug.

If you build your own PC desktops (or get a shop to do it for you) then you can buy quality components for it that last. Or learn how to fix them whenever anything goes wrong. It's why I would never touch Apple with a 10 foot barge pole. They don't want you to open up their gadgets and do what you like with it.

Not that I've ever noticed a PC not last a very long time. I like my equipment to last at least a decade.

mmmm yeah, about that....

Although I've moved on to better things, there was a time when I did computer tech work for a living. So I've built more than my fair share of desktops for myself and for clients over the years. The macs I'm talking about are laptops. I have zero desire to build after market laptops. Nor do I recommend anyone entertain anyone's custom built after market laptops.

As desktops go? I recently rebuilt my studio music machine from parts. Why? Because the music composition/recording software I use and love is windows only. There is finally a mac beta version due in the next few months. If a fully baked mac version were available now? I'd have to seriously weigh options over whether I'd build a PC or just buy a mac for about the same money. Why? Why not?

Car guys will eat me for breakfast here but I'll use the analogy anyway. A corvette is a fast car and so is a porsche. The corvette gets its fast via a huge engine that turns copious amounts of dinosaur bones into horsepower at an alarming rate. Porsche does the same thing by cramming as much torque as possible into a very light weight vehicle. 

And so it is with PC's and macs. I can build a PC muscle car that achieves performance via raw horsepower. And thus needs regular upgrades to constantly raise said horsepower in order to keep up performance as software updates continue to impose higher and higher loads of the hardware. Or you can get a mac with similar torque and much more lightweight software which will therefore run great now and continue to run great even after years of software upgrades. 

For me? Its a very close race. Obviously for you its less so. 

Does apple build in planned obsolescence? Of course they do. But I've run macs all way to their obsolescence and I've run PC's until they were well past the point of deserving resuscitation and I have to tell you, in my experience from a practical usability point of view, the mac was much more usuable for much longer. And that's with regular hardware upgrades and clean OS installs for the PC and almost no hardware upgrades or clean OS installs on the macs. 

Believe me, I was as hard core of a PC only guy as they come. I bought my first mac ONLY so I could learn my way around the OS and therefore expand client base to include mac users. After using both side by side for many years, I got to the point where I could no longer argue with results. They are hands down a better value for my mission and the mission of most others that I know. If they're not a better value for you then they're not. But to be perfectly blunt, I did this shit for a  living for many years. So please quote me and try to make out like I don't know what I'm talking about because it's disrespectful and quite frankly, kind of annoying.

[Sterben]

[The Valkyrie]

A very old, unreliable Toshiba laptop.

Will hopefully be replacing it when I get back.

[Tiberius]

Tiberius, I'm sorry, but you lose this argument. Apple has a deliberate policy of overcharging for repairs, or for doing unnecessary repairs, especially for items that are no longer under warranty. It's one of the many ways that Apple finds to keep draining customers' money after the initial sale.

It's not uncommon, for example, that a simple chip burns out on a motherboard, and Apple insists that the motherboard must be replaced for hundreds of dollars, when a $10 chip and two minutes with a soldering iron could completely restore the product. PC repair doesn't have this problem-- because you can literally choose almost any tech dude within 10 km who can diagnose hardware problems and either fix them, replace them with used parts, or sell one of multiple alternatives from various companies to repair the product.

Now, I'm not saying that Mac products are bad. Obviously, they are good, because many high-end professionals choose them. But Apple's customer culture is patronizing and downright insulting. I fucking hate that company so much, not because of what they make, but because of how they think about customers-- Sheeple, for sure.

What argument? All I've argued is that MacBooks are user-serviceable, as in, you can remove the parts that often need replacing (that is, HDD, RAM, battery).

I never made this into an argument about customer service. That's entirely different. Aractus started moving the goalposts and bringing up stuff completely unrelated to the discussion.

Also, I think you'll find that when it comes to laptops, replacing stuff like the CPU and GPU is hard whichever laptop you use. Unless the industry has changed in the last few years anyway.

Apple do sell their AppleCare warranty which supports all sorts of stuff. I've used it in the past to get a new battery, new power cable, etc.

[SteelCurtain]

I don't like the company, but I don't like Micro$oft either.

I don't like iPhones, that's for sure, but I will be purchasing a MacBook Pro next year. I just absolutely need a Mac platform.

[Gemini]

[Aractus]

[Aractus]

Now, I'm not saying that Mac products are bad.  Obviously, they are good, because many high-end professionals choose them.

Most Government agencies and Corporations go with Lenovo, not Apple.

But Apple's customer culture is patronizing and downright insulting.  I fucking hate that company so much, not because of what they make, but because of how they think about customers-- Sheeple, for sure.

Couldn't agree more!

[SteelCurtain]

[bennyboy]

What argument? All I've argued is that MacBooks are user-serviceable, as in, you can remove the parts that often need replacing (that is, HDD, RAM, battery).

I never made this into an argument about customer service. That's entirely different. Aractus started moving the goalposts and bringing up stuff completely unrelated to the discussion.

Also, I think you'll find that when it comes to laptops, replacing stuff like the CPU and GPU is hard whichever laptop you use. Unless the industry has changed in the last few years anyway.

Apple do sell their AppleCare warranty which supports all sorts of stuff. I've used it in the past to get a new battery, new power cable, etc.

Okay, okay. My hatred of Apple goes wayyyy back to the first Macs. I was doing an AP computer class (1st year uni credit) in programming, but Apple soooo cock-blocked programmers from having any access to features of the operating system, including graphical routines (drawing shapes etc.) and playing sounds in assembly language. They had a series of technical books you had to buy. So after hours of weedling and begging my school, they bought the books-- which Apple said they'd send "right away," but which arrived months and months later, at the end of the school year. So my computer had about $2000 worth of kindling, and I never got to make my 1st pro app while I was still in high school.

On my Radio Shack Color Computer, you could literally buy a commented print-out of the whole operating system, and you could ALTER IT to function how you wanted. Money at that time was actually made by people making cool new OS mods for that computer. PC computers were similarly easy-- you could buy a non-proprietary book on how to program for the early PCs, and get down to work.

So yeah-- proprietary bullshit, extra costs, shitty service, but all of it in a sparkly, futuristic-looking package.

My opinion of Apple users is that they consider the inflated prices a membership fee to inclusion in a cool vision of the future-- and other users are people who want a product they can use how they want, and for which they can expect reasonably-priced service.