Why Windows?

I'm serious here...I've got a Mac with two dual-core Xeon processors and can start up natively with a legit copy of Windows XP SP2.

Please, all you windows people, give me a reason to do it! Does Windows have a "killer app," Does it have anything? From what I see the quality of freeware/shareware on Windows sucks compared to what's available on Mac. Yes, there's more games available, but most that haven't been ported to the Mac suck anyway.

Please, all you people who look down on us Mac users, give me a reason why I have a hard drive dedicated to running a Microsoft Windows XP OS.

[edit on 7/2/2007 by djohnsto77]

Originally posted by djohnsto77

Please, all you people who look down on us Mac users, give me a reason why I have a hard drive dedicated to running a Microsoft Windows XP OS.

1) it's better than Vista

2) You now have an excuse for your boss (I'm sorry but my computer got a virus so the report is going to be late)

3) if you are a masochist, it might be fun!

4) You can ponder why you sent all your money to Apple.. just to run something just as well on a computer that was half the price.


IMHO nuke it and install Linux.

[edit on 7/2/2007 by Cug]

Originally posted by djohnsto77

Please, all you people who look down on us Mac users, give me a reason why I have a hard drive dedicated to running a Microsoft Windows XP OS.

Dont. Give it a 30GB partition or even better just don't install it. You said it your self, unless your really into games there no reason to run windows, so why consider it in the first place.

I have windows installed, it used about 1/10th of my total hdd space to play a couple of games that i occasionally play (a few times a month). I have Q4, defcon, and soon to be ET:QW to keep me happy natively on GNU/Linux as well as a crap load of other games.

i dont look down on macs, just the artists that use them. playing with photoshop and being in a garage band isn't a real job. :shk:

as an IT professional the only reason i keep a copy of XP around is to stay fresh for work. i dual boot linux and xp on my dell E1705 and at home most of the time i use the linux boot for my personal use. any time im using windows is when im testing or working on something for my job. xp is the way to go for gaming and hardcore networking capabilities.

i dont do much with macs except for supporting the artists employed by our company so im fairly biased, but i dig the fact osX is built on a linux kernel so i can always boot up in terminal and run command line when a problem arises. i have a hard time navigating the mac gui because its like walking into a room where everyone has moved your furniture around.

IMO, if you like nice colors and ease of use then macs are for you. if your into tech and gaming then xp is great. if your serious about computers, linux is the only worthy os.

Originally posted by bokinsmowl

i dont do much with macs except for supporting the artists employed by our company so im fairly biased, but i dig the fact osX is built on a linux kernel

osX is built on BSD not Linux.

On my PC right now doing some work related crap!

Hateful hateful machine. I'd love to launch it outta the windows (I live on the 19th floor)

Need to hurry up so I can get back to my macbook!!

Originally posted by bokinsmowl
IMO, if you like nice colors and ease of use then macs are for you. if your into tech and gaming then xp is great. if your serious about computers, linux is the only worthy os.

This statement doesn't really make any sense to me. Mac OS X is a full UNIX implementation and even comes with an X-Windows Server so any program you can run on Linux you can run on Mac OS X too. The same can't be said of the reverse.

And I'm a professional computer programmer so I am serious about computers.

Biggest reason I can see is games. I don't agree that all games not ported to OSX are crap. There are some very good ones out there. It all depends on what kinds of graphics card you have inside your computer. Maybe It's a good idea to just try XP and Vista to see how it feels and learn the basic functions.

Personally, I don't see any reasons for using Windows unless you have some very special hardware, stability problems with UNIX or are into gaming. If you don't care about gaming I would use a virtual machine instead like Virtualbox or Parallels. This means you can have Windows in a little playground inside OSX or for ex GNU/Linux like I use. This also means that you won't need to dualboot and risking Windows to trash your whole system.

Hmm...

Right click.

osX is built on BSD not Linux.

same thing, both unix based os.

Basically, two reasons:

1. I don't have the time and the money to have what I wanted, a Windows, a Mac and a Unix based computer.

2. I live in Portugal. When I went to work to the "mother" company of that in which I work today, they wanted to move from Unix to a graphical interface (this was in 1993). I told them about Apple's Macs, but after some consideration the idea was abandoned because they did not had any software in Portuguese and there wasn't any version of the Mac system in Portuguese either.

But Microsoft was making some semi-graphical applications on DOS, and they had Portuguese versions. So, they started changing the software used in Unix to software that could run on DOS, and from then on they only use Windows computers.

I don't know if this was the case with other companies, but I suspect it was, so, in Portugal, Macs are only a very small part of the computer market, almost limited to people who use Photoshop.

When I went from that first company to the one where I work today, we started making software. Obviously, when looking for a market, the management only found the possibility of making software for Windows, so that is what I do today.

PS: That company still has the original Unix system disks stored in a cabinet along with two versions of Novel Netware, Windows 3.1 and Windows 95. I am the one responsible for that cabinet and the only person who knows how to use the Unix system when we need to get some data from the old accounting software the was used back then.

I really didn't mean this to be a Mac vs. Windows thread.

I'm actually asking if there's something cool to run on it. I'm new to being able to run Windows software at home (at least at a decent speed).

Originally posted by djohnsto77
I really didn't mean this to be a Mac vs. Windows thread.

I'm actually asking if there's something cool to run on it. I'm new to being able to run Windows software at home (at least at a decent speed).

Really, no.

I believe everyone has gone over this Mac, GNU/Linux, *BSD they have everything windows has and more.

Why do you want to run it? you still haven't said.

Leopard was supposed (for a while) to have the capability to switch back and forth between it and Windows on the fly. But apparently this has been taken out, at least out of the first Leopard release. From what hear what was planned was just putting one OS to sleep while switching to the other.

But the Mach microkernel used by OS X should actually be able to support two completely different operating systems running in parallel with full hardware access (not in a VM like Parallels, but with full hardware access). I'm not sure how this would be implemented or manifest itself user experience wise, but it's certainly an interesting idea. I hope Apple is working on it.

Okay, I will tell you. There are multiple reasons why I use a Windows over a Macintosh. Is it because I am a Microsoft fan boy? No, not a raving Microsoft fan boy, but I have no problem with the company. But at this point I buy Microsoft products just to spite Apple. Why? Well...here goes.

I'll be honest, every single Mac user I've ever met, and I swear to god, EVERY SINGLE ONE, has acted smug and arrogant. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. They act like pr****(apparently its a curse word now) and talk down to you if you use a Windows or even a Linux.

And this isn't a symptom of non-Windows users in general, I've met a few Linux users and they were all decent people. Its just these Mac users, and Apple in general, is very arrogant. Steve Jobs is an arrogant dip**** who badmouths other company's products. Apple in general relies on their cult-like fan base to buy their relatively overpriced products.

But everyone bashes Bill Gates. I mean, oh hes the big rich guy lets bash him. He must be a greedy bastard, right? No. Hes a philanthropist. And he didn't just inherit that money like most of the rich people in the world. He started from scratch to earn that money.

So to put it simply, I don't use a Mac (or Apple products) simply because of multiple reasons:

1. The negative things I associate with Apple in general.

2. The fact that tons of games don't work on a Mac, and tons of programs in general don't. I download lots of programs from the internet, having a Mac would be detrimental, as Mac versions are not always made.

3. I'm just much more used to Windows, and its more nostalgic for me, I guess. Its been the only home comp I've ever used. Started at 95, then to 98, to 2000, and currently I'm on XP.

Now, is it that Macs are bad? No. They are decent systems, I will say that. However most of the positive aspects attributed to Macs are a bit well misleading. For instance how many Mac users claim they don't get viruses as often, well that is true but that is not because they are made better its just because of well logic few people bother making viruses for a computer about 1/10th of people use. Same goes for hacking.

But seriously ever since I got AVG security center and Comodo Firewall my computer has been free of viruses and threats. And with Windows you in general have to be more tech knowledgeable to keep errors from occurring. Macs are more forgiving of your errors while Windows is less forgiving, you screw up it won't catch your mistakes.

But I have used Macs before, in Grade School, thats all they had. Of course back then I was computer ignorant and didn't really to a serious extent pick out the differences between Mac and Windows, but I've always used Windows at my house, like I said.

Oh yeah and then theres Oregon ******* trail...grrrr...playing that game in grade school. I hate that damn game. Every once in a while for no apparent reason you get the damned banjo or whatever the hell sound "DUN DUNNNAAAAA" and its like "lolz Billy Bobs got AIDS lolz". SON OF A *****!!!!!! SCREW YOU OREGON TRAIL! SCREW YOU!!!

...so yeah thats why I don't use Apple products.

Again, the purpose of this thread isn't coming through.

I can start up Windows XP on my Mac natively, just like it was a PC. In fact it can run Windows faster than most PCs can.

I'm looking for software to run on it that I can't run under Mac OS X...some specific titles that ATS members like.

[edit on 7/5/2007 by djohnsto77]

[edit on 7/5/2007 by djohnsto77]

Oh, now I see what your asking well in that case can we refine that a bit. Do you want apps that are unique to windows? or just windows apps like say MSN messenger only works in windows but Pidgin does MSN plus 10+ more protocols.. which doesn't really work because its obvious which one is better (pidgin).

Unique windows apps... Well.. none to be quite honest, expect for games I cant think of a single application on windows that you cant get on Mac or GNU/Linux, it may not be from the same company I could name plenty of windows only apps but then why pay for a windows app when you can get a GNU/Linux/Mac/*BSD equivalent for free.

Oh, now I do know of one. Paint. Honestly I don't think theres such a program on any other OS.

OK, now I understand it.

I don't use many programs, but one reason to use a Windows system is to work with Windows specific features, like Direct X and .Net.

You said that you are a programmer, have you tried C#?

Originally posted by ArMaP
OK, now I understand it.

I don't use many programs, but one reason to use a Windows system is to work with Windows specific features, like Direct X and .Net.

You said that you are a programmer, have you tried C#?

.net C# -> mono project for posix systems. Dx -> OGL, OAL, SDL

I haven't done C#, I hear it's pretty much a rip-off of Java (which I have programmed in), but yeah, .NET is in demand, so that might be a useful thing to look at. Thanks.