How hard was it for you to switch from Windows to Apple?

[Zaap]

Windows 8 is certainly annoying, but aside from that, Windows 7 is perfectly usable and Windows in general has been since at least Windows 2000. People fighting with their PCs mostly have cheap PCs- which is a trade off in the Windows world. You can get dirt-dirt cheap (even sub $100 full systems) but then you'll probably deal with a lot of issues. If you get a decent PC, you likely won't have that experience.

Either way, most people who don't have a bias one way or another, of average intellect, who need to do a task can sit down with either a Mac or a decently spec'd PC and accomplish their goal equally easily. Pretending otherwise is usually someone's spin.

I use both. I prefer OSX most of the time because it's well thought out and just makes sense to me, but if I boot into Windows (7) I'm equally at home.

People I know that have switched from Windows to Mac usually make the transition pretty well once they drop a lot of (mostly outdated) prejudices they have, IE: there's not enough software, there are no games, there's no right-click (by the way I know a Mac user of 5 years who STILL thought that!) Macs are slow, Macs are only for non-tech minded people etc. etc.

By the way, EXACTLY the same of people I've witnessed switch from Mac to PC... at least pre-8; once they get past other people's (usually outdated) prejudices they find they can use Windows just fine.

 

[TallBill]

Getting a new laptop soon after not having one for a long time, will be getting windows 7 on it. No thanks to 8 or osx

 

[umrigar]

Windows 7 and 8 (with its odd changes) are fine when they work.

when they don't, it's a PITA. more of a PITA than Macs, IMHO.

Win 7 really stepped up the game and improved (mostly) on XP, which was pretty solid as far a Windows goes. I am not what you'd call a Win hater or Mac fanboi; just a tech who likes to get wonky computers working again as quickly as possible.

 

[BrightCandle]

Being a pro programmer I found osx to be enormously problematic. A lot of the networking tools I needed were very buggy and hard to setup and the programming tools versions available were often older. A setup took about 1 week ion Mac, about 2 days on Linux and about 4 hours on windows. That isn't for lack of knowledge of tools it was trying to get them to work and fond the magic settings.

In a business environment I had issues with exchange email for obvious reasons.

Day to day I didn't fond any of them particularly more productive. Most of my time is spent in the tools themselves and mostly I won't the is out of the way. OS X was the worst for this actually because of the relatively large apps bar. The menu to the top only saved moves if the application was maximised, so the other supporting programs were slightly slower. But it all comes out in the wash on all 3 platforms after initial setup, there just isn't much difference for a professional because their tools are all encompassing.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

Being a pro programmer I found osx to be enormously problematic.

What language do you program in?

 

[dagamer34]

I think if you were able to find this forum and create a thread, you should be able to handle the transition just fine.

 

[TheStu]

I think if you were able to find this forum and create a thread, you should be able to handle the transition just fine.

Assuming you go into the process understanding that they are not exactly the same and that things that you were used to in Windows may no longer apply. If they were exactly the same, then what would be the point?

I like features from both OS X and Windows 7/8 and so use a collection of small apps in both (though I haven't used OS X in a couple months) to bring over features that one may have that the other lacks.

 

[Red Storm]

At one point I made the switch over and enjoyed it. But in the end, I'm back to Windows because I like gaming too much to give it up.

 

[ControlD]

At one point I made the switch over and enjoyed it. But in the end, I'm back to Windows because I like gaming too much to give it up.

Exactly. I have tried making the switch to OS X and/or Linux in the past but the gaming aspect always brings me back to Windows. Sure you can dual boot either system with Windows but I never saw the point of running two operating systems full time when one will do everything. I do like to play with other OS's but when it comes to picking a main one it seems like Windows is the only logical choice if you like to game.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

OS X was the worst for this actually because of the relatively large apps bar.

You know the Dock can auto-hide, right?

The menu to the top only saved moves if the application was maximised, so the other supporting programs were slightly slower. But it all comes out in the wash on all 3 platforms after initial setup, there just isn't much difference for a professional because their tools are all encompassing.

Yeah. The same rationale was at work when Adobe finally released a version a CS that didn't suck, and the content creation types jumped ship for Windows and cheaper commodity hardware. *nods*