This argument is so old, but IT people and techy friends keep trying to get graphic designers to buy PCs. The argument is that PC hardware is faster than mac hardware, for cheaper. Ok, that's true. Here are some of the reasons that it doesn't matter.
Let's assume a person is a ble to get a PC that's $1000 cheaper than a mac, while being 25% faster for my examples.
Hardware speed:
Most of the stuff graphic designers do doesn't peg CPU usage at 100%. They spend a lot of time typing text, drawing lines, moving boxes of text. 90% of the time, they could do all this stuff on a P3 800 or a similarly clocked G4 and not notice any slowdown. Less than 10% of the time are they actually going to see any benefit from that increased processing power. So, when you've got a machine that's 25% faster 10% of the time, you've got a machine that's 2.5% faster overall. Big deal.
Color:
The macintosh has built-in software for color calibration. A lot of effort has been spent to make sure that you can get your mac set up so that the color you see on the screen is the same color that's going to come out of a printer. Windows has always been a lot worse at this. This may seem like a small detail, but it's not. When you print 10,000 copies of a 90 page magazine, your printing costs aren't cheap. You send your file to a printer, and a few days later they send you back boxes and boxes of printed magazines. You know what you do if those magazines are all the wrong color? You print them again. That kind of problem will eat up the $1000 you saved by buying a cheaper PC *really* quick.
Fonts:
The mac has better software for managing fonts than the PC does. This doesn't matter to a lot of people who aren't graphic designers. We use the same 10 fonts over and over again, and we don't need to know exactly where to find precise fonts all that often. This is different if you've got 500 fonts on your machine, and you need to be able to find one that looks appropriate in a particular piece of work. The mac has built-in font management software, and windows doesn't. If you can find the right font in 5 minutes on a mac, and 20 minutes on a pC, it makes a lot more difference in your actual productivity than a CPU that's 2.5% faster.
Software:
Graphic designers use expensive software. Adobe Creative Suite is $1,200. These people who have been using macs for a long time alreadyown the macintosh version. If they buy a PC, then they need to buy the PC version. Spending $1200 to save $1000 isn't really a very good deal.
Operating Systems:
Most of us on this site are good at using windows. We've been doing it for a long time. However, we didn't pick it up overnight. Neither do mac users. It takes a little while to figure out how to install fonts and software, where to save your files, how to hook uip a printer, etc. Now, remember that graphic designers are trying to get work done. They get paid to create graphics, not install printers and learn windows. If they have to spend a week or two of thier time figuring out how to use windows, they've lost thier $1000 savings by not being productive during that time.
Asthetics:
Beleive it or not, graphic designers care how stuff looks. That's why they got into graphic design. The way things look makes a difference to them, and that's why they've made it thier profession. You might not think that it's worth an extra $1000 to have a machine with a prettier OS, prettier case, and that draws text a little bit more nicely than another. Do you think designers share that view? It's likely they don't. They make thier living by design, they obviously beleive that design is worth money, since they get paid to do it, they're mostly willing to shell out a bit of extra money for something that they actually think has good design. That's a mac, not a Dell.
I could go on with this, but can we suffice it to say that price/performance ratio is not the only thing that matters to graphic designers? There's a lot more involved in getting work done than just having a fast CPU.
Let's assume a person is a ble to get a PC that's $1000 cheaper than a mac, while being 25% faster for my examples.
Hardware speed:
Most of the stuff graphic designers do doesn't peg CPU usage at 100%. They spend a lot of time typing text, drawing lines, moving boxes of text. 90% of the time, they could do all this stuff on a P3 800 or a similarly clocked G4 and not notice any slowdown. Less than 10% of the time are they actually going to see any benefit from that increased processing power. So, when you've got a machine that's 25% faster 10% of the time, you've got a machine that's 2.5% faster overall. Big deal.
Color:
The macintosh has built-in software for color calibration. A lot of effort has been spent to make sure that you can get your mac set up so that the color you see on the screen is the same color that's going to come out of a printer. Windows has always been a lot worse at this. This may seem like a small detail, but it's not. When you print 10,000 copies of a 90 page magazine, your printing costs aren't cheap. You send your file to a printer, and a few days later they send you back boxes and boxes of printed magazines. You know what you do if those magazines are all the wrong color? You print them again. That kind of problem will eat up the $1000 you saved by buying a cheaper PC *really* quick.
Fonts:
The mac has better software for managing fonts than the PC does. This doesn't matter to a lot of people who aren't graphic designers. We use the same 10 fonts over and over again, and we don't need to know exactly where to find precise fonts all that often. This is different if you've got 500 fonts on your machine, and you need to be able to find one that looks appropriate in a particular piece of work. The mac has built-in font management software, and windows doesn't. If you can find the right font in 5 minutes on a mac, and 20 minutes on a pC, it makes a lot more difference in your actual productivity than a CPU that's 2.5% faster.
Software:
Graphic designers use expensive software. Adobe Creative Suite is $1,200. These people who have been using macs for a long time alreadyown the macintosh version. If they buy a PC, then they need to buy the PC version. Spending $1200 to save $1000 isn't really a very good deal.
Operating Systems:
Most of us on this site are good at using windows. We've been doing it for a long time. However, we didn't pick it up overnight. Neither do mac users. It takes a little while to figure out how to install fonts and software, where to save your files, how to hook uip a printer, etc. Now, remember that graphic designers are trying to get work done. They get paid to create graphics, not install printers and learn windows. If they have to spend a week or two of thier time figuring out how to use windows, they've lost thier $1000 savings by not being productive during that time.
Asthetics:
Beleive it or not, graphic designers care how stuff looks. That's why they got into graphic design. The way things look makes a difference to them, and that's why they've made it thier profession. You might not think that it's worth an extra $1000 to have a machine with a prettier OS, prettier case, and that draws text a little bit more nicely than another. Do you think designers share that view? It's likely they don't. They make thier living by design, they obviously beleive that design is worth money, since they get paid to do it, they're mostly willing to shell out a bit of extra money for something that they actually think has good design. That's a mac, not a Dell.
I could go on with this, but can we suffice it to say that price/performance ratio is not the only thing that matters to graphic designers? There's a lot more involved in getting work done than just having a fast CPU.
