Why do there seem to be a disproportionate number of Mac users?

Posted by: Andy S on 27 May 2010

... a serious question - and not one I'm trying to bring up the PC/mac debate either! Why are people using macs as opposed to PCs for front ends?


It does seem to me to be an expensive way of streaming data compared to a PC running either linux or windoze...
Posted on: 28 May 2010 by connon price
Ah.... I'll get some at the MUDD CLUB.

Actually, I'm not sure what it was exactly, but I think ROTF channeled something there.

Strong, indeed.
Posted on: 28 May 2010 by Bananahead
quote:


Maude Lebowski: What do you do for recreation?

The Dude: Oh, the usual. I bowl. Drive around. The occasional acid flashback.

Posted on: 29 May 2010 by garyi
Matpip, nail head.

At the end of the day naim users understand what quality is.

Macs are quality.

As a demonstrable fact I challenge any one to find a better looking and built laptop over the macbook pro.

The only outcome to this will be someone telling me xyz has a bigger harddrive, not interested. Just show me a better built, better integrated software/hardware laptop out there.
Posted on: 29 May 2010 by Bananahead
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:

As a demonstrable fact I challenge any one to find a better looking and built laptop over the macbook pro.



What does this mean? Demonstrable fact?

We know that you have already made up your mind. It is therefore pointless to accept your challenge. Or do you have some way of measuring the look of a laptop? You know, turn it into a demonstrable fact.
Posted on: 29 May 2010 by rich46
what all this rubbish to with stored/playback of music
Posted on: 29 May 2010 by Andy S
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:
As a demonstrable fact I challenge any one to find a better looking and built laptop over the macbook pro.
As a demonstrable fact I challenge anyone to find a lower cost Mac with equivalent features to a £300 laptop.

Just depends what you value more really... Winker
Posted on: 29 May 2010 by JYOW
ROTF / PCS, could I have some of what you guys are having? Sounds like a lot of fun!
Posted on: 29 May 2010 by Andy S
quote:
Originally posted by JYOW:
ROTF / PCS, could I have some of what you guys are having? Sounds like a lot of fun!
Hmmm... Try some Zappa Winker I wouldn't call it fun personally, but each to their own.
Posted on: 29 May 2010 by Eloise
A measure of quality?

Not sure if this is a measure of quality, but longevity of Apple hardware is a (possible) plus.

I have a G4 PowerMac (from around 2001) running Tiger which functions perfectly for both music server (iTunes) and as a day to day computer. Can many Dell / HP / [insert brand here] machines say the same and run an OS which is still supported by the manufacturer?

As has been commented there is no inherent advantage of a Mac OS X over a Windows PC - the main being limited (more) closed system supporting limited hardware (generally) well vs more open system running on wider hardware choice which can lead to conflicts, etc. The arguments used for Mac vs Windows generally can be turned around so negatives become positives depending on you point of view.

Eloise
Posted on: 30 May 2010 by alainbil
With a Mac you can run the Apple operating system (OSX), Linux (if you like) and Windows. You can have the three worlds with the same machine. The main reason for preferring a PC is cost. But this should not be an issue for maimies, don’t you think?
Posted on: 30 May 2010 by Andy S
quote:
Originally posted by alainbil:
The main reason for preferring a PC is cost. But this should not be an issue for maimies, don’t you think?
There certainly does seem to be an expensive way of streaming digits and a cheap way of streaming digits. Must admit, I've got other uses for that hard earned cash...
Posted on: 30 May 2010 by Adam Meredith
Why do there seem to be more wasps than bees?

There possibly aren't - they're just more annoying.
Posted on: 30 May 2010 by David Dever
quote:
Originally posted by Eloise:
A measure of quality?

Not sure if this is a measure of quality, but longevity of Apple hardware is a (possible) plus.

I have a G4 PowerMac (from around 2001) running Tiger which functions perfectly for both music server (iTunes) and as a day to day computer. Can many Dell / HP / [insert brand here] machines say the same and run an OS which is still supported by the manufacturer?

As has been commented there is no inherent advantage of a Mac OS X over a Windows PC - the main being limited (more) closed system supporting limited hardware (generally) well vs more open system running on wider hardware choice which can lead to conflicts, etc. The arguments used for Mac vs Windows generally can be turned around so negatives become positives depending on you point of view.

Eloise


I think this is the crux of it - concurrent software support of multiple hardware variations (though still limited) allowed me, on a VERY limited budget, to buy my first Mac (of my own) in 1996 (a used Quadra 700 from 1991), which I used to run music apps (ProTools, Sound Designer, Logic, etc.) as well as an old version of Adobe Illustrator, for $89. Seriously.

In fact, I still have working PowerMac 8600 and a Power Computing tower (that ran Naim Audio North America for years) in my office / lab at home. The stuff still works, and, with a bit of trickery, can run both Mac OS 9 and early OS X, and can handle legacy hardware.

Other manufacturers have used similar approaches (Sun, Silicon Graphics, Intergraph), but have largely fallen by the wayside.

What this brings to the table is the ability to optimize the experience of the product, making it easy to use (for clients that might not have the time to configure their own machines), high-performance (select hardware with optimized drivers) and reliable (as a fully-tested, complete product, hardware + software + firmware). Clearly they've got it right with the iPhone / iPod touch / iPad, which are embedded, optimized builds of OS X, which extends the reach of the platform a bit.
Posted on: 30 May 2010 by garyi
quote:
Originally posted by Bananahead:
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:

As a demonstrable fact I challenge any one to find a better looking and built laptop over the macbook pro.



What does this mean? Demonstrable fact?

We know that you have already made up your mind. It is therefore pointless to accept your challenge. Or do you have some way of measuring the look of a laptop? You know, turn it into a demonstrable fact.


Um, nice get out but you failed to answer the question. Point me at a better made/looking laptop Banana head?

You are presumably with an opinion, opinion me what you consider to be a better made/better looking laptop.

What always amazes me as this consideration of money in these matters. Its like routers. People are happy to spend upwards of £2k on a naim streamer, but bulk at 100 quid for a decent router. Its like a blindess when it comes to computers, everything has to be the cheapest possible.

Thank god are attitude to reproduced music did not suffer the same, I might still have a shnider all in one midi system. 200 watts don't you know.
Posted on: 30 May 2010 by Bananahead
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:
quote:
Originally posted by Bananahead:
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:

As a demonstrable fact I challenge any one to find a better looking and built laptop over the macbook pro.



What does this mean? Demonstrable fact?

We know that you have already made up your mind. It is therefore pointless to accept your challenge. Or do you have some way of measuring the look of a laptop? You know, turn it into a demonstrable fact.


Um, nice get out but you failed to answer the question. Point me at a better made/looking laptop Banana head?

You are presumably with an opinion, opinion me what you consider to be a better made/better looking laptop.



You didn't ask a question.

I already said that it is pointless to accept your challenge.

You may prefer the look of the Mac, I may prefer the loook of the Adamo.

I am very unlikely to buy a laptop of any sort anyway. And the chance of me buying one for audio is zero.

I don't use a mac because OSX doesn't run the software I like. My PC's have been self built for about fifteen years now.

When I finally decide to have some distributed audio solution it will probably be HDX based.
Posted on: 31 May 2010 by ferenc
quote:
Originally posted by pcstockton:
This is a fairly pointless thread.

Most PC users dont like Macs. Most Mac users dont like PCs. Both have different lists for "why".

Who cares? Use what you like.

I personally could never use my Mac for music. "my buddies iMac are a different issue. Constant swirling beach ball. iTunes takes FOREVER to open. Songbird crashes the Mac almost daily. The Mac always "forgets" about the external drive etc... Fluke crashes often. XLD is somewhat stable but can crash during a rip.

I would assume that the number of Mac vs PC users in this forum correlates to the rest of the general public. Whatever ratio that is.

Also, I dont think the problems inherent to either platform are exclusive to that OS. There are plenty of issues on each side of the table.

But the "it just works" is so tiring. My current hifi PC "just works" everyday for the last 5 years.

Also, I love the "off the shelf" and "no additional setting need in iTunes" comments.

Like choosing "ASIO out" in Foobar is somehow harder than opening iTunes preferences and making sure EQ is off and you are not up or downsampling things.

"It just works off the shelf".... but you need pure vinyl or Amarra and maybe a hiface Roll Eyes

That is hardly any different than configuring Foobar or J River etc....

To each their own.

The ONLY people I will really listen to when this comes up ad nauseum are people that own both.

-patrick

PS - Macs NEVER getting viruses and trojans is complete BS. My buddies iMac was infected somehow. Some issue with his iChat. In any event, the ONLY solution for him to fix it was a $300 trip to the Mac Solutions store. I will post a copy of his receipt for the fix if you need proof.


Hi Patrick,

Few notes.

1,

I am extremely interested in you buddies experience virus infection on an iMac. What kind of virus it was? Seems odd to get a virus on a Mac, and pay 300 USD for getting rid of it. The last Mac virus/malware I saw on a Mac was an Office macro virus sometime around the late nineties with OS 9 and we are selling hundreds of Macs every year for video and audio editing purposes, so we have quite a bit of experience in a much harsher environment than a home music listening.



2,

I have a new 27 inch, i7 iMac, the stock one with 4 GB memory. It takes roughly 14-15 seconds to open iTunes with 130k track, 4.8 TB of music, stored on 7 different USB2 drives and 2 USB hubs. No beach ball at all. Never. I am converting/reencoding an AVCHD media in iMovie (from a prototype 3D HD Panasonic camcorder) at the moment to iPhone compatible H.264 mpeg4 file, and recording a TV program using an Elgato EyeTV firewire tuner at the same time and even this case it does not take more than 15-16 seconds to open iTunes.


3,

Regarding off the shelf nature: I remember not so long ago, quite a few people here felt that the so called MacLavry solution was comparable to CDS3 for example using the off the shelf Toslink output of a Mac...

4,

I have Windows 7 64 bit on my new iMac and my old Macbook as well with Foobar, I could use it easily if I want.
Posted on: 31 May 2010 by garyi
Patrick please post the proof. As there is no viruses for macs.
There was a trojan created for people downloading the iLife suite from torrent sites but thats been it in many years.
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by Occean
I just did a quick google and there seems to be plenty of mac related virus's out there albeit rarer than PC one. I know my girlfriends graphics company takes suitble precautions against them.
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by ferenc
quote:
Originally posted by Occean:
I just did a quick google and there seems to be plenty of mac related virus's out there albeit rarer than PC one. I know my girlfriends graphics company takes suitble precautions against them.


I have NOD32 Mac installed on all of my Mac (mainly dealing with PC viruses), however I am with garyi, there are no Mac viruses around, which ever did any harm, no single piece of Mac OS X malware has yet managed to successfully cause significant system damage or reliably spread which I know of. Actually what I found with Google, usually proof of concept exploits for things like JavaRuntime Environment, very few Trojan horses detections, mainly "discovered" by security software developer companies, consultants. I could not find any report about a virus which infected Apple computers of hundreds or thousands of Mac users, even not a report which is about dozens of infections.

Few links:

Apple about Mac OS X security

Very good summary from CNN/Fortune:

Why there are no mac viruses?
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by garyi
I am honestly not gloating. I keep up with the it news as best as possible and I am not aware of a single Virus for mac in the wild.

It may simply be a case of how we are defining things. A virus is by its definition a piece of code which is able once executed to replicate and spread. There is nothing like this on mac right now. I have no doubt its coming.

There was a trojan that was foubnd in the iLife suite if you torrented it, it didn't do a lot but never the less was there.

I have not run anti virus on my mac because of the performance hit. However if there is a genuine threat I am happy to try again. Anything but norton though, as a general rule.
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by Peter Dinh
quote:
Originally posted by garyi:

I have not run anti virus on my mac because of the performance hit. However if there is a genuine threat I am happy to try again. Anything but norton though, as a general rule.


In this case, I will move on to Linux then. As mentioned before, the main reason I use Mac at home because I do not like the big overhead associated with anti-virus programs. A Windows machine, even fully equipped with the state of the art anti-virus, anti-malware program, is still not safe.
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by Peter Dinh
Here is a tidbit about Windows security.
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by pcstockton
"Academic proofs of concept and theoretical vulnerabilities don't count. Neither do computer worms, Trojan horses, spyware, adware, spam or any of the other nasty species in the zoology of malware."

Whatever. I guess I dont know what a virus is. My buddy' iChat was infected with some kind of Trojan horse. Thats all he remembers. Thats all i was talking about. If this isnt a "virus" then I was wrong.
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by Andy S
Is whether or not viruses (and I'd include all those things that have been excluded above) are on an OS remotely related to a device to stream audio Confused Nope... thought not... Winker
Posted on: 01 June 2010 by Eloise
quote:
Originally posted by pcstockton:
"Academic proofs of concept and theoretical vulnerabilities don't count. Neither do computer worms, Trojan horses, spyware, adware, spam or any of the other nasty species in the zoology of malware."

Whatever. I guess I dont know what a virus is. My buddy' iChat was infected with some kind of Trojan horse. Thats all he remembers. Thats all i was talking about. If this isnt a "virus" then I was wrong.

There was an iChat distributed virus back in 2006 -- http://www.sophos.com/pressoff...6/02/macosxleap.html

As for $300 to "fix" it ... a lot of shops would probably charge you similar to do a backup, reinstall OS and other apps and restore your data.

quote:
Originally posted by Andy S:
Is whether or not viruses (and I'd include all those things that have been excluded above) are on an OS remotely related to a device to stream audio Confused Nope... thought not... Winker


Day to day usage of a Audio device is important - the original comment referred to ease of use. It's no good if the device is easy to use, but you need to reinstall its OS ever other week due to virus (extreme example I know).

In summary: if you run your Mac OS X machine without anti-virus software and get a virus you're unlucky. If you run a Windows machine without anti-virus software and you get a virus you're a fool.

Eloise