Low End Mac Reader Specials

TypeStyler For Mac OS X is Now Shipping! Download The Free Fully Functional 60 Day Tryout at www.typestyler.com

OWC: Get the Right Memory / Ram for your Mac. Top Quality, Competitive Prices, Lifetime Warranty. Expert Support and Video Installation Guidies too! 4.0GB Matched Sets from $87.99, Options up to 32GB. Click here

Don't install Parallels to play poker online! Poker Mac will show you how to download and install a native Mac poker application such as Full Tilt Poker Mac.

Laptop Hardware Provided by TechRestore - Overnight Mac & iPod Repairs.

Compare products like desktop computers, apple laptops, apple macs, and LCD Monitors side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for new mobile phones, sat nav systems, or MP3 players. The Ciao online shopping community makes searching products easy for you.

Apple Archive

Do I Miss My Mac?

- 2002.03.29

Over the past week, I moved my Mac over to the table that my PC was on and moved the PC to my desk. The reason? No, not because I was tired of the Mac, and, no, not because the Mac was broken. I had loaded so many files on my hard drive that it was almost full - and if I continued using the Mac as my main machine, I knew that I would never delete the useless files.

So I started using the PC last Friday. It was "custom made" for the previous owner, who I bought it from three years ago. It has a QDI Explorer II AT logic board, a 200 MHz Pentium (non-MMX) processor, 64 MB of RAM, a 1 MB video card, a 56K modem, a 10/100 ethernet card, a SoundBlaster 16 card, two 2.5 GB hard drives, and a 12x CD-ROM, all in a minitower case that looks just like almost every other 133-233 MHz PC clone ever made (three 5.25" bays in the front, followed by one floppy drive below and an empty spot, possibly for a Zip drive).

It's running Windows 2000, which is very stable, and I have never had it crash. Win2k also runs very quickly on this machine, despite the PC being five years old.

It is old, but it works surprisingly well for most things. Browsing the Internet is easily as fast as on my G4, if not faster. Word processing is the same speed, although I don't particularly like Microsoft Office 97 (or 2000/2002 for that matter) for Windows.

So what do I miss about the Mac? Mostly I miss the speed of the interface and the ability to browse folders via the dock.

Windows 2000 is pretty fast, but the design of the Windows interface (as many people know) is clunky and confusing, so it tends to take me just a little bit longer to find what I want. On my Mac, I know I can get to folders easily by clicking them in the dock or in the toolbar of a Finder window. I can't do that on this PC, which means I have to have icons all over my desktop for folders that contain things I want to access - or I have them in the Start menu, which takes slightly longer than the dock.

On my Mac, I can easily access the contents of a folder by control-clicking it in the dock. It's not possible with the taskbar; the nearest equivalent is the Start menu, which is a bit clumsier than the dock.

The Mac also has much better hardware/software integration. I can name at least ten parts in my PC that were made by completely different companies and were never specifically designed to work together. When NEC made the hard drives, they probably didn't specifically test it with my model of logic board. Since ATA is a standard, they probably tested it with a few models from popular manufacturers and said that it is compatible with all ATA controllers. This, of course, means that it's compatible with all of them except the one you happen to be using (although since it was preconfigured when I got it, I didn't have to worry about it).

When you install a new device in a PC, sometimes Windows will recognize it and install all the necessary drivers. But the majority of times Windows won't even know that you installed something, and you will be faced with the tedious task of trying to tell Windows that the files are in the A: drive, only to have it look for your Windows CD in the E: drive. The Mac is nice and easy - all you do is install the drivers from your CD by running the installer, attach the device, and continue working.

In terms of hardware/software integration, the PC is still way behind. But in terms of operating systems, Windows is catching up to the Mac OS in terms of ease of use and features. Windows NT 4, 2000, and XP almost never crash. Things have been simplified, and the OS supports a huge number of devices, but installing drivers manually is still a pain.

Of course this PC looks nowhere near as nice as my Mac, and the keyboard isn't as good as the Apple Pro Keyboard. One thing Apple has that PC manufacturers rarely do are amazingly designed cases.

While I do enjoy using my PC, I enjoy using my Mac more.

Recent Apple Archive articles

iPods, notebooks, and other modern electronics more readily replaced than repaired, 12.07. Whether it's an intermittent failure or a broken display cable, more often than not it's cheaper to replace a broken electronics device than repair it.
Options for replacing your older iPod, 11.19. Whether you've run out of space on your old iPod or want features it doesn't have, here are your options in new and used iPods.
Could the $200 'green' PC with gOS Linux become a threat to Apple?, 11.14. The low cost, low power Everex desktop comes with a customized version of Ubuntu Linux, has a Mac-like Dock, and sells for $400 less than the Mac mini.
Leopard different, a bit buggy, but worth the upgrade, 11.02. Leopard on a Power Mac G4 and a MacBook Pro: It runs well on both computers, but each has some odd bugs, and some of the changes are a step backwards.
More in the Apple Archive index.

Links for the Day

Mac of the Day: 17" iMac G4/800 MHz, July 2002 - The iMac 'grows up' with a 17" 1440 x 900 display.
Group of the Day: LisaList supports Lisa users.
November 8 in LEM history: 99: OS 9: I think I like it - 01: The simplified Mac life - Soured on Windows - Flea market Mac - 02: Little room for improvement in new 'Books - Combo drive upgrade for iceBooks - 04: Re-Porter - 05: Fix the old iMac or buy a Mac mini? - Apple's Copland project - 06: MacBook Core 2 - MacBook value equation - Cheap is as cheap does - 07: Problems with Classic mode in Tiger - The G4 Power Mac that won't run Leopard
Support Low End Mac

Recent Deals

Best Mac Pro Deals, 11.03. Used 2.66 GHz 4-core, $1,300; 3.0 8-core. $2,299; refurb 2.66 4-core Nehalem, $2,149; 2.93, $2,549; 2.26 8-core, $2,799; 2.93, $4,999.
Best iPhone Deals, 11.03. New 8 GB iPhone 3G, $$99; refurb 16 GB 3GS, $149; new, $199; 32 GB, $299.
Best 12" PowerBook G4 Deals, 11.03. Used 867 MHz SperDrive, $348; 1 GHz, $499; 1.33 Combo, $298; SD, $559; 1.5 Combo, $448; SuperDrive, $589.
Best Power Mac G3 and PCI Video Card Deals, 11.02. Used beige 300 MHz, $25; G4/366, $49; blue & white 350, $80; 400, $90; 450, $105; PCI video cards from $15; shipping additional.
Best Power Mac G4 and AGP Video Card Deals, 11.02. Used 400 MHz, $50; 733 MHz, $69; 933 MHz, $209; 1.25 GHz dual, $299.
Best 15" MacBook Pro Deals, 11.02. Used 2.0 GHz, $800; 2.2, $900; 2.4, $1,000; refurb 2.53, $1,449; 2.66, $1,699; 2.8, $1,949; 3.06, $2,169; new 2.53, $1,579; 2.66, $1,799; more.
Best Mac mini Deals, 10.30. Used 1.33 GHz G4 mini, $379; 1.42, $389; 1.5, $419; 1.83 GHz Core Duo, $350; Core 2, $439; new 2.26 GHz nVidia, $580; 2.53 GHz, $770; Server, $990.
Best G4 iBook Deals, 10.30. Used 12" 1.07 GHz Combo, $225; 1.33 GHz, $298; 14" 1 GHz, $349; 1.33 GHz, $398; 1.42 GHz SuperDrive, $498.
Best Classic Mac OS Deals, 10.30. System 6.0.8 floppies, $10; 7.1, $12; 7.5, $20; 7.5 CD, $4; 7.6 $13; 8.1, $11; 8.5, $20; 8.6, $90; 9.0, $20; 9.2.2, $30.
More deals in our archive.

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2009 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, iPhone, PowerBook, MacBook, MagSafe, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.