Well it has been almost 1 month since I moved from Windows to Mac OS X and I have learnt a lot. The overriding lesson is that the OS X and Windows 7 work in almost identical ways. This shouldn’t come as a surprise when you consider they are doing the same sort of things employing the same metaphors to achieve the same goals. There are slight differences but nothing to worry yourself about. I am still learning new things about OS X some of them good others not so. Overall though there isn’t much to choose between the two on a functional basis.
However, when you move from function to look and feel then it is a whole new ball game. Here there is no comparison, OS X simply is a better environment to work in. The style of the OS X is a sleek and well bolted together. It is the same as driving a German marque car compared to a Japanese or Korean marque. They both do the same thing but the German’s usually do it with a style I appreciate. Notice I don’t even mention American cars which, I do believe, are at least 10 years behind the rest of the world when it comes to automotive style and elegance – but that is a whole other story.
You will notice I have not mentioned the Apple hardware in all this and that is for a very good reason. Apple’s model of vertical integration is almost unique in the modern consumer world. In the Apple world only Apple kit runs Apple software and as a result the variations and opportunities for conflicts are almost all removed. So it is no wonder that when you buy an accessory it just works because there is such a small selection to choose from. Image if OS X had to deal with the complexity involved in getting Windows 7 to work with an almost infinite variation of drivers and part conflicts and I would suspect the cool smugness might be knocked from the face of the Apple adverts.
This being said I wanted to move to the closed vertical world of Apple for all the advantages that it provides. I am happy to live with the costs of this move as I believe that it is in my own long term interests and when my wife’s laptop needs replacing I am pretty sure it will be with an Apple product, whatever that might be called by then, iPad Air perhaps?. I love the attention to design details that comes with iMac and really do think that it is a nicer place to work that the rather plainer Windows’ interface/Machine. This being said the one piece of Apple technology I love above any other is the Magic Mouse. This is just so elegant and the functionality is to die for, well may that is over the top but you get the idea. The bluetooth keyboard is less effective and I suspect a triumph of style over substance
So this is one happy iMac user, however I am a PC and I am a Mac. What I am not is an Apple fan boy who accepts anything that Apple produces/says at face value – they are, after all, a huge multinational company with all the same faults that come with such size and power. This, however, doesn’t stop me loving my iMac.
Simon Marchini
Simon's Blog 