I Apple; You should too
This website – for those of you who don’t already know – is done on my Mac. Done on my Mac with a cheap (in cost) $49 program. You like what you see? I hope so. But even if not, we can at least agree that it’s manageable, appropriated, and organized. All that it takes is some time, and a program like iWeb (free on all new Macs), and some forethought into what you may want to accomplish. Many people who use iWeb complain it’s missing features; I agree. But for a free program, it can overcome most of the obstacles with just a little bit of thought into the task. But enough about iWeb – there’s more to the Mac than just a silly website. :-)
I grew up on Macs. I had the original Macintosh with the B&W screen, the all-in-one that was the predecessor (distant predecessor) to today’s iMac. But it’s not like I never tried the nefarious dark side; Windows. In fact, I grew to be rather proficient at that, as well. I joined the military at some point in my life (I can’t remember exactly), and lo-and-behold, they use Windows. And most of the people around me did, as well. I learned to navigate the system, find things I needed to find, accomplish tasks, and find porn on the internet.
But things never worked like they should. Getting around windows was pretty annoying. Dragging & dropping didn’t exist (if you’ve never used a Mac, you may still be unfamiliar with that term. You’ll learn). And it crashed all the time. Have a problem? Of course you do. Restart. Something happened & explorer had to quit? Of course it did; now restart. System encountered an error, you got a big blue screen (The BSOD, or Blue screen of death), and were forced to restart. And no one is oblivious to this: the Three-Finger salute, Control-Alt-Delete. Ah, the ultimate cure for computer ailments, which essentially leads to a restart.
But these ailments are not at the computer level. They are the OS. They are failures of Windows. Moving to the Mac, one of the last things you’ll notice is that it infrequently – if ever – crashes. I say last, because it never happens, and as such you’ll be hard-pressed to recall that you were ever ailed at all. This point came home to me after I switched my parents back to the Mac. My stepfather was complaining about a printer problem they have had with the Mac. You have to understand of course that they are trying to run a Windows-Only program, and it’s not really supposed to work in the first place. But anyhow, he was complaining that it wouldn’t print out of this one particular program, and they never had this problem with Windows. “Yeah,” I said, “but when in the last two years has the Mac crashed on you?” None was the answer. “And didn’t you switch to the Mac because you couldn’t even log on to the Windows Machine for more than a minute or two before it crashed, meaning you didn’t do anything on it anyways?” Yes was the answer.
My point is, it becomes easy to complain about a few this & that things on the Mac, because all-in-all, it’s so stable that you’re actually using it long enough to contemplate things such as printing incompatibilities & the choice if system alert sounds (which you can change).
What can you expect when switching to a Mac? A small learning curve for sure. While similar in a lot of respects, the design is different. I like to describe the Mac as “intuitive;” it behaves in ways that if you looked at a given task you wanted done and contemplated what would be the easiest way to do it, that’s the best way to do it on a Mac. Want a picture here? Drag it there. Done.
What can you expect when switching to a Mac? Let
me tell you this. Of all the people that I have seen
make 
the switch, not a single one regrets it.
Not a single one complains. Each person
thinks about their computing experience before &
after, and smiles at the realization that it’s now fun
& easy, where before it was frustrating
& exasperating.
Cost always comes into play. Many people see Dell systems listed at $799 with a computer & a monitor and see a Mac with computer & monitor for $1199, and come to the conclusion that Macs are more expensive. It’s been repeated and show to be false ad nauseam, but I’ll go ahead and say it again: This is not true. If you look at the specs, you notice that the Mac has a better processor, better graphics, a larger hard drive, a better screen, more options, and more & better software. People assume that a computer always comes with everything they need installed already. This is not the case, often not even on the Mac!
But your shiny new Mac will have more & more useable
software you can get started with immediately. And
most of the tasks you need software to accomplish have
cheaper, easier-to-use alternatives on the Mac (consider iWork, which
replaces MS Word & Powerpoint - only $79 as
opposed to $299 or more). Then there’s the
things that you need on Windows that you’ll probably
do without on the Mac. Spyware programs?
There’s $79 and up per year right there.
And anti-Virus programs? Yeah, that’ll
cost you yearly, too. Of course you can
buy a suite for a little bit of savings, but…. I have
nothing of the sort installed on my Mac. I take
security seriously, and I recommend you do too, but I
have certain settings configured on my machine as it
is, and leave it at that. No recurring yearly
cost. Less additional software needed. In
the end, about the same cost as the Dell machine
properly configured. Remember, when you see
those Dell ads, it’s like a car commercial: $199
a month as shown, without tires, A/C, radio, Oil,
windshield wipers, & tax title & destination
charges. By the time you add it all in, the
actual cost usually varies quite a bit from the
advertised cost.
I won’t lie, there will be some heartache switching to the Mac. You’ll have to grapple with issues like Where do I put it on the desk to get optimum space efficiency, and what screensavers do I want to run, and do I want a wireless mouse & keyboard or not?
In the end, I strongly recommend switching to the Mac. Mostly because I’m tired of hearing about your computer problems. I can’t fix them. Microsoft themselves can’t fix them. Unless you use this one super-special program that you just can’t do without ever and you’re more than willing to put up with ALL the problems that come with Windows to use this one and only WIndows-only application, there is no reason not to “see the light.” So see it already. I'm here to help.