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OSX/Win2K Deathmatch

Michael Paci sent us linkage to a pretty good article on CNet where win2k and OSX duke it out on a variety of categories like ease of installation, UI, and hardware support. It's an interesting report and better written then most of the stuff that you'll see like this.

42 of 403 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Invalid comparison by Chris+Johnson · · Score: 4
    Yeah, but if you read The Register you'll notice that the guy posting bulletins about the latest XP betas has just reported that they've just turned ALL THE COPYRIGHT CONTROLS ON. There is NO capacity to switch from WMA to MP3 anymore. He is already getting license problems with WMA files he already has on his disk!

    Compare that to iTunes. Bit of a difference, no?

    They certainly should repeat this test after the final build of XP. But they need to include 'making a mix CD of CDs that you own' in the tests. People _want_ to get their music onto their computer for easy random access. There is no denying that.

    The difference is, Apple is banking on the good PR from their supporting people's fair use rights- and Microsoft has just put into action their whole copyright control apparatus, complete with the software phoning home to some server somewhere to check up on whether it should bust you- and complete with mp3 being taken away. Sucks to own mp3 playing hardware huh kids?

    I give it a 20 percent chance that they literally go through disks deleting files if the security check says you're a bad-boy.

    The CNET test is just the beginning. We may see a CNET test with XP against some future version of _Linux_ where they side with Linux! There is only so much you can do blatantly against consumers before you stop winning these sorts of tests.

  2. Re:here's the most important category by marmoset · · Score: 3

    Disclaimer: I run Mandrake at work
    (it's an x86 shop.) I run
    OS X at home.

    I have far more usable/useful
    software for the OS X box. Besides
    a growing mountain of OSX native
    software (http://www.versiontracker.com/vt_mac_osx.shtml)
    I also have access to just about any useful
    CLI-based POSIX software and a million
    years worth of classic Mac software.

    And that's just the cheap/free stuff.

  3. Win2k Installation by larien · · Score: 5
    I've done a few W2k installs, and I have to say it's the worst MS installer I've ever seen.

    The process took me 45 minutes on a fairly decent machine (AMD600MHz, 128MB Ram, ATA/66 disk), almost none of which was me having to think about questions or read help. That wouldn't be so bad, but the installer litters questions through the install process so you can't just leave it alone for a while to do the install; you have to be there for those 45 minutes (or more; an install time of an hour isn't unheard of), mostly twiddling your thumbs.

    What would have been far better would have been an installer that saved all the questions for the start or end of the install process (ie, at the start it asks for disk partitioning and install options; at the end you configure things like admin password).
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    1. Re:Win2k Installation by ellem · · Score: 3

      Don't want to rain on your moderation fest but clearly you are not well versed in W2K installations.

      This is a reason people insist that WINXX sucks, they don't know what it can do. Mostly due to poor documentation and the gen'l GUI issues. I know people who make all their users by hand. Yes it can be done but it is time consuming and no where near as fast or accurate as a script.

      Look deeper into that OS you have there are a lot of very cool things you could be doing if you knew about them.

      I strongly recommend the New Rider's line of W2K books they will open your eyes to a whole world of powerful tools. And save you about 45 minutes of question answering. And make you less of a flame target on /.


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  4. Cute Idea, but Not Serious by MaxwellsSilverHammer · · Score: 3

    Comparing these two is a cute idea for an article, but it might not really makes sense. The two are being targetted for different submarkets, even though they can be used in another submarkete, i.e Mac OS X really targetted towards consumers, graphics pros, anyone, etc., while W2k -seems- more focussed on business use.

    Also, regardless of the outcome of this comparison, W2k has been out for some time, while OS X only two months or so. They were both in development for a long time, but I'd have to give the handicap to OS X here because it is more of a new start than Win-whatever. I mean there has been an NT-based OS for years, but a "UNIX-based" OS with the Apple/Mac GUI is new, and Aqua is certainly brand new. Also, I would place more credence in a comparison done by Ars Tecnica than CNET. Makes the difference of whether the comparison is found in the Tech section or the Lifestyle section of the paper, and I don't trust CNET'$ allegiance$ given their 'reporting' of some topics and stories in the past.

  5. Combine 'em. by Syberghost · · Score: 5

    Let's combine 'em and call it OS/2K.

    Or would that be too warped?

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  6. You're being absurd by daviddennis · · Score: 4

    You are probably right that lack of knowledge and prejudice are very real reasons why people hate Windows 2000.

    However, you shoot yourself in the foot here. You should not have to read a 300-page tome about the operating system before installing it for the first time.

    Granted, scripted installs are great if you're setting up 500 machines at once. But someone who just wants to get their single unit up and running shouldn't have to learn a scripting language to do a routine installation easily. They probably can't, anyway; how do you write the script if you don't have an OS already on your computer?

    I'm sorry; if the default installation routine is too clumsy and cumbersome, it's Microsoft's fault, and Microsoft should fix it. End of story.

    D

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    1. Re:You're being absurd by ellem · · Score: 3

      Well in some ways I agree with you. But in others I do not.

      Computers are hard. They are not refrigerators.

      You plug a refrigerator in and you open in and put things in it and you are done. A refrigerator is an appliance.

      Most people wish their computers were appliances. The Palm Pilot (and it's ilk) are very much appliances. You don't *really* install things on a Palm Pilot you put it there. And it runs.

      A modern computer is not an appliance. It is a difficult mess of many things. This requires knowledge. You *should* be aware of your operating system's features if you plan to install it AND complain about it.

      The average joe probably shouldn't be installing their own OS. OS configuration is hard. Maybe it will be easy someday (OS/X is a step in the right direction.)

      Computers are NOT for everyone. Computer applications are.
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      This .sig is fake but accurate.
  7. Re:duh... by SoftwareJanitor · · Score: 3

    Wrong answer. The guy who designed the Amiga (Jay Minor) has been dead for five years. Chuckie Cheese is owned by Nolan Bushnel, the founder of Atari, who was once Jay Minor's boss (Jay also designed the Atari 400/800). Nolan Bushnel left Atari well before Amiga was founded, and he founded Chuckie Cheese with the money that Time Warner paid him for Atari (a disasterous purchase on their part, but Bushnel got his $$$).

  8. moron by austad · · Score: 3

    Matt: File sharing? Windows has built-in Internet connection sharing that's better than any version of Windows to date. Trust us, Windows can do it all.

    What a dumbass! He doesn't even know his own OS. Internet connection sharing has nothing to with file sharing, connection sharing is so you can set up your windows box to be a masquerade box for other machines on your network. Sadly, CNet has just managed to illustrate the level of cluelessness of the average windows user.

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    1. Re:moron by Fat+Lenny · · Score: 4

      What the author was saying, in a nutshell, was: "File sharing? That's nothing. We can share files and Internet connections!". See the Mac guy's previous comment:

      OS X also takes advantage of the Unix Network File System (NFS), too, so your Mac can access Unix file servers and even share Mac files with Unix machines.

      This is actually one of the few cases where their technical savvy wasn't completely transparent.

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      fat lenny's gonna lick your brain today.

  9. Re:Power overwhelming by tbo · · Score: 3

    Try Apple.com. I believe the whole site (which has a hell of a lot of dynamic content) runs on MacOS X.

  10. A summary of the article by mcfiddish · · Score: 4

    MacOSX: we're better because of A, B, and C.

    Windows rebuttal: Your OS sucks because of A, B, and C.

    Windows: We have D, E, and F.

    MacOSX rebuttal: Your OS sucks because of D, E, and F.

    Lather, rinse, repeat.

  11. Round 2: by wiredog · · Score: 3
    I dunno, bash is very consistent across platforms and over time.

    What's that 'window manager' thingy, anyway?

  12. Re:Good post on Ars by I_redwolf · · Score: 3

    You take what they say out of context and add your own meaning.

    In this category, Windows 2000 is simply overmatched. When it comes to Internet-ready operating systems, Apple stepped ahead way back at OS 9

    This is laughable as well. Every single thing the guy listed for OSX, Win2k Pro comes with. Well, Microsoft doesn't supply free WebDav space, but I doubt the OS can be faulted for that.

    "Apple stepped ahead way back at OS 9"; Win2K professional doesn't have the ease of use setting up an internet connection for a "dumb user".

    OS X delivers the killing blow with its integration of Apache

    Thats the big FUD. Sure, Apple biggybacks on the work of others and includes that stuff. But its by no means integration. Its just a checkbox for on or off, I see no frontend for configuring all of the httpd or ftpd options.

    Windows has ISS (MAC OSX is unix and can run your favorite httpd/ftp/gopher etc servers) and Apache isn't in the ftpd business so why the jab there? Apple isn't in the server game, they are in the user arena and have provided power users the option of server capabilities with a robust backend at the same time allowing "I just want to get my stuff done" users a nice UI. Which is what everyone knows however you've taken it out of context.

    The article was more about usability than not. Even though I don't think it was of much substance you've put a new spin on it and have taking it out of context. That is what is known as a zealot and or troll.

  13. Re:Good post on Ars by Porfiry · · Score: 5
    This is laughable as well. Every single thing the guy listed for OSX, Win2k Pro comes with.

    Apparently you're not aware that Win2K is crippled as a web server platform. First, Win2K professional DOESN'T come with Apache. Even if you install it, you are limited to a fixed number of incoming TCP connections (something in the range of 10) that make it utterly useless as a web server. Unlike Microsoft, Apple is not selling you a crippled OS.

  14. REALLY a deathmatch? by rkent · · Score: 3
    Oh good, then one of them will disappear after it's over and we won't have to hear about it anymore.

    Everyone wins!

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  15. Re:Geee by Noer · · Score: 4

    install the developer tools that CAME with the OS. then you'll have gcc and make.

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    -- "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything." -Joseph Stalin
  16. Matt's Windows UI Argument deconstructed by Ukab+the+Great · · Score: 4

    >Argument for Windows 2000
    >Matt: The year: 1995. The operating system:
    >Windows 95. The interface: a taskbar along the
    >bottom of the screen, containing a button called
    >Start and a series of little buttons
    >representing each open program. At the left of
    >the bar, a clock and a few little icons for
    >launching background programs (the kind of >things Mac folk would probably call plug-ins).

    Unfortunately the user is given no choice as whether to have those plug-ins in that corner. Those buttons appear pretty much without rhyme or reason (in other words, at the whim of the developer). The user does not have the option to add stuff to that corner (called the system tray). The icons are almost too small to be discerable. And their smallness presents a drawback I explain in the next paragraph

    >If you were unsure about anything on the screen, >you could right-click it, and a menu would
    >appear with loads of options, usually including
    >a Properties box that explained everything.

    If the user will be unsure of what something does, you are supposed to label it. The user should never have right click on something to find out what it does. You don't have to write the entire contents of war and peace in the label, but the label should clearly announce what action the button performs. The icon such as those in the system tray should also be made bigger, because a larger icon will have more detail that will betray the true purpose of the button. OSX doesn't use labels for items in the dock like it should, but at least Apple made the dock icons large enough that the user is able to understand what the icons do. Why make buttons larger by labelling them and giving them big icons? It has to do with something called fitt's law, which states that the time to access a visual target (e.g. a button) is due to the distance to that target and it's size. This link gives a good explanation of the phenommenon. http://www.asktog.com/columns/022DesignedToGiveFit ts.html If one studies a user's habits, one often observes that users will click large, labelled buttons far more than the small, unlabelled buttons because on an unconscious level, the user understands that these buttons are faster to access. Compare the large, labelled buttons with big icons that you tend to find in browsers with the tiny, unlabelled icons you find in Microsoft office, and you'll notice that users will tend to use the browser buttons but will avoid using most of the MS Office buttons. The OSX dock has much larger buttons than the system tray, so users will most likely end up using them more and with greater efficiency. Really, one of the biggest weaknesses of the entire windows development world are the small, cryptic toolbar buttons. They are neither fast to access nor useful in graphically explaining most features. Their only purpose is to be mysterious and unusable and intimidate the user by cluttering their environment with even more stuff they won't understand.

    >Fast-forward to Windows 2000 and you don't see
    >too many changes. Certainly, a few evolutionary
    >tweaks have shown up along the way. A toolbar
    >appeared next to the Start button that launches >new programs with a single mouse click. Then
    >there's bubble help: rest your mouse near an
    >item for long enough, and Windows 2000 pops up a
    >cartoon bubble explaining what to do (a nice
    >feature that, yes, first showed up Mac-side).
    >And Windows 2000 sports an adaptive menu feature
    >as well, which drops infrequently used items
    >from the Start menu to make it easier to launch
    > commonly used items.

    Many user interface designers have thoroughly bashed Microsoft for the adaptive menu "feature" in office 2000. The same really applies to Windows 2000 as well. The interface should never decide to rearrange itself without the users explicit permission. And just because a user does not often use something does not mean that they won't want to be able to find it when they *do* need it. I don't ordinarily use the fire extinguisher in my kitchen, but that doesn't mean I don't want it in plain sight when I need it.

    >Now, some might call this interface dull. In
    >fact, it is dull--as dull as having the gas on
    >the right and the brake on the left.

    Actually, Microsoft tends to do the opposite. They put the break on the right and the gas on the left. I'm referring of course to their ordering of dialog buttons, which puts the affirmative/"go ahead" button (typically "OK) on the left, and then negative/"go back" button on the right. This contrasts with the way that Western culture (as well as the mac) does it. In a car, the left pedal stops the car, the right pedal goes ahead. On an analogue clock, to go back in time, a hand goes to the left; to go ahead, the hand goes to the right. To go back in a book, you go left; when you go ahead in a book, you go right. In web browsers, the arrow button pointing left goes back, and the arrow button point right goes forward. Apple was smart enough to understand this; Microsoft wasn't.

    >Not everyone drives a car, of course, and
    >likewise, not everyone knows Windows' interface
    >(ha!). But at least Windows 2000 is predictable,
    >and any enhancements come so naturally that you
    > may not even notice that they're there. For an
    >operating system, that's a pretty good thing.

    Microsoft has shown a complete unwillingness to correct bad interface decisions made in a previous version of their software with improvements made in the next one. Probably because of this "predictability" (not to be confused with consistancy, which *is* a good thing in a UI). How long did it take before microsoft killed the "window-within-window" MDI in Office? Then there's clippy, the talking paperclip. This idea was ill conceived from the start, but it took Microsoft 4 years too long to him. These were ideas that any UI designer 10 years ago would tell you are stupid, but that didn't matter to Microsoft. I've heard microsoft has their own usability people and supposedly there are well funded usability labs, but they are either completely incompetant or the programmers don't take any of their advice or apply any of their data.

    As for arguments with CNET's conclusion, Windows 2000 does make far better use of contextual menus, which are UI elements with the fastest access time of all (as they appear right under the user's pointer). Apple should add a second mouse button and improve contextual menu support. However, Windows 2000 has weakness of having pull-down menus attached to each window instead of a menubar at the top of the screen. Menus that are attached to each window are far slower to access than menus on a menubar at the top of the screen because it the user has to spend extra time making sure that the mouse doesn't vertically overshoot the menus attached to the windows. Menus at the top of the screen are impossible to overshoot because they sit right on a border. Such menus are up to five times faster to access than menus attached to windows. Again, this is due to fitts' law.

    If CNET took these serious interface factors into account, I seriously doubt Windows 2000 would have won.

  17. Re:Linux by kevinank · · Score: 3
    • Round 4: Hardware Compatibility:
      Good, but could be better. Win2k is the winner once again with support for practically everything.

    Not to be snide, but practically everything in your lexicon must mean the hardware I want it to work on. Win2k doesn't run on anything besides Intel x86 derived chips in approximately desktop configurations. Headless Win2k is a PITA. Scalability is non-existent on the low end (Win2k in a TiVo?), and crippled on the high end by lack of hardware support.

    But for an office server, sure, it supports the full range of consumer desktop computing hardware pretty well. Big deal.

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    LibBT: BitTorrent for C - small - fast - clean (Now Versio
  18. Re:who woulda thunk it by krmt · · Score: 3

    I don't understand why you think the OS9 GUI is so much better. I was a rabid mac fan (i.e. I got tired of waiting for Copland, then Be, then OSX and jumped ship to Linux) but now that I've gotten a chance to explore the OSX interface I'm really pleased with it. Sure, it's not exactly the same as the old one, but change isn't necessarily bad.

    A ton of old Mac users feel betrayed or something because Apple threw out a decade+ worth of interface, when in fact a lot of the original good ideas are still there. The menu bar at the top of the screen. The trash can. Drag and drop (works better than it ever did for me in OS9 and before). The control panels. These are the major innovations that still distinguish the mac over windows (well, maybe not the trash can and control panels still) and they're still present.

    Well what's actually different besides the looks? Button placement (still getting used to that one). No control strip. File system heirarchy. And the dock. Oh, and the apple menu is diminished (which I don't like either). Overall, these are minor concessions. The control strip will be replaced with dock apps. The file system is a result of unix, and it's a sacrifice that had to be made.

    But overall, OSX feels comfy to me. It doesn't quite feel like a mac anymore, but that's because my conception of the mac carries a lot of baggage about performance and bland looks left over from my system 7 days :-). But it's still true to the overall spirit of the mac, which is fun, ease of use, and simple cool factor. I can't really say that any other OS out there has that feeling, and OSX is carrying that core of the Mac in to the future.

    "I may not have morals, but I have standards."

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    "I may not have morals, but I have standards."

  19. Million Dollar Question by 4of12 · · Score: 3

    So we all know that the only reason MS ports Office to MacOS is to keep alive a toy competitor on the desktop.

    And, given the UNIX flavor of OSX, does this mean that MS is prepared to code Office to a UNIX-like API?

    And, if so, then, making some albeit big leaps of speculation concerning the outcome of The Antitrust Trial about splitting the behemoth into baby Bills like Office and OS, does this not open up the possibility of Office running on not just OSX, but Linux, FreeBSD, etc.?

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  20. Re:Debates like this are pointless by RevAaron · · Score: 3
    Goes both ways, I suppose. I have all the tools I need on Mac OS X (and Mac OS 9, for that matter). If you didn't have the tools, you'd be out of luck, you're right. I use Mac OS X a lot for programming, but I also use it for the other general computer stuff.

    But with Mac OS X having all the tools I need, it is just a waste of my time to be screwing around trying to get Windows itself (let alone the apps) working, or configuring things under Linux. I ran Linux, exclusively, for 3 years, and one of the reasons I switched to a Mac was that the "cool" factor had worn off, and I just needed to get stuff done...

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    Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
  21. Re:Flaws in the Analysis? by RevAaron · · Score: 3
    Disclaimer: I've never used XP, only 95, 98, NT 4, and 2000.

    I've been using Mac OS X since... NeXTSTEP 3.3. The eye candy that showed up in Mac OS X DP3 and has stuck with us doesn't distract the user, in my experience. It doesn't get in the way, and is aware when it should tone itself down. E.g., when I'm running an expensive job (CPU intensive for you kiddies who don't know what that means), and CPU is maxed at 100%, invoking some action that is filled with eye candy, like minimizing a window, the window just pops into the dock, rather than smoothly sucking into the dock, which is what it does when it has CPU time to afford that.

    So, no, you're not correct. :)

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    Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
  22. Re:Debates like this are pointless by RevAaron · · Score: 5

    Who cares what your Athlon box costs? You still have to put up with the same old PC rubbish. Sure, it runs games hella faster than my G4/400, but that's irrelevant to me, because I use my computer primarily for work, not games. But that's fine if you play a lot of games. That's what you use it for. For me, I just want to get stuff done, and it's not worth my time to have to putz with Linux and/or (I pray not) Windows.

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    Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
  23. Flaws in the Analysis? by cqnn · · Score: 5

    Round 1: Installation

    OSX has to deal with a much smaller supported hardware set (Macs) than
    Windows 2000 (or Linux, BSD, and BeOS for that matter). Taking
    this into account, one might see where Apple's OS developers could
    spend more time on the front end of the install, instead of needed
    more effort put into the supportive foundations of the hardware detection.

    OSX still wins here, but its racing on its own track.

    Round 2: Interface

    OSX takes the lead for now in the cool GUI department, but those who
    accuse MS of stealing ideas from Aqua are overlooking a key point in
    the embrace and extend philosophy. Like Win95, 98, and ME before it;
    Windows XP will not only adopt new interface ideas, but those ideas
    will actually be tested for usuability and integration with existing
    user practices.

    Apple seems to design on "Make it look cool, and they will come"

    MS seems to design on "Make it look cool, and work with the stuff that
    didn't look as cool in the last rev, and they will upgrade"

    Round 3: Software compatibility

    Windows 2000 is the better example of what both companies needed to do
    to insure future growth and legacy compatiblity. It wins the match, but
    the real winner overall is GNU/ the Open Source Movement.

    I'm not saying that to be a Slashdot shill, because it is not the "free"
    aspect I'm looking at. It's that OSS is for the most part designed with
    portability in mind that it has held to the best ideas for software compatibility,
    despite the forks in the roads of OSS history.

    Round 4: Hardware compatibility

    Same point as in Round 1, OSX deals with its hardware better, but it
    has a much more limited range of configurations that it has to deal with.

    Round 5: Internet support

    OSX is more compatible with the existing Internet infrastucture; because
    it is based on much of the same ideas/technology.

    Microsoft's flaws were in targeting Windows 2000 more for the Intranet and
    plain vanilla business use, than for the space beyond the corporate proxy.

  24. Harder than it sounds by Lozzer · · Score: 5

    OS X simply maximizes the convenience of the Internet. Its connection wizards make connecting to the Net as easy as thawing a hot dog

    Damn, I was about to go out and but a Mac, but I've never thawed a hot dog and I don't fancy learning now

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    Special Relativity: The person in the other queue thinks yours is moving faster.
  25. Why should I respect these results? by Picass0 · · Score: 3

    This article also links to a "Flyweights" competition between Mac OS9 and Corel Linux! Whatever you may feel about Distros, most Linux users feel this is the most flawed mainstream Distro. C|Net Justifies the comparison between these two by saying they both have a 4% market share, so we should compare them. Winner:OS9. Why? Because MS doesn't support Linux.

    So in this article C|Net pits OSX against an OS that arguably has a 66% potential market share. WTF? And the contest goes to OSX at the end. Why? Not for any reason consistent with the Linux vs. OS9. That article tells me MS has to support an OS to be worth my while. Here's a contest with an MS OS and they give it to the other guy because - Why? - It has a "unix core"!!!!

    In my view the biggest loser in this contest is C|Net.

  26. Re:who woulda thunk it by IronChef · · Score: 4

    Preface: I am a Mac fan too. I've had one since the very beginning, though now I have a lot of other kinds of computers too.

    That said...

    Apple isn't innovating so much as dusting off its old NeXT technology.

    I am very happy with the technical foundation of OSX. It rules. BSD stuff in my Mac! But I hate the new GUI. Apple -- no, STEVE -- threw out a decade of GUI evolution so that he could force his pet project onto us, that being the NeXT way of doing things. NeXT was his baby, and he can't let it go. Steve has an incredibly large ego.

    Aqua isn't revolutionary. It's retarded. It may look good when you compare it to the GUIs that you can get for the free Unixes, but if Apple REALLY wanted to make its CURRENT users happy, they would have given OSX a MacOS 9 style GUI.

    By any measure, the OS9 interface is better. The could have added new features to support the new OS's foundation, but instead they built up a new monstrosity which has, for me, about 10% of the usability of OS9. I suspect that Aqua will be useable a year from now, but only for the people who want to spend $100 on shareware GUI tweaks that Apple/Steve are too pig-headed to build in for us.

    Just another Mac guy's opinion...

  27. A more interesting deathmatch... by zombieking · · Score: 5

    ...would be "Psycho" Steve Jobbs vs. "Battlin'" Bill Gates in a last-man-standing no-holds-barred steel cage match. I'd pay to see that one on pay per view...

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    "The only difference between me and a madman is that I'm not mad." - Salvador Dali (1904-1989)
  28. Re:Depends on the applications by sv0f · · Score: 4

    Linux is good for those who value their freedom (speech and beer)

    Your comment is tongue and cheek, I know, but just to be clear: Linux is for those who value the freedom to see the source -- that's it. There are other kinds of freedom, and I doubt you can make platform-dependent generalizations for these.

    Back to the article: Of course such comparisons are meaningless, but I found it interesting that they gave the Interface comparison to Windows (by a nose). Their argument was essentially 'we know the Windows interface, it remains unchanged, therefore it's better'. By this logic, OS X will only win when it becomes more familiar (read: Windows-like). Weird.

  29. An honest surprise by mblase · · Score: 4
    Lately, C|Net has been more and more favorable to the Windows OSes over Mac and *nix in its individual reviews. It's nice to see them take a head-to-head between Mac and Windows as honestly and democratically as possible.

    That said, they need to do it again when Windows XP arrives (and Mac OS X has a few more *nix software offerings available). There will be enough improvements in the interface and usability that the results should be significantly different.

  30. what end users really want by cbowland · · Score: 3
    End users want applications that help them get their work done better and faster than they could otherwise. They don't give a shit about the operating system. Comparing OS's is fun for geeks, but it is meaningless to the end users. An OS is just an interface to the underlying hardware (See Linus on the NPR Fresh Air archives.) A meaningful comparision would be to ask what tasks need to be accomplished and then compare the systems that handle those tasks. Which systems create a better user experience? Of course, if some systems do not software for a particular category, then the other sort of wins by default (this is called leveraging your monopoly).

    Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day.

    --

    Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day.
    Teach him to eat and he will fish forever.

  31. Re:Depends on the applications by Placido · · Score: 5

    Quote from the article:

    "Before you use our death match as a reason to run out and buy a new dual-processor G4, though, let us remind you that this matchup is all in good fun. If you're making decisions about operating systems and even entire platforms--especially for your business--you should do your research. Check out CNET's reviews of both Windows 2000 and Mac OS X and decide for yourself."

    Nuff said.


    Pinky: "What are we going to do tomorrow night Brain?"

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  32. Interesting point and funny ending by wmulvihillDxR · · Score: 5

    From the article:

    What's more, the OS X installer automatically finds your hardware and recognizes it. No driver problems (what's a driver?), no hardware conflicts, nada. Don't be fooled by its fancy core; just as it did in previous Mac OS incarnations, Apple designed OS X for your Mac hardware. OS X is even better than OS 9 at recognizing hardware, and it even configures USB printers--no "plug and pray" here.

    Well I know I've lost some hardware. I have a beige G3 and I no longer have the built-in SCSI port. My CD burner doesn't work either and it did work in 9.1. So I can't say I have had no hardware problems.

    I like the "plug and pray" shot though.

    --
    Check out Althea for a stable IMAP email client for X. Now with SSL!
  33. Incorrect. by Auckerman · · Score: 3
    Read the documentation. OS X harddrives do indeed mount in at least OS 8.1 and higher. OS X can mount OS 9 drives (with the connect menu). OS X can use Appletalk printers (which any standard networked Laser Jet supports). OS X computers do NOT appear to use Appletalk to talk to one another, but instead use NFS.

    OS X, by default, supports NFS, AppleTalk, and with sharity (which is free for educational people) NetBUI. I have an iMac next to me what has NFS mounts from several SGI's in this room, mounts of NT drives upstairs, and an OS 9 drive of a computer behind me.

    --

    Burn Hollywood Burn
  34. Re:Depends on the applications by American+AC+in+Paris · · Score: 5
    Why can't you just choose the one that works best for YOU and accept that what is best for you may not be best for all other users. MacOS is good for Desktop Publishing and Graphic design. Linux is good for those who value their freedom (speech and beer), and Win2k is good for compatibility and for it's ease of use. x-BSD...Well, I've never used it, but I'm sure it's good for something. The point is, find something that works for you and accept that your solution might not work for everyone.

    ...it's important to consider, though, that while MacOS has historically been the niche player for desktop publishing and graphic design, OS X is one huge departure from the classic MacOS. I'll be the first to admit that it's still a tad early to say exactly what niches OS X will fill, but I don't think it's an overstatement to say that OS X stands an excellent chance of breaking out of the dp/design niche and filling far larger shoes. After all, we're looking at a first in the industry--a BSD system that your grandmother can use without batting an eyelid. That, if nothing else, shows a great deal of promise...

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    Obliteracy: Words with explosions

  35. Good post on Ars by Fatal0E · · Score: 3


    disclaimer: I didn't post this in Ars. XWRed did. greetz to all the other Ars lurkers! :)
    Symmetric multitasking means all OS X apps can take advantage of two processors in a dual-processor Mac to

    That just made me laugh. Reading reviews like this almost make me sick, there's so much misinformation and obfuscation. I'm sure the BF could collectively come up with something *FAR* more comprehensive. Heck, I probably could if I played both sides.

    In this category, Windows 2000 is simply overmatched. When it comes to Internet-ready operating systems, Apple stepped ahead way back at OS 9

    This is laughable as well. Every single thing the guy listed for OSX, Win2k Pro comes with. Well, Microsoft doesn't supply free WebDav space, but I doubt the OS can be faulted for that.
    OS X delivers the killing blow with its integration of Apache
    Thats the big FUD. Sure, Apple biggybacks on the work of others and includes that stuff. But its by no means integration. Its just a checkbox for on or off, I see no frontend for configuring all of the httpd or ftpd options. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a Windows zealot by any means, its just that I can't stand journalism like this. Both of the guys barely know what they're talking about, the Mac guy obfuscates everything, and the Windows guy can barely defend Win2k.

    Oh, and I hate it when arguments hinge on simplicity. It seems like none of these journalists are real men anymore, they all want their hands to be held while they're computing because their pussies hurt too much.

  36. Power overwhelming by NineNine · · Score: 4

    I'd love to see a comparison of the two as servers It's pretty rare that you see a Apple serving anything (especially dynamic websites).

  37. Re:Linux by shyster · · Score: 3
    I believe it's called anecdotal evidence. Are you implying that my anecdote is the only incompatibilty with a Linux distro? Surely you are not. I routinely have issues setting up video cards with XFree86 (of course, I also tend to use off-brand POS cards where the manafacturer has gone out of business, but that's not the point...). I've also had trouble with audio cards and NIC's. But, the main thing is that the HW manafacturer's, in a lot of cases, don't support Linux. Even if a HW company has gone out of business recently (or merged or changed focus, etc.), they usually (at one time or another) produced a 95/98 and perhaps an NT driver, which can still be found relatively easily. I can't say the same for Linux drivers.

    But, wait, there's that damn anecdoctal evidence again. I didn't realize we were trying to adhere to the strictest standards of scientific inquiry and integrity. In that case, I suppose I could parse the HCL for Windows 3.1/95/98/Me/NT/2K, then hunt down drivers for every component that I can think of that wasn't on the list, then do the same thing for Linux drivers, and then run a line-by-line comparison to them using a point + modifiers scale (using modifiers such as +10 for being on an official HCL or similar (with built-in driver support), -1 for having to use Windrivers.com, -5 for having to download the driver through some guy's geocities webpage, +5 for automatic resource detection/assignment, +1 if Linux or Windows at least tells me the name and model of the component, etc.) then added it all up and declared a winner. Of course, then you'd probably be bitching about my grading scale.

    Besides, I have a job, and they do expect me to do work every once in a while. I can only spend so much time on Slashdot and Slashdot related projects. And, if CNET can base an article on anecdoctal evidence, I certainly see no harm in my doing the same. (For the record, I've probably been through 1500+ Windows installations, and only 5-10 Linux installations. I'd say that Windows is leading by a high margin by percentage of "painless installs". And yes, I know 5-10 isn't statistically relevant, but since when does that make a difference on Slashdot?)

  38. Microsoft's response by jsse · · Score: 5

    Dear CNet,

    CNET's decision: Mac OS X

    What do you mean by that?
    I thought we are always friends. I know you've taken efforts to make us win on "Interfaces" part.

    But I'm not satisfied. You know that.

    Can't you be more unethical?

    You can kiss my future first-hand Microsoft news goodbye, sucker.

    Yours master,
    Bill G.

  39. who woulda thunk it by hotblack296 · · Score: 3

    I was very suprised at the results of the 'death match.' Well, not suprised at the result so much as who came up with the results. As an avid (read 'rabid') mac fan, I can only hope that articles like this one can demonstrate once and for all to people that Apple no longer produces the 'etch-a sketch' computer they once did. If I hear one more microsoft representitve say the word innovation one more time I'm going to hurl. The only company out there actually innovating these days is Apple.
    'Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.'-Ford Prefect

    --
    "Computers are useless. They can only give you answers." Pablo Picasso.