Greetings Tacitus,
If you can go back that far youre possibly older than I am. I
m 63.
If youve clocked any of my other posts, you
ll be aware I dont do serious very well, it
s nearly all asinine tripe, looking for lodgings in somebody`s chuckle, unless, that is, where a lack of seriousness is offensively irreverent. So this will probably choke me, but:
A nursing sister on a degree course once informed me, as we debated the near impossibility of reconciling practice with theory
, that on her course, they had been shown how it involved Quantum Mechanics. It was Christmas Day and both of us had imbibed, so I didnt venture down that avenue and as a consequence, I don
t really know how Q.M. impacts upon conflict resolution, which is what this thread is all about, is it not?
The best way to resolve contentious issues is to take the best from both sides of the argument and blend them together and put to one side. Now take that, which with a little bit of give and take from both sides can be deemed acceptable and blend together with the first blending, and there you have it ,
an acceptable compromise; all the things of value from both sides of the debate, as there will always be something of merit to be gleaned from both sides.
What springs to mind, is this thing I`m writing this post on: INTEL CORE2 DUO iMAC with at last, has obscene amounts of RAM; Exocet fast processor and gi-normous hard drive. A quantum leap for Apple, and why? because of an amalgamation with Intel, making use of a piece of evolved PC technology, thats used in, probably, every other non-Apple PC manufactured today. AMD are making similar spec.chips.
Wintel v Apple is a more sensible title (Keiths gonna luv that), since it acknowledges the fact that we
re debating the relative merit and demerits, of numerous brands of hardware incorporating MS OS and one brand, the other, OS X
Its awhile since I read the Mac Mags and Press, but at the time it seemed to me, that all the Mac Heads were saying that, MS
s Office for MAC was a better piece of software, than it produced for its own MS OFFICE, and also O for M was the most widely used piece of software for the MAC OS. Perhaps things have changed, I don`t know, but MS must have been doing something better than Apple.
As far as hardware goes; apart from the aesthetic side of the debate, in which it can be said without fear of contradiction, that Apple are the trail blazers, what went on under the cover, has been a different story. PowerPC chips, pound for pound relatively faster than than the others; true, but when youre watching Intel and AMD moving into multiples of gigahertz, while IBM are still fannying around with megahertz, the pound for pound analogy becomes redundant when all other PC manufacturers are installing 100+Gig hard drives, Apple are still pushing 6/10 20 Gig. Apple graphics cards ? "not that brilliant", etc. etc.etc. It doesn't say much for Apple
s opinion of its loyal customer base. It does however make you wonder if Apples Execs have been cynically exploiting that loyalty.
Another thing about customer loyalty, especially the European customers. Why can my daughters boy friend go the States on holiday , and buy himself a MacBook substantially cheaper than he can over here. Don
t go looking for the near 2 to 1 $/£ exchange rate, you wont get it not from Apple. But what you can count on with Apple, is the oppotunity of paying substantially more for your favorite product, than the guy next door pays for his favorite non-Apple product of similar or superior spec.
The iMAC I`ve just bought came with a keyboard PINBALL machine. If I plug my mouse into the LH USB socket, the curser flies all over the screen just like the pin ball. I can only use the RH socket.
My Mighty Mouse is no longer as mighty as it when it came out of the box, because the scroll wheel has stopped working, but, it doesnt matter, because I
m using MS Optical mouse.
The fact that, approx 40% of the time, when moving the curser over the screen the window I`m working in zooms away to the left or right or to the top or the bottom.
I`m starting to get used to the very sharp, loud, mechanical CRACK!!! that quite often occurs when booting up, as the the little wheel stops spinning. It still scares my wife though.
My iMAC`s Superdrive makes noises similar to our waste disposal unit in the kitchen sink only quieter.
Sooner or later my wife is going to wet herself when she hears that crack!! and I suppose thats when I
ll get round to taking Mac back to John Lewis, and say to guy behind the counter,Mac
s poorly, can you make him better please, but dont hurt him. He
s not a computer yknow, he
s a MAC.
You see Tacitus, the Wintel/Mac debate, has been going on for ever and is shrouded in the swirling mists, not of time, but urban myth and its that, that fuels the proselytizing that emanates from both camps, and is probably 40% fact 60% mist But, and it
s a big but, long may it continue, just as long as you can still pick the PC man`s empty glass up off the pub table and ask " Same again, friend?’.
Take care
Vic