After 5 years of relentless bullying/coercing from Adam Hartwig he wore me down and I ended up the skeptical owner of a brand new 15″ MacBook Pro.
The only way this was going to work for me was a clean break, jump in at the deep end, cold turkey scenario. I would be decommissioning my lovely PC and the MBP (that’s what the cool Apple people call MacBook Pros) would be my one and only computer.
So after using my Mac for a few months, here are my 10 annoying things I’ve found about switching from a PC to a Mac.
- Installing applications is mega weird!
Installing applications is a fairly alien experience, even with simple on-screen instructions I actually looked it up online in fear of doing it wrong because it seemed so dumb. Why am I dragging this icon into this other icon? Weird! - Folder/file organisation
Apple, WTF are you doing? Windows showed us folders should be at the top of a file list, not scattered amongst all the other files. It makes navigating to what you need really frustrating. Apparently this is just “the Mac way of doing things” but it’s stupid. Stop it.You can arrange files by “kind” (the Mac term for file “type”), which will separate folders from files but then also groups all the other file types together, and I like them alphabetical. The sort order within each file type group is alphabetical so they’re trying to get it right but no. Just no. - MagSafe feels a bit cheap and crap
My MBP has the MagSafe 2 power connecter (not that they mention this anywhere on the website when buying the thing!?) So when I first ordered a spare I ordered the incorrect MagSafe 1. Fortunately Apple were pretty cool about letting me replace it.Reading the MagSafe 2 power adapter reviews it seems like everyone’s complaining about them. Like every other Apple charger, they don’t last. The complaints seem to be completely justified, it doesn’t make sense when every other component is so high end that the power adapter feels so cheap and crappy. Hopefully USB-C takes off in future and MagSafe will die. - Capslock button is stupid
A quick press of the Capslock key does not register, it won’t work. You have to give it a slow press to enable/disable capslock. I rarely use it but I found this really annoying! You get this same “feature” for the on/off button, only in this instance it’s actually useful as there’s a very high chance you’ll press it accidentally with it being just above the backspace key. One way of solving a design flaw I suppose. - That price tag
Yea, it’s really nice and you can see where the extra money goes but you’d better have good insurance if you ever want to leave the house with it. Drop it: Goodbye £2.5k. Get it snatched: Goodbye £2.5k. Leave it on the train: Goodbye £2.5k. It’s stressful taking it out to the point the you can’t really enjoy it. Must be similar to taking your Ferrari to the supermarket, it’s nice taking it out but not worth risking someone leaving a ding in the doors unless you’re so rich you don’t care. I’ve never felt like this about taking my old HP or Dell laptops out with me, those were less stressful times. - Snapping windows
Probably the only good thing that came out of Windows Vista (at least I think it was Vista) was the ability to snap windows to the left and right of the screen or drag them up to the top to snap full-screen. It’s a little thing but I actually found myself really missing it. I’ve heard you can buy an app to add this functionality to the Apple OS but an annoying omission. - Keyboard shortcuts are awkward
I use Photoshop a lot and need to “Step backwards” a lot (fancy “undo”). On Windows this is Ctrl+Shift+Z, a nicely spaced comfortable collection of keys. On Mac it’s Cmd+Option+Z, a much more tightly grouped set of keys, they actually all neighbour each other. I don’t find this comfortable at all. I’ve got big hands and I’ve been using Photoshop on PC’s for around 10 years so these closely grouped shortcuts feel horrible. Even with a few Mac months under my belt they still aren’t easy. - Cluttered desktop
Okay, so you get an email with an attachment. You want to view the attachment so you double click the file. The Mac will then ask if you want to just view it or save it. I just want to view, thanks. Attachment then opens in Mac’s handy Preview app, all good? No. It saved a copy of the file to my desktop!!? Why!? Windows handled this just fine, it dumped stuff like this into a temporary files folder and they were periodically removed. I don’t know why my Mac does this, it’s utter stupidity and leaves my desktop littered with several copies of the same PDF documents that I have to manually delete. Bad Apple!! - I’m a hipster now
Unless I’m around design or dev people if I pull out the MBP I look like every other sucker who got one just because they wanted to look cool while sitting in coffee shops attempting to write the novel that won’t ever make them famous (while actually just watching beard care videos on YouTube). It’s pretty annoying being one of those guys. - It’s actually really, REALLY good
This is what probably annoyed me the most. Apple and their OS definitely has it’s flaws and Windows do a lot of things better but ultimately I’ve really liked using my Mac.
I had never had any issues with PC reliability. Which seems to be every Apple fans main argument, “they just work,” “they never crash,” etc. but my PCs have always “just worked” too. If you spec them right for the tasks you need them to do, of course they’ll work. My Mac has definitely crashed and done plenty of weird and annoying stuff.
“But Macs don’t get viruses!” Well if you run a reliable anti-virus and resist the urge to click every link that promises to hook you up with hot singles in your area, you don’t get viruses on a PC either.
And ultimately with a PC you get a lot more flexibility and better hardware spec. for your money.
“But Macs use premium materials!” Okay, here they’ve got a reasonably valid argument, particularly when comparing a top-end Windows laptop to a top-end Apple laptop. When you use a Mac you can feel it’s a premium product; it’s the difference between a cheap pair of jeans and a high-end pair of jeans. They both do the same job but damn that Italian selvedge denim feels gooooood. Some people couldn’t give a shit, others think it’s worth every penny.
I think a lot of the Apple lure is that high-end tactile “special” feeling you get when you pick up one of their products. You really can put a price on that feeling, and it’s basically double what the competitors are charging.
I would have posted this sooner but the battery on my Macbook died and no one had a MagSafe2 adapter.
// Matt