[Mac Zealot]

Is it my imagination or is it just fact that mac owners rarely mod their macs? I almost never see posts on here anymore about a neat cool project.

Why?

Hehe

[Bockie]

Originally posted by Mac Zealot:
<STRONG>Is it my imagination or is it just fact that mac owners rarely mod their macs? I almost never see posts on here anymore about a neat cool project.

Why?

Hehe</STRONG>

Q: Why?
A: Mods mostly try to make a beige box look cool, while Macs already look cool-no mods needed!

[icruise]

Cough...Tronbook...Cough

[Paco500]

We have all seen the tron book and love it, but I believe the original posters point was that this was the exception to the rule- not the rule.

There is certianly some validity to the notion that mac already look cool, so why mod. Most of us bought our Macs at lease partly because of how much we liked the design. Most probably feel they can't one-up Jonathan Ive. But I think there is more than that.

First, I think Mac folks are really excited by the software, most recently, what Apple is doing with OS X and the new consumer apps (itunes, iphoto, etc.) Unfortunately, but understandably, you need the latest and greatest hardware to run this stuff. I think you will find that most computer mods on the PC side are done on generic beige boxes or older equipment- nobody (at least very few) are modding a brand new dell. Most people don't like to mess with their brand new expensive toys. It is a lot less scary to cut into your case when you know if you screw it up, you can buy a new one for $25. On the PC side, people express their fanaticism (this is not meant as a insult) through case mods. On the Mac side, people express thier fanaticism through what they can create with the tools apple gives them.

Second, Mac users develop a more personal relationship with their computers than PC users generally do. I would think in much the same way it would be difficult for a sergeon to operate on a close friend, a mac user has a hard time cutting into his/her beloved machine.

Third, because of the abover reasons, the schism widens though self perpetuation. People mod their PC's, enterprising folks see a market and sell to it, this grows the market, more suppliers, more customers, it keeps growing. This feeds the culture of modification. While their are many original and creative PC modders out there, I would guess the vast majority of folks are just buying off the shelf stuff that is not availible for the Macs.

Finally, and my apologies go out to all the good hearted rice-boys out there, there is a similarity to "The Fast and the Furious" culture out there. Most of the fat tailpipes, supension lowering kits, racing stripes and giant window stickers are not being sold for the upper teirs of cars and their owners. While you can find lots of catalogues with all manner of nonesense for the honda civic- you would be hard pressed to find much of anything for a Saab 9-5 or Mercedes SL. We Mac users are a refined bunch and see these things while passingly cool, perhaps a bit pedestrian. We like our Macs the way God and Steve Jobs intneded them.

Which why the few modifications we see here are generally so interesting. The major apperence mods, such as the tron book, are of high quality and took vision and skill to make beautiful. We aren't just looking at a bunch of flashing lights and a propeller on a G4. We also have quite a few engineering mods- such as the things being done to over-clock an iBook, etc. This stuff is interesting and impressive. Things interesting and impressive come in smaller numbers than mass market crap. NSync sells a whole lot more records than Lucinda Williams.

My $.02 (perhaps I am in the $.05-.06 range by now)

Paco

[Matt Gauger]

Err, the original computer modders as you see them today (since it can be argued that computer modding has always been around) are generally overclockers and gamers. Thing is, they don't use old machines.

The only difference that I can see is that maybe you can't order a new case and trick it out or whatever for a Mac, whereas you can get basically any shape of case for a PC.

Last thing, if you're going to cut into a Mac, make sure that all of the other parts are taken out.. there's less to break if you do

~Damon

[x user]

PC parts are easy to get a hold of and cheap if you break something... Mac parts are not... THAT SAID...


Overclocked iBook
Upgraded to DVD
Changed sleep light, will probably paint soon, over spring break? OR summer?

[icruise]

&gt;We have all seen the tron book and love it, but I believe the original
&gt;posters point was that this was the exception to the rule- not the rule.

Modification is not the rule with any kind of computer or electronic device -- most Windows users use their computer pretty much as they were when they bought them -- even down to the position of the icons on the desktop.

I think that if you exclude people making custom computers and tweaking/modding those (something that is not possible with the mac, and so can't really be compared), actually there is a lot more modification going on with the mac. In other words, there are not very many people who take retail Windows systems and modify them (by this I mean relatively major mods, not adding memory or hard disks etc). It may just be because I tend to move in Mac circles instead of Windows, but I have seen very little in the way of notebook all-in-one modification in the Windows world. There are hundreds of powerbook/ibook mods, as well as a fair number of imac ones as well.

I do think that there tend to be a lot more appearance-based mods on the mac side, whereas overclocking and the like are more common with the PC, but Mac people tend to more concerned with esthetics and usability rather than raw performance (that's why we use Macs and not PCs in the first place).

This is particularly true in Japan. There is an amazing amount of stuff going on here, and while it may not be as active as it was a few years ago, there are still many people who are into it. There were people here overclocking and painting the imac the week it came out.