[maniacal]

I've tried xp on a pentium 4 computer, its crash city. As a computer tech that works on both mac and pc, I can still say that mac os is still the best. I have systems with os 6, os 7.5.5, os 9.2 and os x, most of my calls are it wont print, when I get there dumb a$$ didnt set it in the chooser or better yet didn't even turn on the damn printer. Windows is pain, having to remeber every damn tab to find some stupid setting. Customization is also a full of it. It takes so much time putting the settings back to default. Also makes it hard for new users to find things when someone put stuff all over the place. Under XP guest can still rearrange things. Now thats just plain dumb. One thing I can say about XP is that I never had to look for stupid drivers and everything installs, but it takes slightly over an hour. Its also very good and telling you if you have bad hardware. How does it do this? The installation won't complete. What sucks is you need to buy special third party mp3 software and video codecs, microsoft no longer lets you have them for free.
What also sucks is that you no longer own your copy of windows. IF your machine crashes a hd and you need to reinstall good luck.

No one is forcing you guys to use OS x, stick with OS 9 if you like it better, but most of you switched because you know its stable. For me thats all that matters.

[Sine]

Originally verbally masturbated by iCartman:
Wow are you gullible. Only two people in that thread have reported this and you take it for gospel (while ignoring the four people who say otherwise).

No son. I have seen it with my own eyes. I have seen it myself. Why is this so hard to accept for you? Want some more proof?
http://www.gipsysoft.com/articles/fl...ckerfree.shtml http://www.elj.com/elj/v1/n4/al/ http://www.codeguru.com/misc/flicker...drawing2.shtml http://www.guffy.net/programming_windows_in_c.htm http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/de...dn_flicker.asp http://www.oxygensoftware.com/produc...cy/index.shtml http://support.microsoft.com/support.../Q139/7/18.asp http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~dcfox/dragon/exceed.html

And I am sure I could find tons more.

Your post was not a troll? It was actually an insightful repsonse to this thread? Now you try to weazel out of it by saying you don't perform the actions of an "internet troll"? With all your posts in this thread, you have yet to contribute one item that deals with the topic.

No it wasn't and I wam not weazeling out of things. Mentioning that people forget Apple isn't in charge of 3rd party drivers is not troll like. My comment about tons of people buying ME was not a troll post. Me calling you a idiot when your acting like one isn't being a troll either. If the shoe fits..

I agree, but your posts are kinda stipud, so it's hard not to laugh.

Wow how long did it take you to think that one up? BTW when making fun of someone by calling them "stupid" or saying something they are doing is "stupid" it would be better on your part if you spelled "stupid" right. You'll hide your imbecility a tad better.

Check out the post from Spiffdaddy;
I think he has a valid point.

He didn't point out just me. I wasn't the only Mac user that was calling you names.. Good grasp for straws.. but you don't get a cigar.

Look above. Remember that reading is fun-da-mental.

And he did not point me out did he? As a matter of fact he said "MAC USERS" meaning plural. The people I pointed out to you (And there was many) was specifically talking to you. Big difference there bub.
Try again.

sigh.. there's that reading problem again. I said that it's Apple's responsbility to write 3rd party drivers (which they already do). but you're right, someone else should be writing CDRW drivers (so far not one vendor has).

And we all told you that you was a idiot for saying that it's Apple's responsibility to write 3rd party driver for companies. If Apple chooses to write some great! But in NO WAY is it Apple's responsibility to do such things. And after the 5th time we told you this you STILL don't get it. Yes we knew exactly what you was talking about.. no reading problem there. You just showing your ignorance again.

I'm sorry what was the title of this thread again? Oh, that's right, you're having a difficult time reading English. I'll try to remember that.

Excuse me I apologize. I meant "Post" instead of "thread"

I think we've already proven that you have

Wake up son.

In order to warn everyone else, I've used magic powers to have this thread linked on the front page of MacNN for all to see you in action.

You know what is funny.. I am sure you think you have magic powers. You obviously proved to this forum just how delusional you are.

I agree, but holy sh*t you actually posted something of subsance!

I have more substance on the tip of my finger than you have in your whole body.

Now kiss my ring.

[limbotron]

Sigh. My response to maniacal:

The original poster was not claiming that XP was superior or anything like that. He simply said he liked a few XP features better than their X counterparts.

I'm so sick of reading forums full of brainless kneejerk reactions like the one above. It kills any chance of real discussion. Did anyone mention liking tabs? Anyway lets look at manicals points just to show how dumb they are (sadly I will contribute to the noise vs signal ratio here, diminishing what could have been an interesting discussion).

>I've tried xp on a pentium 4 computer, its crash city

Stability was never mentioned by anyone here. Non issue anyway. On most machines xp is just as stable as X.

> I can still say that mac os is still the best.

Nobody disagrees with this, but isn't the cheerleading a little pass�. 9 has problems, X has problems, XP has problems. None have achieved perfection...not even close.

> I have systems with os 6, os
> 7.5.5, os 9.2 and os x, most of my calls are it wont print, when I get there
> dumb a$$ didnt set it in the chooser or better yet didn't even turn on the
> damn printer.

What does this have to do with anything?

> Windows is pain, having to remeber every damn tab to find some stupid setting.
> Customization is also a full of it. It takes so much time putting the settings
> back to default.

Spelling my friend.

Nobody is defending the tabbed interface. Some of us just want to change the damned finder font.

>Also makes it hard for new users to find things when someone put stuff
>all over the place. Under XP guest can still rearrange things.
>Now thats just plain dumb.

I agree allowing a guest permission to rearrange another users desktop is dumb, but I still like the idea of letting someone log in and coming back to where I left my machine. That's a good idea and that's what has been talked about here.

> One thing I can say about XP is that I never had to look for stupid drivers
> and everything installs, but it takes slightly over an hour.

So there are features of XP that you actually like... Funny... If I were like certain others here, I should start ranting now.

> Its also very good and telling you if you have bad hardware. How does it do
> this? The installation won't complete. What sucks is you need to buy special
> third party mp3 software and video codecs, microsoft no longer lets you have
> them for free.

Actually you can download most of the stuff for free on the web, but who really cares. We all know XP will always have more drivers than X because of economies of scale.

>No one is forcing you guys to use OS x, stick with OS 9 if you
>like it better, but most of you switched because you know its stable. For me thats all that matters.

So constructive criticism of X is outlawed. Admiring features of Linux, or BeOS, or of OS 9 is outlawed? If I were like you and were dumb enough to take everything absolutely literally I would say something like "stability is really all that matters to you why not try Solaris. I've have several kernel panics and freezes in X, never so much as a fart in Solaris..."

[Sine]

This is one thing I am jealous over that XP has that OS X doesn't
http://www.tgtsoft.com/screenshots/style3.html

*drool*

[iCartman]

No son. I have seen it with my own eyes. I have seen it myself. Why is this so hard to accept for you? Want some more proof?

God you're dense. Some of your links go back to 1991! Guess they figured out 10 years ago that Windows XP is slow at resizing compared to Win2k. Congratulations, you have proven that Win95 has problems resizing windows!

And he did not point me out did he? As a matter of fact he said "MAC USERS" meaning plural. The people I pointed out to you (And there was many) was specifically talking to you.

I still can't get over on how dense you are, but I keep forgetting your inability to read. Spiffdaddy's post was directed at "Mac-heads lose an argument and start calling people names". I wonder who was calling me names in this thread? As for people complaining about me, remember, I said you can't count the voices in your head as real people. So you never did point out these "people".

And we all told you that you was a idiot for saying that it's Apple's responsibility to write 3rd party driver for companies. If Apple chooses to write some great! But in NO WAY is it Apple's responsibility to do such things. And after the 5th time we told you this you STILL don't get it. Yes we knew exactly what you was talking about.. no reading problem there. You just showing your ignorance again.

You realize you're the only one who still believes in this? As already mentioned, it's kinda hard for companies to write drivers when the API isn't published. But go ahead and show me where Apple publishes an API so a CDRW vendor can make a driver for the Discburner app.

Excuse me I apologize. I meant "Post" instead of "thread"

Relax, I didn't know at the time you had a problem reading English. Don't worry, those big words will make sense to you soon.

Listen, making fun of you is fun for a while but it gets old quick. I'm through schooling you for the weekend. Talking with you is like talking to a door. I'm sure you will want the last word since you must not have much of a life considering you average over 4 posts a day jsut at this forum

[edit - godamn, you're last post (a good one too!) was the only one that contributed to the thread. I think you're actually learning!]

[ 11-04-2001: Message edited by: iCartman ]

[Sine]

Originally posted by iCartman:
God you're dense. Some of your links go back to 1991! Guess they figured out 10 years ago that Windows XP is slow at resizing compared to Win2k. Congratulations, you have proven that Win95 has problems resizing windows!

I guess you didn't read the MSN ones.. you know the recent ones talking about XP? I guess if you ignore them they will go away huh......
Nice Dodge try there.. but it didn't work.

I still can't get over on how dense you are, but I keep forgetting your inability to read.

And how is this any better than me calling you a iTard?
Thanks for showing me how your better than that

Spiffdaddy's post was directed at "Mac-heads lose an argument and start calling people names".

Who was losing the argument? Been taking more delusion pills again I see.

I wonder who was calling me names in this thread? As for people complaining about me, remember, I said you can't count the voices in your head as real people. So you never did point out these "people".

And yes I did post a list of people that was making fun of you.. even went into description on to what they was poking fun at you about. Now who is the one having problems reading? Or are you that delusional?

You realize you're the only one who still believes in this?

I am? lol that's a laugh. Keep on making things up as you go a long delusion boy.

As already mentioned, it's kinda hard for companies to write drivers when the API isn't published. But go ahead and show me where Apple publishes an API so a CDRW vendor can make a driver for the Discburner app.

Was I even arguing that Apple published any such API? No I didn't think so. THis is just more of you trying to twist the original debate that you are horribly losing into a different direction to save face.
Bzzzzzzzzt didn't work.

Relax, I didn't know at the time you had a problem reading English. Don't worry, those big words will make sense to you soon.

I bet it's hard to post on these forums.. with a **** in your mouth isn't it?

Listen, making fun of you is fun for a while but it gets old quick. I'm through schooling you for the weekend.

I see you get more delusional as the night goes on. You probably look at yourself in the mirror and just imagine all the hot women that just WANT YOUR BOD.

Talking with you is like talking to a door. I'm sure you will want the last word since you must not have much of a life considering you average over 4 posts a day jsut at this forum
[edit - godamn, you're last post (a good one too!) was the only one that contributed to the thread. I think you're actually learning!]

I have never in my life met anyone in the 7 years I have been on the net that was a bigger delusional crybaby in my life. Your giving up cause you know you got the IBS�.. yes that is the Internet Bitch slap. Not that I had to do this to make you look stupid. You do that well enough on your own. Your just one of the many on the net that think they know what they are talking about cause they have been MacNN forums for a few months. You don't seem to forget to mention that. Heh.

I am sure you'll go far in life.

[MDA]

Originally posted by Sine:
<STRONG>This is one thing I am jealous over that XP has that OS X doesn't
http://www.tgtsoft.com/screenshots/style3.html

*drool*</STRONG>

God is that one ugly interface or what?

MDA

[michaelb]

http://www.tgtsoft.com/screenshots/style3.html

Originally posted by MDA:
<STRONG>God is that one ugly interface or what?</STRONG>

I agree! But I think the point was that you can replace the butt ugly interface... with another butt ugly interface.

(It's got to be a deliberate irony that the program to do it is called "StyleBuilder.")

One thing no amount of skinning XP will achieve, however, is the 3rd generation desktop display technology that Apple have lumbered on current generation hardware.

In a year from now, when everyone is running a G5 and our transparent windows genie into the dock like tequila into a margarita, Microsoft will be like:

"Gee, I guess we better look at getting some of that Quartzy technology stuff into our OS. Maybe we'd better hire some ex-Apple employees. And I wonder if they'll let us look at the source code again this time."

[Jerry Curl]

I'd just like to say that my room mate has a Dell laptop running Windows ME. She called me and asked me to e-mail her resume to somewhere from her laptop.


My PowerBook doesn't.


'Nuff said.

[veganpa]

What matters, IMO, is:

-Can I afford the hardware? A friend of mine is building an Athlon XP machine based on the new nForce chipset, etc., for less than the price of a basic iMac.

-Can I run the software I want?

-Does it allow access to what I need? Is it compatible, for instance, with satellite internet access (the only high-speed available here)? Is there support for / are there drivers for the various devices I might want to use?

-Can I do what I want with it? For example, can I run a pop-up ad killer? Can I run a kid-friendly browser? Can I do on-line banking?

I'm sure there are users of every OS out there that are absolutely convinced that their choice is the only "logical" one, and will build every argument around their biases. But, having used Apple's machines since the Apple II, it seems a rational analysis tends to point toward one platform, at least in my situation.

[KellyHogan]

Originally posted by michaelb:
<STRONG>http://www.tgtsoft.com/screenshots/style3.html

In a year from now, when everyone is running a G5 and our transparent windows genie into the dock like tequila into a margarita, Microsoft will be like:

"Gee, I guess we better look at getting some of that Quartzy technology stuff into our OS. Maybe we'd better hire some ex-Apple employees. And I wonder if they'll let us look at the source code again this time." </STRONG>

So I have to dump my laptop Ti-Book portable G4 'supercomputer' for a desktop G5 that I can't carry around in order for PDF graphics to run smoothly on a graphics chip that can run Quake III with less problems?

[MDA]

Originally posted by michaelb:
<STRONG>http://www.tgtsoft.com/screenshots/style3.html



I agree! But I think the point was that you can replace the butt ugly interface... with another butt ugly interface.

(It's got to be a deliberate irony that the program to do it is called "StyleBuilder.")

One thing no amount of skinning XP will achieve, however, is the 3rd generation desktop display technology that Apple have lumbered on current generation hardware.

In a year from now, when everyone is running a G5 and our transparent windows genie into the dock like tequila into a margarita, Microsoft will be like:

"Gee, I guess we better look at getting some of that Quartzy technology stuff into our OS. Maybe we'd better hire some ex-Apple employees. And I wonder if they'll let us look at the source code again this time." </STRONG>

I know what the point was. My point is that no amount of customizing is going to make XP acceptable. Windows still suffers from being Windows, and all of the overtones of big brother are even more present in this version than any other. It would be nice to have more control over the interface but XP falls short in many other ways when compared to OS X.

MDA

[Luis Alcazar]

i have testes MacOSX and the only thing i dont like is the slooow way to handle a window with a list of files with more than 500....
and i test WinXP and i hate the sloooooow searche engine of files.....it suck!!

[jdoc]

I used XP for 2 1/2 hours the other day at three different PC stores (Gateway, CompUSA, and Circuit City). In general, it's nice, but it ain't gonna save the world like MS says it will! A few things:

-the interface is butt ugly- I'm sitting here staring at my daughters VTech Little Smart, and the colors are exactly the same (red widget buttons, green start menu, etc) and the shapes are similar as well. So much for Apple making "toyish" OS's, eh?

-one discouraging thing- virtually every click brought you to anything MS- options to open WMP, go to MSN, or open IE. Problem is, there isn't much room for third party vendors to place any of their items in these "task" panes. I know that there are battles for desktop space, but XP seems to all but eliminate the need to use the desktop.

-I was excited about the "switch users" feature, until I used it. I don't know what I was expecting, but whatever it was, my expectations were shot- it's not that big a deal. Plus, XP froze solid one time when we were trying to switch users, necessitating a hard reboot.

-OS X does a much better job on many interface elements. For example, we were "calling" WMP from a website to view a video in WMP format. All together, there were 4 windows open- three WMP and one browser. I couldn't tell which window was where- they all seemed to blend. OS X does a nice job of preventing this using drop shadows and clear window borders.

-the task bar is not better or more functional than the dock. The combination of OS X's 128 bit, easily readable icons and the hide feature (which places all of an apps open windows behind the app icon) makes the taskbar's "combine" feature seem fruitless. Plus the dock looks better. Some other arguments about the dock v. taskbar have already been covered.

-I like the task oriented nature of the interface- it makes everything seem easily within reach, although that everything seems to be all MS (see above)

-Windows Movie Maker sucks. period.

-there didn't seem to be much good support for Firewire- none of the stores that I went to had good success just plugging in a DV camera and importing video (actually, the Gateway rep just refused to do it). At Gateway, it took the guy 20 minutes to set up an Intel USB camera- he was trying to show me what a good job Movie Maker does with importing video and editing. We never got the video to edit into the computer.

-the finder (or whatever you call it in Windows) is much faster in XP than OS X.

-setting up a network is much easier in OS X.

there are other smaller things, and some which have already been covered, so I won't waste any more of your time. Overall, it was nice, but not anything special.

Good Day, all

John

[dogzilla]

So, putting aside all the mac/pc zealotry for a moment - what is the upshot of this thread? Has anyone come up with something in which XP beats the pants off of OSX? That more than one person agrees with?

I just haven't got the energy to read through this mess of a thread.

[graffix]

Apple writes 3rd party drivers all the time, and collaborates with device vendors the other 95% of the time... it's called a 'support network'... something they're really trying to nurture with OSX.
Can we all stop the bickering over which OS is better, because (if I read correctly), this topic was supposed to be about what we thought XP did better than OSX, not which was a better OS (which is what 'always' generates heated responses)...
Also, anybody that can say the dock is better than the XP taskbar probably doesn't use the dock all that often... it's a clusterf*ck mishmash of apps - aliases - windows and folders...
While I don't think the Windows taskbar is the pinnacle of usability, it does a far better job at it's intended tasks than the dock has... and the dock is on it's second revision!... if people hadn't REALLY bitched and complained about the original, there would be NO organization to the dock whatsoever, and then we 'really' would've been screwed.
Just because you're a Mac User doesn't mean you have to hate Windows and disparage it whenever possible... it just means you prefer the MacOS (with installers that delete drive partitions, a'la iTunes2)...
jinkies... why some people can't realize that I'll never know...
g.
/me steps down from the soapbox.

P.S. Before you flame me, look at the sig:

[Nonsuch]

I just love this kind of thing:

Originally posted by graffix:
<STRONG>
While I don't think the Windows taskbar is the pinnacle of usability, it does a far better job at it's intended tasks than the dock has... and the dock is on it's second revision!... if people hadn't REALLY bitched and complained about the original, there would be NO organization to the dock whatsoever, and then we 'really' would've been screwed.</STRONG>

So Apple listened to its users, and that's somehow a sign of trouble? I thought the standard complaint was that Apple doesn't listen to us?

The Windows taskbar has been in use since Windows 95, and they're just now implementing the ability to consolidate app windows into one button; Windows users have waited 6 years for that elementary bit of design evolution. Compared to that, I'd say the Dock is evolving quite nicely; I would even say that within a year from now, the Dock will have enough capability, either natively or through 3rd-party adds, to squelch the objections of about 90% of users. (The other 10% will still be demanding the return of the Application menu. )

[Sine]

Originally posted by Luis Alcazar:
<STRONG>i have testes </STRONG>

Wow so do I!

[Sine]

Originally posted by dogzilla:
<STRONG>So, putting aside all the mac/pc zealotry for a moment - what is the upshot of this thread? Has anyone come up with something in which XP beats the pants off of OSX? That more than one person agrees with?

I just haven't got the energy to read through this mess of a thread.</STRONG>

I mentioned that I liked the theme tools XP had.

[Mr Scruff]

Originally posted by Nonsuch:
<STRONG>The Windows taskbar has been in use since Windows 95, and they're just now implementing the ability to consolidate app windows into one button; Windows users have waited 6 years for that elementary bit of design evolution. Compared to that, I'd say the Dock is evolving quite nicely; I would even say that within a year from now, the Dock will have enough capability, either natively or through 3rd-party adds, to squelch the objections of about 90% of users. (The other 10% will still be demanding the return of the Application menu. )</STRONG>

The window consolidation thing is actually quite irritating in XP. There comes a point when you have 6 or so explorer windows open, when you know the next one you open will collapse the lot into a single button. This means that you lose your on screen list of windows - which is annoying.

What you end up doing normally is closing a window or two to prevent this from happening. The only alternative is making your taskbar bigger to stop this happening (or disabling it), but then why have the feature in the first place?

[Nonsuch]

Originally posted by Mr Scruff:
<STRONG>

The window consolidation thing is actually quite irritating in XP. There comes a point when you have 6 or so explorer windows open, when you know the next one you open will collapse the lot into a single button. This means that you lose your on screen list of windows - which is annoying.

</STRONG>

Well, presumeably by that time, the buttons would have shrunk to the point where you couldn't read the window titles anyway, right?

[hmpff]

Originally posted by JorgeLL:
<STRONG>And come to think of it, nobody seemed to complain when 10.1 'incorporated' the XP login screen that wasn't there in 10.0.x...

Nice double standard there folks, everything Steve says is Good and everything Bill says is Bad; that's reaal smart.

Jorge</STRONG>

Are you on drugs? That login screen was in MAC OS 9!!! Microsoft copied it, right down to the plastic duck. You are reaaal smart.

[hmpff]

Originally posted by Spliffdaddy:
<STRONG>wow.

yet another thread where the Mac-heads lose an argument and start calling people names.


Seriously, a lot of you do a great disservice to the Mac platform by pretending that, somehow, it is perfect.


If it was perfect, 95% of computer sales wouldn't be going elsewhere.

There's some 'new math' for you.

If Mac = perfect, then 95% of the population is ignorant.

bravo, iCartman.</STRONG>

Wow, talk about faulty logic!!! 95% of the population use Windows, so that means Windows is better than Mac. 95% of the animals on this planet are insects, does that mean insects are smarter than humans? It's not about winning or losing an argument, it's about an operating system that we love. Go back to your PC forums, and take your conformist crap with you.

I don't like Windows, but I don't spend my days on PC forums writing useless comments about which operating system is better.

[b*tchy]

Wow this thread is ugly.

Anyway take a look at this:
http://www.macnightowl.com/newslette.../100.htm#thing

My list of things X could crib from XP is sort of similar:

1. Built in Firewall--a must these days.

2. Fast user switching with environment preservation-- this is a great idea. XP's implements it in a crummy way. Apple could do better.

3. Customization- I am also desperate to change my finder font and have full control over smoothing. To be fair this is not really an XP-only feature. It's available in just about every major desktop OS out there. And God I want to change the bold white on black text on the desktop.

4. Themes - We can debate this till we're blue in the face, but some of us will always want themes. Many of the problems that people warn about with themes could be avoided by adding a simple way to set everything back to the default state (a key held down at startup or a system pref pane).

5. A minor taskbar feature - I really would like to have an option to see the titles of open windows. (in my perfect OS I would also have and OS 9-like tabbed folder feature).

6. Contextual menus - XP does a great job here. 9 did an OK job. CM in X stink.

7. Built in defragmenting- X is fragmented out of the box (do a clean install and check it out in Norton). XP beats X hands down in this category.

8. System Restore-- seems like a great feature, but I would be happy with a simple way to clean install various system components like we had in OS 9.

9. Preservation of old settings- XP does an amazing job of keeping your old settings. The 9 to X upgrade would much simpler if the X installer could grab your old OS 9 internet prefs, desktop backgrounds, browser bookmarks and so on. To avoid problems for folks who want a clean install this should be prompted...


Anyway that's all I can think of. Before the hysterical among you can start screaming--no I am not thinking of switching to xp, no I don't prefer xp, I just want OS X to get better.

[ 11-04-2001: Message edited by: b*tchy ]

[michaelb]

Originally posted by KellyHogan:
<STRONG>So I have to dump my laptop Ti-Book portable G4 'supercomputer' for a desktop G5 that I can't carry around in order for PDF graphics to run smoothly on a graphics chip that can run Quake III with less problems?</STRONG>

Who said there won't be G5 Ti-Books? (Maybe they'll be made of an even more exotic metal by then. )

But your mention of the graphics chip is actually very appropriate. A good deal of the bottleneck with Quartz is that fact that the graphics chip is not helping out -- the computer's processor is having to do all the calculations to shovel all those double-buffered alpha-channeled pixels around the screen.

So it really is like running Quake III without a 3D card.

Hence my assertion that Mac OS X is pushing the current generation of hardware to its limits. But anyway, I find if I don't drink so much coffee, my G3's resizing of windows and scrolling through documents isn't so bad after all.


BTW, I predict within a year there will be OS X themes -- not from Apple -- but remember Greg Landweber started the whole themes thing way back when he brought the platinum appearance to System 7 in the form of an unsanctioned hack: Aaron. Greg is probably too old to start a new appearance hacking thing again, but some younger hotshot will have the energy to outrun Apple's lawyers. So if you really do want to make your OS look like the inside of Darth Maul's bedroom, chances are you'll be able to.

[Sine]

Originally posted by b*tchy:
<STRONG>Wow this thread is ugly.
My list of things X could crib from XP is sort of similar:

1. Built in Firewall--a must these days.</STRONG>

OS X has a built in Firewall.
<STRONG>

2. Fast user switching with environment preservation-- this is a great idea. XP's implements it in a crummy way. Apple could do better.
</STRONG>

Yeah *nixs have been doing this for years.. OS X will be able to soon. This doesn't really effect me though... I am the only one that uses my computer both at the house and at work
<STRONG>

3. Customization- I am also desperate to change my finder font and have full control over smoothing. To be fair this is not really an XP-only feature. It's available in just about every major desktop OS out there. And God I want to change the bold white on black text on the desktop.
</STRONG>

While I love the font.. I too wish I could make is smaller I agree Apple needs to fix this ASAP.
<STRONG>

4. Themes - We can debate this till we're blue in the face, but some of us will always want themes. Many of the problems that people warn about with themes could be avoided by adding a simple way to set everything back to the default state (a key held down at startup or a system pref pane).
</STRONG>

I agree here.. while some of us like myself have went ahead and made OS X themes anyhow.. This should be easier for your basic user to do.
<STRONG>

5. A minor taskbar feature - I really would like to have an option to see the titles of open windows. (in my perfect OS I would also have and OS 9-like tabbed folder feature).
</STRONG>

Move you mouse over the icons or use cmd-tab. I don't miss not having the names on my docked windows. I prefer them not to. But this is just a personal preference.
<STRONG>

6. Contextual menus - XP does a great job here. 9 did an OK job. CM in X stink.
</STRONG>

I hate the way XP tries to cram everything in the CM's though.. I liked the way OS 9 did it.
Can anyone say FinderPop for OSX?
<STRONG>

7. Built in defragmenting- X is fragmented out of the box (do a clean install and check it out in Norton). XP beats X hands down in this category.
</STRONG>

OS X like any other Unix OSs defragments on the fly. There should be no reason to have to routinely defrag your OS X drive. This is something MS got off of UNIX machines. UNIX has did this for a long time now. So does OS X.
<STRONG>

8. System Restore-- seems like a great feature, but I would be happy with a simple way to clean install various system components like we had in OS 9.
</STRONG>

I have never had luck with System Restore in Windows. It always installed things I didn't ask it to..or just screwed up all together. Maybe if Apple did it a better way.. that would be cool.
<STRONG>

9. Preservation of old settings- XP does an amazing job of keeping your old settings. The 9 to X upgrade would much simpler if the X installer could grab your old OS 9 internet prefs, desktop backgrounds, browser bookmarks and so on. To avoid problems for folks who want a clean install this should be prompted...
</STRONG>

OS X is the only OS that didn't take prefs from the old install and used it. That is because OS X is MUCH different than OS 9. Windows hasn't had this big of a OS change since Win95 came out to replace 3.1
<STRONG>

Anyway that's all I can think of. Before the hysterical among you can start screaming--no I am not thinking of switching to xp, no I don't prefer xp, I just want OS X to get better.
</STRONG>

I don't think anyone is going to scream at you. You made valid points and you'll find a lot of people agree.

OS X isn't The Be All End All of OSs that some people like to make it out to be. But it IS a great start. It has a bright future

[ 11-04-2001: Message edited by: Sine ]

[b*tchy]

A minor taskbar feature - I really would like to have an option to see the titles of open windows. (in my perfect OS I would also have and OS 9-like tabbed folder feature).

[b]Move you mouse over the icons or use cmd-tab. I don't miss not having the names on my docked windows. I prefer them not to. But this is just a personal preference. [/b

I hate scrubbing. I want persistant text labels as an option. Minimized windows are useless to me without them since most of my docs are indistinguishable when minimized. In it's current state the dock is less useful for me than the taskbar is re minimizing windows. As a launcher it works better than the taskbar. The best launching system for my money are OS 9s tabbed windows full of aliased apps. The dock would incorporate the best of all these with a bit of work. Grouping options would also be helpful. Dragthing replaces about 80% of the docks functions for me, but it still isn't integrated tightly enough to really be transparent.

Built in Firewall--a must these days.

OS X has a built in Firewall

Sure but Apple should put a friendly face on it similar to what they did for file sharing.

Preservation of old settings- XP does an amazing job of keeping your old settings.

OS X is the only OS that didn't take prefs from the old install and used it. That is because OS X is MUCH different than OS 9. Windows hasn't had this big of a OS change since Win95 came out to replace 3.1

Not an excuse. It would not be a big deal to go through and grab the OS 9 prefs from a selected system folder.

Built in defragmenting

OS X like any other Unix OSs defragments on the fly

Why then is my OS X drive always horribly fragmented after a month? I'm not trying to be sarcastic. Just wondering why.

[Mr Scruff]

Originally posted by Nonsuch:
<STRONG>

Well, presumeably by that time, the buttons would have shrunk to the point where you couldn't read the window titles anyway, right?</STRONG>

You would have thought so but no, not really. It happens before the taskbar buttons shrink to half their size, which is still enough room to identify the window from the text.

[Sine]

Originally posted by b*tchy:
I hate scrubbing. I want persistant text labels as an option. Minimized windows are useless to me without them since most of my docs are indistinguishable when minimized. In it's current state the dock is less useful for me than the taskbar is re minimizing windows. As a launcher it works better than the taskbar. The best launching system for my money are OS 9s tabbed windows full of aliased apps. The dock would incorporate the best of all these with a bit of work. Grouping options would also be helpful. Dragthing replaces about 80% of the docks functions for me, but it still isn't integrated tightly enough to really be transparent.

Having text in the dock would not only look horrible.. but like windows when you get more than a few items docked the text ends up getting cut off anyhow. Like "Windows.png" would look like "Wi....." I haven't seen a dock that used text correctly that didn't make my eyes hurt from the brute ugliness.

Sure but Apple should put a friendly face on it similar to what they did for file sharing.

So they can get 1000s of calls about why someone can't send something to another person VIA ICQ?
There are a few REAL GOOD GUI clients for Os X's firewall that work great.

Not an excuse. It would not be a big deal to go through and grab the OS 9 prefs from a selected system folder.

All except they don't use the same type of preferences.. and OS X has different settings than OS 9.

Why then is my OS X drive always horribly fragmented after a month? I'm not trying to be sarcastic. Just wondering why.

Hm I have no idea.. how much RAM do you have? After 4 months of having OS X installed I had less than 1% fragmentation on my HD..

[Brazuca]

Originally posted by Sine:
<STRONG>

Hm I have no idea.. how much RAM do you have? After 4 months of having OS X installed I had less than 1% fragmentation on my HD..</STRONG>

Hey Sine,

I had no idea that X defrags itself. Is there a built in way of checking the condition of my HD? Can you give a bit more info on this?

[c4zp3rgh0zt]

OSX should add hibernation as well. It's an increadibly useful feature, especially for laptops but still very cool for desktops as well.

[tigrr]

2. Advanced user switching. When you switch users in XP, your environment is preserved. When you switch back, your desktop is just as you left it. In an office or at home where people share machines, this feature is worth it's weight in gold.

Umm have you used 10.1 lately? that works on everyone of my machines.

3. A smarter taskbar. The XP taskbar is much more clever and practical than the dock. You can actually read window titles

the taskbar is just a beatup version of the old one and their alternative menu and nav choices crash every system they've been on since 98 SE.

4. Contextual Menus. It is clear that MS engineers actually use XP. Contextual menus are all over the place, intuative, and helful. OS X's contextual menus are an afterthought.[/QB][/QUOTE]

this is being implemented in newer updates. for those who don't know contextual menus are sometimes taken out temporarily to improve them on newer versions.

This whole XP thing cracks me up. IT is how it is, and it might LOOK pretty but when it comes down to it windows will never touch OS X simply because M$ isn't using open source anything to run their system and it's very clear.

Tried burning CD's and doing things while it's burning lately? Where's the protected memory? The whole stupid system is taken over by that LIMITED version of adaptec which to this day still have not released an upgrade to version 4.

As far as multitasking, no wonder XP has such huge demands for their processors &lt;the real reason intel boosted mhz&gt; to compensate for the lack of multitasking on XP on even the 1 ghz models. IT's a wonderful time to be a mac user.

OS X actually has what was promised in performance and it's getting better all the time.

[tigrr]

Originally posted by iCartman:
<STRONG>
#1. Roxio does not make Windows XP.
#2. There are many other CD burning programs besides Roxio's EZ-CD Creator (might I suggest Nero).
#3 You're unaware the XP has CD bruning built into the OS itself (just like OSX), third party programs are only needed if you want to do some advanced stuff (just like OSX).</STRONG>

yeah but they stole that from OS X. it's too obvious this time Bill. As far as burner support I have no idea what everyone is talking about....there is a ton a supported drives for itunes and disc burner and there will be upgrades &lt;which is something windoze users will have to pay for mostly...teehee&gt; while ours are free!

Ever try to burn a CD from office or from their movie maker or from their windows media player? I have and it sucks. I'll stick with the real OS you know the one that innovates ...when 10.9 arrives you'll be shown the light once again.

[Eug]

OS X like any other Unix OSs defragments on the fly. There should be no reason to have to routinely defrag your OS X drive. This is something MS got off of UNIX machines. UNIX has did this for a long time now. So does OS X.

On either platform, this has always scared me. How hard is it to kill your hard drive?

Twice now I've needed a hard reboot of OS X machine. A hard reboot of a defragging disc can seriously scramble something. I don't know if this is truly related, but after one of those hard reboots I had classic running and afterwards, OS 9 wouldn't load again because it said it was corrupted and tried to repair itself. After that it worked fine, but now I wonder if OS X was trying to defrag at the time.

[Immortal K-Mart Employee]

Originally posted by Eug:
<STRONG>On either platform, this has always scared me. How hard is it to kill your hard drive?</STRONG>

Why did you need to hard reboot?

I don't know if this OSX defragging is true. Every time I look at my OSX drive with utilities it is always fragmented. I also don't hear the drive defragging.

You don't need to worry about your drive becoming corrupt. It is very rare to hear anything like that with OSX.

Are you sure you are getting that message at startup right? If OS9 crashes it is normal for it to run disk first aid at startup. It does not mean it is currupt, it is just checking for any problems.

[ 11-05-2001: Message edited by: Immortal K-Mart Employee ]

[Eug]

Why did you need to hard reboot?

The first I think was the first day and I dunno what I did. Maybe I was just a stupid newbie. The second was days later after installing a bunch of new programs (incl. betas) and running them simultaneously along with classic programs and networked to my PC. Other than that it's been stable.

I like pushing my computers to the limit to see when they choke and with what. I'd say OS 9 is about 2 generations behind OS X in terms of stability. If I try, I can bring down OS 9 fairly quickly but with OS X it's pretty damn hard and with release apps, it's sometimes damn near impossible.

P.S. I ran the distributed net OGR client on the iBook yesterday for much of the day. (It uses 100% of the CPU cycles with the machine is idle. The machine heated up pretty quickly, but it stayed rock solid. Nice. I think it was a good idea for Apple to shut off the machine when the lid is closed. My PC laptop also is stable at 100% utilitization... until you close the lid. Then the OGR client can bring down the machine... way too hot.

Almost 500 posts K-Mart man... Heh.

[ 11-05-2001: Message edited by: Eug ]

[Spliffdaddy]

[ 11-05-2001: Message edited by: Spliffdaddy ]

[danengel]

I didn't read all posts before this one, so I hope this hasn't been told before.

Under Mac OS X, you can actually run processes from other users "logout-safe", but only CLI-apps. Simply type nohup something, logout and back again and it's still there. That's why we love the Terminal

[Ron Goodman]

I believe OS X only defragments the disk automatically if it's running on a UFS formatted drive. Most X installations use HFS+, and for them you need the normal Mac disk utilities to take care of things.

[b*tchy]

d user switching.

Umm have you used 10.1 lately? that works on everyone of my machines.

Your not understanding. When you switch users in OS X all your programs are quit and all your open documents are closed. If you are downloading something the download is halted.

Under XP you can switch users, then later switch back and be right back where you left off (your open apps are basically hidden from the new user). The way XP does this is not perfect and OS X could do it better but when you actually share a machine with someone, this feature is fantastic. A few of the unix flavors also switch users like this, so it should be possible.

the taskbar is just a beatup version of the old one and their alternative menu and nav choices crash every system they've been on since 98 SE.

I thought I made it clear the only 2 features of the taskbar I prefer over the dock are:

1) that you have the option to see titles of windows (without scrubbing)

and

2) that you have grouping options.

That's it. Nobody is saying the taskbar is universally better than the dock... both have problems.

As for the rest of your post, it's similar to many of the zealots around here and just starts flying off the handle. I don't understand why everytime someone says something nice about a particular XP, OS 9, Linux, or Be feature that we all have to be subjected to off topic diatribes about how shitty the systems are in general (often these type of postings end with the tag "If you like [fill in the blank with the OS of choice] so much then why don't you switch." You guys are like the Mac Taliban.

We all want the same thing here--a better OS X. Sigh. Anyway back to discussion.

I believe OS X only defragments the disk automatically if it's running on a UFS formatted drive. Most X installations use HFS+, and for them you need the normal Mac disk utilities to take care of things.

Several people have emailed that this is the case...If so ,a built in HFS+ defragger would be fantastic. For whatever reason HFS+ OS X drives seem to get fraggy much faster than HFS+ OS 9 drives.

[nana2]

Originally posted by tigrr:
<STRONG>Tried burning CD's and doing things while it's burning lately? Where's the protected memory? The whole stupid system is taken over by that LIMITED version of adaptec which to this day still have not released an upgrade to version 4.

As far as multitasking, no wonder XP has such huge demands for their processors &lt;the real reason intel boosted mhz&gt; to compensate for the lack of multitasking on XP on even the 1 ghz models. IT's a wonderful time to be a mac user.
</STRONG>

Why would I be using some crippled POS built-in software? Roxio/Adaptec burning software suxs. I use Nero myself - (free download, you can dl a new version once every month or two). I just start a burn (takes around 2-3% CPU utilisation). Then I carry on with what I was doing previously. If I had a burnproof capable drive (I don't find the need), if the buffer ran low, it would pause recording till the buffer filled and then continue on it's way. I can buy any IDE or SCSI burner, plug it in, and burn straight away. Why? Because I don't need a driver for them! No need to wait for Apple to pull it's finger out and release iTunesofDeath ver2.01.02488

LOL, a Mac user talking about lack of multitasking. Look, you've only just joined the wonderful world of pre-emptive multitasking in your Mac OSX, x86 users have had that for years! Of course winXP is a memory hog, are you saying that OS X isn't? I would sincerely hope that OS X gets better because it is more like a half completed DeathStar at the moment.

[Sine]

Originally posted by nana2:
<STRONG>

Why would I be using some crippled POS built-in software? Roxio/Adaptec burning software suxs. I use Nero myself - (free download, you can dl a new version once every month or two). I just start a burn (takes around 2-3% CPU utilisation). Then I carry on with what I was doing previously. If I had a burnproof capable drive (I don't find the need), if the buffer ran low, it would pause recording till the buffer filled and then continue on it's way. I can buy any IDE or SCSI burner, plug it in, and burn straight away. Why? Because I don't need a driver for them! No need to wait for Apple to pull it's finger out and release iTunesofDeath ver2.01.02488 </STRONG>

Hmm I installed a plain jane PC CDR burner.. made by LiteOn.. I had no problem with my G3 running OS X using it. Most any PC CDR burners will work with OS X.
<STRONG>

LOL, a Mac user talking about lack of multitasking. Look, you've only just joined the wonderful world of pre-emptive multitasking in your Mac OSX, x86 users have had that for years! Of course winXP is a memory hog, are you saying that OS X isn't? I would sincerely hope that OS X gets better because it is more like a half completed DeathStar at the moment.</STRONG>

Win NT Win2K and WinXP are the only Win OSs that had TRUE multitasking and TRUE memory protection. If you was running Win95 or Win98 or WinMe then no.

And Windows has looked like A patched together Death Star for years.. You should be used to that.

[dogzilla]

Originally posted by nana2:
<STRONG>I would sincerely hope that OS X gets better because it is more like a half completed DeathStar at the moment.</STRONG>

Of course, even the half-completed Death Star was powerful enout to completely obliterate an entire planet with no problem. Maybe you're more right that you realize.

[grok420]

Glad to see this thread get back on track. It really derailed there for a while. People take this crap WAY too personally..

I've been running XP Pro at work for a few weeks. We got it early through MSDN. Couple of items I'd like to add:

1) the fast user switch (pretty cool feature) doesn't work if your machine is on a domain. Only standalone machines or in workgroups. That makes it pretty useless to me. They should be able to add this to OS X, Unix is better suited to multiuser enviroments anyway. Add it to my wishlist.

2) I'm really disappointed that all OS X vs Windows debates essentially deteriorates into a shouting match over the GUI. It's so completely subjective I don't know why you bother. Dock vs Taskbar, aliased or anti-aliased, whatever. XP doesn't suck because the GUI is ugly. OS X doesn't suck because the Dock is clunky. Sheesh. I realize a lot of mac users are in the design world, but get a grip. Just cuz you don't like how it looks doesn't mean it 'sucks'. That just means you don't like how it looks. Why not argue over what tastes better, pizza or spaghetti?

That said, the GUI should be COMPLETELY customizable for just that reason. Apple needs to lighten up about themes (branding be damned) and MS needs to hire some REAL artists. At least Luna can be turned off.

3) I feel the need to rebuke the FUD. GUI preferences aside, XP (and win2K for that matter) are ROCK solid. My win2k network machines crash less than 10 times a year. Every time I hear people talking about win2k crashing, I wonder what on earth they are doing to those poor machines. XP Pro has been running non-stop on my box for almost 3 weeks, hasn't crashed yet. I doubt it will very soon. It might hurt you to hear that, but its true.

Ran win2k Pro for a year, XP pro feels every bit as fast if not faster. There is not a single task that I have noticed it running slower than win2k. Again, this is my workstation that I use 8-10 hours a day, not a demo box at CompUSA. XP is NOT slow. That's on a PIII 600 with 256 MB RAM. Not a killer rig, by any stretch. I've got it running beautifully on P2 350 machines with SQL server 2000. Not a problem AT ALL.

4) Another item on my wishlist, Remote Desktop. Basically Terminal Services for those of you who know NT/Win2k Server. It's built into XP Pro (not sure about Home). Not only can I control any XP box or NT/Win2K box running Terminal Server, but I can setup a website on my XP workstation that I can remotely connect to and then control machines from a browser. VERY VERY VERY cool. And yes, it has good security settings.

I like OS X better, mainly because of the Unix tools. The GUI is slick, but not slick enough if the Unix wasn't there. Like many OS X fans, however, I don't get a chance to run it because I can't really afford the hardware. Bummer.

[godzookie2k]

I would sincerely hope that OS X gets better because it is more like a half completed DeathStar at the moment.

Thats the best desription of X I've ever heard... so appropos.

Nick

[limbotron]

Having text in the dock would not only look horrible.. but like windows when you get more than a few items docked the text ends up getting cut off anyhow. Like "Windows.png" would look like "Wi....." I haven't seen a dock that used text correctly that didn't make my eyes hurt from the brute ugliness.

Well, it depends and that's why I want this as an OPTION!!!! I have dual screens. One is 1600 pixels wide the other is 1280 wide. I have plenty of space for my window titles...

Anyway even on a smaller screen:

if I have three files name "foo.html", "boo.html", and "zoo.html"

and they are minimized to "fo..","bo..", and "zo"...

while ugly, these minimizations are more useful than three identical indistinguishable miniaturized icons.

I actually use my Mac to do real work, and sometimes function must take precedence over form.

[ 11-06-2001: Message edited by: limbotron ]

[Sine]

Well considering your mouse is going to be at the dock to uncock the item in the first place.. while its there the text pops up. I've never had to second guess or anything.. it's just natural.

[b*tchy]

Well considering your mouse is going to be at the dock to uncock the item in the first place.. while its there the text pops up. I've never had to second guess or anything.. it's just natural.

Well we obviously do different kinds of work. I edit raw HTML all day. At any given time I'll have 10 to 15 minimized windows of HTML which right now, when minimized, are indistinguishable. I also have a big screen. I don't want to scrub the dock to see where which document is which. I want to go right to it.

[Sine]

Originally posted by b*tchy:
<STRONG>Well considering your mouse is going to be at the dock to uncock the item in the first place.. while its there the text pops up. I've never had to second guess or anything.. it's just natural.

Well we obviously do different kinds of work. I edit raw HTML all day. At any given time I'll have 10 to 15 minimized windows of HTML which right now, when minimized, are indistinguishable. I also have a big screen. I don't want to scrub the dock to see where which document is which. I want to go right to it.</STRONG>

In every Windows machine I have ever used I there was many times I had to open the documents to find out what they was. At least in OS X you can get the full name all the time.

[opsotta]

When I need 600MHz, just to run XP (an not a single app), someone else
can have the fun. :-)