Mad Dog

Wash that taste of Intel out of my mouth!

I've been a consumer of home computers thru the years, and have tried different brands, platforms, systems along the way. Here is my purchase history (in part):

1982 - Apple II+
1991 - Acer ACROS 325SX
1997 - Compaq Presario w/ Pentium Chip
1999 - iMac (Bondi Blue original)
2001 - HP Pavilion Pentium 4, Dell laptop with Linux
2005 - iMac mini, Gateway Intel Celeron notebook

The two iMacs and the Dell laptop have mostly been for play and education. The HP desktop is my 'workhorse' that has all my financial data and documents. If I had to recommend a computer for a young person or a newbie, I'd recommend something like my $575 Gateway with Windows XP. Why? It's inexpensive, practical, easy to use, and there is a ton of software available. Having used all the different platforms and OS's, I can identify things I might prefer about Linux or Mac. But being practical in the extreme, I opt for Windows XP.

When Steve Jobs of Apple announced recently that Apple computers would be powered by Intel, Mac heads the world over screamed bloody murder. They felt some type of ultimate betrayal, that their leader had made a Faustian, unthinkable bargain with the "Wintel" monopoly. I know a guy who steadfastly uses Linux for everything, home and work. If a utility doesn't exist, he'll write it. Mind you, his work is obtuse and no one else could possibly ever follow it or use it, but he's sticking it to Bill Gates! I'll be kind about Mac and Linux -- Mac has a beautiful interface and cool apps like iLife. It is also ungodly difficult to access Windows networks (you have to buy a 3rd party tool called Dave), and it doesn't offer anything that isn't available on Windows in a less hip (and way less costly) package. Linux is a wonderful open-source system. It offers ungodly complicated software with inconsistent packaging and interfaces that could give fits to programming professionals. Attention geeks:

1- We live in a capitalistic society. That product will succeed which gives people what they want, at the right price.
2- Computers are for everyone, not just geeks and engineers. That product will succeed which has a consistent, easy interface and is kind to newbies.

Mac fails on point 1 -- it's overpriced and missing a lot of software, as well as interoperability with the Windows world. Linux fails on point 2. It takes a PHD in Computer Science to navigate Linux very comfortably.

Reading Webster's definition of cult, I think they are too mild: "great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work (as a film or book); especially : such devotion regarded as a literary or intellectual fad". Well Mac and Linux qualify as cults, even by that tepid definition. My definition of cult would be: adherence to an idea, where action disjoins from reason, and emotion supersedes logic. Thus, you have computer advocates who reflexively foam at the mouth over anything which threatens their movement -- their glass menagerie of Mac-dom in this case. Will Windows and Bill Gates reign forever? Maybe not. But whatever unseats them will be something that stands the test of marketability and usability -- not the wails and gnashing of teeth by ultra-geeks and Mac heads.