Irfan’s Corner on the Web On Mac, Linux, Grid, Virtualization and Software Technology

Switched to the Mac!

Its happened! I finally completely switched to the Mac. I was a linux user for more than 8 years so what factors drove me to the Mac?

1, Unstable hardware support in Linux: Don't get me wrong, linux has come a long way in supporting all kinds of hardware. Initially I was a slackware user and always loved to hack my way round, but as I progressed in my studies I realized that I didn't have the time anymore to hack around my system and I should settle for more mature distributions, for a long time I used OpenSuse 10.1/10.2, to me 10.3 is very disappointing so I switched yet again to Ubuntu, which I used till I switched to the Mac. It almost always doesnt support the latest hadware, like the Ipod Classic 6G, initially setting up widescreen resolutions was a challenge and there was this weird problem with linux on the Dell Inspiron where the sound would not be directed to the headphone when one was plugged in rather it would continue to the main speakers. I bought once a webcam, only to find that the linux driver was not available and I had to do some hacking to find what chip it used then I downloaded the appropriate driver however it would show very crap quality where-as in windows it worked perfect. Then I had problems with my scanner, xsane sometimes worked with it sometimes it didnt, Windows always did. Always when I had to setup a dual monitor in the workplace or home, I always had to hack the X config file because even the most popular distributions like Ubuntu 7.10 couldn't do it out of the box.

2, Software: This is the main reason why I switched. I'm a PhD student and I often require access to MS Word for peer reviewing documents and Adobe Professional aswell as Mathematica. OpenOffice has still a long way to go, and I simply hate the way OOo shows changes and comments in documents. The balloon style display in Word is so much more convenient. Initially I used to have a dual boot setup, but since Linux distributions became more and more mature, I could compeltely throw out windows, and run it in VMware for all the software I required within the Linux environment, this setup worked for me right form my undergrad. I also had to keep Windows around for drivers for my cellphone, iTunes, camera etc...

I first explored the mac on my pentium 4 machine, which I documented here. Now I have purchased a Macbook Pro. There were several factors which pulled me to the other side aswell:

1, Leopard: I had seen screenshots and reviews and used Mac OSX 10.4 and I knew that I would love the OS. I could access all open souce software from the Open source world at the same time have access to MS Office:mac. I am so much more productive in leopard, it deals with so many things automatically, and features such as Folder Actions, Automator are simply God sent. Leopard also seamlessly works with all my hardware and it also does dual monitor very smoothly without any manual configuration supporting supporting native resolutions in both screens. Often in Linux I ended up with identical resolutions in both displays ending up with inferior resolution on the external monitor.

2, The Hardware: The Macbook Pro, is a beautiful piece of hardware. Most laptops you get from other vendors are filled with stickers and license keys and tag and misc on the back side. But the Macbook Pro hardly has anything on the backside, ad there are no stickers, rather a smooth surface. The features of the hardware like backlit keyboard, excellent screen, which is waay more brighter than my previous screen and has more resolution, also the superior hardware specs of the new Macbook Pros are simply worth buying.

3, The Software: The Mac to me is the perfect compromise between windows and Linux. It has all the stuff I used in Linux and it has also all the stuff I use in Windows, all in one environment without the need for any kind of virtualization. Talking about virtualization, I simple love Parallels and its coherence mode. It completely integrated into the MacOSX environment, clicking on files supported by programs in windows in Finder, the appropriate windows program would fireup. I also note the software for the mac is generally of higher quality then for opensource or windows.

I'll follow up this post with a post on what thinks Linux distribution should 'steal' from Leopard.