Should I buy an Apple laptop?

moral equivalency

OK so 'equivalent' was not correct, OSX is far superior to windows. I like Apple, and I bought an MBP because I figured £200-300 was worth it to have a play with OSX. I loved OSX, but I tried to reformat and my OSX DVD broken so I installed Ubuntu and I've been pretty happy with it. Now I see that to buy a Mac is about £500 more than a 'PC' with the same hardware inside and I just wonder if that half-grand justifies itself?

Maybe it does - what are the technical reasons that certain industries require Mac OS? I'm not an expert on this but I was talking to a designer friend the other day who claimed that if he bought a Windows machine he would be 'laughed out of the office'.

Already addressed upthread

There are technical reasons, but it's not the type of thing you can make a black-and-white case out of. For every Mac tit in the chamber, there's a Wintel tat in the clip. To properly evaluate whether Mac or Windows or Linux or whatever is right for you or yr company, you've either got to spend plenty of quality time with each platform or discuss the matter with someone whose needs are similar to yrs and who has done this. And if you choose wrong, you can choose again later and it all counts under the former category.

I've been "the industry" for 12 years now, and I've had Mac OS, Mac OS X, Windows, Solaris, IRIX, FreeBSD, NetBSD, NeXTSTEP, and Linux as my regular desktop OS in that time. Of those, Mac OS X has been and still is by far what makes me personally most productive. Other folks' experiences obviously differ from mine, yet I wouldn't claim that their opinions on the matter are any less valid. You need to use what works best for you and stop fretting about making the wrong choice.

Let me boil it down into a couple sentences: If you are not confident enough to choose a computer based on yr own knowledge, find someone you trust and take their advice. When you are confident enough, you may discard the previous advice.

m not an expert on this but I was talking to a designer friend the other day who claimed that if he bought a Windows machine he would be 'laughed out of the office'.

well this is probably just down to snobbery

graphic design requires mac os because the industry came up with it...a Mac SE, postscript, ATM, Pagemaker, Laserwriters. While there'd be plenty of textbook publishers working with Ventura Publisher on PCs and whatnot, the Mac desktop publishing revolution was real and became standard and still is. Years later compatibility became a big issue, I still remember the days of working at one of the top printers in NYC and getting powerpoint and word and publisher files and having to output pages to postscript to place in quark just to do large format printing. At this point, the actual software is virtually identical, but the industry is filled with designers who contrary to some opinions, are not on the cutting edge of anything and still want to use Quark 3.32 or whatever it was. The entire industry is lurching towards InDesign, some places more quickly then others, but Quark 6 (or 4) on a Mac is still the only thing most print designers are comfortable working with.

YES

Okay Jed, not thousands less sorry, but well over a thousand less.

Pretty much I need it for running Pro Tools, which doesn't run on Leopard (also it's unlikey to for a good while).

Jon, I've had my last computer since about 2001 (and am hanging onto it to do retarded internet shit), if this is anything similar then I'm forgetting about resale value.

Finally, I find Macs difficult to use. I'm sure I could work it out in a week or so, but why bother? I prefer PCs.

Pro Tools does run on Windows.

I don't understand what makes macs "hard to use."

Quark 3.32 basically does everything you need. Nice little program.

JW there are people who think all computers are "hard to use."

Pro Tools does run on Windows.

-- libcrypt, Tuesday, 29 April 2008 02:09 (18 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Which is why I'm getting a Windows machine.

Jon, just lack of familiarity.

i don't understand why you'd post on this thread if you want to use pc-specific software and don't know how to use a mac. ya, we get it, you're not gonna get a mac.

Pro Tools runs on Macs as well. Just not the new OS yet

Sorry for using a thread titled 'Should I buy an Apple laptop?' for musing about whether or not I should buy an Apple laptop.

I could sell you my clamshell, which runs 9.3.

Naughty.

didn't know that about ProTools, that's pretty ridiculous. The history or ProTools dates back to mac-centric software. Sound Designer, SD II, Audiomedia...

Quark 3.32 basically does everything you need. Nice little program.

nah...InDesign does so many amazing things, it's really hard to go back. I mean, once you've grabbed a dozen images from your desktop and dragged them into a layout, dropping them into multiple frames one at a time, with each frame already set to fit the images...makes it really hard to go back to Quark.

Actually my part-time job, the one that pays most of the rent, they're still on Quark 6.5.

Pro tools will take ages to appear for leopard as Avid/Digidesign remain eternally grumpy that apple destroyed its happy monopoly on mid-range video editing. They also lost a tonne of money last year, a lo of it from digidesign as so many other products can now do significant chunks of what ProTools can do. (they also lost a tonne of money through their arrogance and generally pissing of key people they should be working with in the video industry).

for hand:

http://gizmodo.com/384526/exclusive-video-psystar-in-the-wild

The entire industry is lurching towards InDesign, some places more quickly then others, but Quark 6 (or 4) on a Mac is still the only thing most print designers are comfortable working with.

Depends who you ask. I work for a large commercial printer and we've banned Quark completely. After fighting with Quark's post-version 3 products I believe this is a sound decision.

Maybe it's because I'm youngish, but I only know one person who still uses Quark compared to maybe 10 InD users.

I emailed the prepress guy at our printer and asked him what percentage of jobs they get in ID vs. QXP, just out of curiosity. Will report the answer tomorrow. He may not know for sure, since jobs come in to them as press-ready PDFs usually now.

I haven't touched QXP in about 5 years.

For what it's worth, I speak as somebody who's freelanced at many agencies of different sizes doing Mac production work for the better part of the last 10 years. Many of the larger and older companies are still using Quark because they're so accustomed to basically just picking up old files and modifying them. I don't know how well the Markzware Quark to Indesign utility is selling, or how well it works, I'm sure it's better then what I've had to do a few years back which involved saving Quark files back to 5, then to 4 just to open in InDesign CS and CS2. That and older art directors are still loathe to learn a new program. Trust me, I'm no fan, although I work much faster in Quark (10+ years of use will do that) and I think InDesign has a few really stupid techniques, but they're way overcome by the great features.

I'm sure young people getting into design now are learning with InDesign, but every place I've worked in the last 5 years have all still been Quark, and that includes 2 of the big 10 advertising firms, several small and medium sized general and pharm. advertising firms, 1 major newspaper of record, and the internal studio of 1 major leather goods designer.

Pro tools will take ages to appear for leopard as Avid/Digidesign remain eternally grumpy that apple destroyed its happy monopoly on mid-range video editing. They also lost a tonne of money last year, a lo of it from digidesign as so many other products can now do significant chunks of what ProTools can do. (they also lost a tonne of money through their arrogance and generally pissing of key people they should be working with in the video industry).

any actual facts to back this apparent total speculation up?

also yeah companies really dig pissing off/alienating a large part of their customer base to 'get back' at a company that already took a great deal of its market share. for fuck's sake.

lots of bad engineering decisions made by adobe et al

Option to use Logic instead of Pro Tools now on the table, and IT dude recommends a higher end Acer or Fujitsu over Dell.

FFS, why can't I hand in work on 4track cassette.

logic mac only, i really dislike it as a daw but some people are all over it

Rumor has it Quark wasn't going to be OSX compatible until a certain sometime ILXor and her friend, who's father may run Quark told said father he was nuts. Quark would be ancient history by now if they hadn't.

I use Performer, fwiw. Since version 3 on a Mac Plus.

It's amazing how industries can shift...Opcode Studio Vision was first with digital audio and almost completely knocked Performer out of the game, but MOTU came out with the 2408 interface, first real low-cost multi-channel interface. Where's Vision now?

i remember opcode - you had to get the damn drivers in order to do anything with protools

Heard back from my contact at the printer -- he said that more and more jobs are coming in as PDFs, but the ones that are native files are 70% ID, 30% QXP.

my girlfriend, who runs the the student graphic design firm on our campus, uses indesign exclusively for layout. very few of the design jobs shes applying for require quark knowledge... not that this contradicts anything anyones been saying, but even my quark-loving dad has switched to indesign, not that he does layout anymore at all

I like Logic quite a bit, although I'm more familiar with Pro Tools. If you have issues with Macs being "overpriced", though, then you gotta have a massive hate-on for Digi.

^ i do

One of the nifty things about Logic is that you can use a (not-too) old Mac as a DSP farm. Conversely with Pro Tools, you can trade in yr first-born to Digi to get more DSP action.

logic mac only, i really dislike it as a daw but some people are all over it

To overgeneralize, I've found that Logic is great for composition while ProTools' strength is straight-up multitrack recording.

Also, I haven't upgraded to Logic 8 yet so that difference may not exist

logic you fucks! behead the infidels!

i still fuck w/quark a lot - tho i wouldnt start a new project w/it it

ive used the markzware quark to indesign utility a little bit and it seems really good - tho my testing has been by no means exhaustive

I think all the smaller and sharper shops have already switched to ID, it's the bigger older agencies with years and years of archives and stodgy creatives who are holding on. I didn't take InDesign seriously until my friend who started a really hip 2 person design firm with very cool clients said he never uses Quark anymore. Still, the freelance agencies in NY and the types of firms they place people at, as mentioned all the big advertising firms, are still stuck with it. Personally, I can't wait till everyplace switches so I can get as good at ID as I am with Quark, and am hoping I'm just not quite fluent enough with ID, as some of how ID works seems a bit more painful then it needs to be, all the stuff with selecting the container vs the content, the Paste Into command, gets overly complicated. I've tried creating key commands to make it faster to a little success.

Option to use Logic instead of Pro Tools now on the table, and IT dude recommends a higher end Acer or Fujitsu over Dell.

I'd suggest HP.

People like Thinkpads too, but my boss (video production) uses HP. (His next computer is a Mac)

a certain sometime ILXor and her friend, who's father may run Quark told said father he was nuts.
wau!

We're about to switch to InDesign at my office, and if we're doing it that means pretty much everybody else already has. Jon's right that Adobe's made lots of bad engineering decisions, but Quark were bafflingly bad at responding to users or updating their apps. I once saw an list of the wont-fix bugs in 4.1, and it was epic.

I've got one of the tiny thinkpads, and really like it a lot. The hardware's solid as hell and the battery goes forever.

how ID works seems a bit more painful
It's got a largely different metaphor from Quark, which took me a while to understand. Now I grok where it's coming from (Illustrator meets Pagemaker, kinda) I get on a lot better with it.

For me the learning curve was about ten days and the comfort curve was about two months.

To overgeneralize, I've found that Logic is great for composition MIDI while ProTools' strength is straight-up multitrack recording absolute market dominance.

The more I use Logic (8), the more I like it, crazy keyboard mappings notwithstanding.

I mean, WTF: <esc> brings up a menu????

I have remapped that, by the way.

pretty much everybody else already has

I WILL REPEAT...NOT EVERYBODY HAS! The last 4 places I've worked in the last 2 or 3 years have all been Quark. I know a lot can change in 2 years, but the place I am still is still Quark, and it's a pretty large operation.

I'm pretty good with InDesign, there's just this one major technique that keeps feeling awkward to me, likely because I'm still using Quark at the same time and it gets frustrating to go back and forth. I won't set InDesign to use Quark key commands because in the long-run I think that'll be lazy and I'd rather just get used to InDesign, not to mention having them consistent with other Adobe products. My main personal issue is that InDesign makes it so easy putting almost every command on a palette that I'm not learning keycommands. With Quark, I can like, layout a book without touching the mouse.

I just think switching between frame and content by using key commands to switch between frame and content tools in quark is quicker and more logical than switching between select and direct select and using that weird "container" button on InDesign.