Low End Mac Reader Specials

TypeStyler For Mac OS X is Now Shipping! Download The Free Fully Functional 60 Day Tryout at www.typestyler.com

OWC: Plug & Play Hardware RAID up to 8.0TB. High Performance, Data Redundant Solutions. FireWire 800, FireWire 400, USB2, or eSATA. Hot Swappable Bays, Data Rates over 200MB/s. Click here

Poker Mac Don't install Parallels to play poker online! Poker Mac will show you how to download and install a native Mac poker application such as Full Tilt Poker Mac.

Laptop Hardware Provided by TechRestore - Overnight Mac & iPod Repairs.

Compare products like desktop computers, apple laptops, apple macs, and LCD Monitors side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for new mobile phones, sat nav systems, or MP3 players. The Ciao online shopping community makes searching products easy for you.

That Old Mac Magic

Casual Comfort: Why I Use a Mac

- 2006.01.25

In my introductory column, I told you a little bit about why I use Macs. I wrote, "Apple makes and markets computers with panache. They don't appeal to everyone, but they appeal to me."

Allow me to give you three reasons why.

I Work, Therefore I Mac (corny, I know, but stay with me)

Let me first touch on a key factor that has kept mine a Mac household for lo these many years - I use PCs at work.

Now, now, this isn't going to turn into a fire-and-brimstone tirade about Macs being the only true path to computer salvation. I'm not going to consign all Wintel boxes to the trash heap as utterly useless wastes of plastic, metal, and silicon.

No, I'm not going to go there, because I really don't have anything against PCs.

Really, I don't! As a communications writer in the human resources arena, my job involves a lot of writing, editing, and group presentations, so I've become quite familiar with Word, PowerPoint, and Quark over the years.

With few exceptions, I've found the variety of different PCs that I've used to be good tools for doing my job. When I boot up my Dell OptiPlex GX270 every morning, I really don't say to myself, "Man, I really wish I had a G5!"

As a matter of fact, I grew to love my Sony VAIO notebook that I used for the better part of four years. It had a terrific keyboard, a gorgeous 15" screen, and more than enough power to get the job done. It was eye-catching, too - at group presentations, when other presenters trotted out their ho-hum Dells and ThinkPads, my slate-blue and purple VAIO would invariably draw comments.

Of course, my happy acceptance of PC technology at work comes with a very big caveat - that all of that technology is backed by an IT staff that works virtually nonstop to maintain, safeguard, and upgrade it. It's the whole structure - hardware/software and support - that makes using PCs at work mostly painless.

Having seen teams of technicians labor a whole day to get my PC up and running on a number of occasions and having known folks who have spent many hours and many dollars to fix their wonky, virus-ridden PCs, there is no way I would want to bring such a potential nightmare into my home - especially not now, when home networking, high-speed Internet, spyware, and viruses have introduced a new level of complexity and danger.

No thanks, I'll stick with my comfy, stylish iBook.

Slipping into Something More Comfortable

For me, the difference between Macs and PCs is like the difference between work clothes and casual clothes. When I go to work, I dress a certain way because it is both expected and necessary for my business. However, when I come home each evening, the first thing I do is change into something more comfortable.

While appropriate and necessary for work, my work clothes are not what I want to chill out in for the rest of the evening. In other words, I use PCs all day at work, and I prefer to use something different (no "think different" jokes, please), less formal, and a tad offbeat when I get home.

The Mac suits that part of my personality.

Swimming Upstream

Did you ever see one of those nature documentaries about salmon? If so, you know that each year when its time to spawn, salmon swim up countless freshwater streams and rivers to spawn. (You may have also seen this phenomenon in documentaries about grizzly bears, who tend to eat many of these salmon - but I digress.)

I've always liked these salmon - being themselves (as if they knew something else to be), fighting the current, going against the grain, doing what they have to do in spite of the rest of the world.

I tend to be like those salmon in many areas of life. I like to explore things and build my own ways, habits, passions, and opinions. The Mac appeals to that part of my personality - I like that it's different, and I like that I'm in the minority.

I especially like that extra little glance I get when I pull out my now ho-hum (by MacBook Pro standards) iBook G3/900 at Panera to work on this column or something else. It says, "Oh, he's one of those!" Call me crazy, but I like that.

So, okay, enough already about why I use Macs. Like I said at the beginning, Macs suit me, but they don't suit everybody.

And that suits me just fine. LEM

Recent That Old Mac Magic articles

Links for the Day

Recent Content on Low End Mac

Recent Deals

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

That Old Mac Magic articles copyright ©2005-06 by John Martorana. Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2009 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
  LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
  Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
  Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
  PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
  Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, iPhone, PowerBook, MacBook, MagSafe, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.

Custom Search

Amazon.com

Navigation

Used Mac Dealers
Apple History
Video Cards
Email Lists

Favorite Sites

MacSurfer
MacMinute
MacInTouch
MyAppleMenu
InfoMac
Macs Only!
The Mac Observer
Accelerate Your Mac
RetroMacCast
PB Central
MacWindows
The Vintage Mac
   Museum
DealMac
DealsOnTheWeb
Mac2Sell
ramseeker
Mac Driver Museum
JAG's House
System 6 Heaven
System 7 Today
the pickle's Low-End
   Mac FAQ
Abandonware
   Petition
Mac vs. PC Info

Affiliates

The Apple Store
Mac Connection
B&H
MacMall
TechRestore
ExperCom
Crucial Memory
batteries.com

Advertise

All of our advertising is handled by BackBeat Media. For price quotes and advertising information, please contact at BackBeat Media (646-546-5194). This number is for advertising only.

Open Link

Problems viewing this page with Internet Explorer 5.5 or 6? It works fine in other browsers, including IE 7. We recommend Firefox for those using Windows, as it is standards based and more secure than IE 6 (and earlier). More LEM visitors use Firefox than any other browser.