Hey, Preston Gralla fans! His latest missive has just hit the webwaves and he’s mad as hell and shan’t take it anymore. His thesis? Vista beats OS X. Let’s go through his suppositions and take umbrage with his arguments.
Reason #1: Vista runs more software
Mac OS X is a very pretty operating system, but beauty runs only skin deep. An operating system by itself is a poor thing — it’s the applications that run on top of it that matter. And here’s where Mac OS X falls short. It can’t run much common software, including enterprise applications and games.
It’s true that OS X is unable to run enterprise applications and games. This is a horrible oversight on Steve Jobs’ part who, when OS X was being designed, implicitly stated that this operating system would not run enterprise applications and games, just as Vista can never run a good photo manager or movie making system. This is a design failure and absolutely unacceptable. In fact, the kernel itself will crash if you try to write Quicken for OS X. It’s horrible and nothing can be done about it.
Reason #2: Vista is safer
Vista is clearly safer because it often crashes and has very few drivers for popular hardware. This prevents people from using it and possibly getting into trouble.
Reason #3: It’s the money, stupid
If you’ve got a lot of extra spare cash laying around that you don’t care about, then by all means, buy a Mac. But if, like most of the world, you’ve got to work for a living, then you’ll find that a Vista machine is far less expensive than a Mac.
It’s true: Mac computers cost over $5 million dollars at Apple Stores and more online. This is another business oversight. I sold my kidney to get a MacBook Pro when I could have bought a $500 laptop from Dell that can’t run Vista.
Reason #4: The Mac is closed; Vista is open
Any person or company who wants to build a PC with Vista on it, and either sell it, or use it themselves, is perfectly free to do so, as long as they buy the operating system. Try to do that with a Mac, and you’ll be spending some face time with Apple’s attack dog lawyers.
Yes. He’s right. Jobs has attack dog lawyers.
Reason #5: Two words — Steve Jobs
Two words+this.wordcount(): Steve Jobs has led a company that has consistently put out a strong product on schedule and with few major support snafus. Say that about Vista, Dell, HP, and Matt Hickey’s mom. There is plenty to recommend for both operating systems, but this gripping yarn is absolute bull. Each of these points have been discussed endlessly and to repeat them at Computerworld in the guise of a column is lazy and digg-baiting. Mr. Preston Gralla, for shame. Your ham-handedness demeans the name of fanbois everywhere.