Windows vista made macs viable

[MarxSchmarx]

I had this idea the other day and was wondering if anyone else felt the same.

Macs were a real fringe but quite slowly growing thing until the latter half of the 2000 decade. XP had a good run, and the Vista came out and got awful, awful press, most of it deserved. Then this gave Apple a real opening to exploit people's dissatisfaction with Microsoft and really catapulted them in terms of market share.

If windows came out with a good operating system, people would have been by and large fine with PCs. But vista really made people otherwise content with their PC think twice, and hesitate. If the next windows after xp hadn't been as disastrous at least from a pr perspective, apple would have had to wait quite a bit longer to see its appeal go up.

WHat do you think?

[xub3rn00dlex]

It's hard to argue against that, but I'm sure there are plenty of other factors. W7 isn't that much of a fucking mess really, but once jobs came back as CEO he catapulted apple into the position it is today. He was one hell of a marketer, and convinced millions apple was the only way to go.

[NewLeft]

Macs were popular in 2005, so I'd say it was just the fact that Windows XP looked like shit compared to uh what was it, Tiger? I wanted a Tiger, they had that sleek design with the white rims.. It was the design.

[socialistjustin]

Apple is genius and the thing I remember most about them back in the day was the colorful computers they put out. Stuff like this plus failures on Microsoft's part contributed to the rise.

[xub3rn00dlex]

Apple is genius and the thing I remember most about them back in the day was the colorful computers they put out. Stuff like this plus failures on Microsoft's part contributed to the rise.

In addition to Macs being famously "Virus free" while vista was a fucking open door pretty much...

[Tablo]

Vista's bad press was a big part of it. I think what really gave them the huge growth was their excellent marketing. Never would I have imagined they would have such a dedicated cult of consumers begging to buy their overpriced products.

[Nox]

The only reason Macs don't get as many viruses as PC's is because people don't bother making viruses for Macs.

BECAUSE THEY'RE SO SHIT!!!!!!!

[xub3rn00dlex]

The only reason Macs don't get as many viruses as PC's is because people don't bother making viruses for Macs.

BECAUSE THEY'RE SO SHIT!!!!!!!

Blah blah blah. Windows is shit too. The only reason viruses fuck windows so bad is because the whole architecture hasn't changed for 30 fucking years. Fuck computers, primitivism ftw!

[Aloysius]

This makes complete sense. Vista is a remarkably shitty OS, and if you couple that with the over-all smoothness of Apple products, the outcome is pretty obvious.

The only reason I'd get a Mac is for Garageband. PCs/Windows is much better as a workhorse/gaming machine.

[Sasha]

Vista's bad press was a big part of it. I think what really gave them the huge growth was their excellent marketing. Never would I have imagined they would have such a dedicated cult of consumers begging to buy their overpriced products.

but the foundation for that was already created decades ago with macs vast populairity among designers, which really made it the computer the cool kids had.
macs are not just excellent designed, they are more importantly excellent computers for graphic design (while lunix is for real nerds and windows is for wannabe nerds.)


The only reason Macs don't get as many viruses as PC's is because people don't bother making viruses for Macs.

BECAUSE THEY'RE SO SHIT!!!!!!!

its not (only) because they are shit, a friend of mine who is working in computer security told me that to understand the inherent overall weakness of various operating systems you need to visualize them as existing of little building bricks. now linux is buildt like a solid wall, remove one brick nothing happens, remove multiple and at most a really small part comes down.
apple is build like a pyramid, remove one brick and again nothing happens but start to remove more and arround the edges shit will be starting to collapse but the center remains pretty solid.
windows on the other hand is build like a fucking upside down pyramid, removing any brick will let huge portions collapse, take out the right one and the whole fucking thing comes down in one go.

[graymouser]

Macs had been slowly working their way towards the main stream well before Vista, although it certainly gave a boost to the sales. I think the iMac really kickstarted the popularity of Macs in the late 90s, and then when they came out with OS X a Mac became something really worth having, since it was no longer just a GUI but backed up with a better OS than Windows.

Vista certainly contributed, although MS has made some comeback with Windows 7. There is a lot of transition from Windows XP to Windows 7 - even at my job, an IT firm where we use MS products for most things, we skipped Vista entirely. (Although I have a laptop with Vista on it at home, I actually got Vista for free from Microsoft a few years back.)

[Lucretia]

XP was built off the old NT code, so it has always been stable. Certainly a far cry from those old blue screens of death. M$ then tinkered around with XP to justify releasing another OS they could box and sell for a couple of hundred dollars, which resulted in the disaster that was Vista. Now M$ is trying to make its OS look like Mac's UI with all sorts of annoying docking shit on the desktop. No thanks. Looks like I'll stick with XP for another ten years. In my opinion it's still the best modern OS for ordinary end users who want more bite than bark.

[Ocean Seal]

I'm going to go ahead and say that Macs captured the hipster market quite well. And then everyone else followed suit. I've never really like Mac products.

[Zav]

Yes, Vista's failure is beneficial to Apple, and made Apple converts.
Yes, Obama's failure is beneficial to the Republican Party, and made GOP converts.

In reality, both suck. GNU/Linux and Anarchy FTW!

[Nox]

http://weknowmemes.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/ancient-aliens-it-was-aliens.jpg

[ckaihatsu]

macs are not just excellent designed, they are more importantly excellent computers for graphic design (while lunix is for real nerds and windows is for wannabe nerds.)


On a minor note, one does not have to be a "real nerd" to readily use the Linux OS -- it's a common misconception. Certain variations, like the self-proclaimed 4th-most-used operating system, Linux Mint, is as easy to install and is as familiar in feel and usage as any commercial product you're used to using. Plus it's free...! Find an unused older PC machine somewhere and try it out. Now. Run, don't walk.


= )


(See other RevLeft threads for more info on this.)

[Sasha]

I'm going to go ahead and say that Macs captured the hipster market quite well. And then everyone else followed suit. I've never really like Mac products.

this was my first computer:
http://www.old-computers.com/museum/photos/Apple_Mac+_System_1.jpg
this was what the competition then looked like:

http://www.unixhub.com/images/txt1.jpg
since then never changed the winning team, not even in the almost bankrupt dark ages, my next one will with out a doubt be an imac/ibookpro again...