Posts Tagged ‘microsoft vs apple’

Windows 7 – Will It Make My Christmas?

Friday, October 23rd, 2009

As you may have previously read, my battle with my laptop running Windows Vista is a bloody and long one, and has led to several embarrassing situations (the less said about the times I told friends I’d be at their house in two minutes, clicked ‘Shut Down’ and been half an hour late, the better). I can really feel it culminating, and the urge to splurge and get myself a technology-related early Christmas present is almost impossible to ignore. My plan to save up for a Mac may have beaten into second place, though…

According to The Guardian, the new Windows OS, Windows 7 (another storming Ronseal title, much better than Vista) works faster than the OS it replaces on most computers. This, for me, is reason enough to upgrade. The basic Home Edition retails at £79.99, while Apple Macs start at around £799. That’s ten times the expense. Is it worth me saving up for a solution to a problem that could be solved very quickly and with much less of an impact on my wallet? True, it wouldn’t solve everything (my cheap-as-chips laptop must shoulder some of the blame), but it’s a start, isn’t it?

The only thing really standing in my way is the fact that I might be forced to have a Windows Party and partake in the kind of forced jollity displayed in the publicity campaign mounted by Microsoft in the run-up to its release. They come across as much like a social skills seminar as they do a Windows tutorial. Yuck.

So what is it to be? Expense, scrimping and saving, or throw my own Windows Party?

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Posted in IWOOT Stuff, Newspaper Stuff, Random Stuff, YouTube Stuff | 7 Comments »

The Past Is A Terrifying Place

Friday, October 9th, 2009

It seems that Windows has come in for a bit of a kicking lately, PR wise, and this old Windows 95 tutorial video is doing them no favours either. Hindsight is certainly a wonderful thing, but even at the time this must’ve seemed a little stilted as a promotional tool. What’s worse is that they clearly haven’t learned their lesson, as anyone who’s seen their latest Windows 7 videos will tell you. Not that Apple have displayed much better form – remember the Mitchell & Webb Mac and PC ads? Either way, have a look at these guides starring comedy stars of the day Jennifer Aniston and Matthew Perry:

 

 

Hilarious, eh? Those multi-million dollar paycheques were certainly money well spent. I particularly liked the “so you can fax from your computer?!” line – JimboWoot will be quietly celebrating the triumph of technology’s inexorable rise beyond the fax machine. As I said in a blog entry last week, it’s not a matter of Microsoft proving their worth, it’s a matter of affordability and until Apple’s prices drop, I’m going to have to use this kind of tutorial video to get my computing tips. Renaming documents is going to be a cinch!

Good on the Guardian for listing a load of interesting viral videos.

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Posted in Cool Stuff, Funny Stuff, Geek Stuff, YouTube Stuff | 1 Comment »

Throwing Apples Through Windows

Wednesday, September 30th, 2009

Charlie Brooker, one of IWOOT’s favourite writers, has highlighted a particularly thorny issue in his latest piece for The Guardian – that of the seemingly eternal dichotomy between Apple and Windows operating systems. Eloquently and with not a little vitriol, Brooker lambastes both sides. Apple users, he argues, are smug, while Windows users are doomed to a life spent waiting for applications to open.

For me, this is an issue that is governed by something else. No matter the incredible ease of the Mac OS, I can’t afford one. Not by choice, but by force I have to side with Windows and their terrifyingly slow Vista OS. My last laptop cost me £249 and, though I thoroughly hate the thing, I would be lost without it. All my work, my photos, my iTunes library (my one Apple luxury) and near-enough anything that’s important is on there – it just takes me a couple of hours to access it. No joke – I was sitting in a North London café on Saturday afternoon (sipping a particularly rich Americano, if you’re interested) and making use of their free wi-fi, and my wretched little box took 11 whole minutes to get used to its surroundings, get comfy, pull itself together and be ready to connect. The poor waitress with the network key was forced to be very patient. I suspect she wanted to pour my particularly rich Americano all over its stupid keys.

laptop-bin

I agree with Brooker when he says that these Apple acolytes are so very obsessed with spreading the good word, and I know that I can’t join them unless I seriously save up for it. I too feel a little pang of incandescent rage when I see someone using a Mac Book or an iPhone – not because I detest the way in which their owners seem to luxuriate in the glow of being correct (maybe a little…), but because I want to be one of them.

JimboWoot even let me touch his iPhone the other day. It was pretty magical. It’s not that I needed converting, but I know I can’t spend my life resisting the urge to despatch strong coffee all over my Vista screen in the same way you would a cuckolding partner. Might be time to open a savings account…

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Posted in Geek Stuff, Newspaper Stuff | 14 Comments »