Windows is faster, better and more usable on my 16" MBP than macOS Big Sur...

[Blue Quark]

I'm not going to speak for myself here, since I don't fall into any of the categories discussed above or what I'm about to mention. That said...

I think a lot of people who are accustomed to the Android OS / iOS experience out there are more likely to be drawn to Gnome 3.4x+ particularly as it further matures and Wayland fully matures and then gets full support from nVidia and AMD (ATI graphics). It does seem positioned to visually appeal to that crowd. I've recently played with Gnome 3.4 (a.k.a. "Gnome 40") and with it running on Fedora 34, it's very solid and fluid, and I think in that specific respect it gives Windows and macOS a run for their money. I bring this up because I can see there's (at least) one Ubuntu user in this thread, and at some point when it's fully where it needs to be to be included on their roadmap, Canonical is going to switch over. You're going to be in for a treat.

Personally, I can't stand Gnome 3.x. I think it blows chunks and is a solution in search of a problem vis a vis running on a desktop system. But, hey... a lot of people out there like it, and a lot more have grown up in an era where Android OS and iOS are the most common OSs (and therefore their respective user interfaces are as well) for a typical person to interact with.

The day Microsoft burns to the ground, I will do a little victory dance, even if it's the last thing I ever do before I go for a final dirt nap.

 

[Steve Adams]

I'm not going to speak for myself here, since I don't fall into any of the categories discussed above or what I'm about to mention. That said...

I think a lot of people who are accustomed to the Android OS / iOS experience out there are more likely to be drawn to Gnome 3.4x+ particularly as it further matures and Wayland fully matures and then gets full support from nVidia and AMD (ATI graphics). It does seem positioned to visually appeal to that crowd. I've recently played with Gnome 3.4 (a.k.a. "Gnome 40") and with it running on Fedora 34, it's very solid and fluid, and I think in that specific respect it gives Windows and macOS a run for their money. I bring this up because I can see there's (at least) one Ubuntu user in this thread, and at some point when it's fully where it needs to be to be included on their roadmap, Canonical is going to switch over. You're going to be in for a treat.

Personally, I can't stand Gnome 3.x. I think it blows chunks and is a solution in search of a problem vis a vis running on a desktop system. But, hey... a lot of people out there like it, and a lot more have grown up in an era where Android OS and iOS are the most common OSs (and therefore their respective user interfaces are as well) for a typical person to interact with.

The day Microsoft burns to the ground, I will do a little victory dance, even if it's the last thing I ever do before I go for a final dirt nap.

You will be worm food long before Microsoft burns to the ground sorry to say.

 

[pshufd]

You will be worm food long before Microsoft burns to the ground sorry to say.

Azure says hello.

 

[Steve Adams]

Azure says hello.

It's funny, ever since 3.11 and apple released their apple mac people have been saying the exact same thing. Microsoft is dead, microsoft this. microsoft that. Just like iOS and it's minions. Guess what, Microsoft will be fine.

 

[Blue Quark]

I do not want to turn this thread into some kind of screed vis a vis Microsoft, so I'll just say this and happily move on:

There's all kinds of companies about which the average 16-30 year old of today has never (or maybe just once upon a time in childhood) heard, that "everybody" once knew were massive corporations which weren't going anywhere. So, Steve, you may be right that Microsoft will be here long after I'm gone. However, they could also go under "next Tuesday" as well, so never forget that.

Ok, enough on that point.

What I'm actually kind of surprised about is that you folks (or anyone else) has had nothing to say about my Linux and Gnome commentary. I'd have thought it would have elicited some kind of reaction from the Mac- (and evidently also Windows-) using crowd here. Sure, there's things it's missing which macOS has that I'd like to see (Automator most immediately comes to mind) but it's pretty hard to look at Linux of 2021 and find much in the way of deficiencies, setting aside the low-hanging fruit response of this or that particular big-name commercial software program, or driver support for this or that particular bit of hardware.

And, the reason I point those out by way of exclusion is those aren't things which are the free software crowd's fault. If Adobe doesn't bother to do a Linux port of Photoshop, that's nobody's fault but Adobe's.

I run the Cinnamon DE, and apart from it having a Windows-esq task bar-and-start menu, it otherwise is very similar to Classic Mac OS / Mac OS X (macOS), right down to the way you can have as well as expand directory trees in list mode, using CTRL + ↑ or ↓ to move into and out of folders, CTRL + I to Get Info (or, as they like to say, "Properties") about a folder, file, etc., and if one sets up a decent keyboard layout (Like English USA International with AltGR Dead Keys) one can have a very very similar experience to how it's ridiculously easy to type accented letters and a variety of specialized characters like the Ezsett (ß), the cedilla-versions of some letters (ç), and so on. To this day, a lot of this sort of attention to basic details still makes macOS (and, by implication, many DEs in Linux) nicer and more elegant to use than anything offered in Windows.

 

[turbineseaplane]

This is about what I'd expect.

macOS has managed to become a resource hog and can feel so slow doing some things.

Hard to quantify, but so many things I do on the Windows side of my Hack simply "feel snappier"

 

[pshufd]

What I'm actually kind of surprised about is that you folks (or anyone else) has had nothing to say about my Linux and Gnome commentary. I'd have thought it would have elicited some kind of reaction from the Mac- (and evidently also Windows-) using crowd here. Sure, there's things it's missing which macOS has that I'd like to see (Automator most immediately comes to mind) but it's pretty hard to look at Linux of 2021 and find much in the way of deficiencies, setting aside the low-hanging fruit response of this or that particular big-name commercial software program, or driver support for this or that particular bit of hardware.

I worked on Mozilla from 2004-2009 and it was considered a successful Open Source story as it received lots of money from Google and large software companies that supported open source. I read complaints from the Linux folks on why the same thing didn't happen there. Linux is great for developers - it's like a wonderful Swiss Army Knife allowing you to do a ton of things that are difficult or not possible in macOS and Windows, efficiently.

But the others have fairly automated and simple maintenance and a focus on UI and there's some level of OEM Hardware/Software integration. The installation process for macOS and Windows is far easier than it is on Linux as well. And then there's the fragmented nature of Linux. End-users aren't going to like to know that they need to use a couple of different command-line commands to do the same thing depending on their distro.

One thing that's interesting is that a lot of people want to run macOS and that one of the simple ways to run it is to install Linux and use KVM/QEMU. You'd think that many would stop along the way and take a look at Linux. I imagine many do. And keep right on going with macOS.

 

[pshufd]

And, the reason I point those out by way of exclusion is those aren't things which are the free software crowd's fault. If Adobe doesn't bother to do a Linux port of Photoshop, that's nobody's fault but Adobe's.

I used to work for a big software shop and we probably had about forty ports back in the 1980s when there were far more hardware and operating systems platforms around. We did the port ourselves for the largest platforms but we had to be paid to do the ports for platforms with smaller marketshare. I recall one time when Mozilla had a performance problem with some x86 assembler code and an Intel engineer joined the conference call and solved the problem for us. I was quite impressed that they made an experienced engineer available to us. I'd guess that Microsoft would do the same for a corporate customer. I don't know if that happens in the Linux world.

In the Corporate world, you want a vendor that you can call any time for support too. I've been on the support end of 7x24 on-site support as well. Maybe Red Hat provides that or maybe they don't.

 

[pshufd]

This is about what I'd expect.

macOS has managed to become a resource hog and can feel so slow doing some things.

Hard to quantify, but so many things I do on the Windows side of my Hack simply "feel snappier"

Most current hardware is faster than the Intel chips that Apple is selling by a long shot. M1 is competitive in single-core but not in multicore. M1X will change the latter. M2 is likely to change the former. Also remember that Intel/AMD is running at 5 Ghz while M1 is running at 3.2 Ghz which is part of the reason for the insanely low level of power consumption of the M1s.

 

[JMacHack]

What I'm actually kind of surprised about is that you folks (or anyone else) has had nothing to say about my Linux and Gnome commentary. I'd have thought it would have elicited some kind of reaction from the Mac- (and evidently also Windows-) using crowd here. Sure, there's things it's missing which macOS has that I'd like to see (Automator most immediately comes to mind) but it's pretty hard to look at Linux of 2021 and find much in the way of deficiencies, setting aside the low-hanging fruit response of this or that particular big-name commercial software program, or driver support for this or that particular bit of hardware.

I like the way Gnome3 looks. That’s the extent of my opinion.

 

[Steve Adams]

I do not want to turn this thread into some kind of screed vis a vis Microsoft, so I'll just say this and happily move on:

There's all kinds of companies about which the average 16-30 year old of today has never (or maybe just once upon a time in childhood) heard, that "everybody" once knew were massive corporations which weren't going anywhere. So, Steve, you may be right that Microsoft will be here long after I'm gone. However, they could also go under "next Tuesday" as well, so never forget that.

Ok, enough on that point.

What I'm actually kind of surprised about is that you folks (or anyone else) has had nothing to say about my Linux and Gnome commentary. I'd have thought it would have elicited some kind of reaction from the Mac- (and evidently also Windows-) using crowd here. Sure, there's things it's missing which macOS has that I'd like to see (Automator most immediately comes to mind) but it's pretty hard to look at Linux of 2021 and find much in the way of deficiencies, setting aside the low-hanging fruit response of this or that particular big-name commercial software program, or driver support for this or that particular bit of hardware.

And, the reason I point those out by way of exclusion is those aren't things which are the free software crowd's fault. If Adobe doesn't bother to do a Linux port of Photoshop, that's nobody's fault but Adobe's.

I run the Cinnamon DE, and apart from it having a Windows-esq task bar-and-start menu, it otherwise is very similar to Classic Mac OS / Mac OS X (macOS), right down to the way you can have as well as expand directory trees in list mode, using CTRL + ↑ or ↓ to move into and out of folders, CTRL + I to Get Info (or, as they like to say, "Properties") about a folder, file, etc., and if one sets up a decent keyboard layout (Like English USA International with AltGR Dead Keys) one can have a very very similar experience to how it's ridiculously easy to type accented letters and a variety of specialized characters like the Ezsett (ß), the cedilla-versions of some letters (ç), and so on. To this day, a lot of this sort of attention to basic details still makes macOS (and, by implication, many DEs in Linux) nicer and more elegant to use than anything offered in Windows.

Well, I don't know about that. I am old enough to have seen IBM be the Apple of the day to IBWHO? But, Microsoft has so many diverse layers now, and provide a great service, product etc on everything....They are not going anywhere anytime soon. I would not plan a party to celebrate their demise, that's for sure. Better off planning for apple to croak considering 70% of their revenue comes from one product.

 

[pshufd]

Well, I don't know about that. I am old enough to have seen IBM be the Apple of the day to IBWHO? But, Microsoft has so many diverse layers now, and provide a great service, product etc on everything....They are not going anywhere anytime soon. I would not plan a party to celebrate their demise, that's for sure. Better off planning for apple to croak considering 70% of their revenue comes from one product.

Their marketcap is $2.11 Trillion and they have $125 Billion in cash. They experiment all the time and screw things up but, overall, they are doing a great job financially. And that's what ultimately matters for corporations.

 

[Kung gu]

This is about what I'd expect.

macOS has managed to become a resource hog and can feel so slow doing some things.

Hard to quantify, but so many things I do on the Windows side of my Hack simply "feel snappier"

I will add to this on Intel Macs I agree.

However on M1 Macs I tried at the store the smoothness and snappiness is noticeable. Apps open instantly and files
load quickly.
Completely different to my Intel 16" where it feels "slow."

It seems clear to me now that Apple is optimising macOS for M1 and later. Not surprising at all.

 

[Steve Adams]

I will add to this on Intel Macs I agree.

However on M1 Macs I tried at the store the smoothness and snappiness is noticeable. Apps open instantly and files
load quickly.
Completely different to my Intel 16" where it feels "slow."

It seems clear to me now that Apple is optimising macOS for M1 and later. Not surprising at all.

Obviously. Their marketing spin of we will support intel macs for years was just to clear stock. They are done, and intel mac owners better get with the program. I pity the ones who bought intel based macs after M1 was announced. Paperweights by the beginning of next year.

 

[mi7chy]

However on M1 Macs I tried at the store the smoothness and snappiness is noticeable. Apps open instantly and files
load quickly.

No. There's a whole thread on the number of bounces it takes to launch an application along with relatively long boot time, time to apply OS updates, etc. Storage I/O is slow on M1.

 

[Steve Adams]

No. There's a whole thread on the number of bounces it takes to launch an application along with relatively long boot time, time to apply OS updates, etc. Storage I/O is slow on M1.

I think apple is even stealing microsofts old slogan. "it seems faster"!

 

[diamond.g]

Their marketcap is $2.11 Trillion and they have $125 Billion in cash. They experiment all the time and screw things up but, overall, they are doing a great job financially. And that's what ultimately matters for corporations.

Uh, MS isn't that far behind Apple in market cap and has more cash.

 

[pshufd]

Uh, MS isn't that far behind Apple in market cap and has more cash.

Yup. If you think Microsoft is dead, you're wrong.

More stats: Operating Margin at 40%, QoQ Revenue Growth 19%, QoQ Earnings Growth 43%. These are stunning stats for a $2 trillion company. Same thing with Apple - stunning growth for a massive company. The old saying that Trees Don't Grow to the Sky isn't working here. Their CEOs can fly to the sky these days.

 

[c0ppo]

And, the reason I point those out by way of exclusion is those aren't things which are the free software crowd's fault. If Adobe doesn't bother to do a Linux port of Photoshop, that's nobody's fault but Adobe's.

I've switched from MacOS to PopOS. And I'm not looking back. But I'm a developer. I don't need Office, Adobe or any other commercial 3rd party software.

But if I did need Adobe for example, I would be using Windows or MacOS. It doesn't matter what OS you (dis)like, what matters is getting the job done. Now for photographers and graphic artists, Linux is a complete bust. Adobe/Affinity have no real alternatives. GIMP is a joke compared to those, and for vector graphics Inkscape isn't good enough either.

So if some of those companies don't want to make Linux ports of their software, it doesn't matter who is at fault. What matters is that linux looses users because of it.

 

[pshufd]

I've switched from MacOS to PopOS. And I'm not looking back. But I'm a developer. I don't need Office, Adobe or any other commercial 3rd party software.

But if I did need Adobe for example, I would be using Windows or MacOS. It doesn't matter what OS you (dis)like, what matters is getting the job done. Now for photographers and graphic artists, Linux is a complete bust. Adobe/Affinity have no real alternatives. GIMP is a joke compared to those, and for vector graphics Inkscape isn't good enough either.

So if some of those companies don't want to make Linux ports of their software, it doesn't matter who is at fault. What matters is that linux looses users because of it.

What you do is you have multiple systems, run virtual machines or multiple boot. It's gotten pretty easy on x86.

 

[DaveFromCampbelltown]

Currently I can boot on my late 2015 iMac

• macOS Big Sur 11.4 (main system, backed up with Time Machine)
• macOS Monterey 12 ß3
• Windows 11 22000.65
• macOS Mojave 10.14
• macOS Big Sur 11.2.3
• Windows 11 22000.71
• Ubuntu Mate 20.10
• Linux Mint 20.2

The first three are housed on the internal drive of my iMac
The next two are on external Fusion Drives
The last three are on external SSD

That doesn't include the Virtual machines that are all housed on a SSD.
There may be some others I have forgotten about

 

[mi7chy]

Isn't Wine compatibility on Linux pretty good these days? Steam Deck is running Linux with Wine and graphics API wrappers for Windows games so it's got to be pretty good. One of the things on my bucket list to play with.

 

[grmlin]

I tried using multiple operating systems but nope, that's not gonna happen. I don't want to deal with Windows, Linux and whatever in parallel for one task.
I use WSL on Windows though, which is pretty great when you think about it. You get the raw performance of Linux for development and all the apps and stuff you might need in Windows. Now if it only ran in MacOS haha. That would be even better.

 

[pshufd]

Isn't Wine compatibility on Linux pretty good these days? Steam Deck is running Linux with Wine and graphics API wrappers for Windows games so it's got to be pretty good. One of the things on my bucket list to play with.

I went to use Fidelity Active Trader Pro on macOS several years ago and it wouldn't start up so I called Fidelity and asked why it didn't work. They told me that it didn't work with the latest version of macOS and that they were working on it. It seems like they are reactive instead of proactive (they should have been testing with the macOS betas). The issue was WINE, not their program.

I've tried running other programs on WINE before and it's like 98 or 99 percent compatibility but that one or two percent may be important to you. Some programs just run better on certain operating systems.

It is so easy to run Windows in KVM/QEMU on Linux these days and you don't need to pay for a Windows 10 license so I would likely just run Windows that way if Linux was my daily driver. KVM/QEMU is one huge advantage that Linux has over Windows and macOS.

 

[raqball]

However on M1 Macs I tried at the store the smoothness and snappiness is noticeable. Apps open instantly and files
load quickly.

I am going to disagree...

I have an M1 Air (getting sold to it's new owner tonight) and a Latitude 9420 with an i5. With the M1 chip in the Air, I've had the dreaded beachball several times when trying to open a simple app or file. My Windows 10 machine just scoots right through almost everything..

The M1 is faster for many things (power usage) but I would not say the M1 is snappy or that it opens apps and files instantly.