Steve Jobs ghost ain't so bad

[punkncat]

I have had a lot of terrible experience with the particular way in which Apple conducts its business over the years. Never had issue with the hardware, per se, but the other aspect has kept me rather 'anti' for a long time. I recently came into (basically) non-voluntary ownership of three really nice, new Apple products. After two weeks of learning about every payment scam currently being used and losing my faith in humanity I opted to power on the iPad I got. I resurrected an account I created long ago and turned this thing on, an iPad Pro 11 (2018) model with the pencil.

I have to say that as a "Windows" guy I had to come to a realization about wrapping my head around iOS. I find it's similarity to Android/Linux to be quite helpful in my understanding of how to navigate the device. Well, that and a hell of a lot of searches and videos...anyway. It's quite an impressive device. The screen is simply amazing. It seems to do what it does well and quickly. I have yet to see it crash, stutter, or fault doing anything that wasn't user error.
It will be rather handy in that all of the techs at work use these. They are quite good with Adobe and such, native Dropbox and Quickbooks support and such. To be fair it's a damned nice device.
Haven't turned on any of the Apple specific programs as of yet just using stuff I already pay for. Facetime is cool as hell....lol.

[the_matrix_guy]

As a long time PC gamer, PC builder, and Windows guy, I can tell you that Apple does make some very neat stuff. Apart from the 2012-2015 scandal about them slowing down their phones on purpose via firmware updates, which BTW, they were finally ordered to pay damages recently -- well, apart from that I've actually enjoyed their products. Their iPhone, Apple Watch, and Air pods work extremely well. And they have better privacy protections (albeit a lesser of two evils) than Google/Android. But their ecosystem is friggin nice man. I never thought I'd care about the Apple watch and Airpods but its one of those things that once you got em: You. Cannot. Not. Have em. I know there are similar, cheaper offerings but the Apple products work extremely well. I love working out and listening to music without having to have the phone on me, I stream directly to the Air pods from the watch. I also have a Mac Pro that I use for stock trading and internet related stuff that I am happy with. And yeah, the phones and watches work really well, have tons of features, quality cameras, and are just neat, man. I never really cared for the Apple v. Microsoft mentality. I think they both cater to different uses, etc.

[punkncat]

I have to say the single most bothersome aspect about it is simply "not knowing" the way that I do Windows and Android. It's a learning curve for sure.
I think the single most irritating thing right this moment is that I have watched the apps in split screen tutorial about a thousand times and all I can seem to do is bring up all the tiles where you can close them. Got everything turned on the way it's supposed to...why won't it just "snap"?

[the_matrix_guy]

lol

[Alexndl]

non-voluntary ownership

I dont know what make apple lover trying to convince everyone to joining them... must be some subliminal messages built in the OS

After two weeks of learning about every payment scam currently being used and losing my faith in humanity

I had several apple product and my young kid still use some we had for gift once the original owner found it obsolete. I fully relate to your pain...

[GreenMan]

Eh. I think the ecosystem thing is a bunch of hooey, it's no secret you buy all one brand of product, they will work together well. The last time that wasn't true was like the 90s, or even earlier?

People love to talk about iMessage, but in other countries they just use WhatsApp and signal, so it's platform agnostic. Wish we did that here. The airpods are also super unappealing to me, another thing to remember to charge that will die and become useless within a few years.

No denying apple is better for privacy these days though. And the devices have been impressive for some time, in some cases anyway. And they have resale value!

I simply can't bring myself to pay the apple premium unless I had work to do that needed software than ran on macos or whatever. Even though I'm pissed at Google right now, they had the nerve to sell me a $40 fabric case that didn't protect my new phone at all. RIP HTC.

[Chappy]

After getting saddled with an iPhone for work a few years back I tried to be optimistic, but man this is some lousy kool aid.

[punkncat]

After getting saddled with an iPhone for work a few years back I tried to be optimistic, but man this is some lousy kool aid.

In my own case, if I can wrap my head around it and learn to use it efficiently it 'should be' great for work purposes. It is as powerful as the 8th gen laptop that I currently use for mobile work requirements and we use a lot of the native programs since the owner and two people who originally started the company were all ON Apple. The biggest hurdle for them was working within "Office" apps (at that time) and my continued hurdle is finding something worth a damn to work with .pdf. I have been paying for Adobe on the PC and it works "meh"....I have tried to use it on the pad and it apparently locks the previous text on page and make the edit function worthless.
Probably wouldn't matter if all the techs would learn how to spell 'confirmation', or put the right date on the first time...

[RuleOfSines]

I hopped on to the iPhone once they finally allowed people to clean up the home screen, the flea-market look of apps everywhere had really kept me away. Now that IOS has a nice clean home screen, app drawer, and widgets, I am quite happy. I just got the iPhone 12 Mini, fully-featured device at what is (nowadays) a compact form factor.

I do however live mostly in the Microsoft camp for everything else. My calendars, contacts, email, photos, etc. are all still in Microsoft. It wasn't too hard to get it working the way I wanted once I figured out what switches to flip and turn off iCloud for some things.

[Falcon16]

I'm primarily a windows guy but I will say that the macbook air is an amazing machine. That in mind the only real benefit to Apple is the continued software support so you can a mac that's 8-10 years old that will still run either the latest or second to latest OS version. The hardware support is also excellet (5 year parts availability for a model after it's introduced in some places that extends to 7 years). I worked for Apple for 2 years and have seen a great majority of devices and the longevity is impressive but the price point for the average non content creator is just eye watering.

Given that I've owned a Macbook air, a couple of Macbook pros,an iMac and several ipads and used them all as testbeds for the newest versions of both iOS and OS X/MacOS I can say that while I respect Apple for what they have done I'm not a fan over all. it's hard to justify the price when on PC I can have an absolute screamer of a machine that will eat the Mac for lunch for less money. I'm also not a big fan of what they are doing with trying to limit the ability to repair their devices or the shift back to an in house processor.

[glaman5266]

I got a smartphone about 6mo ago & went with an Apple product after seeing how my wife's phones worked & factoring in my general distrust/dislike of Google. While it's not perfect, I like how they function. They just work. Granted, they only work one way (Apple's way), but they just friggin' work. That's the beauty of Apple products. I would never buy an Apple PC or tablet though. They are very expensive & are underpowered. But I see why people like them. I don't use my computers for any high-powered applications & most of them are 10+ years old, but they still work. When they finally kick the bucket I'll prolly just get a pawn shop Windows computer again or splurge on a new Linux machine. But I would buy another iPhone again whenever this one dies. They definitely take some getting used to, but when you have it figured out it works well.
Now if someone would get a Linux phone into the mainstream...

I just got the iPhone 12 Mini, fully-featured device at what is (nowadays) a compact form factor.

It wasn't too hard to get it working the way I wanted once I figured out what switches to flip and turn off iCloud for some things.

I saw the 12 Mini & thought "I shoulda held out just a bit longer", lol. I went with the iPhone SE when I finally got a smartphone 6mo ago. Still a good phone though, especially for the price.

[boarder2k7]

it's hard to justify the price when on PC I can have an absolute screamer of a machine that will eat the Mac for lunch for less money. I'm also not a big fan of what they are doing with trying to limit the ability to repair their devices or the shift back to an in house processor.

This is how I feel as well

[vijil]

On the performance front, it looks like the Apple silicon is right up there in terms of power and may somewhat close the power per dollar gap with PCs. The M1 is proving to be a phenomenal chip, and it's their entry level offering.

The prices can get a little crazy for sure. The Airpods Max are $1000 NZD after tax and etc... crazy stuff. But that's their strategy after all. Apple's brand is high end and they need to keep making obscenely priced gear to maintain that brand image.

Spatial audio with position tracking is *amazing* though. Definitely it will tie into their AR and VR efforts going forward.