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Darren O'Neill

Darren O'Neill

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Braving the unknown

13 Feb

After swearing I would never use a Mac I finally succumbed last week and have been using an iMac at work for the past 7 days. Being in an office where you are one of only three people using a PC you start to feel like a dying breed.

I have never been a hater of Macs per se; I usually find the users of the machines the actual problem. They tend to be annoying individuals who love to show you their shiny new toy at any opportunity. As Charlie Brooker excellently put: "Macs are glorified Fisher-Price activity centres for adults; computers for scaredy cats too nervous to learn how proper computers work; computers for people who earnestly believe in feng shui."

Despite this, every six months I consider buying a Mac, before meeting one of the aforementioned and decide it’s best to stay clear. At my last company my colleagues found it hilarious to stick post it notes on my machine saying "MAC’s rule". Notice the inclusion of the non-required apostrophe and capitalisation of a non-acronym. I didn’t feel the need to respond, a two worded insult with two grammatical errors tells me all I need to know about that person: drama student, Mac user.

I have been finding using the iMac an experience, both good and bad. The screen is like its own little ecosystem, pink and greens spouting up bottom left, air bubbles popping up top right, I could sit mesmerized all day. I cannot sign off without mentioning the lack of a hash key on the Mac keyboard though, utterly unforgivable. I know Apple like to give us little and charge a lot (£300 locked 2.5G phone springs to mind) but what's going on?!

All in all, so far so good.

iMac

Posted by Darren on 13 Feb 08, at 9:00 am

4 comments on this post

Ben Philp
22 Feb
Ben Philp says on 22 Feb 08, at 12:38 am.

Darren I still cant believe you are now using a iMac! You have made great progress ; ) I never thought I would see the day!

The Mac vs PC debate has been a hot topic of discussion in the studio and over a few drinks. For the vast majority of creatives there has never really been any doubt that Macs are the preferred tool. However for the home user the PC has always been the strong leader. Both have their pros and cons and with Macs now more accessible to the home user than ever before will the success and awareness that apple has created through the ipod create a trend of more PC owners switching to macs?

So iphone next then Darren?

Site user
22 Feb
Greg Findley says on 22 Feb 08, at 1:35 pm.

I can accept the PC vs Mac debate, both have their pros and cons, but the thing that bugs me are the die hard, elite Apple fans! You must have come across them, the ones who honestly believe Apple can do nothing wrong. I guess that the power of great branding and marketing.

Site user
10 Apr
Phil Bowell says on 10 Apr 08, at 1:33 pm.

Try alt (option) and 3 for the #.

Johan Brand
10 Apr
Johan Brand says on 10 Apr 08, at 5:36 pm.

Update: Darren is now the proud owner of both and iPod Touch and an iPhone. Go Darren.

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