Lack of Apple around here?

Hey all,

I have noticed that there isn't ever much talk about Apple on the forums. Just curious if anyone uses the products / goes for the certs or if most people see Apple in a poor light like I do. I will keep my opinion tame, as I know some people really do like the products, but to me it seems like Apple is always last year's tech with a nice new price tag and a logo.

That said, I'm not looking for an Apple bashing party, just curious if that is a shared view with other professionals.

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WafflesAndRootbeer

Most IT people won't touch Apple products except for the iPad, iPod, or iPhone. The Apple desktops and notebooks are generally not found in the workplace or Enterprise environments, so there's little discussion of them here. The certs are pretty much worthless unless you want to work for Apple and there isn't really much out there in the way of Apple certs.

About7Narwhal

I figured as much but I wasn't sure if it wasn't discussed because it wasn't used or because the certs were useless. I personally haven't seen an Apple product used professionally with the exception of the iPad and iPhone. But I guess not many people use them professionally.

wes allen

I know the apple workstations are not as popular in the enterprise as worker drone machines, but I think you would find a lot of them in education, sales, executives and a lot of small biz creative types. Plus, I have seen a lot of infosec types with Macbook Pros. Apple gets no love from enterprise tech people because they have been forced to start supporting them, via BYOD, etc and they don't have the same control over them. Ipads and iphones, in particular are the early drivers of IT to less of a centralized model, to more of a user centric model.

Zartanasaurus

At Narbik's CCIE bootcamp, there were a total of 16 or 17 of us. I think there were 5-6 Macbooks, including the one Narbik had. All of the other Macbook users were Cisco employees. Anytime I've met a Cisco employee, there's a 95% chance they use a Macbook. They seem to be very popular in the networking world in general. A lot of blogs I read, the authors talk about their iPads/Macbooks.

lsud00d

My previous employer purchased a MacBook Pro for my work/home laptop and I thoroughly enjoyed it. They are very slick machines and are fairly hands-off and maintenance free. I used Bootcamp, Parallels, and Crossover to use whatever Windows specific applications I needed/wanted in various degrees, depending on compatibility and resource requirement. I was sad to give it back when I left.

That said, I would never buy one personally because they are vastly overpriced.

pram

I prefer OS X to any 'desktop' Linux, personally. The only gotcha in the past was package management used to be a pain in the ass (fink and macports were awful) but with Homebrew its now a lot better.

OS X is a fantastic environment if you deal primarily with Unix systems or anything shell based, imo. terminal.app + tmux is a lot better for me than putty and cygwin.

tpatt100

I bought a Macbook Pro a little over a month ago. I like it. Not really a preference the last Mac laptop I had was over 10 years ago I don't use it at work though its my personal.

Most of the admin/developers at work use Macbook laptops for personal use but we're strictly Windows.

SteveLord

About7Narwhal wrote: »

but to me it seems like Apple is always last year's tech with a nice new price tag and a logo.

That said, I'm not looking for an Apple bashing party, just curious if that is a shared view with other professionals.

Huh?

So you don't want to make a thread about bashing Apple, you're just looking to see if anyone else shares your distaste for them?

the_Grinch

We have a handful at work and I love them. I am typing this on a MacBook Pro right now. Everyone complains about the price, but I've gotten years out of Apple laptops can't say the same for any on my Windows machines. My sister had her iBook from 06 till 11 before she finally got a Macbook. Her iBook is still running, though it is slow. Honestly I think Apple is really the way to go when it comes to a laptop. You can load Windows and do all that stuff, plus if you want to get into iOS Development you are set as well. Finally, I've dealt with Apple products since 2004 and never had a virus or malware.

chrisone

I use a macbook pro Retina. I am a network engineer and I work perfectly fine at work on a daily basis. This powerful rig kicks arse with virtualization because of the horse power it has. I run GNS and virtual box, i have a routing lab and a pen testing lab.

ptilsen

My next laptop, if I get one, will likely be MBP+R.

You don't here about it because it's just a computer. The majority of the highly active members are way past the point in our careers where we care about basic computer hardware from a professional standpoint. Apple is not a contender in enterprise server or network hardware or software, which makes its products fairly irrelevant in terms of our careers and certifications. We might discuss Apple in the context of personally using Apple products, but the company doesn't really have much sway in enterprise IT. Even in companies rolling out iPhones and iPads and MDM, it doesn't become worthy of discussion because it's a trivial aspect of the job.

kj0

I am Apple certified. Easiest cert I got, i just decided the night before (Half way through studying my MCITP) that i would sit the exam the next day - No study what-so-ever.

I am a huge fan of the product (Not just the device, but the actual OS) It is amazing, so simplistic to the end user. I do more work with Windows as we have 21 Mac Laptops and desktops and about 20 (About to get more) iPads. The rest of the environment is about 2000 Windows Desktops and laptops. I am the sole responsible for all the apple products, but I spend more time supporting windows, however, my main computer is a mac and I remote into a windows box. We are about to move to VDI (BYOD without Bringing-your-own). The only issue I have really had with the macbooks that we gave some staff was connecting to some shares and that was just due to them needing the path as we couldn't put it into the log in script that we have for windows.

I do own a macbook, but I never use it as I tend to play a lot of pc games and have a stack of HDD's full of stuff, so just easier to use my PC for that.

The server side is a lot simpler as well. Open Directory is a little bit different and we don't use it, except to connect back to AD on our DC.

If anyone asked a question about OS X and how to do something, I could talk their ear off to get the best out of the software.

There are many people on here (particularly those studying Cisco that use MBPs. Even some who use them for MCITP (Kinda ironic)

I don't understand what all the fuss is and why there is still Apple Bashing, or windows Bashing. Each to their own, but each still has different functionality and produces different results depending on what you are trying to achieve. My current work place, I walked into an environment that had 1 Macbook so that they IT department could manage 3 iPads, since I have been there for the past year and a half, I have on implemented 20 odd mac products to a certain department as I had experienced greater results in productivity with using macs, and the staff have all agreed after experiencing it for themselves. But I continue to recommend windows for all other department and most of the time I build more windows machines for personal clients over recommending an Apple, unless they have a need for the functionality.

tpatt100

I like the simple things in the hardware design but it was never enough reason for me to purchase an "Apple Computer" before especially since I was a big PC gamer for the longest time. The 13 inch Macbook Pro I bought was $1,000 when I bought it. Back in 2002 I think I bought a Mac Powerbook G4 and spent quite a bit more than that, which was the only time I owned an Apple computer used them in college years ago exclusively because that was the Windows 3.1 days.

I absolutely love multi touch gestures with the trackpad on the Macbook. Took me a little bit to get used to it but I actually prefer the trackpad over a mouse now when I am doing stuff in the OS. Seems more fluid and natural especially browsing the web in a browser.

I think if I tried out the gestures in Windows 8 I would have had an easier time adapting to that OS.

kgb

I just ordered a 15" retina macbook pro (should be delivered Monday). It was $300 more than a comparable Dell XPS 15 laptop. However, there's nothing comparable on the market when it comes to that retina screen.

So, at the end of the day, yes it's a little more money, but it's not the crazy difference a lot of people think it is. Now, when you start talking about low end PCs, sure. I just got the wife a nice 15" Samsung laptop for $330...good luck finding a mac laptop for that price.

lsud00d

My friend purchased a retina MBP and showed me something people never considered...a lot of the internet looks like garbage!

GAngel

kgb wrote: »

I just ordered a 15" retina macbook pro (should be delivered Monday). It was $300 more than a comparable Dell XPS 15 laptop. However, there's nothing comparable on the market when it comes to that retina screen.

So, at the end of the day, yes it's a little more money, but it's not the crazy difference a lot of people think it is. Now, when you start talking about low end PCs, sure. I just got the wife a nice 15" Samsung laptop for $330...good luck finding a mac laptop for that price.

There's nothing comparable on the market because it's a tiny niche market. But i can't wait for you to post up all those high end autocad drafts or photoshop marketing campaigns you're working on.

YFZblu

These threads never end well.

As others have indicated, there isn't a lot of Apple stuff in the enterprise. I know of several sites within the organization I work for using iMacs on Customer facing machines; however they run Win 7 natively.

tpatt100

GAngel wrote: »

There's nothing comparable on the market because it's a tiny niche market. But i can't wait for you to post up all those high end autocad drafts or photoshop marketing campaigns you're working on.

It's a tiny niche market "now" but manufacturers will create comparable displays for Windows laptops which I thought they already did which helps drive prices down as more of the displays are ordered. Everybody wins eventually.

I couldn't justify the Retina price and it hurt my eyes but it helped drive the prices down on the non Retina models.

GAngel

tpatt100 wrote: »

It's a tiny niche market "now" but manufacturers will create comparable displays for Windows laptops which I thought they already did which helps drive prices down as more of the displays are ordered. Everybody wins eventually.

I couldn't justify the Retina price and it hurt my eyes but it helped drive the prices down on the non Retina models.

Without getting into an argument "Retina" or whatever fancy term you want to call it has been in the market for 20 years just like the "cloud" or "social media".
A mac is the equivalent of alienware for geeks.

kgb

GAngel wrote: »

... But i can't wait for you to post up all those high end autocad drafts or photoshop marketing campaigns you're working on.

Not sure what you are getting at with that. Please explain.

YFZblu

^ I think he/she is saying the Retina display is pointless for the general population. People buy things they don't need all the time, necessity is not the name of the game with Apple computers. People buy what they what and what they like.

tpatt100

GAngel wrote: »

Without getting into an argument "Retina" or whatever fancy term you want to call it has been in the market for 20 years just like the "cloud" or "social media".
A mac is the equivalent of alienware for geeks.

"I" use it because that is what the company calls it, I wouldn't ask for a data cable when I want a Thunderbolt cable. That was what Apple calls it so I referred to it as such even though Thunderbolt does a bit more than "data".

I would consider a Mac equivalent to Sony Vaio a few years ago, a boutique computer line.

And 20 years? I don't remember computer displays with pixel density anywhere near that high for consumer computer products.

GAngel

kgb wrote: »

Not sure what you are getting at with that. Please explain.

The OS is practically free.
The hardware is practically identical

So if the high res screen is the only major difference between that and most other makes what exactly is the typical user paying for. I would actually like to know.

Honest question looking for an honest answer.

networkjutsu

I know some people who would prefer to use Mac but do not have the funds to do so. I was really hesitant to buy a Mac before. Now, I don't think I'll ever want to go back to a Windows based laptop for personal use. I'd use Windows based laptop for work but not my preference. Right now, my gig allowed me to get what I wanted so I got this. When I got here, I noticed that all of the network guys here except for one have MBP. Apple is slowly entering in IT people's lives at work or home. One thing is for sure, for gaming purposes, I would still prefer to buy or build my own rig.

YFZblu

GAngel wrote: »

Honest question looking for an honest answer.

What the poster was asking about, is your claim that retina display quality graphics have been around for 20 years. Is that something you can support?

ptilsen

GAngel wrote: »

There's nothing comparable on the market because it's a tiny niche market. But i can't wait for you to post up all those high end autocad drafts or photoshop marketing campaigns you're working on.

Why do you have to be using AutoCAD or PhotoShop to want higher resolution that 1920x1080 or 1200, which have been around for a long time? I could use it for work and day-to-day activities.

GAngel wrote: »

Without getting into an argument "Retina" or whatever fancy term you want to call it has been in the market for 20 years just like the "cloud" or "social media".

Please show us a 15'' laptop other than MBP+R 15'' that has 2880×1800 resolution. Whether the concept of "Retina" has been around is not pertinent, just like social media of old doesn't change the huge presence Facebook and Twitter have now. In any case, the attractive feature of Retina is the extreme resolution not currently available on any non-Apple laptops. I could and would enjoy that resolution, and unless a PC maker releases a laptop with not only a comparable monitor, but a decent build quality and drivers, I may well get an MBP in a year or two.

tpatt100

GAngel wrote: »

The OS is practically free.
The hardware is practically identical

So if the high res screen is the only major difference between that and most other makes what exactly is the typical user paying for. I would actually like to know.

Honest question looking for an honest answer.

The hardware is not exactly the same. Maybe if somebody glances over a spec sheet and ignores most of what they see they might see "same hardware".

The body of the laptop is a solid piece. It's not parts screwed together. My Dell XPS which I returned because the fan ran non stop and I found out online was a common problem due to Dell trying to make a thin laptop cheaply. It had a silver trim on it that cracked off the corner when I picked it up by the corner when it was closed, it flexed and the trim cracked off.

When I ran even one VM on my Dell it got super hot and the fan cranked up, on my Macbook I rarely heard the fan and when it was on it was super quiet with several VMs running at once.

My Dell had an OS partition so I had to find a way to create a restore disk before I replaced it with an SSD. On my Macbook I just connected to the internet and it downloaded a new copy of Mac OS X to it after I swapped out the hard drive. It's the consumer level stuff like that I found after I bought it.

Now with the Macbooks going thinner and only one RAM slot my next machine will be probably a Windows business laptop but for now it is this one.

kgb

GAngel wrote: »

The OS is practically free.
The hardware is practically identical

So if the high res screen is the only major difference between that and most other makes what exactly is the typical user paying for. I would actually like to know.

Honest question looking for an honest answer.

I'm not the typical user. I'm a professional artist and software engineer. I do graphics/video/etc.

I will not argue that for a typical user, a macbook is considerably more expensive. Like I mentioned, I bought my wife a $330 laptop that is perfect for a typical user. However, I will argue that for high end machines, the price gap isn't as large as people keep saying it is. Last week, when I ordered mine, I built a dell and it was $300 less. Not $500, not $1000, not $2000 less. So, in essence I paid an extra $300 for a gorgeous screen that is only available through them.

Daniel333

I have my Apple certified support tech cert. I did it under OSX.5. It was a pretty good process. I was going to move forward toward ACSA but really never saw the demand.

I don't think Apple drives any value to have certified people on staff. Which is disappointing.

As far as apple in the world place. We have 30+ AppleTVs, we are about 50% Macbooks, and about 80% of our tablets are Apple and Somewhere around 70% iPhones. Really isn't much to talk about. They just work and do their job.

I can share some observations if you would like
1) We've had a lot of HDD failures in the last year, almost twice as many as our Dells on certain MacPros. Apple replaced most of them same day after we pointed this out and rest as would filter them in. So not really mad.
2) People often try to shoehorn iPAd into weird spots. Running XenApp so they can get Office 2010 etc. So that causes issues at times.
3) iOS 6 was a minor issue, kept our poor desktop guy busy for a week downgrading.
4) Office for Mac is way nicer than iWork, but we still have people bouncing back and forward just to not use Microsoft products. So some file format complaints
5) Developer workstation, sadly the MacPro doesn't cut it for us. We have some custom built ~$8000 machines from Dell. Sound crazy, but they can run our entire site on the workstation. They also use Vmware Workstation 8 to connect to our ESX servers. We want to switch these guys to MacPro but they don't quite have what we need without doing a lot of customizations in house and changing a lot of procedures!

Over all although Macs have cost about twice as much our traditional PCs hours are down massively. They even eliminated a couple spots since they were not really needed anymore.

tpatt100

I think the point is that the PC industry has reached a point where it doesn't really matter what you buy so the industry has to find new ways to differentiate themselves from each other.

Profit margins for anything below a grand now a days is so small. Years ago I couldn't recommend anything besides Windows due to third party support. Now? I can because the third party support is pretty solid.