Why do all designers use apple?

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samwooff

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#52716 6-Dec-2009 23:18

Not sure if this should go in here but oh well...
I've been hearing from a few different people lately that a lot of graphic designers are going towards OSX and even design students are recommended to gets macs for their studies.
Does anyone know why this is?
I have a bit of experience using photoshop on both macs at my old school and on my own rig and saw no tangible benefit to either system(extreme hardware differences inside)
I know my way around computers so my common sense is telling me the hardware flexibility with a PC should give it the edge.
Anyone care to clarify?

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nate

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#279846 7-Dec-2009 00:15

They just do it better.

I know for video editing, you plug in a Firewire source from the camera, the Mac picks it up and you are able to edit it very easily.

I don't really keep up with this field, but I believe Macs are used just because they are more user-friendly towards designers, and are really targeted to that field.

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Ragnor

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#279849 7-Dec-2009 00:24

Tribalism/fanboi-ism is an inherent part of human nature.

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tardtasticx

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#279853 7-Dec-2009 01:12

They use them because they can afford them. lol. Its as simple as that. I'd get one if I had a spare 2K in my pocket. But if my computer broke, I'm sure I'd only buy another windows based one because it runs the Adobe Suite fine.

timestyles

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#279865 7-Dec-2009 07:17

I've always wondered about this. Photoshop sales were 50/50 Mac/Windows about 1996 and now the majority of sales are for Windows. Apples are considered 'trendy', although here in NZ we don't get much Mac advertising (I've only seen one Mac advert - on C4) so it's not as trendy. The only other reason is that the issue of fonts etc means compatibility when printing so it's a case of use what's most popular.

paulspain

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#279875 7-Dec-2009 08:19

I've worked in the creative space for a long time and Macs have always been the brand designers like to align themselves with. That's unlikely that will change anytime soon.

The reason is much the same reason as many designers and ad agency people drive European cars - they are typically very brand concious and also want something that itself is visually appealing. And naturely they're willing to pay for it.

I would suggest that from a perspective of which delivers the most 'bang for your buck' - in cars that would usually be something from Japan (rather than a European vehicle), and in computers it would usually be something designed anywhere other than Cupertino, California. Naturally though there is a bigger picture...

I wonder what others think?

Paul Spain
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xpd

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#279890 7-Dec-2009 09:01

I think part of it also is that Apples seem to manage their memory usage a lot better than Windows, so applications such as PS etc seem to run a lot nicer.....
We had a Windows box here for one of our marketing staff and no matter what we did, it always complained about being out of memory and generally being a bucket of bots..tried 4gb, 8gb, 64 bit, 32 bit etc and no better.

Got them a Macbook pro and theyve never been happier and more productive ;)

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plod

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#279895 7-Dec-2009 09:33

DISCLOSUER: home mac user.

Economics would be the main reason we use mac's at work. Legacy software, specialised software.

A mac pro is very expensive, but so is any other off the shelf workstation. Try pricing up a dell or hp workstation and you will be surprised to see the mac pro's are very competitive on price, we also use specialised windows software which is now all run in vmware without performance issues since our last windows box died. All accounting software is done on a cheap dell box. Since the introduction of intel on apples, its about having the best of both worlds. I think the days of mac being better in prepress then windows is long gone, but if you go windows only you don't have that choice
I'm not sure about anyone else, but my work isn't interested in building there own PC's, so thats not an option.

Dawg

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#279909 7-Dec-2009 10:10

I run a team and use PC's and Corel Draw - Viva the resistence!!

BurningBeard

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#279919 7-Dec-2009 10:31

Dawg: I run a team and use PC's and Corel Draw - Viva the resistence!!

And what a well-oiled machine it is!

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samwooff

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#279958 7-Dec-2009 12:31

Correct me if I'm wrong but the biggest factor seems to be fanboism/style though someone did mention being able to use both OSX and windows on an apple which is not something you can really do on a PC.

I think either I'm not reading between the lines properly or there's something else because whilst most graphic businesses should have infinitely more money than me unless they're stupid and want to go out of business they wouldn't just throw it away for the sake of some bling factor or being able to run a program windows can't(if such a program does exist in the mainstream design industry or otherwise I've not come across it).

rphenix

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#279966 7-Dec-2009 12:48

xpd: I think part of it also is that Apples seem to manage their memory usage a lot better than Windows, so applications such as PS etc seem to run a lot nicer.....
We had a Windows box here for one of our marketing staff and no matter what we did, it always complained about being out of memory and generally being a bucket of bots..tried 4gb, 8gb, 64 bit, 32 bit etc and no better.

Got them a Macbook pro and theyve never been happier and more productive ;)

Thats interesting :) Maybe they just like the spinning wheel more?

.

I work for several companies some use Mac's for their designers and some use PC's cant really say there is that much difference especially since I've had a few staff switch from one company to another (and therefore go from working on a Mac to a PC) and had no complains.

I've heard the argument of Firewire vs/USB but does it matter? USB2 is fast enough compared to firewire400, and if comparing to firewire800 well there is eSata! Really external storage only matters for video editing in say Final Cut studio not so much when using Illustrator/Photoshop.

Designers naturally like aethestical things (afterall they are creative) Mac's have the eye candy most regular PC's do not so its as simple as that.

samwooff

219 posts

Master Geek

#279975 7-Dec-2009 13:08

I know that building a computer is not everyone's cup of tea but my computer has firewire usb and e sata and because you are choosing the components yourself you can choose as ugly or as pretty case as you like or even modify it to look however you want.
Maybe not the most feasible idea for large corporations but for small businesses why not?

rhysb

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#279980 7-Dec-2009 13:19

xpd: I think part of it also is that Apples seem to manage their memory usage a lot better than Windows, so applications such as PS etc seem to run a lot nicer.....
We had a Windows box here for one of our marketing staff and no matter what we did, it always complained about being out of memory and generally being a bucket of bots..tried 4gb, 8gb, 64 bit, 32 bit etc and no better.

Got them a Macbook pro and theyve never been happier and more productive ;)

Interesting, considering that Photoshop is available as a 64bit app on Windows, but is only available in 32bit on OSX.

From what I have seen businesses often justify the extra cost of Macs with a percieved cost of re-training staff. I personally think the cost of re-training is fairly trivial now days and Windows offers a lot better value for money.

plod

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#280037 7-Dec-2009 16:37

rphenix:
xpd: I think part of it also is that Apples seem to manage their memory usage a lot better than Windows, so applications such as PS etc seem to run a lot nicer.....
We had a Windows box here for one of our marketing staff and no matter what we did, it always complained about being out of memory and generally being a bucket of bots..tried 4gb, 8gb, 64 bit, 32 bit etc and no better.

Got them a Macbook pro and theyve never been happier and more productive ;)

Thats interesting :) Maybe they just like the spinning wheel more? .

I work for several companies some use Mac's for their designers and some use PC's cant really say there is that much difference especially since I've had a few staff switch from one company to another (and therefore go from working on a Mac to a PC) and had no complains.

I've heard the argument of Firewire vs/USB but does it matter? USB2 is fast enough compared to firewire400, and if comparing to firewire800 well there is eSata! Really external storage only matters for video editing in say Final Cut studio not so much when using Illustrator/Photoshop.

Designers naturally like aethestical things (afterall they are creative) Mac's have the eye candy most regular PC's do not so its as simple as that.

As I said in my post, price up a Dell or HP, and you will find a similar spec mac cheaper. As for mac's addressing ram better, I'm not sure. someone did mention PS isn't 64 on the mac so that throws there theory out the window.
We buy the upgrades of CS at work so to start off fresh on the windows platform would be major expense.