Grilled Apple

I hit the Apple store this weekend while waiting to meet up with a friend (as this friend of mine has chronic punctuality issues), so there I was looking at some MacBooks contemplating if I should ever get one. To summarize the story, I grilled 3 store clerks and was totally unconvinced about buying an Apple computer and left the store with them apologizing to me (well this is Japan) that they couldn't give me any real reasons to switch.

Now, let me tell you how did I come to that conclusion. While I was fiddling around with a MacBook, one of the store clerks came by and asked me if I had any questions, so I decided to chat it up with him to find out if there were any good reasons for me to switch over to an Apple computer.

Reason #１: You don't get viruses or spyware.

No, I am absolutely not buying an Apple computer just because it will protect me from viruses or spyware. I am already an experienced PC user that can handle my own against computer problems. This is seriously a weak reason to me because when I want to buy new hardware, I want a technical advantage.

Reason #2: Nice software that lets me do things.

The sales people basically pitched the photo album software (organization and printing software) to me that looked nice with smooth moving windows. I already have free software like google's Picasa that let's me to pretty much the same thing and I made my case out to them. Then they pointed out other applications like Adobe's Photoshop or Illustrator... which are terrible reasons for me to switch because there are Windows versions of the same software.

To add insult to injury, I asked them if I had a license to run these programs on my PC, would I be able to transfer it over to the Apple computer?

Their answer: nope, you'd need to buy a new copy.

Reason #3: It's got good hardware

They started telling me how they've got the Intel Core Duo 2 chips inside the laptops which are pretty good processors, but you can get them for any other laptops too. I don't buy that reasoning. Anything Apple branded generally costs more than if it were to come from some other laptop manufacturer for the exact/similar hardware configuration.

Reason #4: The OS is nicer

They told me that Mac OS is nicer because I can get to my applications in say 3 clicks instead of 5. Last time I checked, I can usually get to my applications in about 2 on my computer (it's called the toolbar). Then they told me that the OS looks nice.... then I asked them if the OS ran any faster than Windows... to which they didn't have an answer.

So after spending about 45 minutes in the Apple store, the main reason why I should shell out $1400+ for an Apple computer (or say $200 more than a similar, non branded Apple computer) is because I don't get spyware, have to rebuy software that I already own for the PC but have an opportunity to try software that isn't on the PC (which I can find equivalents to!) and use a nicer looking OS in a nicer looking box.

I'm kind of sad to say, but that's some weak reasons to me and I think Apple's computer market share reflects that.