Windows in the design industry.

[Qion]

As of late, I've been forced to use PC's to do graphics work. Enough said.

I have some issues.

To say it in the least amount of words possible, I belive that PC's should not be in the design industry for reasons deeper than the programs they run.

Here's a (small) list of my issues:

1. PC's feel like toys. I don't know what it is, but the feel of the mouse is always bothering me. I feel like it's... twitchy. I go to click on a contexual menu, and my mouse flicks around like it's stopping for a couple milliseconds at each individual pixel. Now, the machine I've been working on is no toy. It's a fairly meaty 3.6Ghz Pentium 4 HT with 2GB of RAM and a 128MB graphics card. It should not feel like a toy when I'm working on it. Besides the mouse twitchiness, the overall feel of Windows itself is twitchy, er, jerky. Whatever. I move a window to another location, and instead of showing me the entire window moving, I get this weird little grey box so I have to guestimate to where exactly I'm dropping the window. There is no transparency to speak of, and I can't view more than 3 windows at once on one screen, due to the lack of something Exposé. The Windows taskbar is a joke, as if you have multiple applications/windows open, the text below becomes unreadable... it's just not there. The little application switcher dongle thing by the Start Menu is cute, allowing an entire plethora of three icons to reside in accessible view. That way, I can open Publisher, PowerPoint and Word at the same time!

2. Professional applications just don't feel professional. If I work in Photoshop, in Illustrator, in whatever you'd like, the interface makes me feel like I'm in Photoshop 4 on my grape iMac again. Sure, the functionality is all there, but the feel of it all is just not conducive to creativity. I'm strangely more inclined to start adding Autoshapes and Word Art into my layouts when I'm working on Windows... it's almost as if the cheesiness of the OS somehow slides it's way into my workflow. I want to hit the monitor with the keyboard even at the smallest mistake, such as putting in the wrong dimensions, because Windows itself just irks me to that point.

Am I the only one that feels as if Windows actually sucks the creative drive from we artists? What does the rest of the creative realm of macosx.com say?

[Trip]

In the real world you'll find that professional design firms use Macs for design and PCs for networking. Every design firm I've ever walked into (both in the real world and via videos) have had surprisingly clean Apple cinema displays on the desk with G5s right next to, or below, them.

Well, all of the good design firms anyway.

[eric2006]

Vista sounds like it may address some of the issues that bug you, by copying what works: OS X. Of course, underneath it all, it's still windows.
It's going to be interesting when Vista comes out. PC users will be excited about all the new features, but Mac users will have already taken them for granite, and moved on to Leopard.

(from the linked article above)

Perhaps most annoying is the fact that millions of Windows users will be delighted by the new look of Windows when it’s released next year, blissfully unaware that Mac users have enjoyed bling for years.

[Sirtovin]

Originally Posted by eric2006

Vista sounds like it may address some of the issues that bug you, by copying what works: OS X. Of course, underneath it all, it's still windows.
It's going to be interesting when Vista comes out. PC users will be excited about all the new features, but Mac users will have already taken them for granite, and moved on to Leopard.

(from the linked article above)

ROFLMAO.... Thats exactly what Steve Jobs said... Well said. I for one was a Windows user from 3.1, till xp... but than I got educated and brought an Apple!

[Trip]

Originally Posted by Sirtovin

ROFLMAO.... Thats exactly what Steve Jobs said... Well said. I for one was a Wiondows user from 3.1, till xp... but than I got educated and brought an Apple!

I love you.

[Qion]

Originally Posted by Trip

I love you.

I'm in such jubilation that my rage could turn into love.

[Sirtovin]

I feel alot of love here... :P

[Natobasso]

One trick that might help you get through your sluggishness issue is using alt + TAb to cycle through programs, just like command + tab does on a mac. Then you can maximize all your app windows and not worry about shifting things around.

I do design on a mac and asp.net on a pc--I got a Dell Inspiron to acquaint myself with the "other side" ha ha, so I have a better understanding instead of just trashing pc's without any historical knowledge.

One feature the pc has that mac's don't seem to have is the Show Desktop feature. It clears all windows away and only shows the desktop. Expose moves all windows out of the way, but that feels clunky to me. Just make em all disappear. That's one thing I like.

The other thing I hate is the lack of font smoothing.