

German company switching 12,000 desktops from PC to Mac - cmcginnis
http://www.9to5mac.com/axel-springer-mac

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gaius
You know, back in the day, it was normal for everyone to have two computers on
their desktop. There would be a generic PC running Windows with a 14" monitor
for word processing and email, and there would be another machine for "actual
work". If you were an engineer, it might be a SPARC or RS/6000 workstation. If
you were a designer, probably a Mac or an SGI.

Nowadays you can get one box to do everything, a Mac is a Unix workstation
that can run a PC in a VM. Why _wouldn't_ organizations switch?

~~~
reazalun
Can someone explain to me why designers should use Mac? I can't see any
significant differences between Photoshop and Illustrator run in Windows and
Mac.

~~~
josefresco
Shhhh, there isn't. But don't bring that up because it's very cool to use a
Mac, it makes you so creative and cutting edge. Rainbows and unicorns and dogs
shitting ice cream and all that.

~~~
modoc
Don't knock the pettable, portable, ice cream dispensers...

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ojbyrne
That's a newspaper/magazine publisher. I find this hilarious, because back in
the day (mid-nineties) most companies in that industry used Macs. Many IT
departments probably completed the switchover to PCs in the early part of this
decade (standardization was probably the primary reason) - and now they have
to switch back.

~~~
DanielH
You are right!

They switched some years ago for the exact same reasons they mention now from
Mac to Windows PCs.

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cstejerean
I wonder just how fun a corporate, locked-down, Mac will be.

~~~
josefresco
About as fun as a corporate, locked-down PC is.

~~~
cstejerean
That's what I'm afraid of. I was hoping people would be less likely to
completely hose a Mac and therefore there would be a lower need for draconian
restrictions.

~~~
josefresco
Operating systems are not 'fun', it's like saying my house is 'fun'. It's what
you do on or in the OS that makes it fun.

I've experienced this over the years with Linux. I will from time to time
install the latest greatest distro, configure it, work out all the little
nagging bugs and then ....

Nothing, it's not fun (unless you think getting your graphics card to work and
spending 4 hours doing it is fun), in fact the goal is always to get the OS to
the point where I can use it ... for something else.

~~~
jobeirne
Certain operating systems are more conducive to 'fun' experiences than others,
much like houses.

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josefresco
More interesting is this "Until now the highest profile switcher has been Auto
Warehouse Co. which is in the midst of a switch of 1000 desktops"

That's it?!? And they're not even done, which means the largest installation
is now under 1K.

Shows how far the Mac platform has to go in the 9-5 world.

~~~
axod
mac dominates the design/music/film industries though

~~~
reazalun
Contrary to popular belief, actually Linux dominates the film industry.

<http://www.desktoplinux.com/articles/AT5611327583.html>

~~~
gaius
That's a bit skewed by the thousands of machines in render farms that could be
running _any_ (free/bundled) Unix. It'll be interesting to see if OSX Server
10.6 gives them a compelling reason to switch.

~~~
Tamerlin
It isn't likely, since most of the high-end shops have a lot of custom
software on those Linux machines, and even their Linux distros are in many
cases heavily customized, beyond what they'd be able to do with OSX.

Smaller FX shops that don't have IT staff are much more likely to consider it,
unless they rely on software that isn't available in OSX, like XSI.

Which reminds me, now Houdini is available for OSX (it might still be beta,
but it's coming if not here already).

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meisterix
by the way, it's not any company. it's axel springer, one of the largest
media-companies in germany

