Linux user reviews Apple’s Mac mini

20 years ago

“In early 2005, Apple was announcing the Mac mini computer. It was the answer to what I was looking for in a computer, so I bought one. This is a report about the early months with my new Mac, and how it compares to a Linux computer. (I have never owned a Windows computer.) In short, I am now both a Mac and a Linux user – Apple gets GUI simplicity, usability, and coherency right, and Linux everything else,” Thomas Driemeyer writes for bitrot.de.

“When switching operating systems, there is a strong tendency to whine about all the things missing in the new OS, or that are done differently and require a change of habits. The advantages become obvious only after some time. I’ll do my best to take that into account and present a balanced review. There are a few fundamental problems that I cannot ignore though,” Driemeyer writes.

“No doubt, the Mac mini is the most sexy box I have ever owned. For some reason, perhaps cost, a PC is invariably a boring big brick where all the designers’ creativity goes into coming up with yet another front plastic bezel, usually on the far end of the ugliness scale. It truly amazes me how PC designers have managed to produce one design disaster after another for thirty years straight, while Apple just gets it right every time,” Driemeyer writes. “But that’s not the reason I bought a Mac mini. The reason why I refuse to buy another PC is that today’s PCs are built for stone-deaf speed nuts who think it’s normal that a CPU must generate more heat per surface area than a stove, and require something that sounds like a jet engine to cool it lest it disappears in a rapidly expanding plasma cloud. I was looking for an unobtrusive and quiet machine that I can put on my desk without going deaf or getting sunburned. And I don’t care about gigahertz ratings when I do desktop work. I get all the horsepower I need for 3D rendering at work.”

“As happy as I am with the MacOS GUI, I am disappointed with the underlying operating system. It’s based on FreeBSD, a powerful and well-respected Unix variant, what can be wrong with that? It’s not a leading-edge OS, sure, but it is tightly controlled by a professional team. I understand why Apple chose it; I am sure they felt it’s more manageable than Linux with its countless features and developments. I am sure they also liked the license… To someone who knows Linux, FreeBSD is a little quaint. It doesn’t even have a /proc filesystem, many utilities like ps or ifconfig evoke happy memories of the early 90’s, network services are sparse (no rsh and no rdist, for example) and there just isn’t a lot of tools included. But it’s perfectly adequate for Apple’s purpose, and very stable,” Driemeyer writes. “So why am I disappointed? Because Apple botched the job. They totally crippled MacOS X with proprietary additions. In particular, they tore out some of the lower layers and replaced them with a Mach-like microkernel. Microkernels were all the rage fifteen years ago, but the idea totally crashed and burned because performance and resource usage was pitiful. All implementations failed, and today it’s deeply buried and forgotten.”

Full article, a very interesting read, here.

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