Hunt for a Windows laptop...on a Mac?
Best Windows laptop: a MacBook?
(Credit: Rixstep)Oh boy, Apple's having a good week. First Consumer Reports puts MacBooks at the top of its list for laptops, and now Microsoft's biggest marketing weapon suffers this indignity: the Laptop Hunter ads, those semiannoying, semiintriguing spots featuring everyday people looking for laptops and choosing Windows ones over Macs, may have been made on Macs.
A visit to Microsoft ad agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky reveals several MacBook Pros behind the desk of Alex Bogusky, the Chief Creative Officer and mind behind the Laptop Hunter campaign in prominent display. Of course, there's no proof that these machines were directly responsible for "cutting video" to make these ads, but most creative agencies do tend to use Macs.
Admittedly, Rixstep, who posted the Alex Bogusky photos, is very pro-Mac and anti-Microsoft. And yet, the photos don't lie.
Does it matter? Well, this would be funny material for a counter-video. Are Windows laptops as good as MacBooks at handling media? You tell us.
(Via Electronista)
Scott Stein, a New York Jets fan and CNET senior associate editor, has written about tech, entertainment, video games, and viral culture for outlets including Laptop, Wired, Maxim, Esquire Online, Asylum, and Men's Journal. He also appears on the Digital City podcast. In his spare time, you might see him performing improv in New York City (when he's not being a dad). 
Just another editorial meeting it would be fun to be in on...
This was made BEFORE the Microsoft deal.
They are not only using Windows but you can actually see the icon.
Apple is so humiliated. The most creative ad agency uses windows.And Mac users keep pretending that using an Apple makes you somehow creative.
95 percent of the time a Mac user is a salesman.
Ha ha ha....
uses Windoze...because it sucks!
Shrek
Shrek II
Shrek the Third
Kung Fu Panda and many other 3-D animated movies were in fact made on Hewlett-Packard Windows based computers. Many of them on computers with AMD processors.
As for this picture, they may have just had the computers there so they could be familiar with the products when designing the ads. CNet is REALLY going above and beyond being a Mac Fanatic.
Shrek
Shrek II
Shrek the Third
Kung Fu Panda and many other 3-D animated movies were in fact made on Hewlett-Packard Windows based computers."
Ummm... Ok? I think you'll find that the big animation houses (like PIXAR) use custom equipment in their rendering/server farms. When you make a blanket statement, joshsc, you REALLY need to provide links to back up your assertions.
Now, insofar as who uses what systems in making commercials and in general video editing (not rendering mind you, EDITING) there is a mix of Mac and PC. Personally, I use a Mac, though I spent eight years at Truevision/Pinnacle working with PC-based video editing hardware. I like Macs, because for me, they just work and I don't have to worry about virus software and BSODs (in general). It's the advantage of having to make the OS work with a small grouping of hardware parameters instead of a lot of disparate systems.
Both systems are, in reality, very bad for handling media. Eventually, people I know using HD cameras have to use Mac computers because they are the very low end of a very expensive market segment, where HP media workstations tend to be the norm [as far as I´m concerned and what my experience says].
The thing I miss most is the Solaris environment, which was a stellar performer for multimedia applications.
Regarding the mass operating systems, both of them crash quite so often, so apart from the hip factor of the Cupertino and HongKong designed brands, I do not see any advantage on any of them.
Apple gives you a choice as well, Ryan_R. You can use Final Cut, Adobe Premiere Pro, the basic editor that comes with the Mac, or you can run Windows OS if you really need to and use whatever PC-based editors you want.
So... Not only can you use the excellent software available for the Mac you can, if you want to for some reason, run Windows and use... Sony Vegas. Why you would want to use a Sony video editor I don't know, but there you are. Now, if you had said you wanted to run Avid Media Composer or something similar on your PC I would have had some respect for you.
Can your PC (the one you are running Sony Vegas on), run Final Cut? Ummm... Not really...
perhaps YOU should check first before confirming something as a rumor. So what if the Macs are older. I still have a Classic that runs. It is obvious that you are an avid PC user who has to buy a new crash machine every few years. Did you work for this company? Did you take the photo? Is there a calendar on the wall somewhere that can prove your statement?
No, I'm not obviously an avid PC user. I am an avid Mac user. And, yes I did work for the company in Miami at the time this photo was taken. And yes, the laptops we had at the time were Powerbooks (not MacBook Pros as everyone seems to "know" about this photo). Alex doesn't office out of Miami, or the office in the picture, since 2005. He's in Boulder, CO. And, in fact, the guy on the left hasn't worked for CP+B for three years. He's a partner of his own agency near LA. Any more questions?
non-technocrats were raised to think Macs were for media and PCs were for business (ahem, mmntech) and nare the two shall meet. Some might call this foolish, especially considering the hard performance statistics, but all of those arguments started to become moot once Final Cut started to gain traction.
Final Cut became an ecosystem and its users a cult. The 2007 study numbers mmntech points out are way conservative for 2009. I'd say it's a lot closer to 75-85% of media professionals use Final Cut today. All the reasonably priced plugins are made for Final Cut, entire workflow products are made for Final Cut, etc...
And now that Apple sells multi-core/multi-processor Intel workstations, you can no longer say that you can get better performance out of a PC. The interesting note here is that you can get the SAME performance out of a PC for about half the price premium you have to pay for Apple Product$...another fact the CR "study" didn't really do justice to - CR compared CHEAP PC laptops to costly macs. Where's the comparison w/ an Alienware laptop that costs the same as an over-priced Mac?
"And now that Apple sells multi-core/multi-processor Intel workstations, you can no longer say that you can get better performance out of a PC. The interesting note here is that you can get the SAME performance out of a PC for about half the price premium you have to pay for Apple Product$...another fact the CR "study" didn't really do justice to - CR compared CHEAP PC laptops to costly macs. Where's the comparison w/ an Alienware laptop that costs the same as an over-priced Mac? "
Which Macs and which PCs? It would be nice if you, quietsnow, actually provided a list of system components, Mac and PC, editing software (etc) and built us a nice little comparison spreadsheet and put it on a web site for us all to look at (preferably in pdf). If you can't even do something that simple to back up your statements then why did you even bother posting? Facts man! We need facts, not leads!
quietsnow made a viable point. With Macs using the exact same multi-core/multi-processor Intel procs as many PC's nobody can say one really performs better then the other. Price is the only concernable difference and Mac's typically do cost more then a PC with similiar hardware specs.
This was made BEFORE the Microsoft deal.
They are not only using Windows but you can actually see the icon.
Apple is so humiliated. The most creative ad agency uses windows.And Mac users keep pretending that using an Apple makes you somehow creative.
95 percent of the time a Mac user is a salesman.
Ha ha ha....
Oh yeah Mac an craps are cheaper then PCs. They also do not look like jail cells.
They run more software then Windows.
The best games are made for Mac.
I love to lie lie lie lie lie. I am a Mac..
you've obviously been brainwashed by Microsoft
From my experience, the more expensive PC, with the high quality hardware, will last much longer and be more stable than the cheapest possible PC. Whenever I've bought cheap memory, for example, the PC had a lot more crashes then when I purchased much more stable (and more costly) RAM.
Without knowing the exact manufacturers from whom Apple gets its parts, we don't know the inherent quality of the Mac hardware vs the PC hardware. And without that, we have no idea how the hardware compares.
As for the OS, I think it's a matter of taste. Both Macs and PCs can do what you need them to, have their own unique strengths and weaknesses, and present attractive UIs. And both have software unique to them, and both have bugs that crop up from time to time.
I believe Macs and Windows PCs are both fine machines. To me, what matters is does your computer do what you need and want it to? If so, it meets your needs, whether it is a Mac, Windows PC, Linux PC, Amiga or even an Atari 800XL.
I feel it's better to spend the energy wasted on arguing "My platform is better than yours" enjoying the computers I'm using.
- by HelloCobra May 15, 2009 7:32 PM PDT
- Hey Quiet now, Thanks for the post about cathode lighting, I would love to chat w/ you via email sometime.
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