Persuasive Speech

[WC Annihilus]

Well, I'm slightly new here so most of you don't really know me. I'm currently a sophomore in high school right now. In English, we have been given an assignment where we have to give a persuasive speech. Now, for my topic I've decided to go with the somewhat classic argument of the PC vs. Mac. Naturally, I'm on the side of PCs and have made my Proposal that Macs should be phased out and replaced. As I am just slightly new at these things, I would like your input/help. For instance, I don't have any real idea of how powerful the Mac CPUs are. Also, I have no experience with Mac's OS:X. Any input/help is appreciated. Keep in mind that this is a persuasive speech and thus, both sides of the argument are NOT supposed to be represented. Thanks in advance for your help!

[Heretic]

Apple has moved to Intel for their new systems, so raw computing power is comparable to anything on the PC side. Where the Apple loses is in price and the fact that OS X is basically tied to Apple hardware (yes, I know that it is possible to run OS X-x86 on PCs, but there's a good chance all of your hardware won't be supported fully anyway). OS X is a cleaner OS with a friendlier interface (imo), so I wouldn't really go after that. You could talk about how, as of now, most popular software is available for Windows and not OS X (see games).

Now for the PC side of things, you could talk about how it's easy and relatively cheap to build a powerful and flexible system (that can run basically every x86 app that's not exclusive to the Mac).

disclaimer: I'm no Mac fanboy, but if I had the cash, I'd have a MacIntel right now

[WC Annihilus]

Yes, my main point is the vast array of options for PCs. There is so much flexibilty in customization and upgradeability. Also, the software support and tech support.

What is the AMD equivalent of the Mac's Core Solo? What about Intel's?

AMD equivalent for Core Duo? Intel's?

What are the main features of Mac OSX? Why is it considered more user-friendly?

Those are the main questions I need answered. I'm sure I'll come up with more though

[Serra]

One great thing to get on: security.

Microsoft has a C2 rating, Mac OSX 10.3.xx and earlier only C1 iirc.
The only other good standards type of rating (which acronym I have forgot) was also made by the NSA... rating scale of 1 to 7 (seven being best)... Microsoft has a 4, Mac a 3. I know that for sure.

Strictly speaking, Macs *are* less secure than Microsoft-based PC's. The NSA quite specifically will not allow Mac deployment in a number of government areas because of it.

If you want to do some googling on it, good places to start are:
- "orange book" -> Designed by 1985 by the NSA. Covers the A to D's on what consistutes good security on a desktop OS. (this is where you'll find info on the C2 rating of MS and C1 of Mac). Yes, the document is old but just as valid today as it ever was. Computer security has not changed that much in the last 20 years... only the software has, and the fact remains that if your OS only has X holes, it will continue to only have X holes 100 years from now.
- "red book" -> also by the NSA. Same as above, but guidelines for networked PC's.
- "rainbow books" -> general term given to a large collection of security publications made possible by the US gov't

The only reason M$ isn't higher than a 4 on the E*** (*=I don't remember letter), is that it (like Mac) uses Discretionary Access Control (DAC) instead of Manditory Access Control (MAC) required by many super-secure installations. I'll leave it to you to do the searching because it's too late for me to explain each term.

Edit: Also: You can't just say PC vs. Mac. When you get a PC, you can have any kind of hardware you want and any kind of software. With a Mac, they control both hardware AND software. You can go M$ vs. Mac, Unix vs. Mac, Linux vs. Mac and/or IBM-compatable hardware vs. Mac... but you're blurring borders by going for both software and hardware like that.


Serra

[ReD.SkY]

uh... hmm... PC > Mac is all i got lol