I woke up today with an SMS from an unknown number - probably someone I’ve dealt with in PR before. She (I assume its a girl because she gave a lady name) knew I was a Mac user and wanted to interview me about Windows Vista - my thoughts, sentiments and basically a comparison with Mac OS X. I wrote a piece previously about how Mac OS X showed some envy with the internal company emails at Microsoft but I think Vista has more to show than just the fancy fancy.

So there - I became rather uncomfortable with the idea that someone would like to hear my views as a Mac user. Doesn’t she know I use PC’s too? I own both machines - as a true-blue geek I don’t participate in the OS wars as I embrace them all (no experience with Linux though, but I’d gladly triple boot my Mac once I get one of them Intel versions).

Truth be told, I can be smug. Just like the stereotype Mac user. But I am also fair - as I primarily use a desktop PC at home for playing games and doing long term work (such as long articles) as I have a bigger screen and wider area of space to work with (my 2004 12 inch iBook is what I use when I’m mobile).

So then back to the question of Vista. When I first previewed the beta version I was more underwhelmed with the new perks because I was expecting to see something value added brought to the table. My reactions were primarily in the “Oh okay cool” and less of the “Wow Aero is really great!” I’m not saying that these new features are useless. It’s just that they already exist in OS X - Spotlight Search, Widgets, Expose …

And then maybe - just maybe I thought that the problem with Vista had more to do with the marketing than the features. These demo folk target consumers who want to be wow-ed by kick ass technology breakthroughs rather than things like security and networking. So might as well, in their PR’s marketing plan, highlight these features. I’m sure there are many more bells and whistles that true geeks would appreciate with the arrival of the BEST VERSION of WINDOWS. But since the general populance aren’t geeks, let’s stick to the eye candy.