Ten reasons why you should buy a Mac

Anything out there as far as firewalls or antimalware, like ZoneAlarm or Windows Defender for the PC?

I used to subscribe to ZoneAlarm on the PC. I dropped over two years ago because they "improved" it to the point it became unusable and unreliable. In earlier versions, it worked well and was simple. Then they made configuring it such a chore, I gave up on it.

So I tried TinyFirewall, given its good reputation for minimalism. I found it was a bigger nightmare than ZoneAlarm.

On the Mac, we have a cute program called Little Snitch. It handles my basic firewalling needs. And even granny can understand it. My Mac buddies all agree: they need to make a PC version of this program! They emphasize simplicity and control. It just couldn't be easier for non-server use.

I can't name all the programs I've seen over the years that have been destroyed by feature-creep and feature-bloat.

Beyond that, the System Preferences offers simple firewall control for Samba, file sharing, FTP server, SSH, Remote events, printer sharing. OSX is so secure that the firewall in System Preferences isn't even enabled by default. It's debatable but I turned mine on.

If that's not enough, you also have the full-blown UNIX standard ipfw firewall and the new ip6fw firewall along with the full suite of network traffic shaping and proxies and nameservers and, well, all that UNIXy stuff. There is nothing else that compares to this time-tested solution for firewalling. But it is command-line stuff so it's not for granny. ipfw uses a set of up to 65535 rules to route and shape traffic. Here is a simple sample of the rules:

02000 allow ip from any to any via lo*
02010 deny ip from 127.0.0.0/8 to any in
02020 deny ip from any to 127.0.0.0/8 in
02030 deny ip from 224.0.0.0/3 to any in
02040 deny tcp from any to 224.0.0.0/3 in
02050 allow tcp from any to any out
02060 allow tcp from any to any established
02065 allow tcp from any to any frag
12190 deny log tcp from any to any
20000 deny log icmp from any to me in icmptypes 8
65535 allow ip from any to any

But if it's difficult or time-consuming to do so, many people will not. For certain users in certain cases under XP, it can be difficult or time-consuming to do so.

It really isn't hard. And it isn't actually difficult or time-consuming, at least in the business world. In a multi-user family computer, maybe you have to log in as admin to install games for the kids.

As for time-consuming, think about the amount of time it takes to rid your machine if it gets infested. That's not a casual issue.

But, what the hey, I fix infested PCs. I make money off the stupidity of most PC users. I try to tell them this stuff, they never pay attention. As soon as you leave them alone, they're back to their usual ways. The difference with Mac is that they set it up properly to begin with. And the developers know this so software only assumes administrative access for installing the program and is very limited in modifying system files.

But if it's difficult or time-consuming to do so, many people will not.

It takes about two minutes to set up a standard user on a Mac. It is not difficult. In an administrator user account click on System Preferences on the Dock. Select Accounts. Click on the "+" at the bottom of the account list. Enter the Account user's name. Give them a password. Decide if they can change their password. Uncheck the "allow user to administer this machine." box. Add a user picture if you want. Exit. Done.

If you want to convert your current account with all its docs and settings tp a standard account, create a new account, make it an administrator, and then uncheck the "allow user to administer this computer" box on your original account. Done. Don't forget the password... it is NOT stored on the computer... if you do, you will not be able to do any administrative functions.

Are you telling me Macs really don't have such shortcuts?

No, the Mac actually has more keyboard shortcuts... and every shortcut is described next to the appropriate menu listing. For the most part, they are consistent throughout all applications. About the only thing to learn is that where Windows uses the ALT key plus another, the Mac may use the Apple Command key plus another (usually the same as Windows). A user can also customize his own shortcut keys or change any of the current ones except those that have been reserved by Apple.

For Windows users here is a list of Windows' keyboard shortcuts.

I build my own PCs for < $400 with stuff I buy from Newegg, and upgrade at will. And then upgrade/swap parts at will

Then how much nosing around on Russian hacker sites it take to amass the drivers you need to make it run? How much is your time worth to you? What if you could pay a little more to just sit down and start using the computer right out of the box? AND to be able to start using Unix immediately, too?

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