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Journal pudge's Journal: For the Record 9

Journal by pudge

In this comment, I got modded down for Troll/Flamebait for accurately pointing out that the idea that Mac OS X is "crash-free" is a fallacy. Note that Mac OS X is not, has never been, and will never be, crash-free. I like Mac OS X, but I won't drink the Kool-Aid. Thanks.

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For the Record More

For the Record

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  • Compared to OS 9, it might as well be. :)
    • Bullocks. Mac OS for me was as stable as Mac OS X is. This is not a joke of any kind, it's a simple fact. In part this is because I knew what not to do, but so what? I "crashed" maybe once a week in Mac OS, and I need to restart to fix a problem, or have a complete system crash, about that often in Mac OS X. And I don't do things more extraordinary then using Apple's own iDisk service, or change Locations after waking from sleep, or try to unmount a network server, to get the crashes.

      Sure, most people crashed more in Mac OS than they do in Mac OS X. But most people used a ton of system extensions and ran MSIE.

      I won't pretend Mac OS was unstable just because everyone tells me to. Yes, it is easier to recover from application crash in Mac OS X, because (usually, not always) the app won't bring down the system, while on Mac OS, it could (but usually didn't). But that says nothing about other OS-related crashes, such as myriad networking problems, driver issues, and moving a directory on to one of the same name. :)

      And don't even get me started on the myth of the Holy Grail of preemptive multiasking ...

      Maybe I should put up a Mac OS X Myths page. :)
      • Pudge, I have been using Mac OS X since the Public Beta and I have had fewer than a dozen 'computer does not respond' crashes in that time, most of those during the Beta/10.0 period. I could get that many in a fortnight even with the later versions of OS 9. And I use the fsck out of my computers.

        Since I know you, or at least of you ;), I don't think you're intentionally trolling, but you seem pretty up in arms about this whole thing.
        • And I reference pudge's mention of using the iDisk service. He's probably using me as a reference here.

          Before the release of Mac::Carbon, pudge asked me to test the binary installer, which he had placed on an iDisk share. Now, being a first-time Mac owner this year, I do not know a whit about OS 9. Admittedly, I can probably boot into it if I want to , but I don't since Mac OS X treats me just fine, and is the primary reason I bought my Titanium Powerbook.

          But fair is fair, here. Mac OS X is a lot less stable than my Linux box, and is a lot worse at task switching than the Linux box is. I don't know why it acts like this, but I've come to dispise ths Mac OS X color spinner. Usually when it shows up for longer than a minute it is the kiss of death of any kind of continuing stability without a reboot.

          Now this is exactly what happened when I tried to mount pudge's iDisk share over my DSL network. Cmd-K, enter URL, click open...spiiin!. And while I could use the system as long as I avoided doing much using the network, it was not a pleasant way to compute, and eventually the system would lock up. Repeatedly. I can now attribute my third, fourth, and fifth catastrophic crashes with my TiBook to pudge.

          The point here is that this is something that I could get to happen repeatably, simply because the operating system refused to recover from what I can only guess could be an unexpected network error. There was no network access going on (I was running iPulse at the time) and the machine just sat there....after mounting an iDisk

          You would think that such a simple operation would be relatively free of such a catastrophic problem.

        • I am sick of people spreading the FUD that Mac OS was unstable, and the myth that Mac OS X does not crash. I like truth, not lies.
      • I had somewhat different experiences. I started using MacOS with System 7.1. (Before that I used GS/OS on an Apple //gs). I ran 7.1, 7.6.1, 8.1, 8.6, and 9.1 (I tend to avoid x.0 releases). I kept a very watchful eye on my Extensions folder and always searched for possible conflicts on newsgroups and web pages before upgrading or installing software. As a result, my machine was fairly stable.

        That said, I was still getting about a full crash about once a week. Most could not be reproduced, and there was almost never a definite cause. This was the most frustrating part of it all. I would generally find myself restarting my computer every three or four days due either to crashes or just to assure stability.

        I have been using MacOS X for about 9 months now and have had three crashes that brought down the entire machine. Two of the crashes came from the same program and was probably reproducable.

        I would much rather have reproducable crashes. That way I can try to avoid the cause, and I believe it is more likely to be fixed.

        I am averaging about 14-20 days of uptime on the G4. Almost all restarts are a result of system upgrades and software upgrades that require restarts.
        • I currently have one box running Mac OS. The rest are Mac OS X and Linux. The Mac OS box, a Rev. B iMac, is running Mozilla, MacPerl, ircle, NiftyTelnet, and BBEdit, and mounts my network file server. It's been up for 40.6 days. Granted, it doesn't get the same workout other machines do that I use full time, but it is slightly more stable than the Graphite iBook that runs Mac OS X, and uses nothing but iTunes, Terminal, Chimera, and the network file server.

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