Okay, I'll get into it. First of all, the one button thing is bunk. All you have to do is plug a two button mouse into any ol' USB port and a right click opens up a contextual menu just as it does in Windows. There is no need for any mods. I switched to Mac after using Windows for years, and on my laptop, there is no effort involved in hitting control and clicking for the contextual menu.

As for paying through the nose. I don't think so! Macs aren't your bottom of the line PC's. They're top notch machines decked out with the best and latest hardware. Find a comparable PC and you'll see that the Mac will most likely be cheaper. Do anything else but compare similar machines (like most people do) and you might as well say that a Car with a puny I4 is better than a 400 hp Z06 Corvette because it's cheaper. The final argument for price is this: How much is Windows Vista going to cost? $399 for the top of the line version. You may say, "Well, that's the top of the line version, though!" Well, the OS X top of the line version costs $129 dollars. That's cheaper than the cheapest, crappiest Windows Vista upgrade. There are no OS X upgrade versions or a cheaper version with less features. Releasing several versions of an OS is got to be one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. At any rate, that's 270 dollars to the OS only.

As for software. There are two things that stick out in my mind immediate that make OS X Tiger such a pleasure to use where there is nothing comparable to in XP. Vista supposedly has them, but Tiger has for almost two years. Spotlight: The instant search. The search as you type genius little app built right in. I press command-space and start typing the name of any application, filename (or the contents of a file with text in it such as PSDs, Word docs or PDF files), folders or preferences. The results pop up almost instantly on my 3 year old Mac (which for everyone's knowledge has never needed to be serviced despite how many times it's been dropped). The second is called Exposé. The two settings I use are 'show desktop' and 'show all windows'. When I move my mouse to a corner of my screen or press a certain function key, all the windows will slide off my screen so I can access my desktop, or all the windows will organize themself on the screen so I can see them all. Those two things programs more time than you could possibly imagine. Not to mention, Apple computers come with iLife, the amazing suite of applications for movies, music and photos. They also come with Safari, my favorite browser of all time. Mail (sort of like Outlook, only better). Automator, which is a useful application for creating all kinds of workflows in an easy drag and drop interface. iChat, an MSN Messenger, AIM and .Mac chatting program all in one with beautiful graphics and amazing video conferencing features. And of course, QuickTime, which unfortunately isn't free for the Pro version. What useful programs come with Windows? I can only think of Windows Media Player, to be honest.

Finally, all I have to say is ease of use. How many times have you struggled with connecting to a wireless network? How about getting that printer to work properly (or wirelessly)? What about connecting that digital camera? Well, on the Mac, a printer takes a minute to setup, cameras don't need any drivers and Internet Connect, the wireless internet utility, makes it a cinch to connect and it will never switch between signals.

I'm going to skip reliability for the most part here. I really didn't have too many problems with XP crashing, but my Mac crashes about once a year, seriously. When an app does freeze, though, sorting it out in Tiger is much easier, however.

I'm going to bed now.