Design Problems
One reason I stick to Macintosh is that I rarely have to lose hours of my time online trying to figure out how to get hardware to work. I plug in, try things by following intuition, and then it almost always works. I don’t know any other company that understands this.
Take Logitech. It’s a strong brand name in the keyboard/mouse peripherals market, and yet its software sucks. Completely. I bought a wireless keyboard and mouse to use with both my MacBook and my PowerBook, since my PowerBook’s monitor is broken, making it a de-facto desktop computer by being tethered to an external monitor. Logitech touts one of the features of this set as having an easy-to-reach USB wireless receiver, for plug-’n'-play usability. Unfortunately, when I unplug the wireless receiver from one computer and plug it in again (either to the other computer or the same computer) Logitech’s software fails to recognize their own products. Thus, all the extra buttons on the keyboard don’t do anything, and ocassionally, the keyboard reverts to the “Windows” layout, where the Option and Command keys switch places.
I haven’t found a fix, other than uninstalling and reinstalling Logitech’s software each time I unplug and plug in the wireless receiver. This is not progress.
I wish more companies did their engineering like Apple, because although Steve Jobs’ minions aren’t perfect, they pay attention to details to make things work as seamlessly as possible. Most companies do not. Logitech, your brand represents shoddy design.
