I've gone from Mac to PC and all the above is true. macOS is a much tidier experience.shadiradio wrote:I use OS X and Windows 7 for both work and play (music production, sound design, and game development). I much prefer OS X but both have their merits. Specifically, for music production, I've found:
- Not having to deal with the Windows registry cruft over time will save you headaches down the road. OS X has a different approach - there is no registry, so stray files and small data (that don't do anything at all) accumulate in system folders - but it will never slow down your machine the more you install / uninstall over time (unless you are running out of hard drive space).
- MIDI support on Windows is an afterthought - if you connect a lot of devices, or even hot swap a lot of devices, be prepared for issues down the road with the registry not recognizing or allowing assignment of new devices. Some manufacturers (Korg) supply tools just to get around this deficiency.
- Being able to create any number of physical sound devices into one aggregate audio device on OS X and use it system-wide (where any audio software or DAW can recognize it) is incredible.
- There isn't anything on Windows that is easier to setup than Soundflower for virtual cables. I'm not saying solutions don't exist - but it's very much like Rewire vs. Jack in terms of ease of use.
However, Apple have a habit of pulling what they see as obsolete technologys from macOS. This is a massive pain if you like plundering KVR and other places for older and obscure plugins. For this reason, I'll be sticking with Windows as my Bitwig machine for a while.
