September 1st, 2008
PC or Mac?
Posted by Greg Atkinson under Church 2.0, Churches, Communication, IT, Random Thoughts
Let the wars begin! Just kidding. Actually, I ask the question because I think the answer (for most churches) is BOTH. I just talked with 2 guys that do video at 2 different larger churches and they use both Avid and FinalCut.
In the world of Church IT (which I’ll blog more about later), there seems to be a either-or mindset and after talking to a few geek friends, plus Tony Steward (who is just too fun to call a geek, but he knows his stuff) - they seem to believe that church networks can have a happy marriage of PCs and Macs.
I wonder: is this your reality? Is your church all PC? all Mac? Are you a hybrid? What’s your situation? My church is predominately PC, but the whole Worship & Arts/production staff is Mac and after talking to several of our pastors, they’d like to be Mac, too. I wonder if you, like me, since we’re at a tipping point.
HERE’S an article that I wrote almost a year ago for Monday Morning Insight. I was shocked at home much attention it got. It was obvious I had hit a nerve/hot button. I asked in the article how many have switched to Vista and how many have switched to Leopard. I ask you the same. We recently switched all our Macs to Leopard and got the Final Cut Studio 2 upgrade.
So, what say you? PC? Mac? Both? Are you near a tipping point? Do you think both can live happily together on a church network? Are Exchange and Entourage incompatible? Are they either-or options or does that even matter? Let me hear ya!
September 1st, 2008 at 6:58 am
The church exclusively uses PCs, but the Music Minister and I (Director of Media Ministries) personally has a Mac. So the PPT file is made and double-checked on Macs, but shown on a PC.
Matthew
September 1st, 2008 at 7:34 am
Hi Greg!
We use PC’s exclusively. I know that Mac’s are supposed to have superior abilities when it comes to audio and video processing, but I am a bit stiff-necked and set in my ways. Our pastor said something about getting a Mac when we replaced his laptop and told him not to. Not because I’m PC oriented, but because he is barely functional on his PC. I really do not have the time to learn a new platform to trouble shoot when things go haywire. FYI: I use Audition for my adio editing and Cyberlink Power Video Editor Pro. For any of your newbies out there I highly recommend it.
September 1st, 2008 at 8:11 am
I’m a pastor that had Mac envy for a couple of years and bought a MacBook Pro last December. I was holding out because of Logos, the bible software I use exclusively, which was in development for the Mac OS but not available. I have been testing the Alpha releases since April and still using the Windows version on my Mac via Fusion running virtual Windows. I love it! The Mac is functional, stable, easy to use and “cool.”
The church has an all PC network but my Mac fits right in sharing files and printing etc. I recommend the Mac highly.
September 1st, 2008 at 10:50 am
We want to switch our office over to Mac, but we have been holding out for one reason MICROSOFT PUBLISHER. This bloated piece of software is the only one that our office staff knows, so we have years of files in that format. Unfortunately nothing could read that format. Now that we have the option of having Windows on Macs we are seriously considering the big switch.
September 1st, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Exclusively Mac for my church. We’re in a bit different position than some of the others who have posted though; being a church plant, there is no pre-existing infrastructure to maintain, so no questions about compatibility, etc. Obviously though, we test things such as website designs, Illustrator/InDesign files, movies, etc. to guarantee compatibility with both Mac and Windows. Case in point: it doesn’t matter how good a website looks in Safari if it looks horrendous in IE.
September 1st, 2008 at 2:57 pm
Mostly PC over here in our neck of the world but we do have Macs and I am a user of both and own both at home.
The Mac is integrated to our W2k3 AD setup and the only thing that it doesn’t control is our shared colour printer because the dodgy sellers didn’t enable that option and are now holding us to ransom … but have a workaround for that as well.
I’d happily move the entire setup to Macs for ease of use, etc but the initial outlay is a big no-no for the pastor and his team.
September 1st, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Most of the our church is PC with the exception of the media and worship teams, and a couple of the communication people. After almost a year of using a Mac everyday at the office, I must say I just don’t understand all the fanboys. Frankly, there are VERY few things that my Mac can do easier or faster than my PC, including video editing. Sony Vegas is faster and easier to use than Final Cut Pro. Final Cut does interface very well with Motion so that is an advantage, but not much. My Mac crashes, yes it does, and does so as rarely as my Windows XP box at home. And I stretch my PC way more than my Mac. I will say I do much prefer Keynote to PowerPoint, but other than that I just don’t get it.
With the latest updates even Vista it has become a very nice OS. And like Mac OS X, they both need regular security and bug fix updates.
September 1st, 2008 at 8:04 pm
we are on windows platforms at our church, except for one old mac with finalcut and my personal/work computer, which runs ubuntu linux.
September 1st, 2008 at 8:23 pm
The media/communications team at our church is mac-seclusive, the rest of our staff is PC. All the computers that are service essential are macs and granted they are a little older and not as powerful as a bunch of the PC in the church but they still keep going and we never have a problem with them. I was a hesitant convert but now I just really like the mac better then PC.
September 1st, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Four years ago, we were exclusively PC, but I started the switch. Now, the only holdout is our children’s ministry, and a few other secretarial positions. Our server is still PC, but we’re about to buy an Xserve, then continue on with Macs.
September 1st, 2008 at 9:13 pm
The church offices use PC. The pastors all use PC laptops with exception of our Creative Arts pastor, he uses a desktop PC. Our church service computers are Macs and we use Renewed Vision software for our IMAG and stage screens. We edit on Macs and all of our graphic design is done on a Mac. Our pastors have talked about going Mac for some time. We’ll see what happens. We also use Microsoft Publisher. I really am not happy with that program, but it’s what our people know, so until we can upgrade and acclimate everyone to Macs and Pages then our stuff wont look as good as it can.
September 1st, 2008 at 9:36 pm
The offices use PC, which I have in my office. We use Media Shout on PC for all IMAG and screens. I use a PC Avid system to do weekly edits, but use a Mac in our recording studio on Digital Performer and the whole iMac world. I have a Mac Powerbook at home which I do Photoshop on for graphics and Final Cut for other edits… next time I get an upgrade on my office computer, I will request a Mac. The two worlds can definitely co-exist.
September 1st, 2008 at 9:44 pm
That’s funny. We’re all Mac and we do our Worship with PC (Easyworship and VT5 for switching). In our next building we’ll probably do all mac.
September 2nd, 2008 at 9:41 am
My church is another casualty to the evil known as Microsoft Publisher. We also use ACS software, which isn’t Mac friendly (you can do online ACS, which can work with macs).
My department (worship), is exclusively Mac from start to finish, thanks to Pro Presenter, Final Cut, and a director who thinks progressively.
September 2nd, 2008 at 10:52 am
We are approaching the 50/50 mark. All but one office computer in the worship dept is mac. We use ProPresenter in 3 different worship spaces, and those are all mac too. Graphic design and one of the youth guys are on macs too. All of the other office computers are PCs though. We have our common drives mapped on our macs, and we’re using Entourage without hickups too.
September 2nd, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Our church has been PC for years. But two years ago we updated all of our creative arts PC’s to Mac ( about 6 computers) and I must say I never been a PC that renders or opens programs as fast as My mac does.
September 2nd, 2008 at 1:29 pm
Rudy, EasyWorship will soon have a Mac version. FYI.
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:51 pm
Our church is in the process of phasing out the Windows PC’s and replacing them with Macs. We recently pulled the plug on MediaShout, (Thank God), and began utilizing ProPresenter. That Mac was the first one. Our Associate Pastor recently moved to using a MacBook. We’re a small church of about 400 members and I think that its even more important for us to utilize the Macintosh platform due to the value proposition that it brings. One of the best parts that I think so many churches overlook is the virus immunity. Also, for those of you utilizing MS Publisher you should consider making the transition to Apple’s iWork Suite. This Suite of Apps runs circles around MS Publisher and believe it or not, the learning curve is really not bad. If you can drag an object and drop it somewhere on a page you can use a Mac and iWork. You can always run Windows on your Mac if you must, but do you really think you will need the archived MS Publisher files? Since we’ve began our migration we haven’t even used MS Publisher. That’s been over 6 months now.
September 3rd, 2008 at 8:30 am
My church has been a hybrid of PCs (volunteers and check-in stations) and Macs (all staff) since at least 2001. We setup a Linux-based server for accounts and file shares so that everything would play nice together, prior to OS X’s better Windows support.
The toughest thing we battled was finding enough people that were experienced enough with Macs to support them. Before we found enough volunteers, we decided to use a local Mac support shop. They did the OS upgrades, hardware fixes/warranty issues, and setup printers and other drivers. Otherwise, they were the same as having PCs on the network.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:39 am
We are transitioning into an all Mac system here. Currently 3 out of 6 ministerial staff have macs and VERY soon 4 out of 6 will. Every new purchase we make is a mac. With iChat SCREEN SHARING for Leopard, I can now be more effective at computer administration for all those “little things” that come up. Sharing is a sanp and backup on our time capsules is a breeze. PLUS they’re macs. Need I say more? haha
September 3rd, 2008 at 7:58 pm
We have a funny mix. Officially, our parent church (CPC) is all PC. And so Upper Room should be all PC. However, 9 of our 11 staffers own or use Macs. As Upper Room is growing into it’s own, we’re in the process of leaving the CPC IT infrastructure and setting up our own.
We’ll be putting in an XServe and moving everyone to Macs. I still run Windows via Fusion for the things I need to (Studio Manager and the odd system control app). I edit on a MacPro using Final Cut Pro (which I greatly prefer over Vegas–and I used that daily for 15 months–sorry Jason!)
Even at CPC change is afoot. More and more staffers are buying Macs and brining them in to work (to use when their PCs crash). I suspect we’ll be 50/50 in a year as a total ministry, though Upper Room will be all Mac in 6 months or less (I hope!)
September 4th, 2008 at 7:33 am
Right now we only have PC’s owned by the Church, but I have written into our new APC IT Best Practices Document that we /will/ be considering Mac’s for the Production and music folks on a case by case basis.
Right now our Video Production genius is using his own Mac, although he does have the best computer in the house for his production needs, and while he uses that on occasion, the Mac is just so much better at doing what he requires that he uses that much more than his PC.
Being as Unix was my first love, Mac’s no longer frighten me. I was weened on a NeXT machine, and I miss it. *sniff*
September 6th, 2008 at 8:36 am
We’re all PC’s, and I believe Mac is simply a great marketing company, not a superior computer. That said, I don’t buy into the “X platform is superior to Y platform” A shame people do.
For video editing after much research we settled on Sony Vegas. Everything I’ve seen and read led us to believe it is as good as FCP. After using it for several years and continuing to read the blogs and forums I believe the choice was an outstanding one.
I’ve upgraded to Vista on my personal computer, and frankly miss XP Pro, but it works ok. For the church whoever I don’t forsee a major upgrade anytime soon.