I think that mechanically they are the same: a sheet with membrane switches. The buttons on mine are just pressing on the membrane at that spot.
…but I could be wrong.
I am mostly firmly in the Apple ecosystem. One miss in the survey is “Homekit vs Amazon vs Google” for home automation. I won’t buy devices that don’t work with Homekit, because I have no desire to have multiple ecosystems (and I really dislike the individual manufacturer ecosystems like Eufy, et al). I have EufyCam 2.0 devices because they actually worked with Homekit Secure Video (it’s difficult to find HKSV devices, which frustrates me). I wanted to upgrade, then found out that the newer devices didn’t support Apple and canceled my order.
I have non-Apple displays for the two Mac Minis (and my work MBP) only because I can’t justify the cost of the Apple displays - I don’t work with color to the point where an Apple display makes financial sense. The ASUS XG49WCR is wonderful (it makes my work day so much better) and the Dell S3220DGF works reasonably well for the M4 mini until I can get a new widescreen curved monitor (at which point the Dell moves to the M1 mini that’s currently on a 24" (it’s probably an LG). I have a Sonos Beam soundbar for the main Apple TV because the 1st gen Homepods just weren’t reliable as a stereo pair (they were great for the first few years, but they started having significant difficulties staying synced). I still have them, but they’re no longer a stereo pair and are mostly for using Siri to do “stuff” or occasionally playing music (one in the living room, one in the dining room). I have a homepod mini in the office that works well for music when I’m working.
As devices start to support Matter, I’m hopeful that we’ll have more options to “add on” to the Apple Ecosystem because the vendors won’t have to explicitly add HomeKit support anymore.
Many of the extra devices I have are either Eve (switches, outlets), Airversa (humidifiers, air purifier), Ecobee (thermostats with remote sensors), Nanoleaf (lights). I bought a new Aqara doorbell with Matter hub to replace the Logitech CircleView doorbell that now “sleeps with the fishes” (it worked for a few years and then just died - but it always had challenges staying connected). The only thing that isn’t directly Homekit compatible is the Simplisafe security system, because as far as I can tell there’s no reasonable security system that offers Homekit compatibility and still allows for professional monitoring.
The current poll was Apple hardware, but an argument can be made that there should be a companion poll for Apple services. I, for one, have a lot of Apple hardware but use no paid Apple services.
Paid services would include, I think:
- iCloud+ (cloud storage and more)
- Apple TV+
- Apple Music
- Apple Arcade
- Apple Fitness+
- Apple News+
- Apple Books
Other:
- Apple Pay
- Apple Cash
- App Store
The App Store seems like a given, but you can still make the distinction: given a choice, is the App Store your primary source of Mac apps? Or do you prefer to get apps elsewhere, such as direct from developer or Steam?
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I’d agree in a lot of respects. For the most part, I get my Mac software external to the Mac App Store - but it really depends on the software. I will buy Mac software through the App Store, but it’s not my first choice. Then again, I was a big fan of MacHeist back in the day before they cratered, back when it was a great way for independent developers to find a new audience. That predated the App Store, so when the App Store showed up I wasn’t really impressed. It’s OK, but there are definite structural issues.
I use Apple Books extensively because it works really well at allowing me to import ePubs from external sources (I buy a lot of my books direct from publishers, preferably DRM-free, then import them into Apple Books to read them). The Kindle app does not work as well for ePubs sourced from outside of the Amazon ecosystem - although you can import books, they’re second class citizens. In Apple Books, as far as I can tell, imported ePubs are treated as first class citizens.
I use Apple Pay extensively (i.e., whenever possible), although not often with my Apple credit card - I get better rebates from a couple of other cards, so I use them via Apple Pay. I like the fact that Apple Pay uses a device specific card with additional security protections (similar to some of the credit cards that offered the virtual card numbers to use online). I don’t use Apple Cash much, especially since they added the ability to automatically move the Apple Cash into the Apple Savings account). There was a point where I did use it at point of sale, before I started working from home, primarily to buy lunch.
Of the other offerings, I have an Apple One Premier subscription, so I “get” most of the rest of the subscription services. It’s primarily because my wife and my son use Apple Music heavily and enjoy not having to buy new music (particularly my son) - I was good with importing my extensive CD collection and then occasionally buying a new album if I liked something. The other reason was to get iCloud+ to support multiple HomeKit Secure Video cameras - I have four at the moment (three cameras, one doorbell) and will almost certainly add more. We have watched some of the Apple TV+ shows, and they’re certainly not bad, but they weren’t a reason to subscribe (for us). We don’t use Arcade or Fitness+ much (if any), and News+ is only useful if I want to look up a specific story behind a paywall - I don’t really use it as a primary news source.
First computer Apple IIe
Current computer M4 Mac Mini
Never owned a smart phone, never will.
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Primary Apple Devices:
Desktop: Mid-2011 iMac maxed out at MacOS 10.13.6
Laptop: Mid-2015 MacBook Pro maxed out at MacOS 12.7.6
Phone: iPhone 12 iOS 18.6
Tablets: iMac Mini 5 iPadOS 14.4.2; iPad Mini 6 iPadOS 18.6; iPad Mini 7 iPadOS 18.6 All used interchangeably, and all have Pencils
Watch: Watch 5 WatchOS 10.6.1
TV: TV 4K 1st gen; TV 4K 3rd gen
Other Apple products:
Apple IIc (first Apple product bought Fall 1984)
Newton Message Pad 2100
iMac G5
iMac G4
iMac G3
Macintosh LC w/ Apple IIe Card
Non-Apple Product
SuperMac C500 with G3 upgrade
Edit on 8 Sep 25: I forgot to list the AppleDesign Powered Speakers that unfortunately died several years ago.
Just to reiterate, folks, I’m sure many people have a lot of hardware from other manufacturers kicking around, perhaps even in use for a non-trivial amount of time. But it’s impossible to design polls that can take into account all the nuances and yield manageable results.
We may indeed have to do a followup poll on Apple services since there are so many.
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That would be a vote for Other.
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I use Apple devices for most purposes - Mac Studio, Studio Display, three varieties of iPad (one used as a display for my weather station) and a couple others. I use a Sennheiser 650n headphone which I like better than Apple’s equivalent - but there’s very little advantage to sticking with Apple here and using a wired headphone lets me play my keyboard together with a recording on my Mac with very little delay whereas a wireless headphone doesn’t work very well - important for trying to figure out chords for a fiddle tune. I have an Apple Studio Display which is by far my best monitor, but I also have a good Dell and a good BenQ display - and for some purposes involving spreadsheets, fiddle tunes and web page design I use all three and wish I had more space.
So while I use some other equipment the Apple equipment is generally gets a strong preference explicitly because it works together so nicely.
Peter Yarensky
The heart of my computing world has been Macs since the 512 K I bought in 1985, and everything I bought from then to now has to be Mac compatible. However, I have chosen non-Mac products over Apple since I replaced the dot-matrix Imagewriter with an affordable non-Mac laser printer rather than an expensive LaserWriter. I don’t remember Apple ever offering an ergonomic keyboard, but I needed one to avoid wrist and finger pain, and Apple has had some very uncomfortable keyboards. Apple displays cost more than they’re worth. I started word processing with MacWrite, but Apple didn’t keep up with what I need for writing and sending for publishers. I bought an iPod to listen to music when driving, but I don’t do that much any more. I never was interested in tablets; I use keyboards for writing. I bought a cheap dumb phone around 2000 to keep in touch when traveling, and only switched to an iPhone last year because my old dumb phone died and my wife had a spare iPhone. (Otherwise I would have bought another feature phone – small screens are not comfortable for my eyes.) So although I have been a Mac user for 40 years, I’m far from exclusive, so overall I’m an other, although I wouldn’t know what to do with Windows or Android, and the only Google feature I use regularly is their maps.
Two things.
- In the ear buds / headphone question, you have no option for ‘Other’. I use my (Oticon) hearing aids - with Bluetooth connection to iPhone, TV and so on.
- When you say “If you answer Other for any of the questions, please describe what you use in the comments.” I expected a ‘Comments’ box to pop up, or to be at the end of the questionnaire. It didn’t. Is this forum where you expected us to write any comments?
I’m not admitting to anything, but I’d like to point out that your form should allow for us to put the number of each type of device that we have. :D 
Apparently I cannot submit without a google login - I am all in on Apple except for the display (HP right now). I do not have a smart speaker or VR headset. Also and Apple Premier Plus subscriber in terms of services. My friends call me Angus MacBigot of the Clan MacBigot.
I’m pretty much all in. The only ones I didn’t check were speakers (I’m a long-time Sonos user, way before Apple got in the game) and don’t have a VR headset. The only reason I wear a watch is because the Apple watch is part of the ecosystem. Having said that, I’m looking for a way out. The integration seems forced, and the continual changes, especially on the macOS side, are driving me nuts. “%&%&ing Apple” is heard around my house constantly. I’m going to take a close look at different Linux systems, and if I find there are good replacements for the Mac apps I use most I won’t think twice about letting the other devices go, too.
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I use an 11 year old iPhone 8+ which Apple no longer supports for my few calls. If it dies I’m not sure I’d have any phone. BTW, I already turned off push notifications. Too many people were abusing the “right to call” especially the medical community.
I use an iPod Mini to watch some of my collection of recorded video.
My computer monitors are HD TVs via HDMI. I like watching movies from my collection large screen using VLC and often speed up over the slow bits. The movies were recorded using not Apple tech (no longer available)
I looked at Swinsian a while ago as a replacement for Apple’s extremely buggy Music app for MacOS. At the time it was abandonware, with no updates since June 2021. Lo and behold, two days ago it was resurrected with version 3 that, among other things, natively supports Apple silicon.
Besides the risk of it returning to abandonware, I have other concerns. Perhaps you can enlighten me about these issues. What I understand from the web site is that Swinsian moves the music files to its own library, is that true? And are the moved files still visible in the Finder, or are they locked in a database? Also, Swinsian cannot copy files to the iPhone, hence the warning that you must maintain the Music app as well if you want to do that. Is that still true? Finally, I have rated a lot of my tracks, and since ratings are not kept in the files as metadate, I would undoubtedly lose them, which is a problem. (I do not use any of Apple’s music-related cloud services.) Thank you for any information you can provide.
I have two iPhones. A 13 Pro is my main phone, and a 12 mini is my backup. Why a backup? I live alone, and when I ditched my landline, I didn’t want to be without communication if my primary phone is lost or damaged or has to be repaired or if service goes out. I bought the mini on eBay about a year ago, refurbished by the vendor with a new battery. The phone is everything that was promised.
I set it up with Tello, an MVNO, with minimum service for $10/month. I don’t know which cellular service is their provider. I only shared the number with family and a couple of close friends, so it gets no junk calls. I have it logged in to my Apple Account, primarily so its contact list stays updated, and so I get all the junk iMessages that have to be deleted separately on that device.
It gives me some added peace of mind.
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Yes, because the options are basically Apple and non-Apple. There are way too many non-Apple possibilities to encompass in a question.
Yes, precisely. Every TidBITS article has comments here.
Try again—it doesn’t require a Google login. I can load it fine in an incognito window.
Sorry, but no—that would induce madness. How many you’ve ever bought? How many you still have? How many still work? How many you still use? Etc…
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This is a comment about the poll that doesn’t really call for a change to the poll but for a change to Apple. :-)
There is no option on the “tablet” category for “growf, growf, I use an x because Apple doesn’t make a real tablet computer.” :-) In my case, what I have is an old Microsoft Surface Go which has cellular internet and is an actual computer. All my other devices are Apple. I’d love a genuine Apple tablet computer, but that means Apple has to either:
- Make the iPad vastly more computer-like, which they seem unwilling to do because it would hurt Mac sales, or, better,
- Give the Mac a touch screen interface and put in a cellular connection, which they seem unwilling to do because it would hurt iPad sales.
Obvious conclusion: Apple has too many product lines. :-)
(As an aside, the Surface Go cannot be transitioned to Windows 11, so it can’t last much longer. And Microsoft no longer has a proper replacement, either. Apparently “true tablet computer” is not a market niche anyone wants to fill.)
Like others here I’ve moved, over a lifetime, from the computers to everything else.
First machine a IIe, followed by a Mac Plus, followed by a Mac IIci & an SE/30. (Loved those last two…)
Followed by a line of laptops, with iMacs for my kids… (and an office supplied Dell laptop, a truly gruesome thing). But none of these equal to the M’s – Apple has finally become Apple!
I’m on an M4 Air now, having passed an M1 & M3 to Windows friends, who have simply gone “wow”!!
Since the first iPad, one has never been out of reach – currently on an 11” Gen 3 iPad Pro. I’ve moved from clamshell Samsung phones to an awful Motorola G to a Mini iPhone 12, finally seeing the error of my ways. Though that’s basically support for a Watch 7, which I’m just in love with…
AirPod Pro 2s complete my hardware – a powered OWC dock runs a Phillips monitor (though I want an ALogic – my only deviation from being a complete Apple fanboy). Of course I’ve an iCloud+ sub, though that’s my one service…
All of these devices have been life changing, I’m just so thankful that Apple exists!