What’s Your Switch Story?

Inspired by this recent post at TUAW. I’d like to share my own “switcher” story.

I purchased my first Mac on June 2004. It was a 1.5 Ghz 15″ Powerbook. I’ve been wanting to switch to a Mac since I saw the Powerbook G3 of a former office mate. At first I fell in love with the design and began reading about Macs. I later fell in love with the OS. I’ve always knew that a Unix based system was better than Windows but it wasn’t as friendly to use. I wasn’t a hardcore computer geek. I knew things but I don’t want to spend my time under the hood of a computer. I just wanted something that worked. OS X promised to give me that. A powerful Unix core under the hood with a simple, user friendly interface that Apple was known for. I was hooked.

So, I saved for a year or so. Putting extra money aside. On that faithful day in June 2004, I finally placed my order. The dealer delivered my Powerbook a day after. The, rest they say is history. Since then I’ve been an Apple convert. I loved most of the things about it. From how the computer was designed all the way to how it just makes my life easier.

I began advocating for the Mac with my family. Showing it off to my brother, mom and dad. I showed them how easy it was to do things on a Mac. They were skeptic at first but they soon realized how nice it was.

My brother was my first convert. He sold his few month old ASUS laptop and bought a 12″ PowerBook. My mom later followed when her Sony VAIO died. Instead of replacing it with another Windows laptop, my dad bought her a 12″ iBook.

To date, it’s only my dad in our immediate family that has yet to switch to a Mac laptop. Partly because he is tied to his office’s system which dictates that he has to use a Windows laptop. He is however, a very happy iPhone user. If not for being tied to his office, I think he would have been a Mac user as well.

The biggest factor I switched to the Mac is that it just allowed me to focus on the things I wanted to do. Do my design work, browse the internet, email, entertainment, etc. Instead of spending a lot of time, maintaining my computer. I don’t have to worry about virus, crashes or whatnot. It just life easier and more enjoyable.

So what’s your switcher story? Care to share it with us?

*Currently I’m using a 2.33Ghz 17″ MacBook Pro and wishing I could get a new 15″ Unibody MacBook Pro