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Hi all,

I just wanted to rant, and see if people have any other issues/solutions to our common issues of the infamous Mac/PC hybrid environment:

  • Lack of Standardization
  • Inability to roll out GP to it’s fullest potential (no folder redirects in mac, no automatic print deployment, etc)
  • Cost of Mac’s during computer refresh’s
  • Making audit’s that much more difficult because of the mac’s.

I know i missed a lot, what else do you guys feel is the worst parts of supporting these environments?

@HP @Dell_Technologies

11 Spice ups
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I know this is a rant, but (like all guys) feel like I have to offer solutions, have you tried looking at ExtremeZ-IP ( Acronis Files Connect - Seamlessly Connect to and Search Windows and NAS files )

We use it for our hybrid environments and its pretty slick, we have minimal issues with it

4 Spice ups
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You can roll out Mac Mini’s for less than $600 each. I think the price argument against Mac kind of ended about 5 years ago. With the proliferation of tablets and smart devices today PC prices are on the rise. You used to be able to get a workstation for $300, now that same system is back up around $500-$800 range putting it on par with a Mac honestly.

All the other points I agree with, Mac’s are not designed to be centrally managed. There have been advances but they still cannot touch Windows which is designed from the ground up to be managed in an Enterprise setting.

BTW the Apple Remote Desktop is great for managing Mac’s on a LAN or VPN and does do it’s own reporting. Not as good as what you are looking for, just throwing it out there.

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I’m an ex-Mac guy, but honestly, they are just a pain to me. Out of roughly 300 end users, I’ve got about 8 Mac’s. So I’m supposed to keep up to speed on Mac’s all the while knowing I’ll never make a dime on them. Not interested.

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I’m not sure what price specs you’re looking at but this is just not true. If you compare spec to spec Mac still comes out almost double the cost (and some times more than).

EDIT: I adjusted the quote to frame the part I disagree with

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  1. We image all our Macs so they are all standard build, then the same patching gets pushed at the same time. No different to a PC

  2. Centrify will give you almost the same granularity as Windows GPO and it sits in AD with no schema changes or training for Windows admins. Works in exactly the same way

  3. Yes a Mac costs more but its insignificant to the cost of the staff using it. If the creative user you pay a salary of 50k a year to wants a Mac that costs 2k (over 3 years) thats a tiny slice of the users 150k plus employer tax over the 3 years. Give users what they work best on and get out of the way

  4. Why does an audit become difficult. If you are big enough to need multi site audit tools most work on a Mac. If you aren’t that big just use ARD its under $100

There are so many tools out there like Centrify, JAMF Casper, Munki, DeployStudio, ARD etc that its not difficult to implement. It is however difficult if you are a Windows admin being tasked with managing a small Mac deployment. Thats not an IT issue its a resource/skillset issue which your management need to resolve

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At that scale you are right to leave them…implementing anything beyond imaging a remote support with ARD is pretty pointless

I had 40,000 Macs to help manage so yeah we spent a few quid getting the right tools to do the job;-)

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Basic example. Just visited Dell.com and Apple.com. Both a Mac Mini and a Precision t1700 (entry models for both companies) start at exactly the same price, $499. Starting both are lower end Intel CPU’s with similar amounts of RAM and drive space.

As you scale up to higher end models you have to consider Apple’s iMac models include a monitor with much higher resolution than 99.9% of PC users will ever buy. A good 27" high end display can easily run you $600-$1,000. If you compare specs of an iMac to a Dell or HP system and include the cost of that screen the prices are fairly similar.

It’s likely you’ll spend a bit more for a Mac, but in the “old days” they used to be two or three times the cost of a PC with similar stats. Now it’s usually within 10% or so. Depending on your needs there can be a gap, but it’s not nearly as significant as it used to be.

I am obviously excluding the Mac Pro because it’s a very specific device not intended for general use. Anyone that would want to roll out an office full of them for word processing and email would be crazy.

2 Spice ups
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I just did a quick check on the pricing of the two you mentioned, the specs ARE very similar with one key difference, the Mac has a 1.4Ghz CPU that performs half as well as the Dell 3.6Ghz CPU. If you wanted to try to match the performance the Mac price goes WAY up…

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Precision T1700 in entry level?

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Yup, go through the process to start purchasing and you’ll see the specifics, I hadn’t customized anything yet chose the first one there for 499

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We have around 380 workstations in our environment. There are roughly 20 MAC’s and we have a definite skillset issue. I am a windows admin and we have standard helpdesk people. I am by far the most knowledgeable on MAC’s because I have taken the time to learn the systems. That being said MAC’s just don’t play well in enterprise environments. This is even more so with the last 2 OSX upgrades with El Capitan being the most unfriendly. Perhaps its just because we have more crashes and issues with the latest than we do with Windows 10.

Recently we implemented Centrify because we want to deploy standard group policies and give standard users admin rights over printing capabilities. It seems to work well and is reasonably priced.

Despite that if I could I would roll them all out the door, just because its just another system to manage and one that doesn’t manage well.

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MacBooks… if you bind them, having persistent WiFi authentication/authorization is still there (when you’re signed in), but if you unplug ethernet and try to log in they have a hard time of authenticating as it shows the connection severed. I double check and make sure the cache local profile (for authentication) is there, but still issues arise. Once plugging ethernet back in and signing in, unplug the ethernet and WiFi shows as persistent/authenticated (grrrrr). Outside of that, ExtremeZ-IP for share prefixes/etc make everything easy enough not to complain. There have been some issues with SharePoint 2013 plugins, but nothing major.

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In my case the worst part is users and techs having panic attacks because, OMG, it’s a Mac!

A computer is a computer. Plain and simple. Email, document editing, and web browsing work the same on both, and in my opinion, that’s all the majority of the end users do.

I support Linux, OS X, and Windows platforms from desktop (which I shouldn’t have to, we have a help desk) to server. They range from regular users to creatives to administrative to executive. (Toot! Toot! Yup, blowing my horn). I really wish people would get over the FUD.

Yes, some things have to be done differently. Yes, sometimes extra steps, software, or hardware is required to do the same thing. And YES, because of this miracle we call technology (and google), it is possible!

But seriously, it’s not that big a deal. We work in IT. We get called to fix things that aren’t even computers because they exist. And it’s 2015. At this point in the game, for a tech to say “I’m not good with Macs” is about as valid as a user saying “I’m not good with these fancy new shiny computer gadgets”.

So queue the flame war. I’m out.

6 Spice ups
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Buying a Mac Mini for an employee sounds like a quick way to also buy them a Macbook. I’ve met very few people who can truly get away with having a desktop only.

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That’s odd, I know very few people who need anything more than a desktop… though many of them try to convince us they “need” a Macbook. I guess sitting alone at the coffee shop without a shiny tech toy to show off is an undue hardship for some.

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  • Lack of standardization: Mac OS is a BSD UNIX under the hood. Lots of Open Source Software and the standards that come with it right there. And a single image of Mac OS can be applied to any hardware the OS supports without driver problems. Nice and easy to standardize your image.

  • Inability to roll out Group Policy:

  • Cost of Macs during computer refresh:

  • Audits: I worked in a company where compliance audits were the norm. Kicking out a Mac report was no problem. Kicking out a Windows report was no problem. As long as you implement the systems needed life is good.

Standardization: What does this even mean? A single OS X image can be applied to all supported hardware platforms with no driver issues. That’s rather standardized. OS X is a BSD UNIX under the hood, with lots of Open Source Software implementing various RFC standards.

Group Policy: Trying to manage an OS X computer like you would a Windows computer is going to be as successful as managing a Linux computer like you would a Windows computer. Why is this an issue?

Cost: Apple’s hardware has a different depreciation rate than Dell, Lenovo, HP, whatever. Personally I don’t think there is an overly logical reason for it, but that’s the case. Used Macs can be sold for more money than a used PC purchased at the same time. Your accounting should be factoring that in. I’ve done enough laptop roll outs to know that once you step up to vPro and other related technologies that let you fully manage the hardware lifecycle, acquisition cost of Mac and PC is a wash.

Audits: Again, this is a managing OS X like you would Windows issue. I had no problem getting the needed evidence and maintaining compliance of the OS X computers when audited for HIPAA, SOX, PCI, etc. In some ways, Macs have a slight advantage here. You can show your auditors the Group Policy being applied to your Windows fleet.

Can you prove those settings are actually being applied to a Windows computer? (If not, you should learn how before an auditor asks.) On the Mac side, the compliance reporting comes from collecting inventory and configuration from the Mac directly. So instead of showing “here’s Group Policy” it’s “Here’s the policies we’ve pushed out to the Macs. Here’s the collected inventory of the random sample Macs you selected proving compliance.”

Seriously, pull this off and the windows guys will hate you because now the auditor will ask them for the same evidence. Poor lazy bum Windows admins. :wink:

Managing Macs is a great place to cut your teeth on empowering the end user, encouraging self service and self reliance, and driving down support tickets and support cost on a platform. Learn to do it, then come full circle and apply that knowledge to the Windows, Linux, whatever side of your house. To borrow a phrase, Different is good.

2 Spice ups
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It’s a 1.4 that scales up to like 2.4 or something with Speedboost or whatever they call it. Because OS X is NIX based the performance is very similar.

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I visited Dell.com. clicked on Business and that was the cheapest model, so yeah. I’d call that entry level for the discussion of office computers. I wouldn’t buy anything less for business.

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As others said, and as I mentioned as well, Mac’s are terrible at central management, reporting, etc.

My only point was that, for small office machines, the costs are not that significant these days as they used to be. Cost of ownership over time can actually make them very viable cost wise.

I manage several offices that use the next step up mini’s at $599 and people use email, Office, web browser, use RemoteApp, etc just fine on them. I hardly ever see any crashes or issues out of the boxes. They are just a computer, anything would work. When done properly you can use Linux these days, it’s all about the same.

Heck many people use Chromebooks which I’d consider useless too me but they get their tasks done just fine with them. I’ve seen sales people that work exclusively off tablets, each environment is different based on needs.

I don’t exclude Mac’s because of cost these days. I would have 10 or more years ago, but not now.