While I don’t always agree with the way Apple conducts business, there are alot of things the Windows PC industry can learn from them. I often help people pick a new PC, and there are things I bump into every time that make the process of picking, buying and setting up a new PC unnecessarily cumbersome. Here are five things I think HP, Acer, Asus and all the others could learn from the way Apple does things.
More Five things the PC industry can learn from Apple

A couple of days ago, I had an interesting dicussion on Twitter with Dutch media guru @erwblo. He noticed a trend at SxSW, where all exciting new developments seemed to be centered around apps. I tried to argue that apps are “evil”, but found that I needed a lot more than 140 characters to explain myself. Hence this post.

Right now, there’s a war raging. Apple, Google, RIM, Microsoft and others are caught up in a bitter fight over supremacy on the mobile internet. And the stakes are high. The web is about to go mobile. Smartphone sales are up, and dumbphones are getting smarter. Tablets are replacing part of the laptop market, and will soon represent a big slice of overall internet consumption.
More A dystopian future of the mobile internet

Over the last couple of days, rumours that Nokia would adopt Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 platform started gaining momentum. I wasn’t suprised when they turned out to be true today. The leaked internal memo by Stephen Elop had made it very clear that drastic measures were in order, and this seemed like the most likely scenario.

Ever since the news was announced, I’ve been reading bitter tweets and blog posts in which Nokia developers and fans detail why they think this deal is a bad move for Nokia. But as understandable as their frustrations are, almost all of those messages are based on a single assumption. That Nokia would be able to maintain market share in the smartphone market with Symbian and/or MeeGo.
More My thoughts on the Nokia Microsoft deal

Last week, I finally switched my main work PC from Vista to Windows 7. Installation was easy enough, and I really enjoy the subtle improvements in 7. One thing I’m not too fond of is the Windows 7 artwork. The default wallpaper is a little too bright and blue for my taste, and while you can easily change it once logged in, it persists on the logon screen.

I know this is a minor gripe, it takes only seconds to log in, but it turns out there’s a really easy way to fix it. There are plenty of guides to be found online that walk you through the neccesary registry tweaks, but there’s really no need to get your hands wet. Tweaks.com offers a very easy to use utility that lets you change the logon screen wallpaper in a few clicks. No need to install, simply run the executable, select an image and go.

There are three corporate giants that dominate tech news. All of them have recently made headlines with innovative new products, and all of them have a dedicated following among tech fans, and are hated intensely by just as many. Time to gather pros and cons for Google, Microsoft and Apple and decide who truly deserves your devotion. Please feel free to add yours in the comments.
More So, are you an Apple, Microsoft or Google fan?

My main work PC still runs a copy of Windows Vista. I’ve tried switching to Ubuntu, but I still need Windows-only software too often for that to work out. So for now I’m stuck with Windows, and as long as I am, I figured I might as well upgrade to ’7′. But as I found out today there’s a catch.
More Upgrading your Vista could severely limit Windows 7

Google launched Chrome Frame yesterday. It’s a browser plugin for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser that, if the website you’re visiting prefers so, turns it into Chrome. At first glance, this looked to me like a great solution and a well-deserved slap in the face for Microsoft, but then it hit me. Nobody will use this.
More Does Chrome Frame have a target audience?

I came across this post on Smashing Magazine yesterday, and while it offers some fine reasons for web developers to use a PC, I thought it missed a few too. Most of these venture into web designer territory somewhat, but I wanted to mention them nontheless.
More Why web designers should consider using a PC too

It’s funny how I just discovered a great feature in Vista by reading up on how to install Ubuntu alongside it. I didn’t know Vista could shrink partitions without the need for 3rd party tools. Well it can and I did. To make room for Ubuntu. I plan to move away from Windows for anything but design work. I’ll need Photoshop for that and there isn’t a viable Linux alternative for Flash either. But other than that I can’t wait to switch to Linux full time.
More That’s it, I’m switching!

My father-in-law just stopped by because his new computer was giving him trouble. He was about to return his brand new Vista laptop because he found himself unable to configure his email accounts. The problem? He couldn’t type an ‘@’. It turned out he was running into the same issue that kept my own dad from succesfully typing in his WPA key when he bought a new notebook. The same issue that my wife’s laptop unboxing a frustrating one too. Windows was expecting a Dutch keyboard.
More Windows Dutch keyboard trouble