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A User Experience: Apple vs. Dell

Posted by Doug Tue, 14 Feb 2006 14:13:33 GMT

Yesterday I received in the mail a new 20” Dell 2001FP LCD Monitor. I’m also the proud owner of an 20” Apple Cinema Display. Even though I’m an Apple fan-boy, I’d still like to compare these two displays from a user’s experience.

From the get-go let’s compare the outside of the box. The Dell is a plain brown box with the Dell logo and “Dell 2001FP” labeled on the outside. Don’t you just love how that rolls off the tounge? “Dell 2001FP.” That just conjures all sorts of images of display magic. Well, maybe not. Let’s flip it around. “Apple Cinema Display.” Wow, could I make movies with this display? Is this display going to give me similar experiences as going to the movies? Only time will tell.

Nobody cares about packaging like Apple does. This is under-reported. Opening an Apple package is a joyful experience. Every step of the unpacking is meant to put their product in the best possible light. Apple packages are more like showcases than boxes. The box for the Cinema Display is nice an flat with a flip open lid. For the last year plus I’ve had it, I’ve used the box as a very convenient carrying case. It’s not too big; it has a handle; it’s easy to get the display into and out of. Maybe I had my hopes up too high. Unpacking the Dell display was under-whelming. In fact, I couldn’t figure out how to get the Styrofoam back into the box so it would close nicely. I’ll keep the Dell box too; but it’s certainly not as lovely as the Cinema Display box.

Don’t get me wrong (particularly not my boss who bought me this Dell display). This is a nice display. It’s very bright; perceptually just as bright as the Cinema Display. It actually has higher resolution than the Cinema Display. My Cinema Display only has two USB ports on it, the Dell has four. Of course, my Cinema Display also has two Firewire ports and the Dell doesn’t. Both displays color calibrated well. The Dell has onscreen menus that let me adjust the white point, the Apple doesn’t.

But the Apple Cinema Display is a very pleasant experience. There aren’t many buttons because you don’t need them. A single cable connects the display to your computer instead of separate video, USB, firewire, and power. The frame is very thin and unobtrusive. And certainly not the least, the Apple Cinema Display doesn’t have two bright yellow LEDs along the bottom distracting your eye while you try to work.

I think these displays are exemplary for the two companies styles. The Dell gives you lots of options for display height and tilt and angle. The Dell has menus of configuration options. The Dell doesn’t seem to care what your first impressions are coming out of the box. Apple does care about how you perceive their product. They present simple and stylish solutions. Apple cares about the user experience. They think about things like cabling. I’ve got ports on the back of this Dell I have no idea what they’re for and cables I won’t use. But my Apple Cinema Display is sublime.

So if I’m so enamored with the Cinema Display, why do I have this Dell 2001FP? Truth be told, I value the extra resolution. The Cinema Display is 1680×1050 and the Dell 2001FP is 1600×1200. That equates to more than 10 extra lines of text (my editor window is 95 lines tall) I can get on the screen. In building web applications with Ruby on Rails, that means I can normally get the entire file I’m editing on screen at once. Very rarely do my files come to more than 100 lines of code.

The extra resolution is a powerful argument, but that’s not the real reason I got the Dell. All along I’ve been saying, “my Cinema Display,” when really I should have been saying, “her Cinema Display.” Yes, I bought the CD for my wife and it belongs plugged into her Powerbook. She has graciously let me use it when I needed to for the last year. Now that I’m working from home almost full-time it just wasn’t right for me to take her display. While my user experience of receiving the Dell 2001FP was so-so, her user experience of me receiving the Dell 2001FP was great!

I’m not a packaging designer nor am I a hardware engineer. So what can I take away from this as a web developer? I think first and foremost, as programmers we have to constantly be aware of how our applications are perceived. Functionality is one thing, but if Apple is our guide simplicity is better. We should pay attention to the little details of the user experience. I’ve been reading 37signal’s Defensive Design for the Web. I don’t think there’s anything Earth shattering in there, but it’s an excellent collection of tips on how to “over engineer” the customer’s experience with your web site.

Oh, one other “little” area where I think Apple excels over Dell: sniff the urls for the two product links above. Look how simple Apple’s URL is versus Dell’s. In fact, I had to go hunting for Dell’s product page while I guessed Apple’s product page. I tried to trim down Dell’s URL to not be so ugly, but broke the link pretty quickly. Come on folks, make things easier on your customers.