speaking of OSX and Japanese, anyone had any trouble finding kanji characers? I just went to type a friend's name in and couldn't find 洋 (hiro)

I have tried macs and just not been able to get into it. However, I have found no better dictionary than (the sadly outdated) Wakan. Windows only :)

I figure I'd join in on this flame war, seeing has I constantly start these things.

To correct a few things:

In point two, you claim that web cam and mic built in is a good thing when in fact it's not necessarily. Keeping in mind the tech specs of a Mac box, you could easily find the equivalent in PC with money left over to purchase expensive/good microphone/webcam. It's rather unfair to call it 'better' because in fact it's not. If you compare both products for the price, the 'pc' branded items would prevail. Albeit, it's easier, but if something tries to be easy then the smart suffer.

On to language support. East Asian language files come standard with any Vista machine or later. Even so, installing language files on WinXP consists of putting your WinXP cd in the disk tray and pressing a button.

I noticed you didn't enjoy the text rendering in Windows. I'd like to mention that every popular browser uses different font faces. Also, make note that Firefox (stable) does not score that well on the Acid3 test, which is a test to see if the browser complies with standards for rendering web pages. Personally, I like how Opera presents Japanese characters.

While Chrome is not part of the software available to Macs (or Linux for that matter), there is an open source project called Chromium. The developers of chromium took the Chrome source code, and implemented their own features. So technically there is chrome for Macs.

On top of this, I don't like the Mac OS X user interface. It just seems counterintuitive. I like to have navigation menu for the computer separate from the program itself. I'd rather just have both menu bars available. I've had to use a Mac for multimedia editing, and it was just horrid. I'm not getting something, because everyone seems to go crazy for mac editing. Someone please explain it to me.

But I digress, computers suck. There is no definitive good, because good is a subjective word and we all have our own definition. You may like Mac or PC, but keep it to yourself. No one really cares, besides software companies.

Thanks for a very informative blog. We all have our own preferences when it comes to techie things. This site might interest some of your friends.

I just want to add JEDict to the list of things that you can only get on Mac. Though it isn't free like using jisho.org it does have a few extra bells and one extra whistle.

i assume you could use http://www.justin.tv on your mac… that has quite a few japanese channels on it ;)

Well, since I'm currently doing a massive directed study project involving the drama “Fuurin Kazan,” I too was having problems writing people's names, perhaps because those names written with those kanji aren't common these days. I had been typing “hareru”, deleting the -reru, then typing “nobu” to get “Harunobu” （晴信）. Luckily, while switching between hiragana and romaji with the keyboard shortcuts, I accidentally hit ctrl-shift-n, which opens the Kotoeri Tango Touroku, so you can register words quickly in the User's dictionary. This way, I was able to finally write “Harunobu” in one go!

For me, typing in Japanese is so much easier on a Mac. The only thing Microsoft has on Apple in this field is that Word supports furigana while Pages doesn't. So far anyway.

Koichi,

First off, don't get me wrong. I'm an Apple fan. Getting a Mac and iPhone are in my wish list. But, I'm not sure about “Writing Japanese Characters (Kanji). Mac 1 – PC 0 (Mac wins)” and I think it could be a tie actually.

You can write Japanese characters on a PC via mouse pad. On my Windows XP machine, for example, go to Control Panel -> Regional and Languages Options, click on the Languages tab, then (1) make sure the “Install files for East Asian Languages” checkbox is checked; (2) click the “Details…” button, the Text and Input Languages window should appear, then click the “Add…” button, you can then add Japanese language and make sure you've got “Microsoft IME Standard 2002 ver. 8.1″ selected for your keyboard.

<img src=”http://i39.tinypic.com/2le3v42.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”">

http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&hl=en-GB&v=y…

Multi-touch technology is getting cheaper by the day; more affordable solutions are being released constantly. Samsung has multi-touch technology in its cellphones, so it's easy to imagine Samsung screens making the most of W7's multi-touch support with a competitive price.

I sat through a 5 hour business proposal for a pen system that costs around $70 USD and can turn any standard monitor into a touch screen from Windows XP up. But even that is being rendered unnecessary.

So why use a trackpad when you can use the screen itself?

As for the built-in camera – No thank you. I tend to move my camera around a lot, so I appreciate that it isn't fixed to my monitor. (For example, Skyping with my State-side mother and being able to show her my daughter running around the house)

I've never had a problem installing any foreign language on a Windows PC, especially Vista. (Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Hebrew, Spanish – All right there, with no installation disc)

Bottom line:

Mac – It's like a PC, only more expensive and less upgradeable.

(Obligatory computer-use history: I used a Windows PC throughout university, switched over to a Mac for 2 years and enjoyed the experience for what it was worth with Tiger, and came back to Windows again. I only use my old Mac G4 Powerbook when my wife is busy compiling her thesis research on our Windows system. Why can't she use the mac for it? Because it doesn't support all of the programs she needs! Haha!)

Oh right,but I wonder why they care and how they found out so fast lol.
Were they offended by Godzilla questioning his sexuallity?lol

I don't really believe there is a “best” operating system for students of Japanese. Most RSR software works on Windows, Mac, and Linux. Firefox and it's invaluable add-ons are cross-platform (at least all of the add-ons relevant to Japanese learners are). Since TVAnts (Windows, Linux through Wine) stopped broadcasting Japanese channels, KeyHoleTV is the best software for watching Japanese television… on Linux, Windows, and Mac. As for one of the best dictionaries, EDICT, that's accessible through your browser or through the countless programs that exist for each OS. Mic and camera? You'll get it to work on any OS, although the first time may require a bit of setting up if you use Linux.

There isn't really a point in comparing Linux to Mac and Windows by the way. Windows is Windows XP and Windows Vista, practically speaking. Apple is the latest version of OS X, and perhaps the previous one in so far as Apple still finds those users cool enough to be worthy of Apple's consideration (the Mighty Mouse, which came out when OS X 10.4 was the latest version, would not let users install the accompanying software under 10.3. Surely software that enabled a few special button clicks on the new mouse was way beyond what 10.3 could handle…).

As for “Linux”, there is no such thing. Are we talking about Ubuntu 9.04 with Gnome? Or are we talking about OpenSuse with KDE? Slackware with Ratpoison? Knoppix with whatever? Or one of those feature-limited “user-friendly” distros that come with certain netbooks?

There will always be an IT-elite that demands more than what the mass market provides. Most computer users feel most comfortable using Windows or Mac OS X, but some will require an OS build on the Linux philosophy. Most people like to read Stephen King or Dan Browne, but there will always be literati who require something more sophisticated, like James Joyce. And among the IT-elite, you will have those who have are proud of their elite status because they manage to use an Ubuntu machine, just like there are those who think they are literati because they have worked through Jaymes Joyce Ulysses… and there are those who distinguish themselves by reading Joyce's lesser-known works, in the same way that there are those who wouldn't be caught dead using anything more accessible than Gentoo Linux.

Full disclosure: Xubuntu 9.04.

Ever since windows XP you've had the option for handwritten character recognition using either the mouse or your trackpad. The mac experience might be smoother than the windows XP, but it is also 7 or 8 years late.
And as you write, “if it's anything like the iPhones…” then it will look up characters in a Chinese dictionary, not a Japanese character dictionary as windows does. And no, they are not the same Windows also has build-in radical look-up.
I've found myself a huge fan of the F17-F10 shortcuts for converting input to romaji or katakana (half-width or double-width) extremely useful, how does mac stack up on that?

/joining the flame war

I can't actually agree on ANY of the “Mac wins” parts. Let's get started:

1) The issue with the touch pad
Regardless whether we're talking about touch pads on a Mac or a PC, I think that training “writing” (can this even be called “writing”?) on a touchpad is actually pretty useless if you do not use a pen-like input device. I mean, if you don't plan to do handwriting in japanese, why even bother with writing and not just learn to read the kanji? Also, even the electronic dictionaries (Ex Words or Sharps, f.e.) use a stylus for direct input, so trying to learn writing by fiddling your fingers on a flat surface seems a bit futile to me …
Also, learning with a computer and actually writing the symbols is not difficult at all – some of you may remember the “magic drawing” pads that were sometimes included in children's magazines? People who've recently had operations at their oral cavities and can't speak yet -or mute people in general- use so-called “permanent writing pads” like this one: http://www.kath-kunststoffe.de/images/printator…
Those pads are inexpensive, can be bought over the web and are perfect for practicing kanji writing.

2) Built-In mic and webcam
I am calling bull especially on that one. It is actually quite hard to find a modern windows laptop WITHOUT mic and webcam. To “prove” my point, I've sort of randomly picked out three popular windows computers:
Samsung NC10
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-NC10-14GB-10-2-In…
Sony VAIO VGN-NS235J/S
http://www.amazon.com/Sony-VGN-NS235J-15-4-Inch…
HP Pavilion DV4-1227US
http://www.amazon.com/HP-Pavilion-DV4-1227US-14…

All those laptops have a microphone and a webcam built in.

3) Learning programs
Adding some programs on the PC side:
The age-old, but golden program Wakan ( http://wakan.manga.cz/ ) has already been mentioned. I know of no program with that much functions that can be run on a Mac without emulation. The character detail menus have nanori readings, indices of more than a dozen important kanji dictionaries (Heisig, Hadamitzky, O'Neill, Gakken, Morohashi, to name just a few), there is an example sentence database and there is a popup-tool similar to rikaichan that can be used ANYWHERE in windows (you have to set it up properly, though), including, but not limited to, word documents, PDF hypertext documents, file names and more.

Then there is the freeware EBWIN ( http://www31.ocn.ne.jp/~h_ishida/EBPocket.html ), a program with which you can open and search japanese-language dictionaries in the EPWING format (see http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPWING for more information on the file format). This format is a quasi-standard when it comes to japanese dictionaries and there are many japanese-japanese dictionaries like the koujien and the kenkyuusha that you can use with this program. As most entries describe japanese words in japanese language, it is a tool for advanced learners rather than beginners.
There are currently no EPWING reader programs for the mac, at least as far as I know. So, if we don't count web applications (because most of them can be used on any system), I'd rather make this a PC 1 – Mac 0.

4) Language support
While the language support criticism may have been partly true for Windows XP where you had to manually install the language files and set up the language bar, it is definitely not true on Vista anymore. The language bar doesn't do strange things unless it's been told to do so, you can switch between different languages with an ALT + SHIFT keystroke and you can switch between kana and rômaji with an ALT + ^ (tilde) keystroke. You can also specify a bias for general vocabulary, speech vocabulary and, very useful, names. A user above noted that he had problems typing the name Hiro for the kanji 洋. If you switch the Vista language bar bias to names and type in “hiro”, the kanji the user was looking for would’ve been on the second page.
The vista handwriting recognition is a DREAM, it always recognizes the kanji, no matter how bad I draw and the conversion actually ‘learns’, i.e. conversions you use more often turn up higher in the conversion menus.
There is also the furigana functionality in MS Word that was already present in Word Xp and Word 2003 – you mark Japanese sentences, choose the phonetic guide option and set up the furigana. While Open Office has a similar functionality, it doesn’t automatically fill in most of the readings and can’t be configured that excessively. For more on furigana in Word, check out http://thejapanesepage.com/fun/furigana_in_word and http://jpop.groups.vox.com/library/post/6a00cd9…

I’d rather call this a tie, or, if there are no writing programs with automatic furigana creation on the Mac, a win for the PC.

5) Japanese text rendering
Nothing to add here, I don’t think that point is important. Like Koichi said, “It’s just text we’re talking about”.

6) Japanese Television
I would call this rather a tie than a win for the PC. While I’m not that much of a television watcher, I know that many Japanese TV stations have a webpage with interactive players that can be used by both Mac and PC users.

I wrote this because of the partly quite rampant misinformation in both the article and the comments.

I also want to clarify that I am not an Apple or a Mac hater (I’m actually waiting for an iPod Touch right now, bought it because of the many, many good Japanese-related programs), but rather a hater of no-compromise, irrational Mac fanboys as well as irrational Mac-bashing retards. Apple surely does produce good hardware and software, but terms like “overpriced, glossy white shitware” are not entirely ungrounded when you can get yourself a similar-looking (a white Sony VAIO, f.e.) laptop for half the price with better hardware.

I'm a *nix user as well and I didn't know about tomoe until I read your post.

While I have to agree with you on the point that PC monitors with integrated webcams were quite rare a while ago, they aren't that rare now; Dell, among other producers, are offering TFTs with integrated webcams: http://accessories.dell.com/sna/products/Displa…

I also should add that I don't consider webcams that important for learning japanese, speech (i.e. microphone quality) is far more important since learning as you'd do it on Edufire and other sides rellies on speaking and understanding far more than video quality.

it's actually quite understandable that linux wasn't in this comparison. as you said, the user base is still small (specially compared to mac and windows users), and this never seemed to even try to be exhaustive. but it's also to be expected that someone was going to talk about other alternatives in the comments, right?

on the terminology aspect, i disagree (but hell, it's your blog, right?). microsoft has very good reasons to try and associate the term “PC” with their OS, and i would argue that if apple started using the term it was to be able to bash on windows in a more … subtle manner.

the fact that it is widespread is only more regrettable: it doesn't make it any less of a misconception.

I dual boot windows XP through my imac, and i can say with confidence, that everything which both operating systems can do (with a few exceptions) MacOS does better. I'm talking everything, from little interface perks like hot corners to the very intuitive file management system.
The problem with MacOS, is the stuff it can't do, ie run a massive number of applications which i use every day. But thats why i installed bootcamp. :P

I am going to throw in the mix here with my “review”.

First of all the original concept of this post is kind of cool. However, to be honest the execution is an epic fail because you even admit it is biased so no real value can be had from this review as you honestly have not completely vetted windows when it comes to Japanese.

I say that because you are haphazared in what you compare where finding the best of mac and the worst of windows compare. And you don't even seem to be using the latest version of windows. Instead you are using the latest version of OSX and a 7 year old of version of windows. I'd be willing to bet if i compared windows 7 to OS 10.0 the first objection is in version of OSX.

Also when it comes to hardware you argue about what is coming/what is around with the newest Macs, but totally disregard older macs to some degree so this varies actual results. A lot. So allow me to provide a similar review to yours but actually using a modern version of windows and hardware that is designed for such things.

My reviews are based on laptops/tablets because it seems that is becoming the most popular form factor of a computer for people to buy unless they neeeeed the power of a Desktop.

Writing:
If you want to bring hardware into play lets look at tablet PC's for writing since you are talking about a pad that not all macs have. Tablet PC's kick the crap out of any handwriting recognition has, however as more people get macs they will get a type of handwriting recognition though it will be cumbersome for really writing over just practicing. So the Tablet PC with windows wins when it comes to writing. I bought a tablet specifically so I can write out math for classes and write do Japanese on the computer to practice writing without having to use paper.

That said if you are after learning/practice then I would have to say they tie.

Built-in Mic and Webcam:
You should have at least given a half a point becuase you have two things here you are comparing. Most laptops come with a mic since like 1997 and as recent as 2004 many many laptops come with webcams. My tablet I have has both and I use it quite a bit with others flawlessly. So since we are going to compare lets be honest and have a tie or at least a Mac 1 Windows .5 since the webacm isn't present only 60% of windows based laptops.

Japanese learning applications:
I can agree with this one since most applications are cross-platform and more and more becoming web apps.

Language Support:
This is one of the biggest areas I have a problem with in your review as in comments you seem to only be using XP to do this review without regard that Vista and Windows 7 are much better. This alone is horrible when it comes to doing your review as you aren't being honest by using the latest version of software available.

As for the bar that thing is superconfigurable i only have one key combination to get to hirigana and japanese. However it does seem to get in the way in XP only. Vista and Windows 7 are just fine.

Japanese Text Render:
Pretty much agree they both do a good job the only thing to change would be you should use something above XP to get default Clear Type text rendering for much nicer look.

Watching Japanese TV:
I don't know a lot about this one on mac, but what I do know I amgoing to disagree with you as most japanese tv I see streaming wise through the browser works on both platforms and since KeyHole TV has a mac verstion now that a friend tested out for me I'd have to say they are tied on the watching TV. Especially if you got the slingbox route as there is a mac client for the sling box.

Conclusion:
That all i'd say they are pretty well tied. If you actually compare similar products to similar products and take out the biases a bit more.

@Kris for converting to katakana write out everything in hirigana hit ctrl+i and it will convert it to katakana before you hit enter

Yep, and that's why we're such snobs :)

That's exactly when it happened, sadly :(

My vote goes to my iPhone, of course :)

I seriously had no idea what I could do with this machine. Now I don't feel so bad about being out of Japan!! Thank you for this article, Tofugu!

I'm a biased Apple fanboi, but here goes on my opinions.

Vista didn't enable cleartype by default for me…
Also, enabling Japanese input is way more complicated in Windows than in OS X. I needed to hnt around a lot to find it in Windows, but it was just right there in the International preference pane in OS X.

Now I have a Mac, so not a problem though! ^^

Wow. Rant much?

Calm down, I thought it was a pretty fair comparison.

And Desktops are a dying breed – everyone else I know has a laptop.

I've used Linux a lot, and while the Open-Source philosophy is great, I have had hardware support issues GALORE. Now that my hardware is older, it's fine, but I use OS X now.

It's true, Linux has a great selection of software from the community (although from my experience a lot of it is buggy), it has a very customizable UI, lots of choice on how you want your computer to run (which drivers, what desktop environment, what default apps, etc). But the list of the awesome stuff about linux ends just about there… T.T

Mac OS X has a HUGE dev community who build quality apps. I have never experienced a crapware or other doesn't-do-what-it-promised apps on my Mac. Every app I have for my mac is superb with great UI and quality. I could say the same for Linux if there weren't billions of packages to sort through, most of them really buggy with the company endorsing it (RedHat for Fedora, etc) had blocked off all proprietary packages. I find the proprietary drivers are the ones that work. Sorry.

Linux is great if it has all the programs you want to run and it supports your hardware. Unfortunately, it just didn't do either of those things for me.

So, bottom line – if Linux does everything you want it to do and supports your hardware very well, and you like Linux – than good for you, you just go ahead and use it. WHatever floats your boat! ^^

But PLEASE don't try to get me to switch over. Been there, done that. Never again.

However, there's always the time when you want to fool around getting your hardware to work for fun… But I'm done with that.

OS X /JUST WORKS/ for me.

And I have a Hackintosh! xD