Noscope is a bi-weekly journal serving up snacksized portions of pointless stuff since 2001.
I also do freelance design and usability via dejligt.com

Ejecting Discs The Mac Way [Update]

    10:18 on October 31st, 2006 , , ,

Eject

I criticize because I love.

Yesterday, I discussed functional design with my better half (read: girlfriend) while driving home from IKEA. She uses Mac at work and mentioned how a new colleague who was used to The PC Way had trouble ejecting a disc on her new Intel Mac Pro Quad Xeon.

A little back story: On most PCs, consumer devices such as DVD players, CD players and other disc handling devices, there’s an “eject” button next to the tray / slot-loading mechanism. On the Mac, however, there isn’t. The Mac Way of ejecting discs is threefold: you can drag the disc into the virtual trash bin1, you can press the “Eject” button on the keyboard (top right corner), or you can press the “Eject” button next to the disc in the Finder device list (the Mac file explorer).

Now Apple makes beautiful and functional hardware. Whenever someone asks me what laptop they should buy, I say “buy a Mac”. I say this because they’re functional pieces of work. Except of course, for the mystery of the missing Eject button. Can someone please explain, using puppets if necessary, why Apple hasn’t included an eject button next to disc trays yet! To me this seems like another doomed-to-fail Apple crusade like the decade-long lack of right-click mice.

[Update]: Okay fine, so an eject button might not make so much sense on a Mac laptop, but I stand by what I said with regards to the non-portable macs, mainly for the reasons Brian mentions.

  1. In addition, the trash bin turns into an eject icon, when volumes are dragged over it  ↑

Pings

  1. Noscope | Ejecting Discs The Mac Way | Open Switch
  2. Ejecting discs on a Mac on The uber geeks

Comments

  1. Brian Meidell says:
    November 02nd, 2006 at 08:53

    Here’s my argument FOR the hardware button:

    The hardware button is a thing people are used to from dedicated devices, so it shouldn’t be hard for that many to understand.

    It’s always the same, no matter what program you are using or state your OS is in.

    Instructions are like this:

    1) If you want to eject, press the eject button on the drive

    Meanwhile, the eject mechanism on my mac, I need to know the following:

    1) Drag to trash to eject

    2) or use the eject icon in finder

    3) … except if you are ejecting the tray to put something IN to it

    4) or use the eject button on your keyboard

    5) … except when you aren’t using an Apple keyboard

    6) then you press and hold F12 (unverified)

    7) but none of the above if you are in the process of booting your computer

    8) then you press and hold the left mouse button to eject the drive

    Somehow, summing all that up in my head, it just seems like it would be a nicer idea to have a hardware button, which would always be there and not preclude any of the other options, plus it would make PC people happy, because it’s less adjustment, and when they run boot camp, it also works in windows.

  2. Joen says:
    November 02nd, 2006 at 11:38

    I didn’t know criticizing details of the Mac was cause for so much alarm! I’m not saying Mac is the vile waste of the earth… if you read what I’m actually saying you’ll see that I kinda like the hardware and aspects of what they’ve got going on, while I in fact dislike Windows in a number of ways. No reason to wave crosses at me.

    That said, I’ll admit the choice of omitting an eject button on the mac laptops was probably an informed choice and good idea. Fine, PC laptop makers can learn from this.

    Even so, omitting an eject button on standalone macs, the Mini, the Mac Pro, etc. I still think is a huge mistake and a case of “aesthetics over user-friendlyness”. Particularly comments like those of Brian reinforce this belief (see right above).

  3. Dave Child says:
    November 03rd, 2006 at 13:05

    It’s the “Mac way”. Just get used to it and quit the “gnashing of teeth”.

    That (and the similar sentiments expressed earlier) is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, if serious. Just because Apple do something a certain way doesn’t mean it’s the best way, or can’t be criticised, examined or reviewed. I like my mac but don’t think it’s perfect – not by a long way. The eject button, or lack thereof, is one of many things wrong with the mac. It’s still far better than my old Windows machine, or my Linux box, in many ways, but that doesn’t mean that computer design and development has reached its peak and should stop. Just because OSX has a far better GUI than Windows doesn’t mean everyone should just stand in awe of the majestic “Mac way” and never question it. There are always improvements to be made (as Apple themselves regularly demonstrate).

    Amazing how people respond to criticism of their chosen OS.

    Imagine if Macs had had an eject button since the very beginning. Would anyone be arguing for it to be removed? If so, on what grounds? That it makes a mac slightly prettier? That it makes more sense to only have the eject button in software? That it is wrong, or problematic, to have a hardware eject button?

  4. Brian Meidell says:
    November 07th, 2006 at 09:01

    The comment above this one by Dave Child described my exact sentiments.

    Dave, I couldn’t agree more on your statement if we shared the same brain.

  5. Robert says:
    December 03rd, 2006 at 06:19

    It might be a bit deeper that just style or looks, eg linux would lock the cd rom once the drive was mounted, makes sense so the os doesn’t panic if you open the cd tray whilst the os thinks it has a logical files system connected.

    I checked my mac pro (my first mac too!) and yer if all else fails there is provision to use a paper clip (not a silly virtual one) to manually extract the media.

    no button, it’s different but it’s the same for network, memory devices and cd/dvd etc so it’s consistent.

    looks, I like it with out an eject button.

    my 2 bobs worth ;o)

    Robert

  6. gregory says:
    December 04th, 2006 at 19:48

    Guys doesn’t xp do the same as Mac OSX because when the cd has been written the cd or dvd is ejected automacatlly so xp is no different to Mac OSX,I know this as my mechine ejects cds dvds execpt for floppys as soon as they are written

  7. fishtanks says:
    November 19th, 2007 at 20:54

    Read this one, you’ll know why:

    http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=876627

  8. ZiGora (subscribed) says:
    November 20th, 2007 at 15:44

    Different products are designed differently ok!

    Mercedes Cars have knobs on the doors to unlock them, Peugeot cars on the other hand have a button kinda thing on the door handle that you use to unlock. No one bitches about those differences, accept the difference in products OK we dont want to have all manufacturers making the same bloody thing…

  9. Shawn says:
    October 06th, 2009 at 03:47

    What i have concluded from the comments here and other posts…

    More Mac owners are douchebags who don’t understand as much as they thing and are far more close minded then they thing…

    I have 5 Macs, an apple TV and two iphones in my home…I’m a Mac user. I’m also a PC and linux expert from work. I know people and I know computers…more Mac owners on the internet are rude and are in fact fanboys when they claim they are not…

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