I will mention some flaws, which are almost exclusively related to the operating system:
1. You cannot set different scrolling settings for touchpad and mouse wheel, even though there are separate menus for each. If you choose reverse scrolling on the touchpad (which is the most common), the same will happen with the mouse wheel, which is completely unusual and strange.
2. By default, if a folder contains subfolders and files, they are all listed together, not showing the subfolders first and then the files. You have to sort them by type to organize them in a more logical way. And this has to be done for each folder and subfolder (there is no general setting for all folders).
3. If you want to view photos in full screen that you have in a folder, you have to first select the ones you want to see (good luck when the folder contains other files and subfolders) and then open them in full screen. The MacBook will ask you beforehand if you are sure you want to open so many files. While in Windows, you can open one image in full screen and simply use the arrow keys to go to the next one.
4. Even worse is when you want to listen to some music tracks that a friend brought, for example, on a USB stick, expecting to enjoy them through the machine's great speakers. Instead, however, of what is obvious and simple on any "common" music-playing device (e.g. Bluetooth speaker, TV, laptop, etc.), here you will first receive a question asking if you are sure you want to open, let's say, 500 files (!?). You say yes, because you don't believe what will follow. Then you realize that the MacBook actually starts "opening" and "processing" one by one the 500 music tracks before you can listen to them, a process that takes several seconds for each track. But what does this processing, which ultimately makes you and your MacBook look ridiculous, consist of? Honestly, I didn't want to find out, as I didn't have the patience and rudeness to deal with this mess instead of enjoying my time with friends. It probably copies the files to the hard drive and organizes them in the playlist according to the artist, title, album, etc.
5. When you choose to close a window (red button), the application doesn't close. It remains open and essentially it's like you have minimized it. This is bad because it allows some applications, as long as they remain open, to record the computer's activity for advertising (and not only?) purposes based on, for example, stored cookies and browsing history. I realized this when I received a message in my email that I hadn't registered with Apple, promoting products for "my new Mac". Is that good? And this happened even though I had set my browser to delete all cookies and history every time I close it. So, I understood that in order to close an application, I have to right-click on its icon every time and choose exit or quit. Very helpful.
6. You cannot install Microsoft Access on a Mac (this hurt me quite a bit).
7. You can't simply connect an Android phone and have access to your files.
8. There is no way to delete text forward (the delete function in Windows).
9. If you connect an external hard drive with NTFS format, it doesn't recognize it.
10. There is no option to move files from one location to another (e.g. cut and paste). There is only the option to copy. You have to know some shortcuts that involve using the command or drag the file to its new location (which means you have to have two windows open).
11. It only has two USB-C ports. Good luck connecting a traditional mouse to this machine. I searched for a silent mouse with Bluetooth and found very few options. So you resort to using inconvenient extensions.
12. Word and Excel are considerably slower on the Mac.
13. The button for switching languages (bottom left on the keyboard) often doesn't respond, possibly because it has a very slow response time, which is extremely problematic when typing a text quickly. In practice, you end up pressing it and pressing it again until it responds. However, the shortcut control + space always works.
14. Searching for a file is not so easy. You open Finder, click on File, at the bottom of the list you click on Find, or alternatively, you click on the icon with the magnifying glass on the top right of the Finder window. Then you type the term and it immediately presents you with files that either include the search term or have it in the title, although in a mixed order. Then you choose whether you want the search term to be in the title of the file or to be included within it.
15. It is extremely difficult and time-consuming to select between different open windows of the same application. In Windows, when you hover over the icon of the open application, it shows a preview of the open windows and you can choose the one you want. Here, you have to make a gesture on the touchpad to display the open windows from all the open applications. You can also right-click on the application icon and choose from the list of names of the open files the one you want. There is also the "Mission Control" setting, which is quite fancy, but you can't do your work when the open windows are in full screen. You have to make a special selection for the left screen and the other open windows of the same application to continue appearing on the left, but you can't choose the one you want. You have to click on the left icon with the grouped open windows again and again until the one you want appears in the foreground.
16. Insufficient support, perhaps intentional neglect, for the Greek language. While some applications and system settings have Greek names (e.g. System Preferences, Control Center, Background Management), others have English names (e.g. Finder, Launchpad, Dock).
17. Splitting a window to the left or right of the screen, which is very useful when working with 2 open windows, works very poorly on the Mac and this setting is lost at the slightest provocation. For example, when you need to do something else with the computer, one of the two windows inexplicably switches to full screen view.
18. Slow response of the touchpad in some functions. The right click, for example, takes a long time to load when selecting with two fingers. Even worse is when you choose to drag on the screen with a double click instead of pressing the surface. The machine takes a while to respond when you release your finger at the end of the movement, so when you click again somewhere on the screen, the screen moves again as if you never lifted your finger from the surface. I searched for a solution and some suggest disabling complex touch gestures to prevent the machine from being slow to understand what you want to do. Seriously now? I never had similar problems with Windows, even with machines that are a decade old or older.
19. User switching: Initially, it does not appear in the Apple menu. There is only the option to log out the user. You have to make a setting for this option to appear. However, you still cannot display it as a choice in the Apple menu, along with the options to log out, shut down, and restart. NO, of course not. Basic things here seem like luxuries. This option will appear either in the menu bar or in the control center. Only then can you switch users.
20. If for some reason someone wants to perform a clean installation of the operating system, they will definitely need to call a technician or be very careful because there are traps here: When you reach the window to delete the disk through the Recovery Menu, you will find that there is no indication to return to the Recovery Menu to select the installation of the operating system. You will have to guess that here, except for a few cases, when you close a window, you return to the previous menu. But if you make the mistake of shutting down the computer, hoping to enter the recovery menu again by pressing command + R during startup, you're out of luck. Because then you can only install via the internet. And guess what... No matter how many times I tried, the installation would freeze at the final stage and tell me to restart the process. In technical support, they suggested (believe it or not) that I connect with mobile data to download some gigabytes of the operating system from there because if the network is unstable, the process gets stuck! They didn't even know to tell me that the system time may have changed after erasing the disk, causing the installation to fail for this reason. And in my case, the time was correct, but the time zone had shifted to the US, so I was... in the future. And how do you adjust the time? Well... of course, through a command in the terminal, or better yet, by taking the mac directly to someone to fix it. The funny thing is that, amidst all this chaos and having complained strongly, I heard the ultimate comment from someone in technical support, that macs are made to better serve the user.
Overall, as I live with this tool, I discover other things that I CANNOT do or that I do with considerable time delay. I made this choice because I wanted a laptop that would not need replacement every so often. It has a very good screen, speakers, and battery life. Also, the price I bought it for (999 euros) was about 300 euros lower than a similarly equipped laptop with not-so-good Windows 11, so I preferred to take the risk.
3/3/2023:
Now, this specific macbook is owned by someone else, who is very happy with it and will hardly ever worry about the things I mentioned before, as they don't heavily use the machine, especially for office applications. I am now using an Asus Zenbook UM3402Y, 50 euros cheaper with a much better screen, which does its job quickly, without any unnecessary delays.