Who here has MAC's?

[syke]

Who here has a Mac?

If you do, what do you think of them after having perhaps a Windows PC beforehand?

Im thinking about getting either an iMac, or a Mac Mini in replace of my Desktop because ive somehow become a fan of Apple

But yeah, anything you like/dislike about the MAC Mini's & iMac's?

Also, would you say they are fast/reliable for the money you pay?


s-

 

[pumaz]

As a owner of Mac's and PC's I would say Apple are best for laptops and PC's are best for desktops and i wouldn't be without either

 

[syke]

Can i ask, what Mac's do you have?

Im really close to wanting to press the order button on a MacBook.

But i do like the Mac Mini's and the iMac's

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[Hamish]

I've got a mac mini and will soon have a macbook pro.

Once you get past the few differences it has between windows it "just works" I always thought it was a marketing thing by apple but after experiencing it first hand it truly does "just work". things do what you expect them to, its easy to use and doesn't crash.
The OS is so much smoother and better designed. probably because window's foundations stem from DOS first relased in about 1981ish wheras OS X was released in 2001.
With windows it is just a jumble of applications mostly ones you have to install yourself with different user interfaces and buggy third party driver support, with OS X most of the applications you need are built in and drivers are supplied by apple so for the most part are decent since millions of people have identical hardware configurations to you.

 

[syke]

I've got a mac mini and will soon have a macbook pro.

Once you get past the few differences it has between windows it "just works" I always thought it was a marketing thing by apple but after experiencing it first hand it truly does "just work". things do what you expect them to, its easy to use and doesn't crash.
The OS is so much smoother and better designed. probably because window's foundations stem from DOS first relased in about 1981ish wheras OS X was released in 2001.
With windows it is just a jumble of applications mostly ones you have to install yourself with different user interfaces and buggy third party driver support, with OS X most of the applications you need are built in and drivers are supplied by apple so for the most part are decent since millions of people have identical hardware configurations to you.

Okay would you say to get a Mac Mini as a replacement of a Desktop - or a MacBook?


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[Hamish]

IMO the Macbooks are much better value than the Mac Minis, for £529 you get a spec almost identical to the £749 MacBook so for just over £200 more you get a screen and the portability offered by a laptop.

But to be honest it really depends what you are looking for, if you have a decent monitor and don't want to move it get a Mac Mini, if you don't get a MacBook. I'm sure youll be impressed with either.

Whatever you do get try and get 1Gb of RAM (not nessesarily from Apple) as Macs love ram

 

[syke]

It becomes £820 with 1GB and £749 with 512MB.

Is it definately worth the extra then?


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[Hamish]

you can always get it with 512 and see how it goes and upgrade if it gets slow, stick a 1Gb stick in and youve got 1.5Gb. On gereral desktop it wont be bad, its just that photo/video/music editing that it can be sluggish. Also with macs if you have loads of RAM you can leave all your applications open so you can access them quicker
On the other hand RAM seems to be pretty expensive at the moment so maybe see how it is with 512

 

[alex2zulu]

hey not bad for xmas - macbook maybe i dunno.

what sort of recording software can you get for the mac - im talking about guitars and amp simulation aswell as multi-track recording.

im learing guitar

also can you use MSN with macbook (maybe a silly question but hey)
whats the browser like ? how is it for watching films, whats the wireless like ? does it only work with "airport" thing and will i be able to use my Creative zen micro photo mp3 with it ?

sooo many questions - - sorry dude thred jacked

 

[syke]

hey not bad for xmas - macbook maybe i dunno.

what sort of recording software can you get for the mac - im talking about guitars and amp simulation aswell as multi-track recording.

im learing guitar

also can you use MSN with macbook (maybe a silly question but hey)
whats the browser like ? how is it for watching films, whats the wireless like ? does it only work with "airport" thing and will i be able to use my Creative zen micro photo mp3 with it ?

sooo many questions - - sorry dude thred jacked

No problem, im wondering similar things too.


s-

 

[Hamish]

hey not bad for xmas - macbook maybe i dunno.

what sort of recording software can you get for the mac - im talking about guitars and amp simulation aswell as multi-track recording.

im learing guitar

also can you use MSN with macbook (maybe a silly question but hey)
whats the browser like ? how is it for watching films, whats the wireless like ? does it only work with "airport" thing and will i be able to use my Creative zen micro photo mp3 with it ?

sooo many questions - - sorry dude thred jacked

Macs come with GarageBand which is meant to be good, I think that you must be able to get all sorts because loads of bands use them. If you go into the apple store they always have keyboards and stuff plugged into them.

MSN you can use Microsoft's MSN messenger for mac or Adium, Trillian (I think) all sorts!

films, its got Quicktime player and VLC, DivX and everything, it's also got front row which lets you browse all your films, music, photos etc with the remote that comes with them from your sofa!

Wireless is just your usuall 802.11g like any normal laptop, it will connect to whatever normal access point you have.

No idea about your Zen, sorry, get an iPod if not

The browser that comes with is is Safari, its meant to be quite good, its got tabs and everything, but you can also install IE , firefox, Opera etc.

 

[alex2zulu]

thank you very helpful

i go ask ont he ultimate guitar fourm if they know of any recording software

 

[Slogan]

but you can also install IE

That's so '97.

IE for Macs is poor - there's another browser called 'Camino' which does a decent job, but Firefox is pretty much the best I've used on a Mac.

I'm not sure how much of a resource-hog it is - but it's never really took me to notice. Granted these were on G4's in college.

 

[Hamish]

That's so '97.

IE for Macs is poor - there's another browser called 'Camino' which does a decent job, but Firefox is pretty much the best I've used on a Mac.

I'm not sure how much of a resource-hog it is - but it's never really took me to notice. Granted these were on G4's in college.

IE for windows is poor!

 

[Slogan]

IE for windows is poor!

Fair point. Although I know a few people (....Microsoft) are expecting IE7 to be good.

I don't mind Firefox, but it just eats away at resources.