Semi-related: Anyone owning a mac, what's the cheapest way to purchase one? I'm thinking a refurbished macbook from the apple store. Any suggestions? I tried ebay and amazon, but they're pretty pricey. I'm willing to spend about $1,100, and I know they start at $1,099 but I want a black one. :D
As far as switching, don't "ditch" the PC rig, use both. Or if you meant sell it, you can get a copy of XP and just get a program called BootCamp to run windows on your mac.
macmall is where my friend got his macbook pro (he got a bunch of rebates on shipping and stuff, esp. software like parallels (for running both xp and osx i think - i don't have a mac). but yeah, his macbook (black 2ghz with 2 gigs of ram) is one of the sweetest laptops i've ever seen or used - my next laptop will def. be a mac.
i dont see that much of a difference, and i really dont see a point in running windows on a mac. its just a matter of what you're used to; try the other and it seems weird. ive always admired the exterior styling of macs, but never really liked the feel. its really up to you tho. my advice is borrow a mac laptop of some kind from someone you know and use it for a while.
I just made the switch and it's very easy to get use to, i think os x is easier than windows, but now with bootcamp, a mac is the only comp you'll ever need.
bah I spit on bootcamp.imho bootcamp isn't even worthy of the beta name and should never have been released. Parallels is a much better alternative, and combined w/ coherence makes bootcamp look silly.
matrix, i have no problem with boot camp, it runs windows better than my PC, Parallels is great but you can't run resource heavy programs, like a game or so
Have fun with your inferior, overpriced, uneasily upgradable machine.
Why are you even bothering to switch? Were you lured by the trendy image that Apple had projected, incredibly successfully I might add, over the past few years? Do you want the OS which is marginally more user-friendly and, believe it or not, full of more security holes than Windows? Macs have seriously nothing going for them other than an image and a trend, and even with their top-of-the-line ridiculous amounts of memory will score lower drastically lower on any benchmark than a similarly priced PC.
I have a home-built PC, and it is faster, more stable, and prone to less lock-ups and freezes than any of the Macs in my house. Those ads can be humorous, yes, if you look past all the false information to lure the consumer. Oh and as an art student, I can assuredly say that the Apple 'we're better for graphic's programs' is a load of crap.
to awnser you're question first: NO mack isn't that much better...no mather what you hear, ofcourse a mac user is going to say that a mac is way better and vice versa
at the academie we work with mac only, i spend minimum 4 hours on a mack every day ,for some reasson i never really liked working on a mac myself ,it looks better than a pc ,layout...etc nobody would argue with that but allot of the stuff is just looking good and thats it. pc is much more straight forward imo . there was a time when mac was better for graphics but we are way past that. were a few years back you'd see graphic design bureau's work with almost mac only , if you take a look now there's more and more pc and allot less mac...not saying that mac is absolutly bad or annything its just way to expensive for what it is. design has its price
I'm extremely glad I made the switch. Sbbath is right. OS X is much easier and with BootCamp/Parallels, my MacBook is the only computer I'll ever need.
ssbath what was your pc setup for gaming? I want to know if a macbook can cream my pc, gaming-wise. Notice I said my not a. I know if I don't point that out we'll get some douche screaming "ZOMG WTF U NOOB, PC OWNZ MAC FOR GAMING LOLZ!!111!oneone" No shit, I mean my pc, cuz it's not too spectacular, and I want to know how much better something like HL2 runs on a mac. :P
shroomy: "Have fun with your inferior, overpriced, uneasily upgradable machine."
inferior? are you saying core duo's, and core 2 duo's are inferior? are you stoned? I've got news for you the cpu that powers my macbook is the same thing in your homebrew pc.
overpriced? thats odd. I paid 1500$ for my macbook new right out of the apple stroe here in toronto and 2 years ago I paid 1800$ for a new compac. gee I wonder which one is over priced the 4lbs speedy mac, or the 9lbs windows anchor?
uneasily upgradeable? that has to be the most ignorant and retarded thing people say about macs.macs and pcs, use the same bus, the same memory, the same hard drives, the same optical drives, the same video cards, the same network cards. what more do you want?
09wkd, my PC was an AMD athlon 62 3500+ 1GB RAM, 7800GS XT 256MB
my mac book pro is better than my desktop, I run HL2 at about 50-70 and BF2 on max with x6 AA at about 30-50 on my macbook pro, Since my desktop crashed i put out more money for it since it was replacing it. sure macs are quite a bit more expensive. But think of all the free software you are getting with OS X, the design of it and i'd have to say that apple care is one of the best tech support ever.
as for this quote
shroomy: "Have fun with your inferior, overpriced, uneasily upgradable machine."
wtf, you can bearly upgrade any laptop and the mac pro is better than any PC, 2 dual core xeons, up to 16GB or RAM!! about 2TB of HDD space, 4 GFX cards, it's deffantly up gradable, and you don't have to buy all the parts from apple.
again, now mac can run windows, even vista. if you have a mac pro you'll be set for about 3-5 years or longer if you want.
Sirwonkus, yeah the powerbooks were hard with that, buy the mac books are just a matter of a about 5 screws and you pull it out and put a new one in.
I'd admit that macs in the past were not too great, but since OS X they've come along way.
It was hard to deside to get a mac, but with reading reviews and looking into them for about a month I got one, it's great.
I'm sold. I'll be getting the black macbook with 1GB ram, 2.0GHz intel core 2 duo, 120GB HDD, etc. in the coming months... I've got about $900 set aside so far, I'll save a bit more to afford it, and from the looks of it, will be well worth it. I've been running osx86 up until now, but it's buggy and I'd rather take advantage of the dual core and such, and since I have XP pro, i'll just get bootcamp and install it on my macbook when I get it. Does anyone know if the upgrade from 10.4 tiger to 10.5 leopard is free or do you have to pay for it? Sorry, but I'm used to the idea of people buying every new version of windows, so I'm wondering how that works on a mac. One more thing, is it worth it to save up a little more and get apple care for my macbook? I'm really good about not even lightly scratching my electronics let along breaking them, the reason I didn't get an extended warranty on my ipod. So is it worth the investment?
well, 09wkd, i have the MacBook Pro, which has an X1600 with 256MB, but the normal Macbook has intel intergraded gfx, but it will play HL2 just bealy, so i would go with 2GB of RAM if you want to play games.
oops forgot about the apple care, well yeah its good, but im waiting a little before i get it, with out it you get 1 year of free service and 90days of free tech support, but you can up grade it to 3 years of tech and service with in the 90 days
I switched and I never want to go back. Its easy. The only problems I had was installing windows on my MacBook... but that wasn't a mac deal... it was Microcrap's fault.
this argument (?) is unneccessary. i think collectively we're better than those who bitch back and forth about such a topic.
if you use a pc and are intrigued by macs, get one; assuming you have the cash. in essence, thats what it comes down to, to me. for every single instance i've heard where a mac/pc user claims that a certain app, game, or medium (graphics, video, 3d, etc) works better on their machine, i've always found an exception.
it's like deciding whether a corvette is better than a mustang or not. if you've already picked a side, you can't talk. if you've tested both sides and decided on one, you can't talk. it's all about personal preference, and everyones needs differ in little ways that may require or inspire choosing one or the other.
wtf, you can bearly upgrade any laptop and the mac pro is better than any PC, 2 dual core xeons, up to 16GB or RAM!! about 2TB of HDD space, 4 GFX cards, it's deffantly up gradable, and you don't have to buy all the parts from apple.
i've definetly seen upgrades for sale for a variety of laptops, even the ultra noobish entry-level dell inspiron models.
furthermore, apple is NOT comparable to dell, sony, toshiba, etc, etc. it is simply apples to oranges. theyre both fruits, but apple makes and sells their own machines which EXCLUSIVELY run osx, which apple produced. dell and the like make pcs (and monitors etc, in some cases) but do NOT make the operating system that their systems utilize.
whatever you call apple as opposed to dell or the like, they are different.
oops forgot about the apple care, well yeah its good, but im waiting a little before i get it, with out it you get 1 year of free service and 90days of free tech support, but you can up grade it to 3 years of tech and service with in the 90 days
while this is an intriguing feature, i doubt many of the inhabitants of this site have ever used or needed customer service very much. i, for one, have never even been able to access such services due to my lack of financial commitment to the makers of my OS software. this being said, you are addressing a group of individuals that may have at some needed the doltish help of a customer service representitive, but clearly no longer need any such help.
i've stated before that i have great distaste for apples marketing scheme, which seems to paint everyone but users of their product as senseless geeks who are wasting hundreds of dollars at every turn. these commercials are clearly NOT geared towards anyone heavily involved at this site.
i'll end with this: since every difference in performance between pcs and macs has been debunked other than base OS beauty, the ONLY arguable factor is upgradability. since i have a pc that runs like speedy gonzales and was built almost 4 years ago and thats only had 512mb of ram added to it since then, i rest my case on pcs. others seem to have very good points about possible upgrades to macs, and i dont doubt them at all.
this leaves me at a stand still...preference between the small differences in OS are really the only factor. if you care about image, stylishness of the case, or other reputation related bs, get off your own high horse. both setups can be used in a very highly effective manner, and until i see a exceedingly high quality work of anything produced on one OS that cant possibly be achieved in any way on the other, i'll be neutral.
sbbath, saying that the two camps aren't devided is bullshit, especially mac users have these oeeeee pc = crap issues and you don't have to run windows , not that i care , all i can say is i use both and probably work more on a mac than on a pc but i prefer pc thats all.
Wow. I never meant to cause this much controversy...
I'm getting a the Cheapest MacBook Pro they have... for $1999. I'll see how it foes when I get here.
Its the fact that I've had so many problems with PC's and Microsoft's OS that makes me want to switch. Now the promise of better gaming or ridiculous hardware specs. I just want a user-friendly interface that I can take with me anywhere and not experiance problems. ___________________ bero_
