PC to MAC

[spiritcrisis]

I am considering buying a Mac Desktop and was wondering if you could answer some questions for me.

What if anything would I miss moving from a PC to a MAC?
Gaming on VM reasonable or able?
What are you able to do out of Box on a MAC?
What is needed Free or Buy applications if I want to...
-burn dvds,
-edit pictures,
-maybe some video conversion and editing
-audio editing as well.

Any other suggestions or comments please add...

How easy is it to upgrade hardware on the MAC PRO
How easy is it to upgrade hardware on the IMAC

RAM easy to change out
HDD easy to change out
Processor

Are the sound cards up to FLAC or uncompressed quality or do I need to buy one for good music listening?

Sorry for all the questions but I need to know these answers so I can make my move...

THX

[xcorvis]

What will you miss? Mostly, options. When it comes to certain apps, you won't have a lot of choice. Gaming is another weak area, but there are some good games for Mac. You should dual boot if you want to do PC games, VMs just don't cut it.

Burning DVDs, editing pictures, audio and video are all done by built in Mac apps, namely Garage Band, iMovie, iDVD, iPhoto, etc. Macs come with a lot more useful applications out of the box than PCs do.

When it comes to Mac hardware, you can only upgrade RAM and hard drives. You can swap RAM and hard drives yourself on the Mac Pros easy enough, but you won't find any processor upgrades. You might be able to find video card upgrades, I'm not too familiar with them. The aluminum iMacs require special tools to access the insides, it really needs to be done by a pro (you have to remove the glass screen), so don't expect to do it yourself.

The sound card is probably fine, I haven't heard complaints from the Mac users I know.

[computoman]

Before you purchase any machine, you should look to see if it has the software you need. Now a days most programs have their equivalents on all platforms. Mac are generally known not to have most of the major games (though that is changing), everything for it is twice as expensive (especially replacement parts), Apple has been known to drop support for their products at the drop of a hat (I owned 4 plus macs), geneerally not upgradeable, expect to have to pay for a whole new osx at least once a year like windows. Unless you have some kind of job requirement, i can see no need to get a mac, but then that is your decision. Rumor has it that apple could possibly come out with newer lower priced systems. There is also a possibility that osx might be sold separately so you can use a standard pc to run osx.
If you have to have Apple please buy the most expensive apple computer with all the add-ons and extended warranties.

If you are fed up with windows, you might look at linux first and save yourself a bundle.

[Mal]

If you've been using Windows for a long time and would consider yourself an advanced user, then you may find the Mac's OS frustrating. It seems to be built with simplicity in mind and a focus on visual aspects. I'm not saying that it is bad, just be prepared to learn new ways of doing things.

[burkhartmj]

All I would add is that the graphics on the Mac Pro is upgradeable through a Mac specific upgrade kit. The iMac is not graphics upgradeable because it uses the same kind of graphics card that laptops use, which is generally soldered to the motherboard.

[spiritcrisis]

I have ran Ubuntu, Fedora, Redhat, Suse, and many other distros of linux and was ok but was hard to find hardware compadability... The thing I forgot to mention is that my house burnt down and was going to just build another desktop pc but I find that I will build a very capable computer but can afford the software and dont use much of the capability its just for show...

I am still going to run Vista on my Laptops but my desktop i just want for media editing and burning... Its just easier and simpler to go with a Mac... I am off tommorow to try the interface again to make sure I want to go with a mac...

I was trained on a MAC and have been given OS9 Macs and fixed a few OSX macs and taken apart the OS9 IMACS ... I think I have a good enough feel for it.. its just a matter if I can live with the layout... but its simular to how I had my ubuntu sector configured

[spiritcrisis]

Thank you very much for the feed back Its been very helpful... I think I am going to go with the IMAC high end model but am going to wait till june to see if new models come out... :)

I mainly use my laptops actually and they are running windows but my desktop is my work horse... Does the video burning... Does the file conversions downloads and editing of everything I need...

Laptops I just use for surfing and podcasts... but anyways

Thx again

[computoman]

I have ran Ubuntu, Fedora, Redhat, Suse, and many other distros of linux and was ok but was hard to find hardware compadability..


That really surprises me to hear someone say that. I have not found anything that would not work under linux, unless it was an off beat piece of hardware or too new to have drivers yet. On my desktop I connect to video cameras, pda's, home automation, webcams, desktop scanners, printers, and etc. Even my old macs were not as compatible unless I ran linux. I have even used wine to load windows drivers on linuxx to get oddball windows only hardware to work.

[phil-mize]

errr side note.

can u run linux on a mac?

[xcorvis]

errr side note.

can u run linux on a mac?

Yes. It's especially easy now that they have x86 processors, but there are distros that support PPC too.

[burkhartmj]

That really surprises me to hear someone say that. I have not found anything that would not work under linux, unless it was an off beat piece of hardware or too new to have drivers yet. On my desktop I connect to video cameras, pda's, home automation, webcams, desktop scanners, printers, and etc. Even my old macs were not as compatible unless I ran linux. I have even used wine to load windows drivers on linuxx to get oddball windows only hardware to work.

Unfortunately, that's still not true. Ubuntu didn't support the generic touchpad on my mainstream Dell XPS M1530. Until issues like that are a thing of the past, the myth of linux hardware compatibility is just that, a myth.

[davmoo]

Unfortunately, that's still not true. Ubuntu didn't support the generic touchpad on my mainstream Dell XPS M1530. Until issues like that are a thing of the past, the myth of linux hardware compatibility is just that, a myth.

I regularly use Mandriva, Redhat, and CentOS, and they usually work on any hardware I've put them on right out of the box. I've also had good experience with Slackware. Everyone's favorite darling love child Ubuntu, however, has been nothing but pain and tears for me. On most of my machines it won't even reach the end of installation without bombing, and on the machines that it will install fully, half of it doesn't work on reboot.

I realize I could probably fiddle around with Ubuntu and it would work. but since I didn't have to fiddle around with Mandriva, Redhat, CentOS, and Slackware, and also didn't have to mess with (*gasp*) Windows XP, Vista or 7 on any of that same hardware, I don't see why I should be expected to waste my time going through extra steps making Ubuntu work.

[computoman]

What a lot of people forget is that operating systems no matter who makes it will not have support for everthing when when either the product or the os first comes out. Touchpads are still not what most people use (aka mainstream), so there will be some delay in support). Though I would imagine that wine or another package could be used to load the windows driver and have the touchpad work under linux. The only time I have had an issue with ubuntu is the network install disk trying to do several things. Ubuntu also has done some quirky things which has disappointed me, but I usually find a workaround by searching the net. Most of my equipment is anything but cutting edge. As for an ubuntu installation, I just do a basic install and add the generic bundle packages instead later, unless I want to be surgical in the installs.. I do plan to start back with redhat/fedora/centos to able to be surgical with it too. I guess whitebox has not been around for a while. On another subject, RH maybe more marketable than Ubuntu. RH also has seemingly some real easy setups for clustering I want to try. I thought it was an interesting comment that Veronica definitely plans to start using open software.

Have puter, will network.

[tokenuser]

I realize I could probably fiddle around with Ubuntu and it would work. but since I didn't have to fiddle around with Mandriva, Redhat, CentOS, and Slackware, and also didn't have to mess with (*gasp*) Windows XP, Vista or 7 on any of that same hardware, I don't see why I should be expected to waste my time going through extra steps making Ubuntu work.<sarcasm>but it free, so it must be good, and being linux you can recompile in the options that yo want, and if it doesn't have the options you can write your own drivers!!!! Microsux Windblowz is not 1337 ... and only "L"users user OSuX.</sarcasm>

Linux ... in any flavour is an option. It is not always the solution.

1. Any Apple hardware can have the RAM and HDD upgraded. Mostly it is simple, but sometimes (iMac) a special tool is needed for opening the case.
2. Processor upgrades are sometimes possible. There are tutorials out there for this, but in reality few do it because there are things like BIOS issues (or lack of BIOS) that can cause problems. Get the highest processor speed you can afford.
3. GPU. Some have upgradeable cards. Some have onboard video. The onboard is pretty damn good (remember, Apple made their name in the graphics industry), but the video cards (if available) are solid.
4. Out of the box, the iLife apps will do 90% of what you asked for, but don't feel you need a Mac to do graphics - that WAS the case, but now is mostly irrelevant and platform independent ... yes, even on Linux.
5. Gaming. Spore and WoW are fine, but beyond that forget about it. Even under VM, but just set up a bootcamp partition running your Windows flavour of choice and do you gaming in a Windows environment. Dirty secret - Apple hardware often actually runs Windows faster than a "Windows Computer".
6. Audio. You wont have any problems with that. It plays lossless nicely. There is a reason Apple's also get used for audio editing.

[computoman]

Linux is not for everyone only because of preprogrammed mindsets. At one time I would not touch Linux much less BSD. Linux has improved dramatically as has BSD since then. When something comes out better that is comparable in price, i might convert. I will use any operating system if you pay me enough. That includes osx and windows.

[fishtoprecords]

can u run linux on a mac?

Why would you want to do that? OS-X is Unix-like itself under the covers. The shell is wonderful (I think bash). It has built in X-windows and ssh and all the stuff that most folks want.

I'm sure that the answer is "yes" but my first question is, since OS-X is son of NextStep, which was son of some Unix or the other, its close enough for 99% of the world.

[davmoo]

I'm sure that the answer is "yes" but my first question is, since OS-X is son of NextStep, which was son of some Unix or the other, its close enough for 99% of the world.

The answer is indeed "yes, you can run Linux on Apple" (and that includes PPC as well as x86), but I always want to ask another question of people who buy an Apple and then put Linux on it. If you're going to do that, why not save some coin and put it on a cheap PC instead of an Apple? Now that Apple has switched to Intel its the same hardware.

[computoman]

DITTO!!!!!! With linux and bsd, we have not had to purchase a whole new machine in a few years now. We have had to replace drives though.

I ran linux on some new world ppc g3's, but have since let go of them. Just an intel shop now except for some the network appliances..