garyi, you're slipping

Yea I know I am trying to justify my powermac, but that has a bigger screen and is faster.

I keep telling myself that mine is upgradable, but it ain't making me feel better!

How the hell do they get the sceen on that mac without it toppling?

Gary, you must get one - the Marco and Bub show is now transmitting in super widescreen.

Indeed, only the mac has an excellent spam filter, I wouldn't see much.

This Mac Malarkey

I have always steered clear of Mac's because I have to do real work and I don't draw pictures or write newspapers for a living.

Reading the blurb for 'Panther', I see that Mac's are able to run PC software without the need for an emulator, which invariably fucks everything up.

Is this true?

Is a whole new world of toy-dom open to me?

Should I warn the bank manager?

ag

No. Because there's no upgradability, when a new, sexy Mac comes out your old one becomes a paper weight.

For the same money as a 20" iMac you can buy a 2.66GHz Dell with 80GB, 512MB, DVD, 20.1" flat panel, 128MB video, Dolby 5.1 sound, etc.

Phew!

ag

Hmmm

I have both a Mac and a PC.

quote:

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I have always steered clear of Mac's because I have to do real work and I don't draw pictures or write newspapers for a living.

---

With the Mac, it is a tool that you use to do productive, interesting and creative things in a fun and hassle free way.

With the PC, you are the tool, and the PC is the task.

Just my bi-computerdom 2c worth

Cheers

John...

Populist thinking exalts the simplistic and the ordinary

Why does it always turn into a mac vs PC debate!



They both have their uses.

Alex: macs run a variant of UNIX now. You can run some UNIX software, but to run PC software you still need an emulator.

Regards

Stephen

quote:

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Originally posted by Ludwig:
No. Because there's no upgradability, when a new, sexy Mac comes out your old one becomes a paper weight.

For the same money as a 20" iMac you can buy a 2.66GHz Dell with 80GB, 512MB, DVD, 20.1" flat panel, 128MB video, Dolby 5.1 sound, etc.

---

Ludwig, this isn't quite true. You can upgrade the CPU on most Macs and peripherals, hard drives, video cards are all upgradable too. OK, so sometimes you need a whole new Mac whereas on a PC you might just get a CPU + Motherboard. But in my (PC) experience faster CPUs demand faster memory and other peripherals anyhow - and not everyone is DIY savvy. I still use several pre-G4 macs for various tasks.

Your comment about the Dell proves that Macs are not expensive! And I know which I'd rather have in my house. The PC is relegated to the studio.



Regards

Stephen

http://www.google.com/press/zeitgeist.html contains an interesting snapshot of what real Internet users are using.

Paul

It's worth pointing out that $1,300 of the 20-inch iMac's $2200 price is allocated to a very nice 20-inch 1680x1050 LCD monitor, assuming that the screen this iMac uses is the same as Apple's 20-inch Cinema Display (the size and resolution match). If so, you're getting a rather impressive LCD in the package, as the Apple LCDs are among the best I've seen.

But I do take the point about the lack of upgradability in these all-in-ones.

Joe

Blimey - these things are quite pricy in the UK.

A Power Mac G5, 2.0GHz with Superdrive costs £2,287 on Dabs.co.uk. I suspect that this is the newest, highest spec machine, but if it's not upgradeable, it's a lot of cash.

I will freely admit that I know nothing of these Macs, and that there will be cheaper online stores etc etc etc.

ag

Alex the G5 is apples top of the range power desktop machine, its fully upgradable in most respects, it can take four harddrives, two drive bays extra PCI ards, better graphics cards etc etc etc.

The only macs which can't be upgraded particuarly are the imacs, although they can take airport and extra memory.

Its worth pointing out the imac is for a certain market, and this market is very popular, the imac is small, attractive, burns CDS/DVDs, does the internet, does OfficeX, does most everything infact in one package. It has USB2, Firewire, External screen support, erthunet (one day I will spell that correctly) audio out etc etc etc.

I bought a powermac because I thought I would upgrade it, to be honest I don't need to it does everything nicely right now.

However I lust after a G5 but unlike PCs its not because I need more, its because like naim I want more ;-)

Really people need to get over this apple not upgradeable thing becasue its bollocks.

ag,

Microsoft Office runs just fine and native on any mac. Also most Adobe products run native as well.

Now lets talk about doing 'real work'. For large computational tasks window's based PCs are not up to the task IMHO - for that you really need UNIX. OS-X is BSD-UNIX with a nice front end. It runs all the GNU compilers just fine. You get gcc, f2c for free. The new G5 chip has great floating point performance -- it's an IBM Power4 chip - the same ones that go into their supercomputers. Currently I do most of my data analysis on a dual Xeon running redhat linux (a UNIX clone), and my fluff stuff (powerpoint, word,...) on an ibook. With the new G5 I could have a true one-box solution -- I'm waiting for a few others to guinea-pig the new Fortran compilers on the G5, at which point I will switch over.

re. upgrading - outside of the home, no one upgrades workstations - it doesnt make financial sense - memory, bus speed, chips all develop in parallel. Lifecycles on these type of machines is 2 years, then you buy new - Moore's law and all that.

Dan

Dan, just a point of correction.

Adobe was created because mac was created. Back in the Mac 512k days Adobe create Pagemaker and a company was born. I remember it well I was at school and suddenly one day appeared around 20 macs with pagemaker on it, suddenly everyone was welcomed to the world of electronic publication what a great time that was. A little while later windows interface appeared with poor poor attempts at software which could compare to adobe. I guess this is where apple got its branding as a graphics/design computer PCs simply did not have a chance back then. (I am not saying that about now Mr Robinson!)

It would be fairer to say Adobe runs well on PCs ;-)

Dan

For the interests of the forum's sanity, I have left you a PT.

Cheers

ag

Gary,

You're right, but just last week I went down to the local mega-store to pick up photoshop elements and all I could find were damn windows versions! arghh...

Dan

Alex its only a bit of fun!

Dan believe it or not Jessops sell elements for OSX in its shops, its a great programme.

Garyi

I know

I have some concerns about Windoze only app's running on Max tho', and it's terribly dull so I didn't want to upset the forum's fun police again

ag

quote:

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Originally posted by garyi:
Dan believe it or not Jessops sell elements for OSX in its shops, its a great programme.

---

OK, next time I'm in Watford, I'll be all set!
Dan

Opps, sorry

In which case I am sure you are aware the apple site sells it.

However you might be a bit like me, into town of a weekend for some spendy spends which the web just does not fit.

Its all about physical contact, tactile purchasing you see.

You Apple folks are sensitive.

I was focusing on the consumer owned iMacs, re: my upgradability comment. To have the components at the mercy of Moore's Law tied physically to the part that's a decent investment with some longevity (LCD) is bad design IMO. So is not allowing all kinds of expansion cards and drives. An iMac is just a laptop on steroids.

And Steve Jobs is an autocratic prick.



PS- Geek trivia: Did you know the iPAQ PDA was originally designed around Linux?

I think what upsets PC users the most is that mac users have something to get sensitive over.

Lets face it who gives a toss about a Dell PC eh?

Nothing to get get excited about regardless of what you use. We're talking about boring computers here. Are you sensitive about your dishwasher?