My PC has had the dreaded blue screen and I'm told it is beyond repair. I'm thinking of changing to an Apple iMac and have booked an appointment at the Apple shop for a demonstration.
Does anyone have experience of changing from PC to Mac or any general advice on what I should ask the Apple person?????
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The iMac is a great computer with powerful performance. You can partition the hard disk to run PC only software if you need to.
Think you will enjoy the demo. The guys at the stores are good.
Go for Office for Mac over iWork (Apple's Office suite), although iWork is better, it saves in a different format to Office and so if you deal with lots of people who run Windows (and let's face it who doesn't), you have to save it as an Office file before you send them a document, which is tiresome and annoying if you forget, sending them a file they can't open. Also means you have duplicates of all your files. Though there is a new Office for Mac coming out in 3 months or so, so it might be worth getting iWork at a low price (which you usually can when you buy a Mac from an Apple Store), before getting the new version of Office when it is released (it is a big improvement, I'm currently running a Beta of it).
Oh and final bit of advice, Apple do discounts of around 12.5% for students so if you are going to buy, take a student with you and claim it's for them, in order get it cheaper. When I got mine, I got the insurance chucked in for free instead of £150 I think, so haggle over things like that.
If you prefer style over substance.
If you can afford the insurance for the repairs.
If you have money you don't need.
Then get a Mac.
Blue touch paper lit ...... now, what next ? ;-)
love mine
Sorry, just cant resist.
I've been owning and running Macs, up to four at a time, since 1992, and i have NEVER had a major repair on any of them outside warranty. Even the Cube, after it was soaked in tea and knocked on the floor in one elegant movement. I could easily afford insurance if I thought it necessary, from the money I save through not needing anti-virus software.
They are stylish of course, I have no idea in what important area they lack substance, for most home or small business users at least. And then when you have an iPhone too, you are in digital heaven..
Yes they are user friendly, look good, and stable when properly configurated. Be careful with ' chipped software' personally speaking you are either legal or illegal, you have to make that decision early on. With me I do not have a choice so I am in for the ''pound as they say' and it is not cheap!...Be wary of 'cheap macs' they really do NOT exist!. They are essentially nicked or buggered!.......
I use them because I do DTP. I run CS3 ( which is photoshop, indesign, Dreamweaver, Flash , illustrator,etc etc.....enough to k create/design whatever.......) I also use Quark xpress. Professionally speaking they last about 3 years, I have an old G3 and G4 gathering dust in the spare room......
If it is for personal use then it will last longer. I buy from Apple direct and get a business discount, which compares with online companies. I do this as you have a decent service, and they will normally sort things out for you pretty quickly!. Bluewater is a decent shop but is busy at weekends. Personally speaking if you just want to email and surf the net, then a PC because of the cost.!
Apple can do a lot, and yes PC's can as well, in fairness I know my newspaper is going over to them at the end of the year, and there will be a considerable saving, plus in in house support is there if things go wrong!. When things do go wrong you need to see a mac specialist!.
I am having to upgrade to CS5 at Christmas, and will get a new machine. I run an 'i' mac 2.4 GhzIntel core Core 2 big screen . It has a 1gb memoory and an external hard disc. As I stated I design newspapers, and magazines on this thing and it is fine. I work in high res photo images to a high level. Probably get a 16inch i book with additional memory and portable external hard disc, because I often go to clients.
At work I had a G5 like these....... Quad-Core
8-Core
One 2.66GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon "Nehalem" processor Two 2.26GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon "Nehalem" processors
3GB (three 1GB) memory 6GB (six 1GB) memory
640GB hard drive 1 640GB hard drive1
18x double-layer SuperDrive 18x double-layer SuperDrive
NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 with 512MB NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 with 512MB
Ships: Within 24hrs Ships: Within 24hrs
Free Shipping Free Shipping
£1,940.00
£2,553.00
We ran 10 of these things, and with the exception of connecting to the net ( a bbc thing!) They all lasted more than 4 years!, and were ' hammered'......
As I said depends what you want it for..... Do not get carried away with the 'sales talk' have a budget and keep to it.
Good luck
Don't start me on iPhones - they're nothing special and there are lots of other phones on the market that do as much and probably more than the new one. I had video calling five years ago.
Around 1 in 10 big companies in the US are now buying Macs to run Windows now because they are more reliable.
When you get your iMac home it will be easy to set up. All you need to know is your internet passwords etc. It will do the rest foryou.
Save your money and just get a new PC for less than half the price.
Giving money to Apple is like giving money to BP to drill for new oil.
Don't knock it until you've tried a Mac.
I use PCs at work!
I've also installed networks with both. Guess which got used most.
Why would anyone buy Macs 'because they are more reliable'? They aren't - not in the workplace anyway. Any company big enough to be represented in any study anywhere pays precisely zero attention to desktop support - they just run their O/Ses from an image - which can be redeployed in minutes - and capex costs for a PC are so miniscule that they have dozens of pre-imaged boxes ready to go.
Granted, for the average Internet Imbecile, Macs are great. They require no understanding of how a PC works, the O/S is very intuitive, and (for the moment, at least) are safer to use. But for a company, there is no reason to use a Mac over a PC, other than in niche environments such as design, or where the company wants to make a 'statement' and show off their spending on technology.
Gartner are independent.
I'm not doubting there's a Gartner report that says Macs are penetrating into the workplace. There's a Gartner report that says Compellent SANs are about to overtake Dell in the magic quadrant. Anybody who has ever worked with them knows it's absolute bollocks, but Compellent will have done some deal or other to nfeature Gartner crap all over their sales & promotional material.
I don't do desktop rollouts so have no need to read the industry blurb, but if you can find me the Gartner report I'll be happy to go through it and take it apart bit by bit
This isn't an anti-Mac rant. I think Macs are shite, but understand they have their place in the home (if I hadn't spent time teaching my Mum how to use a real computer over the years I would have got her a Mac by now) and are still fine creative workstations - on a par with, or even still ahead of - PCs. I just don't see any company ever wasting money on chucking them at people who do mundane office tasks.
There you have it. The beloved marketing campaign that saved the Valley was created on the Mac platform. Does an Addick need any more encouragement?
- (that includes me).
Those people who don't like them, don't use them and get very hot under the collar about people who do use them saying they like them.
Have I missed anything out?
Why do you need a right click?
It took me around 25 seconds to 'get used to' a different system.
As for the little Apple sticker, it's far funkier than that.
It's actually a glowing, bright white Apple ;-)
(Not that it makes a jot of difference).
If you don't like Macs, don't buy one.
If you do, and can afford to pay a premium for something that is a joy to use, then do buy one.
The PC brigade won't be swayed and those of us who like Macs are in general happy with our purchases.
It's all personal choice, innit?
Macs are fun to use but let's face it why would someone creating malware, bother with Macs when it holds fewer bountiful fruit? Mac's are full of security flaws just no one bothers to exploit them. I mean Safari anyone? It just seems the average Mac users are full of more subjective bs than a homeopathic freak. They're great fun to use and if you're more artisitic go get one. Personally for price I'll stick with a PC.
Prepare to spend a bundle on anti-virus software? What are you doing with your PC? Please. Run ubuntu where there's plenty of available free av software, or even AVG/Avista on a Windows platform. Besides if you think buying 95% of home edition AV software is worth any money at all you're a computer Zombie. Macs make it easy for luddite technophiles to use a computer, if anyone's interested in how things actually work behind the pretty colours you can't beat Unix or Linux systems.
I just want it to work.
Guess I'm a luddite.
I can't understand why PC owners get so het up about something that's of little consequence to them.
It's like when Palace fans say we mean nothing to them then keep harping on about us.
Most people on the planet use PC's.
To that end the battle is 'won'.
Pc's 1- Mac 0.
Some people prefer a different way.
Their choice.
Mac user myself since the 80s but not an evangelist!
If you're out buying, look at what you get for your dough and whether you like working with/living with what you're buying.
"You'll be angry that there is no right click for months"
Don't know about angry - it's just a bit weird that I've just posted this with my 2 button trackball mouse
........and the right click does work too
Recent Macs even work with PC keyboards
and as I said before the shortcuts are the same in PC & Mac versions of the software
PC users are fine but just be happy and don't knock people who choose to buy a Mac for their home or office.
There's none so blind as those that cannot see.
Just can't get my head around why people are so anti-Mac, strikes me as sour grapes.
I presume your lack of knowledge comes from ignorance because when I first got my macbook pro, I had right click set up on the bottom right corner of the trackpad, but it didn't feel natural, just like it hadn't on my old Windows laptop and so after looking at the settings, I tried the the two finger method of secondary clicking. I haven't looked back since, for it is so much more intuitive and easy to use than clicking on the bottom right of the trackpad.
At first I was worried about the differences between the two systems but as long as you work out that cmd is pretty much the same as CTRL on windows it's easy. The fact that Windows 7 apes Mac OS in so many ways shows there must be something right.........
Before I got my Mac, a mate said to me "those that love Macs have them, and those that hate them, can't afford them" lol. I wouldn't go back to Windows, and imo it's worth paying the premium in order to get a better system
I have made an appointment to see an Apple person at their shop in Manchester on Wednesday and shall then go to John Lewis and see what they have to say.