Mac or not

Blacksheep1979

markandrich wrote: »

I can't get 50% discount.

I also like the odd game.

What are my best PC laptop options for £500 or under? Dell? Acer?

come on guys don't hijack someone elses thread - start your own

(but don't buy acer)

turbobob

This looks pretty good and should be capable of running some games - http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=uk&cs=ukbsdt1&l=en&oc=n1214004&dgc=AF&cid=5212&lid=122756

As for the Mac, it sounds like a great discount. Even if you find you don't get on with it you could almost certainly sell it on for more than you paid for it. But after many years using Windows almost exclusively (with a brief flirtation with Linux a few years back) I recently got my first Mac, and I think its great. Even though its not a fantastic spec (Mini Core Duo with 2gb) it handles everything I want to do on it and the system boots to a useable desktop in about 15 seconds. I don't see that with Windows even with a much more powerful computer. It is very stable, doesn't really suffer from the same problem with viruses and trojans that Windows has and I just find it nice to use. And as said if you need to you can run windows on them either dual booting through Boot Camp, or in a virtual machine.

jaz_2

lindsaygalaxy wrote: »

when you compare spec for spec against a PC based one, the PC one may look better, but thats cause on a mac it doesnt need all the stuff that a PC based one does, it wont crash like a PC one does, and if you like editing photos or videos a PC one will never compare.

I don't mind what computer folks choose to spend their money on, but it does grate a bit when Mac fanboys/girls trot out the same old unsubstantiated justifications for their purchase. Macintosh computers are no better or worse than PCs, but they are lifestyle products and priced as such. The idea that a Mac is a necessity if you work in a creative industry is an old one - I have friends who run a recording studio and another who works in graphic design. Neither of them uses the Macintosh platform.

For me, the cult of Mac is all about this:

lindsaygalaxy wrote: »

they look gorgous

masterthief wrote:

they also look really pretty

which is fine, but remember that a stainless steel microwave won't warm your soup up any better than a boring old white one.

isofa

Yawn - not again. I don't think any of the responses here were from "fanboys" - I thought that comment died out in the 80s, sadly not. That really does grate.

I've used both platforms for nearly 20 years, as do many others. There is nothing a Mac can't do that a PC can. Something one does better than the other and vice-versa. It's about choosing the best environment for the job. And also if the OS and the actual hardware is nicely designed, well that's also a bonus.

I work as a consultant in several industries described above, and the majority of my design clients (including very large publishing houses of glossies and dailies) use Macs. Certainly many musicians also use Macs, especially now since Apple purchased Logic Audio and it's Mac only.

Technically, in my opinion, Macs are better for design work for a number of reason: the most crucial from is the full workflow colour matching capabilities and the built in PDF engine. Macs have had ColourSync for at least 10 years, in much old OSes like 7, 8 and 9. Window can't hold a candle to that. The native Quartz and PDF options are again are a powerful choice for designers. Many designers also find the interface more intuitive, certainly running packages like CS3 on the Mac are better than the experience in Windows, it's a personal preference I grant you.

However I have many other clients in other industries which use PCs only. About 75% of my database clients use PCs, although the number of Mac offices is growing especially now there is so much more software available on OS X.

I think you are missing a crucial point and that is the OS, there are many advantages to using OS X over Windows.

Having a computer which can boot into two different operating systems, without anything additional software (other than a copy of the version of Windows you want to run), or buying a virtualisation package to run any number of OSes or OS specific Windows or Linux apps directly under Mac OS is something that is a massive advantage the Mac has over PCs. Oh and Mac OS X has the X11 environment built in, so you can run a plethora of apps there too, again without any additional software.

Blacksheep1979

erm fairly sure a pc can boot into more than one OS and can virtually run other OS's...

isofa

Blacksheep1979 wrote: »

erm fairly sure a pc can boot into more than one OS and can virtually run other OS's...

The Mac is the only computer than can boot or run the two most popular home and office OSes: Mac OS X and Windows, in addition it can run X11 (built in), Linux and other flavours of the OS, with all manner of options.
It is also the only platform than can run Windows applications under Mac OS X using "coherence" technology (via a third party app - Parallels) so that Windows apps run, just as if they were a native Mac app, without showing the host OS.

PCs can run and boot into Windows, Linux and various flavours of Unix but not Mac OS X, although some hackers have managed to get it running - but that isn't legal.

Blacksheep1979

so as I said it can dual (or more) boot and can run other os's in an emulation mode - something that isn't unique to macs...

isofa

No, that's true, I should have make that clearer in my original post

masterthief

jaz - if you were accusing me of being a mac fangirl, you are mistaken. I think any posts I've made on here regarding Macs have been fair - I use Macs for music because my experience is that they are more stable and better equipped todo the work I use them for (music production and editing, and minor video editing since I also do some work on movie soundtracks).

as for my lighthearted comment about them looking good - many people use computers in a pbulic space (e.g. living room as a media-centre or if they have kids and wish to monitor internet use), in which case the aesthetics of a machine is a valid point to discuss. if you were given a choice between two tvs which performed equally, but one was plain black and sleek-loking and the other looked cheap and had a big pink glitter frame, you'd choose the one which looked better. that isn't a 'cult of mac' thing. it's a basic aesthetic apprecation thing.

as for the use of macs/pcs in music production - as I have said in another post on here, some people choose pcs for music production because it can be a lot cheaper to get software for pcs (there is a significantly wider range of low-end music software available for pcs, while higher end music software has often been designed with the mac setup in mind). many musicians use pcs because it is cheaper and we're often skint. I choose to invest the extra in a mac and high-end software, just like I chose to buy a fender strat rather than just use a cheaper copy. but I've also (albeit mainly through my ownhard work, not simply fortuitous circumstance) been in a position to be able to finance this - I know many musicians who aren't I also know many musicians who use crack copies of software, and again this is more readily available for pc than for mac.


more guitarist own epiphone les pauls than own gibson les pauls. but this does not mean the epiphone is better. the same holds with the ownership of computers for music production.

masterthief

apologies for going slightly off topic, its a point I do't want to have to make too often on here, but I didn't want my earlier post (which I think was a fair one) to be dismissed for one light-hearted yet valid boservation on aesthetics.