Does anyone have a Mac?

toasterman

be_alright wrote: »

If you keep on top of progress though you don't have to make major purchases every few years that wipe you out. I constantly change things in my pc probably every two to three months. I could never get on with the lack of upgrading ability with Mac's, especially the lack of Ram..

You can upgrade the ram in all Macs (except possibly the Macbook Air). One screw underneath the iMac lets you access the ram. You can source it from anywhere - it's standard DDR2.

You do have to consider what you need it for though. I've got 1gb and I can do video and sound editing (multi-tracking etc) perfectly fine. What do you need more ram for?
Even the latest incarnation of Mac OS runs on hardware specs (including ram amounts) that's several years old. It's not Vista.

And changes every two-three months?! That sounds like a lot of effort.

Cloudane

Hmm how much do you spend patching it up every 2-3 months?! More than the cost of a Mac, surely. The TCO really isn't that bad, especially against patching it up for a 0.1% boost every couple of months.

Also of course I know how to change things like RAM, PSU and motherboard. I've worked with PCs for many years. But my point was, by the time you've upgraded the motherboard to support the new processor, and upgraded the RAM to match, and upgraded the PSU to support those, that's already half a computer. The new bottlenecks are then HDD and graphics card, upgrade those and you've basically bought a new computer and stuck it in an old case.

[Deleted User]

toasterman wrote: »

You can upgrade the ram in all Macs (except possibly the Macbook Air). One screw underneath the iMac lets you access the ram. You can source it from anywhere - it's standard DDR2.

Maximum RAM of 4GB though?

Cloudane wrote: »

Hmm how much do you spend patching it up every 2-3 months?! More than the cost of a Mac, surely. The TCO really isn't that bad, especially against patching it up for a 0.1% boost every couple of months.

Typically about £200 every time on new and selling the old hardware, which doesn't really cost me much at all.

toasterman

be_alright wrote: »

Maximum RAM of 4GB though?

What do you need all this ram for then?

Windows Vista 32-bit versions (which is the version you get on pretty much every new system, regardless of the processor in it) only supports 4gb max anyway, doesn't it?

be_alright wrote: »

Typically about £200 every time on new and selling the old hardware, which doesn't really cost me much at all.

£200 every 3 months? Is that right?

[Deleted User]

toasterman wrote: »

What do you need all this ram for then?

Windows Vista 32-bit versions (which is the version you get on pretty much every new system, regardless of the processor in it) only supports 4gb max anyway, doesn't it?

The x86 version of Vista can only use up to a maximum of 4gb. I use Vista x64 with 8GB of RAM at both home and work because a) I often sit with Visual Studio open on one monitor and on the has VM and it needs a lot of ram to do it and b) I work from home a lot and I play a lot of games too.

£200 every 3 months? Is that right?

Yeah about that, this month was a little more because I bought two graphics cards on the day of release..

Cloudane

To each his own platform and preferences, but at £800/year in upgrades I could get a brand new Mac every year! (I went for a £950 model last year so it'd be an additional £150)... less if it's a refurb model. So that's far from the best way to argue the economics.

There's no denying that for upgradeoholics the PC is definitely the way to go, and if that's what you enjoy doing then more power to you. But to look down on Mac users claiming we waste money when you're paying so much for minor speed increases and early adopter costs, is just silly.

[Deleted User]

Cloudane wrote: »

To each his own platform and preferences, but at £800/year in upgrades I could get a brand new Mac every year! (I went for a £950 model last year so it'd be an additional £150)... less if it's a refurb model. So that's far from the best way to argue the economics.

There's no denying that for upgradeoholics the PC is definitely the way to go, and if that's what you enjoy doing then more power to you. But to look down on Mac users claiming we waste money when you're paying so much for minor speed increases and early adopter costs, is just silly.

I don't remember saying that Mac users are wasting money, unless I was aiming it at Mac Pros (which incidentally I do think are overpriced) which are a completely different kettle of fish completely.

From my perspective on computer use a Mac couldn't cut it for gaming at all, which is what I do a lot of.

Computers are horses for courses though, everyone uses them for different things and has different expectations. There's not one perfect computer for the entire populus.

I tell you what is interesting me at the moment though. Adobe are only going to be shipping CS4 in a 32bit version for OS-X because Apple pulled the 64bit Carbon program that Adobe had been developing CS4 on, whereas Windows will see both the 32bit and 64bit version. I can see this is going to throw the cat amongst the pigeons for the Windows vs Mac debate on Graphics Design because with CS4 being 64bit on Windows and pushing more onto the GPU, there's a potential for Windows to be able to handle a lot more data more efficiently than the Mac. I wonder how this will go in the profession..

toasterman

be_alright wrote: »

From my perspective on computer use a Mac couldn't cut it for gaming at all, which is what I do a lot of.

That's fair. While I could never be bothered with Windows gaming because of the need to upgrade graphics cards etc, if I was going to be into non-console gaming, I couldn't use a mac for it.

be_alright wrote: »

Adobe are only going to be shipping CS4 in a 32bit version for OS-X because Apple pulled the 64bit Carbon program that Adobe had been developing CS4 on, whereas Windows will see both the 32bit and 64bit version. <snip> I wonder how this will go in the profession..

I reckon either:
a) It won't make much difference speed-wise because of some bizarre quirk
or
b) Adobe will redo the 64 bit version in whatever way that it needs to be now
or
c) The professionals won't bother upgrading, and wait for CS5

I think Adobe have made some good software, more complicated, lately. Cooledit/Audition 1 was pretty straight forward - but the newer versions of Audition is so cluttered, it feels awkward to use.
Same with Dreamweaver - that seems massively more resource hungry now, without really doing anything spectacularly better than the old versions.

NickMidgley

I tell you what is interesting me at the moment though. Adobe are only going to be shipping CS4 in a 32bit version for OS-X because Apple pulled the 64bit Carbon program that Adobe had been developing CS4 on, whereas Windows will see both the 32bit and 64bit version. I can see this is going to throw the cat amongst the pigeons for the Windows vs Mac debate on Graphics Design because with CS4 being 64bit on Windows and pushing more onto the GPU, there's a potential for Windows to be able to handle a lot more data more efficiently than the Mac. I wonder how this will go in the profession..

The cat is already looking suspiciously at the pigeons on that one, as CS3 was developed very much with Windows Vista in mind.

The graphics profession is very much a Mac stronghold - although the economic benefits of PC's are starting to become evident to some. And if Apple's ties with Adobe loosen too much then Apple could be in big trouble.

Cloudane

be_alright wrote: »

I don't remember saying that Mac users are wasting money, unless I was aiming it at Mac Pros (which incidentally I do think are overpriced) which are a completely different kettle of fish completely.

Sorry, I was mixing you up with another poster who was using the old "Macs are expensive and only for posers" stereotype. It really grates. Wasn't you though!

And indeed, they're not so good for gaming, although you can boot into Windows - a reasonable enough solution if gaming is not the first priority.

I tell you what is interesting me at the moment though. Adobe are only going to be shipping CS4 in a 32bit version for OS-X because Apple pulled the 64bit Carbon program that Adobe had been developing CS4 on, whereas Windows will see both the 32bit and 64bit version. I can see this is going to throw the cat amongst the pigeons for the Windows vs Mac debate on Graphics Design because with CS4 being 64bit on Windows and pushing more onto the GPU, there's a potential for Windows to be able to handle a lot more data more efficiently than the Mac. I wonder how this will go in the profession..

Yeah, this will certainly be interesting. To put a positive spin on it, you could say that the PC crowd will only be suffering the 64bit early adoption bugs anyway. Not necessarily true, but words that'd help persuade the Mac users to hang in there. Of course, there are more advantages to using Macs in a workplace anyway (those lucky few businesses that can do so - many of us are stuck with PCs for Sage et al) than raw graphic design power as there are less problems/spyware/etc to deal with and the interface and workflow that designers are used to.

I don't think it'll be the death of the Mac in the design sector by a long shot, but will probably introduce a bit of healthy competition. I just hope that Apple don't throw the towel in and concentrate only on consumers.