Mac/PC (don't turn this into a war)

[Ziphor]

Try to restrain yourself
( i know some people are passionate about one or the other, but i dont want this into a debate thread)


Thing is, I'm off to college in a month and the design courses i'm taking demand macbook pro... So you don't really need to try to sell me the thing.

I just never have used a mac more than 2min at any given time and was wondering what makes a mac so good and what are some its drawbacks. All i know is that the corner things are useful (make all windows viewable on the one screen) and hiding them all.

Also, i heard there's a new OS out in the fall? Leopard? my design classes start second semester, so i could use my windows pc til then and wait for the new OS to come out before buying the laptop... Should i wait, or what? My friend thought that Apple is doing the same as windows did with vista-- buy a mac within a yearish around the release of the new OS and they give you a free OS upgrade... any truth to this?


What the heck, while i'm at it, any cool tricks i should know? (hiding pron, passwords protection, shortcut things...etc)



I would ask the mac store people but i just had my wisdom teeth out and can't talk well and can't drive legally due to drugs im on for pain.


Thanks.

[Huggo]

What the heck, while i'm at it, any cool tricks i should know? (hiding pron, passwords protection, shortcut things...etc)

That would be the F11 key. It takes every single thing that is up and running and minimizes it.

OSX is a good operating system. It's really just about the same thing as windows XP or windows Vista. The Dashboard is a nice feature, and you can constantly find new "widgets" to put on it. (Calculators, translators, weather reports, even a cocktail recipe generator.)

If you end up getting the Macbook Pro, I believe it has Bootcamp on it, which will run Windows XP or Vista anyway, since it'll be running an intel chip. Apple also has their iPhoto and iMovie programs if you want to do anything with your digital pictures or movies.

The OSX web browser, Safari isn't quite as good as Firefox in my opinion, just download firefox and ditch safari.

That's about all I know, and I just use my mac for the basic crap like homework, internets, and managing my iPod and iTunes.

[ghostfaced]

If you end up getting the Macbook Pro, I believe it has Bootcamp on it, which will run Windows XP or Vista anyway, since it'll be running an intel chip. Apple also has their iPhoto and iMovie programs if you want to do anything with your digital pictures or movies.

it costs 100 bucks + a copy of windows xp or something like that i got it for my pro to put ffxi and shit on it

[Semitry]

What's your major?

[Shade]

They will tell you that Mac is the "industry standard" for graphic design/illustration, and that is probably part of the reason your school will give for insisting on it. This used to be true but isnt so much anymore... some places use Mac, some PC. It's preference. The core programs all run basically the same on both systems.

Because you're getting a laptop, there is one big difference that makes the Mac a win even if you're much happier in a Windows environment... the screen! Mac screens are sexy. You're going to get better clarity, better color consistency when printing, and less color distortion when viewing it from an angle. If you're doing any kind of graphic work, this is highly important to you. Maybe there are better options now than when I got mine, but I've yet to see an LCD screen (esp. on a laptop) that was as good as a Mac one. And if you can run Bootcamp to get Windows, you've got the best of bost worlds.

[Ziphor]

Thanks people.

I'm in Graphics media marketing.

I wasn't sure if i was gonna get the bootcamp thing, was worried if it runs just as smooth as windows or if dont use bootcamp then there'll be all this extra space taken up.

[Dexster]

http://www.parallels.com/landingpage/ds ... TAodBH9IFA > Bootcamp.

Just a word of caution. Don't use Parallels and Bootcamp. Use one or the other. They both repartiton your HD on the Fly which can do some really bad things the more often you do it. "You're Profile requires 3600 GB to open" is a error i've seen occur on a Mac Mini :\.

If your using the Apple to just use an Apple you might want to reconsider it and buy something that is a little bit more cost effective. @ 1100 to just get into a normal macbook you can get a very nice PC laptop with better performance.

Macs are great, don't get me wrong but they have huge mark-up and the only thing you may be gaining is the experience of running in an enviroment you're not comfortable in and the random hippy chick that comes and talks to you because you have the same black macbook.

[Mayareira]

Macs are great, don't get me wrong but they have huge mark-up and the only thing you may be gaining is the experience of running in an enviroment you're not comfortable in and the random hippy chick that comes and talks to you because you have the same black macbook.

Random hippy chick? You gotta be kidding me. I was using my macbook pro and this random chick at school asked me out.

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y12...090449-big.jpg

She isn't that bad but I kindly turned her down. I am in a relationship.

[finale23]

Thanks people.

I'm in Graphics media marketing.

screaming mac right there.

[Dexster]

Thanks people.

I'm in Graphics media marketing.

screaming mac right there.

Ugh, I really need to read :\

Ya, if your dealing with Graphic design at all i would highly recommend a Macbook Pro. *Max out the ram and run Final Cut Studio.

That or stop screwing around and get a Mac Pro with 16 GB of ram.

[Elesirdur]

My workplace uses Macs because, being a small company, the President has always used macs so we've got those. Our business doesn't need the macs (we're a wind energy development company) but in my part doing communications and PR work, having the Mac to run publishing software is really nice. All our desktop stations have Windows XP dual-booted on them for whenever we need a windows-only app.

Looking at a laptop, I highly recommend a MacBook if you have even small mac needs. That you can run BootCamp (which is a free download from Apple's website) and snag a OEM copy of WindowsXP - make friends with someone who works in a computer store and it's easy to get OEM copies - for less than $100 is a steal; basically like getting two computers. My girlfriend just got a MacBook and has started playing FFXI on it and it runs great. I would only assume that the Pro's, with faster processors and more RAM, would run FFXI even better.

While I'm not the hugest fan of Mac OSX, mostly because I don't understand a thing about Unix-based operating systems, it's very usable and mostly friendly. Yes Panther is slated to come out sometime this fall, but the improvements that it's promising seem to be pretty superficial. (Unless they're adding better support and design for their Intel-based systems, but I have no clue really.)

I wasn't sure if i was gonna get the bootcamp thing, was worried if it runs just as smooth as windows or if dont use bootcamp then there'll be all this extra space taken up.

FYI Bootcamp is only a small program that partitions your Mac unit HD, copies Windows-compatible drivers over, and helps you install Windows. Bootcamp is not an emulator like Parallel Windows (which I don't recommend, especially for gaming as it's a major system resource hog) but just a little helper tool to allow anyone to easily and simply setup Windows XP or Vista on a hard disk partition. BTW I recommend sticking with XP for the Bootcamp partition, I've read that people are having some compatibility issues with Macs+Vista even more so than PCs+Vista

[wyrmtung]

Leopard comes out in October and yes you will get a free upgrade (keep your receipt.) As for use, most of the basic functions that you did in Windows are done the same (or similar) way in Apple. The learning curve is pretty low, IMO.

Here's a list of keyboard shortcuts that you might want to print out.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=75459
Try Control-Option-Command-8. It's pretty cool.

[Elesirdur]

Try Control-Option-Command-8. It's pretty cool.

You, sir, just blew my mind at work.

[Exoduso]

Yeah I plan on picking up a macbook with leopard/xp on it when leopard comes out.

[netz]

Try Control-Option-Command-8. It's pretty cool.

You, sir, just blew my mind at work.

Wow, epic feature.

[Ziphor]

Try Control-Option-Command-8. It's pretty cool.

You, sir, just blew my mind at work.

Wow, epic feature.

wuzzit do? i don't get my mac for loong time.

And, thanks again everyone, the responses and input have been great - i think i am gonna grab bootcamp as well~


edit* "Switch to White on Black" what exactly?

[Isiolia]

Put Bootcamp on it and you've basically got a very nice Windows laptop as well. Except that the built in trackpad only has one button. Meh.

The good things about Macs these days:

Mac hardware is about the single most versatile mainstream computing platform out there. You can run OSX, which is great. The most usable version of UNIX on the market. Comes with a full development suite, X Windows, console with BASH tools, the works. Plus it's pretty, solid, and has drag and drop simplicity where it counts. Welcome to drag and drop, single icon install/uninstall.

If that's not good enough, you can also run Linux on it too.

Or Windows, as mentioned, with Bootcamp. Essentially this is to get around that Macs don't have a BIOS. They're using EFI (http://www.intel.com/technology/efi/), which, incidentally, PCs were supposed to swap over to years ago. PPC Macs were using Open Firmware prior to that. This is free from Apple (in beta), and will be part of Leopard.

Parallels is also great, it's not exactly emulation either as you're running an Intel based OS on an Intel CPU. So the speed is good.
I haven't yet messed around with it + Boot Camp though.

There's likely some way to run most any piece of mainstream software you can find.


With OSX, the low market share can be to your advantage...very few spyware apps, viruses, anything like that out there. Not that it can't be. Just that most don't bother.

What the heck, while i'm at it, any cool tricks i should know? (hiding pron, passwords protection, shortcut things...etc)

OSX is UNIX style multi-user. There's a root account, which you need to enable.
Go to Applications -> Utilities -> Netinfo Manager
On the Security menu, choose to Authenticate. Once you do that, the Enable Root User is selectable, and you can go from there (just has you set a password).

Chances are you should never really need to use this. However, note that even with an Admin account, you can't see other account's stuff (unless they change permissions to let you). Root can.
Really you'll tend to find that permissions mean a lot more in OSX than they do in Windows.

Other stuff, hm, hold down 'T' when the thing starts up. After a few seconds you should get a Firewire logo on the screen. This is Target Disk Mode, basically, you can now hook the Mac up to another computer via Firewire and it'll act like an external HD.

Lots of tricks you can pull really >_> http://www.macosxhints.com/ is a great resource.

http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/ is a good Mac hardware site.

[netz]

Try Control-Option-Command-8. It's pretty cool.

You, sir, just blew my mind at work.

Wow, epic feature.

wuzzit do? i don't get my mac for loong time.

And, thanks again everyone, the responses and input have been great - i think i am gonna grab bootcamp as well~


edit* "Switch to White on Black" what exactly?

It inverts the colors displayed on your screen. It's a neat gimmick.

Parallels is more akin to VMware, if you are at all familiar with that.

[Kaisha]

buy a mac within a yearish around the release of the new OS and they give you a free OS upgrade... any truth to this?

I would like to know this also as I'm stuck in the same situation as needing a mac for college, which isn't a prob for me at all these days thanks to the glorious intel processors and bootcamp...

Anyhow, if there's one thing I know, order right from the actual Apple.com store, the MacBook Pro I'm looking at has a $200 discount for students at/going to college/uni (requires you to input your student ID though), as well as the benefit of an iPod Nano with a mail-in rebate that renders it free.