[Closed] DON'T buy a iMac

buy one

I'd say "Don't buy an iMac" but I'm a pedant...

I've had one for 3 years and I've never had a problem with it.

My dad has had one for 2 years and it's had to go back to the shop twice for hardware fixes under warranty.

Realise this probably doesn't help much 😀

But one and then when it blows up don't go crying to those that said don't.

They're expensive but are good if you can afford one and can justify the extra cost who cares what anyone else thinks.

What you need is an iPC

I don't know of any that have "blown up". I'm working on one now (well I should be working). This studio has used nothing but for years. No faults. At all.

What you need is something that lets you see which forum to post in 😉

If your doing a lot of CAD/CAM work check for software compatibility or you may end up working in windows on a mac which solves nothing.

If the budgets there I'd consider a mac pro over the imac for what your doing.

4 years from a PC does not seem so bad considering how fast the technology moves on.

I've got 2 i7 16Gb ram iMacs on my desk right now and they are far and away the best things I have ever used.

With Parallels installed, I run Mac OSX, XP and Windows 7 simultaneously without a stutter from the iMac.

You won't regret it.

i bought an imac three years ago - still have the same one

it just works

buy one....

Lovely computers although my dads' been returned due to faulty sd card slot and whilst checking it out they realised the main logic board was a little off... his was one of the first batch of the current generation imacs mind so probably have all the bugs ironed out.

Wouldn't let that put you off getting one. One of the few apple products worth their money, next to their MacBooks (puts flame proof jacket on).

Buy one, if only for a change. IME all computers tend to get a bit jittery after a few years, either due to repeated software updates/installation/removal or ageing hardware.

Buy one, become one of the herd buying over priced tat, but buy an extended warrenty, as they're expensive as **** when the hardware breaks.

What happened to Mr. Nutt's hardware problems in the end?

Do what you want, it's your money. Just so long as you know why you're paying extra for an iMac.

I have a mac pro, the best laptop i have ever had, as a designer they are the best thing to use, you will always get people for and against them.

Plus there better looking and if you buy one you are classed as elite and not just a common pc user, ups mite have upset some folk there 8)

BUY ONE, YOU KNOW YOU WHAT TOO

you need a hackintosh, there is nothing a "designer" needs a mac for unless its software specific, I can think of a shed load of better ways to spend money...

coming from a designer, film maker and longterm brown nosing it geek.

General Technophobe here......

I have had my iMac for two years now and am won over by it.

I only ever use a PC now for work.

If you can find someone with a student ID 😉 you can get some very attractive deals.

I just upgraded my OS to Snow Leopard unlike every update I did pre Apple it made the OS better and smaller.

When asking the same question two years ago I got a very mixed response but still fancied something new. My wife made the change over a year after I bought mine and hasn't looked back - uses it for work/Uni with no problems.

We did buy (NHS perk) Office for Mac (£17 IIRC) but have not needed it s Apples office software is great to use....

Like I said at the start though I am a technophobe!

bought an imac G5 May 2005, still using it today but hope to upgrade to a macbook prob his year!

Mac OS X is miles a head on windows

few niggles on ours.....

take the headphone jack out, and it crashes after a short while. Hardware updates haven't fixed this.

For a video processor it's not very powerful.

Weird thins like when you click through a few folders on finder it just jumps back to the root folder then eventually lets you navigate to where you wanted to be.

Stupid positioning of usb slots

no firewire 400 port.

little niggles (except the crashing thing)

All the solutions suggested online have been work arounds rather than solutions.

iMmac keeps my skin silky smooth and hair free

I have one of the latest generation iMacs - it's bloody brilliant it works without any trouble - all the time. How many PCs can claim that? Prior to that I had an eMac for around 5+ years - nothing ever went wrong with that either.

I work in an ad agency and all the creatives and production people use them - never heard of one blowing up.

About half the machines in our office are iMacs, one went back with a dodgy disk but otherwise they're aout the most reliable thing in the building.

Wouldn't entertain buying anything else myself.

The larger sized ones have much better quality screens as well as being simply bigger. If you can stretch to the 27" then do so if you're working with graphics of any sort. Mine is a 24 which has been replaced by the 27 but the boss has a 27 and both blow away the 20" we have in quality.

Macs are just a quality threshold, and a pretty box.

PCs are more common, more abused and more variable. You can get super stable super high power PC setups, you can get cheap cobbled together for $50 windoze boxes.

Apple make a point of not selling cheap ass machines. Unlike every other PC manufacturer.

Its a lot easier to just go out and by a Mac if you want something you know will work. They are not intrinsically better than PCs.

thanks guys,

don't quite understand all those points, i'm just buying the base iMac ?nothing flash about that I know of, even priced around the same a average PC,

it's just a case of getting fed up with windows hanging up and crashing etc etc, as i said i run solidworks and alphacam at work as well as a host of other 'heavy' MRP databases etc on a pc, I have no intention of taking work home, so no worries about that,

I just want something that works and doesn't need an upgrade everytime it starts up, also not having to run a virus scanner is quite appealing,

i Don't want to spend the money, it is part of my new landrover fund and i worked hard for it, but needs must and i currently have 140 itunes albums (paid for)and nearly 20gig of photos hanging by a thread on an
unbaked up hard drive in an increasingly volitile pc,

much love and thanks

I just want something that works and doesn't need an upgrade everytime it starts up, also not having to run a virus scanner is quite appealing,

I'd suggest that a Windows 7 PC would do all that fine - well you would have to install AVG or other similar free virus scanner but since it looks after itself I don't see the issue.

I bought Mrs Tyred an iRon - complete waste of money, she never uses it.

imo macs are awful so my views are very oen sided. I used macs at college for graphics and i thought they were awful. Slow, crashed frequently and generally couldnt get much work done on them.

I also remember seeing a comparison of a computer and a mac in terms of hardware performance. i think the equivelant of a £900 was a £300 computer.

Now, to try and drop the prejudice a bit i would seriously recommend lookign at windows 7. It really is ace, vista was shite. If you dont want to take an interest in your pc/mac with virus checkers and stuff accept that you will get viruses and lose lots of data. Its like not insuring your house/car, only do it if you accept the consequences in advance.

Also 3 computers in 9 years is really very good. If you are a serious user expect your harddrive to die EVERY 12 months, have a backup on the go and switch them out. They really arent expensive. This will affect both a mac and a pc so it doesnt matter which route you take.

ARGH I swore to myself not to get into this thread but its too late, I think I've found an appropriate subject that "boils my piss"

I hate this notion that "osx is much more advanced" and macs are all things shiny and good... there not... there cheaply made and over priced, things fail in them as much as pcs, you take the hit on any prebuilt system pc or mac and usually you have to follow this with after service or you'll end up with a money pit if anything goes wrong.

The idea that "designers" use them because they are better is bollocks and the suggestion notion is from people who dont really know.

the problem is the hardcore geekery coders fight for pcs, really hardcore.. linux and the people who get confused usually sprout up for osx.

if you want to get the best value for money any day of the week build your own system, its piece of piss and will save you hundreds, I run windows 7 and snow leopard on the same system and know lots of other high up editors and designers that do the same.

I look after and work on over 30 £3-10k mac systems and the system is certainly no more stable than windows its just "different"... a funny thing I find about all this is that photoshop and the adobe suite is notoriously more unstable on osx than windows.... thumbs up to all you people that know what the internet has taught you for gospel and not actually sought true advice.

my rule of thumb is...
if your a bit special on a computer and when it has a problem you want to hit it... get a mac with customer support.

if you want to get value for money and performance and stability matters, do some research or send me an email i'll happily point you in the right direction.

and whats even worse is the macbooks have got well more expensive, less features, worse screens, chargers still knacker the batteries and then die and with apples latest news problem with the iphone 4 antenna, god knows how you can think your getting anything of value when they refuse a obvious problem as a problem.

"breathe"

The imacs have really nice screens....I'd have one if I was after a desktop. But then i have a macbook pro already...

Not a student/teacher are you? get a free 3 year warranty if you are...

haha an i thought i was being blunt alexxx. Exccellent post.

How do you know they are nice screens, do you even know what screen they use other than big and shiny? sorry im not having a go but its comments like that producing a mass of people thinking they know what there getting.

Twisted nematic (TN) In-plane switching (IPS) Advanced fringe field switching (AFFS) Multi-domain vertical alignment (MVA)Patterned vertical alignment (PVA)Advanced super view (ASV)

and what do they mean in terms of colour accuracy, value, longevity, quality?

I have two iMacs. Both have been bomb proof. Have had maybe four crashes in four years, all of which simply needed a reboot and all was well. No blue screen of death, no "go to manufacturers website to download drivers" when you try and connect anything. Much better than my experience with a PC. Would never go back. I have an external USB drive connected and it does an automatic back-up (Apple call it "time machine") on ongoing basis, so even if there were a problem you're covered.

I would only ever build my own PC and then install Linux on it, more stable than Windows & Mac OS, just as fast or faster, and 100% free. But I can understand it may not be suitable for specialised applications. However since switching to Linux over 2 years ago my main PC has not crashed or frozen once and it is used everyday.

Like someone said some PCs break due to manufacturers skimping on quality parts (e.g. the Power supply) MACs are no different in construction than PCs apart from standardised parts and a different BIOS chip on the motherboard. Having standardised parts also helps MAC OS be more stable than windows as you don't need as broad a range of drivers to run the hardware. A PC built to the same cost as a MAC would be at least as reliable and much likely have better componentry.

right again, im sorry but.... what do you do on it day to day in 4 years, what kind of user, programs, stress? time machine... wasnt invented by apple it infact stems from a long line of windows based back up systems... if you want good back up id suggest to you all a drobo as unraid is probably the most cost affective way... the backup hard drive isnt as safe as you'd want to think...

also time machine isnt that affective. off the top of my head what about acronis and norton ghost for pc backup or even the inbuilt windows 7 one? all more powerful than time machine.

sorry again, not having a go just think when your looking to buy a products facts are better than if's and maybes

Also 3 computers in 9 years is really very good. If you are a serious user expect your harddrive to die EVERY 12 months, have a backup on the go and switch them out. They really arent expensive. This will affect both a mac and a pc so it doesnt matter which route you take

That's not right, or at least shouldn't be. You're either buying bad hard disks, or doing something horrible to them.

I'm typing this on a PC which I bought in 2001 running windows XP. It still works fine, including the original hard disk, and is okay for everything except watching HD video on vimeo. Been used for everything from video editing and real time audio / video processing, to software development. It is a little slower than new ones (1.4ghz processor, although I am surprised at how little difference there is).

I think I replaced a fan once because it was a bit noisy, and I added more memory in 2003 or so. I reinstalled the operating system once, when I got Windows XP in 2002 (it came with Windows ME). Since then it has pretty much just worked. I've looked after it okay, but nothing special, no maintenance to speak of.

If you had a mac from 2001, it might just scrape working too, although modern software probably wouldn't, as I think that was pre-intel, and it would be a heap of crash-tastic rubbish, unlike the modern intel macs, which are mostly quite nice PCs.

Joe

I think given your reasons you've made a good choice to go for an imac, but I guess time will tell whether you're happy with it (horses for courses and all that)

I grew up using imacs (my Dad and Brothers are in design so we had Macs from the very early days), didn't use a pc properly until I went to Uni and could definitely see some advantages (especially in terms of writing software), but hated that it crashed and had viruses all the time.

I now use a MacBook for business and our home computer is imac, my hubby also uses macs for teaching media and film studies. We haven't had any major problems with them compared to the masses of issues we've had with the couple of pcs we've owned. They do have their issues and can be frustrating at times as well as being a fair bit more pricey for the spec, but I don't think either of mine have ever crashed or lost data and I love them for that!

Oh and btw, I love the fact that you wrote "much love" 😀

I really hope you enjoy your Mac and find it to be well worth the cash! Much love, MM

P.S. Does anyone else find this thread strangely similar to the "HT vs Full Suss" threads?!

Right I'm not posting any more I forgot the masses live in wonderland

FWIW our iMac is now 2 1/2 years old and just works, never puts a foot wrong.

PCs are getting there now that you can get all the security tools from Microsoft (you're no longer in a constant battle with your virus checker) but you still seem to need to be a bit of a geek to get the most out of them - we're still fighting with the crap HP pre-installed on Mrs R's Win 7 netbook to "enhance the experience". And as for getting Vista 64 to boot off a RAID array - don't start me 👿

I'm not going to get into the whole Mac v. Windows thing, but , other than student/teacher discounts, there are really good deals to be had if you check out the refurb section of the on-line Apple store. The items come with the same warranty but BIG discounts. Most of the time what they sell as refurbs are just customer returns that haven't had anything even wrong with them - just the buyer changing their mind after opening the box.

Actually I will make a couple of points on the Mac V. "PC" debate.

- If you actually compare what hardware you get for your money, not just the bare specs, Macs are very often not that far behind, or even ahead in terms of value versus PS's. For instance the quality of screen you get with an iMac would cost big bucks elsewhere.
- The whole "Macs are for people who can't use real computers" is such a bunch of crap. Among people I know it is the hardcore geeks who have been switching to Macs over the last few years. OS X put an elegant interface over it but underneath its UNIX so the proper geeks can get as hacky as they like. When you've had your fun with OS X you can of course also run Windows or Linux as well, even at the same time if you want.

Bought an imac with a 27 inch screen and quad core processor - best thing with sliced bread and the operating system is easier to use than windows. Don't but any word processing software download neo its almost as good as word - without the bells and whistles and cost.

I don't get this 'Macs just work' stuff. I've been using PC's for years and they 'just work' as well. I've used a number of desktops and laptops with Vista for many man-years and not had a single crash. That's running office apps, games, CAD, FEA, CFD, Labview, etc. What are people doing to get all these crashes?

rich - it's because PCs are open and as such people can install pretty much anything they want - this is usually the cause of the problem - people installing all manner of crap which you just can't really do with Macs. A bit like someone running Shimano shifters with a SRAM mech and finding that it doesn't work very well.

Get a Windows 7 PC, install Open office or MS office, a decent free AV and leave it at that (since that covers what the vast majority of people need) and you'll have no issues at all. People bleating on about Windows crashing all the time, etc because they had previous (to W7) bad experiences are pretty stupid - a bit like people saying don't get a full suspension bike because they're all heavy, flexy, bouncy and break because that's how many full sussers used to be 🙄

Still using a Dell Inspiron I bought in December 2005.

I have a balanced opinion, I dislike Windows because its crap (don't really need to expand on that as it's evident to anyone more advanced than an amoeba) and dislike OSX as it comes on overpriced hardware from a company with an attitude problem.

So, to answer the OP, fix the old PC and install Ubuntu. It'll be a learning experience but you'll end up in a better place.

clubber - Member

... a decent free AV and leave it at that

And right there is the big difference.

Amoeba here would like to know why Windows is crap.

What, you have to run an AV? So what? You install it and leave it. Hardly something to worry about.

I've been using Macs and PCs for 20 years in my business.

I have never had a Mac fail. If I could get all the time lost on PC problems I'd have another year of my life to play with.

ok this is getting silly now,

I'm buying a Mac because I've given up with windows,not because i want a Mac,

My current defunkt PC does have a very good anti virus in NOD32 but not having to spend another £40.0 a yr on it is a positive where i come from,

I've built my own pc's before, it was very stable and i learned a lot doing it + i found it fun, (but now i can't be arsed)

Bill Gates makes my piss boil as does Steve Jobs, i want to smash their collective faces in, Steve, using my iphone 3G running the new 4th generation software, although with his current health status it would be as much fun as using the aforementioned, Bill i would like to drop a crate of returned vista disk's on him from the back of the microsoft company jet, just for being a ****, being slighly ginger and producing sh1t that constantly needs tweeking,

I just want something that works all the time when it's asked,and doesn't need me sitting at it for 40 mins downloading and adding patches
jsut to get ot going, Mac wins.

end of thread. thankyou and goodnight.

Mr Amoeba-

Windows is crap because (in no particular order)-

It costs money when better OS's are free
It needs more expensive hardware because it is bloated and resource intensive
It needs antivirus because it is a market leader and has security issues
It has a poorly designed update system
Microsofts embrace, extend, extinguish policy has caused stagnation in the IT industry for years (stated simply, why compete when your monopoly has given you the cash reserves to buy and close competitors)
Microsoft controls the hardware market so that machines with competitors OS's can't compete
The closed nature of the OS means severe problems require a complete reinstallation, were most users will lose data unless backed up. So those who only know Windows are more prone to losing their data. This is partly cause by Windows method of installation surrounding disk partitioning and formating.
A lot of the bloat and slowness of Windows is due to processes that have no benefit to the end user - such as WGA and DRM.
MS will push updates that are more about enhancing their market position than improving or securing your system.
Microsoft produce propriety software.
Windows GUI is inferior to OSX and linux.
Microsoft use patents in a manner only made possible by the £'s in their coffers.

Basically, you are being punted an inferior OS at an unrealistically inflated price, and the IT industry can't evolve to a better OS because they are abusing their monopoly. The consumer and industry suffers.

So basically because you're a geek 🙂

I bought a macbook for the house as a bit of an impulse and have just recently had a new acer laptop with windows 7 and I would say the gap on functionality etc has closed greatly.
Cannot get too excited with the macbook tbh- perhaps it's my it ineptitude?

people installing all manner of crap which you just can't really do with Mac

Not that that can't, the crap software just doesn't exist. A definite good point.

The "Macs don't need AV" argument is a load of mince, reckon people are going to get a bit of a fright soon. Saying that, traditional style AV is near-useless at keeping up with newer gen malware.

Geek is okay, nerd is bad. I can live with that. 🙂

Waderider,
Thanks for that, but as just a user Windows works. Like I said, I've used Windows for years and not had any problems. You may have issues with how it works, but that isn't a problem for most users.
I don't agree that the Windows GUI is inferior to Linux, and anyway, that's just your view.

enfht:
What you need is an iPC

You are some badly written software and I claim my £5.

Here we go 😆 I'm very anti-mac because I can't see any real advantages over Windows 7.

I am running both Snow Leopard and Windows 7 on exactly the same hardware.. the "mac" looks nicer and has Final Cut Studio/Aperture but that's about it. I find the mac side to be slower in the sense that it wastes time looking pretty, doing bouncing icons, animations etc whilst windows just gets on with it and still looks good. I'm very much a "power user" - I use it for rendering 3D stuff at HD resolutions, video editing, photoshop, audio recording etc. The PC does this with no hitches and at a fraction of the cost of a mac.

tbh if you're having problems with Windows 7 you're doing something wrong. I've not had a blue screen yet since October. My friends iMac has had the bsod equivalent about 3-4 times and he's only had it since xmas. All when he was trying to do the same things my PC breezes through, actually 😆

Oh and the default mac colour calibration is awful - oversaturated and too contrasty. Makes stuff look "nice" in the show room though but it isn't accurate.

Finally, if you're getting viruses all the time, get better AV or stop looking at dodgy porn sites 😆 I've not had a virus for years.

Macs are very often not that far behind, or even ahead in terms of value versus PS's.

They are. My pc is still better specced than most macs and cost about £650 a few years ago. I think the equivalent spec mac is at least £1200, and may still have a worse graphics card.

IMO, macs are for people who have the money and care more about style than substance, whilst windows is for people who just want to get stuff done efficiently.

-posting from my 4 year old dell laptop with xp, still going strong-

Well that is the PC side of things....CountZero to the thread please for the Apple response.

firstly, I don't get any viruses as i use use NOD32,

secondly, you can't stop me looking at porn, 😀
although the wife can.

Oh and the default mac colour calibration is awful - oversaturated and too contrasty. Makes stuff look "nice" in the show room though but it isn't accurate.

anyone serious about working with colour will calibrate using hardware (a puck like eye-1/colour munki/spyder3) so the default colour calibration is not even relevant. it would be like buying a shock or pair of forks and not touching any of the rebound adjusters and not adding any air.
a pc's default isn't "accurate" either.

IMO, macs are for people who have the money and care more about style than substance, whilst windows is for people who just want to get stuff done efficiently.

or for photographers who use high end capture software where the windows version is an afterthought and lags behind on development, and who's digital backs are firewire only (and that's powered firewire so a macbook is the obvious choice).

and while we are on the subject of colour if you want to run 2 monitors and have a separate hardware calibrated profile for each monitor which is essential in a colour managed workflow then a mac will do this without issue. even my old non-pro macbook would run a HD eizo at native resolution with it's own profile. evidently it's a mare on a p.c involving separate software, renaming profiles to not confuse the system, reconfiguring the video card and not all calibration software can be run with both monitors connected so you have to calibrate individually.
with a mac it just works.
as you say it's all about getting stuff done efficiently.

Well, on the one hand we have an 8 year old Dell desktop running XP that still functions (after a fashion), although it takes for ever to boot up.

Tried installing Linux on it - lost the will to live after an evening faffing about trying to find the correct drivers for the wireless network card. Eventually got it running, but to be honest, I can't see the benefit in terms of performance for the computer.

Use a Macbook Pro for day to day computing, have an iMac with a second screen for website design and Apeture photo stuff, we also use a Mac Mini hooked to the telly for recording and processing films, tv etc. My wife, who is a senior IT bod for a finance multi-national, used to slag my Applephilia, until she started using my old Powerbook - now she's a convert and I have a replacement for the 8year old, but still working Powerbook sitting hidden in a cupboard for her birthday tomorrow. We also have an old Blue G3 sat in the loft that still works, but I don't have a use for it since it was replaced by a more efficient NAS a year or so ago.

All the mac stuff just rolls along, doing the job it's allocated around the house with a minimum of fuss. Now admittedly, I haven't used Vista or Win 7, but I used to spend hours of my life wasting time fiddling with the innards of PCs, whereas the only time I've had to open up any of the Macs is to upgrade the memory on them.

Interestingly, my wife can get PCs to deliver a reasonable level of reliability in terms of operating systems, largely by replicating the Apple model - they use a standardised laptop/desktop combo across their global operation, and have a pretested software loadset which no one is allowed to alter without thorough testing and a strict approvals process.

Of course the other great thing about owning a Mac is going to the Apple shop - the only other place I get welcomed like that is church (and yes, there are other similarities!). Compare that to your local PC World...

Waderider - Hmmm, a fair amount of tosh in that response, although, as you say you have a balanced opinion. Sadly, a lot of what you wrote is just that - opinion.

It needs antivirus because it is a market leader and has security issues

It has a poorly designed update system

Microsoft controls the hardware market so that machines with competitors OS's can't compete

The closed nature of the OS means severe problems require a complete reinstallation, were most users will lose data unless backed up. So those who only know Windows are more prone to losing their data. This is partly cause by Windows method of installation surrounding disk partitioning and formating.

MS will push updates that are more about enhancing their market position than improving or securing your system.

Microsoft produce propriety software

Microsoft use patents in a manner only made possible by the £'s in their coffers

Your use of the term amoeba is a little uncalled for given that your responses are hardly intellectually or factually accurate. Perhaps it is you that is more amoebic and blinkered having concocted a number of half / un truths to support your personal prejudices and perferences. Not very big nor very clever.

At the end of the day there is a significant difference between Apple and Windows in what they have to cover. Windows is designed and sold as an OS that can run on a wide range of hardware. And is installed and run on a wide range of hardware. Apple design an OS for a very tight and closed set of hardware. Given the 2 approaches Windows does a pretty spectaular job most of the time. I would agree that Vista was an abortion of a product that did not serve MS very well at all but XP was pretty good and Windows 7 similarly is a very robust and performant OS.

MrSmith, fair enough 🙂 I've not tried to do that sort of stuff yet (mainly because I can't afford to) but for me I've found I can get away with my non-hardware calibrated monitor - any colour correction I do seems to translate well to all screens I've tested it on. Not ideal obviously but it works 🙂

As for capture software, can't you just use Lightroom? Seems the same as Aperture to me..

not with phase/leaf/hassleblad backs.
prefer to use captureOne with canons as i have no need for a database type/metadata writing workflow that lightroom excels at

To balance the "only noobs should use mac" argument. 20 years in IT here, used everything from PDP to latest 27" iMac including OS/2, every variant of Windows, VMS, the lot. the iMac 27" is what I've always wanted, quiet, powerful, reliable, well supported and with a cli that talks a sensible language instead of all of that "dir" drivel. I run dual screens with parallels and Windows 7 on one and OSX in the other. ****ing hate it when I have to switch to the Windows 7 pane. Having actually read the OP I just want to say "good decision mate"

Not sure if this has been brought up but according to macrumors.com there are new imacs coming soon. Maybe hold off for now.

Had a Powerbook G4 for 7 years with no mechanical issues whatsoever (until i baptised it in a bottle of wine) and an iMac G4 for 10 years with no problems either. Both of these were built in what i consider the golden age of Apple so it may be slightly worse nowadays with all their concentration on the iPhone (bah).

Since I got rid of those computers for being hugely out of date I've been using a 2 year old 20" Alu iMac with yet again, no issues. I've even just bought a 24" as well!

In short, its a no brainer for me. I've never encountered someone who wonders if Windows would be better, but lots of people who contemplate the move to OSX, that says something IMO.

My GF's a Mac, I'm a PC.

About reliability - there isn't much between a decent PC build and an iMac IMO. I think Macs have better OS/Hardware integration which probably aids stability.

The iMac design, including its big bright screen, is outstanding. I like the design of the OS - good ergonomics, and it's Berkley Unix under the hood. Its noticeably small memory footprint means that the standard 2Gb goes a long way compared with Windows.

I don't like the mouse and I really dislike Finder. Some of the Adobe software seems like overpriced cack, whereas the Microsoft software is just cack. The equivalent apple apps seem much better by comparison IMO.

My next PC will most likely be an iMac or macbook 😉

"Adobe software = overpriced cack" Amen brother - true whatever platform you're using!

Realised I hadn't been very clear about my PC comments - my experience of running Dell computers is that they're generally very reliable hardware. We used them widely in my last place of work, and the hardware rarely caused problems. The problems with Windows software were pretty constant - Win 7 may well be much more stable than any of its predecessors, but I've long since been lost to MS as a customer.

The main reason I became a 'switcher', and wouldn't contemplate a return is the ease of doing stuff on the Mac. I entered the world of computing back in the AT days, and remember writing batch files to get my 30Mb hard drive to load on the DOS operating system. Since then I've built my own computers, wrestled with hardware configs etc. I used to mock Macs and their users because they weren't 'real' computers, that you could fiddle about with.

The somewhere along the line I just got bored of always spending more time tinkering with my computer to keep it going than I did doing anything creative with it. Bought myself a 12" Powerbook and haven't looked back since.

I'd also be happy to admit that the design of Apple products is as important to me as their performance - I've never seen a Windows laptop that matches the clean simple elegance of my MacBook Pro, and the wife's new unibody version is a thing of rare beauty. Windows machines always seem to be overdone, even when they're obviously trying to mimic the Apple aesthetic. People seem to see this as evidence of the flawed nature of Apple products, but I don't see this as a very coherent argument - everything else in my home has to combine the appropriate level of functionality with the right aesthetics, so why wouldn't my computer fit that pattern as well. If I have to pay a bit extra to achieve that combination, then I don't have a problem with that.

You're not wrong, no windows laptops have the nice clean aesthetic of a Mac. Sony Vaio are close but not quite there - bit chunky/clunky looking at the back. And my pc case is ugly as sin - keeps it very cool though! If I got a macbook/iMac I could just see myself spending all my time on the W7 partition I'd put on 😆

Adobe software = overpriced cack

really? if it's "cack" why are there no decent alternatives.

and spending £1200 for 5/6 pieces of software that enable you to earn 10, 20+ times this a year is hardly overpriced.

The only thing Adobe are crap at (for what I use their products for) is video. Might change with CS5 though, seems like its had a serious re-jig and a better playback engine.

We had about 6 imacs in my old office and had to send most back for major power supply or hard drive faults at least once a year. The desktops seemed to fare better, but not amazing either. If you're using CAD, I think only Vectorworks & Archicad are directly compatible with the MAC OS.

why is this in the bike forum??

and girls, grow up its two sorts of computer operating system...nothing to get that worked up about...

Bikingcatastrophe

All OSes need an anti virus if you have any concern about security

Linux does not need Antivirus as there are no viruses in "The Wild" that can harm it, it may be possible to write one but it would be very very hard to do so due to how the OS is constructed, and would most likely need the user to approve its installation using their superuser password. MS products are just full of holes, why do you think their is a multi billion dollar industry out their just to provide security for an OS that should really have its own built in from the Kernel up.

The only antivirus available for Linux is one that scans for Virus that could be a threat to a Windows machine if you shared a file with one, how secure is that!

It has a poorly designed update system
? Eh? Compared to what?

Had mine since January and it's transformed the way I work and the enjoyment I get from actually doing my job. Can't speak for techie type work because I'm not into IT one bit. Buy from an apple store and stump up for applecare and you're covered anyway, even if things do go wrong.

I still install Trend AV on all our RHEL servers. Is that the 'only one' you refer too?

Better safe than sorry eh? I can spare the odd cpu cycle.

well i did purchase an iMac and well, it's bloody brilliant, love it to bits already, everything about it is so much better than my pc, the display is simply stunning, i was watching the follow me trailers in HD and it was mind blowing,

as for the magic mouse and paper thin keyboard 😀

it has taken quite a bit of getting used to after using pc's everyday for around the last 16 yrs (i have four at work, two in my office and two pc machine tools using mitsubishi software on windows 2000, still struggle a little after the first week but youtube is only a click away

even mrs skiboy is staggered 😛

i have just started making my third garageband techno/electronic/dance track, amazing bit of free software,

thanks for all the opinions and advice, it was well balanced and really helpful