Considering changing to Mac from PC - please help

Hi, everyone.

I was in the market for a new laptop and was thinking about using the opportunity to consider moving to Mac (but still keeping my desktop PC). The thing that takes up the most processing power is running photoshop and editing some home videos (not a lot) and I keep hearing that for photo/video applications, the Mac is the way to go. I've been trying the macs out at the Apple store but still have some questions that I hope people can help me out on.

1. What makes the Macs better for photo/video applications? Is it the ease of use? The speed? If were to stick to photoshop on the Mac, would I notice any difference?

2. It should be possible to share files between my PC desktop and Mac notebook and use the same wireless network, right? And it should eve be possible to share the same external harddrives (where I store all of my photos and stuff), right? Just want to make sure.

3. If I do get a Mac notebook, will a MacBook be good enough or should I get a MacBook Pro? I run mainly photoshop and it doesn't have to be instanteous reaction to everything but I don't want to wait a minute while photoshop runs a filter eiither. My temptation is to get the best one but budget is a concern since I will have to replace some of my software stuff as well.

Thank you so much for all of your help.

Kevin

kevinhochen said:

1. What makes the Macs better for photo/video applications? Is it
the ease of use? The speed? If were to stick to photoshop on the
Mac, would I notice any difference?

Click to expand...

Ease of use, lack of problems with viruses and spyware. Really nice, well integrated, easy to use software for music and photos, and videos: the iLife suite. Photoshop on the Mac will look and act the same as the Windows version.

kevinhochen said:

2. It should be possible to share files between my PC desktop and
Mac notebook and use the same wireless network, right? And it
should eve be possible to share the same external harddrives (where
I store all of my photos and stuff), right? Just want to make sure.

Click to expand...

Yes if you've got some networking experience it can be done. Once set up it should work easily.

kevinhochen said:

3. If I do get a Mac notebook, will a MacBook be good enough or
should I get a MacBook Pro? I run mainly photoshop and it doesn't
have to be instanteous reaction to everything but I don't want to
wait a minute while photoshop runs a filter eiither. My
temptation is to get the best one but budget is a concern since I
will have to replace some of my software stuff as well.

Click to expand...

A difficult question. Right now none of the Macs are blazing fast with Photoshop. The next version of Photoshop, due next spring, may well be faster than the current version on current Macs. If you can burn some typical files to a CD and take it to the Apple store you may be able to answer that question to your satisfaction. They usually have one or two machines with Photoshop loaded on it.

Yes, you should switch to Mac. I just bought more stock in Apple.

But seriously, for most practical purposes (not counting some specific professional creative, scientific, engineering, etc. applications), there's really nothing you can do one platform that can't be accomplished in some similar fashion on the other. It's mostly about personal preference. I used to use Windows machines exclusively. Now it's nearly the opposite. With OSX, I find macs maybe just a bit more stable but that's hard to prove. It's really just more pleasant to use for me personally. For what it's worth most of my photographer friends and graphic designers I know also use Macs.

One thing is that if you switch, you might find it a pain to maintain both a PC and a Mac and having separate data and apps on each (even with networking and file sharing). It might be just a bit easier running windows on an Intel Mac, but still not as smooth as everything under one platform. I like to keep things simple. Computers are just tools. Like cameras, but less interesting.

kevinhochen said:

Hi, everyone.

I was in the market for a new laptop and was thinking about using
the opportunity to consider moving to Mac (but still keeping my
desktop PC). The thing that takes up the most processing power is
running photoshop and editing some home videos (not a lot) and I
keep hearing that for photo/video applications, the Mac is the way
to go. I've been trying the macs out at the Apple store but still
have some questions that I hope people can help me out on.

1. What makes the Macs better for photo/video applications? Is it
the ease of use? The speed? If were to stick to photoshop on the
Mac, would I notice any difference?

Click to expand...

I believe that Apple's software for editing home video (comes free with a new mac) is meant to be easy to use and high-quality. I've never used it.

Photoshop currently runs more slowly under Mac OS X than on a PC, althoguh I've seen comments in this forum that it makes little practical difference for most typical applications. (You would want to have plenty of RAM if running under Rosetta, 1GB a probable minimum, 2GB would be preferable.) You could also install WIndows on your mac; there are now multiple solutions. Apple's own solution allows you to boot either to Mac OS or to Windows - but you can't have both running at the same time.

kevinhochen said:

2. It should be possible to share files between my PC desktop and
Mac notebook

Click to expand...

yes, so long as they are not specific to software you only have on one computer.

kevinhochen said:

and use the same wireless network, right?

Click to expand...

yes

And it

kevinhochen said:

should eve be possible to share the same external harddrives (where
I store all of my photos and stuff), right? Just want to make sure.

Click to expand...

yes - although there is an issue with the file format - it will have to be FAT32-formatted if you want to use the same drive with both mac and PC. This has some limitations - i think it won't support files > 4GB (but I am open to being corrected).

kevinhochen said:

3. If I do get a Mac notebook, will a MacBook be good enough or
should I get a MacBook Pro? I run mainly photoshop and it doesn't
have to be instanteous reaction to everything but I don't want to
wait a minute while photoshop runs a filter eiither. My
temptation is to get the best one but budget is a concern since I
will have to replace some of my software stuff as well.

Click to expand...

I have a MBP, which I bought before the macbook was available. The basic macbook is a real bargain compared to the MBP - it is essentially just as fast and capable. The main differences are in the case, and a few fancy extras (e.g. MBP has backlit keyboard) - the macbook is also a bit smaller for carrying around. the screen is not large though, so it wouldn't be great fun if it would be your primary photo editing machine.

This site has excellent reviews and news about macs (and PCs):

http://www.arstechnica.com/

jack

kevinhochen said:

Thank you so much for all of your help.

Kevin

Click to expand...

Color management on Macs is better integrated into the operating system. Has been for over a decade. Photography is more easy using Macs. Just a personal perspective. Aperture in another version or two will be better for workflow than any PC-based tool.

Get a 17-in Macbook Pro but wait until the next chip upgrade which will happen by year's end. You can then attach a nice larger LCD and have a lot of fun.
Everyone else's advice is excellent here.

Forget Mac, forget PC and think Computer for a moment.

What a Computer needs to produce video/dvds are:

1) Capture - to get A/V into the system
2) Storage - to hold the video
3) Clip organisation - to find the parts to work with
4) Graphic power - to display smooth playback
5) Audio power - to incorporate a
6) Processing power - to manipulate images in a reasonable time
7) Processing software - to make footage int something watchable
8) Memory - to hold the media to be processed
9) Bandwith - to move all this data between the components
10) Output - to write and distribute the finished product to.

Actual workflows will enhance this in many ways but treat the above as a basic starter kit.

The problem with looking in terms of Mac/PC is it treats both Mac and PC as a singular items. Not all Macs are equal and not all PCs are equal.

It is certainly possible to put a killer workflow together around a PC. The problem with PCs, historically, was unless you specified it specifically for this task, the average PC was very very far away from this workflow.

Mostly, none came with a capture mechanism, storage was inadequate (too slow, too small), graphics and audio were under spec, processing power was good, memory and bandwith were often indequate/complicated and output didn't exist.

Plugging these gaps required the use of add-ons, upgrades and third party software. And all these had to co-exist nicely together. This is where things often fell down on the PC and the villain of the piece enters the scene, Windows!

There were sometimes hardware issues with bits of equipment competing with each other for resources, but by far the biggest problem was hoping all the drivers and bits of software would play nicely together and the windows architecture and code secracy made this a nightmare that became known as DLL hell. Industry specialists were able to wrestle with this until workable solutions emerged. But for your average Joe user, it was a blood splattered road to a nervous breakdown.

Note, it was not always about Macs and PCs, in the 80s the serious players were Silicon Graphics and for those on a tighter budget, Commodore Amigas. Neither of these had DLL hell issues (which hadn't evolved by that time) and both were used at the center of some impressive workflows.

Macs were making inroads into the publishing industry thanks to the incorporation of proportional fonts and the graphic power required to utilise them. This power eventually evolved into animation and video work. In effect, Apple were delivering machines that required less adding to them to get to the basic workflow. Eventually they started incorporating the software apps required so that today, the out of the box Mac contains all of the workflow needed by Joe user. All of the apps integrate well with each other and are designed with simplicity and ease of use as their focus.

This has been recieved extremely well by its users, leading to the tag line "It just works". The PCs have evolved too and because they are more widespread they have a wider range of tag lines including:

"It can work"
"It works very well thankyou"
"It works better actually"
"It did work, then it stopped"
"It doesn't work"
"Help!"

Najinsky

I've been running years with pc (Windows); then (for my job) happily switched to Linux.
Now (and at last!) definitely become MacOSX user without any regret.

OSX offers a mature and stable unix engine (I succesfully moved on it all software I developed under linux), with a well designed and integrated user interface.

If you don't want to buy another photoshop license, please learn "The Gimp", won't repent.

Almost all well known software running on linux, also compiles and runs on OSX. Serious software developed for Windows (Photoshop, Maya, Lightwave, etc.) also is distributed for OSX.

No doubt, not shy get a Mac! I recently sold my PC and I'm more happy than before.....

Alvise

kevinhochen said:

1. What makes the Macs better for photo/video applications? Is it
the ease of use? The speed? If were to stick to photoshop on the
Mac, would I notice any difference?

Click to expand...

As already mentioned, PS (and its variants, PSE) is the same, essentially. Very small differences in the menu - which are tied to the operating system bits. If you are using PSE, then supporting sw is different. PSE4/5 Windows come with Organizer, whereas PSE4 Mac comes with Bridge. If you use CS2, then no difference.

As for video, Premier Elements only exists for PCs and not Macs. Of course, there is iMovie on Mac. Clearly there are higher end editing SW but you mentioned light duty stuff... So from SW perspective, not much difference but from practical usability stand point, there is bit of difference. Already mentioned are viruses and spyware - true - but I suspect Mac user base is not as large so why bother, and perhaps more importantly, there is anti establishment sentiment against Microsoft, globally.

For me it has been quite nice not to perform those scans to keep my Mac running and NOT HAVE TO DEFRAGMENT my disk. The inherent underlying Unix utilities now incorporated in newer Mac OSX, takes care of silly things like that automatically on its own (although, if there is a huge GBs of fragmentation, then you will have to deal with it but its highly unlikely if your disk is not filled up).

kevinhochen said:

2. It should be possible to share files between my PC desktop and
Mac notebook and use the same wireless network, right? And it
should eve be possible to share the same external harddrives (where
I store all of my photos and stuff), right? Just want to make sure.

Click to expand...

Yes and yes. This is the exact setup I have at home. My wireless router connects 2 desktop PCs and MBP. I have an external (LaCie) drive attached to one of my PC as the backup disk. It is simply another letter drive on XP and shows up as a server on my Mac. You will need to know the IP address for the desktop once it is on the network. You can find the IP address by holding your mouse cursor on the wireless icon on the system tray or open the wireless network status and get the info. Your router should assign an IP address automatically (DHCP) so not a big deal.

Also someone mentioned that the external drive has to be FAT32 w/4GB file size limit. I think there is a 4GB file size limit using FAT32, but if the external drive is connected to PC, it does not have to be FAT32. Macs and PCs communicate using SMB (I think) protocol and transfers files between different file formats. I have no problem writing files to my desktop from my MBP and my desktop PC is using NTSF. I think this is also true if one is using NAS connected to your router directly, as long as NAS has proper software for connection.

kevinhochen said:

3. If I do get a Mac notebook, will a MacBook be good enough or
should I get a MacBook Pro? I run mainly photoshop and it doesn't
have to be instanteous reaction to everything but I don't want to
wait a minute while photoshop runs a filter eiither. My
temptation is to get the best one but budget is a concern since I
will have to replace some of my software stuff as well.

Click to expand...

You can only answer this question based on your own value proposition for the extra cost of MBP.

Lastly, I was looking for a new laptop about 6 months ago to replace my Dell laptop. I made the switch (back, since I was originally a Mac user since SE/30 days until mid 90's, then switched to Win98, when Mac commercial SW options were dismal), thanks to Boot Camp and never looked back. I still spend 40% of my time on XP side for MS Office suite (yes there is Office2004 for Mac but its soooo slow - Powerpoint is my primary tool for business presentations and it has to be portable to PCs without format loss or degradations).

Cheers

I just switched to a Mac myself and went thru the same thought process. I think the Mac is a great platform, but so is the PC. Don't get too caught up in the hype. Choose a platform that best fits the tools you want to run on it.

If Photoshop is your main tool, I'm not sure there's a compelling reason to shift to a Mac. Both platforms will do the job, although be advised that PS is not a universal app on Macs yet, which means it doesn't run natively on the new Intel Macs (it runs in emulation mode). This will change with CS3, which will be a universal app and is due next year.

The reason I switched was almost entirely due to wanting to use Aperture. That's a Mac only tool. I just got tired of the hodge podge of tools I was using on the PC to manage my images, do RAW conversion, do additional post processing, and keep everything backed up. Aperture does all that and more in a single, well thought out app. I tried Lightroom to see if that would do the job on the PC, but like many, Lightroom just left me cold. I also felt the Mac Pro desktop I got was a very competitively priced machine (actually, the Mac Pro is a good bit cheaper than a comparable PC). I haven't checked laptop pricing, but PC laptops are typically expensive so I suspect the Apple models will be very competitive.

One other point that factored heavily in my decision was the knowledge that I can set up the Mac as a dual boot system - I can run either the OS X or WinXP. Aperture was the reason I switched, but the dual boot capability was definitely a comforting factor. If it hadn't been for dual boot, I'm not sure I would have switched, even for Aperture.

Good luck.

--
I Reject Your Reality And Substitute My Own

Web Site - http://www.hgiersberg.com/

I switched back in March to a MBP. My desktop (like you) is a PC and they both integrate seamlessly. It only took a little while to learn the new operating system, and, well, like another poster said ' it's hard to put your finger on it' but it really is just more enjoyable to use.

Anyway you can't lose because if you hate OSX you can just run it as a windows machine

Just to add, i tried the new Vista build the other day on my MBP and it screamed; i was very impressed with it's performance; even with all the enhancements ticked it makes the previous beta look like mush.

S

You should get the 24" new iMac w/2GB RAM

kevinhochen said:

Hi, everyone.

I was in the market for a new laptop and was thinking about using
the opportunity to consider moving to Mac (but still keeping my
desktop PC). The thing that takes up the most processing power is
running photoshop and editing some home videos (not a lot) and I
keep hearing that for photo/video applications, the Mac is the way
to go. I've been trying the macs out at the Apple store but still
have some questions that I hope people can help me out on.

1. What makes the Macs better for photo/video applications? Is it
the ease of use? The speed? If were to stick to photoshop on the
Mac, would I notice any difference?

2. It should be possible to share files between my PC desktop and
Mac notebook and use the same wireless network, right? And it
should eve be possible to share the same external harddrives (where
I store all of my photos and stuff), right? Just want to make sure.

3. If I do get a Mac notebook, will a MacBook be good enough or
should I get a MacBook Pro? I run mainly photoshop and it doesn't
have to be instanteous reaction to everything but I don't want to
wait a minute while photoshop runs a filter eiither. My
temptation is to get the best one but budget is a concern since I
will have to replace some of my software stuff as well.

Thank you so much for all of your help.

Kevin

Click to expand...

Are you running Vista in BootCamp or Parallels?

I would like to thank everyone for all of their input. At times, it is difficult to tweeze out my reasons for wanting to buy something and it helps to get all of the input (as my wife will tell you, I sometimes buy something for no other reason than wanting a new toy). I've played with the macs and I do like the interface better (for some reason, it just feels nicer) but wasn't sure if that justified the cost it would take of switching.

I work mainly in photoshop now but from what I have seen of lightroom, I will likely switch to that since it's geared more towards the photographer and the workflow seems to make more intuitive sense to me. I have to take a closer look at Aperture since it seems similar. And also a closer look at some of the products I keep hearing about like BootCamp and parallels to see how integrated I can make things.

Thank you to everyone!

Leicaman,

I have the latest vista build running on Bootcamp, i can't get my isight to work but other than that it runs with tremendous speed. For example i also run RC1 on my windows dual 3ghz machine, also with 2gb of RAM and the MacBook Pro completely outperforms it.

I run it on the mac simply for the momentary speed jump in Adobe CS2... I guess using parallels would reduce the speed bump.

S