J
John Mason
Guest
look lower on the threads greg
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PC or Mac ?
- Thread starter Greg M
- Start date
Greg M
Veteran Member
I'm sorry John, it's been a long week and it's almost midnight but could you be more specific? I've read all the posts but I'm not following your thought. Maybe it's time to go to bed.
M
Michael Salzlechner
Guest
Dan
the problem i see is that you made statements that sounded like you made them from experience but now you state clearly that you dont know but just simply restate what you may have heard somehwere else.
if you had some experience on both platoforms i would take you serious but in fact you dont so any statements you make on the platform you dont know are pretty much useless to anybody and doesnt help at all.
the problem i see is that you made statements that sounded like you made them from experience but now you state clearly that you dont know but just simply restate what you may have heard somehwere else.
if you had some experience on both platoforms i would take you serious but in fact you dont so any statements you make on the platform you dont know are pretty much useless to anybody and doesnt help at all.
J
John Mason
Guest
BayAreaFoto.com
Leading Member
I'm a PC user, and within the last two years have been using nothing but dual CPUs system. I have had my dual p3 1GHz + 1G RAM for about a year and a half now and it should serve me well for another 8-12 months. I can't see myself going back to single CPU unless I want to upgrade my system every 12 months.
I don't know what the cost/performance of a Dual CPU MAC system compared to PC, but I imagine PC has the advatage in this arena.
Do we need Dual CPU systems? If you work with 16bits linear TIF files at are 18MB each or encode lots of AVI to Mpeg2 or dVix then you never have enough computing power.
This is a Digital Camera forum, so you understand the logic that everyone wants more megapixels, but most don't realize the computing power that you will need to satisfy that pixel hunger.
Ask yourself this question, will the computer you bought today be able to process images sufficiently with the digicam you want to have 1-2 years from now? You don't want to have to upgrade your computer to keep up with your new camera.
Dual CPU systems are not for everyone, but if you can afford it or build your own at reasonable cost, its the way to go.
I don't know what the cost/performance of a Dual CPU MAC system compared to PC, but I imagine PC has the advatage in this arena.
Do we need Dual CPU systems? If you work with 16bits linear TIF files at are 18MB each or encode lots of AVI to Mpeg2 or dVix then you never have enough computing power.
This is a Digital Camera forum, so you understand the logic that everyone wants more megapixels, but most don't realize the computing power that you will need to satisfy that pixel hunger.
Ask yourself this question, will the computer you bought today be able to process images sufficiently with the digicam you want to have 1-2 years from now? You don't want to have to upgrade your computer to keep up with your new camera.
Dual CPU systems are not for everyone, but if you can afford it or build your own at reasonable cost, its the way to go.
J
John Mason
Guest
we've been building dual servers for a long time. we have just started doing some dual atholon MP systems with the tyan board. These really rock. You don't often get an advantage when doing a single task - but even things like network or disk access will get thrown to the 2nd processor when doing things like yarc conversions. You can see it in the taskmgr graph.
You need windows 2000 or xp professional for workstation use for this (unless your building a server but I don't think people are interested in that here)
To build one:
add one Tyan board dual for MP processors - Tyan model S2460 - 189.78
stir in 2 AMD 2000+ MP processors (don't try to use the XP's anymore - last bios update squelched that) for 305.24 apiece
PC2100 ram chips up to 4 of them about 50cents a meg (or I suppose a PC2700 chip might work - their 25% less weirdly enough - but I haven't tried this.)
mix with your choice of harddrives and video cards
make sure you use a dual processor operating system like win2000pro or XPpro - not win98 ME 95 or XP home - these will not work
You need windows 2000 or xp professional for workstation use for this (unless your building a server but I don't think people are interested in that here)
To build one:
add one Tyan board dual for MP processors - Tyan model S2460 - 189.78
stir in 2 AMD 2000+ MP processors (don't try to use the XP's anymore - last bios update squelched that) for 305.24 apiece
PC2100 ram chips up to 4 of them about 50cents a meg (or I suppose a PC2700 chip might work - their 25% less weirdly enough - but I haven't tried this.)
mix with your choice of harddrives and video cards
make sure you use a dual processor operating system like win2000pro or XPpro - not win98 ME 95 or XP home - these will not work
Clint Thayer #32755
Senior Member
Hello,
I use a Mac for many artistic reasons-- both for commercial and leisure. You can see and learn the specifics of how I've used the Mac in this article about one of my most recent projects using a Power Mac G4. It concerns video production, but the same rules apply to my post production of images.
http://www.apple.com/enews/2002/features/thayer/
I use a Mac for many artistic reasons-- both for commercial and leisure. You can see and learn the specifics of how I've used the Mac in this article about one of my most recent projects using a Power Mac G4. It concerns video production, but the same rules apply to my post production of images.
http://www.apple.com/enews/2002/features/thayer/
P
Paul Pope
Guest
After 10 years of Mac's we decided to move to PC's (shock horror a professional photography business using PC's)
I'd say this...
I'd say this...
- 1 We have save approx $50,000 in hardware costs
- 2 We have saved approx $100,000 in salary costs (easier and cheaper to find PC users then to train peopel to use Mac's)
- 3 Today's PC's are much faster then Mac's at most tasks
- 4 I still miss my Mac
Mac D1 Mate
Member
"Trolling trolling trolling, keep these threads a-growing, Troll-hide!"
It's always fun to see the PC-brethen defend their choice of platform by claiming they're "independent" and "wanting to learn about computers." True, on a Mac one didn't have to learn about a GUI, SCSI, PostScript, RISC, USB, FireWire, Ethernet, ... just to get things to work. In a surprising feat of "think about the user first" Apple decided to build these novel solutions straight into the box, no BIOS Set-up or IRQs to mess with, thank you very much.
By "learn about computers", did you mean learning about the OS? Well, the core of Mac OS X is in the open source (the Darwin kernel), what about Windows XP? Oh, Linux, you say? Ever heard of Linux/PPC?
What exactly about computing you weren't able to learn on a Power Mac?
Chan89448
Member
I partailly agree with Jason. I love FreeBSD but like any flavor of Unix you have to be on top of the security issues as they have much bigger affects on the OS than does windows hacks.
I have this suspicion that the low market share of the Mac OS X will prove very little interest for the hacking community but the ease of porting all the tools from Linux and FreeBSD poses a truely significant security issue for me.
My last Mac was a Powermac 8500AV which I still own to run linux on. Great little file server for my windows systems. I love the ideas of the Macintosh but like the value of the PC. I like to upgrade my system very frequently which is why I have stuck with the PC Platform.
I have this suspicion that the low market share of the Mac OS X will prove very little interest for the hacking community but the ease of porting all the tools from Linux and FreeBSD poses a truely significant security issue for me.
My last Mac was a Powermac 8500AV which I still own to run linux on. Great little file server for my windows systems. I love the ideas of the Macintosh but like the value of the PC. I like to upgrade my system very frequently which is why I have stuck with the PC Platform.
Chan89448
Member
- I can change my drive label to anything at anytime and I don't see any problems. All my programs followed. Interesting note though.
- Consider that you only get about 50% of the benefit of down upgrades like that where you change the processor cards. Since your motherboard does not change you can't take advantage of say DDR ram which would benefit the PowerPC tremedously. And when Apple comes out with DDR Ram system you will have to purchase a completely new Macintosh. At the price of Mac processor, I can purchase a new motherboard, new AMD processor, and new memory and install all that in about 30mins. The processor for my Powermac 8500 is about $450 to move to a G4, I find that just outrageous.
- I setup a mixed 100mb network with a Wireless network in about 10 minutes with my Linksys router and PC-Cards for my 3 laptops. I find that many people don't turn on WAP to secure(not totally secure but more work for hackers) their wireless networks and that is kind of scary. My neighbors have wireless network and I have actually got on their network and start surfing the web.
- This I totally agree with you. My Father is using a new IMac per my recommendation to him.
- Sorry to here you never went with AMD but I know the feeling. I was an Intel recently until it was clear that the Pentium 4 was a complete joke unless software was re-compiled which I don't have time to wait for.
Mac D1 Mate
Member
Just like the PC folks don't have a clue about BIOS and IRQ settings, thus the thriving PC tech support industry. What's the average IS support cost for 100 PC desktops vs. 100 Mac desktops? And where did this reliability info come from? Hearsay?
PC users "know computers"? OK, take two random computer illiterate users and put one on a Mac, the other on a PC. Now the Mac person is a "Mac user" and the PC person is a "PC user". Does the PC person now "know computers" by the virtue of using a PC? By your definition, yes. Now, ask each to connect to internet, install PS7 and hook up a Stylus Photo printer and print a page. Care to guess how each will fare?
As opposed to NT/XP/Linux on x86?
How many Mac OS X systems you know of that have been hacked? What, zero? So much for "expert opinion."
Marco
Senior Member
Mind
Heart
I'm using a Dell laptop P-III 1 GHz with 512 Mb Ram - 20 Gb Hd, Firewire, CDR-DVD combo, Zip 250, GeForce2Go 32 Mb graphic card on 15" LCD at 1400x1150 (but I connect my LaCie 19" CRT at home - much better for Photo Editing). I'm running Win2000.
At my brother's (architect) workshop there are 4 Macs (from first PowerPc models to G3 to G4 - not the newer) and sometimes I use them to finish some of my photos they use as a background for 3D-rendering.
As someone stated in another thread, Macs aren't "better" but surely are "cooler".
I can't blame my Dell for its performance (indeed it is a bit faster than most of their Macs...) or its stability (it crashes almost never...) but after using a Mac for a while, when I open my PC I feel like I miss something... icons, text, color-management, general appereance, all seems worse and less eye-friendly on PC.
Not to mention the supercool Mac OS-X...
Of course these aren't rational reasons (and this is why now I don't jump to the Mac side, it costs me too much), but life'd be too grey without emotions....
Marco
Leon Wittwer
Forum Pro
John, The current Mac tower has room for 4 hard drives mounted on the floor of the tower. This leaves room higher up for the smart drive, etc. Probably due to the SCSI heritage, a lot of Mac folks go for outboard storage and peripherals. This was practical since SCSI was a high speed com system. Today Firewire is the choice of many. I recently upgraded my Mac and it was very easy. I unplugged my old external firewire storage and devices and plugged them into my new machine and I was done. I do use the internal drive spaces for some old SCSI drives because they are there. My older Mac did have a problem of only 3 PCI slots but there are 4 in the new one (not counting the graphics card slot). I do Mac, PC, and unix and have never felt particularly limited on my Macs. Macs have, historically, been ahead of the PC world in color management which is important to me. Today, you can do it on almost any machine but it still is easier on the Mac. Regarding the original question in the thread, if you have mastered an OS and are comfortable, I would recommend that you stay put. I'm not sure the learning curve, etc. is worth climbing just to pick up some modest differences. Leon
I run 4 drives data striped and mirrored with a controller with 128
meg of ram. I use a dedicated and fast little 7200 rpm drive for
the swap file and temp files. This is the fastest way to have
fault tolerance and speed. I have a single drive working space of
150 gig. I have to lose 2 hard drives to lose any data. If I were
to build this now I would have 240 gig usable space since I'd do it
with 120gig drives instead of 75 gig. You have lots more hardware
options from many more manufacturers in PC land than Mac land and
at lower cost.
Faster and Cheaper - but you have to know more what your doing.
Mac will constrain your choices but for some people that is a good
thing.
How is this for expandability and upgradeability?! I bought a G4
tower for my mom, it is great. I use a Ti PB my GF uses an ibook.
I really love using PS7 in OSX and I personally find the interface
easier to navigate, but this is b/c I rarely use PC's. I love the
ease of use.
Tom from Arkansas
Well-known member
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This argument can go on forever. I use and like both. I have a PC at work, and a Mac at home. For most tasks, Macs can do what PCs can, and PCs can do what Macs can. You don't find me bashing PCs. My business has over 100 PCs, and a few Macs.
For what I do at home, I love the Mac. Apple is the only company that controls your PC experience by controlling the hardware, OS, and the much of the best software. They are intense about this! It shows! There is no single PC maker who can do this. If it's got Apple's name on it, it's slick. I use the Mac for Photoshop, digital video, and wireless networking around the house.
Wonderful.
For what I do at home, I love the Mac. Apple is the only company that controls your PC experience by controlling the hardware, OS, and the much of the best software. They are intense about this! It shows! There is no single PC maker who can do this. If it's got Apple's name on it, it's slick. I use the Mac for Photoshop, digital video, and wireless networking around the house.
Wonderful.
G
grzzi
Guest
Moviemaking on iMac shows PCs need to catch up
By BOB LEVITUS
Copyright 2002 Houston Chronicle
I have had the new top-of-the-line iMac for almost a month. Of course I loved it. I'm a Mac guy, and there's nothing about it not to love.
Even the inconvenience of the ports being on the back of the snow-globe base didn't bother me (other reviewers have complained about it, but I think it's a nonissue). It's cool to look at, blazingly fast, nearly silent in spite of its internal fan, and has a 15-inch flat-panel display that's as sharp, bright and vivid as any I've seen. And the stainless steel arm, which lets you adjust the screen's height, depth and angle with one finger, is perhaps the slickest piece of industrial design magic ever seen in a personal computer.
There is no doubt in my mind this is the best (and best-looking), fastest, most capable, iMac of all time, as well as the best iMac value ever. This computer is so fine that even Windows users lust for them.
Now allow me to reintroduce my neighbor, Dave (not his real name), whom you first met in my Sept. 22, 2000, column.
When my neighbor saw my iMovies, he immediately ordered a board and software that he said would let him do that on his PC. I told him he should get a Mac. A month ago I asked him how his moviemaking was coming. He looked properly chagrined as he said, "I haven't figured out how to make it work yet."
I lent him the new iMac for a few days and issued a challenge. Since he still, 18 months later, had not completed a single movie project on his Dell, I told him to try making a movie, an audio CD and a DVD on this iMac. And to make things interesting, I offered him no assistance or support -- I told him to look in Mac Help if he had questions.
Three days later I interviewed Dave.
On the first day, he unpacked the iMac, set it up in five minutes and burned two audio CDs with iTunes. He said he never needed to refer to Mac Help and that this whole project was "no problem whatsoever."
On the second day, he used iDVD to create a pair of slide shows using existing digital photos and burned his first DVD. I watched it later, and it didn't stink. In fact, most people would no doubt find it impressive. (I'm so jaded.)
On the third day, he borrowed my Canon ZR-25 camcorder and a tape of my son's last basketball game. I handed him the camera, manual and FireWire cable, and told him he was own his own.
By the end of the day he had imported raw footage into iMovie, edited it, added music and titles, then burned it onto a DVD with iDVD.
As I scribbled furiously, Dave's long-suffering wife added, "He swore less at the Mac than he does at his Dell."
Dave then said he had created more multimedia in three days with the iMac than he had in 18 months with his Dell. He only opened the Help file a couple of times. He concluded, "The hardest part was getting the iMac back in the box."
Before departing I asked if he'd consider a Mac next time. He replied: "Absolutely. In fact, if we hadn't wasted so much money trying to transform that Dell into a multimedia computer, I'd get one today."
It was music to my ears.
By BOB LEVITUS
Copyright 2002 Houston Chronicle
I have had the new top-of-the-line iMac for almost a month. Of course I loved it. I'm a Mac guy, and there's nothing about it not to love.
Even the inconvenience of the ports being on the back of the snow-globe base didn't bother me (other reviewers have complained about it, but I think it's a nonissue). It's cool to look at, blazingly fast, nearly silent in spite of its internal fan, and has a 15-inch flat-panel display that's as sharp, bright and vivid as any I've seen. And the stainless steel arm, which lets you adjust the screen's height, depth and angle with one finger, is perhaps the slickest piece of industrial design magic ever seen in a personal computer.
There is no doubt in my mind this is the best (and best-looking), fastest, most capable, iMac of all time, as well as the best iMac value ever. This computer is so fine that even Windows users lust for them.
Now allow me to reintroduce my neighbor, Dave (not his real name), whom you first met in my Sept. 22, 2000, column.
When my neighbor saw my iMovies, he immediately ordered a board and software that he said would let him do that on his PC. I told him he should get a Mac. A month ago I asked him how his moviemaking was coming. He looked properly chagrined as he said, "I haven't figured out how to make it work yet."
I lent him the new iMac for a few days and issued a challenge. Since he still, 18 months later, had not completed a single movie project on his Dell, I told him to try making a movie, an audio CD and a DVD on this iMac. And to make things interesting, I offered him no assistance or support -- I told him to look in Mac Help if he had questions.
Three days later I interviewed Dave.
On the first day, he unpacked the iMac, set it up in five minutes and burned two audio CDs with iTunes. He said he never needed to refer to Mac Help and that this whole project was "no problem whatsoever."
On the second day, he used iDVD to create a pair of slide shows using existing digital photos and burned his first DVD. I watched it later, and it didn't stink. In fact, most people would no doubt find it impressive. (I'm so jaded.)
On the third day, he borrowed my Canon ZR-25 camcorder and a tape of my son's last basketball game. I handed him the camera, manual and FireWire cable, and told him he was own his own.
By the end of the day he had imported raw footage into iMovie, edited it, added music and titles, then burned it onto a DVD with iDVD.
As I scribbled furiously, Dave's long-suffering wife added, "He swore less at the Mac than he does at his Dell."
Dave then said he had created more multimedia in three days with the iMac than he had in 18 months with his Dell. He only opened the Help file a couple of times. He concluded, "The hardest part was getting the iMac back in the box."
Before departing I asked if he'd consider a Mac next time. He replied: "Absolutely. In fact, if we hadn't wasted so much money trying to transform that Dell into a multimedia computer, I'd get one today."
It was music to my ears.
Well yeah. But for those who aren't into multi-media ...
If someone wants the capabilities the article talks about, sure, consider a mac. I understand they do that pretty well.
I do burn CDs but it's easy as anything and I have less than no interest in movie making. I leave that to Spielburg.
No! I promised myself I'd not enter this fray. leaves
G
If someone wants the capabilities the article talks about, sure, consider a mac. I understand they do that pretty well.
I do burn CDs but it's easy as anything and I have less than no interest in movie making. I leave that to Spielburg.
No! I promised myself I'd not enter this fray. leaves
G
BPW
Well-known member
Unfortunately, Macs need to catch up with more basic things...
http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,51926,00.html
http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,51926,00.html
Mark Mathys
Active member
I started with a Radio Shack TRS-80 in the late 70's. Since then I've switched back and forth between Mac's and PC's and own 2 of each. At work I take care of my lab's 12 pc's and am responsible for everything to do with them, including interfacing with instruments and developing software. Over the years I've gotten to be pretty good at fixing the PC's and keeping them going.
My personal choice for anything at home would be a Mac, although my "newest" Mac is running system 7.5 and I can't remember what the old one has, I can count on one hand (actually 3 fingers) the number of times I've had to restart them (since 1991). In fact it has been so long since I had to restart I can't even remember how (the last time I just unplugged the computer). I never got to be very good at fixing Mac problems because I had so few. I've had some, but not the kind that took "days" to figure out. Whenever I added some new hardware to my Mac's I just plug it in and it works.
At work we use PC's and I like them just fine, in fact my main computer at home is a Dell PC and I just ordered a new Sony Viao. The main reason I went with another PC is becuase I already have a lot of software. Another reason is I am more comfortable solving problems with PC's and know how to "hook them up". The thing I don't like is having to deal with lock-ups and restarts. After I switched to Win 2000 a lot of my problems went away but I still have a few. I still have to restart it about once a day to get my DSL connection to work and I haven't been able to solve that problem. At work we can't go a day without at least one restart, which may take up to 30 minutes to get going again. In fact I joke that I have 3 pc's on my desk (hooked to one keyboard and monitor) because at any one time one of them is in the state of being restarted! It's not quite that bad but it seems like it.
As far as learning how to use a computer goes, on a Mac you can learn as little or as much as you like. You probably won't get as much of an oppertunity to learn how to solve problems though (and some people think this is part of being able to use a computer). You don't have to learn how to solve problems to run a PC either, but you will be more dependent on outside help if you don't.
Both platforms will serve you well as far as performance goes and software goes but if you are just getting started my recommendation would be a Mac. With it you can concentrate on what you are doing instead of what the computer is doing.
Hope this helps
Mark
My personal choice for anything at home would be a Mac, although my "newest" Mac is running system 7.5 and I can't remember what the old one has, I can count on one hand (actually 3 fingers) the number of times I've had to restart them (since 1991). In fact it has been so long since I had to restart I can't even remember how (the last time I just unplugged the computer). I never got to be very good at fixing Mac problems because I had so few. I've had some, but not the kind that took "days" to figure out. Whenever I added some new hardware to my Mac's I just plug it in and it works.
At work we use PC's and I like them just fine, in fact my main computer at home is a Dell PC and I just ordered a new Sony Viao. The main reason I went with another PC is becuase I already have a lot of software. Another reason is I am more comfortable solving problems with PC's and know how to "hook them up". The thing I don't like is having to deal with lock-ups and restarts. After I switched to Win 2000 a lot of my problems went away but I still have a few. I still have to restart it about once a day to get my DSL connection to work and I haven't been able to solve that problem. At work we can't go a day without at least one restart, which may take up to 30 minutes to get going again. In fact I joke that I have 3 pc's on my desk (hooked to one keyboard and monitor) because at any one time one of them is in the state of being restarted! It's not quite that bad but it seems like it.
As far as learning how to use a computer goes, on a Mac you can learn as little or as much as you like. You probably won't get as much of an oppertunity to learn how to solve problems though (and some people think this is part of being able to use a computer). You don't have to learn how to solve problems to run a PC either, but you will be more dependent on outside help if you don't.
Both platforms will serve you well as far as performance goes and software goes but if you are just getting started my recommendation would be a Mac. With it you can concentrate on what you are doing instead of what the computer is doing.
Hope this helps
Mark
Greg M
Veteran Member
This isn't hard to do when Apple is the only company making Macs. There are no competitors so there are no compatiblity issues but that's also why they are so expensive. Apple does not think "user first". Their work to keep other companies from making Macs shows that they want to maintain their ability to charge what ever they want for their computers. Hardware working so well together is a by-product of only one company building them. If only one company built PCs then you would have the same situation but thankfully that is not the case. A little bit of learning and time with a PC does save a LOT of money and offers much more choices.
So far the only advantage of going to a Mac is that it is easier to use if you are new to computers and it sounds like they are easier when learning to use new software. However, they can not do anything better then PCs as far as photo editing. They are very limited as far as hardware choices and software choices.
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