Mac vs Intel: What's Your Preference?

[Smasherman]

I managed to crash a G5 twice after playing on it for under an hour

I've used almost exclusively Windows since my main use for computers is gaming (I used Dos before Windows 95 came out). I've also used Macs, though not nearly as much. Apparently Mac OS X is Unix-based (I don't know this for sure, but my Mac-lover friend says this fairly often).

My next computer will almost definitely be a Mac, but it will have to have an Intel processor, preferably dual core.

 

[Moonbear]

To get back to the original post:

It seems that the switch to intel is necessary to keep up with the "speed game." Since it was Intel, not windows, that brought the speed to PC's. Steve Job's other company (Pixar) had to use machines with intel chips to do the rendering necessary for their animations, and I'll bet that stuck in his craw at least a little bit.

Word going about is that many mac fans will wait at least a little while before getting the Intel generation of iMac. Soon enough it will work out the kinks. It don't matter to me though; my next Mac is two or three years away.

I just got the one with the Intel chip. I can't appreciate the full speed of it yet because the software is still designed for the PowerPC processors, so goes through a translation step with something called "Rosetta." But, even with that added step, everything runs as fast as on my G4...I imagine a G5 would seem a bit faster right now. But, everything is due to upgrade to Universal versions of the software soon, which will take full advantage of the Intel processor. No kinks that I've noticed.

 

[Zygotic Embryo]

I am one of those " young people"

and Mk

how did you apartment set on fire again

 

[Zygotic Embryo]

Oh and pertaining to this thread

Pc all the way-Better everything, except for looks.

mac's graphic cards are normally intergrated, hence-Pretty bad gameplay.. they don't contain hyperthreading.The Dual Processors however, can become useful. But, macs are more secure.

but if your not worrying about security, then go with pc. Alien wares are some of the best you can get, but really expensive.. you can make your own for 500$ cheaper, and it will be as good.

 

[franznietzsche]

When people ask me what kind of computer I think they should get they get an answer along the lines of what Moonbear said:

If you're buying a computer for anything other than games, do not bother with Windows (if they had a legitimate non-game related reason for needing Windows, they wouldn't be asking me in the first place, so don't bother telling me other reasons to bother with Windows, I know what they are). If you're buying a computer that you expect to use for at least 4 years, definitely get a Mac. Over that time, the price is not so bad. If you're getting something you only plan on using for a short time before upgrading (like me, where I'm constantly in search of more computational power) get a PC running Linux or BSD or any other *nix on x86(Solaris among them), dependent on what applications you may need. I'm talking about needing to get work done, not to play games with. If you want to play games, you're pretty much stuck with windows.

 

[Mk]

Alienware and Voodoo are pure gaming machines. Apple's integrated graphics cards do not suck, and if you want you can switch it out for a better one.

I managed to crash a G5 twice after playing on it for under an hour

OMG OMG Antichrist! And did you see his wicked smile?

About the speed, I don't get it. I just bought a 2 GHz laptop, and my old 750 MHz iMac is still like twice as fast as it. What's going on?? How can I improve my PC's speed?

 

[franznietzsche]

About the speed, I don't get it. I just bought a 2 GHz laptop, and my old 750 MHz iMac is still like twice as fast as it. What's going on?? How can I improve my PC's speed?

Get rid of Windows?

I love seeing Slackware run as fast on a 500 Mhz PIII with 128MB RAM as WinXP on a 1 Ghz P4 with 512 RAM. Its cute.

 

[Kakarot]

well i have 3 pcs and 1 mac and generally the mac is a useless piece of crap. i play games and do programming so windows is a must. i don't see why people bother getting g5 macs when all they do is business/word processing work. you really don't need all that power for simple stuff like that. as far as computer virii i don't think I've ever gotten one on my pcs and spyware is easy to stop and remove.

 

[ComputerGeek]

they don't contain hyperthreading.

Neither will any future x86 computer... so what is your point?

HT is just a gimmick.

 

[ComputerGeek]

well i have 3 pcs and 1 mac and generally the mac is a useless piece of crap.

perhaps if you spent more time using it you would think a little differently about it

i play games

windows is a must in this case (though Mac games exist for all the major titles that anyone actually cares about)

and do programming

Hi, I'm computergeek, I graduate in may with a mathematics and CS BS... I have used a mac for my entire course work... I also do lots of nice programming fun on the side... Windows is crap for programming as it is pay to play for the most part, Unix based systems are the only way to go, and OS X is one of the best.

i don't see why people bother getting g5 macs when all they do is business/word processing work.

yeah, and why they bother getting a PC with more than 1 GHz is a mystery to me(can you see the sarcasm?)

as far as computer virii i don't think I've ever gotten one on my pcs and spyware is easy to stop and remove.

Viruses are not as much of a problem today as they once were because everyone has anti-virus software that breaks their machines thanks norton... (yes it is a purposeful exaggeration ), but spyware is a lot more insidious than you think. spyware protectors cannot stop or remove it all... not even a cocktail can save you.

 

[woodsy2k]

Seriously, how can anyone like Mac's?

Unfortunatly our Physics department here at Exeter uni Choose to use them and only them! ARGH! They have all just been upgraded to the new flat ones, (cant be bothered to remember what they are called) And they suck sooooooooooo Bad! For example, a friend needed to hand in some work into a folder that was on a server controlled by the person that was teaching that module. The mac then turned around and said, Sorry there is already a copy of this file in this folder. "do you want to over write or cancel?" naturally he pressed cancel. The mac then proceeded to delete both copies of the work! What the hell is the deal with that!

PC all the IMO. :)

 

[Chi Meson]

Seriously, how can anyone like Mac's?

Unfortunatly our Physics department here at Exeter uni Choose to use them and only them! ARGH! They have all just been upgraded to the new flat ones, (cant be bothered to remember what they are called) And they suck sooooooooooo Bad! For example, a friend needed to hand in some work into a folder that was on a server controlled by the person that was teaching that module. The mac then turned around and said, Sorry there is already a copy of this file in this folder. "do you want to over write or cancel?" naturally he pressed cancel. The mac then proceeded to delete both copies of the work! What the hell is the deal with that!

PC all the IMO. :)

Sorry, I don't believe that story. Sounds like someone wanted to blame a Mac for their own mistake. Seriously, Macs don't do that.

I generally don't understand how either side (Mac or PC users) can say "the other one sucks." Neither one sucks, and I think that it is good that there is not only one choice for commercial operating systems, even if one is currently vastly dominant. So, let's be civil here, and save the "you suck, no you suck" comments for a different forum.

 

[franznietzsche]

well i have 3 pcs and 1 mac and generally the mac is a useless piece of crap. i play games and do programming so windows is a must.

You're funny.

Games, yeah you're stuck with windows. Programming in windows? Not unless you intend to pay MS thousands of dollars for "the privilege".

i don't see why people bother getting g5 macs when all they do is business/word processing work. you really don't need all that power for simple stuff like that. as far as computer virii i don't think I've ever gotten one on my pcs and spyware is easy to stop and remove.

You know just enough to make yourself look silly.

 

[woodsy2k]

Sorry, I don't believe that story. Sounds like someone wanted to blame a Mac for their own mistake. Seriously, Macs don't do that.

Sorry but there was no word of a lie in what i said. It is a known fault with OSX that has happened on more than one ocasion and our staff know about it.

 

[Chi Meson]

Sorry but there was no word of a lie in what i said. It is a known fault with OSX that has happened on more than one ocasion and our staff know about it.

[:BACKTRACKING SMILEY]I'm not accusing you of lying. I just never experienced nor heard of this kind of problem. Even still, without knowing more of the situation, I would continue to think that what you describe is a "bug." Bugs can be fixed.

 

[Cyrus]

Other than games, why does one need to mod and over clock their computer for? I can't see any use of it. Is buying any particular OS really all that important? Its not like your making that computer a network server for a 50 computers anyways.

 

[Danger]

One of the major Mac advantages for me is the functional speed (as opposed to clock speed). Who wants to sit around for half the day waiting for a stupid PC to refresh a Photoshop or Illustrator file? My 233 MHz G3 is way faster than the 1.81 MHz P4 that I have at work.

 

[alex caps]

I like macs for video editing and graphics but I like pcs for everything else.. but the main reason I haven't been a fan of macs is the compatability issues.. Until Now. I am considering getting one of these.. they look perfect for me: http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore?family=MacBookPro

 

[Cyrus]

I must say, apple has an amazing marketing team, though I find their products way too expensive. But in this case, you get your money's worth. $3 grand, outch.

 

[Danger]

Oh yes! I absolutely want one. (Can't afford it, though. )

 

[BlackJack]

Apple is stylish but expensive.
Since the new macs will be running with intel processors you'll have the choise :).

 

[Mk]

windows is a must in this case (though Mac games exist for all the major titles that anyone actually cares about)

This is why I actually prefer Macs for games, because of a combination of 3:

I tend to not like computer/video games very much, and am only entertained by "the best," which all come out for mac.

Macintosh's graphics are better [period]

I love my Mac soooo much!

 

[Moonbear]

Seriously, how can anyone like Mac's?

Unfortunatly our Physics department here at Exeter uni Choose to use them and only them! ARGH! They have all just been upgraded to the new flat ones, (cant be bothered to remember what they are called) And they suck sooooooooooo Bad! For example, a friend needed to hand in some work into a folder that was on a server controlled by the person that was teaching that module. The mac then turned around and said, Sorry there is already a copy of this file in this folder. "do you want to over write or cancel?" naturally he pressed cancel. The mac then proceeded to delete both copies of the work! What the hell is the deal with that!

PC all the IMO. :)

I've never had any problem like that. It sounds to me like a personal screw-up. When you copy a file to a server, you have to go out of your way to actually move the original file, otherwise the default is to just create a copy of it, so the original remains where you left it.

Of course, I could tell plenty of stories of all the things lost on a Windows machine too, but I'm not going to just say PCs are all crap because of it.

I do a LOT of work with high resolution digital images in Photoshop and Illustrator, and the version of Photoshop for PCs doesn't even have all the features that the Mac version has, and that I need to use. I've never tried using Illustrator on a PC, so can't really compare. But, as I've been saying, it's all about knowing what you are using the computer for and which one suits that need best. If you don't know or don't care, whatever the cheapest one is on sale is probably enough computer for you.

I do know that I don't have the patience for Windows. It's just too painfully slow to do anything. Of course part of that is the need to constantly be running antivirus and antispyware and antieverything else software in the background. But, hey, I used to like PCs better back when they ran Windows 3.11 and Macs were on something like OS 6 or 7 (I don't even know which OS it was then, but those were pretty awful...those were the days when you could use the mouse to scroll down a page and read every line while scrolling at the fastest speed). Whenever I'm on a machine running XP, I get really nostalgic for Windows 3.11.

 

[woodsy2k]

My 233 MHz G3 is way faster than the 1.81 MHz P4 that I have at work

That's because its a P4

Oh and Chi Meson, Forgive me if i sounded short, I had a rough night that night, as i went to A&E after drinking too much

No hard feeling :)

Woodsy

 

[Kakarot]

oh yea well macs can't run half-life the greatest game ever! :)

 

[ComputerGeek]

Seriously, how can anyone like Mac's?

Unfortunatly our Physics department here at Exeter uni Choose to use them and only them! ARGH! They have all just been upgraded to the new flat ones, (cant be bothered to remember what they are called) And they suck sooooooooooo Bad! For example, a friend needed to hand in some work into a folder that was on a server controlled by the person that was teaching that module. The mac then turned around and said, Sorry there is already a copy of this file in this folder. "do you want to over write or cancel?" naturally he pressed cancel. The mac then proceeded to delete both copies of the work! What the hell is the deal with that!

PC all the IMO. :)

Canceling a copy does not delete both copies, so your friend most likely did something wrong. O S X is not some weird POS system that does what it feels like.

 

[ComputerGeek]

I like macs for video editing and graphics but I like pcs for everything else.. but the main reason I haven't been a fan of macs is the compatability issues.. Until Now. I am considering getting one of these.. they look perfect for me: http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore?family=MacBookPro

Macs have been "compatible" for almost a decade now.

 

[Moonbear]

Macs have been "compatible" for almost a decade now.

I have not had any compatibility issues with Macs in years. The only "compatibility" issues I've run into have nothing to do with using Macs, but with people who never upgrade their software. The only other issues that people claim are compatibility issues are actually all user issues. Those big red X's in powerpoint presentations are the most common, and it just means people have inserted images linked to files without copying the file the image is coming from...just insert it as a picture instead of a link to a file, and you never have that problem.

I have never had a problem opening a PC file (as long as I own the software of course; Microsoft still has a stranglehold on people in that arena, but it makes no difference between Mac or PC), and have not had problems with opening my Mac files on PCs either. Now it's even easier to be certain files are compatible, because when I send an email using Mail and include an attachment, I just check a box that says to send it as a Windows friendly attachment. Nobody has had any problems opening anything I've sent them yet.

 

[russ_watters]

Other than games, why does one need to mod and over clock their computer for? I can't see any use of it.

It's more about being a hobby than having a need. I enjoy building computers and the hobby has been useful for learning how to fix them for work and for friends.

Is buying any particular OS really all that important? Its not like your making that computer a network server for a 50 computers anyways.

Depends. With any vendor, newer products have different features. Some people need/want the new features, some don't. Ie, one biggie these days is compatibility with USB flash drives: if your PC doesn't have Windows 2000 or XP, it isn't native.

One of the major Mac advantages for me is the functional speed (as opposed to clock speed). Who wants to sit around for half the day waiting for a stupid PC to refresh a Photoshop or Illustrator file? My 233 MHz G3 is way faster than the 1.81 MHz P4 that I have at work.

While it is true that applications optomized for Mac run faster on a Mac than on a similar PC (Photoshop is a typical example), we're not talking more than double (and then only for very specific tasks) and the raw speed difference you cited is probably a good 5x, so if your Mac actually does run faster than that PC doing exactly the same tasks, there is probably something wrong with the PC.

The entire reason Apple has switched to Intel processors is the raw speed advantage of PCs years ago made the optomization advantage of Apple software irrelevant.

 

[ComputerGeek]

While it is true that applications optomized for Mac run faster on a Mac than on a similar PC (Photoshop is a typical example), we're not talking more than double (and then only for very specific tasks) and the raw speed difference you cited is probably a good 5x, so if your Mac actually does run faster than that PC doing exactly the same tasks, there is probably something wrong with the PC.

The entire reason Apple has switched to Intel processors is the raw speed advantage of PCs years ago made the optomization advantage of Apple software irrelevant.

I took his comment to mean that OS X's work flow makes getting things done much faster than in windows.