Should I get a Mac or PC for my next computer? (1 Viewer)

[Justin Lane]

However, do most schools/universities use Macs or PCs?

PCs. Even the college I attend, Drexel University, which used to be in bed with Apple and used Macs in every lab, and required students to purchase a Mac, has abandoned that platform as a University standard. PC is the standard in almost every University at this time.

Like earlier posters said, you will be better off getting a PC just to avoid spending time in crowded computer labs. Many times you will be required to purchase software for certain classes and your bookstore may only carry the PC version (if a Mac version even esists). A valid generalization is that most software will be available for the PC, while it is more of a crapshoot on the Mac (though it has gotten better).

J

 

[Greg Rowe]

Justin,

I think this really depends on the school. The university I attended (SUNY Geneseo) has a lot of Macs. The computer science department had all Macs for lower level courses and Sun workstations for higher level courses.

With the Sun machines you could ssh (remote login) into the machines and run whatever app you wanted from whatever computer you were on (Mac, Windows, Linux, whatever). Try that with a Windows box!

I used to dred going to the lab (it was a fairly long walk), and that's partly why I got into Linux. All the software that was in use on the Sun machines (running Solaris of course) was available on Linux. All I had to do was recompile my code.

It's been my experience that most people only like Windows because they've never used anything else. I am NOT claiming this about anyone in this thread. I find a lot of places place trust in Windows because they don't know of anything else. (I can't believe I just used the word trust and Windows in the same sentence).

Greg

ps - I know I said I wouldn't reply but my post is back on topic.

 

[Greg Rowe]

Oh, one more comment on Macs in schools. SUNY Geneseo invested in an entire lab full of dual G3 Macs. They planned on using them for intro classes as well as for distributed computing! I don't know if they ever followed through on this because I left before they even installed OS X on them.

Greg

 

[Patrick Larkin]

Not true. Penn and Dartmouth are two quality institutions that use Macs extensively. What apps are you speaking of that aren't available on OS X? and as far as I can tell, Drexel still recommends Macs.

In my own experience, it seemed that Arts along with Chemistry/Biology used mostly Macs. Chem and Bio seemed to rely on graphical modeling a lot.

Also, note this page where you will find that Stanford recommends Macs but only "supports" PCs. Quoted below:

If you are debating whether to buy a Mac or a PC, we recommend Macs. We have found them easier to setup and use, more reliable, easier to support, and much less susceptible to viruses and network break-ins. Also, a majority of the commonly used public computers are Macs. If you also want to run PC applications on a Mac, we recommend Connectix Virtual PC. If you choose to buy a PC, however, they are well supported, and actually more common in students’ rooms. For a comparison of the pros and cons of Macs and PCs, see our site on the World Wide Web (listed below).

 

[Phil Kim]

You say you are going off to school. I would see what the majority of the campus uses and get that. It can be difficult if you have to buy some software for class that only runs on windows or program something for windows and you buy a mac. Having to spend time down in the computer labs I found not to be especially fun.

Use Virtual PC 6, a PC emulator. While it's not as fast as native Windows PC, but it works surprisingly well and snappy enough (I am running it under old PowerBook G4 667 MHz with 768 MB RAM).

That said, if you are majoring in engineering, you will likely benefit more from UNIX compatibility than Windows compatibility.

Ten reasons to get a Mac OS X:

1. Stability -- UNIX foundation
2. Lickalicious, easy-to-use, and powerful user interface
3. Secure (thanks to BSD implementation of UNIX)
4. iLife (iTunes, iDVD, iMovies, iPhoto), Office v.X, and Safari, to name a few
5. Virus free (so far)
6. Great network connectivity options
7. Superior file system
8. Compatible with Mac OS Classic, BSD and X11 UNIX, Windows and MS-DOS (via Virtual PC) applications
9. Attention to details -- such as ability to print PDF files, instantaneous sleep/wakeup
10. Better licensing (no Activation, heavily discounted 5-user license)[/list=1]
    
    Ten reasons not to:
    1. Runs only on pricier and slower (albeit beautiful to last details) Macintosh computers
    2. May require you to repurchase applications
    3. Some applications not available (e.g., AutoCAD, Microsoft Exchange client, games)
    4. Not as many hardware supported/some drivers not optimized
    5. Some applications are inferior to Windows (e.g., Quicken, Windows Media Player, Yahoo! Messenger)
    6. User interface is not very customizable (cannot change the mouse pointer, theme, etc. without 3rd party "haxies")
    7. Dock can be annoying
    8. Some learning curve
    9. Not as keyboard friendly as Windows (e.g., accessing menu via keyboard)
    10. Not very home theater friendly (DVD Player is weak and does poor progressive scanning; cannot output Dolby Digital/DTS readily; no HDTV decoder)[/list=1]
        
        P.S. It is widely speculated that new models of iMac and PowerMac are in the pipeline for either late January or February launch. If you can, wait.

 

[MikeAlletto]

Virtual PC does work well, but it is not the same. I used it during college and it was ok. But if I would have had a dedicated windows machine everything would have been easier.

 

[Max Knight]

I have to chime in here and say that I'm a big Mac fan. I started out on macs, moved to PCs until college, then went back to macs. Back to PCs again for work after college, and now I'm using both at my current job. My PC is used maybe 10% of the time (at work).

The new OS is amazing. Talk about tweakability! I've written tons of little apps and scripts on my Mac. I always have at least two terminal windows open for command line access or remote access. You can use Unix shell scripting, perl, you name it.

Or you can use none of that, never open the terminal, and have a super stable computer that does just about everything.

I'm a pretty technical guy, but Windows drove me nuts. The new Mac interface is clean, and has all the advantages of a traditional command line if that's what you want.

 

[Michael*K]

Based on the criteria you listed, I'd have to recommend the Mac. As mentioned earlier, you'll pay more upfront for a Mac, but it's quality hardware and an impressive OS running on it. What the Mac lacks in the quantity of games, it makes up for in quality. Can it handle Internet chores and Microsoft Office? You betcha. Macs have a wide selection of freely downloadable web browsers to choose from and Office v.X is considered more impressive than its Windows counterparts. In the computer industry, I'm a firm believer in you get what you pay for. With the Mac, you're up and running out of the box in no time. On the PC side, good luck farting around with software and driver incompatability problems. If you're a student and your school really does require some sort of Windows-based software, you can always pick up a copy of VirtualPC from Connectix. Does it run Windows screamingly fast...no, and it isn't meant to be used for PC games. But it runs just about any business and productivity software and is certainly capable of handling any educational software you might use in school.

 

[Steven K]

You can program for any platform on a mac.

Um... not true either. Trust me, I know, we're trying to port to Mac right now. It's not as simple as "recompiling" the Unix source code in OS X. OS X is a pain in the ass, and the current batch of compilers are NOT good.

We use ACE (Adaptive Communication Environment) which is basically a set of source code that provides a set of platform independent interfaces into system functions. ACE has worked pretty well for Windows, Linux, Solaris, even AIX... but for OS X, yuck...

Not for nothin, but as a tech-savvy person who works with computers all day, I can honestly say that OS X is still not up to par with what else is out there.

 

[Patrick Larkin]

Um... not true either. Trust me, I know, we're trying to port to Mac right now.

Uh, your reply doesn't address my statement. I didn't say you could port existing code to OS X, I said you can "program for any platform on OS X" meaning you can start with nothing and make an app for Windows or Mac or *nix.

 

[MikeM]

And my computer doesn' have that creepy smiling MacClassic and cutesy names for things.

For someone who has used OSX "extensively", you should be aware that there is no 'smiling MacClassic' at startup anymore. Hasn't been there since the release of Jaguar, Mac OS 10.2.

Cutesy names? I don't get it, you can rename anything. Don't like the name of an app? Change it. Simple.

Those knocks of the Mac have been fairly petty.

 

[Haris Ellahi]

Thanks for all the input!

However, are there any 5.1 sound cards for the Mac?

 

[GaryEW]

However, are there any 5.1 sound cards for the Mac?

Yes, the M-Audio Revolution is Mac compatible.

 

[Haris Ellahi]

But is it any good? How does it compare to PC 5.1 sound cards?

 

[GaryEW]

The M-Audio Revolution is both PC and Mac compatible. It is a new card, just started shipping this month. The Revolution is similar to Creative's Audigy 2, a top of the line consumer level sound card.

 

[Haris Ellahi]

Does this mean I'll be able to get surround sound while playing games on a Mac?

 

[Greg Rowe]

Wow... whoever said this doesn't know what they are talking about (this sounds like one of those "the guy at the computer store said..." statements).

Yes, perhaps I am wrong. Thanks so much for pointing out an error so politely. Yes, that's dripping with sarcasm. When I said the above I was speaking to the best of my knowledge which obviously isn't as vast as yours, oh great one.

Greg

 

[Haris Ellahi]

Will there be a Mac version of the nVidia GeForce FX?

 

[Michael*K]

Does this mean I'll be able to get surround sound while playing games on a Mac?

Will there be a Mac version of the nVidia GeForce FX?

Wow, it really sounds like you have quite a bit more interest than just some gaming.

I'd say it's a pretty good bet that the next PowerMacs will incorporate 8X AGP and if that's the case, I'm sure there will be driver support for the card at that point.

 

[Haris Ellahi]

Thanks.

Just one more question.

How do you think AMD's new 64-bit processors will compare to the Power Mac G4?