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What are the real elements that separate a MAC from a PC? (1 Viewer)

Christian Behrens

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As has been mentioned, it's actually server-class memory, with error correction (ECC) built-in and their own heatsinks.

Incidentally, a friend of mine who got a Mac Pro setup similar to yours a few days ago was lucky enough to order another 4 GB from OWC for about $420. Apparently it was mispriced on their website, but they sold it to him for that price anyway :).

Check here for RAM prices:
DealRAM

And this is what my lucky friend got:

He deserves it, though :)

-Christian
 

Ken Chan

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Since I consider 2 GB a comfortable amount for a "power" Mac and Windows experience separately, I would recommend 4 GB if you're doing both. Of course, you can always buy the extra RAM (4 more of those required-to-be-fancy 512 MB sticks) at more reasonable prices later.

With analog TV, it's digitized and goes across the USB connection as uncompressed YUV. For watching, there is no processing, other than no-brainer conversion to RGB for display. In fact, they advertise that you can play video games, so there's no lag (actually "virtually no latency") as usual with DVRs.

With digital TV, as Jeremy said, that's MPEG-2 to start, so the machine has to decode it. HDTV is hefty, but your machine should have no problems.

I've used both the EyeTV 200 and 500, and while I have some specific complaints, I'm happy with them.
 

Carlo_M

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Will keep an eye out for you. Since it won't ship until Monday (after MWE) we should have heard of anything new by then.

Sometimes the prices don't go up, but rather the step-up options go down a level. Let me give you an example from last year's speed bumps for the Macbook Pro (and this is working off of faulty memory so I could be off on the specs a little, but it's only for demonstration purposes).

Before MWE the this build of MBP was 2.16GHz, 1GB RAM, 256MB VRAM was selling for $2499. After MWE and the speedbumps were announced, the $2499 model MBP was 2.33GHz 2GB RAM, 256MB VRAM. So for the same price, one week apart, you got a .17GHz speed bump and 1GB RAM included.

Not saying the same will happen for the Mac Pro, but it might.
 

Thomas Newton

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Each wireless LAN component (whether client, access point, or router) is both a transmitter and a receiver. It has to be.

You may be thinking of the need for each wireless station to have its own radio. Recent Macs usually hide antennas and radio cards inside. (I think some of the Macs with Pro-style aluminum cases had 'stub' antennas, but those were small, in the back, and out-of-sight, out-of-mind.)

If you bought the just-announced Airport Extreme base station, it has "draft IEEE 802.11n" support, which Apple claims is also there in many of their currently shipping radio cards. Provided that you're using all-draft-N radios, you can expect to see local-area wireless network speeds comparable to those of a shared 100 Mbps Ethernet. That won't speed up most broadband Internet connections, but it'll help with wireless printing and wireless local file transfers.
 

Thomas Newton

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I would suggest playing with the Mac OS X and iLife applications first ... then upgrading to professional applications for the particular areas where you find that the included programs don't meet your needs.

You can make very-nice-looking DVDs with iMovie and iDVD, and it is a lot of fun playing with them. There's one big counter-intuitive thing in iDVD, which poses no obstacle once you know about it. You've got to put in blank DVDs after clicking Burn, otherwise the Finder will try to grab them (and iDVD won't be happy). But otherwise, you can drag and drop things everywhere.

Use the Finder to burn data CDs/DVDs, iTunes to burn audio CDs. (iTunes is OK for this, but if you want a lot of control over CD burning, you might want to look into Toast or Toast+Jam.)

Safari's good for Web browsing, although good, free alternatives are available.

I'd suggest Microsoft Office, except that an Intel-native version isn't out and you may already be planning to run the Windows version under Parallels. If you are into PowerPoint type slides, Keynote (sold as part of iWork) might be of interest, based on the reviews I've seen of it.

The one disadvantage of buying a Mac Pro is that Apple is not going to give you a free copy of Quicken, or any bundled games. They save those for the consumer lines. So if you want toys like "Ottomatic" (flying saucers, robots, space aliens, and killer tomatoes), you'll have to hunt them down yourself. :)
 

Ronald Epstein

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So, I am wondering if I should cancel my order for the Airport
Express Base station.
 

McPaul

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Welcome to the club, Ron. I think you will be ecstatic with your purchase.

I think of a computer as a tool. Does a carpenter spend all his time repairing, tweaking, and in generally working on his hammer so it hammers properly or more efficiently? or does he just use it as a tool and build a building?

Macs allow you to just get things done. Everything just works so flawlessly together. You think your Office for Windows works seamlessly well? That is how everything comes together on a Mac. The mac will just let you spend much more time working, learning, creating, rather than worrying about issues with your 'tool'.

The technology is so much more advanced. Leopard will be Windows Vista to the N'th power - but it will actually work well. Lots of little features that are surprisingly smart and work well together in OS X, plus the bonus of unequalled security.

As people have said, it's hard to put into words, but everyone here has made great points. It's just the overall user experience that defines a mac.

No new computers were released at Macworld, but I suspect we'll hear "...one more thing..." possibly next tuesday or the tuesday following. Carlo mentioned the 8-cores, there is also expected to be a new version of their iLife software also coming out soon, the only other thing would be Leopard, which wont be available until May, I suspect. I think you did great in your purchase.

Please give an official HTF review like only you can after you have spent some time with it.


...and sorry, but I am not familiar with wireless print servers through airport express, but I am interested, as I am going this route this year.

...plus you can get yourself a really cool mac phone in June. www.apple.com/iphone
 

Steven Simon

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I also just joined the club. I have a MacBook Laptop Duel Core 2.0 2 gigs ram, and last night bought the 20 Inch Imac, 2 Gigs Mem....


Im done with PC...
 

Thomas Newton

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I'm not sure the person here knows what they're talking about. The first sentence is about connecting multiple base stations together for extended range -- and if you're doing that wirelessly, I find it quite possible that the feature might be somewhat proprietary.

The second sentence presumes that a Mac with an Apple radio is going to have trouble connecting to an Apple base station. How the guy concluded this from his first statement is beyond me.

It sounds like you're going to have one base station. So the thing about a multi-access-point WDS (wireless distribution system) simply doesn't apply. Assuming it's the new one, Apple advertises it as supporting USB printers -- so there's a good chance your printer will work.
 

Ronald Epstein

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You know, I can talk to 4 people and nobody has the
same answer on how I can add a wireless printer to Mac.

I did do this on the recommendation of an Apple tech....

My computer is still being built so I was able to add a $50
Airport Express Card which in theory should work
wirelessly with my Airport Express Base Station in
transmitting and receiving printer commands.

I am told, at least, this should do the trick.
 

Nelson Au

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Ron-

Congrates on your move to the Mac world! I hope the transition goes well.

Regarding the TV capability, thought I'd add that I bought a TVMini HD from Miglia that also uses the EyeTV software. This device is USB2 and works great on my G5. (My machine is pre Intel) I added an extra hard drive to the G5 and it's now my PVR. I look forward to seeing how the Apple TV works out so I can send the recordings I make to the TV in the HT room.

I wish I could help with the wireless printing. I use a USB cable for that.

Forgot add, the folks over at the AVS Forums has a Mac section for HTPC: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=115
 

Citizen87645

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I was wirelessly printing for a little while. I have a Macbook with Airport Extreme card and an Apple Airport Express. I just plugged in my printer to the Airport Express's USB jack, connected my Macbook to the access point being generated by the Express and then just did a standard printer setup in system preferences. Simple and painless.
 

Ken Chan

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Yes, that's what's required to print wirelessly. But isn't the computer also hard-wired to the network, for internet access? In that case, if the base station is also hard-wired to the same network router (which it would have to be if you also want to provide wireless internet access), then the computer and base station can see each other, and you can print that way. That's the setup I use with an Airport Express, which is a mini base station.

Of course, for $50 you might as well keep the wireless option, because it might come in handy in the future.
 

Thomas Newton

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He may be planning to put the computer in a room where it isn't convenient to run wired Ethernet (without calling an installer).
 

Michael_K_Sr

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I can unequivocally state that this will work, since I have the same setup myself (MacBook Pro instead of a Mac Pro) and I've done setups for a handful of other users. Works perfectly for all of us.

By the way Ron, if you'd like to save some money, OWC sells the 1GB-3 matched memory pairs for your rig for only $395. That's quite a savings from what you'll pay at Crucial. I've used OWC's RAM in my Macs for years and have never had a problem.

Macworld's wrapping up and it's been a blast. Got to see some great new stuff and got some excellent bargains. Although tablet computers aren't my thing, the job that OWC and Axiotron has done with a tablet MacBook is ingenious. Was able to pick up an EVDO USB wireless modem with Mac drivers and an excellent Toast 8 bundle that included a TiVo 802.11g wireless adapter and an illuminated TiVo remote.
 

Thomas Newton

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Since you like to work with lots of programs, here are a couple of things you might want to try:

1. Expose. Some time when you have several programs and windows open, press the F9 key. You'll be pleasantly surprised. I won't spoil it by saying a whole lot more.

2. Dual displays. "Every Mac Pro graphics card supports dual displays". And 17" - 20" LCD monitors are not expensive -- if you think a secondary monitor would improve your overall experience. (E.g., if your desk doesn't allow you to place a second monitor in a convenient position for your eyes, you may be much better off not using one.)
 

MarkHastings

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No offense to anyone here, but these Mac Vs. PC debates are SO tiring because a lot of arguments that I seem to hear, are based in ignorance (i.e. ignorance in the respect that they don't fully understand the opposing system, which often leads to uninformed conclusions).

Ron, I've been using both Mac and PC on a daily basis for over 10 years and I can say that YES, they both have their pros and they both have their cons.

The reason these threads get so tiring is, most Pro-PC users don't care about the pros of a Mac and most Pro-Mac users don't care about the pros of a PC. That's why you always hear Pro-PC users say things like "Macs SUCK as far as software" or why you hear Pro-Mac users say things like "PC's SUCK as far as being user-friendly"...

It's the old "Which is better for me? A truck or a Car?" - Well, it depends on how you drive ;) A truck drive will hate a car because he can't haul top soil easily and a car driver will hate a truck because he'll spend too much money on gas for his 100 mile commutes. :)

I can tell you that (for me) Mac's and PC's are like my brain...The Mac is my right side of the brain and the PC is my left side of the brain. The PC does wonders with computation and mathematical number crunching, while the Mac is tops as far as most creative functions.

Not to say that one can't do as well as the other, I'm just saying that overall, the above is a fairly accurate statement.
 

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