Mac on a Windows dominated network?

[Korruptor]

I did a search on the forum and browsed through some threads but I havn't found the info I'm looking for so I was hoping some people here could advise me a little.

Firstly, I'm a Windows guy. My last experinces with a mac was about 10 years ago in highschool and I was greatly turned off macintosh by the repeated bomb popup ruining my day almost everytime I used it. They were, however, used macs that took a beating from other clowns in my school. But it was enough to taint my young view of them.

Now, a decade later, my fiancee has fallen in love with the new Macs since she took a design course at the local college and they were running macs for the course.
So, now she's been to the local shops looking at them. She wants a mac, I can't remember the model, it's the one where everything is built into the monitor itself.

I'm a semi network admin among other things at work. It is a Windows and Linux environment. At home I run a network connected to our DSL with 4 Windows PC's running Win XP, Win Vista (32 and 64bit), and Win 7 Beta. One of the windows machines is wireless. There is also a Brother network printer. All these devices connect via a 2Wire DSL modem/router provided by our ISP.

When she gets the Mac, as I'm sure she will, one of the Vista machines will be taken off the network.

My question is;
- Will the Mac be able to 'see' the windows machines (and vise-versa).
- Is there functionality in the two OS's to allow a file transfer to happen between them? We currently transfer files on a semi regular basis between the Windows boxes.
- Will the Mac be able to share the DSL on the modem/router without some special configuration being needed?

I am pretty clueless beyond the basics for Mac machines. I'm hoping for some good advice without the 'idiot' comments. I'm not too concerned about being flamed though, as from my reading through other threads here people on this forum seem like a helpful and friendly group so I'll leave the flamesuit off for now.

Thanks!

Mark

 

[Jaygray]

You should not have a problem with any of this. For the most part the two OS's play well together on a network. File transfer is not an issue. In fact you'll be amazed how easily the Mac will adapt to the network. Connecting a new windows machine to a network is 10 times harder than connecting a new Mac.

In fact, I have a friend who is a programmer for Citrix. I don't fully understand everything he does, but it's all based on company servers in a Windows environment. Yet he often prefers to connect using is MacBook Pro and programs from it.

And as long as you have an open mind and are legitimately looking for help, you won't be criticized by anyone here. And you are welcome to ask Windows vs. OS X questions.

 

[cwa107]

You and I share a lot in common. I'm a network admin for a large company that is predominantly Windows, although we do have a smattering of Linux and OpenVMS boxes. Prior to switching to the Mac, my experiences were limited to the old Macs we used in High School and in College, all of them were pre-OS X (System 7 and 8). They were terrible.

In late 2006, I bought my first Intel Mac - a MacBook Pro - because I was intrigued by OS X. Since then, I've been firmly in the Apple camp. I still run Windows on my gaming box and have another XP laptop, but my primary machine is my MacBook Pro. In addition to running OS X (which by the way, integrates very well into Windows networks), I also run Win7 and Ubuntu in VMs, as well as Vista on a Boot Camp partition.

OS X is a complete departure from what you've experienced in the past, and if you have any comfort level with UNIX derivatives, you should feel right at home on the Mac, although the UI might take some getting used to.

As to your questions:

- Will the Mac be able to 'see' the windows machines (and vise-versa).

Yes - in fact, they should pop right up in the Finder with no need to do any kind of special configuration - unless of course you're blocking file and print sharing with the Windows Firewall.

- Is there functionality in the two OS's to allow a file transfer to happen between them? We currently transfer files on a semi regular basis between the Windows boxes.

Yes, SAMBA is built right into OS X, so accessing SMB shares is no problem.

- Will the Mac be able to share the DSL on the modem/router without some special configuration being needed?

Yep. If you're using Ethernet, it should be plug and play. If you connect via WiFi (and the iMac has a built-in WiFi adapter, known as an AirPort card in Apple-speak), that should be pretty painless too - just select the network from the AirPort network and enter your password.

 

[Korruptor]

Thanks for the responses!

I do like to think I have an open mind. I often have people asking me for advice on what computers to buy and things like that. I've been known to tell people sometimes to look at Apple if all they want to do is email, surf the web, and some word processing stuff, and don't don't want to ever (or nearly ever) be concerned with viruses or whatever else is out there.
Or if the person wants to do video editing or graphics work.

She's the one that wants the mac, Being a gamer, I will probably never get rid of my windows machines (unless more games I want start coming to mac). however, assuming I like the machine she gets, I may consider one for my next computer as well.

I'll probably be posting here more once she gets the mac, having so little knowledge of it. Guess who will be the one setting it up and supporting it. lol.

Thanks again!

Mark