Decisions, decisions: move from PC to Mac?

Hello all

Looking for a Mac guru to help me out...

I have an opportunity to buy a (almost) new iMac 24 with 3 year AppleCare for a reasonable price - within the next 3-4 hours - (unless, of course, the bidding goes sky high). OR, I can go the London store and buy a new one for the full retail price after the bid has closed.

I have a few concerns though:

1. My main concern is the tranfer of files, folders and Outlook address book; how difficult is this?

2. I haven't heard that much complementary for either Outlook or Apple's e-mail client. If it's true what else is out there as a suitable replacement?

3. I'm concerned about galre for the 24" screen if, for example, it's near a Window?

4. Can brightness be of the screen adjusted; I've read that it can be excessivley bright if working at night/dark (ish) room?

Regards

Toasty

Moving from PC to Mac is a challenge I found within Office. It can be done and I did it but I found it easier to add as needed and used screen capture to "see" the data. It is doable. I use Entourage for email and it is fine.

I have the 24 with the glossy and i have it turned slightly to not reflect the window and sit at a 135 degrees to the window which is right behind me over my shoulder. No big deal. Yes you can turn down the screen as long as you have the wired keyboard, not sure if the wireless does the same. You will love the machine and I have had no issued for 2.5 years and I have Applecare. It is plugged into a battery backup for clean power.

1) For normal folders and files it's easy as using a flash drive, dvd, or external hard drive. For the outlook address book, I believe that you can through the export option and I think, that is think that the office for mac can use that.

2) I use postbox for mac. I like it, but I still prefer outlook 2007, with business contacts for my pc.

3) There is some what of a glare, but it's not much.

4) Yes you can adjust the brightness through the system panel, or through the apple keyboard.

you can use bootcamp or any virtual software such as parallels/ vm ware to do most of your windows need...

i prefer using virtual because it is widely accessible in mac and windows simultaneous...

Do u guys not find the screen is waayyy too bright though. I don't understand why there is only a limited scale.. At night it burns through my retinas and blast photons through the back of my skull...
I'm using shades atm and used dark adapted a bit before but it's tedious and clumsy having to use extra software to actually hinder the ridiculous brightness..
Although on the plus side, you can make it so bright it'll cut through pretty much any glare!!