running windows programs

i've been searching for a new laptop after my p3 died on me and thought it would be cool to get a mac, preferably a cheap g4 power or ibook of ebay, the only thing really holding me back, besided lack of knowlage of osx but rather can mac run windows programs such as games reletivaly fast

No. Unless your Windows games that you bought have OS X versions on the same CD, then chances are they won't run.

There is an emulator called Virtual PC which can allow you to run Windows applications, but the thing is so slow it's almost impossible to use with games.

If you want to play games buy a console or a handheld - playing video games on computers isn't that cost effective anyway.

if you will you can list the games you want to play and wwe will do ouit best at telling you they written for OSX