Hello I'm a PC...

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"Hello I'm a PC...":bomb:

Well maybe not for long. After being sucked in by the Mac ads lately I'm seriously considering the switch over to a Mac from my PC. With the launch of Vista I'm going to be forced to fork over a lot of money just to upgrade my computer so it is able to run it smoothly. In light (or maybe in dark) of that I'm looking at the options...

So I'm not here to start a PC vs Mac debate because as well all know it has been done 1000x over. Each has their own pluses and minuses and different operating systems. Lately after viewing the whole darn Apple website, reading reviews, listening to rumours I stopped by here thinking this was the place to get some questions answered.

Before I move on to the questions for the record I am convinced Vista is an absolute rip-off from Mac OSX. I'm convinced Windows has been stealing ideas from Macs since the 80s. I'm convinced the Amiga was the best computer I've ever owned and IBM crushed it like a bug. And lately I'm convinced Mac computers are pretty freaking cool computers.

So on to the questions:

1) I understand 'apparently' Leopard (OSx 10.5?) is going to be released in the near future (Mar-May '07) with that in mind will that be included on the purchase of a new Mac?

2) With the release of Leopard is it likely Mac will introduce it's new line of iMacs? Has anyone heard anything about the release of those? If that is the case is it best to hold off on the purchase until such time?

3) I currently run a Nvidia 7800 GTX Video card in my PC because I'm an avid gamer is there any way to transfer this into an iMac if I was to purchase one? Or are video cards PC or Mac only?

4) Only you purchase an iMac is there any way to upgrade it? More RAM, better video, etc etc?

I will have more questions for you all as time goes on and I appreciate the help.

Note: If I've placed this into the wrong Forum topic I apologise. Please remove it and place it where it belongs.

Thanks!
 
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1. There's absolutely no way to tell. Apple is a company, they do what is in their best interests.

2. Once again, no idea. Apple's very good at keeping secrets, but I would imagine a clock speed bump perhaps with the release of Leopard, nothing major.

3. Simply put, no. Video cards are PC or Mac. It's due to the firmware on the card. There's some website (couldn't remember the name of it, someone will come along with it...) that shows you how to flash the firmware of a PC card and replace it with a Mac's firmware.

4. RAM is easy. Hard drive's very, very difficult. Video card (not positive, someone correct me if I'm wrong) is not possible.

Welcome to the Forums.
 
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This outfit recommends you not replace an Intel iMac drive yourself.
Difficulty 5 / 5 - Very Hard

We recommend professional installation for replacing the hard drive in the Intel iMac. We can sell you a drive to install yourself, but we cannot provide help for the installation process.

Please note that installing this drive yourself will invalidate any remaining Apple warranty.
This short video on YouTube shows how to replace the drive in a Macbook (through the battery bay). Couldn't be easier.

This is a pdf, with pix, on the same thing as the video. (Click OK, and the pdf will appear.)

This link, with pix, discusses replacing a drive in an Intel Mac Mini.

The Mac Pro drive access is mentioned here.
The Mac Pro can hold four Serial ATA (SATA) drives, up from the G5’s maximum of two. It’s easy to install a new drive in a Mac Pro: just slide out an empty drive housing (the Mac Pro ships with four housings, even if you buy only one internal drive), attach a SATA drive to it with four included screws, and slide the drive back into the Mac Pro. The drives attach directly to the Mac Pro’s motherboard, so you don’t need to fiddle with cables—the housings are designed so the drives slide smoothly back and into place.
 

eric


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question 1.
once it's released it will be pre-installed on any new mac.
don't let that stop you from buying now though. any mac you buy now will easily handle leopard.

welcome to the forums, and i'm sure we can help make your switch pretty painless!
 
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VISTA = Various Improvements Similar To Apple :dive:
 
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You should switch

Buy a mac for video editing and word processing and things like that
Buy a game machine to play games
and with your old pc boxes install linux

one good thing NO MORE WINDOZE
NO MORE VIRUSES
NO AD AWARE


DOWN THE MICROSOFT TAX
 
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VISTA = Various Improvements Similar To Apple :dive:

Now that's funny!

I recently switched from many years of using PC's - even before windows existed. I aboslutely love my mac. There are a few situations for work where I'll be forced to use windows - but I can run parallels for that. Otherwise I'm perfectly happy with the Mac OS/X. You will be too.
 
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Hi Lisa, welcome to Mac Forums! Like you, I have used PCs forever... well almost, starting with DOS 5.0. I finally got so sick of them two years ago that I switched to Linux. Last year, I switched to Mac. Like you, I love my Mac. Best computer I have ever used.

By the way, another VISTA expansion was posted in these forums the other day:

VISTA = Viruses, Intruders, Spyware, Trojans and Adware

:dive:
 
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Well I went to Staples and had my first shot at the iMac. Wow what a machine. I can tell I will have a little difficulty learning the different functions and keys but I am really impressed. Very smooth interface and the booting time was like 10 seconds (Yes boot not hibernate or whatever).

Anyways I think I answered some of my own questions (like upgrade, etc)when I saw the monitor and noticed no tower sitting around. I had to ask the Staples worker.. "Where's the tower?"... He of course laughed his *** off and told me I was looking at it. You know in all the articles I've read it has never came up that the tower was inside the monitor. What a design...

So yeah i'm impressed.. looking forward to playing with it again.
 
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Well I went to Staples and had my first shot at the iMac. Wow what a machine. I can tell I will have a little difficulty learning the different functions and keys but I am really impressed. Very smooth interface and the booting time was like 10 seconds (Yes boot not hibernate or whatever).

Anyways I think I answered some of my own questions (like upgrade, etc)when I saw the monitor and noticed no tower sitting around. I had to ask the Staples worker.. "Where's the tower?"... He of course laughed his *** off and told me I was looking at it. You know in all the articles I've read it has never came up that the tower was inside the monitor. What a design...

So yeah i'm impressed.. looking forward to playing with it again.

Much of the stories about the need to upgrade your computer to run Vista are way overstated. Vista runs fine on older computers with decent specs. I have it on a couple year old P4 3.2Ghz and 1Gig of ram with an ATI X800 and it runs perfectly fine, including with games (HL2, Medival TW2, etc). The "Windows Experience Index" score is 3.9, IIRC.

That said, the iMac is a really nice computer. My father bought a new 24" last friday and I've been seething with jealousy ;). I installed Vista Home Premium on it yesterday using bootcamp and it runs like a champ, with an index score of 4.5 (the 24" has a better video chipset than the smaller ones though).

The real trade off you end up with on the iMac is a lack of ability to upgrade it later on. You can't just pop in a new graphics card and speed things up for the new generation of games, and I'm pretty sure that the graphics cards in the macs are not Direct X 10 compatible (though nothing much at all really is these days).
 

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