Should i switch

i will be using my Mac in college for computer science. interested in 14 in ibook with airport extreme for about 1300 after student discount. I would watch dVds, type reports, other basic tasks. The most important thing is that i have a fast connection to the internet. are there any problems using airport extreme? how will it preform for programming C++, Java, etc. oh, just some other questions does the apple on the back of the lcd really light up, is it true that i get 2 stickers with my computer, any other cool things that mac does? But anyway, my primary concern is i have to learn another OS, i just recently switched my 5 year old desktop from 98se to XP home and the change took me about a week to get used to it, things were moved around in stupid places new appearence etc. will it be a big shock when i first use it or will i just be able to start like ive had it all my life. Also does iDVD work with an external DVD burner? Also, will Apple be reducing prices, or upgrading notebooks before late june early july? Oh, i also love how Macs look so bad ass. all the windows laptops are just clones made by companys and then sold to dell, gateway, etc. i liked the idea of having a OS made by the same company that made my computer. Also, it is so light and small. Back to programming will i have an advantage over my windows using classmates. sorry for the disorganised post. please reply

Hugh Jazz said:

i will be using my Mac in college for computer science. interested in 14 in ibook with airport extreme for about 1300 after student discount. I would watch dVds, type reports, other basic tasks. The most important thing is that i have a fast connection to the internet. are there any problems using airport extreme? how will it preform for programming C++, Java, etc. oh, just some other questions does the apple on the back of the lcd really light up, is it true that i get 2 stickers with my computer, any other cool things that mac does? But anyway, my primary concern is i have to learn another OS, i just recently switched my 5 year old desktop from 98se to XP home and the change took me about a week to get used to it, things were moved around in stupid places new appearence etc. will it be a big shock when i first use it or will i just be able to start like ive had it all my life. Also does iDVD work with an external DVD burner? Also, will Apple be reducing prices, or upgrading notebooks before late june early july? Oh, i also love how Macs look so bad ass. all the windows laptops are just clones made by companys and then sold to dell, gateway, etc. i liked the idea of having a OS made by the same company that made my computer. Also, it is so light and small. Back to programming will i have an advantage over my windows using classmates. sorry for the disorganised post. please reply

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Airport Extreme works fine
I have not done programming so don't know how well it works with Java or C++
Yes the apple on the back does light up
Yes you do get two apple stickers
The change took me about a week. Just look around on apples website at pictures...its really self-explanatory
With a hack iDVD will work with an external burner but not natively
The iBooks were just recently updated so I would not expect another update til Sept October

It is a bit of a switch. No windows explorer and such -- but I found it easy and a fast adaptation. The most noteable early was the one button mouse - but all is provided by the keyboard just fine. The Apple on the back of iBook/Powerbook is lit by ambiant light from the display (no waste). There are 2 Apple stickers that come with it. An external DVD burner should work fine - I'd sat to firewire or UBS2. Any programming you wanna do I'm sure will go fine - and fewer worms to patch for!

I will take you about 5 minutes to learn the new OS

It will take some getting used to, but in general, Mac OS X is more sensibly arranged than any version of Windows. Windows' UI seems to be arranged randomly, while the Mac's UI designers are pretty thoughtful in going about their work.

AirPort Extreme is essentially 802.11g. In my experience, it works very reliably with any 802.11b/g networks.

OS X is a great OS for mixing programming with "regular" computing tasks. There are many development tools included or available for free download. (The standard UNIX-style text editors, and the javac, jikes and gcc compilers are included, as is Apple's XCode development environment.) Whether or not this will give you an "advantage" depends on what exactly you do as part of your CS program. Where I went to school, most of the PC-owning students had to switch back and forth between Windows and Linux to do their work. Your program might be different.

you'll love os x, it's easy, fun, and perdy.
Airport extreme is an amazing thing; works great, and is compatible with almost every wireless router out there.

Well to the subject of programming with a mac... Yes it is possible but some say its not so conviniend like a PC. Anyway it works and it is possible and to change the OS is not a big deal... And java is a pain in the ass but it will work out...

Cheers Speedy

Programming in the terminal using pico as a text editor is fun and convenient I think

witeshark said:

Programming in the terminal using pico as a text editor is fun and convenient I think

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Oh, so you like Dos Edit for Unix? People around the *nix community look down on Pico. They expect you to use emacs or VI.

jjh

Heh, so I hear, but that's all about opinion, they all work, there is that end of line problem in VI, so I'd prefer Pico

The one advantage of using vi, is that it is included on all flavors of unix.

rman said:

The one advantage of using vi, is that it is included on all favors of unix.

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And even though it's a pain in the arse, it works the same on every flavor. Don't get me wrong, for basic stuff, I use Pico, too. But if I am jumping on a box I've never used before I can be assured that VI will be there.

jjh

Well, it depends on what you're doing -- what are you trying to program software for?

Are you trying to make PC, Mac, Or Linux programs?

Other than that, DVD's, wordprocessing, and net surf'n will work find on an OSX system.

And, if you want all platform worlds -- but only one computer -- get virtual PC.

I'd have virtual PC with XP -- it works fine, with the processing, but graphic intense things (like playing video) don't work well because I only have 64Mb of Video Ram on my Powerbook G4. Remember, when Running Virtual PC you end up sharing both your Ram and Virtual Ram with OSX and XP at the same time!

Windows in Virtual PC is just windows -- it's not a special. Virtual PC is a program that's designed to use the G4 chips hybrid techology -- which means that the G4 chip is a powerpc chip and it can behave like a pentium III chip, too. G5 processors don't have this, so current versions of Virtual PC will not work on a G5. Microsoft, however, is working on a new Virtual PC program (coming out this year) that will work on the G5.

If you get a copy of virutal PC, you can install as many OS's as you want. For windows, I hear that 2000 or 98 is best. You can also install Linux systems with virtual PC -- or just right onto the system it's self, Linux can be set up to use the powerpc chip.

I hear that Red Hat is a good Linux system.

I have a powerbook (laptop) G4 system with 1Ghz powerpc processor. 768 Ram with 64 video ram.

I ran XP (via virtual PC) and my spects came out to be a Pentuim III at 1.2 Ghz processing power, but I had hardly any video ram because I was sharing. Vitual PC will only allow me 16mb of video RAM towards the XP shell. Windows XP recommends 32mb of video Ram.

The amount of available Ram is dependent on what's on your Mac. If I had 128mb of Video Ram, XP graphics would work fine. The processing, I have no problem with, it's just that anything that's graphic intence takes longer to load in the XP part and video tends to be slow too -- so it skips or the audio is out of sync with the picture.

So, in short. If you want a mac -- get it. Get Virtual PC via student discount and throw windows on it and linux too. It'll be like having 3 computers in one. What more can you ask for?

--nate

PS yes you can try to run windows games in Virtual PC, but again, you run into video memory problems. Most newer games eat up video memory...and if there's not enough the game may be slower or not work at all. Solution: get a PS2.

I hear that you can play PS2 games on a mac...with the right program. PS2 systems use a powerpc chip. I don't know that for sure, I just heard about it.

You get Unix, Windows, OSX, OS9 (via Classic folder or what ever its called) and you can install Linux via Virtual PC! It's a programmers dream... Well at least I think it would be.

As for your programming question, programming on the Mac is a dream. Since it's just Unix you can either compile software at the terminal (eg: g++ -o test temp.cpp) or you can use XCode, which is Apple's front end software development app. It's easily the best development suite I've ever used, and best of all, it's FREE!

Virtual PC is a no no. It does everything through EMULATION, it has nothing to do with this "hybrid G4 that makes it act as a PIII" technology. It EMULATES video RAM.
Also, when I installed Virtual PC, my hard drive problems started.
EDIT: It also has no support for 3D graphics.

i don't know bout programming (but folks have already answered that part of the question), but i do know i'm a student and i recently switched and i love my mac.

the only thing i can think of that you might want to consider is that you might like to play videogames and if you do, the mac has a very small and late selection. popular pc games usually make to mac well after the pc arrival (sometimes years) if it makes it to the mac at all. but if you don't play games there is no reason why you shouldn't buy your ibook!

oh yeah and as for switching to OS X... i used a pc all my life and it took me ONE full day to get use to OS X. all i can say is that hands down, OS X is much better than windows.

One day to get used to it? I'm surprised. Believe it or not, OS X seems like a LESS user-friendly OS than XP. I mean, there's no Start button, and going to the Go menu and going to Applications isn't as obvious as clicking the start button. After all, not every application is in the dock. Also, things on XP seem to be more organized than on OS X. And the System Preferences? Not as obvious as the Control Panels, which are in the Start button. System Preferences are in the Dock, and you've gotta hover over them to find them. You know, I read an article once why this guy gives this long explanation about why he feels XP is more user-friendly than OS X....

Nightblade said:

I mean, there's no Start button, and going to the Go menu and going to Applications isn't as obvious as clicking the start button. After all, not every application is in the dock.

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I took less then a day, and the finder replaces the start button for me beautifully

Nightblade said:

One day to get used to it? I'm surprised. Believe it or not, OS X seems like a LESS user-friendly OS than XP. I mean, there's no Start button, and going to the Go menu and going to Applications isn't as obvious as clicking the start button. After all, not every application is in the dock. Also, things on XP seem to be more organized than on OS X. And the System Preferences? Not as obvious as the Control Panels, which are in the Start button. System Preferences are in the Dock, and you've gotta hover over them to find them. You know, I read an article once why this guy gives this long explanation about why he feels XP is more user-friendly than OS X....

Click to expand...

I suppose its all in what you're used to. I'm going to be buying a 14" iBook (hopefully) two weeks from now and since I'm a linux user I've been setting KDE to act like OS X and it took me about 2 hours to get used to it. As for a start menu I was never terribly fond of it to begin with, but it was more organized than the old Win3.1 way of doing things, although in truth I could navigate 3.1 without a mouse. Anyhow, I don't think OSX will be too terribly difficult to get used to personally and as for programming...well...considering that the entire GCC toolchain is available for OSX you won't be lacking there, and I've heard XCode is nice, although for Java I'll always be an eclipse fan at heart.