Switching from Mac to PC

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On Friday, my early 2004 iBook died. Checked it out and it is the board that is messed.
As I am on a limited budget, it looks like my only option is to go with a PC laptop. I could probably swing a macbook as far as price goes, but I think the screen is just going to be too small for me.
Is it possible to switch my files (such as word and excel) from my old hard drive onto a new PC?
I am really not happy about having to switch to the darkside, but it looks like this might be my only option.
 
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Couldn't you abuse the plastic and get a Macbook? What about ebay?
 
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You could get a used macbook.
 
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The situation is that my boss (also my dad) is buying it for me and he has set a budget of $1000. I could swing that Macbook, which I can get an open box one for $945 (Canadian). I am worried that the 13.3 inch screen is going to be too small, but I could get a used flat screen monitor to hook it up to. The thing is, my dad wants to put it on his company credit card and can't be bothered with paypal and all that stuff. Plus, he is pushing me to go to PC, which doesn't make it any easier.
 
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Does the boss have some good reason to go with a Windows box? If not, go with the Mac. You know it well and that will save you from some headaches. Also, if your are the support person, that is a plus too.

If you don't need a laptop, consider a Mac mini with a large display, or a refurb iMac for $999 before taxes.
 

nZa


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The situation is that my boss (also my dad) is buying it for me and he has set a budget of $1000. I could swing that Macbook, which I can get an open box one for $945 (Canadian). I am worried that the 13.3 inch screen is going to be too small, but I could get a used flat screen monitor to hook it up to. The thing is, my dad wants to put it on his company credit card and can't be bothered with paypal and all that stuff. Plus, he is pushing me to go to PC, which doesn't make it any easier.

Have you explained to your father than the Macbook is a PC also, since you'd have the newer Intel technology? (No offense to your now extinct dinosaur :) )
 
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Does the boss have some good reason to go with a Windows box? If not, go with the Mac. You know it well and that will save you from some headaches. Also, if your are the support person, that is a plus too.

If you don't need a laptop, consider a Mac mini with a large display, or a refurb iMac for $999 before taxes.



Have you explained to your father than the Macbook is a PC also, since you'd have the newer Intel technology? (No offense to your now extinct dinosaur :) )
There is a website that would be helpful if I could get onto, which ONLY works with Internet Explorer and that is it. No Safari, no Firefox and no Netscape. I was asking the guy at the apple store about the using Windows on the new Macs and he asked me why I wanted to do that? I told him about the site and he knew exactly which one it was.
And yes, I LOVE the Mac destops, but I need a laptop for doing powerpoint presentations. I did tell my dad that it can be ran as a PC too, but of course, it doesn't help that I may have to pay for Vista, which would add another $150 to the price tag.

Like I said, I could go with the open box Macbook 13.3 inch and get a LCD screen to plug it into (so I am not working on a screen the size of a postage stamp) That option will run around $1,100 which I MAY be able to swing. I ran it by my dad though and he thinks it is kind of stupid. He may just be saying that cause he wants me to go with the PC. I am also looking at a Dell on the PC side. It really doesn't seem to be that bad of an puter and I was using Vista today too, which didn't seem that bad either.
I dont' know what to do here.

Oh, and BTW, my very pro PC friend, who is an IT guy, is pushing me to go with the Mac again, only because he doesn't want to hear all the complaints from me about why Mac is so much better....lol
 
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Vista is horrible. I ran Vista Ultimate side-by-side with Gentoo Linux on my desktop, and Vista is the crappiest operating system I've ever seen. What kind of an operating system uses an upscale memory management system? Go for the MacBook; it's perfectly fine for PowerPoint presentations. I've used my friends, and the screen is pretty good compared to the 15.4" on my MacBook Pro.
 
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No matter what PC you go with it will be good to know "what the tech" I believe that it is a .org and not .com it was formerly known as coyote .org I believe. I a good forum for anyone that has xp or vista. I have both the mac and a hp as I also use the dell and find that the hp is the one I like the most and dont like the dells. I tried a used computer once and that was the worst mistake of my life. I dont advise doing it. I got the mac as a refurb and it came with the same warranty as a new mac so I was happy. as for the screen I am pleased with it and its size and can see fine, I have had to make some adjustments with the window sizes and have had to get used to some things just being smaller. Overall it has not been that big of a deal. No matter what you do I wish you luck ..... if someone else is paying for it for the company I might suggest getting what they want, if someone is getting it for you and it will be used for work get what works for you and throw in some money to make it the best it can be.
 
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There is a website that would be helpful if I could get onto, which ONLY works with Internet Explorer
What website?

And yes, I LOVE the Mac destops, but I need a laptop for doing powerpoint presentations.
Powerpoint (and Word and Excel) are available for OS X. You could also use iWork which has Keynote for presentations (many think it is better too), and a word processor layout application called Pages, and Numbers which is the spreadsheet. They can to some extent read and save from the applicable Office products.
 
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Way... way too many specs to list.
I do my presentations in keynote, then export them as ppt's. I really prefer it to Powerpoint.
 
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Check out Apple Store-> refurb Macbook, at less than a thousand. I know we are Mac heads here, Vista just plain sucks, and since you have software invested in the Mac already, you cost will actually be cheaper to stick with the Mac. You buy a PC, then you have to purchase software, anti-virus, anti-spam apps, which drive the cost up.
 
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You buy a PC, then you have to purchase software, anti-virus, anti-spam apps, which drive the cost up.
This is a good note. Add all of that to the cost and show the boss those costs. Also keep in mind you have to buy subscriptions to keep up on the anti virus/malware software. Yes there are some free ones too that you could 'buy into'.
 
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while it is true that you might have to purchase something like office 2003, 7, or 8 I would suspect your "Boss" has this already and can give it to you at no cost and has the SN or something like that. As for anti virus, fire walls, anti spam etc most of this is freeware as is with a mac. some are very good and some are not, as with mac. Some do cost and are even better yet provide about the same protection. When you break it all down it comes to one thing. preference. When you look at it from a brand new aspect A mac and all that goes with it is more expensive. the other is not as expensive, yet the costs are almost close. Some here might know more and where to get a mac and all inclusive much cheaper, I do not and I did search before I got mine. I agree that you have much of the mac stuff already so that will be a savings to you or the "boss". Some people are a freak for mac stuff and some for M.S. they are two different worlds I think. Both are good in their own ways. a person going to what they might not be used to will have transition issues and a learning curve.
I agree Vista is not a great program and M.S. is working on it to make it better. Keep in mind most people do not like the new os when they come out because there are tweaks to be made and it is new so they have to learn it. Everyone complained about xp when it first came out then it was the greatest thing out there. You can still get XP by the way.
I know some good oit people that use the office 2008 because it works better then the iwork and I am sure there are people who feel the opposite is true. Point is, it is what we know and are used to most of the time. So it comes down to preference again. I suggest you ask your dad how much of a stickler he is going to be on you getting a "PC" or if he is fine with you getting the mac. Be up front and let him know your worries about both and what you can and can not do with both. weigh it all out for him and see what he says. Worst thing he can do is tell you get your own out of pocket, right!
 
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Thanks guys. Everything is still kind of up in the air, but a refurb macbook might not be a bad idea. Software won't be an issue for me, as I have friends who can set me up with that.

The website that cannot be accessed from anything but IE is www.torontomls.net
 
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I used OmniWeb and told it to identify it self as IE 5.5. The login page appeared to come up fine. Besides a couple of tags not being ended properly, I didn't notice anything on that page to suggest they are using any code beyond Javascript. Of course there could be other problems like IE specific code I suppose.
 

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