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New Mac User: G4 or G5??

A

AdamH526

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Hi, I'm slated to be a newcomer to mac community in a couple of months. I preordered the new single G5 1.6 ghz. Because of my college discount I'm getting it for a little under $1700. However, I'm not going to be able to transfer my 120 gb hard drive (ata, not sata) or my 256 mb of slower ddr (pc2100) memory from my PC to this new mac. I was wondering if it would be worth my money to instead buy a single G4 1.25 ghz machine at $1250 and add to it my memory and hard drive.

I'm a computer science major who has been won over mostly by OS X. As such, I would be using the computer mostly for software development. I'm also very insterested in teaching myself the ins and outs of mac os specific coding (carbon, cocoa, etc.) This would be my primary computer and I would hope to be able to use it for some while.

Which one should I go with? Thanks.

Adam
 
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H

hokiethang

Guest
AdamH526 said:
Hi, I'm slated to be a newcomer to mac community in a couple of months. I preordered the new single G5 1.6 ghz. Because of my college discount I'm getting it for a little under $1700. However, I'm not going to be able to transfer my 120 gb hard drive (ata, not sata) or my 256 mb of slower ddr (pc2100) memory from my PC to this new mac. I was wondering if it would be worth my money to instead buy a single G4 1.25 ghz machine at $1250 and add to it my memory and hard drive.

I'm a computer science major who has been won over mostly by OS X. As such, I would be using the computer mostly for software development. I'm also very insterested in teaching myself the ins and outs of mac os specific coding (carbon, cocoa, etc.) This would be my primary computer and I would hope to be able to use it for some while.

Which one should I go with? Thanks.

Adam

Its completely up to you. I am a CS major and I have a 1ghz powerbook and it does everything i need it to. If you are going to buy a G4 though, since the prices have dropped a bit, you would be better off getting a dual G4, they are more powerful and would probably outlast a single processor machine. The g5 is nice but i don't need the power so I couldnt consciously tell you to spend more on one. I would suggest keeping the PC around for a while at least to play games or just in case something comes up where you have to use a PC.
 
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Why not keep the PC for gaming, and those apps that you just can't find?

Although I am really into Macs now, I still find that there are some things I need to do with my PC's.
 
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F

Fomer

Guest
Emrys, as I posted earlier I will be getting the g4 powerbook. But in order to afford it, I will need to get rid of my current PC, leaving me with nothing but my powerbook. You said you kept yours for things you couldn't do on mac, I was wondering what would be some things you can not do on your mac, so I know if I for sure need to go through with this purchase and leave the windows world behind.
 
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Well, the main reason to keep a PC would be for gaming. I don't know if you are heavy into gaming. the other reason would be for apps that don't have a Mac equal. Don't know if you use any of these either. I am a Win2K Administrator so I need to keep some Win2K machines around to keep "up-to-date" with the Windows world.

I would say the only really good reason to keep a Windows machine around, is for gaming. I find that the games that I've played are kinda slow. But these are first person shooters. The games like Enigmo make up for it :)

I would definately go with a PowerBook if you are not tied to legacy Windows apps. You can also run VirtualPC which works pretty good for running business type apps, but isn't a solution for playing PC based games. Not yet anyways.

So to sum it up, I use my Mac for everything, and I use my Win2K machines for stuff that just isn't available for Mac, which isn't a lot, but unfortunetly most business's haven't adopted the superior platform :)

Oh yeah, and games too.
 
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Not new

Ok Im definitely not new to the Mac and I have been using the platform for hmm.. about 8 years now.. before OS X I needed a PC box along with my Mac box, but now since OS X I have completely left PC's and have never looked back.. Then again I am not a gamer :) Since I used to be and realized that.. well basically.. it was a waste of my time, even though it was indeed fun :) I am a web developer, so Im a code head, php, perl, mysql all that good stuff and everything I need, Mac OS X provides. I have my production software, I have my server, I have more web browsers then Ill ever need, I have all the unix software I will ever need, plus if you are a gamer.. there are so many mac os X games out there now, that not only do they have peecee counterparts, but they are also better than the peecee version.. so I hear :) Anyways you need to figure out what you are going to do with your computer and figure out the software you will need, and do searches on versiontracker.com or macupdate.com and find all that software and if there is any part missing.. and it is only available on the peecee.. then start sending messages out to forums etc that you need a certain piece of software for the mac and either someone will direct you to it, or someone will write it for you and for the community. Or you can email me and I can talk to a couple of people who are in the mac os x software business and I can discuss the possibility with them :) So in other words.. dump that peecee and join us happy/jubilant/ecstatic users of the new Mac OS! :)
 
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F

Fomer

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I see what you mean already Emrys, the "Mac community" is always willing to help I thank you guys for your fast replys. I don't use any work apps on my computer, nor am I deeply involved in computer gaming. I own Unreal Tournament and several ZNES roms and emulators, but I can live without those and UT2003 is on for Mac so I am set. Hope to pick my mac up Saturday, if I can find someone to pick up this old machine. :)
 
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Fomer said:
Hope to pick my mac up Saturday, if I can find someone to pick up this old machine. :)

You're definitely on the wrong forum for that then ;) Good luck! :)
 
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F

Fomer

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That's true. You always see people switching to the mac world but you never hear of people switching to the windows world. Something over there must be woth staying for. Hopefully I'll find out soon. :)
 
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M

meerk

Guest
Fomer said:
That's true. You always see people switching to the mac world but you never hear of people switching to the windows world. Something over there must be woth staying for.

Yeah it is kinda strange that. I've been using Macs for 15 years now, and when our company installed an M$ NT Network system all my colleagues (apart from a couple of die-hard Mac lovers) snapped onto PCs. Now every day I get the usual 'sledging' from them.
Ok. just started on OSX and it sure knocks the stuffing out of there machines. Pity the 'boss' won't let me upgrade my department's G3s :rolleyes:

meerk…
 

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