Ordered a dual 1.8 GHz Power Mac...

R

rush24t3

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Jun 1, 2004
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Don't know why, figured I'd try out a Mac and see why peeps like 'em so much. Got an extra gig of RAM from Crucial, too...think I'll give up my PC for it?
 
What are you going to use it for?

The 1GB of RAM will be nice, so let us know how it works out.
 
fibroptikl said:
What are you going to use it for?

The 1GB of RAM will be nice, so let us know how it works out.
Click to expand...

That's the thing. I don't know, LOL

I've always wanted to try a Mac, and after reading a few Mac forums and checking out Apple's site, I robotically got my card out and ordered it. I got the standard config and snagged the RAM since these days, the latest OSes = you need lotsa memory.

Maybe I'm bored with Windows and want to try something new...wish I knew. If I don't like it, I can always return it for a 10% restock fee or sell it if I miss the return window. It'll be here in the morning, along with the RAM. I have all weekend to test it out. I'll need to get a Mac book, too, though...heh
 
Actually - to learn the best, make it your main system (but if you want to game use your PC if you wish) - and you'll learn great. I was gonna get a book too when I got my iBook, but the nature of the OS is pretty simple and it's very intuitive and found that buying the book wasn't really necessary - but you might feel differently.
 
Well think about doing any creative stuff on it.. you'll get a feel for where things are really nice..
Work with photos, video, audio.. play around and see how you like it. There really isn't much that compares on the PC side.. at least that doesn't cost you an arm and a leg.
Otherwise give a try with the stuff you normally would do on your PC.. gaming of course may not be as similar, but if you snag a copy of some mac games they'll run like a breeze on the dual 1.8.
 
Head over to yer local book store and pick up
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/macxmmpanther/

if I may suggest :) It'll get ya into it quick. I never regretted picking up my G4 or my Powerbook even though I love tweaking and building PC's. I do all my stuff on the Mac like e-mail, surfing, etc. My game rig is exclusively a game rig and experimental unit for work. :)
 
As already has been said, make it your main box. Do everything on it but the odd game that needs Windows. If you need help or just tips, feel free to ask. I'd like to hear your progress! Also, here are some software tips:


Internet, WWW:

Safari is an ok browser, quite speedy, but lacking in functions. Standard Mozilla is the one most like any Windows browser, Firefox is more different (though not alot, it only matters if you have to tabulate your way to buttons and such). But to be honest, I recomend OmniWeb 5. It's still just a beta, but it's a very good browser. The best, in my opinion, regardless of platform. I've benchmarked it a little, and it's actually quite a lot faster than both Safari and Mozilla at rendering complex pages, and tends to eat up less RAM. It costs money, though, but try it for 30 days for free and see if you like it. ;)

Internet, chat:

Instant messaging:
iChat works, but is fairly limited. The standard ICQ/MSN/AIM clients suck. Proteus is, according to me anyhow, the best chat client on any platform (it's strange that Mac OS X has so many of those ;) ). That, too, unfortunately costs money. You can use it with a nag screen, though, it's not very obtrusive or annoying, and it's quite cheap if you want to buy it. But if that's not your cup of tea, try Adium or Fire. The former is quite similar to Proteus, and has a rather appealing feature set, but I still prefer Proteus. Fire is very low on resources, comparatively, but lacks functions. No tabbed chatting, for instance.

IRC:
There's always XChat... Any *NIX client works, too, so if you like, you can run BitchX or whatever. No mIRC. Not a big loss, according to me, but you can just emulate Win98 or something and run just that. It works, and I've spoken to quite a few who do that. There are LOADS of IRC clients for Mac OS X, but most of them are awful, and I'd only use them if I got paid, but there are two that are actually good; XChat and Colloquy. Colloquy is rather minimalistic in terms of features (it's multi-server, can do DCC, etc etc etc, of course, but if you're a hard core advanced user, XChat is probably better), but has a really great UI and full AppleScriptability. It's very low on resources, too. It uses ~10-20 megs of RAM even when connected to loads of servers and channels.

FTP:
Use the cli app "ftp" if you want, it works for most things... Personally, I like Transmit the best. Again, a damned shareware app that costs money, but you can use it with a nag screen and a reboot (or the app, that is) every five minutes. So it's still useful when you just need to pop by and do something quick.


Argh, I got tired more quickly than I thought I would. I'll try and type up more in a while...
 
Thanks for the replies, everyone.

I've gotten a lot of good advice over at the MacNN forums as well, and I downloaded a ton of apps last night to try out, including Transmit and Proteus. Most are shareware, but aren't all that expensive, so if I like 'em I have no problem buying them. Then again, I did the same thing for my PC, heh.

The worst part about going away from Windows is games of course, but also ACID Pro. I do a lot of hobbyist music making with ACID, and I have a 160 GB drive full of loops and samples I use to do it. I know Apple has their ACID equivalent, Soundtrack, but unfortunately you can't import ACID project files. So it looks like even if I fall in love, I'll have to retain a Windows box.

Thanks again.
 
No problems going dually (platform that is ;) ) Second the motion for Transmit....great App. And sync features own :D
 
Torquemada XP said:
That's the thing. I don't know, LOL

I've always wanted to try a Mac, and after reading a few Mac forums and checking out Apple's site, I robotically got my card out and ordered it. I got the standard config and snagged the RAM since these days, the latest OSes = you need lotsa memory.

Maybe I'm bored with Windows and want to try something new...wish I knew. If I don't like it, I can always return it for a 10% restock fee or sell it if I miss the return window. It'll be here in the morning, along with the RAM. I have all weekend to test it out. I'll need to get a Mac book, too, though...heh
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I'm sorry, but for for os ten your really not going to need a book. I would suggest perhaps maybe getting a book about powerpc based hardware over a book about os ten, learning about different architectures of computers is like learning a second language in the geek world I guess.


Once you really get to know and understand os ten, you'l find thats its basically a flexible and powerful nix operating system thats easy enough for any 5th grader to use.
 
Are you interested in learning the OSX specific unix stuff at all? If so, I would really recommend OSX Panther Unleashed for a book choice. The best Mac book I've seen.

You will love your mac. Give it a chance, and if something is difficult to do on there, there is most likely an easier way to do it. That's what our forums are for :) ask ask ask ask.

I love hearing of new mac users. Welcome to the club!
 
This has been my experience:

I bought a 1.25 GHz 15" Powerbook last September. Almost on a whim too, just to check it out. Over the past 10 months or so I've slowly, almost unconciously, started using it more and more. As of this past week I haven't turned my PC on once! I am certain my next desktop purchase will be a PowerMac.

I'm sure once HL2 and Doom3 show up, I'll fire my PC back up. Outside of gaming, I can't think of any reason to fire up the PC though. It's my opinion that using a Mac is so much better than a Windows PC. So much so that I don't understand why everyone hasn't tried one out :) I suppose the price and lack of games hasn't helped, but I seriously love this machine.

Background: I've used and built PCs for a very very long time. This was my first Mac since a IIci back in the early 90's. I mainly use it for writing, and video editing and general everyday use.

my 2 cents
 
You can count on DoomIII being on Mac for sure... maybe not HL2. And, if you have a decent mac, your DoomIII performance might just be VERY GOOD!
I'm just not as rich as many of you... partially cos I'm 17 and live with my parents, jobless. All I get has to come from congvincing my folks. And they would never spend 3k on a decent computer, while a PC system that's just as powerful can be build for half that. Damn, I really wish I could use a Mac, though. The sheer perfectness of OS 10 makes me cry. It's a pity they are so uncommon in the comp world.
 
Slooooowly creepin back though. I am fotunate enough to support them in the education field. I am enjoying the PC guys scramble to patch things while I surf the [H] unaffected (unless it takes down the WAN connection, which is when I start swearing!) :D
 
Now that I've tweaked my mouse with USB Overdrive X so that it better resembles the linear acceleration Windows provided me, I've been using the Mac a lot more, even though I've been upgrading my PC like mad lately. I think Apple has gotten the integrated nature of OS and included apps down pat...everything is just so...together. Microsoft has its work cut out for them in catching up to that. It's amazing how enthralled I was to see how fast QuickTime and iTunes loaded on this thing compared to my quite-uber PC. Now I feel like I don't have to download dozens of different programs to handle all my normal file usage.
 
You'll probably find yourself like me. I have a XP3000+ and the Dual 1.8 A G5.

I only use the PC for games, I dont even download anything on it, and After I buy the Mac version of BF 1942 and load Desert Combat on it ( yes there are .DMG installers for that already as well as 3 or 4 other mods ) I seriously doubt if I will turn on the PC again for a long time.

I dont care about Doom III. The decision to leave internet multiplayer out of it killed it for me. Battlefield has set the pace for all war internet gaming, the exact right balance between fun and reality. I'll be playing that franchise for a long time. It's no big deal that they dont release on the Mac at the same time, I'll just buy the PC version first and then the Mac version later. I'm not worried about 50 bucks over 6 months gametime. Thats more than enough for me to get my $$$ out of it. Of course I'm 41 and make my own money too. If I was 17 I might feel different.
 
You can count on DoomIII being on Mac for sure... maybe not HL2.
Click to expand...

Absolutely not HL2 barring a massive bribe of Valve by Apple, which isn't going to happen. It's a DX9 game, which explains it all :)
 
Deific said:
Well think about doing any creative stuff on it.. you'll get a feel for where things are really nice..
Work with photos, video, audio.. play around and see how you like it. There really isn't much that compares on the PC side.. at least that doesn't cost you an arm and a leg.
Click to expand...
WOt? :confused:
 
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