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colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
so i'm finally thinking of buying a mac smile

i'm looking at an imac g4 (1.25ghz) with a 17" screen:


Non-Https Image Link


i'll be using it for layout and graphics mainly (running quark and adobe cs2) but would like it to completely replace my pc if at all possible.

i currently use my pc for video editing, watching videos, watching dvd's, playing music and browsing the net, so i don't think a g4 should have any problems doing all that stuff!

the problem is, the last time i used a mac was in 1997 so its safe to say i don't know that much about them...

will i need to look out for one with a hardcore video card if i want to edit video?
how much memory is sufficient to run say illustrator and quark at the same time with a few files loaded?
how easy would it be to replace the hard drive with a larger one?
can i convert my current hard drive to a usb external drive and use it?
will pc peripherals work with a mac (hp scanner, sandisk card reader, svga monitor/projector)?
how much cooler will my ipod look next to an imac? wink
should i keep my pc anyway cos all my friends have them and its easier to have one around than mess about converting files?
can i get good thirdparty software for free like firefox and thunderbird, a download manager, anti-spy/adware, virus checkers and a multi-region dvd player hack so i can play any dvd form any region (this one is *really* important for me)?


i'd also like some general advice please, especially anything important that i should look out for when buying a mac.

if anyone has any experiences that they'd like to share of going from using a pc to using a mac as their main home computer, i'd love to hear about them too.


cheers,


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


NateBRONZE Member
Groovy ga watashi no namae desu!
1,530 posts
Location: Oxford, Oxfordshire, England


Posted:
polarity i'll come live in japan with you

wait 6 years and i'll be able to speak the damn language more fluently

I like Languages.

Educate your self in the Hazards of Fire Breathing STAY SAFE! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hug.gif" alt="" />


SixthSILVER Member
Devil May Cry
327 posts
Location: Manchester / London, United Kingdom


Posted:
macs suck! long live blue screens of death!ubblol

I give hope to others but I keep none for myself.


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
 Written by: Sixth


macs suck! long live blue screens of death!ubblol



offtopic offtopic offtopic
so no brownies for you either tongue wink


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


polaritySILVER Member
veteran
1,228 posts
Location: on the wrong planet, United Kingdom


Posted:
My Japanese is pretty limited too. Things like:

pantsu
hokairi
tadaima
hara hachi bun
ishindenshin saru
and the names of lots of crawly animals.

I do know the Japanese for apple though. Ringo.

They probably use apuru though.



One thing that may come in handy with the new intel CPU Macs; they can run windows XP, so I don't have to keep a PC around to play my huge collection of PC games.

The downside; I'm supposed to be getting a Mac so I can get more work done.

You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgment of your existence.

Green peppers, lime pickle and whole-grain mustard = best sandwich filling.


NateBRONZE Member
Groovy ga watashi no namae desu!
1,530 posts
Location: Oxford, Oxfordshire, England


Posted:

sore wa ringo ga arimasu ka

i think that is what is that apple over there

lol

I like Languages.

Educate your self in the Hazards of Fire Breathing STAY SAFE! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hug.gif" alt="" />


MikeGinnyGOLD Member
HOP Mad Doctor
13,925 posts
Location: San Francisco, CA, USA


Posted:
Cole, you could have got a Mac Mini. You already have a keyboard and monitor and a Mac Mini is teeny, but Intel-Happy and fast as a rocket.

Too late.

Anywhoo, I'm a Mac man here. Ask me if you need anything.

-Mike

Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella



A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura


Fine_Rabid_DogInternet Hate Machine
10,530 posts
Location: They seek him here, they seek him there...


Posted:
https://www.ctrlaltdel-online.com/comic.php?d=20060513

ubbangel

The existance of flamethrowers says that someone, somewhere, at sometime said "I need to set that thing on fire, but it's too far away."


Pen DravenUnofficial Lord Of Confusion And Pirate Extrodinaire
1,363 posts
Location: Nuneaton


Posted:
Hehehe Pure Class FRD smile

Some men see things and say why....

I Dream of things that never were and say Why Not....?

Oh No I'm going to get Shot Alive if he finds out - DA wink


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
hey doc.

i did consider the mac mini but i decided it was a bit too low-end for my needs.

i'm working with quark, in-design, photoshop and illustrator mainly and the intel macs took quite a speed hit on these apps.

the imac i chose currently runs all those tools at a half-acceptable speed, plus it can manage high-end, resource-hogging apps like final cut studio - and of course, when the intel-native versions appear, i'll be laughing smile

plus, with the help of a snazzy little adaptor, i still get to use my old 15" vga monitor to create an uberdesktop! biggrin


this weekend i put up a shelf to put me mac on (much better than the floor), learnt a bit about css and html, played with dreamweaver and knocked up a temporary banner and holding page for my website.

which was nice.


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


SymBRONZE Member
Geek-enviro-hippy priest
1,858 posts
Location: Diss, Norfolk, United Kingdom


Posted:
Cole, feel free to talk to me about CSS/HTML...

There's too many home fires burning and not enough trees


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
i will very likely do that at some point!

thank-you sym hug

just learnt enough this weekend to cover the basics and fumbled my way through to be honest.

i have a 1/2/3 column css template to learn from but all i have done so far is set up some styles made a quick banner and chucked a 1 column holding page up while i construct my site.

some planning might help with that i guess... wink


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


ickleMattenthusiast
242 posts
Location: L.O.N.D.O.N.


Posted:
When I went to get my iBook fixed the hard drive was Kaput so they had to install another one and recover the data - except the drive was so smashed hardly anything was recoverable. I lost nearly two months of work frown
My lesson - back up your data. Get a firewire external drive and copy an image of your drive on to it every night. The Mac can boot off a firewire external so they'll be no worries.

Good news is I now have 40GB and the friendly people in the shop upgraded my iBook to Tiger, iLife06, iWork06 Office2004 plus loads of other s/w all for free (it is India after all) smile

Unfortunately they didn't have dreamweaver - Cole have you got dreamweaver for the mac? When I get back to the Uk could I get a looki at that. I could go through some basics in html and css with you smile

colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
so i think i broke it... ubbcrying



i got my uberdesktop on the go (two displays) and everything was rosy ubbrollsmile



a few hours later that night, it automatically installed some software updates and told me it had to reboot, so i let it.



it never started up again frown



it gets as far as the 'loading os x' screen with the silver apple and the blue status bar but it just locks before the bar gets to the end and that's it ubbcrying



i have no idea what i can do apart from sit in front of it and weep into my hands frown





if i reinstall os x i'm scared all my files won't be there when it finishes, and if i call applecare, i'm scared that i'll be on the phone for an hour and a half before they tell me to pack it up and take it to an apple dealer.



and of all the times it could choose to give up, this is possibly the worst - i *really* needed it working this weekend - delayed taking it back and sorting out the faulty screen just so it would be available this weekend frown





feels like i've got a pc all over again rolleyes wink





cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


SymBRONZE Member
Geek-enviro-hippy priest
1,858 posts
Location: Diss, Norfolk, United Kingdom


Posted:
Cole, how long did you leave it starting up for?

The latest update caused mine to 'hang' for about 3 minutes, but i've heard it stoped come computers for about 10...

I don't know why though...

try pressing Command-Option-P-R just after you turn it on, and leave it until you hear the start up sound 3 times. This will reset the pram...wikipedia it.

other than that, hold down Command-V and see if there is anything to help you (or us) at all...

There's too many home fires burning and not enough trees


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
not long enough by the sounds of it.



i got used to it taking no more than about 40 seconds to boot and thought that a hung loading screen and no hd noise for anything over about 2 minutes must have meant it had gone kaput.



i tried the cmd-option-p-r thing but it didn't do the normal repeat the chime bit - maybe i was pressing the wrong keys... redface confused shrug



i will definitely try it again tonight and will leave it hanging for a good deal longer.



i'm not sure what booting in verbose mode would do though apart from confirming to me when it boots that i know bugger all about how macs really work... wink



will try the command-v startup if all else fails and report back here on monday.





thank-you for all your suggestions sym - you know, if you don't stop being so lovely and helpful all the time, i'm going to have serious trouble letting go when i finally get to hug you in person wink hug





cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


SymBRONZE Member
Geek-enviro-hippy priest
1,858 posts
Location: Diss, Norfolk, United Kingdom


Posted:
ubblol awwww

It's ok, you'll let go when I start talking about Chris Bliss wink

There's too many home fires burning and not enough trees


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
chris who? tongue





cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


ickleMattenthusiast
242 posts
Location: L.O.N.D.O.N.


Posted:
Cole,

The Apple support website is fantastic. https://www.apple.com/support
Try looking through its database. If nothing there fits or works, try searching through the discussions. Again if nothing fits there, post your own message on the board; the people there are super helpful.

Best of luck, I do hope its only something simple to fix.

Matt

Pen DravenUnofficial Lord Of Confusion And Pirate Extrodinaire
1,363 posts
Location: Nuneaton


Posted:
If the last update you installed was 10.4.6 and you rebooted the mac halfway through the startup because it seemed to be taking too long the you probably nuked the system frown

Its what one of the op's at work did and in the end i had to do a reinistall. Got away with using the ' archive old system and preserve users data' option though so all was good again in about an hour.

of course you might get away with just booting from you system dvd doing a permissions repair and a disk repair then job done smile

Fingers crossed mate.

Some men see things and say why....

I Dream of things that never were and say Why Not....?

Oh No I'm going to get Shot Alive if he finds out - DA wink


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
hello you lovely people hug

my mac was broken - but i fixed it now...

tried a bunch of stuff before i spoke to a nice indian man with all the answers.

booted in safe mode by holding down the shift key on startup.

then removed the smc update from the accounts, login items bit of the sys preferences.

rebooted and the world became rosy once more.

thank-you all for your kind and helpful messages grouphug


cole. x


Non-Https Image Link

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


EveishGOLD Member
*Tickles pretty strangers*
610 posts
Location: Australia


Posted:
Cole- if you have any more issues, I can probably help out when I'm in London - I have used macs my entire existance from the first apple mac compuer ever made (iwhich btw still works and is now being used as a bookend in the library)
so send any questions my way wink

What if I should fall right through the centre of the Earth and come out the other side where people walk upside-down?!


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
thanks eve smile

it actually crashed the other night frown

then it wouldn't boot properly so i called the helpline again.

apple's not-very-clever bloke on the end of the phone, went through all the stuff i'd already done and then kept saying "that's interesting" meaning "my expert system has run out of ideas, hence i can't help you any more".

then, after i told him that i was printing a pdf at the time that it crashed, decided that "it was probably adobe's software that crashed it".

"this man's a genius" i thought.

then he made me take all adobe software off, which made me like him less, and then when it still wouldn't boot, he said that i'd have to "just wait for adobe to write the universal binary versions" - which i already knoew isn't due to happen until early 2007 umm

so i laughed at him, and told him that before he told me i couldn't use any of adobe's creative software (which is just about all i use), that it would be handy if he could fix the problem at hand so my mac would actually boot - then we could discuss which software may or may not work.

he tried to talk about the adobe software conflicts again and i got the hump a bit.

i also told him that what he had told me was entirely unacceptable (not to mention a load of bullsh!t) and that not only was adobe's software the main reason i had bought the mac in the first place, but also that i was sold the intel machine with apple's claim that all current mac software would run fine, 'without me even noticing it'.

at which point he got a bit flustered and put me on hold before passing me on to a senior technician.

the senior technician listened to everything i'd done and told me to reinstall os x - a 40 minute phone call that told me to do precisely what i thought i would have to do in the first place.

"blimey" i thought, but i did it and i fixed it now smile

adobe cs2 is a bit freaked out by being taken off and then put back on again but it was working(ish).

then last night the mac freaked out again and the screen dripped funny colours and quicktime kept closing itself.

i'm going to hopefully get it replaced next week anyway, so fingers crossed that i've just got a dodgy machine and the new one will be lovely-lovely and work properly and all that good stuff...


i still love it though wink


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


tartanfairyBRONZE Member
newbie
22 posts
Location: London, United Kingdom


Posted:
That's such a bummer umm frown

Don't let your one screwed up machine damage your opinion of Macs though, mine has never crashed, I guess you've just got a dodgy one :-(

*sending mac sympathy vibes...* peace sunny sunny peace

Hope it gets sorted soon, demand a brand new one!!

E x

**I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.**

Douglas Adams

**There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it.**

Mary Wilson Little


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
quick, someone tell me i can't afford to save £300! wink


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


polaritySILVER Member
veteran
1,228 posts
Location: on the wrong planet, United Kingdom


Posted:
You can't afford to save £300. You should put it towards one of those sexy new MacBooks immediately wink

You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgment of your existence.

Green peppers, lime pickle and whole-grain mustard = best sandwich filling.


Pen DravenUnofficial Lord Of Confusion And Pirate Extrodinaire
1,363 posts
Location: Nuneaton


Posted:
they've so gotta release a macbook pro in black......

Some men see things and say why....

I Dream of things that never were and say Why Not....?

Oh No I'm going to get Shot Alive if he finds out - DA wink


polaritySILVER Member
veteran
1,228 posts
Location: on the wrong planet, United Kingdom


Posted:
I'm going to paint mine when I get it.

You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgment of your existence.

Green peppers, lime pickle and whole-grain mustard = best sandwich filling.


Pen DravenUnofficial Lord Of Confusion And Pirate Extrodinaire
1,363 posts
Location: Nuneaton


Posted:
Would love to respray / Skull up my 15" AlBook but its a work machine and i know the boss wouldnae be all that pleased if i tried hehe

Although trying to repaint the keyboard..... ouch

Some men see things and say why....

I Dream of things that never were and say Why Not....?

Oh No I'm going to get Shot Alive if he finds out - DA wink


ado-pGOLD Member
Pirate Ninja
3,882 posts
Location: Galway/Ireland


Posted:
Just bought an imac. Cant wait till next week.

Its soooo fancy smile

I know nothing about macs. nothing.

Love is the law.


colemanSILVER Member
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom


Posted:
yay! hug

another one turns away from the darkside biggrin

you'll get it the week before ejc though and have to leave it at home all by itself for a week.

in my experience, they like lots of attention in their formative months...

oh no... what the hell am i talking about?! what have i become...?! ubbloco


cole. x

"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood


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