Wow, do I need some advice. Eesh.

I don't know what your budget is, but to give you a simple answer....YES, you can run both units with one monitor and one printer, but maybe not with one input peripherals.

This is not an idiotic plan. I only joined the Mac community 3 weeks ago, and my hardcore PC living and softcore Mac life co-exists in harmony.
But my setup is kickass self built PC for gaming and other PC stuff and stable mobile work on Mac for on the go stuff that doesn't involve too much computing power.

If I were you, I would wait to switch. But I assure you that for a business, it may or may not be worth the switch. If you do a lot of work and require software that is only on PC, inevitably, you must stay on that platform. But if you believe that Mac has everything that will fit your business, I know that it is much more stable system.
You could just purchase a PowerBook and see if you can slowly integrate Mac into your PC environment.

As much as I like Mac now, I don't see it every replacing my PC life, unless the world changes to accomodate so many things that can be done on the PC.

Yes, this is totally possible. I have a PC desktop and a PowerBook in a small London flat, and when I need to I share peripherals between the two. Just un-plug them, nothing fancy! My Mac is great at picking up "plug and play", unlike Mr Microsoft PC.

I'd say go for the PowerBook if you can - just see how it fits into your life. You might be surprised at how little use your PC gets after a while...

edit: I share them over a Netgear router but AFAIK you can share over an AirPort base station if you want to. I already had the Netgear but dimly remember looking into AirPort.

inkster218 said:

I know this board is about being a Mac supporter, but I really need hard hitting advice on the logic of running both systems in a small apartment in Italy. Can I share a monitor? Can I share printers? Is this an idiotic plan?

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I don't see any problems with this at all. I see this all the time where I work. You surely can share a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, using a KVM.
If you're unfamiliar with a KVM, press a button on it and poof, you're looking at and typing/mousing on your Mac. Press another button, poof, you're using your PC.
A couple things to note, you'll have to get a USB KVM, because Macs don't support PS/2 connections, so hopefully your PC has USB. I suggest a Microsoft keyboard, because I know that they have software (IntelliType) that will remap it's keys (they keys are different on a Mac & PC keyboard) to Mac specifications within the Mac OS. There may be other software that can do this with other keyboard, I don't know.
Macs can also use multibutton mice, usually straight out of the box without software drivers, but some mice software allows programability, which is a nice feature.
The powerbook has a special DVI to VGA dongle that comes with it. Through this, you can hook up to a KVM that uses VGA as well. I'm fairly certain your PC uses VGA as well.

Sharing a printer gets a little more complicated. In most instances it can be done. If it's a networked printer, no problem. If it's an inkjet it might be more difficult, but it's fairly rare in my experience that it cannot be done.

(Sorry, pizza came and I stopped to eat, so this post is coming in about an hour later then I started)

Yeah, as mentioned before, you can definitely do this with a USB KVM switch. I have this exact setup in my home office right now. Works like a charm, no problems.

I'm currently using this KVM switch and it works great. Even at 1600x1200, I don't see any ghosting.

inkster218 said:

I am looking at the PB 17" with the upgraded video and 1 Gig Ram.

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As you will see here in many threads, if you plan to upgrade to 1 Gig of ram don't go thru apple to get that extra gig. They charge an arm and a leg for ram. Find your ram somewhere else. many people say crucial.com is a good source.

Good luck

inkster218 said:

So I can KVM using a PB17 and a PC desktop with EITHER a Dell flatscreen or an Apple Flatscreen?

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I think Dell flatscreens have multiple connections and ports to allow for VGA or DVI. Apple flatpanels (at least the old ones) all use an Apple proprietary connection called ADC*. In order to use any KVM with the Apple flat panel, you'll also have to get an ADC to VGA converter box.

*edit: Looks like the new ones (20"+) now use DVI.

Natalia81 said:

As you will see here in many threads, if you plan to upgrade to 1 Gig of ram don't go thru apple to get that extra gig. They charge an arm and a leg for ram. Find your ram somewhere else. many people say crucial.com is a good source.

Good luck

Click to expand...

People keep saying this, but in some cases (edu. and other discounts) the Apple RAM is actually cheaper than Crucial's gig stick (which was $479 last time I checked ) Apple also seems to price RAM lower for the 15" and 17" models... as low as $380 last time I checked. That way you can get the AppleCare on the RAM, too.

But yeah totally, pay attention to how much the RAM is.

If you want to get a KVM for an Apple LCD, you need to get an adapter that takes the VGA out from the KVM and makes it DVI. However, if you get a Dell LCD, it may already have a VGA port on it. You can't get the 30" Cinema Display at all, so don't even dream (it requires a G5 with Nvidia 6800).