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Imac 1.25 - 17 inch....thinking about it.....

Brundlefly

Brundlefly

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 4, 2003
78
0
Hamilton Ontario
I have a 17 pbook, and for home a desktop PC, I want to switch fully to mac, and I really like the G5, but price wize I think the imac is more affordable....

can I span the display off this machine?

is the G5 1.6 going to be much faster?

:confused:
 
Re: Imac 1.25 - 17 inch....thinking about it.....

Originally posted by Brundlefly
I have a 17 pbook, and for home a desktop PC, I want to switch fully to mac, and I really like the G5, but price wize I think the imac is more affordable....

can I span the display off this machine?

is the G5 1.6 going to be much faster?

:confused:
Click to expand...

no

yes
 
I have the G4 17" 1Gz, and have enjoyed every minute of ownership. Up until I got this machine I exclusively used the "pro" machines. I can honestly say that unless you will be doing things that are processor intensive, the imac line is fantastic. I have actually done a small bit of photo and video editing on my imac and it has performed extremely well.

Hope that helps...

-Hobbes
 
Damn, I just wrote a long reply but the picture I tried to attach was too big, so I lost the lot.

Main points:
imac great, see photo

There is a hack to allow you to use another monitor to extend your desktop. Depends on your video card. Often used with ibooks.

Performance, well, wouldn't the performance be similar (if not exactly the same) to your 17" powerbook?
 

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imac is a great machine, but if you ever think you may want to grow it wont. the all in one design is so pretty,cool etc but in the end a computer is a big investment and you really should get one that can grow. have you looked into a 1.25 tower?? a tower allways outperforms the imac even at the same clock. monitors can be had for 100 bucks these days and now you have a machine where the cpu can grow,video cards can grow,pci slots for whatever etc etc. after a couple of imacs i went tower and am very glad i did. think real hard on this-- the imac will do whatever you want now but in the future you still have a imac with a tower expansion is almost limitless. good luck in your choice.
 
Was in almost exactly the same situation myself a few weeks ago - PC for work, 12"PB for portable and decided to make the switch. Went with the 1.25 17" iMac and am absolutely delighted.
Really depends on what you want it for, I am doing moderately intensive Word + Excel + graphics stuff (not pro graphics though) and really speed is not an issue - and I have been a PC user for years previously.
Am no expert regarding Macs, but my thinking was to go with the iMac for home and then make the move at work in a year or so, going with a dual processor G5 - I reckon that the big advantages and benefits will be seen there. A 1.6 G5 will be nice, and faster, but the real leap (and maybe bang for buck) is going to be in the duals.

But for general home stuff, well, I really am glad I switched.

The lack of physical upgradability of the iMac is undeniable, but then again, discourages amateurs like me taking it apart for a bit of a tinker!

Anyway, sorry to go on, but I had found this forum very helpful before buying and understand your dilemma!

Suspect you will be happy with either at the end of the day...
 
I came from a PC background and just switched to a 17"iMac last week. I was really worried about the speed. Not that I do really intensive work... just brainwashed by the whole Mhz. issue. The other day I had iphoto, photoshop elements, itunes, and safari open at the same time and did not notice any discernable choke. When I try this with my 2ghz XP notebook (especially with Windows Media open) the thing slows to a stop everytime it changes a CD track. Not sure why. My point is that unless you are doing some heavy duty stuff the iMac should take care of you. As far as the expansion issue, I got this for $1699 with my edu discount. I can see me buy another one in three years and not feeling that I ripped myself off. Too each his own. Good luck.
 
I can't help about spanning the display.

As to speed, I have an 800mHz iMac with 17" display. I switched from a pretty high end PC and have absolutely no problems with it. I mainly use Word and Excel, iPhoto, iMovie and Photoshop. Even if Photoship is taking time to process filters etc, I can still use another app with no slowing down.

So a 1.25 gHz machine should be just fine.

As to upgrading: sure this is an all in one machine, but it does have ports. It also seems that Macs go on for years and that processor mHz are less of an issue than on PCs.

10 months into my Mac experience and I'm still loving it. I look forward to going in and switching the machine on!
 
me too

I just went through this: I decided on 17", 1.25GHz imac.

But - I upgraded the HD to 160GB, and I got the bluetooth module. So, for my thinking I am future safe for quite a while - since macs are ahead of the curve pcs will take a while to catch up anyway. I can install airport card later - the bluetooth sounded like a weird install so I decided for 50$ to just get it.
I got the 256MB module, but bought another 256MB from crucial/micron for 50$ including shipping.

Also, I think with 3x USB 2.0 and Firewire - there is in fact a lot of expandabilty. If you went with the expandability argument you would never buy a notebook. As for the power g5 - that's too much power for my home use, plus for home I want it to look good and the imac has style! If you got powermac its 600$ for the monitor or else you get a horrible looking CRT for 100$ and your home office looks a mess from the start.

So: I am busy waiting, it is due to ship 10/14. I have a PC at home - I cannot wait to give it away....

that's my 2c
rob
 
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