Should I wait for Adobe to catch up before buying a Mac?

[Perks]

Hello! First (proper) post here, and I'm still stuck on a PC, but I've got my eye on buying a MacBook, what with me becoming a Mac evangelist, needing one for college, and the urge to make it go 'fwing'. But I'm not sure if I want to give it a while before I get one because I'm going to be using Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign quite a lot and I'm not sure what the performance is actually like using these on a MacBook.

I say this, I'm going to be upgrading from this PC I'm using (specs: 512MB RAM, 2.7GHz Celeron, 80GB HDD) which, with Firefox and iTunes playing, took over a minute for Photoshop CS2 to load up properly. If it's better than that then I'm sold.

Cheers ^^

 

[Nermal]

I don't use the Adobe apps but if the performance is too bad in Rosetta then you could still run using Boot Camp until universal versions are available. Does the Photoshop CD include Windows and Mac versions, or are they two separate products?

 

[thumb]

yes, you probably should wait if you really need to run the Adobe suite extensively. i dont think running them through bootcamp if you use them alot is going to be worth the headache.

however, if you dont really need to use them that much, at least at first, then go for it! the MB or MBP will be an eye-opener after that PC. you will love everything (save the adobe stuff...)

cheers,

 

[skubish]

I don't use the Adobe apps but if the performance is too bad in Rosetta then you could still run using Boot Camp until universal versions are available. Does the Photoshop CD include Windows and Mac versions, or are they two separate products?

From what I have seen they are separate.

 

[Nermal]

Well in that case, I certainly wouldn't buy a PowerPC version of CS2 now, with CS3 just around the corner.

 

[9Charms]

The screen on the MacBook is terrible for Photoshop. The glossy finish will throw you off. You'll have to work in darkroom with no other light source... but then the screen will be bright and will reflect your face any ways... Photoshop is equivalent to a 1 GHz G4 through Rosetta right now... so yes it is faster than your celeron, but not by much.

 

[Perks]

Well, by 'a lot' I mean for my sixth form college courses, and even if it's just a little faster then that'll do to be honest! Then I could upgrade to CS3 (by the time it comes out I'll be able to afford an upgrade, methinks!) Although if it were to be really slower than I need it to be then I'd probably go with Nermal's idea...

 

[FF_productions]

The screen on the MacBook is terrible for Photoshop. The glossy finish will throw you off. You'll have to work in darkroom with no other light source... but then the screen will be bright and will reflect your face any ways... Photoshop is equivalent to a 1 GHz G4 through Rosetta right now... so yes it is faster than your celeron, but not by much.

For what I've heard, there is little or no reflection off the MacBook, I think your just thinking of PC laptops. I'd get a MacBook, but have at least a gig of ram. Rosetta craves ram and when Photoshop runs natively, you will thank yourself for all that ram.

 

[celebrian23]

The macbook screen is really too small for someone who seriously needs the adobe line. Of course, the macbook runs these operations fine, but it's not a professional machine, and while you're not a professional, you are using quite frequently. I'd wait until CS3 comes out. If you buy a mac now, then you'll have to buy another version of CS2 then CS3- not a cheap deal.

 

[FF_productions]

The macbook screen is really too small for someone who seriously needs the adobe line. Of course, the macbook runs these operations fine, but it's not a professional machine, and while you're not a professional, you are using quite frequently. I'd wait until CS3 comes out. If you buy a mac now, then you'll have to buy another version of CS2 then CS3- not a cheap deal.

If anything, none of the Intel Macs really can run Adobe Products at a decent speed. I doubt any professional is using a Intel Mac for Photoshop, It's too slow for a pro at this time.

 

[godbout]

For what I've heard, there is little or no reflection off the MacBook, I think your just thinking of PC laptops. I'd get a MacBook, but have at least a gig of ram. Rosetta craves ram and when Photoshop runs natively, you will thank yourself for all that ram.

I think that you might be thinking of the MacBook Pro with the matte screen because the screens that are used on the MacBook are exactly the same as those glossy screens that most PC notebooks are using... Personally, I don't care too much (although given a choice I would take matte) but indeed you will be checking yourself out all day whether you want to or not!

There was an earlier post that suggested that PS will be running at G4 1 GHz speeds when used in Rossetta? From my experience this is not true. I have used the 2.0 MacBook and it is faster (atleast in some tasks) than my PB in my sig. It is very useable although I would not go and buy CS2 then CS3 at this point.

Finally, there was a post that said somthing along the lines of "BootCamp will be a hassle"? The thing is that if you buy a MacBook what you are getting is a fully native i386 machine that is capable of NATIVELY running THE three OSes, Windows, OS X & Linux. So you can run programs for any of these OSes. What I am trying to say is the only hassel that you will have to deal with getting a MacBook and running PS in Boot Camp is that you have to use windows :ekk: .

Anyways, if a macbooks specs are satisfactory for your needs (compared to a windows box) then you should be fine... Sorry for the rant

 

[celebrian23]

The macbook glossy is NOT the same as PC screens. Most (all?) PC screens don't have an anti-glare coating, but the macbook does.

 

[godbout]

The macbook glossy is NOT the same as PC screens. Most (all?) PC screens don't have an anti-glare coating, but the macbook does.

This is from macworlds frist look at the MacBook. I am not saying that it is true it is just what I have read. Also, I should say that I have not had time to look the MacBook over carefully (just glanced) and I have not done side-by-side comparisons with other glossy screens...

From macworld " If you’ve ever walked past a PC laptop and noticed that its screen was incredibly reflective, you’ve seen the same type of screen that’s been incorporated in the MacBook. While it’s too early for me to have reached a judgment about whether this new screen style is an improvement to Apple’s older, anti-glare screens, I am sure of this: some people will love it, and others will hate it. In the right conditions the glossy screen looks absolutely gorgeous; however, it’s also remarkably reflective, and it can be quite distracting to continually see yourself reflected back by your laptop’s screen."

 

[celebrian23]

I'm not saying much of anything, just that from the macbooks I looked at and the pc laptops I've seen, the reflectiveness is not nearly as big as a problem on the macbook. I just think it's dangerous for someone to evaluate the glossy screen on the macbook without seeing it.

 

[godbout]

I'm not saying much of anything, just that from the macbooks I looked at and the pc laptops I've seen, the reflectiveness is not nearly as big as a problem on the macbook. I just think it's dangerous for someone to evaluate the glossy screen on the macbook without seeing it.

Oh, you are definately right you should of course see it and see if it suits your needs and if you think that it will get the job done. I have seen the macbook screen, like I said briefly, and it looks like every other glossy screen. This, in addition to the reviews (most of which are not negative about the screen) I think that I am justified in saying that infact the MacBook does have a screen with Glare and Reflections moreso than a matte finish which is what I was making a statement on initially because someone said that it does not have a reflective screen... which it clearly does...

That being said, I should not have said that the screen ARE exactly the same as the PC counterparts but that they are reviewed as being equivalent and upon first glance SEEM to be the same as thier PC counterparts... My bad.

 

[Zoowatch]

keep your current Mac for another year... by then UB versions of Adobe CS 3 and MS Office should have been introduced...

that's a good time to upgrade to intel Macs.